What a Week!

Thank goodness it’s over!  The week, that is. You may remember from my last post that I had a “procedure” scheduled for Monday. Oh heck, we’re all adults here...... it was a colonoscopy. After my weekend of fasting, the procedure finally took place on Monday at 2-ish. Missing the food was not the worst of it. Neither was the frequent trips to the bathroom. The worst was drinking the POISON - a solution that can be best described as warm seawater. But the results were perfect, and I don’t have to do THAT again for ten years!

And if that wasn’t enough crap (literally and figuratively), the election was on Tuesday. The results, to most of us, are devastating. Talk about CRAP. And by “most”, I mean the majority of voters (because H won the popular vote), educated women, minorities of any variety, and the rest of the peace-loving world. My daughter (age 30) called me, crying. My neighborhood friend’s daughter (age 24) called her, crying. Bruce’s co-workers (many are gay or minorities) were in a deep funk on Wednesday. We are still trying to come to terms with what this means for us going forward.
End of political discussion. I just deleted a paragraph of rant here. You’re welcome.  

So, back to why we're REALLY here - faaaaabric and those wonderful things we do with it!

I didn’t get much sewn this week, but I did finish the litter of purple kitties from last week. That is 4 litters down, two to go on the third and final Kitty Quilt.  As this is a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project, I am linking up to Angela’s Scrappy Saturday party. Swing by and see all our rainbow projects coming together!

I also got the green and black borders sewn onto this pre-printed panel from Pattern Jam that I bought a year ago. Our son-in-law Mike is a hunter and this has his name written all over it.  The backing is pieced and it's ready to be quilted (behind several others in line!) And yes, I realize I need to pay more attention to how I pin quilts up on my design board. Sorry for the waves, LOL.

I finally began quilting the Magic Carpet quilt last night. After a false start that required some frog stitching (rippit, rippit), I decided on some basic stippling for the blue sections. The quilting on all the colored squares will be simple and medium to large scale. I don’t want to interfere with their color punch. The black bits will probably be X’ed or ???

I am not enjoying the quilting of this one, mainly because of all the stops and starts, changing thread colors, etc. I just want to put the pedal to the metal and stitch because I have so many quilts to do. But I am being patient, though it’s hard.

As far as my Christmas quilts go, there is only one left to start, and that is for my son Ryan. I have a jelly roll of Black Tie Affair by Basic Grey, plus lots of light and dark neutrals and some matching yardage for a border. Originally, I was going to do a Ribbon Star (MSQC) pattern, but decided it was too much background, and the stars were too cutesy for my athletic son. So now, the four patterns I’m considering are below, and they’re all in fabric colors or lines that are similar to what I’m working with. Which one do you like? I’m leaning to the strings one in the upper left (a la Three Dudes quilting).

One of the projects I’ve set for myself for 2017 is to make and contribute small kennel quilts to charities. These quilts are for cats and/or small dogs and measure approximately 12x18”. To find a local charity, I contacted our local Best Friends Shelter, a no-kill shelter and organization from whom we adopted Alfalfa and Darla two years ago. They were enthusiastic about the kennel quilts, and indeed accept quilts of all sizes for not only the kennels, but for fostering families and other uses. My cousin Kim and her granddaughter Trinity and I will begin sewing these in January. Our goal is to complete and donate at least a half dozen per month. Here are some kitty fabrics I ordered just for the fun of it, but any fabric will do, of course.

Along with the fabric I got a great new book, Modern Selvage Quilting by Riel Nason. I ordered it because I was having difficulty finding a pattern to use my selvages for. After getting the book (and seeing what she has coming in 2017 - a book of Halloween selvage patterns!), I am now having trouble narrowing it down, LOL.  But I think this quilt, pictured below, will be a great one to use for my selvage RSC project in 2017.  I will do it as a column quilt, working on one color - two columns - per month. The selvages themselves can be multi-colored (which will allow me to continually collect them), while the alternating solid pieces can be sewn in the color of the month. And those solid-color pieces can be one piece or scrappy/crumby. A solution that really works for me!

Finally, in remodeling news, the living room is fully painted, with new outlet and vent covers installed. The hallway is getting its second coat of Agreeable Gray today by yours truly.  Then, since Sunday is Sewing Day, on Monday I will start painting all the hall doors and door trim white. The baseboards will be replaced along with the baseboards in the living room. But unlike the living room, the hallway will not have crown molding.

All our living room furniture is moved out; we have temporarily relocated  the TV and Bruce’s recliner to the library/music room (our back bedroom). I have the futon to curl up on. It’s cozy, but the cats think we are crazy. So what else is new. The living room carpet comes up today, and the old ceiling lights are coming out and new can lights are being installed.  Our cabinetry may be done as early as next week, but if it’s the week after, that’s OK. In the meantime, the hall painting needs to be finished (me) and floor laid (contractor). Once the flooring in the living room is done, we will move the recliner (etc) back while the flooring moves down the hall and into that back bedroom. Such fun; musical furniture. And we are still on track for the new furniture delivery on or around December 7-8. And padded white cells shortly thereafter.