Welcome to my Creative World with quiltmaking, scrapbooking, and most of all family and friends!

Friday, December 26, 2014

Grand Illusion Clue 4 and 5

Got so busy this past week that I never posted my pic of the Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt created with Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville.com.  That's OK, I am just posting the completion of both clues 4 and 5 in this post.
I took a picture of all the clues together for clue 4 which was more broken dishes blocks like clue 1 with some different fabrics.
 Again the colors are still showing much darker that they are in real life.  The pink is a lighter warm pink, the yellow is much softer.  The white and dark green is OK

Clue 5 is a bit better in coloration but still somewhat too dark.
Simple 4 patches.  I wonder at the one on the left as Bonnie calls for 4 of them if they might be used to resolve corners or make a center block?  If I need to make more at least they are easy enough to do.

Next week is the last clue!  Can't wait to see what we are going to be making  LOL

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Stocking Dilemma

Oh, my!
Yep it's true...since the last time we hung stockings here we have had three new granddaughters join the family and they need some Nana made stockings!  So, what am I to do but...
I have always been a good Girl Scout at heart and live the motto
"be prepared" 
 and that is my excuse for the lovely fabric I have stashed away over the years.  Sitting high on my shelves was a set of fat quarters...quilter's talk for pieces measuring 18x20 inches...that have been pulled down over the years but never seemed to be right for the project at hand.
Oh, so pretty and very girly in nature.  I think I bought them maybe 4-5 years ago at a wonderful sale.
Good thing I also had some time to sew and that's what I did!




What a mess when I was done!  
The other thing that was stashed were laces and trims from as far back as when my daughter was younger and many that I had bought through the years since then.  I was able to gussy them up so that they finished up like this
Such pretty stockings for two of my granddaughters.  The other one lives in Arizona for now and since she won't be here this Christmas it gives me a bit more time.  
Wish we had a mantel here but displaying 11 stockings might have even overwhelmed the longest mantel!  


Oh yeah and I was able to do some Leader/Ender blocks for a challenge too!

Sunday, December 14, 2014

Grand Illusion Clue 3

Ahhh
An easy clue this time!
Squares that come from strips cut from my dark pink, white and green fabrics subbing for Bonnies green, white and black.
I still need to make a few of the HST from clue 1 but doing this one quarter size has been great for me so that I could do some work in the sewing room clearing out the "black hole" corner.  More on that later but let's just say one of the results is that I un-earthed FOUR forgotten quilt tops!  LOL
Clues 1, 2, 3 with my "inspiration fabric".  The color is really off as the dark pink is not so orange and the yellow not so bright.

Sunday, December 7, 2014

Grand Illusion Mystery with Bonnie Hunter UPDATE

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt

So here it is a year later and time for another mystery quilt designed by Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville.com.

For this year's mystery the first clue began the day after Thanksgiving and Howard and I were still visiting our family in Arizona so my quilt making was put off until I returned to Utah.
  My plans were to start on Wednesday but it was not until Thursday that I began clue #1 which luckily was a fairly easy step of half-square triangles and squares.  Easy enough using Inklingo for the half square triangles and rotary cutting the squares.  That one was done by Friday afternoon and I was ready for clue #2.

OH, my!  It's like last years "diamonds" step that we made into chevrons!  Sigh,  this one is a tricky step and since there is no Inklingo sized for this clue I decided to use the Easy Angle Ruler method.
I have never bought the Easy Angle however I did have a ruler that I purchased quite a few years ago from Kaye England that is the same concept which she uses to cut HST's like Bonnie does with the easy angle.
Hurrah it's wonderful to be able to use what I had on hand already.
So, to be honest mine didn't turn out perfect...and for some reason all the "diamond" shapes I cut from the printed template Bonnie provided turned out about 1/8 inch too small...sigh...

UPDATE: I figured out what the problem was!
I made measurements of the page comparing it to Bonnie's measurements and low and behold my printer was printing too big!  Took some trial and error but I need to reduce the printing to 95% of normal...When I did that and measured again the templates were accurate with the exception of the longwise measurements which were less than 1/16 of an inch too large. Glad to have that figured out but unfortunately I will have to live with what I have as the light pink fabric is almost gone and I am hoping that we won't need it for any more clues

I am not sure what happened but they are done and I will have to adjust as I sew them into the quilt once we have been given the reveal and assembly steps.

Photo one shows my fabrics and Clues 1 and 2 finished
Photo two shows the Kaye England ruler