Scrap to Art Quilt

Another one of the classes I did at the Voices-in-cloth quilt festival in Pietermaritzburg was how to turn your scrap fabric pieces into an art quilt with a very simple technique under the guidance of Mari Strydom using adding machine tape as illustrated in this video by Karen Brown of Just get it done quilts.

It was such a calming experience just adding pieces to the tape without thinking or having to worry about seam allowances, corners matching etc. and with me struggling with insomnia, after 2 days and nights, I had 40 strips done and ready to be compiled into a background which will become an art quilt in 2025.

This is also the kind of stitching where all those little bits of thread on various bobbins could be used without anyone be the wiser that different colors of threads were used.

Whilst stitching all the memories flooded back of the quilts that were made of these fabrics, such a satisfying journey.

I used 1" sasching strips of a neutral beige check fabric which enabled the rather thick seam allowances to flat lay against each other at the back rather than stitching the individual strips together thereby reducing the bulk significantly.  With all the seams, the quilt is not so surprisingly quite heavy.

After all the stitching, all that remained was to remove all those adding machine tape at the back, but with another sleepless night, I got that tedious task done as well.

With that, the scrappy part is finished whilst the art portion of the quilt will have to wait until 2025 after our upcoming trip to England visiting our daughter, son-in-law and two grandsons.

Miniature Storm at Sea quilt

During the  Voices-in-cloth quilt festival 2024 I signed up for the Miniature Storm at Sea quilt presented by teacher Annie du Toit.  It was really an informative class with Annie showing us how easy it in fact is to do miniature quilt blocks using foundation paper piecing.

The completed quilt consist of 9 blocks containing 9 miniature blocks each, totaling 81 petite individual blocks smaller than the palm of one's hand.  With borders attached the completed quilt measures 43 x 43cm (17 x 17").

This is one of the 9 blocks constructed with the 9 miniature blocks.

Looking at the measurements you can see how small they are.

It was a real lovely experience from start to end.  Didn't had problems aligning the points, everything just fitted.  And it takes a fraction of the time of a big quilt. I really enjoyed this challenge.

Applique heart designs

The previous set of hearts was released for applique as well.  Buy them here.