Fabric Tape ~ Who Knew How Easy

Any season is a season for gifts and tape is usually needed to wrap it up - personalizing each gift for that someone special with a final touch of fabric tape.  Tape made by you!  Oh, how fun to use up a few fabric scraps.....a tutorial found at We Are Scout...Lisa Tilse.  I expect the original tutorial was first posted on The Red Thread Studio but I couldn't find the original. 

Go forth and gift wrap in the style of your fabric scraps.  And thank you We are Scout and The Red Thread Studio for the pleasure of your blogging company this morning and for filling my mind's eye with so many ideas.

In A Festival State of Mind?

If in Louisiana, you've not far to wander to be near a festival - all about food and music.  Premier is Mardi Gras and the well-known New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.....but we can't forget the Crawfish Festival, Strawberry Festival, Peach Festival, Catfish Festival, Little Italy Festival and the well loved Shrimp Festival.   The list goes on and on.  From North to South, Louisiana is an on-going event with magnitude.

But wait!  You say there's another festival just born?  Yes, one celebrating a quilters' world with scraps.  Love, love, love that Ann Wood Handmade has started the first annual Scrap Festival - 2019.

Ann shares that she loves to iron her fabric scraps before deciding which ones to discard.  The close-up and personal relationship with each fragment allows her an opportunity to envision its new life in a quilt top or jacket for a stuffed animal or perhaps a doll's bonnet.   Focusing on each little fragment gives it the importance it deserves.

What a delightful way to piece leftovers from each project as remembrances once the large quilt is out of the house:  fabric works and mobiles as found on Specks and Keepings.

For many, January is the month to focus on resolutions and expectations and well-being in general.  It's a month to reorganize a kitchen drawer, hall closet and YIKES, the fabric scrap bin!   But just as we clean the kitchen cupboard, giving each item its fair chance, so should we organize our scraps.

We check for expiration dates on the soup cans before discarding....don't we?  We re-shelf the soup with the soup and the vegetables with the vegetables....the bag of meal next to the bag of flour.  So should we organize our scraps.

Many scrap-a-holics such as Kristen @ A Little Crispy organizes by color:  greens and blues, reds and purples, whites and yellows.  She also keeps the bins conveniently located under her cutting table.

Many organize by size or shape, each scrap gently placed in its proper bin.    Some just save them willy nilly  to puzzle over later.  Then there are always those who resist the temptation to save and generously pass each scrap on to a best friend who is addicted to scraps....you know, the one who definitely needs to celebrate with a Scrap Festival.   Laughing out loud as I  ponder 'do we need scrap management workshops'?

Laissez les bons temps rouler

I found the most delectable scrap happy quilt on a favorite blog - Red Pepper Quilts - that was worthy of sharing.  Using Rita's comments on construction and this delectable mountains block  how-to from The Fat Quarter Shop, I'll bet your scrap pile will diminish quickly. 

Photo Credit Red Pepper Quilts Pinterest 

Don't want to make your own.... shop Red Pepper Quilts on Etsy!

inspiring to become ~

"When I am an old woman, I will do patchworks"  a quote from Edrica Huws whose life quite nearly spanned a century:  1907-1999. 

 

 

Edrica Huws, a Londoner.  It was not until after her death that she became widely acclaimed.....the quilting world realized how remarkable the work was. 

 

 

 

 

"It is splendid if there is some inner tension,

a hint of disorder

being controlled.

That, to me, is the essence

of an aesthetic experience."

 

                              Edrica Huws

 

Bottles on Garden Table - 1983

Tone, not color, was the most important element in her patchworks.  Not quite quilts, there being only two layers, and not quite paintings - while from a distance, her works appear to be more paintings than fabric patchworks. 

Life is a blur, and then you get old and make patchworks. 









 

Simply Organized ~

More times than not, when the sewing room is organized, the day just purrs.  It's a feel-good-feeling to walk into the studio and see order. 

Join me in seeing how The Crafty Quilter, Julie Cefalu, goes from mayhem to organized as she reduces her clutter very simply with easy scrap basket storage bins.  And, how clever how all her scraps are organized in color order.

 

 

FreeFall Quilt Along (better late than never)

How did I ever miss  the FreeFall Quilt Along? ?  hosted by Sandra Walker at MMM quilts.   But, lucky viewers, all the tutorials and fabric requirements and steps 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 are still available. 



FreeFall by Sandra walker
MMM! Quilts
 

Happily surfing the web brought me right on top of how to paper piece without sewing through the paper!  From this tutorial, I realized their was something good about to start....now remember, Sandra started all this in February 28, 1017 and it's now mid-November so we can go from start to finish of this quilt along at record speed. 

• Here's how to paper piece without sewing through the paper
• And the fabric requirement and tips for your FFQ:
• Step 1: Cutting
• Step 2:  Construction of leaves that float on shadow leaf
• Step 3:  Construction of leaves that float on background and shadow leaf points
• Step 4:  Construction of half and half leaves
• Happy Day:  Quilt top assembly  Yes, be sure to read Sandra's advise (for free) about how to avoid meeting seams that make too much bulk to easily quilt.

The fabric possibilities are endless....check out these little beauties made by participants in the quilt along. 

A personal favorite made by Julie at Pink Doxies




FreeFall by Julie @pinkdoxies
 

And another favorite by Laura on Instagram:  l'm coveting that background fabric but especially love the purple leaves....who knew falling leaves could make this grand a statement. 

Made by Laura

Hope you enjoy making your very own FreeFall quilt.  In the meantime, can we get a whoop! whoop!  for all those quilt designers and those who test their patterns. 























 

Scrap Happy Scrap Buster Quilts

It's was just a pile of scraps - a few days ago! And, as the song goes, 'baby, won't you look at her now?'  A beautifully pieced pile of Christmas fabric by Mary Duhon Louviere.  Mary says,

"I do a lot of Christmas projects so 2-3 years ago I started sewing the scraps together to make 5 inch blocks and saving all unused triangle blocks. When I felt I had enough I put them together with white sashing. I will quilt this one this fall."

And the sweetest note from Kelly Broussard along with a picture of her scrap quilt. 



"Marty, this is the first scrap quilt I made.  I found a picture on Pinterest and completed it in May 2016. I'm working on another scrap quilt using 16 patch stars,  but it's still a wip. 

Thanks

Kelly Broussard

Ps. I enjoy your blog!  Thanks for posting!"

 

 

Kelly, it's scrap quilts such as yours that make my heart sing.

 

Love, love, love Gloria Raggio's scrap-made tumbling jewel.  

 

 

 

Gloria says this is one of her favorite quilts made from scraps done as a Bonnie Hunter scrap busting challenge.  She used this setting so she wouldn't have to match seams as in a more traditional tumbler setting!! Girl after my own heart. 

 

And one of my personal favorites, a design idea out of "making quilts" with Kathy Doughty of Material Obsession.....Greenfields:

 

 

Books, oh, my!  Aren't there just a number of books on how to use those fabric scraps in quilts and so many other projects.  Zakka Style helps us use those scraps in 24 projects complied by Rashida Coleman-Hale from bags and totes to potholders, pin cushions and more. 

 

 

And Sunday Morning Quilts by Amanda Jean Nyberg and Cheryl Arkison: 

 

 

 

Also by Amanda Jean Nyberg is No Scrap Left Behind  with bragging rights to 16 quilt projects. 

 

 

An oldie, but certainly a good one to jump start the love. This book continues to make me

Scrap Happy....by Sally Schneider: 

 

 

 

So, what do you do with your fabric scraps?  Do you organize by the size or shape of the scrap?  by color?   Do you cut in squares or strips? 

 

 

Scrap quilting isn't for every quilter just as buying packaged kits isn't for everyone.   So.....if 

 you aren't in love with piecing with fabric scraps.....well, just pass those scraps on. 

 

But by all means, don't just sit on them! 

Signed:  A Happy Quilter in Scrap Heaven

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you love it, raise your hand ~

To music: 

If  you love it and you want it, raise your hand. 
If you love it and you want it, raise your hand.
If you love it and you want it and can't help that you covet.
If you love it and you want it, raise your hand.

Okay, I felt the same way when I saw this adorable string happy pattern at Orange Dot Quilts.   Orange Dot calls this one Beads On A String.  Since I'm in the scrap busting mood, this pattern just fit the bill to help me out.   Except I didn't use the pattern! Different size strips were foundation paper pieced on Office Depot end of roll paper purchased for pennies.  The ream comes in 500 sheets of  8 1/2" x 11".  So, after all 15 sheets were covered with my fabric strips and trimmed down to size, I cut the 1 1/2" strip off each one for my strings to hold all the beads together.  Get it?  So fun to make do and use what's on hand.   



Foundation Paper Pieced Beads - a work in progress

Both the front and the pieced back  makes me raise my hand.....while singing a happy tune. 

And it all started with strings from the scrap pile. 



Stay tuned to this channel.  There'll be more scrap quilts

to love coming soon.  The call has been put out to send me a picture of your favorite scrap

quilt and how it was constructed.   

An email to martymason@bellsouth.net will get your scrap quilt spotlighted. 

 

 

 

 

 

If  you love it and you want it, raise your hand. 

If you love it and you want it, raise your hand.

If you love it and you want it and can't help that you covet.

If you love it and you want it, raise your hand.