Scrappy Bow Tie

One of my favorite things to do with down time in my sewing room is to cut scraps. It's like a walk down memory lane. How did I come to have this fabric? What project was it originally used for? It is very satisfying to take odd size fabric and make useful units for future projects. Very therapeutic.


With the recent sewing room clean out, I had discovered several small "special" bins of scraps. I really don't know why they were special, but they had garnered their very own bin. So I dumped one out and commenced with cutting. Quickly, I noticed they were very well color coordinated. I think I used this set to teach cutting techniques a few years back. After cutting a good stack of fabric, I started playing with them. Hey, this looks good as a block. Pretty soon, I had a rough layout for a quilt.


It was time to call in the family. What do you think? What should I change? Once the invitation is issued, anything goes with the arrangement. More random? Less random? What about these smaller squares? After a few iterations, it was time to get to sewing. All the while, I'm trying to figure out how I wrangled myself into making a quilt when all I planned to do was cut a few scraps.


Here's the finished top. Most of the half square triangles were already sewn in the bin. Sometimes it is fun to just work with what you have and make it happen.


This was NOT going to end up in the unfinished project pile. I stuck with simple quilting. It is all straight lines about a half inch inside the bigger blocks and in the ditch around the border rows. A dark brown binding finishes it off. I was all set to do scrappy brown binding, but found a piece big enough to do the job.


Whew! I didn't know I needed to get a quilt out of my system. Now, maybe, I can get back to scrap cutting for a while.