WIP Wednesday: Piece On

Contrary to my post last Wednesday when I was anticipating a binge of quilting to occur - the last week of sewing has been ALL about piecing.

Piecing Station:

I have finished 60 of the 80 blocks needed for Picnic in Serenade on the left side of my design wall and 5 of the 20 blocks needed for Sunny Lanes. They are proving to be a nice complement to each other and instead of using Sunny Lanes as a true leader/ender project I have found it easier to alternate back and forth as I create the parts needed for each.

I am using a handy new ruler which is making my Picnic block construction much less painful and keeping Mr. Ripper out of use. The Folded Corner Clipper by Prairie Sky Quilting is designed to eliminate drawing the lines by trimming the corner before you sew. I was having issues getting pinked edges of jelly rolls to "behave" while piecing these sub units but this ruler allows me to clearly see that both fabrics are aligned properly before cutting. Having that trimmed edge to follow while sewing makes a huge difference in accuracy for me.

You can use the same technique with an Easy Angle ruler but I found all the markings to be distracting when I tried mine. And I am very careful to lay out my fabrics in the same way so I don't cut them incorrectly!

The parts for Sunny Lanes were all jumbled together in my bin so I've spent a fair amount of time sorting them out and calculating how many 4 patches and HSTs I still need to make. To complicate matters I had less than a yard left of the Moda Marbles background fabric so I was rather nervous as to whether I had enough. Turns out I had made too many 4 patches and not nearly enough HSTs but I'm quite sure I have enough fabric at this point. Whew!

I'm a big fan of the Eleanor Burns Quilt in a Day Triangle Square ruler for making quick work of trimming HSTs to the proper size. I love HSTs and have found over the years that trimming saves me a lot of headaches in block construction later. This technique allows you to trim before pressing so you only trim 2 sides instead of 4. Periodically I use my 4.5" square ruler to check my finished blocks to make sure I'm on track. Assembling Path & Styles in Thimbleberries earlier this month was an excellent reminder to keep my sub units the correct size.

I've decided I might as well finish piecing the last 20 blocks for Picnic in Serenade and the rest of the HSTs and 4 patches for Sunny Lanes while I'm in the groove... even though that means pushing my quilting projects out at least another day. As long as I'm working on UFOs in one way or another in the end it will all even out right?

I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday@Freshly Pieced.

Design Wall Monday

I haven't done a Design Wall Monday post for a long time because my wall looked the same for months on end. And really, could anything be LESS motivating than a project that lingers and subtly shames you every time you look at it? And, why don't I figure that out sooner than later?

It's going to be a good week of sewing - I can tell because I've already been sewing this morning and I rarely sew before 11. And NEVER before 9! Blue Slabs on Yellow is a flimsy after putting the last 2 rows together and I'm really liking how it turned out. It's a happy mix of scrappy shapes and it was a fun experiment along the way too. I pulled out my Mary Ellen's Best Press and gave each slab a liberal spray to stabilize all of the bias edges before I trimmed them up into 12.5" blocks.

I'll sort through my trimmings and put them away to deal with when yellow pops up for RSC15.

Last night I spent some time excavating an old UFO. I have been emailing with Vic who has a lovely blog called Park Hill Farm for some time about our Sunny Lanes projects. She encouraged me to consider using it as a leader ender project and I'm excited to get that underway. During the summer of 2013 I got into a system that worked well for me where I used the right side of my design wall to build a UFO as I was working on a primary project on the left side of my wall. Here's a pic from an old post to illustrate.

While I was working on Scrappy Strip Stacks (left) as my primary UFO I was assembling the sub units for Arkansas Crossing. Double motivation to keep both quilts growing is what it boils down to for me plus I simply love having a wall of quilty art to admire!

Sunny Lanes is another Pat Speth design from her Nickel Quilts series of books. It was an immediate favorite for me due to the fantastic secondary pattern created by the strong contrast in the blocks. And, as you can see, I've already created a fair amount of the parts. In my previous life as a Prolific UFO Maker I spent 90% of my sewing time piecing.

And, I would always sew just a few blocks together to make sure I was on the right track before going back to my happy place - piecing. The 2 blocks on the right are my test blocks and both of them had errors in them. I fixed one last night and then saw the other as I laid the blocks out and started building the next 2 blocks. Can you see it?

My plan for today is to fix that block, clear off my worktable and sort through the parts in the plastic bin to tally up where I'm at with my supply of 4 patches and HST sub units. Then I'll be ready to "load" a primary UFO on the left wall. I can safely say my quilting mo-jo is back!

I'm linking up to Design Wall Monday@Patchwork Times.