Vintage Christmas Wallhanging

Here is my finished top for my Vintage Christmas wallhanging.  All the embroidery is done on the blocks that called for it, too.  I think it turned out nice, even though the 6-inch blocks were a real pain to make and keep to size.

As you can see from the picture above, I opted not to make the Twinkle Light border.  It would have required me to make 44 individual 3-inch light bulb units and I just wasn't convinced that I wanted to do that, or that I would even like the result when I was finished.  I think this will work just fine, and was way quicker and easier to finish.  And the border fabric has little starbursts on it, so that's sorta like twinkle lights, right?

No more Lori Holt blocks for me anytime soon, except maybe making the giant train block baby quilt I mentioned earlier.  Her blocks are cute and all, but they just have way too many pieces!

Vintage Christmas block for September

After cutting things so close last month, I decided to go ahead and knock out my blocks early this time.  The two blocks that I made from this month's assignment were, from left to right, Vintage Ornament and Under the Tree.  We were also assigned the Twinkle Lights block, which I was going to use as a border, but I decided to wait until I got the top finished to the point of needing the border before I decided or made any of them. 

August Vintage Christmas blocks

This month in our Vintage Christmas block of the month class (aka Moda class) we were assigned 5 blocks, as usual, but I actually needed 3 of them this time.  From left to right, the blocks are: Taffy, Stocking, and Toy Train. 

The first two I did in the featured colors (though not the featured fabric), but with the train, I decided to switch things up a bit.  The original had the train in dark and light blues, but I decided to go with gray and black.  I had dark and light blue (the light blue is in the Taffy block and the dark blue is in the Stocking block), but I thought the gray and black would look better than the specific blue fabrics that I had.  I was afraid there wouldn't be enough contrast between the blues.

I really like the train block, in general, so I'm thinking that I might use the design to make a large block baby quilt.  I've already figured up the cutting directions to enlarge it to a 36 inch block.  I'm not sure when I'll get around to making it, though.

I was really cutting it close getting the blocks done this month. For me it was more important that I get the wedding quilt top finished (featured in the previous post) so I could leave it to be quilted, than to get the blocks done, so I worked on the wedding quilt first.  Once it was finished, then I shifted over to the blocks.  I finished them the night before the meeting.  It all worked out in the end, since I got them all finished in time.

Split Stars Wedding Quilt

My oldest step-daughter is getting married in November, so as a wedding gift, I'm making a quilt for her.  She picked out the fabric and the pattern.  The fabric is Something Borrowed by Christopher Thompson for Riley Blake fabrics.  I purchased mine from the Fat Quarter Shop, and I was really happy with the experience.  The fabric shipped and was delivered very quickly (unlike my recent experiences with Missouri Star Quilt Company).  The fabric seemed to be accurately cut and very neatly packaged, so I was pleased all around.

The pattern she chose was called Split Stars from A Bright Corner. The pattern actually features this fabric, so it was really easy for her know what the finished quilt would look like ahead of time.  I've never done a quilt in the featured fabric before, so this was a first for me.  I'm usually not a "paint by number" kind of girl, but it did make the whole process go a little easier, because all of the decisions were made for me ahead of time.  And when I'm making something for someone else, it's nice to not have to make the decisions.  This way I know it's something she will like. 

I dropped the quilt off at the quilt shoppe on Wednesday to be quilted.  Hopefully they will get to it in time for me to get it bound before the wedding.  Fingers crossed.

Five Easy Pieces baby quilt

This little quilt is a variation on a Five Easy Pieces Charity Quilt I found online.  In the original quilt, the blocks were like a single round of a Log Cabin block, but one of the commenters suggested that she would make all the bricks around the center the same size and put it together with partial seams.  I liked that idea and decided to try it.

I wanted to be able to use fat quarters and I wanted to make as efficient use of the fabric as I could.  That is one reason why I wanted to use the one size brick and partial seams method.  That way I could cut all the fat quarters the same way and make all of the blocks the same.  The original pattern made a 12 inch block, but I scaled it down to a 9 inch block so that I could get enough pieces from the fat quarters to make a reasonably sized and shaped quilt.  The quilt finishes at 37 inches by 47 inches, which I think makes a nice sized baby quilt.

This quilt uses 4 fat quarters for the blocks, along with some white yardage.  The fat quarters are ones that I won from our monthly drawings at the Moda class I attend at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe, and the white yardage was left over from a previous project.  All I had to buy for the quilt was the border fabric, binding fabric, backing fabric, and batting.  I'm not sure yet what I'll do with it, but I think it would make a nice little quilt to donate somewhere, possibly.