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Welcome back! This is just a quick post to share some upcoming scrap quilting projects that I have planned for 2022. But first some back story –

First, let’s talk scrap quilting organization

Early in 2020 one of my “quarantine projects” was to organize all my scraps by color. A book I had read inspired me to try this. Now I don’t believer there is any such thing as a “one-size-fits-all approach” for how to organize your scraps, so I was open to trying something new, thinking it would help me use scraps in a more efficient way. (Are you thinkin’ “This girl sounds like a sucker.”? 😂!)

By the end of the year, I realized it wasn’t working. Now it might work for you. For me, not so much. Not a single scrap got used by the end of the year. Meanwhile the scrap bucket below my cutting table was OVERFLOWING because I discovered that I really didn’t like taking the time to sort by color unless I was making a quilt. It seemed like double the work. Then if I saw a scrap quilt I wanted to make, I would look at those colors then start to felt like it was too much trouble to figure out if I had enough fabric to make it. Eventually, I decided that I needed to go back to cutting and storing my scraps by size. So in late October of 2021, I went back to my old method, but I didn’t have time to tackle all the new scraps that were waiting to be organized..

Meanwhile, during 2021 I had something absolutely delightful happen: my mother finally took the plunge into quilting. As soon as I got my vaccinations, I headed down for some quality time with my parents and (naturally) I took my sewing machine with me. Mom sat at the table and watched. At one point she said, “Is that all there is to this?” and I reassured her that it wasn’t rocket science. Then I got smart and asked if she wouldn’t mind pressing some blocks while I sewed. I showed her how to press quilt blocks and she pressed while I sewed.

That Tom Sawyer trick never grows old, does it? 😂

Seriously, it’s been such a joy to watch her get excited about quilts and to see her taking small steps to challenge herself. The quilting bug REALLY bit her! But I knew that Mom would eventually need to break herself away from squares and rectangles and later in the year I started thinking of ways to get her to branch out a bit in her quilting knowledge. I had been working on a Village Quilt and I realized that this pattern might be a great way to get her to learn how to make flying geese. I’ve made two of these quilts so far. Every house has it’s own personality, so I never get bored making it.

Now you can make a Village Quilt with charm packs, but it also works great with scraps, so instead of having Mom buy a bunch of charm packs I decided to wag all my scraps (which had not been organized for nearly two years!) down to her place so she could wade through them. I wish I had taken pictures, but my scraps were overflowing out of a jumbo-size Williams Sonoma tote bag that measures 16″ x 13″ x 17″. In addition I brought most of my recently reorganized scrap bins, and told her that if she helped me sort out this mess she could keep whatever she wanted.

We spread them all out on the table and slowly worked through the piles during the evenings. Mom would work on them in the living room during the day while I did my “real” job. After about 4 days, we had most of it knocked out and I headed back to Tulsa with the remaining scraps.

Over Christmas break I finished organizing every last scrap in my sewing room and here is what I now have to work with:

I resolved that once I got a bit caught up on current projects I would make a significant dent in those scrap bins.

My 2022 Scrap Quilting Plan:

So now it’s February of 2022 and I am nearly caught up on my “current” projects. For the last few weeks I’ve been mulling around what to do with all those scraps. I’ve spent the past several weeks trying to map it out, going through old “bucket lists” and “someday-maybe” ideas and here is what I’ve come up with so far:

1. The first scrap quilt on my list is to do something with this pile of leftover fabrics from my Halloween Figs project (You can see photos of that over on Instagram.) There were too many leftovers to justify scrapping them, but I didn’t really want to put them back in my stash either. I’ve decided to make an Irish Chain out of what is left here.
2. Next, I plan to make some kind of string quilt (still researching patterns)
3. My next plan is to make some kind of basket quilt. Thinking about this one from Laundry Basket Quilts. I did the Anna’s Basket Block of the Month last year and really enjoyed making baskets, so I’m thinking something that repeats a small basket block. What I like about this pattern is that it would use up a bunch of my 5″ squares.
4. Another plan is to make a quilt using Scrappy Triangle Foundations (My friend Barbara told me about these and you can find them over at Lelia Gardenia‘s website. ) Barbara’s quilt was fabulous, btw. Foundation piecing is not my favorite, but I do like the results and I like the fact that you can use odd shaped bits.
5. Mountain Top quilt by Laundry Basket Quilts (I have a lot of LBQ scraps and I’m thinking they would look good in this design.
6. I’m not really a pink person, but I like this pattern on the cover of American Patchwork and Quilting or something similar

7. The Circuitry Quilt Pattern by Amy Friend which will use up some of my selvedges!

There you go! I’ve identified at least 7 projects for 2022 to use up scraps, and I’m thinking those should keep me busy for awhile. 😆 I will post here occasionally throughout the year as I make progress and let you know if I get any wild hairs to add more projects to the list!

In a few weeks, I hope to get down to see my mom.. Unfortunately, she still has not started on her Village quilt, so I think I need to get her going on that! I may have to resort to the Tom Sawyer trick again, but I will definitely take a bunch of scraps with me and see if I can inspire her to take some more since I fear that these 7 projects won’t make much of a dent in my pile.