At a loss

of ideas for what to do with these panels.  I know that I want to use them to make a quilt for my daughter’s bed.  I bought way more panels than I needed (9).  There are 3 different girls but they are similar to the below picture

Beauty is in You panel by Cori Dantini

My thought is to use 5 panels -2 on the top, 1 in the center and 2 on the bottom  with a pieced block between and sashing all around the blocks.  I can’t decide what to do for the pieced blocks though.  The panels aren’t squares–they are 14 x 22 so that is one reason, I’m having difficulty.  I thought of perhaps putting something different in each block that tells what Lil Bee is like–but do you think that is too busy and will detract from the panels.  Maybe I should just do some simple appliquéd flowers in between the panels or circles(bubbles), what do you think?  Just not sure…..

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Hubby’s T-shirt Quilt

So after finishing the top of my jelly roll quilt, I decided it was probably time to focus a little on Hubby’s t-shirt quilt.  I’ve mentioned before how much tedious it is ironing interfacing to the backs of t-shirts.  Well, I think I’ve finally finished that step.  Since my husband’s birthday is coming up in November, I had hoped that maybe I could finish it in time–that is until my husband informed me that he still hasn’t decided how he wants his Boston Marathon finish represented and that is a KEY piece of this quilt.  Sigh…so much for getting this off my to-do list.

Anyways, since I didn’t really have any easy projects keyed up for quilt guild meeting (we usually sew at them–it’s the best 2-3 hours of sewing -sometimes the only sewing–I get done in a month), I took the t-shirts to cut-down.  

I still need to cut down the filled t-shirt strips.  I’m hoping that will add a little life to this quilt.  So until Hubby decides what he wants for the Boston race (the pinnacle of his running career), I guess I will be putting this aside.

My jelly roll quilt

I haven’t done a lot of sewing lately (except for those “pin cushions”) -life has been crazy busy between work and the kids activities.  I have completed a top from a jelly roll  that I started a while back.  Since this quilt isn’t designated for anyone, I’ve just worked on it sporadically.  I made it with a jelly roll of Martinique by Moda (Three Sisters).  I bought this jelly roll when I first decided I wanted to quilt–I was afraid to use it in a project though because I loved the colors so much that I was afraid to waste it on my first project.  I ended up using really cheap fabric for my first project (that remains unfinished).  I finally realized why it’s best to use good fabrics–the fabrics are so stretched out and uneven on that first quilt-so now they are set aside for when I start practicing free motion quilting.

The pattern  I used for the jelly roll quilt is Candy Heart in the book Jelly Roll Inspirations compiled by Pam and Nicky Lintott (the actual designer of the pattern is Pamela Boatright).  I have not finished pressing all the seams.  I seem to lose track of that step when I’m working on something a little bit here and there-probably because I love ironing so much:).  All in all it’s a fairly simple pattern.  I made a few mistakes sewing this.  First, the heart is comprised of half square triangles of the dark/heart strips and light colored strips–I did not realize when I squared them up that I needed to make sure that the center diagonal on my ruler needed to match up with the meeting of those 2 halves so my blocks for the heart don’t really match up.

HST seams that don’t match up

Just so we’re clear, I am pointing out these mistakes so I remember them in the future and hopefully someone out there will benefit from my mistakes.  I do realize that for the most part, if I don’t point out the mistakes that the average viewer will not notice them.  I suppose I could pretend it turned out perfect but who’s going to benefit from that?

Second,  the checkerboard seams around the heart don’t quite match up all the way around the heart.  I’m usually pretty good about making sure that I have a 1/4 inch seam but I do on occasion make take that “scant 1/4 seam” a little too seriously.  If I had thought of it early enough, I would have purposely staggered the outside checkerboard so that it didn’t meet at the seams.

See my mismatched seams. If I had staggered the seams, no one would have ever noticed.

All in all, the top didn’t turn out bad. I will probably keep this quilt in my family room so I’m fine with a few mistakes.  I mean after all, quilting is a learning process, right?  In the future, I think I will use actual yardage for these types of patterns in the hopes that maybe I can fix some mistakes.  When you hold onto the jelly roll as long as I did, there really isn’t any recourse when you make a huge error unless you start all over with new fabric.  I may still go back and fix the checkerboard around the heart.

My version of Candy Heart.

Looking at this picture, I just noticed another mistake–can you tell what it is?

For now, I’m putting this top aside to work on my youngest daughter’s quilt which is going to be fabric panels of Beauty in You interspersed with some free form blocks.  I bought this fabric because it just screamed my daughter’s name when I saw it.  I had fully intended to buy Aneela Hoeey’s Walk in the Woods fabric to make a quilt for her (her favorite color is/was red–she now says it’s purple) but the Beauty in You Fabric was just too perfect and actually coordinates with the bright pink walls of her room.  She doesn’t seem as thrilled with the fabric as I do–so I may have a quilt to sell when it’s all done.  I’m hoping that she will be pleasantly surprised with the end product–wish me luck.