Time Slips Away: Done and Dusted

The first of my two recent finishes. This is Time Slips Away, the last quilt I started before covid struck and the last quilt I finished in my old house. Also, thanks to covid, this is my least blogged quilt ever.  I just about managed to sew and was thankful for it, but blogging was mostly beyond me. As a result, it is a piece of work that I have generally overlooked.  When I pulled it out of the drawer to sandwich, I realised I didn't have a strong sense of it at all, but fortunately, looking at it after all this time, I rather like it.

I think this represents part of a transition phase for me - there are a few shirts (3 I think) in this, but there are also a number of pieces of proper yardage whereas now it's almost entirely shirt/recycled clothing.

The fabric that kicked this all off was a little shirt, probably from around the 1970s, with a swirly floral print (you can get a proper look at it here). When I got to the quilting, I tried to echo this by sewing overlapping circles so that I got a sort of petal effect.  This seemed like a good idea and I covered the whole quilt in next to no time. Only then I had the bright notion that I would do a second round of stitching, just inside the first.

Undoubtedly this has given me a much more flower-like feel in the end, but about halfway through I started wondering what on earth had possessed me. Who in their right mind quilts a whole top and then does it again?  On a practical note, while I like how it looks, it definitely makes the finished item ever so slightly stiffer than I am used to.  Not enough to bother me, but I wouldn't want to go any further in this direction - I prefer my quilts to feel drape-y and inviting and ready to use.  

I started piecing on 11th March 2020 and, despite lockdown and consequent home schooling, finished piecing 25th June 2020. It was the last quilt I pieced in my old house and the last thing I sewed at all until the December. I have to admit I don't know when this went into a hoop. I have been working on another one and this has taken the longer of the two, so probably since around the beginning of the year, on and off.

The wadding is organic cotton and as usual I used whatever perle cottons I had that were a close enough fit.  This is a habit I will have to reassess soon as my store of half-used threads is growing smaller and smaller.  The binding is a grey print from stash - again, I will have to reassess eventually, but for now there's still plenty of fabric in the boxes.  In fact, given how long it is since I bought yardage it's a bit scary how long my boxes are lasting.  I am given maybe three or four half yards most years, but given that I use them for both bindings and in quilt backs, I had expected to run out ages ago.  

My favourite parts of this are the lines created by the black triangles, the pinwheels, which happened accidentally at first and then accidentally-on-purpose, and the way I had to use teeny-tiny pieces to get to the end.  I have done this lots since but this was one of the first times it got so close to the wire and I was both relieved and a bit pleased with myself when I got to my finish.

No scrap left behind

Right down to the wire is customary practice for me now, but this time I can barely see the wire in my rear-view mirror.  Literally every last piece is being utilised and I'm drafting in any extra bits and bobs that catch my eye too.  Blocks I tried and rejected are now a shoo-in for this quilt.  In fact, anything goes if it fills a bit more space.

Here are a few examples: this one has much bigger triangles from the mucky green fabric with the little rows of sprouts.  It's the one thing I still have a lot of, as it was only going into the black hst blocks.  

You can also see triangles pieced from two fabrics...

 here's another one of those...

I have lots of little hourglasses, as a consequence of cutting without reference to a ruler or any form of measurement.  I'm making them bigger, like this one

 or using them in groups, like here.

I'm rather enjoying the challenge.

Coming up for air

I have been sewing.  In tiny moments, here and there.  It doesn't ever feel like much at the time, but I think that when I add it all up it does amount to something.

This is where I am up to with the hourglasses.

It doesn't look like school will be going back before September, so my aim now is to establish a routine that covers all the other stuff but builds in more coherent sewing time.  Sometimes I take this out of the box and can't really recall what I thought I would do next.  That was okay for a while but now it starts to irritate me.  Let's see if I can do better.

Next steps?

Having finished a long central column - or at least a long column I'm currently thinking will be in the centre - I am now trying to figure out what next.  

I have a few wonkier rectangles...

or I could keep going with my squares but set them so that you see the diamonds...

or I could use more of my little black blocks.  Maybe not quite like this, which seems a bit over the top to my eye, but something along these lines.

 Or, final option, is that maybe I throw the kitchen sink at it and include bits of all these ideas.  Now there's a thought to wrestle with.

A little self-knowledge

Having come up with one chunk of hourglasses that I liked, I did the obvious thing and made another.  Easy progress, you might think, and you would be right.  I could just have kept making chunks and then sewed them all together and hey presto, that would have been my quilt finished.  It was tempting but then I had a bit of a word with myself about my short attention span.  In all likelihood, I would get bored way before I had enough bits to make a whole quilt.  I've tried it before and it just hasn't worked, so best just to admit it now.

Also I still had one or two fabrics from my initial pull that felt like they belonged in this.

So I played around with borders, wondering if I might make this into a medallion, but it didn't quite work how I would have wanted.  Next step would be to chop into them, but I like to have more of an idea than that before I over-commit.  Smaller hourglasses?  Squares? In the end I decided to make just a few wee units and see if I liked them.

Hmm, these I think I can do something with.

Now I have my two chunks, with a little row of hsts between them.  That will do for now.

Time slips away...

...is what I am calling this quilt (with a nod of thanks to Mr Springsteen).  It's a name that seems appropriate on all sorts of levels at the moment.

I am managing to sneak in my bits and pieces of sewing time, just enough to keep my hand in and stop my head from exploding.  All I need to do now is the blogging bit, which I am determined to hold on to.  I apologise now to everyone who has waited ages for a response to their comments and also to everyone whose blog I would normally visit  - I will be back on track soon; just one humungous piece of real life work to get over and done and things should be back on a more even keel.

I am still hourglassing and after playing around with various layouts came up with this little block, which I liked a lot.

Then my machine started acting up.  Since it's an old one there aren't many things that can go wrong and in this case it was just the wiring in the bit that plugs the foot pedal into the machine.  That was the good news.  The bad news was that in taking it apart I managed to drop the worlds tiniest nut (and in nuts and bolts) onto the carpet.  Could we find it?  Oh no, not a hope.

Not to be discouraged I pulled this pretty little thing out of its case.

It's a funny thing - a Singer clone with Arabic script, which I bought, to be perfectly honest, because it was a lovely yellow colour (the case is the same shade as the base).  Not the swankiest machine in the world but it does a fair stitch and is seeing me through.

Detour over, I made a few more blocks and joined them together.  Now I have this.

I notice now that I have one deliberate pinwheel in here, but one has happened without any help from me too.  I love it when that sort of thing happens.

Keep well, everyone, and keep sewing.