Wednesday, May 9, 2012

How to build a raffle quilt.....................


I am happy to report that I had a VERY PRODUCTIVE day yesterday. You know those 544 blocks I made last week - well I made good progress in getting those blocks together. A bit of a false start - I started to sew them together - then thought if they were rearranged in a different way - they would look better - a bit of seam ripping and YES - I was right - looks MUCH better this way. Sorry - can't share until the end of the month.


I took on the responsibility of the assembling the raffle quilt for the Halton Hills Quilter's Guild. (Oh yes - I still have the Brampton raffle quilt to put together as well)

I thought I would share with you the steps to putting the quilt together..................

Step One - pick a pattern (thanks to Marian for suggesting this)


The pattern - was in the Special Winter 2011 edition of Quilt Mania (although I am CERTAIN that Marian sent me the picture months ago after she saw it on a blog)

I increased the numbers of blocks in the quilt and had to REDUCE the size of each center block from 16 inches to 12 inches. An EASY task in EQ7


Buy a bolt of SOLID WHITE fabric

Enlist the guild to donate REDS

Wash the fabrics (YES - I did wash the whites separately from the  reds)

Hmmmms - looks like a little bit of bleeding on a couple of the reds. Washed the entire lot with SYNTHRAPOL  which is a bonding agent for loose dye. 

Testing the reds AFTER they were washed. Take a small snipped - SATURATE it with water and lay on white paper towel

HMMMMMM - looks like we have ONE rogue fabric - although I could not get it to repeat this bleed

Start cutting - here are the white parts

Gather a few eager sewers - Vicki, Lynda and Bar - see how happy they were and this was the END of the day

More happy sewers - Sue (on the iron), Mary (she was speedy and sewed TWO at a time because she didn't want to wait for the pressing or the trimming) and Marg


And what do you get?????????????????




THIRTY TWO blocks DONE for the border!!!!!!!!!



What an awesome job and SO MUCH FUN!!!!!    Lots of laughs and never a dull moment. And we had a HUGE variety of reds, but all together - they look AMAZING.


I was cutting and trimming and when they all got into production mode - I couldn't keep up to them!!!!!   Of course in the morning, I was cutting the blocks for the center squares as well.



Here is ONE block that I sewed for the center blocks. Ooops - that center is supposed to be RED. I have fixed it, but can't load the picture.


One of the center blocks - GORGEOUS

The reds cut for one of the alternative blocks - they are twelve of one and 13 of the other style. 


Wow - one more sewing day and we should be ready to assemble!!!!!    How is that for TEAM WORK!!!!!!!



Of course - there were some comments that weren't welcome and I sure fixed that in a hurry - see what I mean....................
The QUILT POLICE has been tossing unwanted comments for a long time and I finally FIXED her yesterday!!!!    She shall comment NO MORE!!!!!!
Like everyone - our sewing spaces tend to get a bit messy if there is NO reason to keep it tidy. With people coming over - I had to tidy up a bit. The nice thing - it just doesn't take long to tidy up. I kept out the URGENT projects for this month and the rest is tucked away. I am only going to leave out those projects for this month and I LOVE having all the space!!!!!

This was from one of the quilt shows that I recently attended. Well a visit to one of the vendors at a quilt show.

MORE I Spy fabric - ACK - STOP ME!!!!!!!!!!



Well there you have it - another great day in the studio. I can't help myself - I am sewing late into the evening and I'm LOVING IT. And I am getting so much done - I am feeling great about that. BUT - I have to start getting some hand work done.

Oh yes - so yesterday we were chatting about what quilt to do for a second place quilt - a couple of ideas got tossed up - someone said Christmas, someone said paper piecing and VOILA - I had the perfect pattern. We agreed and so the second place raffle quilt is born. Have to get everything ready for the guild this month so the members can make the blocks.


OK - I'm out of here. I may get a smidgen of gardening done before I hit the gym.


Have a great day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Ciao!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1 comment:

  1. I spent a bit of time reading some old posts and they are so funny! Love the quilt police!!

    ReplyDelete