Scrap Buster Baby Quilts

It's Friday again, and I have finishes!  These two sweet little baby quilts were made entirely from my scraps.  It's such a rewarding feeling to make use of some of those scraps.  I'll tell you what else is really rewarding about baby quilts: speed! There's nothing to help you get your quilting groove back like whipping out a quilt in a day.

Photo from White Sands National Monument, NM.

The little girl quilt I am calling "Pink Lemonade."  I wrote up a brief tutorial in case you want to make a scrap quilt like it; the tutorial can be found here.  Basically, I just cut patches from my pink and yellow scraps that measured 3.5" on at least one side. Then I sewed those patches into one loooong chain, chopped up the chain and sewed it into a top.  The finished quilt measures 36" x 39".

I decided to try out spiral quilting, a new-to-me technique, on this little top since the size made it manageable.  I used a light pink thread and a fairly tight spiral and I have to say, I love the result!  In fact, I am already in the process of spiral quilting a larger quilt now.

The pieced-pieces in the lower right and middle left are remnants from my Dino quilt

Several people have asked me how I went about the quilting but, honestly, there was no real science to it.  I used my compass (like the kind you used in geometry) to mark a circle about the size of a quarter in roughly the center of the quilt. Then, using my walking foot I quilted around the circle. After I closed the circle I deviated slightly out to begin my spiral. I eyeballed a slim 1/4" gap to the side of my walking foot nearest my previous line of stitching and just quilted along.

I thought the circle in the middle of the quilting looked empty so I embroidered a little flower in it.

It was a little stop-and-go at the beginning as I was having to turn the quilt so much and quilting in a pretty tight circle, but the farther out I got the easier it became.  Starting on a small quilt is definitely the way to go as less bulk makes it a lot easier to turn. 

I was expecting problems with wrinkling or distortion but none ever emerged.  Just a couple of cautionary remarks about spiral quilting: 1) It takes a long time and a lot of thread, relative to the size of quilt you're doing. I think this tiny quilt used 5 or 6 bobbins.  And 2) make sure that you spiral clockwise, other wise you'll end up pushing more and more bulk through the throat of your machine with every round, rather than less.

I have to give a shout out to Rachael from The Floral Suitcase.  I won her drawing during the Sew Mama Sew Giveaways and she sent me a charm pack and a ton of the best scraps, all the way from Ireland!! Several of her scraps made appearances in these two quilts and I adore the fabrics she sent.  Thanks Rachael! 

For the backing I used some of my precious, large scale Tula Pink fabric from the Plume line.  I found a bolt of it on sale at a quilt shop in California. It was marked down because it had faded some, but I can't tell the difference! I stocked up on it for little girl quilts.

I am generally NOT a pink kind of a girl, but I love these swirly swans and the soft pink works so perfectly for a baby girl quilt.  I bound the Pink Lemonade quilt in a pretty pink weave fabric and it will being going off soon to a sweet couple expecting their first baby in the fall.

I also made this baby boy quilt from my scraps after seeing all the modern herringbone quilts popping up around blogland.  It measures about 36" square and is backed with a soft, dark blue flannel.  Every fabric in the quilt top, including the muslin, was cut from my scraps piles. 

Photo from White Sands National Monument, NM

I have to give credit to Amanda Jean for convincing me to sort my scraps. It was reading Sunday Morning Quilts that got me to finally get around to it. Since then I've made exponentially more scrap quilts than before. It really is true that piles of well sorted scraps are not only easier to use, they're inspiring!

I quilted this one with sort of an overlapping zig-zag in a variegated blue-green thread.  So far this quilt isn't assigned to anyone, so it will be added to my emergency baby-quilt stash.  I wrote a basic tutorial for this top, too, which you can read here if you'd like to make your own.  

Linking up to Amanda Jean's Finish it Friday.  Have a wonderful weekend!

Scrappy Herringbone Tutorial

Hello, as promised I am posting another scrappy quilt tutorial. This one is for a scrappy modern herringbone. I have been seeing these quits pop up every where in the modern blogging world and just had to make one.  It makes a perfect quick, scrappy baby quilt AND a great scrap buster!

Just like I said yesterday, before you start sewing, really pre-quilting step one, is to organize your scraps.  Having your scraps organized makes them sooo much easier to use and be inspired by.  So, scraps organized? Good! On to the sewing!
 
Step 1 is to pick two contrasting colors (or color groups) for your quilt. I chose muslin and blue with a bit of green.  Pick a size of square to start with.  A 5" square will yield finished half square triangles of about 4" square.  It doesn't really matter what size you choose to start, as long as they are all the same.  You will need half as many squares of each color as the total number of HST blocks the finished quilt will have. (So for an 8x8 layout, that's 64 blocks, meaning I need to cut 32 squares from each of my colors.)

Step 2 is to go through your scraps cutting squares of your chosen size until you have enough.  If you start running out of scraps large enough to get a square from, you can also cut triangles half the size of your chosen square. 2 triangles = 1 square.

(Method #2 here details the technique we are using to make our HSTs)

Step 3 is to begin sewing your HSTs.  Use a pencil and your ruler to mark a line from corner to corner on the back side of all the squares of one color.  Then pair up the fabrics with the opposite color, right sides together, and sew 1/4" to either side of the line.  Cut the blocks in half along the marked line to yield 2 HSTs per pair. Press and trim if desired (I hate trimming, and since this is a scrap quilt anyway, I just let it go.)

Step 4 is to arrange your blocks on the design wall.  In retrospect, I wish I had tried more to keep the blues similar where they touch. Oh well, just an excuse to make this design again!  When you are happy with your arrangement begin sewing the top together. I prefer to sew this type of quilt together but grouping the small blocks into larger and larger blocks, rather than rows.  It makes it so much easier to make those points match!

That's it! There are plenty of potential variations to this design. Try going for rainbow colors, or creating a gradation across the quilt.