A couple small quilts

Spring is coming slowly this year, and it has given me time to finish binding a couple of small quilts.

The first, as yet unnamed, sprang from a desperate need to reduce the scraps in my 5-inch scrap bag.  It hardly made a dent!  The starting point: five remaining tan squares from a border print dress I made way back in the 1980's!   They were all that was leftover after making this table runner a few years ago.

33 x 37-1/2 inches

The second is a small quilt that used up all the pink/white squares remaining from a whole-cloth baby quilt that I made two years ago.  Little tan bunnies, frogs, turtle and dragonflies make these fussy-cut blocks shine.  Perfect for Easter!

30 x 32 inches

And finally, a little 13-inch square blue and white quilt from Kathleen Tracy's book Small and Scrappy.  The light fabric was cut from a blouse that my late mother had sewn for herself.  It's not 100% cotton and was hard to work with.  It just wouldn't stay square.  All kinds of wonky!  And, of course, I was too lazy to get out the spray starch to keep it in line.  But it turned out pretty well, and it will always remind me of Mom.  Here it is with my Aunt Mary Ellen's old Singer.

13-inch square blue and white quilt 

Not Exactly Pfeffernusse

A chance find at the thrift store provided me with yards and yards of a lovely rich brown quilt shop fabric with hazelnuts, red berries and a hint of gold.  They had a former life as curtains and matching valances.  But I had new plans for them! 

Close-up of the brown Curtain and white Shirting fabrics.

With all good intentions this quilt top started out to be Bonnie Hunter's "Pfeffernusse" from String Fling.  The wonderful browns and reds seemed a great fit.  But, I wanted to really feature the brown fabric and not cut it up in small pieces. 

 First alteration... use the brown fabric in place of the string pieced scrappy browns.

Second alteration... if I wasn't string piecing the brown could I get away with a neutral stripe instead of piecing?  Out came a white stripe shirting from my mother's stash.  That's deep stash!  Let's just say I remember this fabric from around 1970 when she tried sewing dress shirts for Dad.

Queen size top

Time went by and things were going along really well.  All the blocks were pieced and it came time to put them together.  Hmm...The large brown pinwheels of Pfeffernusse just weren't speaking to me.  It looked a little blotchy.  Probably because I used large pieces of fabric instead of string piecing.

Third alteration... re-arrange the blocks.  How about a barn-raising pattern?  Yep, looking better.

Don't you think those curtains should be pleased at how nice they look now?  And, I have two curtain panels and a valance left over just in case this ends up in a room with a window that could use matching cafe' curtains.

Sometimes quilts just name themselves, but this one is eluding me for the time being.  It doesn't look anything like the original pattern.  Take a look HERE.