What's Red and White and Blue All Over?

 An American Patriotic quilt of course!

I had a bunch of patriotic scraps cut into 2" squares, and I had some scraps of blue wide backing fabric, so I put those together, and voila, a scrappy patriotic quilt! Well, a quilt top at any rate 😉 This quilt used 608 2" squares, bringing my total to 10,862 2" squares sewn into quilt tops.

Obviously I am not one of those people who needs all the stripes in a quilt going the same direction! I like the movement stripes create when they are going every which way.

The April murder mystery quilt blocks are still warm from the iron.

My leg and hip are still causing problems, and I was warned that ligaments take a while to heal. I finally was thinking straight enough today to make the murder mystery blocks, but most of the week I've only been working on making units for quilt blocks. I haven't even been assembling the blocks, just sewing up easy units for several quilts. 

Making easy units like four patches and nine patches are a good thing to do when you're hurting, and can only sew for short sessions at a time. Until my leg is all healed up, I'm cutting myself some slack and will only work on what I feel like doing since sitting hurts. I don't have any pressing deadlines right now, so if I had to be somewhat out of commission, the timing wasn't bad. 

DD#1's other pregnant goat had her kids, and she had triplets!

What are the odds of her having a blonde, a brunette and a redhead? The redhead is the only girl of all four new kids, the rest are boys. I love seeing pics of all the baby animals, and I'm hoping I get to see them in person before too long. 

Correction and a Finish

 When I posted about my Scrap Vomit Quilts, I said I couldn't link to the pattern because that link no longer worked. Well, I was right and wrong about that. The link to the blog where I got the pattern is defunct, BUT, the pattern is on another site and that is working.

If you wanted to make a Scrap Vomit quilt and need a pattern, here you go.

http://www.free-tutorial.net/2022/02/technicolour-yawn-aka-scrap-vomit-quilt.html

I used 2" cut squares in mine, not the 2.5" the pattern calls for so the measurements of mine are not the same. You can use the same method with any size squares, go smaller if you like and make a postage stamp quilt, or use bigger squares and make a bed size quilt quickly.

I did have an actual quilt finish this week. The quilt DH will be raffling off at Amerivespa in Flagstaff, AZ in June is now finished! When I was debating on which color thread to quilt it with, I found that a spool of thread my mom gave me was a good choice, so that's what I used. 

Besides that finish I haven't sewn much this week. What I thought was just sleeping wrong ended up being a damaged ligament in my leg. Sitting is not very comfortable at all, so I'm only sewing very short stints at a time. I'm doing my physical therapy exercises and I've got some meds that will hopefully sort things out a bit more quickly, but until then I'm only doing what I can tolerate. 

DD#1 has been cheering me up with pics of the new baby goat on their homestead.

Here he is with Mama.

This marking on his back earned him the name Batman.

I already sewed a bit today and caught up on my temperature quilt. I've found doing the units a week at a time easiest to stick with. In a bit, I'll go back to assembling another quilt made with 2" cut squares, this time in a patriotic colorway. Any progress is good, even if it's slow!

Color Control the Scrappy Way

 In a way, I'm kind of glad I let the 2" cut squares get out of hand. That may sound weird, but since I have so many squares, I can play around with color control.

The black squares in this quilt were all leftover quilt backing. It has a grey design on the black, so if you think it looks more grey than black, there's a reason for that. I had enough red squares that I picked out the ones that only had white or black designs on it, plus red solids and blenders. For my white squares, they all have a black design on them. I ended up with a very color controlled palette all from scraps. This quilt was just 3.5" cut squares alternating with four patches made from the 2" cut squares.

 I had a lot of yellow squares, and not quite as many orange ones. To give myself more orange options, I added in white fabrics with orange designs. The white squares don't scream out they don't belong, since I staying within the color families I was using. 

If this scrap quilt looks fun to you, it's a free pattern called Twirling at the Disco, but since I was using squares cut at 2", I needed to do a little resizing. My background pieces needed to be cut at 3.5" x 3.5", and 3.5" x 6.5" instead of how it reads in the pattern. 

This quilt is Dancing Nine Patch, and it's written for 2" cut squares. I just made more blocks than the original quilt. The original quilt was quite scrappy, but since I grouped the colors in each nine patch, mine looks less scrappy. 

I'm planning another Twirling at the Disco quilt that will not be color controlled, and another Dancing Nine Patch that will be color controlled a different way. 

So where am I in the 2" cut square count? Well, at the end of my last post my count was 6,966.

The four patch quilt used 576 squares, Twirling at The Disco used an even 1,200, and the Dancing Nine Patch used 1,512. That brings my total 2" cut square usage to ....10,254 squares! I'm still sewing, so I'll keep adding them up! 

Scrap Vomit #2, or Is It #1?

 I am finished making the Scrap Vomit quilt tops!

I haven't pressed the top yet, but here's the photo I took of it. This is the way the original pattern was, alternating bullseye blocks and light colored 49 patch blocks. The last one I made will the all neutral sides was just my variation. This quilt top used another 1,715 2" squares, bringing my total 2" squares sewn into quilt tops up to 6,966! 

My bullseye squares were all cutoffs from quilt backings, which is why I used those colors. Had I wanted to cut up yardage, I would have used something different. The neutral squares are all scraps from other projects. Scrap Vomit may be a less than ideal name, but a quilt that is 100% scraps is a winning pattern! Now, if you are thinking your scraps are mostly darks or medium value prints, you could still do this pattern by changing the value of the bullseye squares. If you do a Google image search for Scrap Vomit Quilts, you'll see a bunch of them a lot less color controlled than this one. 

You know, I thought I'd be sick of busting 2" squares by now, but actually, I'm more satisfied by seeing them used than I am sick of sewing of them up. For now, I'm going to stick with busting the squares. I follow a lot of quilters online, and it always surprises me when I see how many people don't save scraps this size. They think they are too small. If a usable WOF is 42", you can cut 378 squares from each yard of fabric. I've sewn 6,966 into quilt tops in the last six weeks, which represents almost 18 1/2 yards of fabric! Sure I've busted more fabric than that overall, because most of the quilts I've made use more than 2" squares.

 I know not everyone likes sewing things that finish at 1.5" or less, so if you don't enjoy it, by all means don't save the small stuff. My suggestion would be to find someone who does enjoy the small stuff and give them your scraps. If you like big pieces and quick finishes there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I will admit I cringe when I hear of someone throwing their scraps out because they don't want to work with them. I'm not cringing because I think every quilter needs to make scrap quilts, I'm cringing because of the waste. Do the landfill and a fellow quilter a favor, offer the scraps that are actually usable, but not something you want to use, to someone who will use those scraps. If you are a lone quilter like I am, I've found the easiest way to do that just posting something online in a Facebook quilting group, or some other type of online quilting group. I usually have a taker within minutes, and most people are happy to pay postage. If you want to give your scraps locally, ask a local quilt guild or quilt shop if they know someone who could use your scraps. I love making scrap quilts, but even I get overwhelmed by scraps from time to time, and I try to always give them away. Back when I was making custom scrub tops, I simply didn't have time to make a lot of scrap quilts, so I gave away LOTS of scraps. I wasn't just giving away the small stuff either, I was giving away larger pieces that I just knew I wasn't likely to use soon, or ever. People who don't have a lot of money, but want to quilt for charities, really appreciate the influx of scraps. 

 So, am I running out of 2" squares? Nope, not yet, but I am seeing a considerable dent put in my boxes of squares, I'm guessing I still have at least a dozen more quilt tops to be made. I'm not making any huge quilts right now, but sometimes a bunch of smaller quilts for easy donation are a fun way to go. By making smaller quilts, I'm able to be a bit more color controlled, and I've found that makes scrap quilts more desirable, since not everyone appreciates the kitchen sink variety of scrappy that I love.