Merry Christmas 2014!!

Bonnie Hunter has challenged those following her blog and Quiltville Open Studio facebook page to post some Christmas quilts (or Hanukkah, Solstice, Winter).  We are linking up with her blog starting tomorrow, Christmas Eve.

Here are a few of my Christmas quilts:

Let's start with the oldest...the Christmas stockings I made my kids a few years ago:

 

Next is a Christmas "Magic Tile" quilt which I have now sold.  So glad I got a photo of it before it went.

This one was a gift for my niece  few years back.  It was a 'cheater' panel with chenille borders and red cornerstones in quilting cotton:

This one is also a few years old and was also gifted.  The pattern is called "Warm Wishes"

This next one is a Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt from a few years ago called "Carolina Christmas".  I can't remember which of her the books the pattern ended up in but I modified it only slightly by breaking up the squares with some sashing.  This one is king sized and lives on our bed during the Christmas season:

Closeup of the quilting which is now nice and krinkly because of washing it.  I love when that happens.  I used Hobbs Wool batting in this one.  It's nice and toasty warm.

And lastly, is my Christmas Celtic Solstice quilt.  I did two, a king sized one in brown, blue, rust and light blue/white and this one using Christmas fabric.  Originally this fabric was going to be a second Carolina Christmas but I lost steam on doing a second one of those.  The fabric worked perfectly for a Christmas Celtic Soltice quilt.  I modified it slightly by simplifying the blocks.  I wanted to get it done!  So happy to have this one ready for Christmas 2014:

Merry Christmas from our corner of the world in Victoria, BC Canada where we are going to be enjoying a green Christmas!    Mavis

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt from Quiltville 2014 - Clue 3

Moving right along on our winter's mystery by Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville, my guess is that these units are for the border. 

These were super speedy. Once again I used my 2" strip die on my Accuquilt GO, sewed the strips/stratas together, put them right sides together and then laid them 90 degrees folded on the strip die to subcut the units. All that remained was seeing them together and pressing. 

I'm loving this mystery quilt so far, especially since I've been able to keep up!  With surgery looming on Jan 19 I'd love to have my top done before then. 

After some Christmas baking I'll see if I have any energy left for clue 4!

Until then happy Saturday!

Mavis

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt from Quiltville 2014 - Clue 2

So far I'm keeping up with the mystery clues as they are released.  I got all 100 broken dishes units done, pressed and stacked into piles of ten and set aside.

This week we got to play with black, white and pink.  It was like enjoying a bag of Licorice Allsorts candy.

Bonnie Hunter always goes the extra mile showing multiple ways of approaching the cutting and piecing.  Clue 2 was no different.  I ended up doing her third piecing option which gave me the opportunity to use my 2 1/2" strip die.  Pictured below is 2 1/2" strips which I cut in pink and black then folded, placed on a 90 degree angle and then passed through the Accuquilt cutter on the 2 1/2" strip die which yielded me a bunch of 2 1/2" squares.  Oh how I love my Accuquilt GO! 

There is often talk about fabric waste using the Accuquilt GO.  I don't think so!

Just a few pieces on the sides.  The rest is all useable, perfectly square 2 1/2" squares.

I also used the Accuquilt GO to cut white strips at 2 1/2" and then used my ruler and rotary cutter to cut them down to the required 2 1/2 x 4 1/2" rectangles.  From there I had to draw the diagonal line on the pink and black squares so they could be added to the rectangles...like this:

Don't they make YOU crave licorice allsorts??

One of the benefits of option 3 of clue 2 (this method) is that you gain some bonus half square triangles.  Here is my growing stack.  I am using them for leaders and enders while constructing the blocks.

They are  stored in a little treasure box that we inherited fro my mother-in-law.  I love this box!

Come to think of it, wouldn't that make a lovely quilt design?  Hmmmmm.

Thank you Bonnie Hunter for another great winter mystery quilt and for the opportunity to join the "Linky" party.  To continue on the journey of reading through the linked articles, click here to go back to Bonnie's post:  http://quiltville.blogspot.ca/2014/12/mystery-monday-link-up-part-2.html

Until Friday...clue 3...I've got 79 units done for clue 2...21 to go.

Mavis

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt from Quiltville - 2014 - Step 1

I always look forward to Bonnie Hunter's winter mystery released on the Friday after the American Thanksgiving.  Since October when the yardage requirements and colour cards were released, I've been shopping my stash and augmenting with a few smaller bits of yardage to round out what I have.

I've also been analyzing some of Bonnie's patterns to see what are the most common components making up her blocks.  I've done this because I want to add some useful Accuquilt dies to my collection.  I have found my Accuquilt GO radically cuts down the cutting time for quilts.  And I really want to use it for this mystery quilt.  I concluded that there are many, many strips in various widths as well as squares in various sizes.  What I did find is that she commonly uses 2 1/2" strips and 2" strips to cut sub units from with the Easy Angle ruler (which I own).  I knew I couldn't go wrong with these two dies.

Clue 1 was released on Friday.  I was able to use my Value Die that came with my GO cutter for the 2 1/2" squares and the 2 1/2" half square triangles.  Here is my journey through Clue 1.  I'm not done yet.  I've got all my 'twosies' done but still have to join them to make the broken dishes.

Here is my value die.  I used the bottom two to create the broken dishes units for Step 1.

 I sub-cut my pinks and aquas right sides together and stacked them in 6s onto the half square triangle section of the die. It was not exact sizes like a regular rotary cutting job, but just enough to cover the blades.  I left the 4 1/2" die empty.  I added the black and yellow for the squares on the bottom of the die using the same principle of 'just a bit bigger than the size of the die".  This is my rough cut:

Sub-cutting to cover blades of half square triangles on the GO die.

Here is the sub-cut now covering the blades and ready to cut.

 

 There is very little waste this way, as you can see in the picture below.  

Here is my first test block.  Perfect 4 1/2".  LOVE my Accuquilt GO because of the accuracy.  No slipping rulers.  No "oopsies".  :)

And here is the back of the block with the center swirled but Bonnie mentioned last night that it creates bulk on the triangles to press this way and I have to agree.  I will be pressing mine open I think.

Here are some pictures of our Bonnie Hunter Quiltville Mystery Launch 2014.  There were twelve of us in our group working on the mystery.  I brought some Grand Illusion colour appropriate cupcakes .

The girls:

 My chain pieced half square triangles at the ironing board:

 

And that folks was the adventures of Step 1.  I've got some work to do before Friday to get my blocks put together but am already eagerly anticipating Step 2 and wondering if I've chosen wisely with my dies and whether I'll have what I need for cutting Step 2.  We'll see.
Here is the link back to the linky party on Bonnie's blog:  http://quiltville.blogspot.ca/2014/12/mystery-monday-link-up-part-1.html

Until Friday then....

Mavis