Tuesday 27 March 2012

Scrap attack!

Remember this?
hundreds and hundreds of hexes
I’ve turned them into this:
Memory quilt top
For a while now I’ve felt a growing need to try english paper piecing. This is the type of patchwork my mum did, and she recently sent me the cot quilt she made for me, which we use on one of BoyGoblin’s change tables. Last year I went to the v&a quilting exhibition   – this was the impetus really for me to start patchwork, and it was the paper pieced quilts, with scraps of love letters and household receipts sewn in, that really captured my attention.
So, in the cross-generational spirit, I kept aside all of the goblin’s sleepsuits and onesies from his first 6 months. I feel slightly guilty, because some of these could be passed on, but most have had pretty heavy use and lots of washing – after all, the only things a newborn does really are sleep and make mess. (older children of course stop sleeping, and come up with new and e exciting ways of making mess…)
Because they were all stretch jersey, there was some front-end faffage involved in stabilising the scraps with iron-on interfacing before I could cut out my hexes.
So, here are the hexes, all ready to be pieced.

I did most of the sewing on my commute. Assembling  the daisy chains was just about doable in transit, but putting them together was definitely a late-night-telly job.
Now I need to sort out backing and binding. I’m reluctant to buy new fabric but don’t really have big enough scraps for the backing…
Back view, where all the process (and layout notes) is visible

2 comments:

  1. That's a fantastic accomplishment! You'll be so glad later on (if you aren't already) that you did use those precious baby clothes for such a meaningful end.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Rachel, i must admit to feeling a stab of guilt as a cut them all up, but you're right, its been great to see it come together.

      Loving the Frestival over at your place - such beautiful quilts. I'll never throw anything away now!

      Delete