The Curious Quilter

Dreams of Flying Fabric Charms

thecuriousquilter — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 18:42:36 +0000

Last night I dreamed that the sky was full of little two-inch fabric charms, flying like birds. They were everywhere, even winging over the oceans and tall mountains. This was no nightmare of scary birds attacking–this was a colorful delight.

I know why I had that dream. This week there are hundreds of postage stamp quilt fabric charms flying all over the world. Quilters from Australia to Croatia, from Canada to the Indian Ocean, are all awaiting their little parcels from their swap partners.

I am really excited to see this first swap succeed. Not without a few bumps along the way, though. I goofed up on a couple of people’s lists, for which I apologize. One swapper had to drop out after the partners were assigned–she is recovering from unexpected surgery and I know we all wish her well.

All of you are amazing! There were twelve swappers trading 40 sets of 2.5 inch squares. Another seven swapped 26 sets of the tiny 1.5 inch squares. And 68 swappers are trading almost 200 sets of two-inch treasures.

Looking ahead to the April swap, I welcome comments and email suggestions for making this work even better. Also, I am curious, are there any folks out there seriously looking for one-inch squares to swap? Let me know! Meanwhile, many thanks to all of YOU for taking part!
©2012, The Curious Quilter, thecuriousquilter.net, maryeoriginals.com.

Charm Swap Matches!!

thecuriousquilter — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 17:18:58 +0000

Arranging a pile of postage stamps by color can be fun!

Attention Swappers! The matches are emailed out (all but about 3 percent) so check your email. If you do not see yours, please check your SPAM folder before emailing me.

Thanks to everyone for taking part in this round! Now you have to watch your mail for fun little treasures, and be prepared to be shocked at the variety of fabrics you will get. I love swaps, partly because I am drawn to earth tones or jewel colors, and getting a set from someone who loves pink and yellow is a great addition to my stash.

The last handful will be out as soon as I hear back from a couple of people who didn’t state the quantity of sets. They will all be done within a day or so.©2012, The Curious Quilter, thecuriousquilter.net, maryeoriginals.com.

Postage Stamp Charm Swap, Round One Closes

thecuriousquilter — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 18:09:18 +0000

A lot of swappers have signed up, and been busy cutting little charm squares. Now I need to get my fingers in motion and get the swap partner assignments done. Those emails will be heading out between January 20-22, so keep an eye out for them.

If you missed this round, the next Postage Stamp Quilt Charm Swap round signup time will run from April 4-14, 2012. So keep cutting your little charms, or get started if you haven’t already. Participate every time, I will make every effort to assign you new swap partners with each round. That way, even if you have repeats to offer, you should be able to get lots of charm varieties back.

Last Day to Join Postage Stamp Charm Swap is 1/18/2012

thecuriousquilter — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 17:11:23 +0000

Have you started cutting your little charms to share? Tomorrow is the last day to join this charm swap. Participants will be matched with their swap partners by January 22. To take part in the fun, you must have at least one set of 100 different fabric 1.5, 2, or 2.5 inch charms ready to mail.

If you are just starting to cut and not yet ready to swap, do not despair. There will be four rounds of swaps this year. Imagine how that can expand the variety of fabrics in your postage stamp charm collection! Next month brings new activities for postage stamp quilt lovers, so stay tuned.

Some of my Two Inch Treasures are very nicely organized.

But most of them are just randomly tossed in baggies.

A Random Act of Quilty Kindness

thecuriousquilter — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 21:06:45 +0000

View From The Cabin, from Twin Cities Quilting.

Last month Pippa from France (Pippa’s Patch) was the winner of my “View from the Cabin” pattern giveaway. But her luck did not stop there. Luisa from Italy (Luisa’s Quilt Friends), a reader who has been quilting for many years, commented to congratulate Pippa. But Luisa also left a personal note for me to forward to Pippa, offering her a gift.

Pippa is now the happy owner of these beautifully pieced blocks for a bed-sized quilt, sent her way by Luisa! What a lovely, and totally unexpected, delight! Thanks to Luisa for her generosity, and to Pippa for sharing the story with us all.
Have you signed up for the Postage Stamp Quilt Charm Swap yet?

Imagine the fun, watching your mail for little envelopes of fun charms from other quilters. Everyone is invited to participate! You must sign up for this round by January 18th.
What a difference a year can make!

A large part of the United States is having a very dry (and often warm) winter, and Minnesota has been no exception. While the far north woods have fared better, most of the state has had little snow, all of which has melted soon as the temperatures climbed well into the 40′s over and over. This week the temps have fallen off to more seasonable, but much of the state has no snow cover. Nice for shoveling, but not so nice for our garden perennials, or the farmers who count on winter snow for moisture. But weather can be very fickle, perhaps we will catch up with snow yet this winter!

The view across the street last winter.	This year we have only a trace of snow!
(Yep, we lost a big tree this summer, due to major water main construction.)

Cutting Novelty Charms for Postage Stamp Quilts

thecuriousquilter — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:32:36 +0000

Can you hear the rotary cutters slicing out there? People are cutting charms to share in the current Postage Stamp Quilt Charm Swap. If you haven’t signed up yet, you can do so through January 18, 2012. Click here to get the details, and to sign up!

I love including as many novelty fabrics as I can in my own Postage Stamp Quilts. Like little gems waiting to be discovered, they add a real element of delight. One quilt was for a cat-loving librarian, and I put in snippets of every cat and book-related fabric I could lay my hands on. She figures I wound up with over 100 cats in the little charms! Book fabrics were far more challenging to find, meaning there were only a handful of those included. But the quilt was also full of other novelties, from apples to zebras, and much more.

A small sampling of novelty fabrics cut in two-inch charms.

A postage stamp quilt can be very entertaining. At one large family gathering, when the children had worn out their interest in being with the adults, we started sending them to the bedroom with assignments. How many squares have bugs on them? Can you find any striped squares? Soon they were taking it upon themselves to count the purple charms, the charms with foods, and so on.

Try to include a wide range of these fun fabrics in your own charm collection. If you find you normally avoid novelties, but would like some for this project, consider buying only 1/8 of a yard piece of fabric. I have even been known to buy an individual 2.5 inch strip from sites that sell by the strip. You will have excess fabric, but may be surprised by how much of it you can use. Ask your friends for small scraps too, and share.

I carry this with when shopping for novelties.

When shopping for novelties, whether in the store or in your stash, having a previewing template can help you decide what is suitable. I made myself one that includes previews for two inch and 1.5 inch squares, simply cut from light cardboard. The trick is to remember to cut the preview window at the FINISHED charm size, not the cut size. If you are working with two-inch squares, your window will be 1.5 inches, for one inch squares, your window will be only one-half-inch. It is helpful, though, to draw the seam allowances on as well. That comes in handy later, as you fussy-cut, so you remember to layout and allow for seams.

Some novelty fabrics will yield many unique charms–for instance a zoo print might give you several different animals. The dinosaur included above was one of twelve different dinos on that fabric. Unless you are making a quilt for a kid who adores dinosaurs, you may choose to only use one or two. From this wintry bird print, I can cut cardinals and chickadees, but also some nice charms featuring pine needles.

The same cardinal as above, but previewing as a smaller size charm.

Granted, the smaller the charm you are using, the more challenging it can be to find novelties. Watch for small prints, but remember there are no rules. See the owl in the bottom row of those little charms? His entire body was on the fabric, but I cut only his head. The same cardinal shown above in a two-inch charm would preview well in a 1.5 inch charm as well.

Non-novelty fabric can surprise you sometimes too! In the set of novelty charms shown above, the green one with the brown milk-weed pod was cut from a fall floral fabric. Many florals have little bugs scattered about, you will find all sorts of novel treasures if you keep a watchful eye.

When fussy-cutting your novelty charms, take a minute to plan. You want to get as many charms as you can out of that little piece of fabric. Even the background might work, or make for great swapping pieces. With the preview window in place, I use a disappearing marker to mark the corners of the charm. Alternately, you can center the object on your ruler as you cut, for example, if cutting a two-inch charm, set the cross-hairs of the one inch marks on your ruler in the center of the object. Do not forget that you will lose the edges to seam allowance. Here is one way to fussy-cut a two inch charm:

Center the character on the one-inch crosshairs.

Recenter and make the other two cuts, leaving the face centered.

This will make one cute little charm in a postage stamp quilt!

Sometimes the design needs to be cut on the bias or off-grain to get the object in your window, and that’s fine too. You can spritz the charm with a bit of starch if you are worried about stretching it. But they are small, and these are very forgiving quilts.

A renegade rectangle is going to show up in this quilt!

And I have cheated from time to time too! This lovely rectangular charm will take the space of two standard charms, I cut it at 2×3.5 inches. I simply could not cut it in half, it was delightful just as it came.

I hope you will dig through your stash with an eye for little treasures to include in your own postage stamp charms. Perhaps you will find some to share in the current charm swap as well, or one of the ones coming later this year. Happy cutting!©2012, The Curious Quilter, thecuriousquilter.net, maryeoriginals.com.

Postage Stamp Quilt – 2012 Charm Swap Kick Off

thecuriousquilter — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 15:17:43 +0000

Behold the Postage Stamp Quilt. Simple squares. Not difficult to stitch. No rules to follow. Perhaps the ultimate scrappy quilt.

I freely confess that I am an addict. I love cutting tiny squares. I started doing it when I was about seven, and have thousands and thousands of them in shoe boxes and baggies. I have sewed six quilts with them, but I still have tons of my little “two-inch treasures” left. I have sold some and given many away, but there remain several boxes of them under my bed. And yet, every time I have new fabric scraps, I cut more little charms, and tuck them away. Personally, I strive to keep duplicate charms to a minimum, but there are lovely quilts out there with lots of repeats.

As I have shared my cutting and storing antics with my blog followers, many of you have written how much you love postage stamp quilts too. Or how you have dreamed of making one. So I have declared 2012 to be the Year of the Postage Stamp Quilt at The Curious Quilter, and invite you all to join in the fun. Add to your own charm collection, or start one. Stitch up a quilt top, or a potholder. Start using your scraps to create a quilt that can be cozy, comfortable, and even entertaining!

What’s Coming Up?

Let’s Talk Size.

Join the January 2012 Swap!

What’s Coming Up?

At least twice each month in 2012, I will be posting about these fun quilts, or hosting a swap, or a giveaway, or a blog hop, or, well, just stay tuned and see! Blogging friends are planning to showcase their own examples of quilty items made with little charms, ranging from one to 2.5 inches square. Today is the first day, so we will look at what size charms to use, and get started on the first swap of the year.

Let’s Talk Size.

Yes, size matters! Before you can start to assemble your first postage stamp quilt, you have to decide what size charm squares you want to use. There are quilters who insist that you should use 1.5 inch squares for a postage stamp quilt. But there are also quilters who are just as adamant that a charm size of 2.5 inches is perfect. I have seen stunning quilts made from charms as small as one inch. Because I accidentally started cutting two-inch squares as a child, I have stayed with that.

While you are deciding which size to collect and stitch up, here are some things to consider:

The smaller the charm, the more pieces you need to make your quilt.
A two-inch charm makes for a 1.5 inch finished square. A one-inch charm makes a finished square a mere half-inch across.
The pattern of the fabric shows the most in larger charms, and matters less in smaller squares. There is no right or wrong, they just look different.
In scrappy postage stamp quilts, charms are placed in random order.
Postage stamp quilts can be watercolor quilts. Prints can alternate with solids. You can color-block your charms. You just need to choose what direction you want to go. Playing with color can be a lot of fun!
If you are undecided, you could make 12.5 inch blocks of each, and put them together for your quilt. Or you could make the quilt body with two-inch squares, and the border with one-inch squares. Like I said, there really are no rules.
While you may aspire to not have any duplicates squares in your quilt, they are totally acceptable. Over the next months we will talk about this more.

This is what the different size squares look like.	This is how 16 of each size look when stitched up into a square.

And, looking ahead, this is how many charms you need to create different size quilts. Don’t panic, they go together faster than you may expect.

Charm Size	2.5 in.	2 in.	1.5 in.	1 in.
12×12″ (1 blk.)	36	64	144	576
48×60″ (20 blk.)	720	1,280	2,880	11,520
60×60″ (25 blk.)	900	1,600	3,600	14,400
72×90″ (45 blk.)	1,620	2,880	6,480	25,920
84×96″ (56 blk.)	2,016	3,584	8,064	26,496
96×108″ (72 blk.)	2,592	4,608	10,368	41,472
108×108″ (100 blk.)	3,600	6,400	14,400	57,600

You can see from the chart why most people choose not to make a quilt starting with one inch charms! But they are spectacular, unique, and duplicates disappear. The 1.5 or 2 inch sizes are most common, the 2.5 has become more popular as strips and 5″ charms have come easily available, but do not have quite the same effect as the smaller charm option. If you are undecided, why not make up some samples.

Join the January 2012 Charm Swap! Note 1/20/2012: This swap has closed, the next swap will be in April, 2012.

Now for the fun! Pick your size, get out your scraps, and start cutting. Cut some for you, and some to swap. Please use only 100% cotton fabric that is suitable for quilting. Homespuns or flannels should not be used for this swap. Hopefully, it has been pre-washed before cutting, but that may not always be possible.

For this swap, if you are interested in one inch charms, please cut two inch charms to swap. You will have more people available to swap with, although you will have to quarter the ones you receive.

Keep cutting. Fussy cut some fun novelties. Solids, stripes, plaids, prints, almost anything goes. Bust up as much stash as you want. Cut up strips and charm squares that you are not using. Keep cutting, as charm swaps will be offered in January, April, July, and October.

My head is STILL full of little squares!

Make sets of 100 to swap. Count them out into stacks of 100, hopefully with no duplicates in each stack. (Large-scale prints may read as different fabrics when cut into small charms, which is acceptable.) If you cut 400 squares from 400 fabrics, you have 4 unique sets. If you cut 400 squares, 4 each from 100 fabrics, you have 4 matching sets. OK, that may sound confusing, but think of it this way: with unique sets, you could swap them all to one person, but with matching sets, you would swap one set to each of four people, so no duplicates came through!* Don’t sweat it, just holler if you are stuck. If you have 100 charms to swap, you will get 100 charms back. If you have 1,000 charms to swap, you can get 1,000 charms back. But remember, there will be more chances to swap later this year!

Note added 1/12/2012: A UNIQUE set has each one different. Two UNIQUE sets have 200 different fabrics. If you only have one set, with all different fabrics, it is UNIQUE. TWO MATCHING SETS means that you have two sets cut from 100 different fabrics, but each set is the same. The sets match each other. A goal with postage stamp quilts is to have few or no repeats, so ‘coordinated sets’ – say with 4 each of 25 fabrics, are not acceptable for this swap, but will be for one coming in April!

Keep some for yourself. Set aside the number of these stacks that you want to keep for your own stash! After all, they are YOUR little treasures!

Now that you have cut and counted, you are ready to sign up to swap. I will be matching you up to one or more other swappers, and emailing you both so you can share mailing addresses. I will be getting those emails off as fast as I can, but please do not worry if you do not hear before January 22th! Once you have the swap info, you should arrange mailing your charms and get them out within one week.

Any time between January 6 and January 18, 2012, leave a comment below, stating each of these items: (it will be helpful if you use the numbers to answer)

Your first name.
Your City, State or Territory, and Country.
Are you willing to swap with people in other countries? (Often more variety, but higher postage rates will apply.)
What size charms you want to swap, 2.5, 2 or 1.5 inches. If you are doing a 1 inch project please swap 2 inch charms.
How many UNIQUE sets or MATCHING sets of 100 you have to swap.
A brief comment about what you are dreaming of making with your little squares.
Please DO NOT include your email address or your mailing address! You email address is held privately when you submit the comment form. By joining the swap, you are giving me permission to share your email information with your swap partner/s.

Here is a sample comment:

1- Mary.
2- St. Paul, MN, USA.
3- Yes Int’l.
4- two inches.
5- 3 matching sets.
6- a crib quilt perhaps.

Have fun! Keep watching for more Postage Stamp Quilt goodness, tutorials, pictures, giveaways, and surprises. And thanks so much for taking part!!
©2012, The Curious Quilter, thecuriousquilter.net, maryeoriginals.com.

One Quilter’s Trash, Another’s Stash?

thecuriousquilter — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 22:20:06 +0000

Are you thinking about joining the Postage Stamp Quilt Swaps and Challenge later this week? Do you wish you had more little scrappy bits of fabric laying around to cut into squares? And are you looking for more inspirating ways to use your scraps?

Then pop over to Pleasant Home and check out Sew Scraps Along. Visit the featured sites, and even enter to win some great scraps from other quilters.

Remember to come back here on Friday, January 6th to get the scoop on the Postage Stamp Quilt – 2012 Charm Swap, Round One! Continue along twice a month, as we discuss this classic quilt, other ways to use small to tiny charm bits, tips for cutting and sorting colors, and find out just how many unique fabrics are in some of the postage stamp quilts I have made! ©2012, The Curious Quilter, thecuriousquilter.net, maryeoriginals.com.

A year of Postage Stamp Quilts, coming soon!

thecuriousquilter — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 19:19:45 +0000

My obsession with small squares appears to be shared by many other quilters. On January 6, 2012, I will be launching the first event for my year-long Postage Stamp Quilts – 2012 Charm Swap & Challenge.

If you are looking to start, or perhaps to finish, one of these scrappy delights, be sure to join the fun. Throughout the year we will have swaps, tutorials, giveaways, blog hops, and more. Turn your scraps into amazing quilts! You are invited to share stories, photos, and questions at any time.

And, if you are a blogger, please share the news! Email me for more info, or to get a button for your blog. Blog along, join an upcoming blog hop, share your own experience with postage stamp quilts. Join in now, or anytime during the year. ©2012, The Curious Quilter, thecuriousquilter.net, maryeoriginals.com.

UFO Crash? My list certainly has!

thecuriousquilter — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 01:09:13 +0000

Everywhere around the world, people are making lists, setting goals, and naming resolutions. I am NOT doing that this year! Not that goals aren’t a great idea, but stating them out loud does not seem to help me accomplish them at all.

This one was high on my list if things I INTEND to finish this year. I never touched it!

Last year at this time I made a great list of all my UFO’s (UnFinished Objects in quilt-speak) and recently I took it out to check my progress. Every item on last year’s list is still there, unfinished, except for one quilt. Since there were at least 15 items on the list, my finish rate is about six percent. Not that I haven’t been busy! I have started and finished several other quilts, and tons of small projects, and made dozens of clothing examples for sewing classes I am teaching. Yet, my UFO list is sitting there, fermenting like sauerkraut.

But hold on a minute there! Perhaps it is all one’s perspective. Are we really planning to knock all those items off our lists, or is they just notations of works we are proudly pursuing? THAT puts a different spin on things. Maybe a UFO list really is a proud banner showcasing tons of great ideas that make quilters smile.

In that case, I am proud to say that I have an even longer UFO list this year, which includes last year’s list (minus one) and at least six new items. Reviewing the list is like meeting old friends. Some I am excited to look forward to. Some I would like to bury somewhere dark and ignore for a very long time. A few I had nearly forgotten. Better yet, maybe the items on the list are like fine wines, getting better with age.

I do not need a list to recognize that I sometimes like starting things better than finishing them. I feel no guilt over unfinished quilts. And I am telling myself that New Year’s Day is just a line in the sand, a marker. If I change my mind, and want to start checking things off my imaginary UFO list, I can start on it anytime. Maybe in March.