Summer Charm Quilt.

Since I started quilting 5 years ago I have always admired charm quilts. I think the true definition is one where every fabric is used only once. However I believe it is common to use one fabric twice for a bit of fun and to see if anyone can spot it.

About a year after I started making quilts I decided to make my own charm quilt - I chose the thousand pyramid design. Because my stash was a bit puny I began to buy charm packs from sellers on Ebay and started piecing away mostly by hand. This is the result

I love this quilt and use it a lot when I'm reading alongside one of my cats on top of the bed. ( I know my cats are clever but it is me reading and the cats trying to sit on the pages- lol ! ) Anyway I like looking at all the fabrics and remembering what other quilts I used them in. Patrick who is 11 likes doing this too but would rather die than admit it in front of his mates :-) Now because I bought a lot of the fabrics in packs especially for this quilt there are loads of them ( nearly all ) that are JUST in this quilt and no others. Do you see what I'm getting at ? To cut a long story short ( you'll be glad to hear - lol ) I now want to make a charm quilt with fabrics that I have in my stash only with no extra charm packs bought in. As my fabric collection has increased a little since a few years ago ( here's the bit where my DH chokes on his coffee - lol !! ) I think I will be able to manage a nice size quilt quite comfortably.

I bought this book a short time ago and it contains patterns and templates for 36 different charm quilts. Everything you can think of - squares, rectangles, tumblers etc. I had to pick one. Eventually I decided on one called 3-D hexagons. It is basically a shape which when joined together in groups of 3 makes a hexagon like this...

I have gone through my scrap box and fat quarters and yardage and cut a bit off every one. This took a bit of time let me tell you but was great fun. I cut out the basic shape on freezer paper and pressed them to the backs of all my fabrics. I have piles of these all over the place but am slowly getting organised. I am tacking these over the papers and putting them into a box according to colour like this. I am trying not to repeat any of the fabrics but I'm sure one or two will get duplicated.

I couldn't resist sewing some up.

This is a great project to do in spare moments - nice and portable. Now and again I'll rip off a bit of freezer paper and cut some templates and leave them next to the ironing board along with my little piles of fabrics and press a few ready for tacking. Now when I say this is my Summer project I don't mean I will get this done THIS Summer - lol ! I'm sure it will be a long term thing.

It was great going through all my fabrics and chopping bits off - fun, fun,fun !! I would recommend this to everyone if you like hand work. And the book is a good one.

Other news is I have started the Summer round of the 4 seasons quilt swap but this time there will be no pictures as I KNOW the person reads my blog - lol !

Have a great weekend and stay tuned for next post - I am getting excited about this.