Paducah Log Cabin Flimsy

It is finally finished! This is the Paducah Log Cabin pattern from Judy Martin's Extraordinary Log Cabin Quilts book. I made it with a number of reproduction William Morris cotton prints. I started this project for my mother-in-law, but there was a miscommunication about the size she needed, so I ended up changing the size and made it queen size for our bed.

This was a lot of work; I definitely underestimated how long it would take to finish. Though, in fairness, having to make an additional 48 blocks added at least a week to my schedule. I'm just happy to have finished the flimsy before the end of the month!

When the finished size changed, I ordered a navy blue wide backing and it still hasn't arrived. So, my option right now is to either make a pieced backing or wait for the wide back to arrive. Since I've already paid for the wide back, I'm inclined to wait for it. This will have to do for my One Monthly Goal.

I am quite pleased with how it has turned out so far! I've already got the quilting plan, so I should be able to finish that part as soon as I get the backing. 

I'm linking up with

Finished (or Not) Friday
Needle and Thread Thursday
Off the Wall Friday
One Monthly Goal
Peacock Party
TGI Finished Friday

Tuesday ToDo #53

This was one of my most productive weeks in a long time. Most days this past week I started quilting after breakfast and then worked on quilt projects until it was time for bed. I think I only spent one evening watching some TV with my husband.

Paducah Log Cabin in Morris Fabrics. Designed by Judy Martin
from her Extraordinary Log Cabin Quilts book.

I spent a whole day cutting out the pieces to finish the Paducah Log Cabin.

And then I spent several days slowly building the strips for the Paducah Log Cabin block.

By Sunday evening I had all of the strips ready to finish the quilt. The pieces along the left side are all the strips for building the central quilt blocks. The pieces along the right side are all the strips for the border blocks.

Now I can just sit down for a couple of days and finish assembling these units. I am hopeful I'll be able to finish this quilt in the coming week. My one monthly goal is to finish it entirely by the end of the month, so I don't have much time left.

Also, since I finally had a plan for how to quilt it, I put my Snake River Log Cabin on the long arm and got started.

It turned out that working on this was really compatible with sewing all these strips. I would set the area for the block, align the pantograph, start the long arm stitching, and then I could return to my sewing machine or ironing board for the several minutes of time I needed to fill. I spent all weekend doing this.

I have nearly finished quilting it. I have done all of the central blocks and the top and bottom borders, but I need to rotate it on my long arm to do the side borders. Unfortunately, I made the backing for this quilt before I had the long arm so it isn't quite oversized enough to make it easy to put it on the long arm; I think I'll have to sew on a strip of muslin to add a few inches, but it can wait until after I finish these Paducah blocks.

In the next week, I hope to finish the Paducah Log Cabin quilt. It is my one monthly goal to finish it, so I am going to focus exclusively on it until it is done. Luckily, I have already figured out the quilting plan so that part should be able to get started as soon as I finish the quilt. I don't really know how quickly the pantographs will stitch up, but it may potentially take more than a day to do all the quilting.

I may spend my Halloween sewing on binding. LOL

Thanks to Linda for hosting the ToDo Tuesday linkup.

Oct Friday Night Sew-In

I got started early again for Friday Night Sew In. I went back to work on my Paducah Log Cabin quilt because it has become clear that I won't be receiving the new fabric from Hancock's in time to finish before the end of the month so I figured I may as well finish something.

I started sewing after breakfast and sewed all the way until after 10PM, with a couple breaks for meals/washing dishes.

This morning, I started out with a bin of strips and the smaller pieces already sewn together.

Then I spent all day assembling strips. These are most of the pieces for all 48 border blocks and the first two strips of the remaining 44 quilt blocks

This pile will probably take me a couple hours to iron, so tomorrow I think I'll put my Snake River Log Cabin quilt on my long arm frame and alternate between ironing and quilting all weekend. I would really love to finally be able to have one of my Judy Martin quilts finished. They've been in my queue for way too long.

Tuesday ToDo #52

I wasn't nearly as productive as I was hoping during the past week. But I did manage to quilt up three flimsies; two of them were paid gigs for other people.

While my husband was out of town, I spent way too much time streaming TV, but I was usually working on planning out future quilting projects. I ordered a blue and yellow print for the border and backing of Marianne's bed quilt so I put off cutting out the fabrics because I'd prefer to make sure to use fabrics that coordinate well with it.

Island Batik Petals Provence Flowers

Hopefully, the fabric will come in the next week or so and then I'll be able to get started on that project. Assuming it arrives soon, I still think I can finish by the end of the month.

Also, I think I finally have a plan for quilting my Snake River quilt flimsy. 

When I ran across this border block in Donna Kleinke's Aspen line of pantographs, it seemed like it was practically tailor-made for the Snake River blocks.

I added the triangle pattern to the corner and made a
few minor changes to the completed block.

I played around with a lot of the pieces to make the units for the border and I think this is going to be a fun, but challenging, project. I'm hoping to get started on it after I finish Marianne's quilt.

I'm linking up with Tuesday ToDo.

Look Who Came For A Visit

I actually made this Queen's Jewel quilt flimsy back in October 2019. At the time, I planned to also add a border, but in the end, I decided I didn't like the colors and how scrappy it was, so I bartered it to a friend in exchange for our mason bees.

She brought it back to me today for quilting. It was nice to see it again, and I must admit, absence has made the heart grow a little fonder. LOL

She had me quilt it with a circular dragon pantograph that I stretched to fit one per block.

We used a bright red thread so it would stand out on the plain black backing she provided.

Another Quick Finish

I spent another day quilting up a flimsy from my stockpile. It's a Broken Bricks/Spruce Root Basket pattern I finished earlier this year.

I almost used another dragon pantograph, but I was apparently in the mood for something more flowery. This is the Dolce pattern by Christy Dillon. I quilted it with a turquoise thread.

I've become quite a fan of using solid fabrics for backings because the quilting shows up so well.

A friend is dropping off a quilt tomorrow for quilting so I'll soon have another priority project.

Paid Quilting Gig

I met a nice lady on the Northwest Quilter's Guild facebook page and yesterday she dropped by a flimsy for me to quilt. She told me she needed it finished in time for Christmas. This was officially my first paid quilting gig. (I'm not including a couple of quilts that Jeff quilted for a friend/coworker that we were also paid for because Jeff did the work.)

I know I had plenty of time, but I felt like working on it today. It was a quick edge-to-edge design so it only took me a few hours.

I quilted it with a nice blue-purple variegated thread. I think it turned out pretty well.

Tuesday ToDo #51

I made a bunch of progress on my Paducah Log Cabin since last Tuesday. Last Friday, I finished putting together the central portion, and then I just needed the border.

But, by the time I got that far, my husband was at his mother's house and he told me the quilt would be a little too large for her bed. (Yes, I asked her for dimensions first.) He wanted me to make the quilt 10" smaller on one edge. Yeah, that's not going to happen. I could make this quilt smaller, but it would have to be 14" smaller because the blocks are 7" wide and I would have to take a row off each edge to keep it symmetrical.

After talking about it, we agreed I would just make her a different quilt, one designed to the dimensions he wanted me to make (74x90ish, so I don't lose them). 

After spending so many days slaving away on this project, I decided to take a day off and put my feet up and stream some TV while I worked up some options in Electric Quilt to show him. Unfortunately, in the process, I realized I had all the DC Comics movies. I spent three days behaving like a teenager, streaming movies and eating leftovers. LOL

So, it's now Tuesday and I'm trying to get back on track. Of the options I sent to Jeff, his mother chose this quilt as her favorite. On the bright side, it's a really easy pattern so it should go pretty quickly.

So, now I guess I'll plan to make the Paducah Log Cabin large enough to fit a queen-size bed. That, unfortunately, means I'll have to add another batch of blocks all the way around⏤44 blocks total. Then I'll need to add the border; I think that's another 52 blocks. So I have ways to go on that one. I will still try and finish it by the end of the month, but the quilt for Marianne is the priority. I just need to disentangle myself from the TV. 

So, this coming week, I hope to cut out a good chunk of the 2½"-squares I need for this project. I think it's 856 total. I'm not sure I have enough blue fabric, but I will see how much I can scrape up from my scrap bins and stash.

Thanks to Linda for hosting the Tuesday ToDo linkup.

Oct Friday Night w/Friends

For today's Friday Night With Friends, I actually got an early start and spent most of the day on my one monthly goal. I had all of the 100 blocks finished for the Paducah Log Cabin and today I assembled the central block section.

This is not a finish. I still need to make another 44 blocks for the border.

Thanks to Cheryl for hosting FNwF.

Paducah Log Cabin

Last week I ditched all my plans and at the last minute decided I wanted to try and get a full-size quilt finished before Jeff left for California this week.

If I had chosen a different pattern, I probably could have managed it, but not with this one. I forgot how long these Judy Martin log cabin quilt patterns take. I have done little else since last Friday, and I still haven't finished assembling the central blocks (though I am close). There is so much cutting and ironing involved.

I've been making all the blocks in assembly-line fashion where you build them all at once and I am close to the end but I ran out of one of the sizes of strips so I need to do another round of cutting before I can continue on. 

This evening I felt the need to continue ahead for one batch of blocks so I could put them up on the design wall and see how they look. I like it.

Since I've gotten distracted with this project, I think I'll go ahead and make it my One Monthly Goal for October. I would like to get it completely finished (quilted and bound) so we can ship it to Jeff's mother as a belated birthday gift.

As for last week's Tuesday ToDo list, I finished binding all three quilts on there. I had hoped to do a post showing photos of all the finished quilts last Friday, but then I got distracted by this project. Blogging gets sidelined when I'm obsessing about projects.

For the coming week, I'll be working on this project until it is finished. I am on a mission to get it done.

I'm linking up with Design Wall Monday and Tuesday ToDo.