I’m usually behind on binding quilts for several reasons that I’ll spare you. Anyway, that makes it look like I’ve made a lot of quilts in quick succession, when really I’ve just procrastinated. Then I get around to binding a bunch of quilts at once and people think, “Wow, you’re really productive!” See how that works? Ha!

This is the second finish of 2025. It’s called “Ice Cubes”. I got the idea from a quilt by Zen Chic (her pattern here). I made it to use scraps, and mixed white and cream neutrals for the background. It made a good “leaders and enders” project.

Quilt Stats

Name: Ice Cubes

Finished Size: 54″ x 54″

Design: Inspired by a Zen Chic pattern

Pieced by: me

Quilted by: Linda Nichols

More to come!

When I straightened out my studio for the new cabinets, I found some “leftover” fabric sent to me by my blogging friend Elizabeth (OPQuilt). Then a short while later I learned that she had torn up her studio looking for fabric to bind her pomegranate quilt. Oops, I realized it was the very same fabric! I contacted Elizabeth to let her know I was the culprit and we both got a good laugh out of it.

Here’s Elizabeth’s picture of the original fabric:

Photo courtesy of Elizabeth Eastmond

And here’s her pomegranate quilt, pattern available here.

Photo courtesy of Elizabeth Eastmond

Then, since I’d found the fabric, I decided to use it for a donation quilt. One of the places we donate has a particular need for quilts for older boys, and I thought these green-gold-magenta fabrics would be perfect. I added a couple of fabrics from my stash for variety and was ready to go.

After looking through patterns, I selected this one by Elizabeth herself! It’s available in her PayHip shop, here.

Photo courtesy of Elizabeth Eastmond

And now my version of the quilt, after adding fabric from my stash for the borders.

Last but by no means least, here’s a little bundle of scraps to be passed on to a scrap-loving friend. I wonder what will happen to these fabrics next!

Here’s the first finish of 2025, made last year but finally bound now.

This was made from the BQ2 pattern (available here) to make use of the sewing-themed fabrics I’ve collected.

Hopefully you can see the spool, needle, and thread in the quilting pattern

Quilt Stats

Name: Quilt Drama

Finished size: 63″ x 77″

Pattern: BQ2, by Maple Island Quilts

Pieced by: me

Quilted by: Linda Nichols

Now to binding the rest of the quilts!

The change of year got me even before the year changed! When I scheduled this for January 5, WordPress defaulted to 2024 and I didn’t catch it. So you probably got this last Sunday, but it was intended for January 5 2025, and here it is now!

I’ve said before that I make a practice block before deciding to make the whole quilt, and here is another situation in which I’m glad I did.

I bought this pattern, only to realize that it’s just a variation on a Karla Alexander quilt I made years ago.

It has the same problem as the original pattern: it’s difficult to get curves to lie flat when both the concave and convex sides are cut the same (i.e., with no seam allowance on either). So, as you hopefully can’t tell from the picture, nothing lies flat here:

Additionally, I don’t care for this look. Sure, it might be better when the rest of the colors are added and mixed up more, but I’m over it already. So I re-arranged the blocks:

This quilt includes some of my favorite Alison Glass fabrics, so I was determined to find a way to make it work. I went to dinner, then came back and just put the other fabrics from the collection up on the design wall to see how it all looked.

I decided to use the blocks I’d made so far as a panel. I put a little border around the panel to set it off from the background blocks.

The following day, I cut up and rearranged some of the remaining fabrics, then sewed it up.

The finished top is about 57″ x 68″

I love it! It’s nothing like what I started out to do, but it’s satisfying to me. And I’m really glad I made the sample blocks because this way the fabric wasn’t wasted.