# Question about scrappy quilting



## Ruby (May 10, 2002)

For you who do scrappy quilting, how do you decide which colors to sew together? I'm cutting a bunch of squares to do a scrappy quilt. Should I just put them in a bin and mix them all together. I was thinking putting the lights in one bin and the darks in another on. 

I have problems trying to control the colors. But I want to so something that has a pattern like Bonnie Hunter does but still look scrappy.


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## CraftyLady (Jul 18, 2014)

Is it for a person who likes certain colors? If not what is your wish? 

I think about light mediums and dark values. Or just Light and Dark values. 
Sort to that. 

And then there is the put them all in a bag and just sew them together. 

It's a scrap quilt. Don't think too long or hard about it. 

This is a great website for scrap quilting. Bonnie Hunter's www.quiltville.com is a great site for scrap quilting. All of her patterns are free use.


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## Classof66 (Jul 9, 2011)

I have this problem. I guess I am too OCD. I have a lot of scraps, and I tell myself I am just going to shut my eyes and draw a piece out and use it. However, I look at it and decide its a 30's report, or a Civil War, or too modern, or a kids print, etc. etc. And I go nowhere!


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## Debbie in Wa (Dec 28, 2007)

For me it depends on the pattern that I am using. If I do total scrappy, then I use everything I have, novelties, solids, tone on tones. On some things I will go with colors that I really like with light and dark hues, maybe mediums too. I have been know to find a shirt that I really love because of the colors, and pick those colors from it.
For inspiration of colors, you can go here
http://design-seeds.com/


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## FarmChix (Mar 3, 2013)

I am a scrappy quilter. I do keeps lights and darks separate. Sometimes I have to pull from both to pull a medium. The "issue" I see with your post is that you say you want to 'control' the colors. Let go....let loose.....don't try to control.....let the fabrics do all the work. Your only job is to sew them together and let them speak to you. Just reach into either the light or the dark pile, grab a piece and stitch. The more variety, the better. Somewhere in the middle, you will freak out and want things to 'match' better. Resist the temptation and keep going. If you let it, it can be very freeing.


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## Maura (Jun 6, 2004)

Scrap quilts. Scrappy is the cutsie name. Like she said, pay attention to lights and darks and if necessary, mediums. You are going to tend to buy the same colors over time, so your scraps should harmonize well enough that you can mix fabric from one quilt with fabric from another quilt. Like in other quilts, you can use medium tones as the darks and have a medium and light quilt. Or, a medium and dark quilt.

You can do a crazy quilt, or carefully choose for a tumbling block, which looks great in lots of colors.


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## Gretchen Ann (Aug 30, 2010)

Bonnie Hunter is the queen of scrappy quilts BUT, she is so scrappy that sometimes I can't see the pattern. I try to make my light colors light enough that the design of the quilt is easy to see.

That is my personal preference and not everyone feels that way. Thats ok, there is more than one way to piece a quilt top.


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## Macybaby (Jun 16, 2006)

I like to do scrappy where you have a background fabric and the "scrappy" part is the design. When doing that, I don't pay any attention to the order of the colors, other than trying not to get the same ones right next to each other.

Here are some that qualify as "scrappy" 










some may not consider this "scrappy" but it was made with scraps, just needed some a bit larger. I think there are over 20 different "purples" used.










This one is very scrappy - but with the solid background to make the pattern show.










here is another with scrappy and a solid. I just made sure not to have any "scrap" in a yellow that would mess up the look.










then you can also do "scrappy" with paying attention to colors - but not patterns.










This is a crazy quilt, and I paid a lot of attention where I put the colors with this one, but only for the individual block to make sure it was a pleasing combination.










I'd love to do a scrappy pattern with 3-4 base colors, but use all sorts of fabric within each color. The problem there is making sure you don't have too may inbetween colors (like using red and blue, make sure you don't have some purple shades that could go either way).


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## Maura (Jun 6, 2004)

I agree you have to see the pattern. Otherwise, just make it easy on yourself and make squares. There are quilts made of leftovers (I think the cat quilt and card trick are such), and those that are &#8216;scrap&#8217; quilts where you have a zillion different fabrics and are unable to to create a same color grouping or a top that could pass for so many yards of this and so many yards of that. I have lots of fabric and often buy without a specific pattern in mind, but I don&#8217;t think that qualifies as scrap because I have enough of any fabric to do as I please. I just like a lot of color and movement.


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## Ruby (May 10, 2002)

Here is one scrappy I did. But when I said controlled scrappy. I laid out all the different fabrics and tried to make sure each little tent had colors that matched. That's why I thought maybe mix all them together and just sew what ever I pick up. I love that pattern Bonnie Hunter has on her web site at the top. It's the site where she has the videos.


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## maxine (Jun 22, 2004)

Macybaby I really like the fourth picture of block with the yellow center... do you know it's name please ??... I'd like to try it.. )

Ruby I have learned to pick the colors from all my favorite fabrics, cut a strip off of each and just randomly place them together... and sew... it was difficult for me at first, but now I can sew them without having to pick certain colors to go next to each other..


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## Macybaby (Jun 16, 2006)

Maxine, I don't know the name. I was just looking for a pattern for a swap and saw the picture and went from there.

It's four blocks, I started out with cutting random widths at a slight angle and sewed them together in pairs, then I sewed the pairs together and then laid them against a template and added to get enough fabric. 

Then I squared up two edges and added the cross triangle piece of yellow - and sewed four together. 

I think it was suppose to be paper pieces, but I've never done that. And one could make the yellow extend to the end if you wanted to match points, which I did not want to do with this. When I had them done, I thought they made a nice pattern together.


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## maxine (Jun 22, 2004)

Macy very clever of you to just figure it out without a pattern..!! .. way cool.. I'm impressed!!... thank you for sharing how you accomplished it.. I'm going to give it a try.. fingers crossed..


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## Ruby (May 10, 2002)

Here is the little tent scrappy I was talking about in post #10 for some reason it didn't post the picture then.


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## Gretchen Ann (Aug 30, 2010)

Very cute. See, you know how to sew scrappy. And it looks like a planned scrappy too.


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## maxine (Jun 22, 2004)

Oh Ruby, I love it!! I especially like the stripey tents.. How fun it must have been to choose all the different fabrics for each tent & door... good job!!!


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## Macybaby (Jun 16, 2006)

I love the tent scrappy too! Was thinking it would be cute to collect animal or cartoon prints and fussy cut them so they are standing or looking out the doorway - maybe not for all of them. . .

Darn, I'm not suppose to get any "new" ideas until I use up some of the old ones. But wait, that's going to be a 2015 resolution, so I'm OK since I saw this in 2014.


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## maxine (Jun 22, 2004)

Macybaby how funny.. I was thinking the same thing about the animals looking out the doors!!! COOL... and I also have made a rule for myself... I MUST Finish atleast one project each month before I am allowed to start a new one... I got out my Snowman swap blocks... that is going to be my first quilt to finish in 2015... I like to keep snowmen up for January, so guess I'd better get to sewing fast... )


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## Ruby (May 10, 2002)

I so want to start a scrappy one I have in mind. But I need to do some quilting on a couple old quilt tops for my DIL before I start another one.


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## RedHeadedTricia (Jun 20, 2006)

Gretchen,
I'm am once again working on making another scrap quilt for the new year once my son goes home to dad's this weekend. I plan to make BH's Bricks & Stepping Stones this year. You can see the link here ~~ (http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2005/06/bricks-stepping-stones.html)

Other than having the 4-patch blocks kind of consistent in the 2 colors of your choice - anything goes. I plan to keep the black & white 4-patches in mine and I have been cutting the bricks out from some of my larger scrap pieces. I know the brick pile will continue to grow but I'm okay with that. Just more I can use in other quilt for the 2 twin beds in the guest room. 

We did start a scrappy thread year with lots of pictures here. http://www.homesteadingtoday.com/co...g-quilting/502946-start-new-year-scrappy.html

I will be sure to add pictures of my new BH project as I go along. I was able to finish my anvil quilt before midnight last night, albeit not by much; but I felt good meeting my goal of finishing it a one years time.

I hope we can do a scrappy quilt sew-a-long this year as a group. I think it would be fun and interesting to see all the different patterns that we come up with. (Hint Hint to the Mod's - LOL)

Well I'm off to do some sewing on my POM for another board and make some peanut butter rice crispy treats with the boy child.

Happy New Years Y'all!!
RHT


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## CJ (May 10, 2002)

I've discovered I don't care for "true" scrappy. I just finished one that is true scrappy and I don't care for it.










Controlled scrappy quilts however, I love. This one uses solid black to tie it all together, and just one neutral background fabric, but all the stars are random scrap.s










This one I used all random scraps for the blocks and border, but black pulls it all together.










This one has 4 colors I used throughout, but each block is scrappy.










I'm getting ready to quilt another "controlled" scrappy. I will not do another one that doesn't have at least one fabric to pull it all together.


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