A Seriously Scrappy May

I decided to get serious for this month’s ScrapHappy day.  There’s not much fabric that’s scrappier than the long bits cut off the sides is there?

I’ve been saving them for a while.

I like the ones with writing and colour swatches on best but not all selvedges are printed equal and some are just too narrow to be useful.

I decided to do a little quilt as you go piece so took a scrap of fabric leftover from the shirt I made Mr. Tialys and a piece of wadding and drew  round a large embroidery hoop to get a circle of the right size.

Then I laid a couple of selvedges right sides together across the middle and joined with a quarter inch seam through all the layers which is where the ‘quilting as you go’ comes in.

Keep pressing each strip open and adding another, the circle slowly starts to fill in.

I put the whole thing into the large emboidery hoop and trimmed the excess selvedges and wadding very close to the wooden edge, leaving some of the backing longer to glue down onto the surround.  You can see the quilting and pretty fabric so I didn’t want to cover it up with another back.

The result is an unusual wall hanging for my sewing room which has the added appeal of reminding me of past projects I made with the fabrics formerly attached to those selvedges.  I deliberately framed it so the selvedges run diagonally (in case you were wondering) because I think it looks a little more interesting than if they were running horizontally.

 

And all from a box of cut off edges.

As you can see, I have quite a few more.

I’ve got an ‘ongoing’ scrappy project to tell you about too. My suggestion to my Wednesday afternoon sewing friend was that we could make a pixelated sewing machine wall hanging out of 1.5 inch squares.  Unsurprisingly, she seemed a bit dubious, even slightly unenthusiastic you might say, but went along with me anyway bless her.

We’re doing the mini version you’ll not be surprised to hear.  Even that takes 388 neutral squares and 275 (or thereabouts) coloured ones.  I found the pattern on Craftsy (now Blueprint).

The idea was sparked off by me finding a packet of 1.5 inch squares I’d cut at some stage from a charm pack of batiks.  I have no idea what I was intending to do with them but whatever it was obviously didn’t materialise.

I rummaged through my scraps to make up the number of different colours I need but must confess I had to use a couple of new fat quarters in order to have enough neutrals for the pixielated background.

The 1.5 inch squares are arranged 5 x 5 to make a 5.5 inch square block and then joined together in horizontal rows of five blocks.

I’m not gonna lie, as my daughter says depressingly often, keeping those tiny squares joined accurately is, frankly, a bit of a nightmare for me.  I’m using a 1/4 inch foot on my machine but I still have a few wonky bits. Pixelation might be somewhat enhanced in my version.

I’ll be doing an update next Scraphappy Day but don’t expect it to be finished (or unwobbly).

If you like the idea of using your scraps (of anything, not just fabric) click on Kate or Gun(first two names in the list  below) and join us on the 15th of every month – or just those months you feel like joining in.  Here’s a list of both frequent and occasional Scraphappiers (?) if you want to see what everybody else is doing.

Kate,  Gun, Titti, Heléne, Eva, Sue, Nanette, Lynn , Lynda,
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy, Debbierose, Tracy, Jill, Claire, Jan, Karen,
Moira, Sandra, Linda, Chris, Nancy, Alys, Kerry, Claire, Jean, Johanna,
Joanne, Jon, Hayley, Dawn, Gwen, Connie, Bekki, Pauline and Sue L.