Jelly Roll 1600 Update

Yesterday was a lazy day....  I deserved it!

I decided to leave the trout pond intact as a "design element"...  *lol*   ...and added the first border.

 

My apologies for the fuzzy photo... but you can get the general idea, I think.

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This coming Friday, June 17th is the monthly Friday Night Sew In with Bobby and Heidi.   I've signed up and plan to work on hand sewing down some quilt binding.  That way I can camp out on the sofa and watch movies while I sew...

Currently, there are 60 folks signed up and I hope you'll join us!

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Sometime over the weekend, this blog went over 10K views and I decided it was time for a little give away.

I have quite a few 1800s repro fabrics left from the tumbler quilt and I thought I would start making Barbara Brackman's Civil War Reunion blocks.

I started with #24: Ladies Aid Album...  I made one and boy, do I need practice!  So, I made a second block and it was a bit better.

I decided to give away the second (better) block to celebrate over 10K views and I will leave it up those interested in signing up whether they would like the block "as is"... or would you like me to make the block into a mug rug.

To enter, simply post a comment telling me whether you'd like the block or a mug rug.  

If you are a no-reply blogger, please leave an email address as a way to contact you if you win.   If I am unable to contact the winner, I'll draw another name.

A winner will be chosen on Wednesday, June 15th when I get home from work.

Good luck!

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Psst...  guess who is the guest blogger at Sew We Quilt @ Stash Manicure?  Madame Samm has a cool give-away so check it out!

Jelly Roll 1600+

The Jelly Roll 1600+ went well although it was interrupted frequently.  Not that I don't want to talk on the phone with family or visit with friends, it's just that I didn't get as much done yesterday as I had planned.

I did keep track of the actual time spent so I could report back.

 

It took approximately 50 minutes to sew all 50 strips of fabric together, mitering ends of strips as you do for binding, snipping threads, trimming selvedges and corners, and pressing seams open.

 

Things went smoothly... no surprises.

After cutting off 18" of one end of the very long fabric strip...

 

...the jelly roll 1600+ began!

The first lap took 32 minutes total... fairly easy to do.

The second lap took 21 minutes... mostly because I had to unfold the two sewn-together strips all the time... which slowed me down.

The third lap took 10 minutes... even though I had to open up fabrics, it was much easier with four strips sewn together rather than two.

The fourth lap took 5 minutes and...

...the fifth lap took 3 minutes... totaling 71 minutes or 1 hour, 10 minutes.

Things I learned:

Adding fabric strips does not make the quilt top longer... only wider.  The quilt top turned out to be 60"x64" instead of 48"x64".  I don't want an almost-square quilt so I cut off 10" off one side to make the flimsy 50"x64".  (More on this later.)

If you want a focus fabric (in this case, the fish fabric), a jelly roll 1600 isn't the best way to go about it.  It would be better to sew the strips with attention to where the focus fabric is placed.  

If you noticed, I have a "trout pond" at the top of the quilt flimsy.   I'm thinking of unsewing one seam and adding some of the "trout pond" to the bottom of the flimsy where there are fewer fish.

Stay tuned for more adventures at Fish Camp Trout Pond!

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For complete instructions about how to make a Jelly Roll 1600 quilt top, visit Heritage Creations.

Guess What I'm Doing Today?

Have you heard about the Jelly Roll Races? Or the Jelly Roll 1600?

Using one jelly roll {40 - 2.5" wide width-of-fabric (42-44") strips}...

...and by following the instructions HERE, you can make a 48"x64" quilt top very quickly! 

Watch these ladies...

Amazing, isn't it?

I'm planning on using a Holly Taylor jelly roll "A Simpler Time"...

 

...along with strips from this fabric (which blends much better than it seems from these two photos)...

...replacing several of the tone-on-tone dark/black fabrics.  I plan to use at least two borders since the young gentleman for whom this quilt is intended is 6'5" tall and the quilt needs to be a tad bit longer.

One of the borders will be this fabric (which also blends perfectly)...

Backing will be pieced most likely... haven't decided for sure yet.

So that's what I'm going to be doing today... jelly roll racing!  Let the fun begin!


Any bets on how long it's going to take me???