Sewing JOY in September with Pat Sloan and Scraps!

I have been sewing up some JOY in September - and it turns out a LOT of it is inspired/enabled by Pat Sloan!

I did the Vacation Time block right away this month - mostly because I liked it as soon as I saw it and couldn't resist! So happy to have been able to use the last big turtle in my novelty print AND that I could cut the toile print so that all the images go in the same direction. Next up will be the sashings and fill in blocks. 

Vacation Time free Block of the Month by Pat Sloan

Pat Sloan also has a scrap challenge right now making these blocks. 
I had to.
My scrap bins are full and I have the perfectly pretty Pat Sloan daisy fabric to make into star points!

Pat Sloan Little Wishes Challenge

I only started to feel a little guilty that I haven't touched my Roosting Round Robin lately - plus a lot of fabrics that could turn into scraps for Little Wishes blocks are being set aside with this one - so I worked on making another rainbow block.

I'm glad I did because I found out I lost my scribbled plan of how many blocks I need!
Now I know and feel a bit more motivated to keep going. These blocks are fun to make and come together really quickly.

This one is also a Pat Sloan inspired quilt - I'm making it with a group of online friends who follow Pat!

You can see how far my Roosting Round Robin is on this post.
{AND it includes a photo of that drawing I lost - yipee!}

This was another one of Pat's scrap challenges and I am happy to report that it is with a friend to get quilted!
My first time having someone else do the quilting for me.
I have a lot more waiting. he he.
Notice there's a lime green focus print in this one too? hmmmm. 

You can find the Traffic Jam pattern scrolling down Pat Sloan's Free Pattern Page - it's 2nd!


With Joy,


Sarah V



p.s. There will be more blog posts this week - promise!

Next one should be the Harvest JOY Wall hanging post for the 9 patch blocks ;)

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The Rainbow Roosting Robin Quilt is Growing

I have been able to keep working on my Roosting Robin quilt. I got the final friendship star border made and attached to the quilt.

Here it is laying out on my queen size bed.

I didn't take any photos of the quilt off the bed, but you can see that it needs to be at least a little longer. The quilt underneath is my Liberated Churn Dash Quilt and I know from using it that I'd like this quilt to be a little longer.


So what's next?

The next round called for a ribbon or twisted border. I've been thinking about a herringbone quilt for awhile now and thought maybe I could do something like that with selvages. Adding selvages is kind of a prerequisite for this quilt - I love to use them!

I started by making 3 1/2 inch blocks and realized they would look too small on the quilt.

Then I made 6 1/2 inch blocks. I thought I would put these just at the top and bottom of the quilt to give it more length.

Then I played a little more!

I turned it into a heart!

I'm calling it a Selvage Heart on a String - because the middle strip is actually a 'string' of fabric and not a selvage. 

{Think I'll do up a tutorial for it too}

Pretty neat, eh!

And I will only need 5 to go across the top of my quilt! Which means I will have enough of that polka dot green fabric to make another heart for the bottom row:)

I could have stopped there, but I didn't! I'm really trying to plan out what I'm working on so I know what fabrics I'll be using and how much time it's going to take to do things. I like to have projects at different stages on the go and now this project feels like two - because I figured out my next border too!

The next border could be curves and I have wanted to make this Snakes in the Grass quilt for quite some time. The quilt is from the Emilie Richards quilting book I won awhile ago.

Quilt Along with Emilie Richards - Sister's Choice

Part of the reason why I've put it off is because it's made of templates! Not a big deal, but it does slow down the process. 

That's what I love about the summer - time to sit on the porch and drink coffee and really let my mind wander into my quilts and not feel rushed or hurried to get some quilting time in. 
I thought about making the block simpler.
Make it less units in the curve - make the curve one piece?
Why not make the background one piece and applique the curve on!

I decided to make the background one piece and to simplify the curve by making it only one on each block AND by making it only 3 colours. This photo shows how I made the curve template twice the size, omitting the middle seam allowance.

Join 2 blocks and make a rainbow! 

I'm so happy with my next two rows I can't wait!

If you're still reading - thank you! - and here's a peek at my drawn out design for the last two rows. 

Another friend suggested that the liberated churns could be a row - I've decided I can make the corners for the rainbow row into churns. It will be better than what I've planned here - half rainbows.

My reds are all cut out! 

Linking up this week with The Needle and Thread Network; go visit some more Canadian quilters:)

With Joy,

Sarah V.

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The Rainbow Continues - Roosting Robin Update

It fits! After laying out my sewn together friendship stars for the side border I realized I needed 7 stars not 6 for the side. Makes sense. The sides are supposed to be longer as I try to make this quilt rectangular!

Spurred on by my success {grin} I set to work picking out the fabrics for the 4th border. This one will be reds as you can see from the top photo. I even cut my spacer rows and the pieces for the final corner block which is Penny Arcade by Pat Sloan, part of her free Vacation Time pattern.
The small, quartered stars are from Michelle at the Quilting Gallery. It was serendipity that they both released these blocks when the next row came out for this quilt requiring friendship stars.

Now I need to look ahead to see what the next row is so I don't let this quilt sit too long! I find the longer I wait to start the next step the longer I take to get back to it. Sound familiar?


Linking up to The Needle and Thread Network - it's their 200th WIP Wednesday!


With Joy,

Sarah V.

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Fifteen Minutes on Wednesday

There. Mr. Turtle is fixed and his star is floating now! I'll add him to my Flickr page and you can see the rest of his travelling buddies there too. Only two more blocks to go by the looks of the pattern layout from Pat Sloan. Hopefully I will have enough critters to fussy cut for those centres.

For the rest of my 15 minutes tonight - actually it was just over 16 when I stopped - I sewed together the half square triangles to make one of the friendship stars for a border on my Roosting Robin quilt.

I sewed then cut then ironed - then trimmed. Yes I have been converted to measuring my squares at the next size up and trimming. Mostly because I always  seem to be in a hurry now when quilting and find my accuracy is better in trimming down than cutting smaller to start with. I think I might "drive" faster when I'm in a hurry;) Regardless, I have still found my measurements to not be as accurate as they used to be. I'm working on it.

Now to relax for another 15 before my son gets home from soccer.

Are you giving yourself permission to quilt for 15 minutes a day?
Do it.
Everyone in your house (including your pets) will thank you for it!


With Joy,

Sarah V

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Another Border on My Roosting Robin Quilt

There's something to be said of being motivated by other people's success! One of the other quilters posted her progress on her Roosting Round Robin and I felt compelled to step up and start quilting again this week.

Sunday I picked out fabric and planned the star colours. I needed to really rummage to find some background fabrics for the stars in this row.
Throughout the week I set myself the goal of sewing for 15 minutes. Some nights that meant I only got lines drawn for the half square triangles, or only the sewing done not the cutting and pressing. Then it was painstaking trimming - which I am now almost a complete convert to {which will be it's own post soon!}, then finally it was the weekend again and I could just sew a whole bunch of 15 minutes together and get the row done!

I confirmed my already suspicious belief that I am a project-based person not a time-based person; I need to see a full step complete to feel like I accomplished something. Putting in 15 minutes is just teasing my psyche into thinking I did something. Anyway, at least I'm able to salvage some sense of accomplishment by getting a row done in a week.

Getting the row attached with next to no fussiness this time was a bonus! Here is my quilting helper Mr. V holding up the quilt in what I now think of as upside down. But you get the idea!

Sunday night I was still motivated to keep going and cut out the fabrics for the blue and purple side.

The stars on this border will only be two colours. And I decided to use the back side of a bold large floral print for my light background pieces. I read a comment on Facebook this weekend by someone who had a quilt teacher who said (breathe!) that you purchase both sides of the fabric, which came to mind when I was again frantically (or feverishly, fervently, frenetically - pick one!) searching for background fabric for my stars.

My problem now is that I am having difficulty turning my mojo off or focusing it only on one quilt! Do you get this problem?
Now I feel like I can make everything I've planned, finish everything I've ever started and .........
I can collect more ideas!

Yes, this weekend I also updated my Pinterest app and now it's so much easier to use. It thinks like me:)
If you want to get sidetracked and inspired too, check out my Pins.

{of course, my mojo excess will pretty soon get redirected into report card writing, which means you need to follow me on Pinterest so I can follow you and reward myself with time looking at your pins ;) }

With Joy,

Sarah V

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Roosting Robin is Seeing Stars and a Club in the Works

I hope you had an enjoyable Easter weekend. I was sick for most of it, but when I finally felt better - it was right to my sewing space to try and catch up a bit!

I added borders to the top and bottom of the Roosting Robin top: I'm trying to make it rectangular so it is only a lap quilt. However, there are 3 more rounds to go and I'm not done this one yet!

It just might end up on my bed (secret squeal of glee - I may need to paint my bedroom to match!)

Now the "official" (very flexible) rules are to include at least 4 friendship stars in the next border. Never one to pass up an opportunity for a challenge, I decided to make the entire border of friendship stars - and wouldn't it be fun if it looked like they were floating!

Here is where I link to Michelle's excellent free tutorial for the block that really got me seeing the possibility of making all the stars.

Link to Michelle of Mishka's Playground/The Quilting Gallery Quartered Star Tutorial

This required some drawing out of my idea to get the math right (or right enough!) I wanted to make sure I had enough of the upper and outer border colours so the stars could float.

Then, it also being April, Pat Sloan released her free Vacation Time block of the month which just happens to feature - a friendship star.

Link to Pat Sloan's Vacation Time April BOM - The Penny Arcade

If you look closely at my drawing you see I have decided to incorporate Pat's 12 inch block at each corner. I've done some fancy figuring and am still at the hoping stage - hoping that I will have enough of the green with white polka dot fabric to go in each of those corner stars.

Time will tell.

This is as far as I actually got on the first bottom border.
There may only be a top border of stars to go with it.
Or there will be an unofficial extension granted so that I can get the other borders done too!



Because I also spent some of my quilting time taking final photos and writing a pattern to finally start a club!

Something easy and fun!  Sadie Paisley wanted to JUST CREATE ALREADY! So we are! I hope you'll join us;) I've still got more of the behind the scenes stuff to work out, but I'm hoping that by Saturday I'll be able to make it a real live thing for us to share with you!




With Joy,

Sarah V

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Roosting Robin Round 2

So happy with how this is evolving. This is only the second round of borders for this quilt! It started with just the churn dash block then the green with white polka dot border.

I decided to make it easy on myself and use up leftover 5 inch squares. This first layout I put opposite colours beside each other. It looks very scrappy.

The 'rules' said we could add a 2 or 3 row of checkerboards so I thought about making the quilt bigger even quicker by adding a third row. I thought using the same fabric between the variety of fabrics would work - unfortunately my same fabric is pretty busy!

Then I went back to arranging the scraps using the spectrum, repeating it in the same order as the churn dash. I did put the same rose print in each corner and then used the green with white polka dot in the final border corners.

For the next round I will have to consider making the top less square - perhaps by adding a border to only the top and bottom.

Finishing this round gave me a chance to take advantage of my steep snowbank to lay the quilt top out on!

Snow does make for a pretty white background:)


With Joy,

Sarah Vee

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