Tic-tac-toe baby quilt

In January 2010, the block lotto made tic-tac-toe blocks with bright fabrics in a white background. In February, I met up with Julie when she visited London and she gave me a handful (three or four - I can't remember for sure) of these tic-tac-toe blocks, which are made the same way, but with the white crossing and the brights as background. The rest, as they say, is history. The quilt is now finished (except see I haven't sewn the binding all the way down in this photo?) and will be going to its new home with a friend who is having a baby, later this week (the baby isn't due for a few more weeks!). Thanks, block lotto, for another brilliant Lotto-Inspired Quilt...

Tic-Tac-Toe quilts

It's taken a while, but I have finished 2 more quilts, which means that every tic-tac-toe block I won last year has now made its way into a quilt.

First, is my wacky setting, for the wacky blocks.  I added scrappy white sashing around/between each block to make a big square, and then cut it just like we did the small blocks originally, and added the blue sashing.  The back was pieced with the rest of the blue, and 6 more blocks.

Blocks came from Trudi, Linnea, Kate, Dianah, Laura, Kathie, Michelle, Carrie and Brooke.

The second quilt is a simple sashed setting.  I really liked the look of the six blocks on the back of the blue, so I made the final quilt in that style.  Not enough green for dark borders, so I went with white for the outer border in that case.  The backing of this one is polar fleece, and the quilt is soooo soft and light because of it.

Blocks in this quilt were made by Mary Jane, Dianah, Carrie, Michelle, Linnea, Sophie, Brooke, Kathie, Laura, and myself.

let's play!

I finished up the second top from my tic-tac-toe winnings last year, and hope to get this quilted soon.  There were fun to play with -- thanks again to all who made the blocks!

Julie Wa

Krista's Completed Tic-Tac-Toe Quilt

Krista gave me permission to post photos of her finished Tic-Tac-Toe quilt. You can read more about it on blog, Quilts and More: June UFO

The pieced back is really cool, too--a giant Tic-tac-toe block ;-)

Finally...

my son gets to enjoy his tic tac toe quilt from blocks I won in January 2010.

tic tac toe revisited

One of the first "liberated blocks" last January was the tic tac toe block. I had fun with those, and when I was finishing up a string piecing quilt top based on an Ami Simms workshop, I decided to make my backing a giant tic tac toe, to use as a bean bag toss target. As you can see, the front of the quilt is filled with prints of fruit, flowers and bugs, so I think of this as a picnic quilt.

The one on the left is the top and the right is the tic tac toe back.

Thanks, Sophie, for the inspiration.

Linda

re Tic TacToe

I haven't figured out how to add a comment so am sending it this way. Your Tic Tac Toe top is delightful. I like the dark backgrounds with white crosses sprinkled around in the quilt.
To help with some of your questions, I would suggest that you quilt it then bind it. If you plan to quilt in the sashing, you might like to try using a serpentine stitch if your machine has one. A quilter friend used it instead of a straight stitch and if you are trying to stitch along a seam ( in the ditch) it hides a multiple of "oops" I went off the line. It looks nice too. If you think that it needs more quilting after doing the sashing you might tie it in the blocks. That would certainly be secure enough to withstand lots of washing.
I took a machine quilting class recently and the instructor suggested pinning the quilt layers well, press the backing and top well. Then to layer them tape them down on the edges to hold them taut then pin approximately 4" apart in the centre of the quilt and closer around the outside edges. A walking foot on the machine will help to feed the top layer and prevent bunching up pleats where you stitch over lines. It probably won't be needed if you don't use batting. Some machines have the walking foot built in. Remove the pins after you have quilted to make the whole thing lighter to handle. A hint I learned to help support the quilt, move your ironing board next to you and the sewing table and adjust it to the height of your table. It gives you more surface area beside you to hold the quilt as you are quilting. Practice on a few small pieces to get the hang of it and take your time. Don't forget to breath - we tend to hold our breath as we are trying to machine quilt - the instructor was right about that, I learned that from experience too. Happy quilting!
Cory

Tic Tac Toe - January winnings progress

Sorry for the poor picture, but I'm very excited - this is the nearly completed flimsy of my January 2010 Tic Tac Toe winnings. There's just one row of 7 purple blocks not yet set with sashing/cornerstones to add to one end.


Don't look too closely - the cornerstones don't match. But that's fine with me.

Once the last row is on, it makes it 7 blocks by 9 - but actually it needs to be 9 blocks by 9 blocks. So I need another two rows of blocks at each side - another 18 blocks. I'll probably do them in the same colours as the rows, but all with coloured backgrounds and white crosses. Or maybe I'll do a bit of lettering. Am undecided.

I do want to ask some questions though - where's the best place to find out:

1. I've got some cotton to use as the backing, but I'm not using batting as this quilt is going to be my bedcover which keeps my duvet cover free of cat hair (Ivor cat only trespasses on other furniture in the flat if he's banned from the bed, so he gets to sleep on the bed, I only have to worry about hair on the bed), so it'll be washed fortnightly/ weekly, so needs to be small enough to go into the machine, and to dry pretty quickly. I have loads of safety pins to use to baste the two layers together - and will probably just sew up & down the sashing lines to quilt it by machine, but do I add the binding before or after I've quilted it?

2. How far apart do my quilting lines need to be? Do I need to quilt inside the blocks as well - bearing in mind there won't be any batting.

3. Should I put the completed flimsy in the washing machine (a) before quilting (b) before binding or (c) after it's all completed?

4. What else do I need to know that I don't know because it's the first time I've done any quiltmaking?

Hopefully someone will be able to point me towards an idiot's guide to making the quilt bit to completion on the net!

Thanks

http://goblinfblog.blogspot.com/

Using leftovers

Jewel's post the other day about using her leftover fireworks pieces reminded me to write about something I made last week using the leftovers from January's Tic tac toe lotto. I wrote about it on my blog.

Progress - Block Lotto January 2010 Tic Tac Toe winnings

I've not been around much as my computer had a virus and I was not going to take the risk of passing it on! Anyway it's all working again so I can show you that I've begun to sash the blocks and join them together.  With hindsight I should have checked all the blocks are the same size, and made sure my sashing was too. Nevermind, it'll cheer up my bedroom no end to have this on the bed to protect it against Ivor cat hairs and the quilt police don't know where I live....

I'm using all the blocks I won, but have made some extra blocks in the same white background and then some with hand-dyed backgrounds with white haches on.  I've arranged them 7 across and 9 down in the order of the spectrum (red/ orange/ yellow/ green/ blue/ indigo/ violet but with 2 extra rows that are yellow/green and blue/green because I got more of some colours than others).  Sashing is white, and then the cornerstones (well they're in the corner but don't look to hard at the matching - they don't!) are in complementary colours (well as near as I could find in my stash - green/ blue/ purple/ dark magenta/ red/ reddish-orange/ orange/ yellow).

As you can see, I've done 3 & half rows (red, orange, yellow, yellowy/green mixed) so far, with another 5 to go (green, greeny/blue mixed, blue, indigo & violet) to go.  Poor Ivor cat currently languishes on a plain white sheet covering my duvet cover, when it's eventually finished, he'll be in colourful luxury!

I've been looking at Lazy Gal Tonya's letters and the lettering that was the Block for February (that I didn't get around to joining in on) - and if the quilt needs a border on one or two sides I'm thinking of doing liberated lettering 'Block Lotto January 2010' or similar in white lettering on handdyed background.  First I've got to make the blocks go together, I'm getting ahead of myself again!

I'm biased and inexperienced, so I think it's going to be gorgeous!

http://goblinfblog.blogspot.com/

Hi Everyone!

I know I haven't played along in a while. I wanted to show you what I designed using the ideas of blocks from December and January. I had appliqued my dots on 10 1/2 inch squares (the dots were a little too big so I didn't enter them in the lotto). Then in January I made the lotto blocks and had fun with them... The idea of this quilt came then. I cut the 10 1/2 inch dot squares wonky (so the dots aren't centered) and made some more tic-tac-toe blocks. Then I made some hourglass blocks to represent x's. I did them all with a layer cake of Spring Magic. So this is "X's, O's, and Tic-Tac-Toes". Sophie had said she wanted to see it when it was done... it isn't quilted yet but at least I finally got the top together.

TicTacToe progress

Not sure you'll be hugely interested, but I've sewn on the side sashing and ordered the blocks into something I like.  There's 4 'holes' as I need another 4 blocks and I can't decide whether to make them coloured background with white hashes or not.  I've not done the rest of the sashing as I can't decide whether to have handdyed coloured cornerstones.  Decisions, decisions!

First Tic-Tac-Toe Quilt

I finished my first tic-tac-toe quilt, using 9 of the blocks that I received from the January lotto.  (The quilt itself is actually square, although that's not completely obvious in this photo.)  I mirrored the wonky blocks in the setting, and then continued the theme in the quilting.  I echo-quilted the lines in each of the blocks.

I love these blocks - they are so nice and bright.  I can't wait to finish my plans for the next set.

I included everyone's name on the label for this quilt (click the photo to enlarge).  I thought I had blocks from 9 differnt people, until I went to write out the label.  I swapped some blocks around, and apparently ended up with only 8 contributers.

This quilt is on its way to my guild meeting on Wednesday, to be donated to the local children's hospital.

I won!

My last package of blocks arrived from Chris yesterday! Here are all my tic-tac-toe blocks -- I think they'll become two kids' quilts and so far I've divided into the girly set arranged sort of randomly
and the boyish set arranged from skinny to fat.I love 'em all! Thanks!

blocks rec'vd today....

from Chris. I'm complete! All 48 in! Thanks to each one of you for my very pretty blocks.

All Here

All my blocks have arrived safely!

~Kristin

TicTacToe all arrived safely

I've been away from home for most of the month, and arrived back to an huge pile of post - I cherrypicked what I thought would be the blocks envelopes - and this is what I've got - 48 (plus a dud one I didn't enter of my own) gloriously coloured blocks - all the right size, all beautifully sewn (whoever did the handsewing with ends finished so the second cut worked is a genius!), and in an amazing range of brights and WOWs.  It's given me an education in what quilting fabrics there are out there!

Sorry for the bad pic (and the boxes on the floor), it's a small room and there's too much other stuff for me to move the dining table out of the way at the moment.  I'm having a ruthless clearout that is emptying the cupboards quicker than it's going out the door - and significant floor coverage is the distressing result!

more tic tac toe blocks!

I now have blocks from Manuela and Linnea! Thanks to both of you! I'll charge up the camera and post a picture as soon as Chris' blocks arrive...

Julie

Update

Woohoo!  I just checked the mail box (realized that my housesitter had not picked up mail today) and I found my last 3 blocks from Sophie waiting for me.  Here they are, all 48 blocks, ready for me to figure out :)

An exciting day!

I came home from a trip today, and found wonderful treats waiting for me.  Piles of blocks arrived while I was gone!  Sorry for the delay in letting you know that your blocks arrived safely.  I have now received blocks from almost everyone - Brooke, Carrie, Dianah, June, Kate, Kathryn, Laura, Linnea, Lois, Mary Jane, Michelle and Terri - your blocks all made it here safe and sound.    No blocks from Sophie yet, but I know they are on the way.  It can take 2 weeks (or more) to get here from the US, so I expect they'll arrive sometime next week.

I am really looking for forward to putting my creativity to work with all these lovely blocks!!

Laura had a wonderful idea - she put her name/address on sticky labels and attached one to the back of each block.  I'm going to do the same for the rest of the blocks I received - this way, when I put the quilts together I'll know whose blocks are in each quilt.