Tag Archives: quilting

Orca Bay Mystery Quilt Part 4

Posted on December 14, 2011 | 21 comments

For Bonnie Hunter’s Orca Bay mystery quilt – Part 1, click here.

For Bonnie Hunter’s Orca Bay mystery quilt – Part 2, click here.

For Bonnie Hunter’s Orca Bay mystery quilt – Part 3, click here.

Part 2 was all about warm string blocks, so I’ve chosen to sew Part 4’s string blocks in cool blues. No planning here; I’m mixing it up. Confederate blue, teal, light blues, dark blues, some purple thrown there, floral prints, corn, Asian prints, hand-dyes, dots, whatever I have on hand.

Will it all work together? The controller in me says that the teal strip does not go well with blue-gray plaid strip. I’m turning up the music so I can’t hear her. ‘Que sera, sera…whatever will be will be….’

All pressed and lookin’ good.

Trimmed up. Will they play nice?

It’s a mystery. But I’m likin’ it!

21 Comments

Posted in Uncategorized

Tagged Bonnie Hunter, Crafts, Orca Bay mystery quilt, quilting, sewing, string blocks, works in progress

Orca Bay Mystery Quilt – Part 3

Posted on December 9, 2011 | 12 comments

For Bonnie Hunter’s Orca Bay mystery quilt – Part 1, click here.

For Bonnie Hunter’s Orca Bay mystery quilt – Part 2, click here.

This isn’t WIP Wednesday, but I finished Part 3! Yay!!!!

The clue? Make 350 (1.5″ finished) half-squared triangles (HST). Whoa! That’s alot! But, as mentioned in Part 2, Linda Franz and her Inklingo make this clue easy peasy to accomplish.

I am showing printing on both a light fabric and a muslin fabric just for comparison. You can easily see the printing (on the wrong side of the fabric, by the way) on both of these fabrics.

I cut the fabric 8.5″ x 11″…the same as copy paper (only because my dinosaur printer doesn’t do custom sizes) and I still get little waste. In fact, I get 30 HSTs per printing. Cool! This is a real timesaver!

Sew on the diagonal dash lines.

Cut apart on the solid lines.

Almost finished already!

Pressed open and trimmed! YeeeHawww! That was easy!

Cute little guys, aren’t they?

12 Comments

Posted in Uncategorized

Tagged Bonnie Hunter, half square triangles, HST, Inklingo, Linda Franz, Orca Bay mystery quilt, quilting, sewing, works in progress

Orca Bay Mystery Quilt Part 2

Posted on December 7, 2011 | 13 comments

For Bonnie Hunter’s Orca Bay mystery quilt – Part 1, click here.

Part 2 mystery instructions calls for piecing 72 string blocks. Strings? In a nutshell, string piecing is taking cut fabric strips, or scraps, and piecing them together, using a stabilizer for backing. The stabilizer can be used dryer sheets, muslin, newsprint, interfacing, etc…. In my case, I’m using old phone book pages. I had all 72 paper squares prepared in a very short time by simply tearing with the edge of my ruler.

No rotary cutter necessary. Simply tear.

I was very indecisive about what color these scrappy string blocks ought to be. Should I use orange (one of my very favorite colors)? How about yellows? Then I remembered that one of my goals for doing this mystery is to ‘lighten up’; be random. So…how about I use a warm palette? Then I can have it all.

A fabulous, feel good warm pile of unsquared string blocks!

Pressed and peeling paper! Oh, the excitement of it all! The paper practically falls off when a short stitch length is used.

And a closer look. What a funny bonus! I did not notice what this phone book page said until I was snapping this photo. I’m doing my part to go green!