Sunday Quiltin'

Oh sweet sunny Sunday! I was able to start the quilting machine up early today and get some quilting done. My aunt Jean sends baby quilts to me for quilting, and I worked on two of them this morning. She is so creative! I also found a wayward quilt project from many years ago that had some minimal hand quilting to hold it together. I went ahead and finished it on the longarm.

I visited my friend Laura today and we were chatting about Cootie Bug's Siggy Block swap. I haven't picked out my fabric selections, but Laura has some great ideas for hers. We also talked about mini quilts, so I am posting two pics of unfinished minis I have hanging around. I think I'll add another border to the black and Asian fabric one. The scrappy sampler has been hanging around for a couple of years - I used to sell a lot of mini quilt tops on eBay, and this one was made during that time. It doesn't hang straight, so I kept it...I see that every time I look at it.

The Asian quilt measures 12" x 16", and the scrappy measures 9" x 12". Both were made from leftovers from other projects.

Maybe I will make more little quilts this year once I've finished these two. The ones I've made in the past were based on antique doll quilts, but unfortunately I don't have photos of those anymore.

Laura is having spaghetti for dinner, which sounds terrific, but my hubby is craving something spicy, so I see chicken-filled tortillas in my future. I better thaw out the chicken then!

Hope everyone is having a good weekend!

Pieced Backings - Fun!

I just saw a neat backing by Bonnie on Quiltville's blog, and decided that is what I want to do for my version of a split nine patch (one of my UFOs in my To-Do bin). After pulling the top out, I am going to use the red prints you see to make scrappy borders. The quilt needs to be larger as I want it to fit on our queen bed.

Any left over reds will go onto the back. Another idea I have is to actually make a large version of 4 split nine patches for a center - maybe done in creams - so there is a design on the back. I really like how the pieced backings give the quilts a little more surprise.

In Bonnie's backing example (Quiltville) she used up many scraps (7 yards worth!). I don't have that many reds so will go buy some more - Just for fun! Here are examples for backing (think varied reds). The 4 centered blocks measure 18" x 18" (see block on the right) - so they can be easily divided by 3. Making the outer borders 22" each side will yield a backing thats 80" x 80". Not quite large enough, so I will play around with the sizes.

I have made notes and put my top back in it's project bag for now. I have some prep to do for a small quilting meeting this Friday, so while inspired, my big top will have to wait a week or two for it's backing.

Hope you are happy quilting out there!