Some inspiration

The last two years I've gotten interested in projects that have taken all my time (new quilting machine, Empire Place, bags, t-shirt quilts, etc.  The result is I've been neglecting my novelty stash - 2 novelty quilts in 2 years and  of those only needed a border!  I am astounded and kind of ashamed.  One of the side benefits of this blog, I can see just how long it's been since I made the last quilt.  The scary part is it doesn't seem that long.  Time really does start going by faster as you get older.  So now I've resolved to sew up some of my stash.  I want to shared these fabrics, not hoard them in my baskets.  I'm pretty sure I have a SABLE - stash acquired beyond life expectancy.

So once again I went scanning through my old photos from quilt shows, old catalogs, pins on the internet for inspiration.  And here is the result.

This modified Friendship star was challenging.  The inspiration was from a FB post by Quilting Digest.  The piecing is easy, just HST and 4" blocks.  But figuring out how to lay it out was not easy.  I drew it out first on grid paper, to get the basic idea, then just starting putting the pieces on my wall.  I used my felt row/column tags and am proud to say I did not have to rip anything out.  This quilt was made entirely of the precut squares I had been keeping (except for the background).  I've realized I'm really not using the precut squares much any more.  Most of my quilts seem to have different sizes fussy cut from my stash so I'm going to use up those precuts.  These squares are actually 3.5" finished  - I cut the 4.5" diagonally to make the HST, then trimmed the HST down to 4".

Interlocking Friendship star - idea from Quilting Digest

 The inspiration for Radiant came from 2 places.  First the internet, which I then snipped and put in my OneNote idea notebook.  I later took a picture of one at the Dallas Quilt show and put it in my notebook.  I didn't realize I had double marked it until I was looking through my notebook for ideas.  There it was twice - how about that.  So I tried making one and it was pretty fun.  I did not want to use black for the small centers because so much of my novelty stash is dark fabric, so I decided to use yellow.  At first I was using novelty yellows, but that was too busy - the yellow got lost.  So I replaced the novelties with a small dotted yellow.  This block is made with 2 simple blocks which are then cut diagonally and sewn back to the other block - making matching pairs.  I love the optical illusion of the diamond.  I'd definitely be making this one again.

Radiant by Cozy Quilt Designs

This Kaleidoscope quilt is one of those that I give a qualified review.  It honestly would be a much prettier quilt without the novelties - they are distracting.  But it was an enjoyable quilt to make and pretty simple.  I may do another one using "regular" fabrics some time.  I'm also not completely thrilled with the piano key borders but I've discovered I'm running low on border fabrics.

Kaleidoscope by Leila Boutique

My next plan is to dump out all the precut squares and see what I can come up with - there are likely 4 or 5 quilts in that box.  Certainly I can do a few trip around the world quilts, maybe some color diagonals too.  I'll need to add a few just to keep all the ABC's plus some background fabric, but I bet I can whittle it down pretty easily. Stay tuned.