I have a plan! Picture this: A quilter that actually spends more time USING scraps than endlessly dreaming up storage solutions.
But, let’s be real—creating a quilt solely from leftover binding would take… I don’t know how long, but I can guess it’s longer than I’d want it to! While the goal is to use leftover binding bits, they’ll be other scraps joining them along the way.
Coming up with ideas for 2 1/2″ strips seems pretty simple, until you try doing it. Too many block ideas require more than just one fabric and a background. Having to collect another strip or two before I can make a block is not at all what I have in mind.
I nixed ideas like a 3 fabric rail fence block because I don’t want to a leftover strip to sit in some sort of container somewhere waiting for their future fabric friends to show up. If I can turn it into a quick, simple block right away, I’m way less likely to enter my procrastination black hole!
Another goal was to pick out the other fabrics for my tops ahead of time from my fabric stash, avoiding the chaotic game of “find the right match” after creating a bunch of blocks. A few days ago, I chose a couple of fabrics, but then I had a classic case of fabric remorse and swapped out a couple of them for different ones.
Three of the tops will be made using the Zippers pattern by Urban Elementz. I’ve owned the pattern for a long time. I graphed it out anyway because I wanted to adjust the size. I also had to make sure I’d be able to use the directional print I choose for this first quilt. The good news is, the piecing doesn’t get much easier than this.
I made my plans last night and as soon as I woke up, I embarked on an epic quest to cut up all the background pieces needed for all the scrap quilts—because who doesn’t want to feel like a mad scientist in their sewing room first thing in the morning?
It’ll make it a lot easier to know I have enough blocks for a top when I run out of background squares in it’s project bag – than to continually keep counting the units and calculating like I’m preparing for a math test. 🙂
I also graphed it using 2 1/4″ wide leftovers—I needed a smaller child size version, and it’ll work with the one-yard focus fabrics I’d like to use with them. I still bind with 2 1/4″ strips occasionally and they’ll work well here. I’ll just give those wider pieces a little trim if the color works better with these prints than the larger adult lap size above.
I love using stripes, checks, plaids, and all sorts of geometric prints for binding. So, I’m planning two quilts to use them up. They’d be waaaay too busy to use the zipper design.
The first one uses an 18″ length strip for each block. It only needs 24 blocks plus some snazzy borders, so I fully expect it to strut across the finish line before all the others.
The second one is a classic two-rail fence block, the superhero of short fabric scraps.
I’d toyed with the idea of whipping up some 9 patch blocks out of those pesky leftover 2 1/2″ squares, but then I had an epiphany—why not be a little more creative? As I rummaged through my inspiration photo albums (aka my wish list), I stumbled upon not one, but two fantastic 4 patch quilt ideas that I’d saved. Talk about a jackpot! I mean, who needs 9 patches when you’ve got coordinating fabrics ready to party with a 4 patch?
To keep my sanity, I’m shoving all that coordinating fabric into a project bag with the photos, because forgetting what you planned to make is just awful! (Or so I’ve heard, because it NEVER happens to me! 😉
For now, I’ll dive headfirst into making a mountain of 4 patches as my next leaders/enders—who knows, maybe I’ll eventually conquer both designs. I’ll keep this little clear bin next to my sewing machine as a monument to my ever-evolving creative chaos! (I’m starting to sound like maybe I didn’t get enough sleep after all. LOL)
It may seem like I have a mountain of projects planned, and I do. But, I think that’s what it’s going to take to wrangle those scraps into submission!
I absolutely love making string quilts and go through a lot of scraps/strings less than 2″ wide. It’s those slightly larger pieces that have declared a rebellion—getting ready to scale the walls of their containers and stage a jailbreak.
Grabbing a square or two to stitch onto another piece is about as challenging as ordering takeout.
I’ve got 30 projects on my “to make” list, which will happily churn out even more scraps. If I don’t manage to finish at least one scrap quilt every quarter, I might have to face the reality that these scraps are just not that into me!
Once I graduate using up binding scraps as I go, I’ll tackle planning and making a scrap quilt from start to finish from the other bins… or decide it’s not my thing and stop saving them.
Time to Quilt 