Quilt Reveal: Dog Gone Cute

Dog Gone Cute is ready for a quilt reveal.

This is Lorna Mahon's pattern from Sew Fresh quilts.  She offered it on her blog for free.  She has many other dog patterns as well.  She is also getting ready to host an Ugly Sweaters quilt-along.

I adapted this one - okay, it was partly an error that I decided to keep because I thought it would get a longer nose this way.  Then I looked at Zeus and realized that I only see his nose when he is looking down but when he is looking up, I see his mouth and chin.  So I  gave the quilt dog a chin.


I quilted straight organic lines, like Lorna would do, but it looked like the Bad Dog picture in the Small Quilts photo album. He looked like he was in jail. I then quilted wavy lines between all the straight lines. I started on the right side, and didn't like the really wavy lines so I made them less wavy as I went to the left.

I bound it with a solid brown. To make sure it got finished this month, since I don't have hand work time, I sewed down the binding on both sides by machine.  It isn't perfect, since I am not used to doing to sewing down the binding by machine (and I was sewing from the front where I couldn't see if the binding was catching on the back), but I managed to get it done, and pretty quickly too.

I showed you the back of the quilt yesterday. With so many finishes so quickly and limited space, the improv elephant quilt didn't get to stay on the bulletin board very long.

It is 17"  x 17 3/4". To see other posts about this quilt, click on the Dog Gone Cute label under this post or in the sidebar. To see other posts about finished quilts, click on Quilt Reveal label under this post or in the sidebar. I think I finished more quilts this month than I did all of last year combined.

Wanda said that for each finished quilt, I can start three new ones. Who am I to argue with that?  So I have picked out three quilts to start!

Shirts Quilt

I received a stack of solid blue shirts from my brother-in-law and I have decided to make a quilt with these to give back to him.  I was considering all kinds of quilt patterns to make but I recently saw the Gee's Bend documentary, and saw a quick glimpse of a Courthouse Steps quilt. The steps are on two sides instead of all four sides.  It only uses two colors and there is very little of the other color.  I figure I could use a pair of jeans for my second color, and make this simple quilt that showcases the shirts.  I won't make it improv method though; I think he would prefer straight lines.  This will be a pretty big quilt though, even if it means I have to buy more shirts, so it won't be a quick finish.

Adinkra Quilt 2016

Debby Kratovil is offering an Adinkra Quilt 2016 block of the month.  I have decided to join her, because this quilt uses African fabrics in a beautiful way and I want to use my African fabrics. It is a simple quilt. Alternating blocks are pieced, and one design is appliqued every month. When I printed the pattern, it printed smaller than the size needed to make the block. This is probably my fault, since I didn't check to see if the printer was going to print actual size.  I was going to consider reducing the size anyway, and now I didn't need to. I decided to use the smaller size. I am going to have to remember to make my alternating blocks smaller.

Scrap Quilt

I am going to start cutting fabric for my next scrap quilt.  When I pull out scraps for the Quilty 365, I wind up having to put the remaining scrap away.  I think it would be better for me to trim these scraps down and get them ready for a scrap quilt.  I am thinking Quilt Vortex, which lets the scraps be the size they are for the most part.  I also want to start cutting fabric for the triangle quilt for my own bed.  I haven't made a quilt for my bed, and although it hasn't bothered me before, it is bothering me now. Mostly because my Walmart quilt is shredding to pieces day by day.

Linked to:
Fabric Tuesday 
Linky Tuesday 
Let's Bee Social #110

Quilting and Quilt Label

Hand quilting continues on the Cheddar and Crackers quilt. I am still hoping on finishing the quilting this month.

I machine quilted the Dog Gone Cute quilt using organic lines.  I am going to show you how I made the quilt label. This quilt label is sewn into the binding of the quilt.  There are several benefits of doing it this way. First, you only have to hand sew two sides of it, since the other two sides are under the binding.  Second, it provides a nice professional finish. Third, it makes it harder to steal the quilt since someone cannot simply take out the label without having to re-do the binding.

I first pieced together the bonus triangles that came from making the front of the quilt. You know, those bits that you are supposed to throw away.  Since this is a label, I tried to keep all the white places together so they would form a continuous space to write the information for the label.

I wanted to include the raw edges in the seam allowance of the quilt.  That left two sides that would need to be hand sewn.  Since this is pieced, I wanted to make sure that these hand sewn sides were neatly turned under.  To do that, I sewed these two sides rights sides together to plain square.

Turn it right side out and poke out the corner. Note that the other two sides are still raw edges.

Align the raw edges to the edge of the quilted and trimmed quilt and pin in place.

Then baste it in place using a smaller seam allowance than you will use for the binding.  You will notice that I also folded squares in half and basted the triangles in place to serve as quilt hangers.  I just have to bind as usual to cover these raw edges.

When I sew the binding down, I plan the path for sewing that includes the label. Which means that I start the quilting near the label if I plan to do the label last. I usually start with the label first and then work my way around the quilt.  When I start near the label, I don't have to tie off the thread to end in one place and just to have to move to do the label.

Dog Gone Cute

When Wanda suggested using the end of the month as my deadline for the Moldy Cheese and Crackers quilt, I thought that would be fantastic.  I would be done early, and I would get a gold star!  Then I started quilting it and realized why this is a slow quilt.  My wrists hurt if I do a lot of handwork, so I can only do a few minutes a day.  This means I won't get done early and won't get my gold star.  I may not even be able to get the whole thing done by the end of the month. I will be happy if I can at least get the quilting done and the binding machine sewn down.  Then hand sewing the binding down can be done early in February.

But what this means is that I have quilting time that is not used on the Cheese and Crackers quilt.  Free time in which I can do anything my little heart desires.  So let me tell you about the Dog Gone Cute quilt.  This is a quilt that Lorna from Sew Fresh Quilts offered as a quilt-along. (It's still available if you are interested.) I told myself that since I was still working on Elephant Parade, I should wait to start it.  I printed out the patterns (all of them even though my plan all along has been to just make one dog.

This is a big deal for me, since I don't like to waste paper and ink and especially storage space on patterns, but I really like this quilt.  Then my mother needed a ride to Walmart, and this fat quarter pack just jumped into the cart as we were walking by to get the groceries. Those little puppy dog eyes were just begging to be in a Dog Gone Cute quilt! And now the pattern and the fabric has been united.

My original plan was to use the two browns -the regular brown as the main part of the face and the reddish brown as the accent.  I considered the gray for the accent, but I decided against it.  I cut the parts of the fabric as I work the steps to make sure I don't use the wrong size shapes and don't lose any pieces.  As I was putting the block together, it was getting darker outside and the two browns were barely distinguishable from each other.  I decided then to use the gray instead of the brown so there would be more contrast.

I liked playing with the pieces to see the different animal shapes I could make, as you can see in these pictures. Looks like a bear here.


I adapted the pattern to make his snout a little bit longer.  I have to decide whether to add a border.

All last year, I wanted to make these one block quilts - the Farm Girl Vintage, the Snapshots, even this Dog Gone Cute. And now I have been able to make one of these.  I just have to quilt and bind it and I will have a start to a new collection!

Linked to:
Linky Tuesday