A Little Time for Me

 I started the day well by finishing off the top made from Split Nine Patch 4" blocks. I sewed for quite a while last night and got almost all the blocks done so today I only needed to make 2 more blocks and then join them together. Aesthetically I prefer to add a narrow border in a feature fabric and then add a darker border 4 to 5" in width. However this one is a donation quilt, it's large enough at 44" x 64", and I didn't have any suitable fabric for the border. I even used left over binding in greens which worked with the colours in the blocks.

 I had received a lot of these floral squares which are 4.5" in size so I used them as the dark side of the half square triangles. You think you'll use up lots of fabric when you make a quilt but the stack of 4" squares has hardly decreased in size at all.

 It was a good way to use up some of those older scraps though and I \will be able to make lots more before I run out of squares. These have been sitting here for too long and it's good to get them made into quilts and donated. Even the less pretty (or downright ugly) fabric still looks OK when the pattern depends on tone rather than colour and using dark or light fabric allows me to use up lots of different scraps.

Finally this afternoon, after quilting and binding the donation quilt, I made time to get one of my projects out to work on. My Melbourne quilting group is making a reproduction of an Australian quilt made in the 1800s and there is going to be a display of them at our exhibition on the 5th and 6th of April 2014, so I need to get mine finished soon. Until today I was up to the last border of rust and cream but had only sewn one side of the border. It's a bit tedious making all the small triangles which measure 2.5" square but it's best to just keep going as it's harder to get motivated again after putting it away for a while. Others are making their Elizabeth Legacy quilts in reproduction fabrics but I decided to use my Australian wildflower fabric, designed by Leesa Chandler.
I'll keep going with it again tomorrow before I work nights again so maybe I can get another border or two finished.
Hugs, Jan Mac