Lovely Lemons

 

Last year, you may recall, I made the Take Four placemats using a lemon-themed fat quarter bundle. Except that it had 5 fat quarters and so I made 5 placemats. For whatever reason, the lemon theme really appeals to me. Whether it's the bright, cheerful yellow, or what, I'm not sure. 

Then later in the year, I found a second lemon-themed fat quarter bundle, this one with black as the accent colour instead of blue, and purchased it as well and made a table runner. Other projects superceded that one, however, and I didn't get around to quilting it until this year when I bought another of the same fat quarter bundle to make a wallhanging. 

As I was working with fat quarters and not yardage, I wasn't sure what to do for a wallhanging. In a quilting group on Facebook, someone suggested the Fat Quarter Shop, and I ended up choosing the Cobblestone pattern. In addition to the 5-fat-quarter-bundle I had recently purchased, I was trying to use up leftovers from the previous projects, but still ended up having to buy some individual fat quarters. That's how I ended up with some fabrics from both fat quarter bundles in this project. I honestly am not really that happy with it. While it is bright and cheerful, the design just doesn't speak to me. However, one of my Facebook friends liked it well enough to offer to buy it, but when I quoted him a price, it didn't happen. No surprise there. Although I do think he wanted more green in it... I would have been rather happy to sell it: more money for my projects and I don't have to look at it any more. 
Meanwhile, I had decided to add more projects to my lemon collection: 

When looking for kitchen towels to use for projects in the dollar store, I found this one that actually had lemons on it. You can find the kitchen towel dress instructions here. 

Hot pot holders - I made the hourglass blocks and quilted them on the longaram along with the wallhanging and the table runner. Then I used some cotton yarn to crochet some hanging loops and stitched them in when I added the binding. 

I managed to find some brighter yellow cotton yarn and added this lemon slice dishcloth to my lemon collection. This is the Orange Slice pattern from A Year of Dishcloths by Maggie Weldon. If I use this pattern again, I will make the long white spike stitches looser because they tend to pull the dishcloth up into a bowl shape instead of lying flat. 

Of course, I have my lemon salt/pepper/cream/sugar set that I picked up at an antique mall that completes the ensemble. So, it's all very coordinated. I have enough scraps left of the lemon fabric that I will likely complete another small project or two. 
I don't plan on using most of these items until after fair season is over as I may wish to enter them. The wallhanging is on the wall and the table runner is on the table, but it's covered in plastic. So neither is likely to get dirty before I have a chance to enter them.