New Project - Filmstrip Quilt

At our May Central Florida MQG quilt retreat, I saw my friend Cindy working on a charming scrap quilt. I haven't forgotten it. She recently posted a picture of it on her Instagram feed @cbubblesandsews, telling me she got the idea to make it after seeing it on the guest bed at her friend Janice's house.

Don't we love how quilters inspire each another? 

Here's Cindy's picture. From her own scraps, she pieced a 1½" wide jelly roll, then pieced strips. Cindy shared that the trick to its visual success is making sure each print doesn't change at the corner, rather the print wraps around the corner. This layout helps lose the log cabin look - exactly what I like about it! 

So, I selected one of my canvas scrap bins full of brights, cut 1½" wide strips, and pieced them end to end using a 2.0 stitch length to ensure the piecing doesn't pull apart. 

I'm piecing with my new favorite thread - Scanfil. It's fine but strong - a 50-weight, two-ply organic thread that I like a lot. 

I pressed open seams, and rolled it up. I have 35" yards here which comes to about 1.4 yards of fabric. 

I started with a 5½"-long piece, and began piecing prints in a clockwise direction. As I go, I'm using Magic Quilting and Crafting Fabric Fresh to stabilize the fabric because I think this sort of piecing could go wonky pretty quickly. 

I press open seams as I go.

It didn't take long to make this approximately 10" X 16" rectangle. It will be fun to keep going! 

As I've been thinking about this design, and what to call it - it doesn't have a name that I can find - I'm thinking this a Filmstrip Quilt. Google tells me that old movies were once formatted in 35mm-wide strips (1.377"). These strips are 38.1mm. Close enough, wouldn't you agree?

If you've known me for even a short amount of time, you know I like to make big, useable-sized quilts, so I'll be going for a while on this one. I'll be sure to track how far this jelly roll reel (Get it? Like a film reel?) of 35 yards of fabric goes.

Central Florida MQG QuiltCon Community Outreach Challenge

I was free to start the new project because I finished quilting my portion of the quilt being made by Central Florida MQG for the QuiltCon Community Outreach Challenge.

Our members really stepped up, in a timely manner, to work on their assigned parts. The top is 64" X 80". I pieced a backing, got it sandwiched, and quilted the center sections, leaving the four outside borders for another domestic machine quilter-friend, Karen, who has it now. I even added some big stitch hand quilting around each of the two flamingos. 

Since I quilted lots of starts and stops and had thread tails all over the place, I had some fun with thread-burying.

I took the quilt to last Saturday's Central Florida MQG Sew-In, along with a package of Sench needles (The Needle Lady) - my favorite side-threading needles for easily picking up thread tails to slide between the top and backing.

I invited everyone to knot and bury threads! I tracked our time, and it took an hour for four of us (changing places to include different people) to complete the task.

So, I saved myself four hours of thread-burying, and helped others learn how to do it! What's that old proverb... 

Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. 

😀 Linda