Bowtie #5, and Princesses Take A Trip

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  I hope you're having a good week.

It has been fun sewing these Bowtie blocks I made for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge this year, and even more fun making them into quilts.  Above is Bowtie #5, posing next to my Willcox and Gibbs treadle.

This is a little one, 38 in. x 46 in., made with just 20 blocks.  This time I arranged the colors in diagonal rows of aqua, purple, pink and yellow.  It will be donated to the Children's Advocacy Center in Milwaukee, for a baby or toddler.

When making the blocks this year, I tried hard to find light fabrics that were just as much fun as the dark novelty prints.  These pears are definitely a little weird.

The aqua fabric reminds me of phonograph records (remember those?).  I have had the cat fabric in the background for years, and will be very sad to finally use it up.

This block is my favorite:  unicorns and rainbows!  I have to admit, I'm not hating pink anymore.

The back is this 1990s print, which I used on the first Bowtie quilt I finished this year.

So, to sum up the Bowtie quilts:

#1 was a pink baby quilt, used 20 blocks, is a finished quilt

#2 I called You are Loved, used 48 blocks, I will donate it as a top.

#3 I called Bowtie Trip Around the world, used 48 blocks, I will donate it as a top.

#4 was the one with the cats in cups border, used 30 blocks, is a finished quilt.

#5 is today's, used 20 blocks, and is a finished quilt.

So that makes 166 blocks!  Good grief, I really did get carried away.  

These 4 blocks are all that's left.  Anybody got any good ideas for what to do with orphan blocks?

It is finally dawning on me that I might need a plan for the RSC quilts BEFORE I make the blocks.  Hmm.  

Remember this picture?  A friend at quilt guild donated these Princess Life charm squares to me.  There were 335 total.  (Amazing!  Thanks, Laurie!)  She had planned to make a quilt for her niece (I think?) but changed her mind.

Here's what I did with some of them.  Trip Around the World was on my mind (thanks to Bowtie #3) and I had enough squares of each print to go this far.  This quilt will be donated as a top to the CAC, to eventually be given to a kid in foster care.

All the squares in the quilt came from the charm packs, even the pink and blue prints.  I set them 11 across and 13 down, using 143 squares.

I like the diversity of princesses.  I especially like the one wearing glasses.  Not a princess here, but I've worn glasses since I was in second grade so I like seeing kids in prints wearing them.  I bet glasses-wearing kids like that too.

It's probably hard to see, but the purple print in the corner and the darker blue print have crowns as the design.  They are my favorites from this collection.

The blue border is from my stash.  It's a print of sewing threads and needles, with hearts and swirls.  To me it says Sewn for You With Love.  That carriage print was a little odd.  If the carriages were right side up, the frogs were usually upside down.  And blue frogs?  Maybe they were cold?

Speaking of cold...Yes, it's definitely winter, no matter what the calendar says.  Last Saturday's snow is still here, and we got another dusting last night.  The roads are clear though, as well as the parking lots, etc.  Wisconsin knows how to deal with this stuff.

This is a view from one of the sewing room windows.  Check out the icicles!  We don't need to buy icicle Christmas decorations.  They are melting in the sun today, even though it's still 20 degrees F or so.

I don't mind the cold, mostly because I'm snug and warm in my sewing room!  Here are some things I'm hoping to work on this week.  More princesses of course--I still have 192 squares!  This pattern might work, at least for some of them.  I have a plan for the pink hearts, which was really difficult because I have hardly any pink stash.  I bet I could fix that lol.

Have a wonderful week, everyone.

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia at Treadlestitches  

Check out these fun linky parties, hosted by these terrific quilters.

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday 

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

  

Hourglass Four Patch Tutorial

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Here's a quick tutorial for a very easy quilt.

The blocks are made of two hourglass blocks and two plain squares.

To make the hourglass blocks, choose one dark charm square (5 in. x 5 in.) and one light square, same size.

Place the charm squares right sides together.  In this example, I put the light square on top.  Now slice the squares diagonally twice, corner to corner.  When pulled apart they look like this.

Each section is two triangles, right sides together.  Take them to the sewing machine, and stitch from the right angle to the triangle tip.  Make sure to sew all of them exactly the same way, with the light side up.  Here they are, all sewn.

Now open them up.  Gently finger press or iron the seam toward the dark triangle.  Arrange them like the photo below, and pin the center seam.  Then stitch.

 

From two charm squares, you get two identical hourglass units.  These units measure 4 1/4 inches square unfinished.  The edges on the outside of the units are on the straight of grain, which makes them less likely to stretch.
 

 

To make the four patch blocks, I cut two squares 4 1/4 in. from another fabric in the same color family, and sewed them to the hourglass units.  The resulting blocks finished at 7.5 in.

I realize this is an odd measurement.  The hourglass units could be trimmed down to 4 in. easily, which might make them easier to use with other shapes.  If you do that, the hourglass units would be 3.5 in. finished, and the four patch blocks would finish at 7 in. square.

I have never seen this method before, but it's possible somebody else came up with it first.  If you know who that might be, please tell me in the comments, and I'll give them credit.

And of course, if you make a quilt from this tutorial, I would love to see it!

Happy Quilting!

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Time to Sew

Bella, our dog, says hi.  She's worn out today, but she has had an amazing week.  She loves Christmas, for several reasons.  There are children's faces to lick, food scraps to snarf up off the floor, more kind hands to pet her, a present or two, and maybe even some Christmas ham in her bowl.  She even loves the mailman who brings packages to the door.  January might seem kind of flat to her.

But not to me!  It's all done--the shopping, wrapping, cleaning, baking, hugs and laughter and merrymaking.  Time to reveal the secret sewing, and to get back to making the needles fly.

Here's the little wall hanging I made for the Brown Bag Challenge at our quilt group.  Each participant puts a fat quarter and a slip of paper with their name on it in a brown bag, and we exchange bags.  We make something (pretty much anything goes) using the fat quarter for the person who brought it, which we give as a gift at Christmas.

The fat quarter in the brown bag I got was the white-on-white fabric I used for the background.  On the slip of paper with the person's name was a request for a Christmas table runner or a wall hanging, with cardinals if possible.  I delivered the cardinals, courtesy of Connecting Threads.com, seen here in the border.  I also made a matching pot holder, but didn't get a photo of that.

I added these corners on the back, to assist in hanging.  Have you done this?  Was it useful, or not very?  I've never done this before, and I'm not sure.

I don't make a lot of sewing projects for Christmas gifts.  It increases the stress, which I can do without.  I did make each grandchild a new pillowcase.  It was fun choosing the fabrics for them.  My granddaughter got vintage kittens, Little Buddy's has tractors (of course), my second-oldest grandson got a Minecraft print, a video game he loves, but I was stumped on the oldest grandson, Big Buddy.  My husband reminded me that Big Buddy will be in high school next year (!!!), so we chose a manly plaid.

I love my family, and I feel like I'm the luckiest person on earth, but I don't mind that the holidays are just about over and I have some time off babysitting.  I have so many UFOs to finish, and I'm hoping to make a dent in them during this long weekend.
The top above was inspired by a lady in my quilt group (the amazing Laverne) who brought a similar top to show and tell some months ago.

It's very simple, just charm squares with 1.5 in. rectangles sewn to two adjacent sides.  Mine is a lot smaller than Laverne's was, because I ran out of the fabric I was using for the narrow pieces.
Everything for this charity quilt comes from the stash.
I'm not sure if I'm going to quilt it myself, or give it to the long armers in the group so they can do a more professional job.

My Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilts from this year are STILL in progress.  I'm adding brown print borders to the Wagon Trail quilt sections.  This is the big "half".  Once the borders are done, it's on to the quilting!

I hope to get this one done soon, but we'll see.   My 2017 RSC quilts are still waiting to be finished.

But that's not stopping me from thinking about RSC quilts for 2019!  This is my current idea--8 pointed stars made from two fabrics in the designated color, plus a white background.  I love all the rainbow star quilts Angela and others have made for the RSC.

This was the view out our back door on Christmas morning.  It's a White Christmas!  Never mind that it all melted by the next day.
Little Buddy is really hoping for more snow so he can build another snowman.  Eventually I'm sure he's going to get his wish.  This is a Wisconsin winter, after all.

With snow, or without, may your days be merry and bright.  Happy New Year!
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches
Linking up with
Angela at soscrappy
Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Myra at Busy Hands Quilts
Cynthia at Oh Scrap