Orange Blocks and a Caterpillar

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!

It's the last Saturday of September, and the last Saturday of orange for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  I'm working on sewing the blocks I've made all year into baby quilts for donation.  This little quilt uses Friendship Stars and Very Hungry Caterpillar fabric.

I'm a retired school librarian, so of course I love The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and all the other books by Eric Carle.  In this fabric, we can see his little head (before he ate all that food) and the colorful dots found on the title page (below).

The border fabric also copies those dots, but with brighter and darker colors.

I bought the caterpillar fabric in a quilt shop on our recent vacation, but I had to order the border fabric (from the Fat Quarter shop) when I decided I needed it.  Lesson learned, buy it when you see it!  (BTW, my local shop didn't have it.  I always check there first.)

The set was easy and fun to do, and one I had never done before.  Instead of sashing, I sewed a rectangle of the caterpillar fabric (cut 2.5 in. x 6.5 in.) to the top of half the blocks and the bottom of the other half.  When I sewed the rows together, I alternated the blocks, and that's what gives it the staggered look.  I chose to make a mini-rainbow with the colors.

I absolutely love orange, especially Halloween prints!

More orange blocks are done. 

The 1890s reproduction prints in Poinsettia blocks,

and of course Ice Cream blocks.  Orange sherbet, mango ice cream, maybe even pumpkin and cantaloupe!

So what's ahead for next week?  As you can imagine, I've got lots more blocks to sew into tops.  Once I've figured out which blocks go where, I use paper labels and clothespins to organize the rows at the treadle.  I usually piece in the mornings, while waiting for my Baby Buddy to be dropped off.

Once the tops are made, there's the usual backing, batting, and basting to deal with.  Then Mrs. Pfaff and I get to work doing some simple quilting.

But first Baby Buddy and I need to go to the park!  Sometimes I wonder why we buy so many toys, when his favorite things are sticks, rocks, leaves, and pine cones.  Here he's banging on the metal post, making lots of exciting noise.

Little Buddy, Baby Buddy's big brother, was Student of the Week this week at kindergarten.  He got to bring in his favorite book for storytime.  Guess what it was!  That's right, The Very Hungry Caterpillar!

I hope you have fun this week with all your favorites, whatever they may be.  Stay safe, and keep sewing!

Cheers,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy 

 

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Bright Hopes, and The Trouble With Pink

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!

This is such a fun time of year!  I'm starting to finish my Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilts.  Blocks I've been making since January are finally going into baby-sized quilts for donation.  I know we have another green month coming up, but I've already used up most of my green scraps, so I'm putting things together early.

The two quilts above are made from Bright Hopes blocks.  (Click HERE for a tutorial on how to make them.  BTW, they're really easy.)

Now about the trouble with pink.  Our culture is pretty specific about the color pink.  It's for girls.  Just for girls.  I don't happen to agree with assigning any one color to any one gender, but this is how it is.  So if I make a quilt with pink in it, it will be donated by the charity to a girl.

Charities often report receiving more quilts for girls than for boys.  So most of the time I make my quilts gender-neutral, with lots of bright colors and fun fabrics for everyone, girls and boys.

In January, when pink was our RSC color, I thought about this "pink problem", and decided to just make enough blocks in most of the sets to make two quilts, one with pink and one without.

Both quilts have lots of novelty prints, like cows and tractors.  And I got to use up some cute pink prints in the "girl" quilt, like pink cowgirl boots, plus a cupcake print in the border.

The orange blocks I just made this month went in the not-pink quilt.  

I quilted both of these little quilts with a 2 in. grid, the pink one with the serpentine stitch and the not-pink one with a straight stitch.

I bound the not-pink quilt with an orange plaid.  The border is a turtle print I got on our vacation in July.

The backing for the pink quilt was considered an Easter print by the local chain store, so after Easter I got it very cheaply.  

The backing of the other quilt is another novelty print, with cars and trucks and helicopters.  I put a strip of the turtle fabric in the middle to make it wide enough.

So that's two quilts made.  They will go to our local Project Linus, which has been revived with a new chair person.  Project Linus gives blankets (including quilts) to children in need.  (Click HERE to find out more about Project Linus).

Guess what's in this fat little package!

Did you guess fabric?

It's an explosion of delicious scraps!  Little Buddy was here when I opened it, and he quickly picked out his favorites--dog bones, penguins, and Thomas the Tank Engine, of course.  This was my prize package from the Positivity Plus challenge, started by Pretti of Sew Preeti Quilts.  I was one of the finishers whose name was pulled out of the hat.  It was so kind of Preeti to organize this challenge to benefit Mercy Hospital, and to curate this scrap bag from her own stash!  By the way, the challenge is on again for 2022.  The pattern is fun and easy, and it goes for such a good cause.

So this has been a great week!  I even got some orange block sewing done.

Crumb hearts, with the cut-off triangles made into Friendship Stars.

Novelty prints just keep on giving!  A Halloween cat dressed up as a pirate and an orange dinosaur peek out of this one.

Little Buddy evaded the camera this week, but Baby Buddy says hi.  He even wore an orange shirt.  It's different here now, with Little Buddy in kindergarten all day, but we still have a good time.

I wishing good times for all in the week ahead.  Take care, and stay safe.

Cheers,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

 

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy, home of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

 

Happy Scrappy Orange

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!

Isn't this shirt a hoot?  It just shouts 1960s hippy culture, doesn't it.  It was worn by John Lennon back then, and now hangs in Cleveland at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. 

The diamond shapes in the flowers and the graceful leaves and stems make me think of antique quilts, but it was the orange color that really caught my eye.  Orange is on my mind and under my needle this month as I make blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

First, the Four Patch Stars.  To make these, I use 2.5 in. wide strips and my trusty Easy Angle and Companion Angle rulers.

I don't have a lot of novelty prints in orange, but I did find a little minion for one square.  Not sure if this is Bob or Kevin.  My grandkids tried to educate me on the minions' names, but the lesson didn't sink in. 

The log cabin blocks got done last night.  These have been lots of fun to sew.

Again, not a huge variety of orange fabrics.  I think I might need to go shopping!

Here are all the log cabin blocks I made this year.  I'm going to start putting them into small quilts soon.  I know we will have another month of green, but I've already used up most of my green scraps. 

 With all the blocks I've made this year, I will have LOTS of quilts for donations, so I need to get started piecing tops together and quilting.

Do you do this with your projects?  This year, because I had so many things going for the RSC, I started using a notebook.  Above is a chart I made for the different kinds of blocks (there are more on the back!).  I also wrote down the cutting directions for each block, etc.  It has saved me a lot of time and aggravation.  The only problem was occasionally losing the notebook under a pile of fabric.

I have a favor to ask.  Has anybody made a pillow out of a latch hook piece?  Can you steer me to good directions?  My youngest daughter made this years ago, and it was stored in a box in the basement.  My excellent hubby has been cleaning things out (hurray!) and I volunteered to finish this adorable Lion King design into a pillow.  Should I line it before finishing?  Any help will be appreciated.

Baby Buddy and I found the first orange maple leaf in the park this week.  (I took it out of his mouth as soon as I took the picture!)  Everything is still a lovely green, but fall is definitely coming.  

When I was younger, I always looked ahead, wanting the year to hurry along.  Now I drag my feet a bit, trying to just take each day as it comes.  They fly by pretty fast anyway.

Have a good week, everyone.  Let's take time to remember September 11, 2001, and all the caring people who helped others that day.

Cheers for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy (home of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge)

Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

September Sewing

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  And happy Labor Day weekend to all who celebrate.

 I'm celebrating finishing this Rail Fence top, which will be given to a veteran by a local group.

It was really windy yesterday afternoon when I tried to get this picture of the quilt on the clothesline.  I just kept thinking, long may she wave!

Nothing could be simpler than a rail fence quilt, and the pieces were already cut out by our charity committee, so it was a perfect project for some mindless sewing for a good cause.

Here's the whole top, laid out on the floor.  I really wanted to add a border, but we aren't supposed to.  The quilt tops the group asked for have to be roughly the same size since they often present several at the same time to the veterans.  The group will quilt and bind the tops, so my work here is done.

I was caught up on my Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks, and needed something to sew for leaders and enders.  This drawer of 2.5 in. squares came to mind, so I started yet another new project.  (And I'm not even sorry!)

The squares are 1800s reproduction fabrics for the most part, and are leftovers from other quilts, mini charm squares, and even some from the free table at the quilt group.  I'm making these 16 patch blocks, and will set them with alternate blocks of some kind, probably a light shirting fabric.  Some of the red blocks have 16 different fabrics in them.

Orange is the new RSC color for September, and I've made a start on my blocks.  Orange is the last color I need for most of my RSC baby quilts, so soon I can start putting the blocks together.  This is going to be so much fun.

In other news, we have a few family milestones.

Our beautiful granddaughter Miss E. turned 10!  She's going into the fifth grade.

Her brother Mr. H. is now in 7th grade!  It's hard to believe.  

This is a photo of Little Buddy on his first day of kindergarten.  All the brothers got in on the act.  Big Buddy, our oldest grandson, is a junior in high school.  And of course Baby Buddy still comes here every weekday for child care.

Baby Buddy and I go to the park nearly every day.  Some days he wants to play on the playground.  Other days he just takes off walking and I follow with the stroller.  The weather has been beautiful lately and we're enjoying every minute.  (I know what's coming in the months ahead!)

I want to thank everyone for their kind words last week about the loss of my niece.  

Have a lovely weekend, and a happy week ahead.

Cheers for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Angela at So Scrappy

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict 

Cynthia at Oh Scrap