Working as An Elf for Santa

I wonder how many of the women who read this blog are the primary “Santa’s Helper” for Holiday merrymaking in their family? I used to love to do it all; decorating, shopping, baking, wrapping, sewing, writing cards or the “annual letter” - and all while being married (hubbies can be work too, amiright?), raising three kids and holding down a full-time job. I bet many of you did, too. Were we wonder women or something?

For Bruce and me, our respective first marriages failed, and together we blended the last of the unfledged teens into a new family. In time, they too fledged and we were empty nesters. It was easier and simpler as the years passed to downsize the tree, decorate minimally, and hand out cash and gift cards at Christmas to our kids and ever growing list of grandkids. And forget the baking, cooking and sewing! 

But we’re changing things this year. It’s been an expensive year with the move from the old house to the condo, and the subsequent remodeling and furniture purchases, etc.. Bruce and I both agreed that it’s now the time and season -literally and figuratively - to slow down, be more deliberate and enjoy the spirit of Christmas. This December, we’ve reached our stop on the Big Spending Train and we’re getting off. 

We started by cutting our gift budget to about 1/3 our usual amount and informed our adult kids. Surprisingly, or maybe not-so-surprisingly since we tried to raise good humans, they were beyond cool with it. One asked me to bake biscotti, another one requested a quilt (done!) and another one wanted some old family pictures and such. 

And so that’s the theme of this post. I’ve been working as a secret elf for Santa! 

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In the Sewing Department of our Santa’s workshop, Elf Cathy finished sewing together this quilt top of bright scraps:

The size is 40.5” x 50.5”, and the top has been put on the Sewing Department Schedule to be basted for quilting next week. The eventual quilt will be donated to Quilts for Kids. 

Next, the assignment was to complete between 10-12 quilted zipper bags for gifting over the next couple weeks. Elf Cathy was able to completely finish seven of them the first week. They’re all box-bottomed and of varying sizes. Shown below on their sides, not the most flattering view. 

The remaining five zipper bags are all cut out - fabric, fleece, lining and tabs, and ready to be assembled next week. 

As for the Cooking Department, the elves have worked out a four-variety selection of biscotti, a modest ingredient shopping list, and a timeline. And already a whole turkey sits in the freezer, waiting for its turn to shine golden brown. (Oooh, I’m making myself hungry!)

The Decorating Department sent an elf to help the North Pole Homeowners Association decorate their clubhouse. As a reward, an old wreath with jingle bells that was being thrown out was brought home by said elf to be used on their front door. 

The seasonal merriment has just begun here, and life is good! How are your elves faring?

Linking to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

Snow, Sew and Vegetate

What a fun week it was as the Christmas season began to bear down on us. We got the last of the shopping done on Monday, just ahead of the snowstorm this week. It snowed overnight Tuesday, and on Wednesday we woke up to a winter wonderland. There was over a foot on the valley floor where we live. The ski resorts were inundated and I’m pretty sure we could’ve heard the skiers rejoicing had we tried. 

Our neighbors pitched in to help us old folk shovel out. And some friends with a truck loaded up our (too large, in my opinion) snow blower and took it to the repair shop for us. It wouldn’t fit in our SUV, and we couldn’t have lifted it ourselves if it did. We have family members with a truck arranged to help us get it back when it’s been serviced. In the meantime,  I’ve kept the walkways shoveled and de-iced as we get skiffs and flurries. It’s exhilarating to be outside in snow and moving the ol’ body! Is it sick and wrong to enjoy snow shoveling? 

I went light on the sewing this week. Usually I spend several hours a day, but we had Other Important Things this week, like dentist appointments (semi-annual cleaning and all is well), going out for lunch, making a trip to the liquor store, walking in the snow and watching Christmas movies. I’ve also been trying to learn some advanced strategies for solving extreme Sudoku puzzles (on You Tube) with some success. Not much, but some. I go on Sudoku binges every few months….

But let me show you what I did sew. Inspired by my friend Julierose, I made a JOY table runner. I cut all the pieces several weeks ago, so it was quick work to assemble it. Actually, it can be either a table runner or a banner.

My goal this season has been to use up as many of my old Christmas scraps as possible. To that end I’ve already made two kitty quilts, a pair of pillowcases, my Christmas Presents quilt shown last week, and now this JOY table runner of scrap squares and yardage. 

JOY finished at 14x36”. The quilting is snowy-looking spirals. I added a hanging sleeve in case I want to hang it, but for now it will be a table runner. And see the Father Christmas in the picture? That was painted by Cousin Carrie (Kim’s sister) last year as a Christmas gift to us. I love it! Carrie selected the Father Christmas with all the wild animals for me as a nod to my Kenya trip back in 2018. Didn’t she do an amazing job? I keep him out almost all year. 

When I finished the JOY topper, I decided it was time to get a year-end chore done. Time to tackle the mountain of batting scraps and pieces. So I put on some lively Christmas music and spent an afternoon making Frankenbatting. I had some good-sized chunks and lots of strips. If it’s over 6” wide I save it. Skinnier strips and scraps to to a friend who makes pet beds. Some batting scraps are set aside and stored for things like table toppers, placemats, kitty quilts or zip pouches. But I had enough “ingredients” to make seven quilt-sized Frankenbatts!

My preferred method of making Frankenbatts is just to trim edges, butt them up and sew together with a short and wide zig-zag. I do have the heat-bonding strips, but they’re more of a pain. However, I keep a roll on hand just in case. (… in case of what, I’m not exactly sure). Anyway, once they were all sewn, I measured and labeled each one so they’re ready to go for the new year!

My final project of the year will be to finish up this Ring Around the Roses quilt for myself. I made the 10” blocks back in January and February, when the Rainbow Scrap Challenge colors were pink and yellow, respectively. I’m finally getting back to them now. The first plan was to just sew them together without sashing, like this. 

But I felt it needed and deserved more, and the blocks really needed some separation. An inner white stop border and an outer larger border of pink/yellow Moda Grunge fabric were already planned, but I felt that some narrow sashing and cornerstones would be sharp. 

Yep, much better! That’s as far as I have it now, although the border fabrics are all cut and ready to add. 

And since my daughter Megan claimed my last zipper quilt, I’m making another one for us. This week I sewed a couple dozen blocks or so, just a few here and there as the mood struck. Here are some of them from this week.

That wraps it up for today. We are planning a quiet week, hopefully doing nothing more than visiting a friend and exchanging neighborhood gifts. We’ll be spending Christmas Day with my son Ryan, DDIL Kim and her side of the family. I don’t yet have my food assignment, so I will need to make another grocery run before the big day. Plus, I’m feeling the need to bake some almond biscotti to enjoy in my coffee share with friends and neighbors. *wink* 

Rainbow Scrap and Christmas Quilt Finishes

We finally got our first snow of the season this week. YAY!! It began on Thursday morning and stopped about noon on Friday. The accumulation here on the valley floor was about 3-4 inches, and about double that up in the mountains at the ski resorts (who’ve had to resort to making snow before this week). We are thrilled. Unfortunately, our snow blower, which had no use last year, has the throttle stuck in the open position. Bruce couldn’t get it unstuck, so we’ll have to take it in for a tune-up. I shoveled the front walkway and some walking paths on the driveway, but our wonderful neighbors across the street (dad Jason, mom Jen and son Riker) came over early in the evening and shoveled the rest of our driveway and sidewalks. We love them to bits! So today we need to get more ice melt and take the snow blower somewhere. Fun (not!)

There was plenty of sewing this week. First, I finished the Christmas Presents quilt for myself. The only Christmas-themed quilt I’d ever made for us before was a jelly roll race quilt in my early days of quilting. It had a red Minky (cuddle cloth) backing and I quilted it on one of my old machines. I used red thread, a big mistake for a beginner. The quilting was hideous and there for everyone to see in glaring detail. Also, the tension was bad in places. But my granddaughter London loved it, so I gave it to her. And almost ten years later it’s still going strong. Go figure. 

So, here is the quilt. The pattern is a free one from Kate Spain called Flurry, after the fabric line she released at the same time. After I quilted and bound it, I threw it in the washer so I could use it asap. Luckily I remembered color catchers (2), because they came out very pink and there were some areas of bleeding on the front. I washed it again in cold with more color catchers and it all seemed to come out. Phew! The quilt is nice and crinkly now, but the quilting, which I was reasonably pleased with, is difficult to see.

Christmas Presents (such an original name, LOL) finished at 54.5” x 58.5” before laundering. I love the smaller size as a lap quilt for me. 

In the four red cornerstones, I stitched large flowers. 

In the center colored strip of the border I just used a serpentine stitch. The white strips on either side were quilted with a meandering vine interspersed with holly leaves and loops. You might need to click on the picture below to enlarge and see the detail.  Also, each “gift” had a different quilting motif (stars, stipple, ribbon candy loops), with only about 3 repeats. 

The horizontal and vertical sashings got either viney loops or viney hook curls. 

With that quilt finished, I moved on to assembling the Spring Star blocks I sewed all during the year for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. This quilt fought me every step of the way during assembly. The blocks had a variance of about 3/8” inch, which means I lost a lot of points in the trimming. I ended up starching the front and the cotton sheet backing before basting to get them as flat as I could. 

At this point, I just trusted the quilting and the washing/shrinking to take care of the rest. I quilted it with loops and it was fine, finishing at 48x60”.

As usual, this will go to Quilts for Kids.  The quilting is a simple meandering loop, and with the fold-over binding from the backing fabric, I was wishing that I’d made those black squares gray instead. But when I started the blocks back in January, I had no idea of what the eventual backing would be. 

Well, I’m late getting this posted on this Saturday morning. My son Ryan came for dinner last night (DIL Kim is in South Carolina visiting Easton in the Navy). Between the snow shoveling yesterday, cleaning the house (sometimes it just *has* to be done) and fixing dinner, I guess I was more tired than I realized!

Linking up to Scrappy Saturday.

A Rainbow Scrap Finish

Thanksgiving is over and the Christmas Season is now upon us. I hope that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving if you celebrate it. Ours was quietly spent at home, just the way we prefer. But later this weekend comes the task of taking down the seasonal autumn decorations, admittedly pared back from previous years. After a good dusting and vacuuming, we’ll start in with the Christmas and winter decorations. Now that it’s past Thanksgiving, Christmas music is officially allowed in the sewing room. And let the silly seasonal Christmas movies begin! Oh yeah, and the shopping too. Ugh.

I did finish one of my Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilts this week. It was made from the “waffle” blocks I started in January. The individual blocks were 5” finished, but I grouped them in blocks of four. Several blocks I made over the course of the year were oriented incorrectly (the verticals and horizontals were switched), so into the Block Orphanage they went to be adopted (or adapted?) for some future project.

Waffles finished at 40x50” and will go to Quilts for Kids. I quilted it in a simple stipple. The backing is this wonderful wide print from Connecting Threads, which also folds over and becomes the binding.

In addition to finishing Waffles, I basted two other string tops in dark neutrals (plus color), which will finish up my work with dark neutral scraps for this year. The first top uses the 27 brown string blocks I mentioned but didn’t show last week, (plus others in my stash) and some green string blocks. This is next up to be quilted and will be finished before month end.

And then there is this string quilt in shades of gray with red and navy blue. It’s a rather masculine quilt, and so I made it larger (48x56) than a baby quilt so it could go to an older boy through Quilts for Kids. 

It’s probably not a color scheme I would have put together, but I had some strip sets in grays and reds from the stash of strips and scraps I got last month from Quilts for Kids. You can see some of the strip sets in the picture below. They are the narrow dark gray/light gray/dark gray/red sections in the two leftmost blocks below. I added blue and just went from there, clearing out a lot of unloved strips in the process.  

Like the brown and green strip block quilt, this one will be quilted and finished before month-end. I’ll show them both next week. 

******* WE INTERRUPT THIS BLOG POST TO BRING YOU AN ELEPHANT UPDATE!*****

I couldn’t help it. It seemed we needed more gray elephants, so I dug through the dark gray chunks and found enough to make two more Ellies! If you’re overly observant, you may notice that their hind quarters are a close match, but a different fabric from their forequarters. And if you didn’t notice or can’t see it, good. Never mind. That brings the gray and brown elephant herd to ten blocks this month. Elephants will be taking the month of December off, but will be reasserting themselves in January!

******** WE NOW RETURN YOU TO YOUR REGULAR BLOG POST ********

It was time to start some Christmas sewing. Alfie and Darla have been waiting patiently for their new Christmas quilts for their beds. Yesterday their wait was rewarded. I used leftover 10” layer cake squares to make 20” square (give/take) quilt tops. Pink for Darla, Blue for Alfie. 

The backs are both the same cute and festive Christmas cat fabric I picked up this year. 

Here is Alfie checking out his quilt. He liked it right away (can you just see the excitement emanating from him? LOL) He did curl up and sleep on it in the early evening. 

Darla has so far ignored hers. When we went to bed last night, she was curled up in Alfie’s bed. I don’t know if that’s a statement against “new”, against pink, or against the fact that her bed isn’t heated like Alfie’s is. Oh, the drama!

Another item on my personal Christmas sewing checklist this year is to make us a pair of pillowcases out of this reindeer fabric I’ve been holding on to for a couple years. It’s not sewn yet, but I will add the leftover red cat fabric for the cuffs and a black strip for the accents. Because, you know, reindeer and cats just go together. At least, in my world. 

So, when I finish the pillowcases and two quilts, I’ll move on to the Christmas quilt I cut out last year for us. My plan during December is to hopefully finish the Christmas quilt, plus another Rainbow Scrap quilt (I’m thinking Spring Stars), my pink and yellow Ring Around the Roses quilt (from February!), and possibly another Quilts for Kids string quilt finish. It’s a good thing I’m retired! 

Have a great week!  Linking up to Scrappy Saturday.

Roundup for Pink June

We’re into our summer routine here at Chez Kizerian. Bruce spends most mornings out puttering in the yard. Today he whacked weeds out of the walkways between the garden beds, along the driveway and in the sidewalk cracks. If you’re a weed, never underestimate what a one-armed man with a weed-whacker can do to you! I join him two or three mornings a week pulling weeds, keeping the grape arbor trimmed, filling bird feeders and deadheading blooms. Sometimes I do housework or errands instead. Next month I’ll start thinning all the overgrown iris beds, and preparing and labeling the rhizomes for a massive giveaway to Cousin Kim and any unsuspecting neighbor who would like irises. With the weather now in full summer mode, we get out early and come in well before noon. Afternoons can then be spent playing, which for us means reading, sewing (me) or tinkering (Bruce). How did we ever fit all this stuff in when we were working full time?

So this week, being the last full week of the month, I concentrated on getting my four basted quilt tops finished. They were quilted, bound, labeled and photographed by Wednesday. Let’s take a look, shall we?

First up was Creature from the Bubblegum Factory.  I had a lot of leftover pink blocks from various other projects over the last couple years. To that I added some of the 6” string blocks I made earlier in the month to fill things in as needed. It ended up at 42x55”. 

Here is a close-up of some of the quilting, which was just my usual stipple.

The backing was leftover fabric from some I used in a quilt earlier in the year, given to me by my friend Annette who is in my Weight Watchers group.

Then I decided to get the two donation quilts of civil war reproduction fabrics out of the way. This first one is just plain horizontal strips cut randomly. I actually ended up liking these quilts until I realized I had no background fabric that was appropriate or matching from my stash. For the Quilts for Kids donation quilts, the backing and binding are one piece. Once the quilt is quilted, we trim away the batting first, then trim the backing fabric 1” larger than the front all around. That excess fabric is folded to the front and becomes the binding - an all-in-one method that saves a lot of time and fabric (which is great when you’re cranking out lots of quilts for charity).

For some reason I can’t explain, Blogger won’t recognize the pictures I took of the backs of these quilts, and I’m not going to haul the quilts out again and re-take pictures to appease the Blogging Gods. In fact, after this month, I have a few choice words for Them that aren’t repeatable here.

So, the stripey quilt above finished at 42x52” and the striped squares block below finished at 40.5 x 50.5”.

And lastly, I finished the simple pink patchwork donation quilt in an effort to use up more of my pink scraps. It turned out very sweet and cuddly.

The quilting was a simple stitch in the ditch and then a crosshatch in the blocks. Finished size is 40.5 x 48.5”. 

The backing used up some chunks I had. It was good to see them finally get used.

I’m linking up today to Scrappy Saturday at Angela’s blog. Here is a summary of the pinky goodness I stitched this month.

One pink scraps tote bucket, 16 pink selvage half hexes, 25 6” string blocks, 4 zipper blocks, one Scraptastic Star, 11 Twin Sisters blocks and 12 Split nine-patch blocks, for a total of 69 blocks and one bucket.  

After Wednesday when the quilts shown above were finished, I just had to make more Zipper blocks. These are addicting, and I’m not sure I’ll be able to hold off and just do these in the color of the month. In fact, I’m pretty sure I won’t. These are six additional blocks I sewed from the Sallyscraps.

And just to show you what else is on my “plate” (if by plate you mean my sewing tables....), there was some of this going on...

This is/was my OMG (One Monthly Goal) for June, which will not be finished by month end. I decided not to go crazy trying to finish it at the last minute. It will be another pineapple quilt (literal pineapple motifs, not the pineapple piecing technique). The yellow strips are all sewn and matched up for 23 out of the 24 blocks. The green “foliage” four patches are all sewn, but each of the 24 pineapples will need 6 half-square triangles. Those 144 green and 144 white pieces are all cut and waiting to be sewn and trimmed. And then I’ll have to piece the final 24th pineapple in an as-yet-undecided color. Should I do pink again? Or aqua? We’ll see...

And yesterday this Christmas panel arrived. I’m going to do a Christmas quilt for my brother who loves old cars and trucks (and quilts too).  I’ve got plenty of black fabric, but I may run over to Joann Fabrics to get some Kona Red while I have a valid 50% off coupon. That car fabric hanging on the right (below) will be mostly for the back, but it may become one of the borders (I plan on 2-3 borders) to enlarge the size.

I’m looking forward to playing with this one!

So Much Progress (and a Finish) to Share

Another busy week draws to a close, but I'm jazzed because I have something(s) to share with you! Happy Saturday, and welcome!

First, a finish. YAY! I finished the Newport Butterflies quilt for Cousin Kim. The fabric line that we both loved was called Newport, and it contains several butterfly prints. Kimmie loves butterflies. Hence the name Newport Butterflies. I had purchased the fabric in a 10" square stack (a Layer Cake), and cut those in half to make brick-sized pieces that would show off the print. I didn't realize until just now that the pattern echoes the brickwork of our house in the background!

The sashing or "mortar" is Kona Snow, and Newport Butterflies finished at 58x72".  After practicing quilting butterflies a bit, I forged ahead and quilted lots of little butterflies and swirly loops into the quilt.

Like the meandering lines, the butterflies are multi-directional. 

They are cute, but definitely not a consistent size or shape. Do I care? Heck no! They are different, just like in nature. I know Kim will love them.

Newport Butterflies was my OMG (One Monthly Goal) for December. That makes 12 of my 12 monthly goals finished for this year! Woo-hoo! That is such a happy thing for me, especially given all our challenges this year. And it shows that sewing is definitely my happy place and keeps me grounded when the world is going crazy around me (or is the world just fine and I'm the one going crazy?) Anyway, I'm linking up to Elm Street Quilt's OMG Finish-Along post. This was also my finished goal #3 for the 4th Quarter Finish-Along. My goal list is HERE.

I made a couple zip pouches for sweet friends. One of them I forgot to get a picture of before gifting it this week. But the other one is stuffed with little gifties and I did get a picture. These are just Bonnae's colors! The zip pouch is sitting on a newly-sewn ironing pad made from a couple of fat quarters.

The ironing pad is two-sided. This print above was a quilty cheater cloth that I picked up for a song on this year's quilt Shop Hop. The other side, shown below, is a wild purple fishy print which was a fat quarter I ordered from Spoonflower last year. It's laying on my newly-covered ironing board pad. Yep, I've been busy!

And speaking of Spoonflower, I couldn't resist their 50% off fat quarters earlier this month, so I bought the two shown below. The cannabis print is to make into a zip pouch for my brother who imbibes (and lives where that is legal). He's an epileptic who has used marijuana for decades (since we were kids living at home in California where he secretly grew it) to control seizures. Oh, I have stories about those days! Anyway. The other print is just one I fell in love with.

Next in line will be to quilt this little nap quilt (bad shot of partial basted quilt) for the grand cats Xbox and Carl. The size is roughly that of a crib quilt. It will be delivered sometime between Christmas and New Year along with the family gifts when we see them.

And then there is this monstrosity - my rainbow selvage blocks from this year. This quilt top has been sitting in Time Out for a couple months. I was hoping that it would somehow either change itself or that I might grow to like it. Nope. If it weren't already sashed, I would've ripped the large 16-patch blocks into four-patches and started over. But I hate it so much that I'm not willing to invest that time in it. Heck, I'm not even going to add outer sashing. Just quilt up the da** thing and donate it. Bam! Done!

And last but not least (are you still awake?) are the four blocks I stitched for the Block Lotto this month. They are hourglass blocks that measure 6.5". As usual, since my friend Nann and I have been running the Lotto since August to keep it going until year-end, the blocks I make are for donation. It's sad, but the owner of the Block Lotto site has decided not to renew the site. I can't say that I blame her. Interest has fallen off over the years, and she has to pay the site hosting fees. So, this will be the last month for Block Lotto.

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ALERT!  I just moved Newport Butterflies from the washer into the dryer. Since this was the quilt's first laundering, I had thrown two color catchers into the wash. As I went to put it in the dryer, I checked the color catchers - only to find out that they weren't color catchers, but dryer sheets! WHAT?!? What is happening to my brain? Didn’t it just get back from vacation? Well, it doesn't look as though any colors bled. Whew! Thank goodness I used good quality fabrics.

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As I age, I've learned that I don't enjoy or cope well with all the stress of the Holidays. For us, that's about mid-November through the end of the year. So, we've devised alternate routines and celebrations that let us keep things very low key. Thanksgiving is either just us (and maybe a family member or two who doesn't have plans) or going out to family or restaurant. Christmas gifts are bought here and there all year as something reminds us of someone, or else they get gift cards or money. Wrapping is minimal (a bag?), reusable or given in a card. Decorating is also minimal (bonus: we've been able to donate a couple tubs of "stuff" to charity). Christmas baking this year was a two-fer. I made Bruce's favorite cookies, which I do periodically for him, just in time to serve some for dessert at our family dinner gathering last week. Neighbor gifts are jars of jam that I made last summer. Even the kitties got their gifts early (new beds and catnip toys) when I took advantage of a Chewy coupon a couple months ago. I can't decide if it's my age, or if I'm getting smart or lazy or some combination of all of them. But I rather like the toned-down version of things. It allows more time to enjoy people; friends, family and each other.

I've already shown you the picture of our tiny Christmas tree, but now I'm going to treat you to our menagerie nativity. There is no baby Jesus, although we did find a half walnut shell for his manger. Stay tuned for that next year. In the meantime we have a little soapstone elephant (from last year’s Kenya trip), a wood deer (that I got in Austria in 1970), a dough turkey (made by son Shane in 3rd grade), a see-no-evil monkey, a rooster from Portugal, two marble mice (they're the best kind), a pewter rabbit (Austria, 1970), a one-eared bunny that just wandered in, a wood-carved owl (also Austria, 1970) and a smiling Buddha-like character. Eclectic, irreverent, cute. Just like us!

Thank you for reading my blog and sharing your thoughts and friendship over the year. I truly love and appreciate all of you. I wish you and yours the Happiest of Holidays, whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukah, the Solstice, or whatever else (because I don't know all the holidays, to my shame). May you enjoy good company, love, warmth, peace and plenty.