Jo's Finished Quilt

 Well I made the deadline by miles for once!

and of course the back...

I went with simple diagonal wonky like quilting, I didnt want it to have loads of quilting because some of the seams are super chunky and it would be a nightmare trying to get them threw my machine.

Onto the next thing!

What to do with the Split Herringbone Quilt?!

I was trawling the quilting internet (as you do) and I keep coming across Quilt As You Go (or QAYG for short) and it totally interreges me! 

As it is now The Split Herringbone is a monster quilt and I really am not sure how to quilt it, I was thinking straight lines down the black sashing but now I'm thinking to take it apart and make it a QAYG - am I totally crazy?!

Obviously I hope my quilting skills are better than my skills in Paint 3D (and maybe they won't be) but I think it would be fun to try... 

It does mean a hell of a lot of unpicking... something to ponder  

Following on...

So after my last post and the disaster of trying to get the Split Herringbone measure the same I put it away for a little while because looking at it made me angry lol... I still don't like to think about it!

As I was looking at it when I finally got it out of the box I decided it wasn't really my sisters style (I told you I was changeable!!) - so I went back to my original ideas and decided on the Half Square Triangle Quilt!

I found one one with colours that I really liked online (::Pantone Pop Quilt:: - SewKatieDid) that listed the colours used (because I still suck at that bit) and set about sewing up a storm!

The good news is HST really don't take long so my quilt top is finished!

I got to thinking what I was going to do with all the scraps that where created when I was making The Split Herringbone and...

I made some Sawtooth Stars with them!

These are going to go onto the backing.

Now originally the whole back was going to be white with these dotted around, but I'm not very good with improv because I spend wayyyy to much time trying to get things lined up - so for my sanity I decided to use them as two strips between another fabric, my sister is a science nerd so this seemed like a good choice! 

More good news is I am onto assembling the back! I have all my Stars sewn and I'm just sewing them together into strips... bad news is I have to find time (stupid work, do they not know I have things to create?!)

So many problems!!!

 In the name of total transparency I am having so many issues with The Split Herringbone Quilt, nothing is going right and I have taken the thing apart way to many times!!

I assembled each row together and for some reason they are different lengths - by inches!!

Like this but way worse! every single row is different and I have no idea why.

Seam allowances where the same, I cut them all the same size.... I am completely baffled and annoyed 

Added to that when I sewed them together with the sashing it all went wonky! When I folded it it looked like this >>>>

At least I realized why this happened (after a lot of swearing)
When I sewed the rows to the sashing I must have pulled to hard and the cuts on the bias stretched... and just like that a fucked up quilt.

I have had to take a loooonnnngggg break from this quilt top because it was frustrating me so bad.

I think I have it fixed now but who the hell knows. 
I added some extra length to the short rows, starched/pressed the crap out of the stretched edges and prayed to the god of sewing.
I am honestly dreading squaring this quilt top and that has never happened before - its kinda taken the joy out of sewing which sucks.

And BOOM... done

And just like that I'm done!

Over here 🠜🠜🠜 we have  blocks K, O and J

On one O block you can see I used some scraps to make a strip - not sure I like it right now but I will lay it out and see how it looks 

Over here 🠞🠞 we have blocks E, H G and N

and lastly blocks A, B, C and D!

Next is working out the layout for them all, I'm going to fire up trusty Microsoft Word and get it looking pretty 

Busy Bee...

More blocks for The Split Herringbone Quilt

Here 🠝🠝🠝 we have long blocks W, V, Z and Y

These are blocks L, I, N and R

In these two pictures are the hardest blocks so far and you'd never guess which ones!

Nope not the ones that are split in half... it was the simplest looking blocks out of the whole thing - the ones that are just blocks of fabric with black corners (also known as V and I).

I couldn't get the bloody fabric to sit straight! the long ones where the worst, every time I sewed the opposite corner the fabric would shift and there would be puckers in the whole thing - lots of unpicking went on for those blocks.

I tried basting down the sides of the fabric to stop it shifting... but it shifted! If I knew it was going to be that hard I wouldn't have used foundation paper and instead just do it the normal way

 

Split Herringbone Blocks

 I have been hard at work this last week and have manged to complete some some of my blocks

Blocks F, S, P and M

Foundation piecing is super quick once you get into a rhythm - I had two mishaps where I sliced off the wrong part but I learnt from it (ok so it took me doing it twice but I got there in the end) and I was super careful after that!

There is a butt tone of waste that goes with this method.

This is just from trimming to the right size! 

Not sure I'd be ok with all this waste regularly, it made my heart hurt putting those scraps in the bin!

I had already sorted the small bits that could possibly be used for something else - and when I say possibly I mean probably not (some aren't even 1'' big)

I did use some of them in two blocks - one is in the block picture above.

 

Split Herringbone update

 Look what arrived!

I finally got to see if my math was right! (spoiler: it wasn't!)

I looked through my stash, pulled out all my solid colours, went through to find the ones I thought went well together and came up with the bundle above. I steered clear of any darker tones as the 'backing' fabric is black and I want the 'stripes' to stand out.

Speaking on the background colour I went for Moda Black. I would preferred Kona Charcoal but that cost £11 per meter and the Moda Black was £8, there is no way my sister would have noticed the slightly lighter shade of black so my frugal self won and I went with the cheaper option.

I set about cutting my fabric to the plan I made but alas it all went wrong! The fabric measured 41'' across and not 44'' so my math went out the window! 
I cut the long Z, X and W strips first because they are longer than a metres worth of fabric so that made most sense, then I sort of winged it. The ▮ (5x8.5) blocks went next, then the 🞴 (5x5) blocks and then everything else. It ended up being just under 4 metres (lucky I had the little extra on hand)  so I wasn't off by much!

I cut my colour strips next and they look so pretty all mixed up, I really like the colour explosion! 

Next up is the assembly part, fingers crossed that goes well!

Designing The Split Herringbone Quilt: Part 4 Fabric Math

 After deciding how many of each block I wanted next came time to work out how much background fabric I would need.

On the blocks I'd already drawn I used symbols to represent the different widths.

For example on the A block to the left you might just be able to see an asterisk, triangle and diamond. 

The asterisk represented the background triangles, the diamond's are the colour strips that measure 3/4'' wide and the triangles are the background strips that measure 3/8.

On the bottom of the picture I have written it out so I know in each A block I need:

▲= 3 
♦️ = 4 
🞹 =2

I have 7 A blocks so therefore I need:
▲ = 21
♦️ = 28
🞹 = 14

I did that for each block and separated the symbols for the background and coloured fabrics.

Background:

▲ = 174
D = 2
+   = 3
@  = 16
─ = 4

For the end triangles I am going to use a square/rectangle and cut them in half 

🞹 = 147 (or 74 squares)
▮ = 138 (or 69 rectangles)

Coloured Fabric:
⏺ = 50
♦️ = 153
⦚ = 12
>  = 4
# = 13

Swirl  = 41

Now knowing the amount, widths and lengths I once again opened trusty Microsoft Word

I have no idea if this makes sense to anyone else but I will try to explain.

The first measurements I factored in where the longest ones, I labelled these W, X and Y, they measure 72'' in length (the finished quilt being 70'' by 70''), which is obviously longer than 1 metre of fabric so I drew 2 metres (illustrated above by the blue square outlines)

I needed 2 W lengths which means I needed 5'' by 72'', I needed 8 X lengths which made it 8'' by 72'', 7 lengths of Y which made it 10.5'' by 72''

Which added together made in 23.5'' by 72'' (and I just noticed I made a mistake and fixed it, thank god I left a little extra just in case)

I had 20'' left which I used for my ▮ rectangle block - they are 5x8.5 so I fit 4 across and 8 down - measuring 20 by 68 (that gave me 32)

I carried on like that until I had all the right number of bit and I worked it out to be 3.5 meters (with not a lot spare) but considering I just found a mistake I'm going back to double check everything!
(I will be totally honest if I was wrong and make an edit at the bottom.)

I used the same method for the coloured fabric, this time using fat quarters instead of  meters of fabric.

As I have said before I want this quilt to look scrappy/colourful so instead of using a whole fat quarter I am only going to cut maybe 3 strips from each colour - I'll need about 26  different fat quarters colours.

Especially when it comes to the largest sizes e.g. I don't want 2 > the same colour or even a > and # from the same fabric.

Edit: 
Well I looked at it again and I did make a mistake
I think I gave myself to many rectangles and as that is the biggest size I only need 3 meters of fabric... Not sure I trust myself anymore!! Hopefully when I look at it again it will still add up the same!

Designing The Split Herringbone Quilt: Part 3 Placement

After drawing out my blocks onto paper I scanned them onto my computer so I would have a copy, then I had a brainwave about using Microsoft Word to arrange (and rearrange) my blocks so I could get it just right. Once again I am sure there is a better program out there that could do this, however Word is what I have so that's what I used.

The pencil marks didn't show up to well on screen so I used draw feature and coloured in some of the sections, gave them each a letter to identify them  and made them all roughly the same size -  this is what I ended up with 🠞🠞🠞🠞🠞

Next I made the page as large as I could, put the grid setting on and set about placing the blocks in a random (but eye pleasing) manner.

This would help me work out how many of each block I would need and hopefully a guess about the amount of fabric I would need

The rows with the triangles to the left I numbered 1 and the rows with the triangles to the right where 2 (eg the first row starts with Y1, the second A2). The idea being that when it came time to draw the blocks it would help me keep track of which direction the block should face

I made a list of how many blocks of each type there where that looked something like this...

It showed me if I had to many of one particular block and not enough of another - at one point I had 7 H2's and 0 K 1's

This is the final layout I came up with

When drawing out the blocks onto the greaseproof paper I was just very careful about which direction I drew it in. On paper blocks in the first row look like they belong in the second row and vice-versa - that took some getting use to (also lots of swearing)

Next comes Part 4 Fabric Math - working out how much fabric I needed.... 

Designing The Split Herringbone Quilt: Part 2 Foundation Piecing

 After discovering that Alison Glasses Feathers Pattern was foundation pieced I thought I would give it a go to see if it yielded better results than my previous method, if it was something that I enjoyed and would like to do - because lets face it, what's the point in doing it if I find it awful?!

I googled how to foundation piece, found some decent videos on youtube and then gave it a try.

I know there is special paper for foundation piecing but I wasn't going to buy anything that I wasn't 100% sure I was going to use so instead I found some grease proof paper in my cupboard 

I drew this simple block design (I've made the lines darker so its easier to see, the pencil marks weren't visible) and grabbed some scraps from my stash.

With foundation piecing you have to sew on side that the lines that are drawn on - the top side of the paper if you will.

I didn't get any pictures of the steps because as I said there are many tutorials out there that will explain in better than I can.

After sewing all the bits of fabric down this is what I was left with. 

It's an easy process to sew, due to the fact that you sew on the 'top' and place the fabric on the 'bottom' I had a few issues making sure that the fabric was placed properly to make sure that there where no gaps other than that there where no problems. Except...

Can you spot the difference?...  it's flipped!

The triangle that was on the top right is now on the top left.

So when it comes time to draw all the blocks I need to make sure I take the flip into consideration, it'd be a total pain to expect it to come out looking like the top picture and instead get the bottom - there would definitely be swearing. 

Now that I know I can foundation piece and that I don't hate it I decided to go ahead with this method when making my Split Herringbone Quilt (although I have yet to try the block with the strip down one side).

I set out to draw on paper the blocks I would need to make the quilt top; once I started drawing I ended up with 23 different block designs, 4 of them where double the length of the 'normal' blocks. To be honest there could have been more due to the various ways each strip of fabric could be arranged, I had some that started right at the top corner and went down to the opposite bottom corner, I had come that started a little bit further down than the corner, some that ended before the bottom corner, some strip widths where 2'' some where 1 1/4'' - you get the point.

I thought I would go with actual foundation paper just to make my life a little bit easier (you can print on foundation paper) and found some online that would suit my budget, but then I had the realisation that I had no way of transferring the block drawings from paper onto my computer and keep the accuracy. Scanning them would result in stretching, trying to recreate them on my computer would not be true to size either and I have no other ideas how it would work so I stuck with greaseproof paper and a pencil... that was rather long winded but I have to do something until my fabric arrives!

The next post will tell you how I knew how many of each block to draw... Designing The Split Herringbone Quilt: Part 3 Placement 

Designing The Split Herringbone Quilt: Part 1

 

As we know I found this amazing fabric print (Alison Glass, Art Theory) online  and I thought it was beautiful, I really love the concept so I decided to try and make it a quilt top.

I started off by drawing different size blocks and the hardest part was the middle section, I liked the wat it look when it was quite small (about 1/4'') but I knew that would be a total nightmare to try to make so I drew a 1/2'' middle section moved on to sewing it up because as we knew what works on paper doesn't always translate to fabric 

First I tried to strip piece it using scrap fabric from my stash, I sewed together alternative colour  and background fabric. 

The first attempt is the one on the left - the  red fabric was all different widths and the grey was 1/2 wide when sewn.

Although I still liked the look I still thought the grey looked to wide, so using more of the same fabric I sewed it together with the grey finishing at 1/4'' wide and I liked this look much better.

I chose to make the block with the split down one side because I thought that would be the hardest part (and I was right) and I wanted to know it if was possible and let me tell you trying to match the different sides together was a nightmare but I think it was worth it, this type of block will stand out in the quilt and make it a little bit different.

This is the part where I discovered that the pattern already existed.

Alison Glass obviously had the same thought I did about this being a beautiful quilt top and designed a pattern which is available to buy in loads of different places.

I decided to go my own way and carry on designing my own version before I knew of this one.

The only part I took into consideration is that this pattern is made using foundation paper - something which I have not done before but I thought I would give it a shot to see how it went.

Check out Part Two so see how I got on.

Foundation Paper Piecing... a new frontier

Confession - I have never used foundation paper before, The Split Herringbone is going to be a first for me.

I researched foundation paper and found one that was kinda in my budget, but then I was completely stumped on how to print my block drawings onto it! I guess if its a brought pattern it would include a PDF but I am no where near proficient enough on a computer to know where to start with that... so frugality strikes again and instead I have gone for greaseproof paper, a pencil and ruler! I'm sure there are many reasons not to use these items and instead go with the proper foundation paper but whatever, I will see how it works and if its awful I know not to do it again 

I have drawn out all 98 blocks and let me tell you printing would have been a hell of a lot faster and easier!

With foundation piecing the block is reversed so I got incredibly confused about how many of a block I needed and in what direction it had to face - complete headache! I'll try to write a post about the prosses

Split Herringbone Quilt

Having pondered the idea for awhile I decided to go with the Alison Glass inspired quilt top - Which I am going to call Split Herringbone Quilt from now on because that's what it reminded me of when I first saw it.

For the last few days I have been figuring out the sizes of everything I need and I came up with this...

70''X70''

There will be 98 blocks but this is comprised of 23 block designs - I did so many because I wanted it to look as random as possible.

I did the math to work out how much backing fabric I would need - that included lots of swearing, a crap ton of paper and many confused moments but I think I managed it in the end.

My math put it at 3.5 metres (with very little to spare) so hopefully it all works out, we shall see when the fabric arrives in a few days.

Morally questionable...

No I don't buy patterns and it is a morally grey area for me.

On one hand I am poor, the little bit of money I have to spend on my hobby could be spent on something more substantial than a bit of paper - like the actual fabric to make the bloody thing.

I got 7 fat quarters of solid fabric and 2 metres of white that already added up to just under £40! That isn't even including the wadding, backing fabric or binding! (which is something people who say I should sell my quilts fail to take into consideration - its a lot more money than people realize).

On the other hand the amount of work that goes into creating a pattern must be astronomical. 

Thinking of a pattern (hard), working out the math (even harder), testing it (not only yourself but by other quilters to make sure the instructions make sense), distributing the thing (no idea how you would do this), advertising it (also not a clue)... I'm sure there are 100 other things that I have missed because I have never done it. All of that deserves compensation. 

But I always come back to the first point... I don't have the money - if I did I would totally buy patterns and save myself the extra days work trying to figure it out, plus I would know how much fabric I would need and I wouldn't have to make an educated guess.

I guess my only saving grace is that all my quilts are gifts for people I know and not being sold - that would be completely wrong and that because I work out the piecing myself it's never quite the same as the original pattern. 

Sisters 40th Birthday

 Look I'm back! (I know I'm shocked too)

My next big project is my other sisters (Jo) 40th birthday quilt (Emma got one so it'd probably be bad form not to give Jo one 😄)

Which leads me on to the next bit... what to do!? Emma's' quilt just sort of happened organically so I didn't have to come up with a plan... its happening differently this time around!
I have been looking around for a while, taking screen shots/pinning quilt patterns that peaked my interest (as you do) and I thought I'd found it...

Confetti Stars! Its colourful, deceptively simple and there was a tutorial done on by Missouri Star Quilt Company (click here for that).
The tutorial used Bee Basics by Lori Holt (which I loved) and layer cakes (and I have none of those!).
I started searching online but I couldn't find any of that collection and alas I couldn't find any other ones in my price range that I liked... but brain wave - solids! who doesn't love a solid colour quilt?! 
I looked through my stash and for some reason I have a crap ton of blue but everything else was seriously low on options... more online shopping! I was looking around one of my favourite online stores (plushaddict.co.uk) and this lovely print by Alison Glass came on my screen

Rainbow Feathers - Art Theory 

and that was it, bye bye Confetti Stars hello random print that I had to try and make into a quilt. 

I sat down with my paper, pencil and all the other bits I needed and set to work trying to figure it out.

It took lots of drawing to sort of get the sizing right but drawing are not the same a fabric - I got some of my random bits of fabric and sewed a couple of different sizes together

Basically I sewed it together like it was a herringbone but added the middle bit - getting the parts on the left side to line up was a bitch challenge but I thought it worked out pretty well.... the next bit is the kicker

I was googling something to do with the print, (I don't remember what but I'm annoyed I didn't do it sooner) and up pops 

Its already a pattern!! What an idiot.
That being said I don't buy patterns, I'm a girl on a budget! So I googled the pattern some more to figure out if there was a better way of doing it and I found out that the proper pattern is foundation paper pieced - that's a whole other ball game that I had not considered, so off I went with this new found knowledge to try and make a better way of doing it and I totally did

more random bits of fabric I had became this lovely block. BOOM revolutionary!

My ever changing nature though could not leave it alone so I've found other patterns I'm thinking about 

I'm still leaning towards the Feathers pattern though. I'm gonna ponder it for awhile, I don't want to start something and not love it half way though.

Ha told you I would be back

 This one is actually something I was working on when I last blogged in 2016 (if you can remember that far back), hot damn those WIP really sick around huh?

It was this bad boy...

Yep more EPP! The pattern was called Ferris Wheel and I worked on it for a while (on and off, you know how it is) and it ended up like this

I ended up giving it to my Mum for a Christmas present... which she loved (because shes been loving crap I've made her since I was 5, she really doesn't have a choice at this stage).

The back looks like this...

                     That's right, more hexis!

Pintrest strikes again with this black and white backing, I can't find the original picture but I loved how both the white and the black made the colours pop so I thought I'd give it a go... not sure it translated quite how I wanted it to but hey-ho thats how it goes sometimes

I hand quilted it using different colour embroidery thread and it gave it a nice poofy look

ok so I'm definitely not a blogger....

 5 years?! I have no excuse except that I totally forgot I had a blog (and I use the term 'had' very loosely)

I have been doing stuff over the last 5 years, but for the life of me I cant remember what!

There have been 2 more babies so its safe to assume 2 more baby quilts - what they where is anyone's guess (I'm currently trolling though my one drive in search of pictures!). Honestly its kind of annoying me that I can't remember, I'm a bad honorary aunt! 

My oldest sister turned 40... there was definitely a quilt for that

Emmas 40th

This was an EPP one, I love Hexis and had/have a giant box I'm slowly working my way though, I was working on some and I thought why not use some for Emma's birthday? so I sorted though and found her favourite colours (purple and pink for those of you who couldn't guess), obviously ordered some more fabric in those colours and set about the longest project EVER! 

The EPP took a really long time, especially as I was trying to keep it a secret so would have to hide it whenever she came to visit, but I enjoy a bit (or a lot) of mindless sewing so it suited me!
I'm not going to lie, the fact that the E is not in the middle of the 'back' annoys the hell out of me, but by the time I realized it was to late so I just learned to live with it (at least its only the back!)

I was actually about a month late with this and the way I chose to quilt it in no way helped!

Not the best picture, but what you gonna do?

I started off  by quilting hexi shapes in different sizes, then between those shapes I did straight lines it different widths, directions and colours.
I really liked how the quilting turned out, it was different than anything I had done before and I think it looks good - my sister likes it anyway which is the important thing!  

There was another one I'm going to looks for pictures of... I'll be back... probably.. maybe... we will see