My Colourwash Jelly Roll Quilt

I have been working on my tasks from last week and before I know it, it is Friday! 

My list from last week included

- work out the tension for that blasted orange thread so that I can start for real on the background filler project. Interesting to note that the white Invisafil thread does not usually give me such a headache.

- finish the colourwash quilt top...another 6 rows to go and then putting all the rows together. Still undecided as to whether I will put a border on this quilt. Will have to see the completed quilt top...

- continue on my strip quilt, i.e. make another stack of blocks (I think I need something like 56 blocks)

- look at the newly picked up charity quilts and make a start on basting one (very hopeful here)

Well, I did not do too bad. I did work on my tension issue with the Invisafil thread. I unpicked all my stitching on the new project as I just could not face starting a new project with wonky tension. I just cannot stitch if the tension is not right. Spent hours on the tension exploration last week one day when I felt particularly relaxed. Have detailed the process in my previous post.

Re-stitched the section that I had unpicked after I spent some time rejuvenating the fabric.

Was happy with that. The thread buried into the fabric and I had no orange pokies on the back! With that resolved I can now begin the stitching of this project. This will take a while as it is bigger than the last one but now that I pieced this together I am determined to get that done.

I also continued on my colourwash project...and yay, finished it!

If anybody is interested... I followed a very easy pattern that I found on Bethanne Nemesh' web site called the 'Colorwash Quilt'. Saw it first on FB and thankfully I then located it on her web site. It is free and as Bethanne remarked, more of a guide as each set of precuts has its own personality.

Close up of mine

I was curious as to how one of my Bali Jelly Rolls (recently went to Bali and purchased way too much fabric) would come out as it is definitely a bit more dramatic than the Jelly Rolls I am used to. My daughter helped me sort the colours and I must say that I was not convinced about the abrupt change in colours to the white. There was a bit of a temptation to open some of the other Jelly rolls that I had bought to get a better colour match but in the end I stayed firm and stuck to working with one Jelly Roll at the time. Bethanne had mentioned that most Jelly rolls have two strips of each colour. Well, obviously the Balinese people do their own thing. I sometimes had two, but also three or just one of the colours. In the end I decided to just run with it and see what happens. I did take out two strips, one were I had three of the same and another one where the colouring just did not match anything in this lot. Still made it to 200 little blocks which I laid out as 13 blocks by 15 rows. So I have some leftovers which I will use for tension/thread testing.

In the end I also put a border on with one of the remnants I had purchased in Bali. I was the only one in the household who liked this really. When this happens I always have to think of Cindy Needham. When I met her in a workshop, but also in some of her videos she always says 'you are the boss of your quilt'. Sounds somewhat funny but has stuck with me all this time. So I attached the border and I love it! The quilt comes out at 48in x 54in, so just a small lap size quilt. Have put it away for the moment with the other five quilt tops that are patiently waiting to be quilted.

Also continued on my strip quilt and am up to 37 blocks...will need about 56 of them so that should not take too long.

So, for the remainder of the week I am planning to

- continue making those strippy blocks, so that I can get on cutting out the sashing and put all this together

- continue on the background filler project

That's probably all I am going to achieve until next Tuesday. Felling a bit overrun with all those different projects I have on my mind. Also need to get onto the charity quilts and finish that last stack before December.

Linking up to To Do Tuesday #96 over at Quilt Schmilt.

Karin