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May 15, 2025
A lot of trays.................. from Exuberant Color

I continued on with my sorting on the 2.5" x 4.5" rectangles which I usually use for colorwash wallhangings.  They are all batik fabric.  The brown and purple fabrics are on one tray each.



Yellow/orange and pink/red each have their own tray.  When I'm actually ready to use these I'll pull 3 empty trays to use to spread out most of the pieces from one tray in single piles instead of overlapping piles.




It took 2 trays for all of the blues.








The greens filled 2 trays and they are prettier than they look ...

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May 14, 2025
Behind the scenes work..................... from Exuberant Color


I have been avoiding a lot of the behind the scenes work that leads up to a successful quilt.  I have the choice of not posting on my blog until I have a project in progress but I choose to continue to post every day, a safety net for me.  There are a few of my readers that contact me if there isn't a post some morning and ask if everything is OK.  Occasionally I forget to click on Publish or forget to change the time of the post to 3:30 a.m.

Last night my task while ...

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May 8, 2025
Sorting and stitching........ from Exuberant Color



These trays are the 2.5" x 4.5" rectangles of batiks, most of which will be used for colorwash.  There was one tray of a previously cut group and I added another tray and worked the newly cut rectangles into them.  On the right is the stack of trays with one color on each and they are a mess and need to be sorted and straightened.  I'm spending a couple hours a day on organization in the basement, nothing to take photos of.


Last night I continued on the hand stitching of the binding of this Bow Tie ...

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May 4, 2025
Basement doings.................... from Exuberant Color


 I was in the basement doing laundry and finished up a few other tasks.  One was stacking the trays with the 2" x 3.5" rectangles.  I store these in a large bin with trays of 2 other size rectangles.


I found this partially sewn project.  I could slice and sew the strata and make another section like the first or I could cut it into 2 sections and add stripes to both sides of the sewn section, lining up the fabrics to continue the design.  The first option would make one piece 24.5" square.  The second option would ...

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May 3, 2025
Small projects................. from Exuberant Color


 I finished quilting the second table topper last night and will get it trimmed today and get the binding sewn on.  This one is more scrappy where the first one had matching strips at the corners.







I pulled out all of my trays of 2" x 3.5" rectangles and worked on feeding the new cuts (shown at the center on top of the trays) into their color group.  The trays were all a mess, not straightened up after making the last quilt.


This is what they all look like now, ready for the next project.

Now I need to ...

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January 31, 2025
A finish for January 2025.......... from Exuberant Color


I'm so happy to finally have this batik colorwash finished.  I finished designing and sewing the quilt top in April 2023 and it waited 1 3/4 years to be basted and quilted.  I chose the back and cut the batting 6 months ago.

It is 31.25" x 50.25".

The pieces in the colorwash are 1.5" x 3" finished.








I need to record the details in this online journal.

The backing is a green/orange/gold batik and the binding is a brown design batik. The batting is Warm and Natural.  I used Invisifil thread to ...

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January 29, 2025
Quilting.................. from Exuberant Color


The basting was finished a week ago and I finally got around to the quilting on this colorwash.  It is designed with 1.5" x 3" rectangles.  It took 3 hours to complete the ditch quilting and had 5 colors of thread used.  I'll look for a binding fabric today and maybe squeak in one finish this month.


I sent 2 quilts with my longarm friend to be quilted for some February finishes.  They are a couple of my favorites.


It was 45 degrees yesterday and will maybe be 50 on Thursday and again on Sunday.  Quite a change ...

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January 12, 2025
Past quilt from parts department............ from Exuberant Color


To expand on my "parts department" post yesterday, this is a quilt I made in 2016.  I had a lot of batik 2" finished triangles that I had previously cut from scraps.  I made the star blocks as my mindless evening sewing for a few months.  Then the blocks got placed on a shelf.  One day I came across them and on the next shelf were leftover red 16 patch blocks from another quilt.  As I moved them and placed one pile on top of the other, I saw that the both sets of blocks were the same size and ...

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January 1, 2024
December 2023 monthly recap................ from Exuberant Color


 December was my best month for finishes.  Three were just waiting for binding so that was pretty fast.  Four of them were gifts that needed to be finished.  On the left are the two I Spy quilts for my two families of great-grandchildren. (64" x 80.5" and 67.5" x 79").  Next to them are Soft Colorwash and Small Colorwash (20" x 33 and 18" square).  Next is layered churn dash, 77" x 101" and below it flannel baby quilts, 38" square and 39.5" square.  At the right is Batik Stars, 73" x 99".


Only one quilt top ...

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December 31, 2023
First and only quilt top for December 2023 from Exuberant Color


This month is quite a contrast with most months with only one top and many finishes.  Usually it is fewer finishes and as many as 5 tops made in a month (Jan and Apr this year).

This top is called Rosy in the Kaffe Fassett books, first shown in 1997 and made with other commercial prints because he had only designed the yarn dyed woven stripe fabrics at the time they were writing the book.

In the book the blocks are 9".  Mine are 6".  This top is about 52" x 70".


I thought about taking this block out but ...

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December 30, 2023
Finish # 7 for December 2023................. from Exuberant Color


I finished the binding on the Soft Colorwash early in the day yesterday.  It is made of all batik fabrics and it measures about 20" x 33".


It is ditch quilted in the vertical seams with Invisifil thread.









I mentioned yesterday that I put squares folded diagonally on all 4 corners so a hanging rod/dowel can be slipped into any 2 on a side to display it in the orientation that is desired.











The next in line project was pressing all of the edge blocks for the Rosy quilt.







Then I started sewing this top together.  By 7 p ...

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December 29, 2023
Racing to the end with 2............ from Exuberant Color


I started working early yesterday and got all of the top row blocks sewn.  I also have all of the 3.5" squares chosen for the bottom row.  I think I'm going to go ahead and sew this now and I'll add the bottom row to it when I get it finished.




I sewed the binding onto this small soft colorwash last night (only a portion of it is shown here).  I have had the quilting done for several weeks but couldn't decide which edge was the top and couldn't decide between a facing and a ...

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October 25, 2023
First finish of October 2023............ from Exuberant Color


 I feel like I'm finally making some progress this month.  I had so many side projects to take care of this month that I really haven't gotten much stitching time.  This colorwash is all batiks, no fabric repeated, and the squares finish at 2".  It is 31.5" square.

It got up to 77 degrees yesterday and our normal high is about 60 degrees right now.  We may hit 70 a few more times this week and then 40 next week.  While it was nice and warm I took my shovel out to the back garden and started ...

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October 24, 2023
Binding............. from Exuberant Color


I didn't look any farther; I liked one of the binding choices in the first round.  I got it sewn on and have started the hand stitching.  The hanging sleeve is sewn on too.






This is the orientation of the other colorwash as I designed it.  














When my daughter was here we tried it horizontally and thought maybe that was a better choice for art over a piece of furniture.

I put the leftover piece of backing fabric there to analyze whether it might be a good binding choice.



I flipped it 180 degrees to see if I like ...

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October 22, 2023
Quilting on two............ from Exuberant Color


The top of my sewing cabinet was finally cleaned off and I quilted both of these colorwash quilts yesterday.  Today I will choose bindings and prepare hanging sleeves.




While I was sitting at my computer a little after 5 p.m. I noticed the tree a little farther north of me glowing in the sunlight.  When I saw the color of the partially dead tree next to it I figured it is the golden hour.



Here is another view while the sun was hitting it and just a short time later after the sun had gone down behind the houses ...

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October 16, 2023
Cross seams sewn........... from Exuberant Color


All of the seams are sewn and this colorwash has been pressed.  It will be the next to hand baste and should only take about a half hour.  It is 18.5" square.  The majority of prints are Kaffe Fassett collective and other fabrics added in as needed.  This one is not as smooth but has a lot of interest in the fabrics.  I sometimes describe this type of prints as chunky/bumpy.  It was fun to make and just what I needed as I contemplate the next to be added to the African elephant quilt top.


I brought the ...

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October 15, 2023
Progress.......... from Exuberant Color


My layout got more crooked the farther down I got on the small portable design wall.  I did come to a final decision though and it was ready to sew.






Last night I started the webbing process of sewing it together.







That was finished about 11 p.m.  Ready for pressing now so I can sew the seams in the other direction.












I printed labels for 3 boxes and 2 clear plastic drawers and got them cut down to size for their containers.  These are ready to go up on a shelf now.


We got 2.85" of rain in ...

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October 14, 2023
Geese are done............ from Exuberant Color


I finished sewing the Flying Geese blocks yesterday afternoon.  I decided to try 3 mock ups for possible use for them so I can refer back when I'm ready.

This Dutchman's Puzzle block would be 12" finished.  I think I have 120 Flying Geese blocks so I could make 15 blocks.




This is the layout that was on the little scrap of paper on the tray holding the triangles.






I was surprised when this one happened when alternating rows of dark geese and light geese.

For now the blocks will go into a labeled box for later consideration ...

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October 13, 2023
More little things........... from Exuberant Color

 


I have made so many larger projects earlier this year that I'm enjoying just working on small things right now.  I sewed more flying geese with Australian fabrics in an effort to get my sewing machine cabinet cleaned off.  I need to quilt a small colorwash that is already basted and the table top has been a mass of clutter for awhile.  I have 110 sewn now and then I found another group of half square triangles that had fallen off the tray.  That means I need to cut some more quarter square triangles for geese.  I hope to ...

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October 7, 2023
No decisions, just play.......... from Exuberant Color


I had a lazy day yesterday.  The only sewing I did was the staystitching around the African/batik 16 patch quilt top.

In the last 3 weeks I have been cutting 2" squares of Kaffe fabrics plus a few others from scraps.  I cut a few more squares yesterday and then decided to put the pieces up on a small design wall to see what is missing to make a colorwash.  I will probably add non-Kaffe fabrics and make this larger.

It was a partially sunny day yesterday with periods of clouds and rain and high 40s and low 50s ...

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  • colorwash
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