Finally Fussy Cutting Allietare!

At the same time that I was writing my post for Week 5 of Bonnie Hunter's 2015 mystery quilt, Allietare, Bonnie went ahead and did the final reveal early! For the next few weeks you can see it here. I had already figured out that we would need some type of 4" square in the middle of all the blocks, and I had my heart set on some fancy piecing in there. So I was actually a little disappointed when I saw they would be plain 4" squares. But then I came to my senses! I realized that those big squares were the perfect opportunity to do the fussy cutting that I decided against in Week 3:

This was my chance to showcase all those larger prints from my collection of Kaffe Collective fabrics. So, first thing yesterday morning I hunted high and low through my stash for everything Kaffe and reddish.

Some things I knew I had, but were hard to find, and some things were a nice surprise. In Week 4 I was sighing over my last strip of red Kirman. Yesterday I found almost a yard more!

These red squares will be used in 20 of the Allietare blocks. When I finally rounded them all up, I had more than 20. Charms!

I laid out a couple of blocks to see how they will look. I think this combination will be too tempting to resist:

And, best for last:

It's like this quilt was designed for my stash. I am so amazed at how well it's all coming together! That first flash of inspiration to use my Kaffe fabrics, based on Bonnie's photo of the gold hotel walls, has totally paid off. I'm glad I listened to it!

Now I am loaded with fun things to do. Soon I'll get these 20 red blocks up on the design wall to find the best points for each middle. And I am still making the Week 4 "bowtie" units, after I had to take a rest that week. Only 8 sets are done -- 22 left! I really like the shape of those, and they go together well, so I will probably do that first.

We certainly won't be looking at a flimsy here on Monday. But, I'm going to stick with it until it's done!

Allietare Week 5

Just in the nick of time, I've finished all 98 of my units for Week 5 of Bonnie Hunter's 2015-16 mystery quilt, Allietare:

And, I sewed all the blue squares onto our long "sashing" pieces as well:

I don't think they are sashing any more, actually. Now that they are asymmetrical, I think they are for the border.

Do you realize that when we cut off all those corner triangles, we lost ground in the total area of the quilt? We're only at 65% now. Somehow, I don't think tomorrow's clue will be the last one. (Edit: Well, it looks like Bonnie went ahead and posted the final reveal just as I was writing this!)

With all my time this past week trying to "rest" my arm, I've had plenty of time to play with the units and doodle on graph paper. I think I know how it will come together! (Edit #2: I was right!) And, I also think that Bonnie's design is going to look best with the medium grey constant fabric that she specified. I think my blue batik may look best with a slightly different layout. So, that's lots of speculation, but this may be the last week that I follow the directions. ;D (Edit #3: No need to worry, my fabrics are exactly perfect after all!)

This lovely fabric finally arrived in the mail this week:

It's a new 2015 colourway of Philip Jacobs' Banded Poppy. And, it's the final answer to a longstanding problem of mine. What problem? *looks coy* Wait and see!

In the meantime, please click here to see everyone else's work for Allietare Week 5!

And if you haven't already, please have a...

I know in Australia they have already recovered from the hangover. :D

Allietare Scraps & Blacks

Week 4 of Bonnie Hunter's 2015-16 mystery quilt, Allietare is a big one -- 120 red and white flying geese units in 30 sets of four. When I sat down to make my cutting plan, I started to think that Bonnie's quilts are really designed for scraps, and so far I've been using yardage. My scrap box is not very big, but I thought there might be a few more Kaffe reds in there. I was right!

I had enough for one set each of the two Brandon Mably fabrics above. Near the bottom of the box was a real treasure, a full 2.5" x width of fabric strip of red Kirman, now discontinued. Enough for three sets:

And, a big enough piece of red Asian Circles for two sets as well:

So that was exciting! I might have rejected that last one at the beginning of the mystery, but now I have a good sense of how things are going, and I know it will work.

In addition to the black hearts fabric that I cut for Week 2, I have five more black fabrics to work with:

The small prints here are a good balance to the large prints on my reds and golds.

And once again, even though the instructions call for a random mix of light fabrics, I cut them in matched sets of four. I have a good feeling about how that's going to work. Finally, after two days of cutting, I was able to match up all the sets:

That was fun!

But my shoulder has had enough. I was able to sew the black "wings" on 10 sets, and completely finish just one set...

Kaffe, Brandon and Mary Engelbreit!

...and even though I love how it is coming together, my shoulder just isn't having it. So it is all packed up, and let's hope that three full days of rest will give it a chance to cool off.

Click here to see how everyone else is doing with the Week 4 challenge. From me, I wish everyone a wonderful holiday, no matter what holiday you are celebrating!