Category Archives: Donation Quilts

Two More Orphan Block Quilts

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As I probably have mentioned, I have over 100 orphan blocks. Some are from swaps, some from blocks I made to learn something, some just extras from quilts I’ve made.

Yes, that bin is full of smaller orphan blocks, with the big orphans stacked on top!

I have made numerous quilts in the past to use some of them up. Here are a few just for review.

Aha! Orphan blocks can be cut up to make new blocks, as I did with my Giant Circles quilt, here

I’ve used orphan blocks to make greeting cards, here

orphan block on bag

This is a great use for orphan blocks. Just attach to a bag, and you have a handmade gift!

Splendid Stars, 51″ x 53″, was made from orphan blocks left from numerous projects

And of course I’ve attached orphan blocks to shirts.

quilt block on a shirt

Here’s another orphan block on a shirt

Recently I was browsing patterns and noticed that the folks at Maple Island Quilts had used one of their patterns to set some orphan blocks, so of course I ordered the pattern.

I have made two quilts. Here’s the first, which I considered the less successful of the two.

Quilt made using orphan blocks and the BQ5 pattern from Maple Island Quilts.

I thought the points coming together would make the design cohesive, but the blocks were just too dissimilar. And yes, there is a “mistake” block that I decided to leave “as is” when including it in the quilt 😀

Oops. But this is not the time to re-make this block!

The second quilt was made with the other design offered in the pattern, and I believe the blocks are more homogeneous as well.

Finished quilt 54″ x 68″, made from BQ5 pattern

Perhaps Elvis helped this quilt be more successful.

But the favorite block is this one. It’s a print from many years ago. I used the fabric to make a quilt for a friend who is a child psychologist.

What do you do with orphan blocks? How many do you have?

And just in case you have a LOT, the BQ5 pattern is available here. It is well written and I do recommend Maple Island Quilt patterns because I’ve never had any trouble following their directions! Several other patterns in the line would work for orphan blocks, too.

Two Quilts

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I mentioned last week that I had forgotten to blog about my improvisational quilt, so here’s the whole story.

Last summer I took part in an improv quilt-along hosted by Shannon Fraser Designs. I made a bunch of blocks in response to her prompts.

Eventually, I used my signature little black strips to combine them into a final design.

And then I forgot to blog about the finished product. So here we go:

Quilt Stats

Name: Improv 2022

Finished size: 42″ x 57″

Designed, and made by: me, in response to improv prompts from Shannon Fraser Designs

Quilted by: Linda Nichols

More recently I made another raid on the scrap drawers and put together this top.

It’s from an old book from Cozy Quilt Designs, entitled Strip Clubbing: Fast and Easy Quilts with 2 1/2″ Strips. I was pleased with the pattern and directions. Instructions were such that every one of those seams nested!!! How great is that? Because of that, almost all of those intimidating-looking intersections were close to perfect! Woo!

This is only about 36″ square, so it will be a donation quilt to cover a premie incubator at a local medical center. If you’re interested in the book, your best bet probably is a used book site like Abe Books. Sure it’s available new, but it’s old enough that there are plenty of used copies out there at a fraction of the price.

Have a good week!

 

 

Off to Ronald McDonald House

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If you’ve been wondering what I DO with all the quilts I make, you’re not alone!

Made from the “Tilted Tiles” pattern by Charles Cameron for the MQG

I’ve been holding a number of quilts for some programs I did on scrap quilting, but those are finished now so these quilts are off to Ronald McDonald House. The larger ones are for patients and families at the house; the smaller ones are sent to the NICU to put over incubators.

Made from Tula scraps because I always wanted to make a quilt that looked like the squares overlapped

Modification of the “Turning Twenty Again” pattern made crib size

Modification of a pattern by Sherry Shish

My arrangement of the “disappearing 9 patch” blocks

From a pattern by Sherry Shish

Quilt I designed to use a layer cake. No pattern available.

My arrangement of scrappy HSTs

scrap quilt

Scrap quilt made with strips that finish 1″ wide; no pattern available

Modification of something I saw online; no pattern available

My original design for a crib-size quilt; no pattern available

Modification of a design in “Jump Into Patchwork and Quilting” by Sarah Ashford

My husband said, “Those are some really nice quilts you’re giving away”. Yes, they are; I do not make quick versions of quilts for donation, nor do any of the people with whom I work on donation quilts.

Consider the quilts that have come to light recently after having been sent to the UK during World War II. I think they were valued for their usefulness, but also for their beauty in a difficult time.

Will our donation quilt be worth saving that long? I do want them to be used, but I hope they are beautiful enough to be cared for as well.

Another One Bites the Dust

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Like most quilters, I have more fabric than time, so I recently decided that I don’t need to finish everything! Much of what I do in my studio is experimental, and some of it “fails”. I put that in quotes because failure isn’t a bad thing, it’s just an indication that I’m trying new things. It’s natural that some experiments work out and some don’t.

I recently took a class in making map quilts (over here, at Creative Spark). My first attempt has gone out with the trash already, but the important thing is that I tried something and learned from it. The second attempt is going much better and I’ll eventually finish it and show you.

And here’s another experiment that’s working out pretty well. I pounded these leaves in a class years ago and finally dragged this out and quilted it both by machine and by hand. I’ll face it and show the finished product eventually…

My next experiment is the one that’s biting the dust today. I was inspired by this quilt (in part because it’s entitled “From Hell to Breakfast” and I haven’t heard that expression in years).

I started with orphan blocks and decided on a palette of turquoise, blue, and purple with lime accents. It started out pretty well, but after a couple of days it just looked entirely too random.

Choice: try to fix it or toss it. I left it overnight, then decided to toss it. Granted, it has some nice elements. However, I don’t think it will ever “gel” and I’m not one to throw more work into something that’s going sideways unless there’s a good reason. I made this to learn something, I enjoyed it, and I did try a few new things. Good enough. It has served its purpose and out it goes.

One of the things I learned was how to make this block, which was intended for use in this project but hadn’t made it in at the time the project was tossed. So you see, here is the start of another project! Ha!

And one little soap box moment, please: Some acquaintances say, “Just make it a donation quilt” when a design isn’t working out. I say, “If I don’t want it, why would I give it as a gift?”

What’s your opinion?

 

Orphan Blocks–A New Use!

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Most of us have a good pile of orphan blocks left over from various projects. Here’s the box with most of mine–there are a few in other locations 😀

Typically, I use mine for donation quilts. I’ve used the Circle of Nine idea.

A couple of Circle of Nine Quilt,s to use up orphan blocks

Sometimes I  have just arranged them on the design wall then filled in around them with background fabric.

Splendid Stars, 51″ x 53″

Sometimes I’ve even cut them into circles to applique onto a quilted background.

Donation Quilts for Ronald McDonald House

But still, there’s a big box full of them.

Then my friend Jerri told me she had made some of her orphan blocks into a quilt back! Great idea!

The next time I had a quilt needing a back, I took the blocks from the top of the pile and sewed them together. Then I surrounded them with pieces of quilt backing left from other projects.

Quilt back with a center of orphan blocks

Voila! It may be more “interesting” than beautiful, but it used up a lot of orphans and scraps. And it’s done!

Susan’s Ideas Explode

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I took a class with Susan Cleveland at AQS-Paducah this year and it was excellent. Susan manages to be both pleasant and precise as a teacher and has many, many tricks for improving quilt making skills.

Thinking of Susan’s creativity and sense of humor, I decided to make my SAQA donation quilt a picture of ideas exploding out of her head.

Here’s the resulting piece:“Susan’s Head Explodes”, 12″ x 12″, a tribute to Susan Cleveland

Susan is known for (among other things) her binding techniques, prairie points, and Dresdens. All these involve her signature precision and attention to detail. I used some of her techniques in this little quilt and added several of my own. Here are some details.

First, the martini glass. Please note that I have no idea whether or not Susan drinks alcohol; I just couldn’t resist this use of a prairie point!

You can see my binding up close in this detail photo. I used a flange to accent the edge. The little spheres are wool balls cut in half, a technique I learned from Susan.

The red exclamation mark is made with Kraft-Tex to avoid any risk of fraying on such a small element.The flamingo is a plastic button! Following a suggestion from a reader (Elizabeth, in response to my Habitat House), I removed the shank and glued the button to the quilt.

For one of the prairie points, I put a clear spherical button inside to hold it open a little. This button was one of my happy finds in Paducah, so it deserves to be in the piece!

The wool blend felt used for batting was a suggestion in a recent book by Sue Bleiweiss. It worked quite well in terms of being stable and easy to use.

Quilt Stats:

Name: Susan’s Head Explodes!

Designed and made by: me, with inspiration from Susan Cleveland

Finished size: 12″ x 12″

Materials include: Commercial cotton fabric, hand dyed fabric (Cherrywood), hand dyed embroidery thread (Artfabrik, Laura Wasilowski), Kraft-Tex (C&T), plastic buttons, commercial rick rack, wool felt balls, a polymer clay button, wool blend felt for batting, and various commercial threads.

Note: As always, the links in this post are for your convenience. They are not affiliate links.

Circle of Nine Quilts

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I found this book in my library when I was sorting things for the move and noted that it had an interesting layout for blocks.

It is an old book (2013) but my online research revealed that there is a newer one, Best of Circle of Nine, available from Keepsake Quilting. It looks like that book includes the “best” designs from my Circle of Nine book and the one that preceded it, which I do not own.

So in December when I should have been doing other things, I used the book to make two quilts from orphan blocks.

The first used blocks that finish 8″, and made a quilt that finished 36″ with the border added. That is perfect for a preemie incubator covering, so it’s a win for the orphan blocks.

I should note that the book offers many interesting ideas for pieced sashing, but I thought the blocks were busy enough by themselves so I just used plain sashing and it went together fast.

The second quilt was made with orphan blocks that finished that finish 10″. The quilt was 40″ square without borders, also perfect for Ronald McDonald House.

Of course I couldn’t just leave it at that, so I used EQ to expand the “Circle of Nine” idea to use 25 blocks. Here’s what it looked like:

Design made with Electric Quilt 8

The Circle of Nine quilts were great for using up orphan blocks. I don’t think I’ll make the 25-block version 😀

 

2021 In My Studio

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Good morning! I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday, whether religious or secular in nature. Here are most of the projects I’ve done this year:

Magic Kaleidoscope, 30″ x 30″

Practice for Charm Weave, 40″ x 40″

Donation Quilts for Ronald McDonald House

Mill Wheels, 51″ x 51″

Baby’s First Yoga Mat, 45″ x 45″

Super Simple Squares, 52″ x 52″

Oriana, 47″ x 48″

Rumble In The Jungle, 54″ x 54″

Splendid Stars, 51″ x 53″

Sunrise, 75″ x 50″

HST Stars, 78″ x 53″

Fossil Fern Stars, 59″ x 44″

COVID swap block quilt, 55″ x 72″

Hayden and the bag he made

Fabric bowl, from the Modern Fabric Bowls book

A few more quilts for Ronald McDonald House

Christmas napkins

A couple of Circle of Nine Quilt,s to use up orphan blocks

And a few shirts for me!

And the Japanese Maple in the fall!

Retreat! (At Last)

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Our retreat group was so happy to get together again after having to cancel the last two scheduled get-togethers due to you-know-what. We went to Kim’s Summit Retreat in Maggie Valley, NC, and it was perfect.

We were greeted by this beautiful Sassafras leaf on the front steps

Assembling some of the triangles from one of our previous swaps

Haha! This was a donation quilt project we were scheduled to do in October of 2020!

This was picked up from the quilter and I got it bound. More later.

One group member modified the free Kaffe Fasset pattern “Carnival” so she could use smaller blocks

This is a paper-pieced block-of-the-month that two of our members are doing

One retreater is making at least two quilts from fabric featuring national parks

I took these orphan blocks and put them on the design wall…

…then made additional blocks and strips to fill in the holes

That was so much fun! We are looking forward to the next one 😀

 

Can This Quilt Be Saved?

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Ha! Many, many years ago there was a column in a women’s magazine called, “Can This Marriage Be Saved?” I have no memory of reading the content, but somehow the overly-dramatic title has stuck with me. (I just asked Ms. Google, and I’m not the only one who remembers this: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/can-this-marriage-be-saved_b_58404189e4b0b93e10f8dfdf)

Anyway, in moving I have come across some experimental pieces that I’ve kept. I learned something from each of them, but sometimes what I learned was that a particular piece was not especially attractive!

Well, this didn’t work

The above piece was an experiment after reading a book by Freddy Moran. It’s well made but not especially attractive. For me, the colors don’t “gel” and the prairie points are entirely too regular in their arrangement.

This unquilted piece, approximately 42″ square, is the THIRD attempt to make something with these dotted fabrics! The other versions were no better, but I’ve saved some of the fabric by cutting out circles and using them as applique.

Rescued Dots

I think the “rescue” was pretty successful, and I’ll probably do something similar with the rest of this fabric. So I guess that’s 4 iterations of a design with those dots before finding something successful! 

And then there’s the Stuffed Olive Block. Never mind why I designed it in the first place. I made it into a pillow, but really, we have more than enough pillows. I think it just has to go!

I’m a firm believer that no experience is wasted, so we’ll call it good even if some of these just go out with the trash.

Of course that’s nowhere near all the experimental pieces I came across, but that’s all for now 😀

P.S.: I enjoy seeing “barn quilt” blocks as we travel, but this one struck me as unlikely: