Welcome to Saturday Quilting Bring & Share. Bring along your project(s) and click into the sharing going on in our Worldwide Quilting Community. There’s so much knowledge, inspiration and genuine kindness being shared via the blogs of patchwork quilters around the World. Join in by leaving words of encouragement or helpful advice in the comments boxes of the blog posts you visit using the links below 🙂

This time last week I’d come to the conclusion I needed to make more of the triangular foundation pieced blocks to enlarge my version of Carolyn Forster’s Spider Web & Stars patchwork. I did find time in the week to dive back into my bag of assorted string scraps. I made twelve of the triangles which when sewn together made another row of three 15¼” blocks.

This morning I stitched all the blocks together into a 3 x 4 layout (I stitched the border strips to the edges of the outer blocks before stitching the blocks together). I’m very happy with the kaleidoscope look of the quilt top. It measures 47½” wide by 62″ long. I’m contemplating making 4″ scrappy borders to increase the overall size to about 56″ by 70″, more of a conventional throw size quilt.

This patchwork is the result of a quilt retreat meander. It’s now become a bit of an obsession, no distractions allowed! I was thinking maybe my creativity has stopped the meander to move in a straight line but then I thought, ‘Actually as I’m concentrating on this one quilt, I’m taking a meander AWAY from other projects’. The Diatom QAL has been parked and as for the Aran cardigan I was knitting so happily before Christmas… Well! Despite only needing the button border stitched, that isn’t so much been parked as fallen by the wayside! Never fear though, even whilst concentrating hard on one project I can still go meandering! This time to make a new design wall for my sewing room.

My original design wall was a large piece of felted table protector cloth. I hung it from the IKEA picture wire you can see at the top of the photo. It had the advantages of being large and relatively easy to pack away when the sewing room is converted into a guest room. However, over six or more years of use the hanging design wall lost it’s efficacy. As you may have noticed the original hanging wire had to be replaced with garden wire when it pulled out of the fixings. The garden wire gradually stretched. The table protector no longer hung flat, developing a couple of vertical waves that made placing blocks and partially pieced quilt tops on to it’s uneven surface rather problematic. So the long and the short of it is: I’ve covered three polystyrene boards with wadding remnants and attached them to the wall with ‘velcro’ style Command stickers. The three panels together measure 53″ across and are 18″ long. This is more of a permanent arrangement. The boards are positioned just above the back of the sofa bed. I can still hang a quilt from the wire to cover the boards when guests are using the room or I think the boards look neat enough to be left exposed. Maybe I should leave some patchwork blocks for guests to stick on the boards in an arrangement pleasing to them – like playing with a giant Fuzzy Felt board!

This week I hope to make a final decision about the borders for the Spider Web & Star quilt. Then it’ll be time for my bag of rumpled string scraps to be flattened and put back into the box they sprang from 😀

Here are the links into our Worldwide Quilting Community:

Combining 1930s reproduction prints with florals and plaids from thrift store clothing has created a quilt with a wonderful vintage air. The maker, over at Sane, Crazy, Crumby Quilting was inspired by a block she’d seen on a vintage quilt and her Grandmother’s habit of using worn out clothing in her quilt making. The block is a four patch created with two HSTs and two nine patch units. Very effective!

Using up fabric scraps and stash busting are definitely strong themes running through our patchwork-quilting world. If you have a collection of 5″ charm packs or have big enough scrap pieces to cut your own charm squares you will be especially pleased to know Cheryl Brickey of Meadow Mist Designs has a new book of throw size quilt patterns coming out very soon. She has posted more details about her book, Just Two Charm Pack Quilts, over on her blog page.

Allison over at Cluck Cluck Sew has just published her latest pattern, Kitty Cats Quilt. She’s used fun, bright fabrics to create the cat silhouettes across her sample quilt. The pattern includes instructions for three sizes of quilt and is fat quarter friendly.

Most quilts have some sort of story stitched into their making. I really enjoyed JanineMarie’s quilt reveal along with the inspirations and events woven into it’s creation. It all started with a 2011 blog post ….

A change of season can be the inspiration needed to make something new. Nancy shows that the something new doesn’t have to be big or complicated, simple to piece mini quilts can bring a fresh look to indoor decor pointing us to the hope Spring brings.

Rebecca has taken some time away from long arm quilting to patiently cut and play with all the curved pieces required of Jen Kingwell’s ‘Halo Quilt’ design. If you’ve ever considered making a ‘Halo Quilt’ or any design using curved templates then you’ll find lots of useful tips and ideas in Rebecca’s post.

Krista has made two cushion covers using the traditional Grandmother’s Flower Garden design. In her blog post, Krista shares a modern method to cut and machine piece the flower shapes.

Some physical disabilities are easy to spot and it’s all too easy to label the person with the disability, failing to realise there is more to them than their disability. Michelle is raising a son who has Down Syndrome. She has made a quilt to remind everyone that there is far more to him than his disability.

Amira is continuing to work on finishing projects and has found having her own ‘Friday Finish Link Up Party’ is the perfect motivation. This week she made one small block to add to a collection of orphan blocks before creating a useful little table topper. I really like the FMQ design she used, a variation on loop-the-loop – I must keep this one in mind for future use!

There’s a nice gallery of completed projects to peruse over on Cheryl’s Favourite Finish Monthly Linkup.

This week I’m linking up with Alycia for Finished or Not Friday.

Happy Stitching!

Allison