Project Quilting 16.4 - Birthstone

A few years ago, I participated in a Sulky webinar on making quilts that resemble gemstones. It involved using an interesting technique where you use freezer paper templates to piece together different shades of solid fabric.  The different facets of the gemstone are different shades of the gem's color.  It's like paper piecing, but since you don't actually sew through the freezer paper, there are no tiny pieces of paper to pick out of the final project.

Birthstone series by MJ Kinman

I've always wanted an emerald, but real ones are a bit above my price range.  Quite a bit above! So I bought the webinar kit for the emerald.  That was more affordable than a real emerald, and I could hang it in my sewing room.     

I pieced the quilt top, but never quilted it.  The quilting instructions were a bit scary to me, since they involved free motion quilting using different color threads in each facet. So I put the project aside and figured that I would finish it after I practiced FMQ on other projects.

So this challenge immediately brought that project to mind.  I know that there is lots of left over fabric and I haven't even touched the thread yet.  So I decided that for this challenge I would make another emerald and actually finish this one!

The only problem with that plan is the fact that I have no idea where I put the original emerald quilt top and the extra fabric and the thread.  I know that I put them all together - somewhere.  I've looked everywhere that I could think of and they just refuse to be found.  I started looking on Monday and by Thursday afternoon, I got desperate. In addition to a Friday evening and a Sunday morning commitment, I have a workshop scheduled with my local quilt guild for 6 hours on Saturday. That left me with basically only one day left to get this challenge done.  

I did some stash diving and found a half yard of a green tone on tone that really called out to me.  I let it sit on my ironing board for a few hours to see if it would tell me what it wanted to become.  

My PQ16.1 project was a leprechaun that I named Cornelius, and he is hanging near the ironing board in my sewing room.  So under Cornelius's influence, the green tone on tone decided that it wanted to be a lucky four leaf clover pillow for my living room.  Here is my new birthstone colored pillow, just in time for St. Patrick's Day!

Project Quilting 16.3 - Common Blocks

This week's theme didn't really excite me.  In fact, I considered skipping this week altogether.  Don't get me wrong, I like common, or traditional blocks.  I have made lots and lots of quilts with common blocks.  I've even designed a few.

But for some reason, I kept picturing a block of the month program for beginner quilters.  Something that starts with very easy blocks, (probably 12 inches) laid out 3 X 4 with sashing.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with a quilt like that, but I just didn't want to make one. And for the life of me, I just couldn't picture anything else.

Also, I'm in the middle of working on two different UFOs, and I didn't want to take the time to make anything very big. 

So I kept procrastinating and mulling over options.  I could make a table runner.  Or not.  I could make a wall hanging.  Or not.  How about another potholder? (Always my PQ fall-back option!) Nah. Sometime midweek, I realized that time was running out, so I was REALLY going to have to 's*** or get off the pot' as my mother used to say.  

When I received an email on Thursday asking me to do a demonstration on quilt finishing techniques for our next guild meeting, my decision was made. I volunteered to show how to make faux flange binding and two sided binding.  I needed to make a small sample quilt to use as a sample to demonstrate a faux flange binding, so I could also use it as my entry for PQ 16.3!  And maybe I will use the two side binding on my entry for PQ 16.4.  That would give me samples for both techniques! No pressure, Trish, LOL!

I also did a little 'creative reading' of the challenge.  It said that we have to use at least three common blocks.  But it didn't say we needed to use three DIFFERENT common blocks.....

For my sample, I used four small churn dash blocks, set them two by two and finished the edges with a faux flange binding.   When I was done, I realized that they formed a four patch, which is a  common block.  Then I looked closer - the corners of the churn dash blocks are 'half square' triangles, and when you set four churn dash blocks together, they form a 'small square in a square' block right in the center.  So technically, I did use three common blocks ^.^

10 1/2 square small quilt or hot pad