That Batik Modern Double Wedding Ring Quilt

A really long time ago, I posted about a modern Double Wedding Ring quilt I started.

I first posted about it in this blog post in 2013. More recently, there was progress -- but that was in 2015. So, it's been a while.

In my original post from 2013, I mentioned that I was definitely inspired by this quilt from Jo's Country Junction. I loved the dark blue background, and I'd never seen a DWR quilt with anything other than a light background, and I LOVED the look of dark blue.

Not being sure I had the endurance for all those hundreds of tiny pieces, I decided on a "modern" look: rings made from larger pieces, and done in batiks.

I've loved the fabrics, and the colors, and I've enjoyed working on it, but I've been busy. So, it's been sitting.

Yesterday, Jo's Country Junction announced a Double Wedding Ring Quilt-Along ... Mine's not quite the same, but the Quilt-Along sounds pretty user-friendly and uncomplicated ... So, I think this is my opportunity to get motivated to finish mine!

I dug the project out of its zipper-bag-in-a-box. As often happens, I got a lot of the "hard part" finished, and then the project stalled for lack of time. Looks like I've got 5 of my 7 rows mostly-assembled. There are pieces to add to the edges, possibly in conjunction with the borders. And I'm undecided how I want to do the borders, but I've got some ideas.

So, before next week, I want to double-check my layout and figure out the plan for the border. (See all those options laid out on paper? I need to figure out which layout I chose and started, and whether all my pieces and parts are accounted for.)

I'm linking this post to Jo's Quilt-Along blog post for this week.

UFOs: These quilts are happening!

My UFOs have been coming along! 

Here's the short version: 

Finished Quilt Top: Hopscotch Butterscotch. This turned out big (75" x 88"), since I used mostly 2½" cut pieces, instead of the 2" in Bonnie Hunter's pattern. I love the organized randomness! I REALLY love the fancy piano-key border.

Still in the works: the quilting on my great-great grandmother's Dresden Plate. Haven't worked on it since last week; more details about this one in last week's post.

Up for border & quilting soon: the 1008 checkerboard.

Got a few stitches in this week: My modern Double Wedding Ring. I've almost got the 5-circles by 7-circles main section done. I last mentioned this quilt top in my initial UFO "goals" post here. Before that, it had been a while since I worked on it. Actually, I started this gorgeous thing about 3 years ago (2013: see this post and also this one), but then I didn't blog about it for another year (2014: see here). For whatever reason, I blogged about it one time a year ago (2015: see this post.) Who knows ... maybe this will be the year this one gets done! I'm not pressuring myself, but it does feel great to get these projects worked on!

Finished & Given away: Baby Happily Scrappily Irish. I blogged about it last Friday.

Got their portrait painted: A couple of quilts ... Two of my quilts served as inspiration for a friend's beautiful painting! See that post here.

 

I'm linking this post to this week's UFO Challenge update at Jo's Country Junction ... lots of other quilters are working on their "Un-Finished Objects", and a weekly link party helps remind us to keep up the good work.

Batik Double Wedding Ring Progress

This Double Wedding Ring quilt top is coming together slowly, but surely. Every now and then, I pull it out and work on it. Several days ago, I spent some time adding to this one.

Right now, it just needs a couple more rows of circle units added, and then the center with be done. After that, it'll get an order border of the same navy as the background.

I love the way the bright colors look against the dark navy background.

Another Progress Milestone

I recently arrived at another patchwork milestone ... 

All the "melon" pieces for my Double Wedding Ring Quilt are assembled.

My layout says I need 84 of these "melons" ... each one is made from two batik arches and two batik squares, and one navy-blue center piece.

So, it's been a lot of piecing ... I started this project about a year ago (see the first post about it here), and it has involved a lot of bits and pieces (see another post here).

I LOVE this fabric! The colors are great, and I think the bright colors look great against the navy blue.

So, now, the thing to do is to start assembling rows ... I'm excited about the progress!

Little bits of Batik Patchwork

I've been sewing bits of the Batik Double Wedding Ring quilt I mentioned cutting the pieces for ...

Lots and lots of pieces got sewn together ... squares and arches and melon-shaped navy blue pieces.

... with lots more still to come.

It seems I need eighty-something of these little melon-shaped units. 

I've got twenty-something made.

Pretty good for a start. 

I love the colorfulness, with the navy background.

Double Wedding Ring block trial-run

The other day, I mentioned starting my Batik Double Wedding Ring quilt. 

Here's the test-run for that one:

Got this cutesie fabric cheap. While I'm not really a Tinkerbell fan, the price was right to make a trial-run of a few blocks, using my new DWR templates I'd just bought from Amazon.com.

Found out a few details that proved helpful. Found out I can do it, and the curves aren't really that bad. 

Finishing this one up soon, into a 16-block quilt top that'll measure around 40 inches square. I'll probably sell it as a quilt top, so somebody else can quilt it for a real Tinkerbell fan. :-)

Beginning a Batik Double Wedding Ring Quilt

A few weeks ago, I mentioned starting to try some double-wedding-ring quilt blocks.

I made a relatively successful gingham DWR block.

Then I got a cheap deal on some cutesie fabric that would make a good next effort. Cut it and started sewing it. It's almost done. (More on that another day.)

My inspiration? I want to make a double wedding ring quilt with these pretty fabrics.

I got these batiks half-price (oh, joy!), and I was delighted. 

Laying things out to cut, measure, or photograph seems to set off the kitty's radar-sense that something quilt-y is ready for her inspection. (Happens every time. We find it hilarious.)

I'm making it with navy blue as the background color. (Heavy inspiration from this double wedding ring quilt from Jo's Country Junction.)

The navy blue was part of an all-cotton KING size sheet set I bought NEW for $11. Love deals like that. 

So now I've got all these pieces cut out. I marked each side of the the center of each of those curvey pieces. Hundreds of little snips. (Is there a better way? Anyhoo, it's a good rocking-chair activity, and it's done.)

Layout is going to look like this snapshot. 

Exciting stuff. Will post more pics when I have something sewn (and pressed)!

This is a quilt for me, and I'm loving it already. If it's done in time, I might enter it in that DWR Quilting Challenge, but I'm not pressuring myself, because the challenge deadline a pretty ambitious time frame for me to actually have a quilt pieced AND quilted.

And now that I've discovered the wonder that is variegated thread (I think I mentioned that here), I'm definitely planning to free-motion-quilt this thing with this thread. Love it!

Double Wedding Ring - Gingham style

I've been trying something new ...

Perhaps inspired by the idea of the Double Wedding Ring Quilting challenge, and definitely inspired by another blogger who's been making a beautiful first-ever Double Wedding Ring quilt ... I've been thinking that if I could make a block, I could probably try making an actual quilt with some batik fabric I just bought ...

So, for starters, I traced templates onto gingham ...

... did some sewing ...

... and some seam-ripping ...

... and got things almost flat, after lots of pressing ...

... and made my version of a Double Wedding Ring quilt block!

 For now, the "block" is round, so I guess I should add "corners" in white to get it ready to join the other gingham blocks in my sampler quilt ...

I'm making this up as I go along, but the plan is to have white sashing between however many gingham blocks I end up making ... So far, the block total is up to 8!