My plethora of improv pieced scrappy quilt blocks has gained a lot of interest lately so I thought I'd recap the journey.
In March 2022 I was gifted some scraps by fellow sewists Teresa and Carol:
https://adventurousquilter.blogspot.com/2022/03/scrappy-play.html?m=1
Later the same year just before our international move to Australia they gifted me a second batch.
https://adventurousquilter.blogspot.com/2022/08/more-gifted-scraps.html?m=1
Here's a collage illustrating both batches first in their bags then during the sorting process:
The first batch was 3 small shopping bags and few bundles that would've almost filled a regular sized shopping bag.
The second batch was in 2 shopping bags.
So in total their were about 4 to 5 regular sized shopping bags of scraps.
Think about that now if you are one of those quilters that has tubs and bins overflowing with years of scraps!
Step one is always to color sort; low volume, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, berry, pink, grey, black, brown, beige, grey, aqua, teal. I also make a pile of scraps that are multi-coloured or are drab dated prints.
The first project I made was a double sided quilt that was almost twin/ single size. I used all the multi-coloured and drab dated prints that didn't suit any of the other scrap piles when I sorted the scraps. They all went into in this one quilt which featured a bright multicoloured eye spy half hexagon quilt top and a drab/dated print scrappy quilt back:
Then the next task was to improv foundation piece 6" quilt blocks in each color of the rainbow:
Some colours were sub sorted into different shades/ tones eg. light, bright and dark blues.
I had no idea I was going to end up with 1600 of these quilt blocks from what came out of those 5 shopping bags of scraps after already having made one entire scrap quilt!
I did add some of my own scraps as I went, but I don't hoard scraps, I regularly cut mine into usable squares for future use, so the vast majority of the scraps in these quilt blocks were the gifted ones.
I sewed and sewed; just focused on making improv blocks, one color at a time.
Remember we moved from Colorado USA in January 2023. So I did no sewing in 2023 for several months until my new sewing studio was set up and ready to use in March/ April.
So now in August 2023 the block piles are ready to sew into quilts. 17 months have past since I received the first batch of scraps! Many, many hours of piecing went into these block piles. Without our international move I could've perhaps done this in one year. But make no mistake this was an epic task.
So for those quilters I mentioned earlier that hoard scraps in tubs and bins and have a lot more than 5 shopping bags of scrap fabric. Consider how long it would take you to sort, sew and use your scraps, if you started today?
Here's the first rainbow quilt layout that I'm currently working on:
I am only just beginning to make actual quilts with these blocks. Like this low volume quilt I recently finished.
So if you are a scrap hoarder, ask yourself; do I really want to sew with these scraps or do I prefer to sew with stash? Either is okay. Remember it could actually take many years of focused sewing to use those scraps. If you don't feel like sewing those scraps consider gifting them to a fellow sewist. If you have a quilt club near you there's likely at least one quilter that will take other people's scraps!
5 shopping bags:
- 2 finished quilts
- 1500 more quilt blocks ready to sew into quilt tops!
I'm expecting to get 7 or 8 more double sided quilts from these blocks! Probably 100 blocks front and back so 200 blocks per quilt.
Your scraps are actually a valuable resource not trash.
Assuming I get the expected ten generous sized quilts (at least 55" x 55") in total made from 5 shopping bags of scraps. That's the equivalent of 30+ yards of fabric yardage by my estimation.