Took Off

I took my machine in to be fixed, cleaned and oiled today.  Should be about 4 to 5 days and I'll have it back.  In the mean time, I set up my Featherweight machine and took off sewing.  I finished the jelly roll racer.

This one was made with 2.5 inch strips that are not a jelly roll.  I love that you can take your own fabrics and create a jelly roll to use.  I also love the way the way the pattern presents itself.  Like working with variegated yarn, you just don't know how the pattern will evolve.

P.S.  Another row added to the Orca Bay Mystery quilt.  :-)

Duuuh!

I was looking at all the 2.5 inch strips of Christmas fabric on my cutting table, trying to figure out how I would store them.  Should I put them all back in the bin they came out of?  Should I look for another bin/tub to put them in?  Then it hit me!  Duuuh!  Pack them into kits to be sewn together!

So I now have a total of 5 jelly roll racer kits to take with me to the Quilt Retreat.  I think I should have enough to keep me busy!  I could even check out some of the other kits I have.  I do have a wool kit I started to cut last Fall plus I've been cutting hexies. 

I did finish cutting all of my paper templates out yesterday.  There were some great old movies on TMC that I have never seen.  Plus it was a rainy day, a perfect way to spend the afternoon. (I did some cleaning in the morning.)

I even have more dryer sheets ready to be made into string blocks.  Should I take those too?  You know, just in case I run out of things to do.....

Little Bits

I cut some more of my hexagons out this week.  I stacked them together with a yellow center and 6 petals.  I'm going to store them in the little tin behind behind the stack.  This tin was one that my son and daughter-in-law gave me with cookies.  They had been to England and since I collect tins, it was the perfect gift!

 I also cut these Christmas fabrics into 2.5 inch strips for a jelly roll racer quilt.  I have about 62 strips.  The red strips at the top have some flaws in the fabric by the salvage edge, so when I sew the strips together, I'll lose some of the length as I'll cut that part off.

And all of the strips fit nicely in the lettuce container.  Ready to take it to Quilt Retreat in September.  I now have 3 projects ready to sew.  So how many would be too many projects?  I'm thinking I need more, as I don't want to run out of things to do.

My Own Jelly Roll Racer

Do you remember me talking to you about our Quilt Day here?  We had strips of fabric that we used to make our own jelly rolls and then sewed them to make a quilt.  It takes 40 strips and the directions are here. 

Using my own Christmas fabric, I finished a top today.   I didn't count exactly 40 strips as I used left over pieces of fabric, fat quarters and some pieces that were the width of the fabric.  I really like the way it turned out.  

I'm thinking I should cut up all of my Christmas fabric into 2.5 inch strips.  I could make a couple more of these and also use the strips to make 2.5 inch squares for 4 patch or 9 patch blocks.  I've used up all of my Valentine fabric and most of my St. Patrick's Day fabric.  Why not clear this out too???? 

Summer Is Over (for me).

Today was my last day of vacation.  I'm back to work tomorrow. I'm happy and sad.

I set about trying to make a jelly roll of my Christmas fabrics today.  Took a lot longer than I thought it would. (I'm still not done.)  And I'm trying to sew the strips together so I can make one of the jelly roll racer quilts to show you.  I posted about making one this past Saturday at my quilt day.  I have a bin of fabric but when I started decide what to cut, I really didn't have many large pieces.  Lots of fat quarters.  So I'm using those.   It will be interesting to see how this turns out.