Some Rainbow Scrap Challenge Finishes

I've put the finishing touches on several Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilts recently, but did not take the time to photograph all the results.  Since we spent the long Independence Day holiday at our camp last weekend, I packed up my finished quilts so I could hang them from the balcony for photos.

I started making the 9-patch variation blocks in 2015 and put the finishing stitches in the quilt late last year.  

Diane Knott of Butterfly Threads Quilting did the long-arm quilting for me - lots of swirls to counteract all the squares and angles on the front of the quilt!  

The handprint backing fabric has been hanging around in my stash for 20 years, at least.  This seemed like a great project to use it up!  I also shopped in my stash for the binding fabric - a purple cross-hatch fabric that worked perfectly.

Another long-running Rainbow Scrap Challenge project is this sampler quilt.  Our RSC leader, Angela Feldbush, shared block instructions every week throughout 2014, resulting in lots of scrappy sampler quilts.

My finished sampler top languished in the "Needs Quilting" pile for a couple years, until I had the great idea to ask Diane Knott to long-arm quilt it for me.

I spent some binge-watching TV time hand-stitching the binding last week so I could add this quilt to the Finished pile.

I was being optimistic when I put the finished date on my label!

Windblown Wishes was a more recent Rainbow Scrap Challenge project.  My inspiration was the Windblown Wishes quilt in Diane Knott's Scrap Quilt Secrets book.  I used a different border treatment than Diane's pattern, but I think it worked out well for the RSC format.

Of course I had to ask Diane to quilt this project!  Even the quilting reflects the "windblown" idea!

I used some leftover binding fabric to make a frame for the quilt label.  

So the UFO pile has shrunk a little, but there are still plenty of projects waiting for their finishing touches.  If I can tear myself way from non-stop weather coverage on television, I might actually do some sewing today.  And since our power is still on, I'm going to go look at more Rainbow Scrap Challenge inspiration at Angela's Soscrappy blog.

(FYI, we're still waiting for Tropical Storm Barry to make his presence felt in the New Orleans area.  Forget about the sensational coverage on the Weather Channel.  We've had minimal rain, minimal wind, and little storm surge.  Conditions are a little worse closer to the coast, but still not life-threatening.)

Scrappy Fabric Therapy

Today was one of those Saturdays when I was in serious need of some fabric therapy.  I did a lot of traveling for work this week, and that left me too tired to do much of anything in the evenings.  Happily, I was able to spend most of today sewing, and getting lots of good things accomplished!

I'm still plugging along on some Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects.  This month's color is teal (and similar variations), so I pulled some 1.5 inch strips and pieced two 49-patch blocks.

I'm still not sure what size quilt project I'll ultimately make with these.  They're only 7 inches, so I'll either need to make a lot more, or stop soon and make a small quilt.

Last year's block was made with random 1.5 inch squares; the Trip Around the World/strip method is much easier!

I've been feeling the need to finish up a number of languishing projects - so most of my current stitching focus has been on moving things along.

One of last year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects was making Windblown Wishes blocks from Diane D. Knott's Scrap Quilt Secrets book.  After I assembled my blocks, I took a little detour from Diane's pattern when it came to the borders.  I decided to make a half-square triangle border, again using rainbow colors.  

Today I added a narrow all-white border and stitched all the HSTs together for the next border.  If I'm lucky, I'll get to sew the borders to the top tomorrow.  I think I'll add a wider white border after the HSTs to finish things up.

I haven't been blogging much over the past several weeks, so I was surprised to discover Blogger had disabled the emailed comments feature.  I've switched to moderating all comments, so at least I'll get an email notification when comments are posted.  I do enjoy all the sharing that takes place via blogging comments, so I hope this helps keep the conversation alive!

*Edit:  moderated comments are not getting sent via email, either. 

There's more Rainbow Scrap Challenge inspiration at the weekly RSC link-up, so please stop by and see what other quilters are up to!

Scrappy Quilt Construction Goes Pink

Pink is the color for this month's Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  I've scoured the bins of pink strips and squares and pulled some pink scrappy chunks from various drawers.  Blocks were made and parts and pieces assembled.  I'm getting anxious to finish up a couple of scrappy projects from last year, so I jumped ahead and made some extra parts and pieces as well.

First project:  use up some 1.5 inch strips to make 49-patch blocks.  I already had one pink block from last year, and I was able to add 2 more.  I'm waiting for the end of the year before I decide what to do with these blocks.

I started making these quarter square log cabin blocks this year using reproduction fabrics.  My original plan for these blocks was to make a straight set quilt, but maybe I'll reconsider and set them on point.

One of last year's RSC projects was based on Windblown Wishes, a quilt from Diane D. Knott's book, Scrap Quilt Secrets.  I decided to do an outer border of HSTs, and planned to make the HST parts each month as part of this year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

Since I had the box of 2.5 inch scrappy strips out anyway (for the pink HSTs), I went ahead and finished up all the remaining colors needed to finish the border.  I'm not sure when I'll get to start assembling this, but at least the HSTs are ready to go.

This is another Rainbow Scrap 2017 project that still needs attention.  The scrappy pinwheel blocks need sashing and cornerstones; the cornerstones are more pinwheel blocks.

And now the cornerstone pinwheels are complete, so as soon as I cut the sashing, I can start assembling this RSC project!

If you love scrappy quilts, be sure to check out today's Rainbow Scrap Challenge link-up - lots of colorful inspiration!