uh oh!

Remember back when I told you I needed to make a baby quilt but had plenty of time?

Remember how I kept not working on it because it just didn't grab my attention?

Well...

Wednesday last week that came to bite me in the butt when a shower invitation arrived.  Date?  May 7th.  I had 11 days to get a whole quilt done.

I had a pattern chosen.  I had background fabric from my stash, but bought a little more, just to be safe.  I knew what colors I was going to use.  I had re-drafted the pattern some to make the blocks smaller, but also more because the secondary design was offset and would bug me.

Nothing more.

So Thursday morning, I jumped out of bed and got busy.

First up, I need a LOT of half square triangles.  I learned this grid method ages ago, before Thangles were a thing (which I hate), before specialty rulers were a thing (which I hate), probably before I really knew the two-at-a-time method even.  Time to put that heat transfer marker to use!

As I was trying to fall asleep in bed Wednesday night (it was too late in the day when I got the invitation to do quilty stuff - I had to do house stuff and hubby stuff, which is fair), I figured out if I made 13 sets of 16, I would have enough plus a few extra.

I cut pieces and transferred the grid to the white fabric and then time to pull blues!

I have a LOT of blue.  In a lot of shades, as you can see here.  I wanted a good variety so this would look scrappy, so I chose 13 blues from here and knew I could add to the variety with the 2.5" squares that would be coming.  (Also the rectangles that I nearly forgot about!)

It seemed to take forever to do the prep work, but before I knew it I had 208 half square triangles.  (No photo - sorry!)  Untrimmed, but in my thinkings, I decided that I would divide up the block parts and sew one block at a time - trim the triangles as I went so I didn't have to take a day off for a sore arm!

After these, I went back to the stash and chose a dark grey for what will become a secondary pattern across the quilt and sewed those as strips and subcut.

Then I remembered I needed some rectangle units, so back to the stash, again with the 13, and sewed strip sets and subcut.

Raid the stash of 2.5" squares and cut more from the stash and then...

Mix and match, using the paper plate method again...

And the bits and pieces for 25 blocks are ready to sew!  (13 block A and 12 block B.)

Since the four patch units and solid background are all the same, they didn't go onto the plates, thus saving some time sorting.

Start sewing!

For each block, I layed out the pieces and chain sewed squares into rows and rows into blocks.  This worked well and though I was doing some ironing from my sewing chair, it also got me up and moving between each block to reset.  (And trim the half square triangles.)

I did swap out pieces here and there, using the extra half square triangles, as well as the stash of 2.5" squares.

I sewed like a madwoman for four days and then I had all the blocks done - under this stack demonstrating block B.

  

This felt good, but I knew I had more work to do.  25 blocks don't just sew themselves together.  And there would be a LOT of pinning for this next part.

Since Gabby stays in my bedroom all the time, with the door shut against rowdy Toby, she doesn't get to help with quilting much any more.  I decided since this quilt is rather small (blocks finish 10"), I'd do the layout in my bedroom.  There was just enough room.  At first she sat on the bed and looked at me like I'm a wierdo, but she quickly remembered her duties and, as you can see here, got right to work.

You can see the secondary pattern here, and understand why a 4x4 block layout would drive almost anyone batty.

This is it, there are no borders.  At least not in my version!  It doesn't need to be any bigger, so I'm going with it.

Oh, I also made a trimming monster!

(If some of those trimmings look oversize, it is because they came from the edges of the grid and I had cut the pieces to sew a bit larger than the grid - thus making some sides of the trimming a bit larger than others.  But if I had trimmed those edges down first, they would all be skinny.  I was trying to waste as little time as possible!)

Yesterday at about 5pm, I finished the top.  I don't have a photo of the whole top yet, but I promise that is coming.  Since the shower is less than a week away, I expect I'll be blogging again next week about the whole, finished, quilt and I'll have a photo there.

What else did I do this past week - you know, the part BEFORE I realized I needed a baby quilt in 11 days?

Well.

Monday was the last day of the cassettes quilt along and the assignment was to make the last cassette and put the top together.

Monday was a long day.

I made some sewing errors, requiring more un-sewing than I would like, but it was okay.

I kept going and about dinnertime, I had a top!

The background looks muddy here.  I didn't anticipate that.  But I still like it.  And I'm glad it's done.  This one has no other deadline, so it will have to wait a bit to be finished.  Probably.

Tuesday and Wednesday I worked, but Wednesday I did get out earlier (it was a shorter shift) and started on the Woodland Wonderland blocks again.

I got this block (the second most difficult - or maybe most difficult - in the project) half done before sewing time ran out.  I finished it up early Thursday, before starting on the baby quilt, just to make it easier to pack away.  Little progress, but progress, right?

So that was my crazy week.

It was nice to have the weekend off work.  Without it, the baby quilt might not be done.

This week...

Today I'm going out to lunch with quilty friends.  We're meeting at a new-to-me restaurant, so I hope it's good!  It's close to fabric shops, so I'll be picking up something for the back of the baby quilt, with plans to longarm it Wednesday.  (I work Tuesday, as is almost always the case.)

Wednesday is also Gabby's rescheduled vet visit, so we'll see how the day goes.  I can always longarm on Thursday, right?  I mean, I have until Sunday at 1pm...

My goals for today are to get the tiger quilt trimmed and put a border on it and make bindings for the four quilt tops I've recently finished.  That will allow me to clean out project boxes and tidy up my sewing room.

The rest of the week?  Who knows!  I'd like to get back to Woodland Wonderland, which is likely what will happen, but we'll see.

I have a due date for the next baby quilt - December 23.  The hubby is picking on me about this already, telling me I'd better start on the quilt.  Because not only did I somehow assume the due date for the baby quilt above was LATE June (it's June 5th), I also failed to process that a baby shower would happen ahead of that event...and that I'm more than likely going to get invited.

Oh well.  If Project Quilting taught me anything, it is that I CAN get a whole quilt done in under a week.  And not just one that is five wide strips of fabric, but something good sized.  (See this one, this one, this one, this one and this one.)

Better get going if I'm going to make all that binding AND put a border on today!

Happy quilting!

Katie