String Fling CONQUERED!! Over the last 7 or so years I ve been working to make EVERY SINGLE QUILT in Bonnie Hunter s book String Fling. With this week s finish of Tulip Fields, I am officially FINISHED! did it can you believe EVERY QUILT IN THE BOOK!! I Someone asked if being I was finished if I would do a parade of my quilts from the book YOU BET I AM!!! I m pretty proud of the accomplishment. Besides, I thought you might like to see a parade of quilts. I know I did!! (this is one of the many reasons I m so glad I blog. I have the history right here) Let the show begin. First Up Blue Skies. here. Find a full write up about the quilt I adore blue and yellow together. I have another blue and yellow quilt percolating in my mind. I love the color combo that much.
This quilt taught me to put some variety in the strings. You can see here how the yellows go from bright yellow to white.
I had thought to make this one bigger but Kelli made one and did make it bigger. Then she had trouble with the outer border. After I knew that, I knew I d make this one the same size as the book. Charlotte s Baskets is next. (More about the quilt here)
This one went pretty fast for me. I had just made Texas Tumbleweeds (shown in the picture below) in batiks (it s a Bonnie Hunter quilt from More Adventures with Leaders and Enders) I ended up with lots of bonus triangles. were used in Charlotte s Baskets. All of them
I made a 5 x 6 layout vs a 4 x 5 layout. The sashing on mine is 2 strips with 2 cornerstones. I didn t piece the small cornerstones like the original. I also opted to not add an inner border.so I guess you could say- I followed the block pattern and then made it my own.
I no longer have this one. local Fireman s Breakfast. Daylilies I donated for the raffle for our (More about the quilt HERE) This quilt was a challenge for me. I am not a girl that loves applique or inset seams. My family bought me a treadle for my birthday last year and one of my goals was to learn to use it and to make a quilt with it. Well I haven t made an entire quilt with it but I did do ALL of the string blocks on the treadle and I have to say I do love treadling.
This quilt helped me really expand my quilting abilities. I m so glad I stepped out of my box and gave it a try. This one I have kept. It might get gifted someday not yet though. Jamestown Landing (More about the quilt HERE) When Bonnie Hunter said on her blog that one of her quilts would be in the Australian Homespun magazine I was really sad thinking I wouldn t be able to find the magazine Then I thought oh well. Then Bonnie showed a picture of the quilt on her blog and I thought..i am going to find the
magazine and the mad hunt was on. I finally found and though I had many other projects going on, I the fabric out and started working on it anyway. I am so I did. This quilt ended up landing in her String Fling and by the book came out, I already had mine made. even cut glad book I made this in 2011 and that was when we had our old beagle Gracie. Blues are my favorite right up next to red so it s no wonder I like this one. This quilt taught me that it s best to have some fabric from light to mediums when making string blocks. Limiting the fabric options to only light neutrals doesn t make the best looking string quilt.
This quilt I have kept. Orka Bay (more about the quilt HERE) I did this as a mystery. I loved this as a mystery one of my favorite ones. had me really loving the quilt. The border I had some UFO blocks and was doing a UFO challenge at the same time I was working on this. I ended up putting the blocks on the back of the quilt.
I ve kept this quilt and not gifted it.that means I like it!! If I were to redo it, I d have added some lighter blues in my strings. Pfefferneuse (Read more about the quilt HERE) I knew I d make this quilt the minute I opened the book! mother in law used to make Pfefferneuse cookies Christmas. I have made them a few times. My each I loved the colors on this. When I went to a
garage sale and bought a large box of 80 s calico prints for $1 this quilt moved to the front burner. The box was filled with browns and creams. PERFECT for this quilt. I added some of my own scraps and before I knew it I had the perfect combination of scraps for this quilt. The mix of fabrics from some modern to those old calicos is perfect. I made this one the size that was suggested. own and likely will not gift it. This one I still Pineapple Crazy (Read about this one HERE) This quilt was the most challenging quilt I have ever made. Before this, I had done VERY LITTLE paper piecing.
For those of you who don t know, the blocks finish at 5. There are 224 of them in the center and 60 on the outer edge. That s a lot of paper piecing. Never in my life did I think I could do that.
I did a little bit of change ups on the corner and border blocks. Nothing too big.
I like making a quilt my own. This one will go to my daughter Kayla once I m ready to part with it. Roll Roll Cotton Boll (read the original post here) I did this as the mystery. I wasn t a string girl at all at the time. I remember dreading when I heard the words string. I almost gave up on the mystery right then. I can t tell you how happy I am that I moved on beyond that. String honestly opened a whole new world for me.
Of all of the quilts, I would definitely make this one again. Of all the quilts I m made that are designed by Bonnie Hunter, this is my favorite. I think the reason I love it so much was that this quilt sold me a scraps. Before this quilt I did scraps but this one showed me I loved scraps.
Mine was all Civil War fabrics and it looked good in those. This quilt is a keeper. I won t gift it. Santa Fe String Star (Oh I love this one!!) Read more about this one here. When I first bought the book, this is the one I most wanted to make. The stars are made from scraps and the background ended up being a blue batik. I had the center part done for a long time but I couldn t bring myself to decide on a color for the background. I think this was perfect.
Flying geese are another of my favorite quilting elements. So, for me, what s not to love? Yep. Love it. Stars, Flying Geese, blue.
One note on the pattern. After getting the star sewn together, I tested the size of the background corner. For me, I needed pieces that were larger than the pattern indicated. A blog reader gave me the advice to cut the pieces bigger, sew them in place and then cut the center of the quilt down. I did that. I couldn t cut it to the size the pattern suggested so I also added four more flying geese to each side of the border.and then added the outside border-making my quilt bigger. I don t think there was a pattern misprint. I think those little diamonds have give to them and some stretched. This quilt has stayed in my collection. I don t think I ll part with it. It is also one of a VERY few quilts I would ever considered making another of. Talkin Turkey (Read more about it HERE)
Mine is larger than the original pattern. I added a row. That makes it 6 x 6 setting vs 6 x 5 setting. We have a queen sized bed and I knew this one I was keeping larger was better. I started this back when the block first appeared in Quiltmaker s 100 block issue. It languished in the UFO pile for quite awhile. The reason: The directions in the magazine were slightly different than the ones in the book. I was nervous that what I had wouldn t work..not true, it all worked out fine.
This one will be on my bed for Christmas and likely through Valentines day. Seeing this again is making me get the itch to make a red and white quilt again!!! Tulip Fields (read more about it HERE)
This was the last of the quilts to finish up. It wasn t last because I liked it the least. It was last because I knew I wanted to tackle the harder quilts first. For me the harder ones were Pineapple Crazy and Daylilies. I m so glad this one waited as I got braver and mixed batiks and regular fabric. I know it s not a big deal but I was a purist for a little bit. Now I m not. I love this look.
I love the soft fall colors of this one. I typically don t branch out so far from the original quilts this one I did by not adding the border that was originally designed. I am so happy with how this one turned out. Wild Thing (read more about it here) Here is is on the frame. on the back? I sure do! Don t you love the polka dot fabric
Here it is on my bed. A blog reader, and friend, Linda gifted the outer fabric to me. Oh I love that fabric. Yes, it s a Kaffee fabric.
When I made this I accidentally turned a bunch of blocks around so in the end I had 20 wrong blocks. They are still in my UFO pile. I haven t decided what to do with them yet. Maybe that should be my next project.
I have two childcare kiddos that go off to kindergarten next fall. In the past I ve gifted the kids a quilt when they go to Kindergarten. I was thinking about using the other blocks, and making another of these quilts with those wrong blocks. Hm I might have to pull them out and get looking at that. I love this quilt but I can t keep them all!! Speaking of gifting quilts to childcare kids I made TWO Zuckerwaitte quilts. (read more about them here)
I gifted these to my two oldest childcare kiddos. They both had paged through the quilt book with me and both loved these. I think it was because they were pink than anything else. I also think the scalloped edge was appealing.
Both quilts were the same except for backing.
I wanted them to be able to tell them apart. These were fun but a little tedious making two. Thankfully the quilts are smaller in size. I very much liked how they turned out. It was so-so fun to gift the to the girls!! That s the parade of quilts. I ve heard it said that if a person buys a quilt book and makes three quilts from the book then buying the book was worth the cost as that would equal out to about as much as it costs to buy individual patterns. I made 13 quilts from the book. This book was definitely worth the price. For the most part, I m not a big believer in that saying though. I take quilt books with me to bed. I read them and page through them LOTS. I take them with to a doctor appointment and dream about the quilts I d rather be making at home.
I am thrilled that Bonnie Hunter is writing another string book. THRILLED. I can t believe that at the start of the Roll Roll Cotton Boll mystery I didn t know what a string was. I had never sewn strings. Now I ve made 13 string quilts.this book got me to try so many different things: -Strings -Scalloped Edges -Inset seams -Applique -Batiks -A treadle sewing machine -INTENSE paper piecing I can t believe how my skills have improved. I can t wait for the next challenges the new book brings. I m sure some will ask Hey Jo, are you going to make all of the quilts in the new book? Ah, I guess time will tell Maybe that s a topic for another blog post, how many quilts have I made from the other Bonnie Hunter books? I think there is one book that I only have three quilts to make and I ll have made all of them too. Stop by tomorrow. I m reviewing Bonnie Hunter s new string book, String Frenzy. You might think I m sick of strings NOPE. I m totally up for another 12 string quilts.