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November 27, 2025
Flannel............. from Exuberant Color




Standing at the design wall didn't sound appealing to me yesterday so I got 2 boxes of flannel pieces off a shelf in my studio.


I decided bullseye blocks was a nice mindless project.  They will probably be made into a baby quilt.



They haven't had their final press yet so they look a little crooked.  Some of them used a variety of short pieces and others were just 3 fabrics for the whole block.


I still have tomatoes ripening in the garage.  A lot of them are golf ball size or smaller but they taste great, better ...

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October 18, 2025
3 quilt tops................... from Exuberant Color


I finally turned on the iron and got all three quilt tops pressed and measured.  Then I staystitched around the perimeter of this 16 patch made of Nancy Crow fabric.  This photo was taken with my Canon camera and is the closest to the real color.  My previous photos were too light.  This one is 64" x 80".


I am so happy these simple borders worked so effectively to make this medallion into a rectangular shape.  It is 61" x 81".  It is now a shape to cover a body.  No one will ever convince me that a 61" square ...

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October 17, 2025
Borders, sewn top................... from Exuberant Color


Thanks to a friend I decided on borders on a medallion quilt made 9 years ago.  I was stuck at 61" square and wanted it to become rectangular.  The borders are sewn on the top and bottom.  Here is the top and the inspiration for it.



Last night I finished sewing the flannel tumbler quilt top.  Now I have 3 quilt tops to press so maybe I'll turn on the iron today.

A friend started blogging again so check her out.  She mentions me in this post from yesterday.

 

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October 16, 2025
A different project............... from Exuberant Color


After grocery shopping and putting everything away, I wasn't in the mood to turn on the iron and press the quilt top....so I started a new project.  A while back I showed all of the precut flannel pieces I had and I decided to make another baby quilt with the 4" tumblers.  This is just rows pinned to the design wall.  I'll decide if I want to move any of the rows to a different position and then sew them together.  This one should finish around 40" x 40".


There were 257 tumblers (cut with my die ...

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September 27, 2025
Counting pieces................... from Exuberant Color


There wasn't time yesterday to sew on any project so I counted pieces of flannel, both pieced and cut.  This pile is 35 flannel 16 patches.  I need to make 28 more blocks for a decent throw size quilt, or mix these with some of the pieces in the following photos. 



There were several boxes of cut pieces.  In this one there are 53 of the 4.5" x 8.5" rectangles, 45 of the 4.5" squares, and I didn't count the strips since there are only a few of them.

A lot of my flannel quilts ...

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July 26, 2025
Checking out an idea................... from Exuberant Color


This is the idea I had for the Kaffe rectangles and Brandon Mably's Gameboard fabric.  I have seen this done with different dimensions for the pieces and I think longer rectangles might look better, but this is what I have already cut, so I need to use it.  I only got 110 B&W squares out of the yard of fabric that I had.  I had figured I needed 150 for a quilt 54" x 75".  I have another of his black and white fabrics called Chips that I could possible mix into the outside edge blocks.  These pieces ...

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July 25, 2025
It was binding day...................... from Exuberant Color


I had the binding sewn onto the flannel baby quilt before lunch time yesterday.  I need to take some blocks off the design wall before I can take its full portrait.





These are the blocks that need to be removed from the design wall.  I added the 4 new ones so I could take a photo of all 36 blocks (one of each combination of fabrics, two alike of each are sewn).  This wasn't necessarily the final layout but I have a photo of it now if I do want to start with this when I get the rest ...

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July 24, 2025
Another hot day.......... from Exuberant Color


Yesterday I found a flannel binding fabric that was lightweight and the right color for this little flannel baby quilt.  I hope I will get it sewn on today.

A friend came over and was designing a quilt on my design wall.  She brought Subway sandwiches, yum!


I had another dishcloth more than half knitted so I finished it late yesterday afternoon.









That gave me permission to start another one (or two).




I cut the black and white squares for another idea I have.

The overnight temperatures are staying up in the mid to high 70s, some close to 80 ...

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July 23, 2025
Quilting a small one.......... from Exuberant Color


This flannel quilt has been ready for quilting for a couple weeks so I finally quilted it yesterday.  It will get trimmed today or tomorrow and then I'll look for binding.








I pressed the stratas yesterday and sliced off the segments for 8 blocks, 2 of each combination.  They aren't pressed so they can't go up on the design wall yet.  I have 72 blocks made now.  That would give me an 8 x 9 layout but that is too close to square.  I would rather have 7 x 11 or 8 x 10.  I could still ...

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June 29, 2025
Finished a small one................ from Exuberant Color


I made the top for this quilt in February, using the 6" Bow Tie dies so the blocks are 3" finished.  All of the fabrics in the blocks are Kaffe Fassett collective prints, a large variety in the larger piece and in the triangles.  I think I would call this exuberant pastel because of the large scale prints which appear darker.  It is 34.5" x 45".




The cute print on the back is flannel that I found on sale.  The binding is a gray print I found in my stack of grays.

I used Hobbs 80/20 batting in ...

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May 1, 2025
Last day of April sewing............. from Exuberant Color


This isn't the prettiest table topper I have ever made but it will serve a good purpose anyway.  The top was made to demonstrate how to make the block for a class over 10 years ago.  I just used strips that were already cut, not fabrics chosen specifically chosen for a project.  It is almost 21" square.


The back is a pretty fabric so that side might be used more than the pieced side.  I hand stitched the binding last night while watching TV.









I also added a border to a small flannel quilt top so it is an ...

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March 31, 2025
Flannel quilt for beginners from Pieced Brain

Flannel quilt for beginners

Here’s a quick flannel quilt for beginners, perfect as a graduation gift or home decor. You can make it in one day!

Suede Satchel

My middle son turns 25 today! I had been collecting flannels for a few years to make the Suede Satchel quilt for him, and, while on a retreat at Lake Okoboji earlier this month, I finally put it together! It is smaller than my original pattern – it measures 48″ x 64″ with blocks that finish at 8″ – and I hope he will enjoy it as a throw as he hangs out with his cat, Junior ...

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February 15, 2025
It's finished! from Exuberant Color


I found a nice stripe in the mid-tone of the quilt for the binding and got it sewn on.  This quilt is 39" square.








The backing is a grayed purple even though it seems to be brown in some lights.  The quilt is much softer looking in person, not such high contrast.

I used Hobbs 80/20 in this quilt.





The close up shots show some of the colors in the quilt, like this green print.






There are browns, rust, blue and gold tones.








Burgundy check and a burnt orange are in this shot.







Up in the top left is ...

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February 14, 2025
A little fabric therapy................ from Exuberant Color


I made my first fabric purchase this year.  Yes, it's Tilda again and yes, it was pricey because it is a new line, but I needed a perk.  











I bought the smallest pack available, fat 8ths plus 1/2 yard of my favorite fabric.





I finished quilting the baby quilt last night but haven't trimmed it yet.  That will happen today and I'll find a binding fabric and hopefully get it finished.





I was just about out of the cookies in my freezer so it was time to bake something else.  I love this cherry topped cake ...

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February 13, 2025
Hanging sleeve #2 from Exuberant Color


I had been dreading sewing the hanging sleeve on the second quilt for my grandson and his wife.  Lots of black to deal with.  I finally decided how to stitch from the front to catch the top edge and used charcoal gray thread so I could see where I had stitched.  This side is going against a wall so it won't matter that it wasn't black thread.


I continued working on it and got all of the hand stitching done.  Now I have to get the 2 quilts in a box and mail them to the east coast ...

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February 1, 2025
January 2025 monthly recap................ from Exuberant Color


I'm happy to have one finish for January 2025 and I ditch quilted it on my Pfaff sewing machine.  I like designing with the little rectangles in my colorwash wall hangings.  I don't always work yellow into them but I got a good variety of it in this one.  It is 31.25" x 50.25".









I also finished 3 table runners.  I'm hoping to get a lot of little projects finished this year.  I have plenty of large quilts right now but I still need to make more baby quilts.  

Making baby quilts gives me a ...

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January 19, 2025
A quilt top!............... from Exuberant Color


The flannel quilt top is finished!  It has been hard to get a good photo of this quilt.  It is a little more rust toned than it looks here.  The contrast between the light and dark is also softer.  If you go back to this post you can see the original quilt I planned this layout for.




I took some close up shots to better show the colors and patterns in the fabrics.









The colors in this photo are truer than the photo of the whole quilt top.









This photo is also truer color but the contrast if off.  The ...

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January 18, 2025
Now this is better......... from Exuberant Color


I cut several flannel fabrics into 4.5" x 8.5" rectangles and some into 2.5" x 8.5" rectangles.  I left a few of the darker pieces in it and added more medium value rectangles.  It flows much better now.  I sewed a lot of the triangles into squares last night and made more blocks.  I have to make two more blocks with 3 vertical strips of triangles to finish the layout.  This will be 40" x 40" when sewn together, a nice baby quilt size. 

I have one more baby quilt size top that I sewed last ...

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January 17, 2025
Cut, sew, cut............. from Exuberant Color


I needed to get the Plaid-ish pieces off the design wall so I sewed 3 of the 4 blocks, then sewed 3 more dark blocks.  After that I cut more pieces so I can  make more medium color blocks.  I only had about a third of the medium color pieces cut after an hour.




Last night I pressed all of the sewn blocks for the flannel quilt and did a trial layout.  I can see that about half of the rectangles that are already cut are too dark for this quilt so I'll cut some more light and medium ...

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January 16, 2025
Taking count.......... from Exuberant Color

 It was an errand day yesterday, in addition to baking a batch of cookies.  I didn't get much sewing done so I did counting instead.

Single columns of flannel triangles.  The original quilt I designed (shown on Monday's post) has 7 of these.



9 Double columns - most would be like this because I have 8 in most of the sets of triangle squares.  In my original quilt I have only 4 of these so I can add one more strip to 5 of them to make triple columns.






I only have 4 of the triple column blocks sewn ...

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