Light Blue Scrap Recap and Another Quilt Finish

Here we are near the end of January. It’s been a long, cold month, but at least it didn’t seem as long as last year. Maybe getting out more often (to the mall three times a week to go walking), along with my other activities and errands, helps the yucky winter days to pass more quickly.  

This is the last week to post our blue scraps for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge before Angela assigns the February color.  I usually do a collage to sum up my progress, and I will continue that this year. So here we go. I had a total of 51 blocks this month.

Top:  2 Squared Away Blocks, 10 - 6.5” selvage blocks, 2 Linked Squares Blocks
Middle:  2 blue string blocks, 2 birds, 12 crumb blocks
Bottom: 10 - 6.5” quarter log cabins, 1 Geese Migration block, 10 bow ties

I am ready for a new color!

Last week I realized that I’d never given a weight loss / health progress report (it keeps me accountable) in my end of the year/end of December recap. So, I’ll combine two months into one. December went well, eating-wise, until the neighbors started bring over treats and we decided to a family cooking bake-along. Long story short, I lost, then gained, then lost most of that. Bottom line was that I ended December weighing .2 LESS than I started. I was happy with that.

For Christmas I got a Fitbit. I’ve been working to increase my daily steps. I’ve always been a relatively sedentary person. I worked in an office and had sedentary hobbies (sewing, reading), with the exception of gardening. But that’s not an option in Utah in winter. So, Bruce and I began mall walking three times per week, and it has noticeably strengthened my legs, helped me feel so much stronger (and younger), and helped the pounds peel off. I have to remember that I’m losing pounds, not years! So far in January I’ve lost 5 pounds. My next weigh-in is Tuesday, so it could be a bit more or less before the actual month end. Anyway, total loss to date is 34.2, and I am close to moving into the next size down again in pants. Yay! My goal is to do that before we leave for Arizona on the 8th without having to lay on the bed to get the zipper zipped! Raise your hand if you’ve ever had to do THAT!   Yeah, Diann, I see you with your hand down. You’re naturally thin, LOL!! 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

And as the title says, I did have a quilt finish this week. It was rather unplanned. You see, DH Bruce sort of backed into the neighbor’s car when he left for work the other morning (it was dark and as the mirror says, “objects may be closer than they appear”). No damage to neighbors car, thankfully,  but it broke his truck’s rear tail light. Our neighbor, who is a prince and a gentleman, even ordered the part for us because he gets a discount. Anyway, Bruce and Steve will replace the tail light  this weekend, but I’ve been bummed out about it for reasons that aren’t really important (and that I can’t even put my finger on anyway). I felt I needed to find a happy place, and for me that was doing some zen-like sewing or quilting. So I pulled out my basted Autumn Quilt and spent two 2-hour sessions quilting it in a loopy, leafy, and whatever-floated-my-boat-type of motif. The border orange cornerstones even got big spirals. Because I could.

I quilted it with a 50-weight Aurifil in a golden color. I usually use 40-weight, but I still have a couple spools left over from a 50-weight set I bought a few years ago, and this golden yellow seemed perfect for the Autumn Sampler. The binding is my usual Warm and Plush. The quilt finishes at 64x79”. 

The back is a piece of yummy flannel that I picked up on sale last year during the Utah Shop Hop. It is actually a bit darker than the picture shows. Anyway, all in all a comfy fall quilt which will is late for last year or early for this year. Take your pick! 

This quilt was Goal #2 on my first quarter 2018 Finish-Along list, here.

Have a great week!

First Quarter 2018 Finish-Along Goals

I’m joining, for the fourth year in a row, the global Finish-Along challenge. We make our own quarterly lists of things we’d like to finish. While there are no penalties or even stern looks if we don’t finish them, we DO get to link up each finish to an end-of-quarter party. Each finish then becomes an entry into prize drawings from lots of great sponsors - fabrics, patterns, gift cards, etc. Wow, sign me up! LOL. Actually, the link is in the sidebar, LOL.

These are my hopeful finishes for FALQ1 (Finish-Along Quarter 1). No particular order here, just how the pictures loaded.

1.  Bruce’s Guitar Quilt.
This is a pattern by Robbie Joy Ecklow and it’s giving me fits because I’m really not good at working in reverse (as in fusing images, paper piecing, etc.).  But it’s got to happen sometime.

2.  Autumn Sampler Quilt
FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE.

This quilt is actually a flimsy that is backed and basted. So all I need to do is quilt and bind it. It will be a good project for when I need a break from piecing. I expect this one to be an easy and quick finish.

3.  Starry, Starry Day, a Friendship Star variation Quilt.
FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE.

This quilt is now officially a flimsy too. The next step is to piece a backing from my orphan fat quarters. Then baste, quilt and bind it. It’s my January goal for OMG - One Monthly Goal.

4.  Rainbow Strings.
FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE.

This Rainbow Scrap Challenge project actually started with some test blocks in 2016 and was the first time I’d string pieced. Now I’m obsessed! I only have 10 more 8.5” blocks to make to finish this one. I originally thought I would wait until the missing colors rolled around in the monthly assigned colors of the RSC, but now I’m anxious to finish this so I can piece string blocks for Covered in Love and also start my own new strings project. Like I said, I’m obsessed.

5.  Hot Rod Quilt.
FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE.

This is a quilt that I’ve finally started for my brother, Steve. What a mishmash of fabrics from clothing, panels and fabric. It’s really not just hot rods, it’s vintage cars, motorcycles, license plates and more. I was finally able to devise a plan that would separate some of the bigger or more incongruent fabrics for the backing. That, with the addition of lots of blue, green and black solids will hopefully help to unify this into a merely nauseating (vs. migraine-inducing) quilt. One can hope. Don’t tell Steve I said that.....

6.  Kennel Quilts
FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE.

Yep, I’ve done dozens of these in the past, but I’m going to add them in here for good measure. I’d like to get 10 done this quarter to deliver to some of the California animal rescue sites after all the autumn fires. Ten kennel quilts for one checkmark, not a bad deal.

Darla models some kennel quilts from 2017.

That’s it for the first quarter.  Wish me luck, and thanks for dropping by!

Two Flimsies and Some Dark Blocks

Ok, don’t tell me. You want to see the flimsies first. I know I would want to if that was what you posted on YOUR blog. So without further ado, here they are. (For the uninitiated, a flimsy is just a quilt top before it is sandwiched with batting, backing and quilted). 

This is my Rainbow Selvages quilt top. It was originally going to contain just 14 columns, but I added the brown column, extreme left, after adding the planned black and white (polka dot) column on the right. It measures 60x72”.  I like this so much more now that the top is complete. The texture is so much fun!  I have a couple choices for a backing, but have made no decisions yet on that or the binding. I think a fun scrappy binding might be the ticket if I have enough leftovers. Must go stash-diving!

The second flimsy is my autumn farm girl type sampler. Please excuse the distracting blue low-tack tape holding it up (in addition to pins); it is too large for my design board.  I probably should have just let it hang, but it makes it look wonky. 

I am pretty amazed at how this turned out. You see, some of the original blocks were made 3 (or was it 4?) years ago during the Vintage Farm Girl Quilt-Along. I was learning as I went, and the block sizes ranged from 12 1/8"  to 12 3/4”. They were supposed to be 12 1/2” unfinished. So first, some blocks had to be added to and of course everything trimmed. There went some points. And the 1” sashing didn’t leave much wiggle room. But it got done, slowly, imperfectly. Not a competition-level quilt by any means, but not bad.

Then, since I wanted the leaf fabric of the outer border, of which I only had one yard, to orient with the leaves falling down, the cutting was a challenge. That’s why there are cornerstones - there was not enough fabric without them! And then, when it was all sewn up, I measured the top. And nearly fell over. And measured again. The width at the top and bottom were exactly - EXACTLY - the same. Not an eighth of an inch difference! The length at the two sides had a 1/8" difference, which I don’t even care about. How the heck did THAT happen??? Anyway, if it looks wonky now, get over it. It isn’t!  YAY!!!

My plans are to get these two tops basted this weekend and maybe even quilt one. They are both on my Finish-Along Quarter 4 list, so they will get done before the end of the year!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
I want to thank you all for your thoughtful comments on my post last week about gathering and saving ideas for quilting projects (for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge and quilting in general). And there were many great ideas and comments about scrap and fabric storage, settings, and organization. Thank you all so much!  And be sure to check out the rainbow lineup over at Angela’s So Scrappy blog. It’s Scrappy Saturday, and there are always great ideas and eye candy over there!

* * * * * * * * * * * *
By early in the week, I was digging into my scraps. Since Dark Neutrals (gray, black, brown) are the color of the month at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, I sorted all the colors and decided to play with the browns first.

First I made twelve 4.5” (unfinished) bow tie blocks. This brings me to 214 made of 304 needed. I’ll probably do a few dark gray and black ones, but these will carry over into next year.

And then I whipped out the brown strings and made four 8.5” string blocks and sewed them together.  

In fact, I sewed all my string blocks together into foursomes (like above) and took an inventory. It appears I have 12 more 8.5” string blocks to make: 2 orange (to finish up an orange foursome), 2 blue (to finish up a blue foursome) , then two more foursomes out of any of either red, green or purple, depending on what the scraps dictate. It would be quick work to finish this by year-end if I didn’t have so much ahead of it in line. But I may get to it by the end of the year. If not, it will finish up in the first quarter of 2018.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

And how fun is this??  Bruce had the day off Friday and we went grocery shopping together. I spotted these Lehi Roller Mills (a local Utah mill and bakery that makes great breads and mixes, etc) items on an end display at our local (Harmon’s) grocery store. What caught my attention? They are all in sacks of Lori Holt Vintage Christmas fabric! Lori, of course, is a local sew-lebrity fabric designer (for Riley Blake fabrics, also a Utah company). So I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at the collaboration. 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Finally, I asked last week if any of you were participating in the Bonnie Hunter annual Mystery Quilt-Along, On Ringo Lake. It appears that several of us are!  Here is my fabric pull. I decided to go with grays instead of the browns that Bonnie suggested, mainly because I have grays. I could’ve gone out and bought some chocolate brown, but I’d rather use my stash. The grays look good with the colors, and it will all look better in our newly-remodeled living room.

Have a great week, and stay warm!

Tickled Pink with Sewing!

My pink sewing priority for this week was to finish up my Friendship Star (variation) blocks. The scraps and I just cruised along for a day or two, and in the end there were 24 of these 6” blocks. I now have 162 blocks and only need 136 to finish the quilt. The leftovers will either go on the back or into the “Parts Department”.

My tentative layout calls for concentric rings of colors, but some rings will have combined colors (like red/orange). I have to see how it’s going to look all laid out before I make a final decision. And this won’t happen until November anyway. In the meantime, I’m linking up to Scrappy Saturday at Angela’s So Scrappy Blog. Come see the pink fun for this month - and why not consider joining us for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge in 2018?
Also linking up to Oh Scrap! over on Cynthia’s blog.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

This week I also worked on my Autumn quilt, finishing up four of the final five 12” blocks.  First, there was the crow, a Lori Holt pattern.  Secondly was the turkey, of which I have no picture.

Next was the Schoolhouse, also a Lori Holt pattern (free on her blog, HERE).

And then there was the requisite SQUIRREL block, courtesy of Sally at The Objects of Design. Sally didn’t have a formal pattern written for her cute squirrel, but did have a line drawing here that she gave me permission to use.

I needed to convert it to a 12” block so decided to make the tail bushier. And I’ll be honest, I’m not half as talented as Sally in the design department - I don’t like my squirrel as much as hers. He still needs an eye sewn on, and his haunches/leg is rather unwieldy with the changes I had to make. I may “operate" on the back part of his leg to remove some of the obvious cellulite from eating too many acorns. .

The final block will be a barn block, then all 20 will be done and ready for sashing. The last time I showed some blocks with sashing, I used a brown grid fabric seen briefly here. Well, it just did absolutely nothing for the blocks, and I discarded that idea. So now I have switched to the 1.5” mustard strips that I originally cut (then rejected) for my Scrap X+plosion quilt here. I like this color with the bright autumn blocks much better.

I’m also auditioning fabrics for a border, because the 1” sashing only yields a quilt that is 53x66, too small for a lap quilt. The border size will depend on how much of the chosen border fabric I’ll have, but I’m hoping for a 4-5” border. Possibilities so far include the orange and yellow in the left of the above picture, and the leaf print shown below that I picked up in Colorado last month. I like the leaf one best, but I’m not sure if it is bright enough to hold its own as a border....

Chances are that once I have the blocks all sewn and sashed (a goal for the coming week), I will have several other possibilities to pick from and may be asking your opinion!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

And finally, I have basted with feline supervision Reading Rainbow.  I sewed a backing, then cleared the tables (a feat in itself) and got to work. Of course once this happens....

 then THIS is never far behind:

We’re here to supervise the basting, Mom!!

Alfie was pretty miffed at first when he discovered that I had put a mouse on the quilt. But he got over it once I agreed to his demand: an extra large safety pin right near the mouse’s butt.

And then Alfie began feeling frisky. See how his rear leg is up in the picture below? He kicks it in a frenzied manner whenever he gets excited. But the mouse wasn’t moving and he eventually lost interest. And I was able to finish basting the quilt.

Beginning today and over the next week I plan to quilt Reading Rainbow and the pink scrappy baby quilt I threw together last week. And then I’d like to sew the 12” barn block and assemble the autumn quilt top. After that - and thank goodness my calendar isn’t full like it was this week - there are lots of pink scraps left to sew into blocks or slabs for possible kennel quilts or ??? I may post mid-week if I have a finish or two to share.

Make it a great week!

Recapping a Busy September

September was a busy and fun, fun month. But lately I feel as though (as the saying goes), “the hurrier I go, the behinder I get”. Do you ever feel that way? Luckily for me, I am moving more and feeling physically much better since I started Weight Watchers back in June.

In September I lost about 5 pounds, making my total to date a loss of 20.2. But even better than that are my two NSV’s (“non-scale victories” as we call them). First, my annual physical was great and my blood work was all in normal ranges, unlike last year. And then my clothes are looser (one pair of pants keeps falling down - goodbye!) and I’m on the verge of moving into the next size down. The smaller pants are ready and waiting in my closet for the cool autumn weather to set in. I did a lot of walking and hiking on vacation, totally controlled my snacking (easy when peaches are in season!) and lost weight. I’m enjoying this journey!

I thought I’d get more sewing done over the last week, but my time in the studio was limited.  I did sew up all the rest of my orange scraps, making three slabs from fabric crumbs. They’ll be used in kennel quilts later this fall. And I made a couple more strip blocks, stars, as well as two Geese Migration blocks. Linking up to Angela’s So Scrappy blog for Scrappy Saturday.

So here is my Orange Collage for September:
Top Row, L-R:  2 Geese Migration blocks, 20 bowties, 4 Plus blocks, 3 crumb slabs
Middle Row, L-R: 2 Selvage columns, 5 Bookshelf blocks (not all shown)
Bottom Row, L-R: 16 Friendship Star variation, 8 Strings blocks

That totals 62 orange blocks for September, rather down from my usual. But that’s OK! I also made several 12” blocks for my Autumn Farmgirl quilt and cut several hundred 2.5"x4” orange lozenges and began adding 1.5” corners to them. Speaking of the Autumn Farmgirl quilt, I used the leftover HSTs from the Friendship Star blocks to make cornerstones. It’s just pinned, but you get the idea....

And here is the start of a pair of Indian Corn blocks for that same autumn quilt....

This week we visited friends and went out to lunch on one of Bruce’s days off. We got to pick out pumpkins from their pumpkin patch, which is bigger than our whole backyard! It was like being a kid again!  We also had family over (twice), including our boisterous grandkids. I would love to be able to bottle just enough of their energy to use to clean my floors after they leave! LOL.

Also, Darla and Alfalfa had their annual physical at the vets. The hardest part of the whole ordeal was catching them after they saw the cage, which was my fault. It would’ve made a good half-hour sitcom. Something about The Little Rascals and their Stupid Human. All that, combined with a lot of autumn batch cooking (lasagna, pot roast, beef enchiladas, chicken rice soup) made for a busy, exhausting week!

And finally, I have something else I made earlier in the month that I haven’t shown yet, but will do that next week after the recipient receives it.....

Have a great week! Have you decorated for fall yet?

Sewing More Orange

Hi! We are back from our fantastic week-long vacation to Colorado. We had a great time visiting friends and family, but I will save the recap for a separate post in a couple days.  For now, I want to link to Scrappy Saturday as our September color is orange. And boy, did we see a lot of orange leaves in the mountains of Colorado!

Before we left, I sewed up 20 bowtie blocks. They will finish at 4” each. I’ve now completed 177 of the 304 blocks needed, so I am 58% of the way to the block finish line. This is definitely a 2-year project.

Next up are the 13 Friendship Star variation blocks that I sewed while on vacation. They are an unfinished size of 6.5” each.  I now have 135 of 136 blocks needed, and we still have PINK to work on. The extra blocks will probably end up on the back of the quilt.

And I have been sewing 12” autumn-themed blocks, using some of my old Farm Girl Vintage blocks and adding new ones from here and there. These five were sewn last week.

I have a total of 4 (first one from a couple years ago not shown) and they will go in the four corners. I still have several blocks to work on: an owl, a crow, a turkey, a schoolhouse, a squirrel and some Indian corn. I am hoping to get this one done by early October.

Finally, I sewed some pillowcases for the Hurricane Harvey/Irma relief efforts. I had hoped to finish 10 of them, but did managed to get just half of them done. That will have to do, as I want to get these, along with 3 donation quilts, off this week. There is a local quilt shop who is collecting, and I may just save myself some postage and take them there instead of mailing them back east.....

We returned home from vacation on Wednesday night, and I have spent Thursday and Friday doing laundry, grocery shopping, errands, housework, etc etc.  I haven’t even unpacked my machine yet!  After one final errand on Saturday morning, I plan to commune with Bernadette (my Bernina 550QE) all afternoon and not come up for air until dinnertime.  I hope you have a pleasant weekend too!