Groovy Guitars - Finished at Last!

This has to be my biggest quilt finish of the year! Not in terms of size but in sheer weight off my shoulders. I’ve been struggling with this beast quilt for my dear husband Bruce for over a year. It’s been in Time Out, it’s been cussed at, it has narrowly escaped being butchered with shears, and I’m sure there is plenty of blood, sweat and tears in there, too. But this afternoon I finished sewing on the binding - by machine, because the sooner it was done, the better - and I will never have to labor over it again. Hallelujah!

Am I pleased with how it turned out? Well, yeah, I am. For the most part. The picture above was snapped just awhile ago in the shade of our backyard apricot tree. Please excuse the dappled sunlight that shows.....  Groovy Guitars finished at 52” x 69”.

Here is the back.

I used batiks for all the bright colors - the colors that were picked, along with the black background, by Bruce. He loves bright and he LOVES red.  I enlarged the pattern to make the two guitars on the ends complete. I also completed the bottoms of the guitars and the head stocks so that the entire group floats rather than being cut off at the borders. Cutting all the interlocking pieces (and working in reverse, with extra additions) was a challenge for my brain. Once that was done, the worst was over. It’s just that after that, I didn’t even want to look at it for awhile. 

I am a mediocre quilter at best, but I did do some different things on this quilt. All the black background areas were stippled with black thread.  The large orange guitar with the circle-print orange batik fabric got quilted swirls. I’m not very even or proficient with them, but no one is going to sue me over it, LOL. The guitar necks were all given straight line treatment to mimic guitar strings.

This yellow electric guitar body got some angular quilting.

The head stocks mostly got quilted with echoing lines. The rest of the pieces here and there were treated with straight lines, swirls or stipples.

After the outside photo session, we came in and I threw the quilt in the washer with 2 color catchers. We may get more pictures after it is washed.  Bruce loves the quilt! And I love that it’s done. finished. gone. over. completed.

This is my OMG - One Monthly Goal for August. I linking up to Patty’s August goal completion linkup for OMG HERE. This also checks off my Goal #8 for the Quarter 3 Finish-Along, which I blogged about HERE.  I’m also linking up to Sarah’s Whoop Whoop Friday, because I really am happy dancing over this finish!

Now I can put the pedal to the medal and finish up the next 4-5 quilts in line. They should be a breeze after this one!

By the way, Blogger has been acting up again - has anyone else been having problems? I missed several days of comments from Saturday the 11th through yesterday, the 15th. I reset everything once again and it seems to be working again. For now. However, there are several people who commented over my last few posts (Pets on Quilts, Africa Final post and Orange Saturday at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge) that I cannot respond to as I don’t have your email addresses. Please accept my thanks for commenting and apologies for not responding personally. 

One Monthly Goal for August

It’s time to list our August goal for One Monthly Goal (OMG). I’m linking up with Elm Street Quilts. 

This Groovy Guitar quilt for my DH Bruce is still unfinished. My goal last month was to finish it up - just the quilting and binding remain - in July. I knew I would be in Africa for 2 weeks, but figured I’d have the entire last week to finish it.  What I didn’t count on, though, was being totally wiped out when I returned home. And then there was the unpacking, mountains of laundry, and readjusting myself. 

And so here we are in August! I will complete the quilt this month. In fact, I basted it today and intend to get a great start on it this weekend.

Hooray - Blogger is Fixed

FINALLY!  We are once again receiving comments in our email. YAY! I always love and appreciate your comments and am so happy that Blogger has restored our ability to receive and respond to them. Blogging without two-way conversations is like living in a vacuum, so let the chatter commence!

Last week I said that I’d finished all my regular teal/aqua blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. But that didn’t mean I was finished with the color yet. A few years ago I had purchased a charm pack of Kate Spain’s HORIZON line and I decided that it was time to do something with it, since it was mainly aqua.  So I whipped out some additional scraps and an oatmeal-colored neutral (not my fave) and whipped up this baby quilt top:

After this picture, I fixed that wonky bottom border and then pieced a backing. And that’s as far as I’ll take it for now. It will be a quick process to baste and quilt it for donation when the time comes.

While checking out Pinterest or Instagram (sorry, can’t even remember where let alone who) I saw a great block that used scrappy crumb blocks. Since I’ve been making 6.5” scrappy crumbs all year without a plan, it was good to finally have the perfect plan for them:

I just sashed them with a black 1.5” strip, and they will finish at 13”. So, as time permits, I’ll go back and begin combining the smaller crumb blocks into these larger blocks. Going forward into next year, I’ll make the smaller blocks (or finish up a color) in sets of 4.  With what I have already, they could be assembled into a baby quilt, but I would prefer to go bigger. So, that’s the plan for these crumbs.

And there is lots more aqua inspiration over at Angela’s Scrappy Saturday. Come join us!

And speaking of baby quilts, AB Baby was gifted to my step-daughter Stacy on Tuesday afternoon, just before she left for her OB doctor appointment.  The doctor told her she was already dilated to a 3, and the next day (Wednesday the 20th), she felt achey and unsettled. Then the labor started and WHAM! Baby Evie was born within a couple hours. She came so quick (18 minutes after Stacy got to the hospital), that no epidural was even given. And here is the little cutie herself:

Isn’t she adorable? I love the little cap with a bow that the hospital uses to keep their heads warm!  Mom and baby (6 lb. 13 oz) are back at home and doing great.

The preparation for my trip to Kenya (leaving July 8) is continuing. This week we had another online meeting/travel training. We won’t be taking any blow dryers or curling irons, so I think I’ll get my hair trimmed again just to keep it short and simple. And after price shopping for the required malaria pills, I was able to get them (21 days’ worth) for $50.60 instead of $125+. Our Kenyan visas have been approved, and all our plane flight seating assignments have been secured. Oh, and I got some support hose (YUK) for the loooong flights.

I also prepped some handwork (embroidery) for the long plane flights. Last month when Cousin Kim and I went to the quilt show, I bought a few 8x10 (ish) embroidered designs. This week I cut and stabilized some fabric, then pressed the designs on. This is a new-to-me product by Adorn-it, and one is just supposed to stitch through the design layer. Then the design sheet melts away with a quick soaking. We’ll see how that works - it was an alternative to marking the design directly on the fabric.

All I have left to do now are pull the threads to bring along. My granddaughter Lauren, whom I’ll be sitting with on the flights, loves flamingoes. So I’m hoping she takes an interest and maybe even give embroidery a try. Just in case she wants to, I’m packing two designs and two hoops.  Muahahahaha.  Method to my madness.....


And finally, more work on Groovy Guitars happened.
I had originally planned to do an all red border, but didn’t have enough of the red - or any other single color for that matter. So, the border was constructed of all the colors except purple.

Here it is in all its carnival-like goodness.

All the machine appliqué is complete. I even did all the large round circles on the machine.

All that’s left to do by hand are the 24 small yellow circles (on the blue and red headstocks) and the three small green circles on the small middle-isn guitar.









Here are some close-ups.

My goal is to have the hand stitching done before I leave for Kenya. Then when I return, I’ll still have about 10 days left in July in which to finish the quilt by layering, quilting and binding. My plan right now is to quilt the background in a black stipple. The guitars will need quilting, too, but I’m not certain yet how I’ll proceed there. Certainly I’ll match the thread to the colors. And then just perhaps some shape echoing or simple crosshatch.

Thanks for dropping by!

Teal Zeal

I guess I could’ve titled this post Aqua-something or Turquoise-something, since those are all the colors (not blue but not green) that we’re working with for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge this month. But it’s summer and I’m lazy, so there you have it. Teal.

My scraps this month are tamed as much as they’re going to be. Lots of nice chunks got put away to use for next year or for when I decide what other teal/aqua/turquoise blocks I’ll need for other WIPs.  For now, here’s what I finished up this week to share.

I made 13 - 6” (finished size)  quarter log cabin blocks. It always seems as though I have an odd number of these blocks when I make them. 

This month there will be no birds sewn because that color is not represented in my Birds in the Lattice quilt. So, the final blocks for this month (unless I begin a new project) are my 6” (finished size) crumb blocks. I got seven of them before the smaller scraps ran out, and really didn’t want to cut down any bigger chunks.

So, that leaves me a couple weeks to twiddle my thumbs sew on other things. So, just for the sheer joy of piecing (because I already had all the orange lozenges and a large pile of black and another of white 1.5” squares), I worked on these lozenges.

I was sewing these into 3x2 blocks, then sewing those together. Only I kept going and somehow got the starting colors reversed. But this is still early days in this quilt top, so it will be easy just to add to the bottom part before proceeding. And that little lozenge in the second row, fourth from the left - that has got to come out. That fabric needs black corners. But that, too, is an easy fix. Anyway, I’m liking it. I don’t know when we will have orange month for the RSC - hopefully not next month when I’m gone for half the month - but I plan to work on this pretty heavily this year in order to finish it up by Christmas. It’s already 2 years old. At least 90% of the cutting is done. 

And then, guilt struck. Bruce’s poor Groovy Guitars flimsy shamed me mercilessly (“Having fun piecing, are you? What about me? I need to be appliquéd!"). And finally when I found one of the tiny purple circles that represent a tuning peg, I caved and switched gears yet again.

You may recall, the top looks like this:

After reattaching the errant purple tuning peg, I began hand sewing those down. That was no fun. Well, it was, but the other larger pieces are not taking well to being scrunched while I hand sew. So, I actually began machine appliquéing them down. All the blue parts are done, and now I’ve started on the yellows. They’re done with the exception of one seam.

The very fine thread I bought for the appliquéing of Groovy Guitar didn’t work out. It was just too fine. Originally this was meant to be a wall hanging, but Bruce wanted a useable quilt. So I expanded the edges and filled out the guitar shapes, adding headstock motifs, etc. to make them all float on a larger black background. The fusible, per the instructions, was not lightweight, but a lighter medium weight. It has changed the hand of the pieces and I hope it will soften after washing. But at this stage, using a fine thread was not cutting it. So, I’m back to my 50-weight Aurifil and it is behaving admirably.  

Today I’ll finish up the yellow and do the orange and perhaps move on to the green and purple. I’d like to be able to sit down and enjoy some slow stitching of all the tiny dots once everything else is secure. Then I’ll probably add a red border. My goal is to get this ready to be basted by the end of July. 

This garden photo was taken last Monday, and the garden has grown even since then. The various squash plans (left side, middle area) all have blossoms now, as do the tomatoes and the tomatillo. We’ve finished up the radishes (“we” meaning Bruce, because I hate them) and are feasting regularly on spinach. And I’ve been making lots of rhubarb-strawberry compote for the freezer to enjoy during the off-season.  

And the white climbing rose in the middle on the back wall is now blooming mightily. It’s lovely to sit out on the patio and see it all!

Under the Wire for my April Goal

Whew! Here it is, 5:30 pm (Mountain Daylight Time), four hours until the deadline for finishing my OMG - One Monthly Goal. And I finished! YAY!!!  My goal for April was to get the top of my husband Bruce’s “Groovy Guitars” (a pattern by Robbie Joy Ecklow) cut, placed and fused. My goal-setting post was HERE.

I'm very pleased with the primary and secondary colors I used. Bruce wanted bright on black, and boy do these colors sing! Or should I say they “play” well together! I’m so full of puns today!! Probably because I’m doing a happy dance at getting this beast moved along to the next stage.

Right now I’m waiting for special polyester thread and finer gauge needles to arrive before I can move on to the next step - machine appliqué. I learned so much about this from my friend Angela at Quilting on the Crescent. Thanks for the great post, Angela! But all those tuning pegs and assorted other dots (64 of them total) will be hand appliquéd. The appliqué will be a goal for June so I can work on another project for my May goal.

So, I’m linking up to Patty at Elm Street Quilts for the April OMG Finish. Come see all the wonderful finishes!

Also linking up with Linky Tuesday at Connie’s Freemotion by the River. 

Wrapping up Yellow

Let’s talk yellow. I was able to get in some good sewing time this week, but it was all on two specific projects. First though, let me recap the yellow blocks I sewed for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge’s April color of the month.

Top Row, L-R: 10 selvage squares, 6 (4.5”) bow ties; 4 (6.5”) blocks for AllUNeedisLove

Middle Row, L-R: 6 Noon & Light 9” blocks, 3 Squared Away blocks, 12 6.5” Qtr Log Cabins

Bottom Row, L-R: 6 crumb blocks, 4 yellow birds, 3 Linked Squares blocks

Total Blocks: 54

I also made 32 yellow flying geese units for the AllUNeedisLove quilt, but haven’t counted those because they are just units, not blocks.

And in weight loss, I lost a grand total (hold on to your hats) of a half pound in April. Still walking, still riding my bike and still watching what I eat. But obviously, not as conscientiously as I should be. Life will get easier when I can go back to cooking for just Bruce (after my brother leaves). 

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Groovy Guitars, the quilt I’m working on for DH Bruce is coming along nicely. I’ve got about seven or eight more pieces to fuse, plus several little dots for “tuning pegs”. It’s possible that I could finish this today or tomorrow and squeak in just before the end-of-the-month deadline for my April One Monthly Goal (OMG). The goal was to get the top cut and fused.

And I may or may not continue with this project for May (the hand and machine appliqué). I need to add a border, and am torn between using the bright scraps in piano-key fashion or just finding a suitable red, which is Bruce’s favorite color, to border it with. The Utah Quilt Shop Hop is May 30-June 2, and I’ll be hunting for that fabric then if I decide to go that way. So, I may select a different project for my May OMG.

That OMG project is likely to be this ABC baby quilt. The working title of this project is “AB Baby”. I had a math teacher in 7th grade named Mr. Abrahamson. We called him Abey-baby (not to his face, although he was cool and probably would’ve laughed). This quilt made me think of that. Yes, my brain works in mysterious ways.....

I am so in love with these blocks! The pictures do not do them justice. They are so sweet and whimsical. The picture above shows everything just pinned up on the design board. My goal for this week was to get halfway through the alphabet, and I actually did more than that.

Some close-ups:

The fabrics are mostly from various collections of Tamara Kate, with a few other fabrics thrown in here and there.

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This week I was also able to meet up with Emily from Em’s Scrap Bag. She runs Quilty Hugs for Happy Chemo, one of the charities for Hands2Help. Hands2Help is a great online international charity organized and run by Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict. 

Anyway, Emily was kind enough to meet with me last Wednesday and a passerby was kind enough to take our picture. I donated six quilts; four of which will go for Quilty Hugs and 2 smaller ones which will go to Primary Children’s Hospital (where my friend Terri and I donate our baby quilts). 

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Grapes along west patio, 2006 

Garden-wise, it’s been another busy week of working in the yard. The new drip irrigation is installed in the raised growing beds. The weeds have been pulled everywhere (for now), although I still have an area on the west side of the house that has a lot of grass to pull out where it’s invaded the flower beds. But everything else is spiffy; the lawns are thick, weed-free and nicely trimmed, the flowers and bushes are all cleaned up and dead-headed from last year and we are ready to plant vegetables. 

The only concern is that last fall my brother cut back the four grape vines along the west side of the patio to within an inch of their lives. It looks as though three out of four are still (barely) alive, but they won’t be producing anything this year. My brother thinks he knows more than he does about everything gardening. Anyway, since the grapes shade the patio from the afternoon sun (see the old picture, above), we are going to have to come up with a plan B to make the patio habitable in the early evening. The apricot tree will provide some shade, so that might have to do. I have hung some cute solar firefly lights (a gift from one of my friends) along the lattice and could always stitch up a canvas valance or something. I’ll just have to wait to see how it goes. 

After we plant the veggies this weekend, I’ll focus on visiting nurseries for flowers for my front entry Talavera flower pots plus some other landscaping items I’ve wanted for awhile - more roses and perennials. We are members of Red Butte Garden and I’m looking forward to their annual plant sale in a couple weeks.  

The first half of May will be crazy. My brother Steve is leaving for Arizona this week and Bruce’s birthday is also this coming week. Plus over the next two weeks there are dentist appointments, a graduation, two charity sewing meetings to attend, a family gathering and the aforementioned plant shopping and garden work. My sewing time may grow scarce for awhile!

Following the Yellow Block Road

It’s been another busy week here. Our weather has varied from snow one day to rain to high sixties (F) all in the same week. We’re supposed to get into the mid-seventies for a couple days next week. I can’t wait! Bruce has the garden beds all tilled, mulched and the drip irrigation about ready to go. We will likely plant at least the early stuff in the coming few days. The more tender things will have to wait 2-3 more weeks.

This week I finished up my yellow blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (visit our link-up at Angela’s blog, HERE) by stitching 12 - 6.5” (unfinished) quarter log cabins:

Six 6.5” crumb blocks:

And four blocks (also 6.5” unfinished) that will go into the All You Need is Love quilt:

And I finished quilting Geese Migration!! This pattern is by Cynthia Brunz, and it is so much fun! Geese Migration finished at 52x64”. I quilted it with loops, and when it was washed, the texture was just amazing!  I think the gray sets the colors off really well. This quilt is #3 on my Finish-Along goals for the 2018 Quarter Two, which you can read about HERE.  By the way, those columns really are vertical - that bump near the top left area is the quilt holder’s head or some other body part. Sheesh, it’s hard to get good help these days, hahaha.

Geese Migration is my final quilt finish for Hands2Help. All my quilts will be going to Emily at Happy Chemo up in Centerville. We weren’t able to meet up last week because she was traveling to teach, but I’m hoping we can get together this coming week. I really don’t want to have to mail 5 quilts. Anyway here is the back. It’s a combination of a spring green batik that I bought last year (but not enough, obviously), along with a Tula Pink remnant for the sides.

Cousin Kim was over last week to sew, as usual. The week before I had quilted her latest quilt for her and then she sewed on the binding. This fabric was a layer cake of something that we both bought from Missouri Star Quilt Company about a year ago unbeknownst to the other. I have a different pattern planned for mine, but I love how her pattern shows off the lovely prints and colors.

We auditioned several backs, but we both agreed that this old vintage sheet was the cutest, softest and overall best.  Kim is keeping this quilt for herself. Congrats on a great finish!

And I have been working on my April OMG project. The goal is to get the top of Bruce’s guitar quilt all cut out, placed and fused. This is where I am after a couple short work sessions on it:

There are more parts to add to what is here so far, as well as two more guitars that will expand the quilt out to the left of the green guitar. But it's progress! And other than struggling just a bit to get pieces to fit where they’re supposed to fit, I haven’t had any issues (so far, knock on wood) with reversing things. My brain is humming along in “drive" instead of neutral or reverse. One everything is in place, things will be tweaked and trimmed to make lines more flowing, etc. Then it will be properly fused and I’ll begin the buttonhole stitching around each piece. That ought to be a barrel of fun (do you hear the dripping sarcasm?)  But first things first. Since this piece, “Groovy Guitars” hasn’t earned my wrath this week, it is saved from Time Out. It's still on my design wall and will be getting more attention this week.

This week I also cut out most of what I need for the granddaughter-to-be’s new baby quilt. Bruce’s daughter Stacy, who is still due in early July, and her hubby have decided the new little girl will be named Evie. I love it! And Evie’s ABC quilt is started. I’ve trimmed up all the letters and other blocks (there will be 30 total). I pull out a block/letter randomly and sew the strips around them. These are the first two:

I’ll talk more about this project as it progresses over the next couple months..... if I can wait that long. If I had my way, I’d just sit down and do it all NOW, but I have the guitar quilt and the Love is All You Need quilt going on, too.

In personal news, my brother Steve is getting ready to move out next weekend. It’s been nine months (a couple more than I had planned), and hard at times, but we are all ready. His health (and health insurance) is under control, he sold his old truck and motorcycle and has a new(er) truck - reliable transportation. He’s got his social security and retirement benefits all settled and coming in, and he’s has been able to save a good chunk of money. So, he will be heading back to Arizona temporarily to seek out new digs and visit friends. When he’s got that finalized, he will be back to pack up his stuff (stored in one of our bedrooms and an outdoor shed) and his hotrod and make the official move. Bruce and I wish him well, but are looking forward to having our privacy back.

And that’s about it for now.

Goal Setting for the Second Quarter

It’s time for me to set my quarterly goals for finishing up quilting-related projects. I’m going to pretend that Spring will really arrive one day and that the cold, rainy weather and blustery days will give ‘way to warmth, sunshine and flowers. But I’d be an ingrate if I did not acknowledge that Mother Nature has already blessed us with three - yes, only 3 - daffodils. Wha????? I planted at least 30 last fall..... Well, the tulips are poised to open any day now....

My list for the second quarter proposed finishes is relatively short. But even so, I know that with everything else going on in spring, I will be fortunate to finish just half of them. Anyway, I’m linking up to the 2nd Quarter 2018 Finish-Along Goal Setting linky. 

1.  Bruce’s Guitar Quilt

This quilt is also my One Monthly Goal (OMG) for April. But I’m advising everyone, Bruce included, not to hold their breath. I don’t even want to pull it out until I finish my yellow Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks, probably next week. And that’s already half way through the month.

2. Baby Quilt for Stacy
FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE.

Our daughter Stacy is expecting a baby girl at the beginning of July. Yay! I was hoping it was a girl, because I’ve had this ABC panel (Tamara Kate) for over a year, just waiting.

3.  Geese Migration

FINISHED AND BLOGGED ABOUT HERE. 

This is a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project. The pattern is by Cynthia Brunz. It’s a flimsy currently, but will be basted and quilted soon. Probably it’ll be my first finish of the quarter.

4.  All You Need is Love

I’ve used this picture before, but actually the quilt is well under way. It’s for my Beatle-loving daughter, who needs another quilt. Well, she has a Minky-backed winter quilt I made her about 3 years ago, so this will be an all-cotton alternate quilt. So “need” is appropriate, right?

5.   Lozenge Quilt in Orange

I’ve been working on this off and on for a couple years. Mostly I’ve just worked on it when the orange month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge rolls around. But I’ve got all the orange rectangles (all 475 or so) cut out, as well as a majority of the white corner squares. Now I need to cut out the black corner squares and do some heavy chain piecing. But the priority is after the four above-listed quilts.

6-7.   Charity Quilts

I’ve been trying to add charity sewing to my quarterly output (whether listed as a goal or not) this year. I may as well list a couple of them here. The two I’ve selected are basically whole-cloth quilts that were selected by virtue of being on the top of the 12-quilt pile! LOL

Sorry for the lousy picture; the purple fabric is even shown wrong side up. I just match pieces of fabric, flannel, batting and keep a baby quilt-to-be pile going. These are all meant to be baby sized, from 36” square up to about 48x54”. They either go to a local church group, online charity drives, or the local Primary Children’s Hospital. 

And that’s it for me for the second quarter. Now, must get sewing......  Thanks for stoping by!

April Goal for OMG

Once again I’m linking up to Patty at Elm Street Quilts for the monthly OMG - One Monthly Goal - challenge. I’m three for three with my finishes so far this year. But April’s goal is going to prove to be a bit tougher given my history with this project

Anyway, my goal for April is to finish THE TOP (minus any border I may decide to add) of Bruce’s Guitar Quilt. To refresh your memory, this project is a fused appliqué project designed by Robbie Joy Ecklow that I started for my DH last year.

My plan has added a bit to the dimensions to make the quilt bigger. For example, that orange guitar is only a half-guitar in the pattern, but I rounded it out to complete it and add a few inches on that side. The same will happen at the other side. And I am not planning to cut off the bottoms of instruments or the tops of their headstocks. That will add a few inches all around. And then I’ll finish up with some sort of bright border (maybe piano key piecing or just a plain bright-colored border) to bring it up to lap quilt size.

It’s a complicated process with these odd pieces, and my brain struggles (no comments from the peanut gallery please, LOL) to work in reverse with the tracing, fusing, etc. This project has been in Time Out more than not. But I really want to make progress on it, even though I’d rather be sewing something else. Anything else, actually.

If I can get all the piecing traced, fused, placed and assembled by the end of the month, this girl will be a happy camper. Ecstatic. The border can come later, because I will probably have to purchase appropriate fabric for it.

So, to sum it up, my goal is to finish fusing and assembling all the instruments and their parts for the main part of the quilt top.

I’m linking up to Patty’s goal-setting linky party. My fingers are crossed. If I can finish this quilt top by month end (with my hair still intact), it will be a double win!  Why not visit us over at Elm Street Quilts to see what others are up to?!

Onward and Orange-ward

Welcome to September!  It’s a new month and a new color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. This month, Angela at So Scrappy has chosen ORANGE for us to work on. It’s the perfect color to get us in the mood for autumn.

Last year at this time we were just beginning the demolition of the living room for its remodel, so I never got to decorate for fall. This year I am so excited to get out my fall decorations. I’m not sure how they will work with the new furniture and decor; without my old antique sideboard, I have fewer places for bigger things. But it will be fun trying this and that. Some things may have to find new homes and maybe I will have to add a few choice new pieces.

First, let me do a bit of August recap before I get into Orange September.

I did finish 9 kennel quilts and one doggie bed as I had planned. Darla tested out the kennel quilts for me and  declared they were just right.  In fact, she wanted to fall asleep on them right away. But mom had to wash them all, so she was deprived of that privilege.

With all the flooding from Hurricane Harvey in southeast Texas, I believe I am going to package these up and send them off to Houston-area shelters. They are needing them badly there right now. If you have time, why not stitch up a few placemat-sized kennel quilts and join the effort? I always get a lot of questions about how you, the reader, can help the animals with shelter quilts. Here are some websites (just a few; there are so many more) that are helping out in Houston:

Best Friends Animal Society
The Quilt Pattern Magazine - they work with Petfinder. Great site!
Petco Foundation
There is an article on Today.com (link HERE) that lists many ways and sites to help animals

Also in August, I did 168 little (4.5” unfinished) neutral string blocks, finished my Pineapple Quilt and started the Groovy Guitars quilt for Bruce (more on that below).  On my personal weight loss journey with Weight Watchers, I lost 7-something pounds in August, for a total to date of 15.5 pounds or so. My clothes are looser and I already feel much better. My annual physical is in September, so I am hoping that my bloodwork and other numbers have improved correspondingly.

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I started my orange sewing as soon as I read Angela's color announcement. I was able to finish up the two orange columns for my RSC selvage quilt.

After sewing up the light orange and the dark orange columns, I added to add them and the previously-sewn red column to the quilt top. Now all that’s left is a dark column (gray? brown?) for the very right, and two pink columns - one dark and one light - for the left-hand side. The flimsy will finish at about 56x72”.

And then there is the Groovy Guitars quilt, which I am name changing to Damn Guitars. Enough said about that! I did let the quilt out of Time Out for a couple afternoons during the week, and in doing so was able to make some progress.

After re-doing the initial orange guitar, things have gone slightly smoother. I hung the black cotton background up on the design board and use my portable iron to fuse directly onto it while its hanging. Genius, if I do say so myself. The design board is flannel-covered board insulation panels, so it takes pins and heat like a champ. Doing it this way also allows me to fiddle a bit more than a horizontal table or (heaven forbid) an ironing board would allow.

The picture below shows where I am so far. There are several areas that need tweaking, but for now I am just lightly fusing them to the background. Once all the pieces are there, I will finesse and trim the seam overlaps, then machine appliqué all the edges.

And I can already see that the yellow rectangle on the orange guitar needs to be re-centered. That was the piece that made me think there had to be a better/vertical way to do this quilt instead of horizontal. There are still red and blue pieces to come as the quilt grows to the left. If I can tear myself away from my orange scraps this week, I may work on it some more.

In two weeks we leave for Colorado for a week, where we will be staying in Winter Park at Snow Mountain Ranch. We are meeting a few couple friends and sharing a cabin. I will also be meeting up with Diann of Little Penguin Quilts (and her hubby) who will join us for a couple days of sewing (Diann) and golf (hubby). I’ll take along plenty of sewing and hand stitching projects, but I haven’t figured out exactly what yet, much less prepare them. But other than a little walking/hiking and chatting with friends, sewing is all I plan to do....  That’s my idea of a vacation!