short circuited

 Wow! January flew by, didn't it?! As they say, "time flies when your having fun!"

I started working at The Old Craft Store in June 2020. The Covid pandemic had started. Stores were closed due to quarentine. The Old Craft Store had shut it's doors for two weeks. However, The Old Craft Store is a contract United States Post Office. Plus, there was a sudden need for masks. And fabric stores became essential because sewists needed fabric to make masks. That's when I started working there. When almost everyone I knew was saying, "2020 is the worst year." My sentiments were, "I'm back in a quilt shop, 2020 is an awesome year!"

I am a needle and thread artist. Give me hand sewing needle, thread, and fabric and I will create something! I love hand stitching.  It's my first stitching love... But I also love machine piecing...

This is the first machine pieced sample I did for The Old Craft Store.

The pattern is called "Motherboard" by Orange dot Quilts.  I mentioned it in my blog update Dream Job.

Motherboard is a great pattern. Very well written and a very quick quilt top to make. The pattern is written for using jelly rolls, so even the cutting could be a quick job. I used the Conservatory fabric collection designed by Jill Finley of Jillily Studio for Riley Blake Designs for the color fabrics and a white tone-on-tone for the background.

However, this sample is still displayed at The Old Craft Store because we still have a few patterns to sell and I'm ready to have it come home with me. So I decided to make another quilt top that maybe will draw interest to the pattern again. This time stepping up the visual interest and try to create some movement with dramatic prints.

I am so in love with this black and white floral print in the Illustrations fabric collection by Alli K designs for Moda. My first thought was to use it for the background in the whole quilt. This is where my inner quilt muse took over and determined "scrappy." So I purchased more black and white prints from The Old Craft Store to be mixed with black and white prints from my stash. All the color prints were pulled from my stash. Some of those fabrics were purchased from The Old Craft Store over the past 2 years. But some of them may have been in my stash for many years. It's great to be using them!

I started with red prints. The block with bandana print and the flower print is the only block that has two different prints in the block. The Quilt Muse let me know that was much too scrappy. I left it in though, I guess because it's part of the story. Don't you love that black and white floral? 

Then the green blocks were made next. And I was still planning to make this top just like the pattern. I remember entertaining the idea to continue with red and green to make it a Christmas quilt. It would make a good Christmas quilt don't you think?

Miss Quilt Muse - "That's a good idea, but look at this orange." I paired it with a polka dot and took this picture because I practically giggled with joy because it's so pretty.

Still on track for Motherboard. The orange floral print is actually too busy, but again I left it in because it's part of the story!

I keep mentioning Miss Quilt Muse because it's been inspiration that has been building this quilt top from the beginning. I had a plan, but inspiration, Miss Quilt Muse, was guiding all my choices and changing my plan.

Miss Quilt Muse - "what if the blocks are split?"

Yes!! I really like this. The joyful giggle feeling grew with each block added.

I love this next picture. Doesn't it look like Motherboard short circuited? I think this would be a cool quilt top just like this with background filling in to square it up.

I had the brilliant idea to put it all on point. And it looks fun, but takes away from the Short Circuit idea. 

And back to setting the blocks straight.

Even to the end, I was still auditioning fabrics. I love the sun print on the purple background on the top right corner in this photo, but it just doesn't belong in this quilt.

When the Motherboard blocks were pieced together in my new layout, I felt it needed a border. This is another Miss Quilt Muse moment. I had started piecing blocks that I started calling Bytes. I put them on the design board and Miss Quilt Muse - "Keep it simple!"

The measurement of the center is about 60" x 60". Keeping it simple, I cut 4.5" squares from all the color fabrics I used in the center. 

That was a mistake. I forgot to calculate in the inner border measurements too. I was a bit disappointed and not sure how to fix it. Another square would make the strip too long and also throw the center off.

I ended up re-cutting all the squares a 1/4" bigger, 4.75". (Some of the squares I had to piece together because it was the last bit of the fabric. I always feel this makes it a true scrappy quilt.) I tried to use a generous seam allowance because I knew the strip with the 4.75" squares would be too long. After centering the middle square, I still ended up trimming 3/4" off each end. It was more than I had wanted, but I made the choice to be ok with this solution.

-- I want to mention here. If you make this quilt like I am sharing here. There are a ways to help get a border to perfect measurements without having to trim the outside pieces. (edit: best way is to measure the top and divide that measurement by the number of squares you want then add seam allowance. When I did this the number was between 4.5" and 4.75". I decided to go larger so not to be messing with a measurement like 4.625". In hindsight, I should have!)

The first is to increase the width of the first border. (I had originally cut the inner border to be 1" finished, and then decided I wanted it thinner. So I trimmed 1/4" off.) This is a personal choice. If you like a thicker inner border, this is the easiest fix.

The other way, would be to make the squares a tiny bit shorter. Sew every other seam by perhaps an 1/8"  (making a bigger seam allowance) would evenly shorten all the squares and you wouldn't have to trim so much off the ends.

The side borders I did the same as the top and bottom. The corner squares weren't added until the strip was trimmed to fit the inner border. It makes the shortened squares less noticeable because they are all the same.

  

Here they are together! Motherboard (on the left) by Orange dot Quilts, finishes at 54" x 64" and my Short Circuited quilt inspired by Motherboard finishes at about 71.5" x 71.5". The block is the same, I won't give any specifics about block or piece measurements because that is in the pattern. Short Circuit has the same number of color blocks plus one more for the corners (turquois blocks)

If you purchase the pattern from The Old Craft Store and you would like to make Short Circuit, I've made a color placement diagram you can have with your purchased pattern. Also, I am willing to help with any questions you have about piecing the borders if you need.

Thanks for visiting my blog and reading about my latest stitching! I'm working on at least 4 or 5 more projects. Hopefully I'll be back soon to tell you about one or two of them 😉. Until then, I wish you happy creating of your own!!