Scrap Happy Saturday: It's Been a Long, Green Trip

Green was the scrappy color of the month for August, specifically light and bright green.  I already used light and bright green scraps when we visited green earlier this year, so I didn't have the range of scraps to make all of this month's Rainbow Sampler blocks.  

 

I did make the Bouncing Betty block with some light green scraps.

 

Still, I had no lack of green scraps to use up.  I finished piecing my green Trip Around the World quilt - and I still have lots of green scraps left!  It was raining yesterday, so I took pictures of the quilt top draped over my sofa.  Maybe I can get some outdoor pictures while I'm at the camp this weekend. 

The quilt is made of 36 twelve inch TATW blocks.  I added a one inch border and a six inch border of  half TATW blocks (which are really just 9 patches).  The finished size is about 86" x 86". 

As always, the Happy Scrappers are sharing their green scrappy adventures over at Angela's Scrap Happy blog.  And if you look carefully, you might see a hint about the scrappy color for September!

 

Keeping up with the Austens

I am caught up once again with the blocks for Barbara Brackman's Austen Family Album BOW.  I have been enjoying all the stories about Jane Austen's circle of family and friends.  There is also a Flickr group associated with the BOW, and it has been fun to see how different stitchers interpret the blocks.

 

The Lucky Pieces block is in memory of Jane Austen's Aunt Jane Leigh-Perrot.  Aunt Jane was accused of shoplifting some expensive lace and held in prison until her trial.  If she had been found guilty at trial, she could have been executed or sent to the penal colony in Australia.  Fortunately, she was declared not guilty when evidence turned up the shopkeeper and his assistants may have planted the lace in hopes of blackmailing Aunt Jane.  Lucky indeed!

 

The block Water Wheel commemorates Jane Austen's uncle and Aunt Jane's husband - James Leigh-Perrot.  Uncle James suffered from gout and spent a good deal of time in the English city of Bath, "taking the waters" in hopes of a cure.

 

Indian Star is meant to remember Austen family friend Warren Hastings.  Mr. Hastings was Governor General of India when Jane Austen was born and continued to have a close association with the family throughout his life.  

 

The Cross Patch block was chosen to represent Mary Lloyd, an Austen family neighbor and later Jane's sister-in-law.  

 

Martha Lloyd, Mary Lloyd's sister, was also a friend to the Austens and later became a housemate to Jane, her sister Cassandra and Mrs. Austen.  Her block is called Best Friend.

 The West Wind block was chosen to remember Cassandra Austen's fiance, Tom Fowle.  Mr. Fowle became acquainted with the Austens when he attended the school run by Jane and Cassandra's father.  Mr. Fowle became a minister for the Church of England, but he initially had no parish and no job.  He sailed to the West Indies as a chaplain, but died of a fever before he could return and marry Cassandra Austen.  

The Austen Family Album series will have 36 blocks when complete.  The current block is number 21, so the end will be here sooner rather than later.  I have been reading novels other than Jane Austen's - I shall need to redirect my literary steps in that direction!

Friday Flamingo Fun!

Growing up in Florida, I was exposed to souvenir kitsch at an early age.  Back in pre-Disney days, Florida tourist attractions were smaller and had more local flavor.  Being a kid, I was always drawn in by souvenirs offered in the ever-present gift shop - seashell figurines, carved coconuts, postcards and snow globes - so many unlikely items to catch the eye!  

Musical pink flamingo snow globe

Years later, my nursing school roommate and I took great delight in bringing each other "tacky tourist" gifts whenever we returned from visiting our respective Florida home towns.

My delight in Florida souvenirs eventually focused on pink flamingos.  Such a beautiful bird and such a wonderful souvenir subject!

Pink flamingo nodder clock

  Eventually, Dear Husband built me a cabinet to house the smaller flamingos.

 

And the stuffed flamingos are on top of my quilting bookshelf.

 

So far, I only have one flamingo quilt though.

 

This quilt was made as part of a guild challenge.  We were to complete a UFO without buying any new fabric.  I had already made the attic window blocks featuring flamingo fabric, so I used the leftovers for an inner and outer border and found a coordinating print in my stash for the binding.  

 

I hand quilted sunbursts in the attic windows.

 And pink flamingos in the outer borders!

Scrap Happy Not-Sew-Saturday

For the first time in a long time, I didn't touch a scrap of fabric or a sewing machine on Saturday!  There was a beautiful breeze blowing at our camp and Dear Husband, Dear Son and I spent a huge chunk of the morning just chilling on the porch, drinking coffee and watching the birds.  Various other activities followed, including an ALS IceBucket Challenge.  After being doused by a bucket of ice water, it was too easy to jump in the river and spend some quality time swimming with the dogs!

Jozy, our youngest son's yellow Lab mix and Bailey, our black Lab mix.

I've about run out of appropriate light green and bright green scraps, so I may hold off on any new Rainbow Sampler blocks this month.  I'll keep the unused ones in mind in case I need extra blocks or colors when I'm assembling the final quilt.

 

I did make a light green and dark green 9 patch block to go with my bright green 9 patch block from earlier this year.  These blocks will continue to be an on-going RSC project.

 

After cutting a huge stack of green strips last weekend, I was able to stitch together a good number of Trip Around the World blocks this past week.  This is just a representative sample.  I need to make a few more blocks for the quilt top, and some half blocks for the border.  It could be a completed quilt top by the end of the month!

Despite my late entry, I'm still linking up with the other Rainbow Scrap Challenge bloggers over at Angela's SoScrappy blog.  It's always fun to check in and be inspired by everyone's colorful ideas!

Scrap Happy Saturday: Slicing Thru the Greens

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge directs us to play with light and bright greens.  There were two Rainbow Sampler blocks to inspire us this week, so that was a good opportunity to use light and bright green scraps.

 

The Dakota Farmer block was easy to create with left-over greens from other projects.

 

The Indiana Puzzle block is a Friendship star with 4-patch blocks in the corners.  My scrappy choices don't have much contrast, but I like the result anyway.

After making my Rainbow Sampler blocks for the week, I turned back to my scrappy Trip Around the World blocks.  I rearranged the blocks into diamond shapes (they are trip around the world blocks after all!) and decided I needed an additional 24 blocks to make a queen-sized quilt for one of the beds at the camp.  

 

I still have a large collection of green fabrics - many of which are quite vintage.  I spent most of today slicing these into 2.5" strips for  Trip Around the World blocks.

 

By dinnertime, I had a good selection of 2.5" strips and had started sorting them into stacks of 6 strips for TAtW blocks.  I'll continue setting up stacks of 6 strips so everything will be ready for piecing this week.

I'm linking up with the other Rainbow Scrappers at Angela's blog for lots of rainbow scrap inspiration.  Hope you'll join us!

 

Scrap Happy Saturday: Pondering Scrappy Greens

Green is the color for scrappy creative play for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge this month.  We visited green earlier this year, but then the intent was to use dark greens.  Now the challenge is to use light and bright green.  I guess I got a little carried away using green the first time around, because I've already made light and bright green blocks for some of my scrappy projects.  I still have lots of light and bright green scraps, though, so I'm sure I'll find good use for them in more Rainbow Sampler blocks!

Before I could really get into playing with the green scraps, I had to finish up my red Carpenter's Wheel for July.  I had most of the block assembled, I just needed to stitch the rows together. 

 

I did finish the remaining red Rainbow Sampler blocks earlier this week.

 

The Big Dipper block used up some vintage scraps.

The Kaleidoscope block showed me how rusty my paper piecing skills have become!

All the red scraps went back into their assigned bins and the green scraps came out to play.  The first August sampler block was mini bow ties, for which I happily used up some Kaffe Fassett scraps.

 

As I pondered what other green scrappy projects I could work on this month, I remembered I had started a green Trip Around the World last year - specifically to use up some of the dark, vintage greens in my stash.  I had cut a large batch of 2.5" strips and sorted them into groups of six so I could pick up the project and work on it throughout the rest of the year.  When I pulled out the bag of strips this morning there were a dozen or so sets of strips still waiting.  I finished all of them and got the blocks laid out for viewing and arranging.  The setting is currently 6 x 6 (the blocks are 12") and I think I'll make at least one more row.  I'm glad to have used up some of these older fabrics!

I'm linking up with the other Rainbow Scrappers over at Angela's blog.  It's late, but I think a little scrappy inspiration sounds like good bedtime reading!