The Start: 2" Fabric Strips

Many of you know part of the story behind all of this.

One day back in 2015 I decided that I just had to start using my 2" strips. I had 2 bags of them - I mean large trash bags.  It was the beginning of this series.

I ended up making 21 of these tops that year.

I also managed to get myself tossed out of a large Facebook group for "promoting myself too much" (since I didn't have a website or a group, I pondered the meaning of that - in the end, I took it as a compliment) and that treatment resulted in my starting the Facebook group Becky Quilts in the Old Country - where I could show my quilts and share patterns without fear of reprisal by a moderator who figured I had simply 'making a name for myself' as a goal.

OK. I was actually pretty upset - because I had just wanted to share what I had made with people and she apparently felt threatened. I won't tell you which group as I don't want to give them one iota of advertising.

Subsequently, my twin sister started www.quiltedtwins.com.  She and I have always been interested in sewing (both of us were home ec ed majors in college) since we were young - but she's had almost no time to sew for the last 20 years as she has had another business that kept her busy (www.thecouponclippers.com). 

The Result

So I made 21 tops in 2015 even though I just started in June.  I guess I worked like a mad woman. I know a good bit of it was a way to work out the grief I felt at my dad's passing on to glory in July of 2015. 

Then I decided to try for another 21 in 2016.  I finished number 42 late in December.

And it's now only early September, but I've finished my 21 for this year. I will now turn my attention to other things for the rest of this calendar year.  I've actually got several more ideas written down - but this year, by tackling DNA Wrap and Colorful Blades as well as several others, I attempted more complicated designs than I had done to date.

I've not shown numbers 20 and 21 for the year, but I've finished them - look for them in the next few days - they will be number 62 and 63 in this series. I'll start with number 64 in January, 2018.

But--

let me take you back to early in the year. 

I started with Explosion, finishing it up on January 1 - it made me think of fireworks- thus the name Explosion!

Then came DNA Wrap - an idea I had come by back when I made Balls and Chains (number 32) in 2016 - but hadn't taken the time to figure out the math to make it work.  It's one of my favorites.

Then I decided that a whole quilt out of a border theme I'd seen would help tame those purple/blue strips.  I like it - it's just not finished yet. Library Stacks is its name.

Ice Cube Prisms still make me smile - I really like it a lot! My daughter in law, Jessica, came up with the name. I thought it fit perfectly.

Posing Posies was a return to something more subdued. I thought it would be great with blues and yellows, mimicking Forget-me-nots - my husband's home state of AK's state flower, but I did it in red.

Then I decided to test myself, using mostly the same block to create the next three. The first, Blades of Color, was actually the simplest of these three.

Then several of you helped me nail down the name "Test Pattern #49" - a great name, by the way, for the second in this little series of 3.

Then, the one that I am currently using on my computer as my desktop background - Arapaho Roads. This was number 3 of my little sub series of three quilts using a lot of the same pieces - just put together differently.

Number 51 is Classy Scraps and quite a change, both in appearance and feel from the last few. I wanted a completely different look.  

Number 52 had been in my Electric Quilt program for a while - and I named it Kachelofen as that is the German word for ceramic tile furnace. This design made me think of the old style ceramic tile furances that used to be common here in Poland. In fact, when we bought our church property, my husband had to tear out several of these as part of our remodeling efforts.

Snowballs and Scraps was a nod to using browns and all things calm after the riot of colors of the last few. My supplies were overwhelmed with these colors - so I made it.

And now, once again, I had been working so feverishly in my sewing room that I left pieces all over - so I decided that a major Clean up was in order. So the next one - simply "Clean Up".

and Clean Up 2.  These two brought order back to the floors of my sewing room as I just sewed anything I touched as long as it was a 2" strip.

By now I'm up to number 56 for the series - and I just wanted to go back to simplicity and easy - as both Clean Ups were pretty intensive piecing, as you can imagine.

So Scrappy Sawtooth Stars was made. Delightfully simple and a visual break for the eyes.

I was concerned with the number of very short pieces I had in my sewing room about now and sewed many of them together end to end in lights and darks and used those rolls of 2" strips to make a log cabin using all these small pieces sewn together. I called it Patchy Log Cabin.  I went wild with the center color and the border lime green.  Do I like it? Not particularly. But It accomplished a goal of using up some of those small pieces.

I had been mulling over the idea of using bricks again so I decided to come up with something that would be do-able.  Native Splendor is a design made with blocks (not rows as Mosaic number 11 in this series) and using bricks and a few 2" squares.

I had made up the heart blocks a couple months earlier, but not gotten to making the chain blocks so I could finish this up. I decided to "just do it".  I've have a soft spot for the simple Irish Chain ever since I started quilting. This wasn't quite "so simple". But not so hard either.

While working with Native Splendor, I decided to completely change the colors but use the same blocks. This is the result. Am I pleased? You betcha! Mosaic Variation was born.

And this brings me to number 59 in this series - or number 19 for the series for the year 2017.  

Obviously not all of these have been quilted yet.

What I have learned to do is to make the top and then put it aside for a while before quilting. I find that I work better, for the most part, that way. Then, when the weather turns cold and nasty, I will quilt again.

If they are lying flat on the floor - they are just a top.

What I hope you've seen is a variety--I don't want to get in a rut!  None of these are particularly complicated. You could probably make any one of them. The patterns are in the free patterns section of the website.

And now you know....I still have two left to show you.  You've probably figured it out by now that I've not finished the patterns - and that's what's keeping me back from showing you the last two for the year.  I'm working as fast as I can.

And just in case you you need something for your own project, check out what my sis has for you in the fabrics section.