I walked in and Lynn was talking about Victoria Findlay Wolfe's book,
and showed us some sample blocks she made by making fabric following Victoria's process. I thought to myself, that's pretty easy to do and then didn't think about it again until much later in the day.
After the meeting I stopped at the JoAnn Fabrics on that side of town, across the river and through the woods; looking for just one fat quarter of the orange swirl print I used in my chevron quilt to augment the Swirl Charm packs by Whistler Studios at Windham Fabrics.
I already tried the two JoAnn's on my side of town, as well as, JoAnn's website but to no avail. After deciding earlier this month to add another four panels to each row in this quilt, I was moving along quickly until I hit the orange row and realized I didn't have enough fabric for another block. I already used most of that fat quarter for the Alzheimer's art quilt I donated last month. Hence my mad search in all the Jacksonville JoAnn Fabric stores.
I was contemplating using different fabric and taking the whole orange row apart; when the inspiration struck. I have a pile of small pieces of the orange swirl fabric in a ziploc baggie, which is my favorite way to save the small scraps. Since I do a lot of foundation paper piecing, I always keep a few small scraps just in case I need to add a smidge here or there.
So, I looked at this small orange swirl pile and thought to myself; can I make enough fabric from this? I just needed one 5" square.
The answer is yes! Thank you, Victoria, Lynn and the JMQG.
It's not exactly beautiful yet: a.) I need to clean up a couple of the seams at the points; b.) definitely clean up those blue chalk marks, funny how the naked eye doesn't pick these things up; and c.) the made fabric seams will all but disappear when the quilt is machine quilted. My goal is now to have this quilt completed by the end of the month.
I was so thrilled to be inspired, I ordered Victoria's book today and should get it by the end of the week.
So back to the JMQG meeting. Yes, I did donate a block and told the story about how I had this dilemma about taking back the promised paper pieced block. I made a duplicate of the one below but with a thin 1/2 inch border around the block. I'm using some paper piecing templates from The Quilter's Cache by Marcia Hohn, but didn't pay close enough attention when I made the first block. Her templates are for 12 inch unfinished blocks and they need to be adjusted since the other blocks are going to be 12 1/2 inches unfinished.
After getting home from the guild meeting [inspiration hadn't struck me yet] I decided to make another turquoise and gray block. As I was trimming the last of eight pieces for my variation of Marcia Hohn's Spiderweb block, below....
that's when the inspiration hit! I was thinking about the making fabric process and my baggie of small orange scraps and trimmed the last spiderweb piece exactly at the 1/4 inch mark instead of adjusting and making it 1/2 inch on the outside border. So while I solved the chevron quilt dilemma, I now have to make another corner for the spiderweb block. I'll just have to add this too perfectly trimmed corner to my stash for future fabric making.
All in all, it was a great day. See you soon,
Maus
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