Modern Plus Signs book hop ++ Celestial ++

Hello and welcome to my stop on the Modern Plus Signs book hop. I’m Sue and I live in Perth, Western Australia. You’ll see no snow covered landscapes here, since we are just heading into autumn J.

I first met Paige (QuiltedBlooms) and Cheryl (Meadow Mist Quilt Designs) through the 2016 New Quilt Bloggers Hop, although I was already a keen follower of their blogs, and I was thrilled to be offered the chance to participate in this book hop.

This quilt is Celestial. I love the way it looks on a bed with its random minimal smattering of plusses.

In the version in the book which  graces the cover as well, this quilt is made using a dark blue background and print plusses. I really like the use of prints.

Mine was made using Moda Bella solid 'Etchings Stone' for the background and a variety of other solids from my stash for the plusses.

I’ve used 9 blocks to make a 72” square version and quilted it with a simple grid two inches apart. 

It gives great texture and it made sense to use the seam lines as a quilting guide.

The book is a must-have if you are a fan of the plus block. Patterns range from modern and minimalist through to a more modern traditional look and techniques include pieced, foundation paper-pieced and applique. You are sure to find more than one quilt to put on your to-do list, I certainly have. 

The book is divided into sections according to project size and one feature that I really like is the thumbnail photos on the contents page. It makes it so much easier to find which project you’re looking for.

I came across an old, short, timber A-frame ladder in a second-hand shop a few weeks ago and, in my pursuit of the better quilt photo shoot, bought it. I’ve dragged my very on-trend mother-in-law’s tongue plant inside too. 

The book on the side table with the suffering and bedraggled maidenhair fern is Home Comforts – a book written by someone whose hobby is housework (a hilarious thought!). It makes a good prop. Buy Modern Plus Signs instead you'll be glad you did! 

Signed copies of Modern Plus Sign Quilts can be purchased at here:

Meadow Mist Design  Etsy Shop

Quilted Blooms  Etsy Shop

And digital and print versions from

Modern Plus Sign Quilts (Amazon)

Modern Plus Sign Quilts (C&T Publishing)

Thanks for visiting and make sure you check out the other stops for a look at different versions of all 16 patterns in the book. 

Here's the complete Modern Plus Sign Quilts Blog Hop schedule:

Monday, March 12th 
Cheryl @ Meadow Mist Designs
Paige @ Quilted Blooms

Tuesday, March 13th
Soma @ Whims and Fancies
Ann @ Brown Paws Quilting
Kitty @ Night Quilter
Sophie @ Luna Lovequilts
Afton @ Quilting Mod
Shelly @ The Carpenter's Daughter Who Quilts

Wednesday, March 14th
Jayne @ Twiggy and Opal
Jen @ A Dream and a Stitch
Abigail @ Cut & Alter
Yvonne @ Quilting Jetgirl
Sandra @ mmm! Quilts
Karen @ Run Sew Fun

Thursday, March 15th
Linda @ Flourishing Palms
Bernie @ Needle and Foot
Liz @ Savor Every Stitch
Stacey @ Stacey Day Quilts
Michelle @ From Bolt to Beauty
Patty @ Elm Street Quilts
Melanie @ A Bit of Scrap Stuff Blog

Thursday, March 15th
Linda @ Flourishing Palms
Bernie @ Needle and Foot
Liz @ Savor Every Stitch
Stacey @ Stacey Day Quilts
Michelle @ From Bolt to Beauty
Patty @ Elm Street Quilts
Melanie @ A Bit of Scrap Stuff Blog

Friday, March 16th
Myra @ Busy Hands Quilts
Izzy @ Dizzy Quilts
Ruth @ Charly and Ben's Crafty Corner
Christa @ Christa Quilts

Monday, March 19th
Jessica @ Quilty Habit
Cindy @ Hyacinth Quilt Designs
Jennifer @ The Inquiring Quilter
Julie @ The Crafty Quilter

Tuesday, March 20th
Tish @ Tish N Wonderland
Judy @ Sew Some Sunshine
Emily @ TheDarling Dogwood
Wanda @ Wanda's LifeSampler
Karen @ Tu-NaQuilts, Travels, and Eats
Katherine @ Sew Me Something Good

Wednesday, March 21st
Anja @ Anja Quilts
Kate @ Smiles from Kate
Sue @ Sevenoaks Street Quilts -MEEEEEE!!!
Carole @ From my Carolina Home
Alison @ LittleBunny Quilts

Thursday, March 22nd
Debbie @ Esch House Quilts
Laura @ Slice of Pi Quilts
Beth @ Cooking Up Quilts
Janice @ Color Creating and Quilting
Joanne @ Quilts by Joanne

Friday, March 23rd
Cheryl @ Meadow Mist Designs
Paige @ Quilted Blooms

Sue

Linking up to Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts, Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation and Wednesday Wait Loss at The Inquiring Quilter

February 2018 Bee Block Round-up

The February  Stash Bee block was chosen by this month’s queen Tracy (@tracysbitsnpieces). She picked the Vintage TV block by Lori Holt. She asked for a novelty fabric for the screen and two different fabrics for the TV and accents on a light background fabric. I have a limited stash of novelty fabrics so it was out with the Dr Suess fabric again for this block. After seeing everyone else’s TV screens I’m wondering if I should add at least one more to my stash…

This month’s colour in the 2018 Monthly Color Challenge hosted by Jen over at Patterns by Jen is blue. I’m keeping up with my scrappy 16 patch blocks so far. I’ll be linking up for the end of month check in.

Anne from Brown Paws Quilting (@brownpawsquilting on Instagram) is this month’s queen in Bee Inspired. She asked us to make scrappy strips and then slash a white background square at least twice and insert our scrap strips. I decided on an X. It was tricky trying to get the arms to match up after the second cut. Her tutorial is here. Finished size is 12 inches.

Happy sewing

Sue

Linking up to Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts, Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation and Wednesday Wait Loss at The Inquiring Quilter

Hold the Pickle Quilt Block Tutorial

As I promised last week here’s my quick and cheap tutorial for the Hold the Pickle block.

The block is effectively a  Pickle Dish Variation variation and once I modified it to remove the Drunkards Path units it lost its dish shape. I’ve named the quilt I’m making already as my Hold the Pickle Quilt, thus these are Hold the Pickle blocks.

I’ve given myself some parameters for fabric choices that you can ignore completely for your version. I’ve decided that I’m trying to achieve a sweet and pretty vintage effect so I’m using pastels for the backgrounds (B1 and B2) for the simple quarter log cabin units (not sure what to call these bits), low-volume prints as background for the star sections (B3) and checks, dots, and small scale florals for the focus prints in the centre (F). Star points are S. That’s what you’ll see in the photos.

I’m also using a tri-recs ruler these days to cut the fabric for the triangle in a square unit but I started out doing them as paper-pieced. You can find a pdf here from Generations Quilt Patterns for paper-piecing templates and paper-piecing cutting templates.

For this block we make 3 inch finished units.

So now that we’ve all got our templates ready we can start cutting.

CUTTING INSTRUCTIONS

For the triangle-in-a-square units, start with strips of your chosen fabric (S and B3) wide enough to fit your templates on and cut 8 star points and 4 background triangles. 

Cut two 3 ½” squares from the B3 fabric.

From the B1 and B2 backgrounds cut one each

          3 ½” square

          3 ½” x 6 ½” rectangle

From the F fabrics cut a total of four 3 ½” squares

SEWING IT TOGETHER

This part’s pretty easy.

(Notice how suddenly my fabrics have gone all wrinkly? That’s because a gust of wind blew them all over the garden and I had to chase them and grab them quickly in my sweaty little hand. Thoroughly annoyed I took the photo ANYWAY. Notice also that I have the far left star point section upside down - don't do that.)

Sew the B1 and B2 squares to two F squares, then attach the B1 and B2 rectangles to make the quarter log cabin units.

Lay out the star points S around the B3 triangles to make sure you’ve got everything lined up okay and then stitch together.

Arrange the different bits to make sure everything’s pointing in the right direction. Sew together two triangle-in-a-square units to the two B3 squares and two triangle-in-a-square units to two F squares (black arrows). Sew these two sections together (red arrows).

Sew the sections together like a four patch and *ta-da!* one block done! The block is 12" finished.

I hope this all makes sense to you. If you have any questions or need some clarification, please comment and I’ll endeavor to fix it.

I’ll be linking this up to Cheryl’s (Meadow Mist Designs) and Yvonne’s (Quilting Jetgirl) new quarterly tutorial link up.

In the meantime, I’m linking up to Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts, Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation and Wednesday Wait Loss at The Inquiring Quilter