Giving Scraps the Green Light

Green gets a green light in the sewing room this month. May is not only green outside (it’s so beautiful here in the Salt Lake Valley in May!) but we’ll be working with our green fabric scraps inside for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge all month. And I’m down for it!

But first I wanted to finish up the quilting and binding on the two quilts I basted last week so I could put them down as April finishes. And I did. But it’s hard to get pictures when you only have a one-armed Quilt Holder (my hubby Bruce had an arm amputated due to cancer from Agent Orange in Vietnam). And it’s also very bright outdoors, so we had to find some shade or dappled sun so I could snap some pictures. Given the results of these photos, I think I’ll be taking the photos indoors or on cloudy days from now on.  But I’ll share these photos now, for better or for worse. 

This string quilt pattern came to me from my friend Nann of With Strings Attached, who thought it up. Big thanks (and hugs) to you, my friend! 

The backing is green with a bright insert that seemed to fit the vibe of the quilt. As usual, I quilted this string quilt in a basic meander/stipple. I always feel that’s best for coverage in a string quilts. The working title for this quilt was “Nann’s Strings”, but its final name is “Nann’s Heart Strings” because of the very recent passing of her husband.  Nann, what a wonderful companion and caregiver you’ve been to Stevens. May this silly little quilt also give comfort to someone else - all because of you! 

The second finish for April was this purple diamonds quilt. I absolutely could not get the color accurate with my iPhone camera. It’s less of a red-purple and more of a blue-purple. But that’s OK, I guess. It’s done and will be heading off to our Quilts for Kids workshop next weekend. 

I had just enough of the purple fabric to finish the backing and binding. That is, with the addition of the little bit of blue in the back. 

And then - green sewing! Fifteen Switchplate blocks that will finish at 3x5”.

And here they are with all their friends that I’ve sewn this year. We haven’t quite reached the halfway point with these yet, but they’re shaping up.

I started sewing the side sashing to the Rainbow Candy blocks. But of course I sewed the second row bass-ackwards from the first row. No problem, I thought. I’ll just flip the row. Um… no. It’s still the wrong orientation and then the two greens would be neighbors. So I will be alternating the direction of the candies every row. 

I’ll continue with this during the week, as well as sewing its twin with the other half of the candy blocks. And I’ve pulled out all my green strings for some nice string piecing this week too. I loves me some mindless string piecing (key word there being “mindless”).

This week was another doozy. Sometimes I just want to run away to a nice tropical island, lay under a tree sipping Margaritas and napping. (Who’s with me?)

Anyway, we sold our second car this week, but it entailed a lot of phone calls and running around. It was three days of chaos, then done. And I even remembered to promptly cancel the insurance on it. My friend T is coming home from the hospital today, YAY!! We are so relieved, I can’t even believe how much her illness has worried us. But one of our neighbors passed away this week. Another friend, Joan, had her daughter visiting from Connecticut, and they invited me over for lunch one day, then sent me home with cake for Bruce. 

My grandson Easton is getting married next April. Right now Easton and his fiancé Madalyn live in Connecticut (yes, a lot of Connecticut people in this post, right Julierose?) and he is in the Navy. His mom, my daughter-in-law Kim, and I talked about colors and theme for their wedding quilt. So, I’m going to attempt a Storm at Sea with a Snail’s Trail block variation in the center of some blocks instead of the large square-in-square economy block center. This is my inspiration photo from Pinterest:

I have an Accuquilt Storm at Sea die, which I can use for all the diamonds and small economy blocks (I’ve checked sizes) then I’ll piece all 36 of the 6.5” Snails Trail centers separately. Right now, the hunt is on for a line drawing to color up so I can figure color placement and yardage amounts. We have a quilt show coming to town in a couple weeks, and I plan to buy the needed batiks it all at once. This quilt has been on my bucket list for years. I hope I’m finally capable of pulling it off. If not, there’s always simple patchwork to fall back on!

Have a great and relaxing week!