Log Cabin, Stash Building, and Scraps

Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

My quilt tops are getting too big to go on the clothesline for photos, but the breeze this morning worked against a good picture in the tree, sorry.  The charities I donate the tops to prefer larger sizes for the kids and I'm happy to oblige, especially since a volunteer from the organization will quilt them.

It's breeze-free in the house, laid out on the floor.  These blocks were one of my Rainbow Scrap Challenge sets from this year.

I was calling these blocks Half Log Cabin, but they might more properly be called Quarter Log Cabin.  Each one is made from one 3 in. (finished) square and three sets of 2 in. wide (finished) strips.  Easy peasy!  And it used up strips from my Parts Department.

Did you catch the Halloween prints in the blocks above?  I wasn't trying to be timely when I made them, it was just hard to find good novelty prints in purple and orange.  I've since found more orange, but purple is still harder to spot in the stores.

As usual, this quilt top will be donated to the Children's Advocacy Center at Children's Hospital in Milwaukee, to be given to a child in foster care.

This week was a BIG DEAL for stash enhancement!  On Monday I met my friend Debbie C. in Sun Prairie at J. J. Stitches quilt shop.  We shopped for fabric, and had lunch out.   I bought dog prints and several light fabrics.  The best part, as always, was visiting with a friend.  We were too busy talking to take pictures, sadly.  We both admired the quilt above so I'm including a photo of it from their web site.  Great purple fabrics!

On the way home, I stopped at Sew Many Pieces in Richfield.  Of course I bought sale fabric (it was $10 per yard, which seems cheap now when fabric goes for $15 or even $16 a yard).  I also bought these scraps.  They have a big basket full, and customers like me fill a plastic bag for $7.00.

Here's what I ended up with after I cut it up. There are small stacks of squares in 5 in., 4.5 in., 3.5 in., 2.5 in. and 2 in. sizes.  Then there are 3 kinds of rectangles:  2 in. x 3.5 in., 2.5 in. x 3.5 in., and 2.5 in. x 4.5 in.  These are all the shapes I keep in my Parts Department, which makes them ready to go when I need them.  The odd shaped pieces in front are scraps for more crumb quilts.

When I went to put all the cut pieces away, I found that the shoebox with the 2 in. x 3.5 in. rectangles was getting really crowded.  I could get a bigger bin, or I could start a new quilt.  Which do you think I did lol?

Of course I started a new quilt!  The block is a Potato Chip variation, with a center 3 in. (finished) square instead of two rectangles.  Each 9 in. finished block will use 6 light rectangles and 10 dark ones. I don't think I have enough rectangles right now to make a twin sized top, but I'm sure more of these scraps will show up over time.  Scraps are forever!

Quilt Guild meeting last Wednesday night was our annual Silent Auction.  This is always so much fun!  This box of flannel scraps was calling my name.  I tried not to listen, but it was no use.  This is what it looks like now, after I weeded out fabrics I won't use and washed the rest.  There is so much cutting in my future!  If you have any good simple patterns for flannel, I would love a link to them.  I'm going to start with baby quilts.

The Silent Auction went really well.   Our guild raised over $400.00!  I was happy to help.  All told, I bought 6 lots, including the charm squares above and the jar of candy, which came with several yards of cute kid fabric.  (The jar was full when I won it.)

Question for you.  Do you keep your charm squares in their original packs, or do you sort them by color?  I'm always interested in how other quilters work.

It's a beautiful day here, and I'm going to take a walk in the park after lunch.  I hope you have a lovely productive week, doing what you love best.

Thanks for reading!

Cheers,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with these fun ladies and their blogs:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap