Green Everywhere!

I love green. The month of May is always green here in the Salt Lake Valley, and it’s just about my favorite month (along with October). Here’s a view of our street decked out in green. 

Besides the green outside, we are sewing green scraps in May for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. More on that a bit later in the post. 

Bruce and I also decided that when we repaint the master bedroom next month (meaning, when we have it and the living room repainted by professionals), we’re having the bedroom done in a light sage green. The light through the bedroom windows is filtered through trees and there is no escaping the green cast it gives the now-cream walls. So, we’ll just embrace it! We are also getting new window coverings along the back of the house (4 windows). That’s the extent of the major house redecorating projects this year. Except the courtyard. I hired a local couple to come in and help me remove the old topsoil, straighten out the stone edgings on the beds, dig out two old shrubs and spread the new topsoil. So, later today I’ll finally get to visit the garden store to buy flowers for my pots and purchase some more perennial and annual flowers to fill the beds. Maybe I’ll finally have some garden pictures next week! 

But let’s set the Time Machine back to last Saturday when Cousin Kim, Ruby and I went to the Sewing and Quilt Expo. This time the Expo was not very large - I think the major quilt show promoters have long since abandoned this market. But it was OK. The quilts displayed were all from the Utah Quilt Guild. There were scores, if not a couple hundred, quilts from huge king-sized quilts down to small wall hangings. Some were sewn for fun, others for challenges, the whole gamut. I snapped photos of my favorites, and here’s a small sampling. 

My favorite was this Bird Houses quilt. It wasn’t until I was uploading the pictures from my phone to my iPad (from which I write my blogposts) that I read the information tag for this quilt and realized it was sewn and quilted by my friend Bernadette Turner from Quilts for Kids! 

I was so enchanted by the pattern, the critters in the windows, and the rainbow scrap nature of this lovely quilt. Now I want to make one! 

This next quilt was truly stunning. It was not a Halloween quilt per se, but definitely an Autumn Forest, moody quilt. The affixed crystals gave it a magnificent, sparkly presence. 

This little collaged orange tree captured my heart.

And talk about color! This next quilt was just a riot of color pattern and, well, its title says it all - FUN!

And of course I had to take a picture of a kitty quilt! See the mice scampering around the border?

And this bookcase quilt reminded me of the one I did many years ago (see HERE). But the maker cleverly embroidered actual book titles on hers, whereas my book titles were from selvages.

So that was it for the quilt expo. The only thing I bought was 3 yards of a pale pink Kona cotton for the upcoming attempt at sewing a Storm at Sea quilt. 

But with my green scraps, I not only attempted but actually completed 15 green crumb blocks, which will finish at 6”. These, like my string blocks, are going to Quilts for Kids for their kit-making. 

Next I sewed up four Weathervane blocks. 

And then I began putting together the next Rainbow Candies quilt from some old RSC blocks. 

I had enough of the fun multi-colored fabric to cut for the backing of both quilts, plus the sashings. However on this second top, I’ll have to add the green solid as the outer border. But that’s just fine with me. Once I get this top sewn up, hopefully over the long Memorial Day weekend, I plan to baste both the rainbow candy quilt tops and the green column quilt I showed partially constructed last week. 

I would have gotten more sewing done this week, but we spent 2 days at the Huntsman Cancer Center while Bruce had a six-hour infusion done on Wednesday and again on Thursday. Next week and the week after we’ll only have to go one day per week for about 3 hours. The infusions help kill the excess white blood cells produced by his CLL (chronic leukemia) plus fortify him with goodies (my technical medical term) that will help give him some more energy. Unfortunately, during the course of the treatments, he is more susceptible to infections, notably Covid and shingles. Yes, shingles - even though he’s had the vaccinations. They don’t really know yet why those two particular diseases are more troublesome, but hopefully forewarned is forearmed. Bruce always masks up whenever he leaves the house and avoids large groups of people. 

Thanks for dropping by! For those who observe, I hope you have a safe and fun Memorial Day weekend. And for those who don’t observe it, I hope you have a safe and fun weekend as well! 

Autumn Arrives, Thank Goodness

Here in the Salt Lake Valley, we’ve had a nice cooling down as autumn takes charge. Those miserable days of 100+ temperatures (Fahrenheit) are just a memory. The days now are pleasant and the evenings are coolish. We plan to get out in the courtyard to put away furniture, cover the barbecue, and pull the annuals. Also, the contractors have finished the kitchen remodel and are no longer using the garage as a staging area and/or workplace for painting or cutting things. So we’ll also take time today to reorganize the garage and find storage for the leftover materials like flooring and tile. And now that all my china and cookie jars are unpacked and displayed, we will knock down all the packing boxes to store some of them and recycle others. 

I’m not ready yet to show Before and After pictures of the remodel, because one accent wall has to be repainted. After all the paint samples I got and weeded down and fretted over, I ended up going way off base. The color is too light and has yellow undertones. Totally my fault. My friend Joan has a guest bedroom with the best sage green walls, so I picked up more paint samples, went to her house, and I was able to match the exact shade. Turns out it was Sherwin-Williams Sage. How it got eliminated before, I don’t know. Our neighbor Andy has volunteered to paint the wall for us - he enjoys painting and helping others. I’m going to swallow my pride and take him up on it. 

I need to get cortisone shots in my right shoulder again, which I regularly do about every 8-9 months. If I like how the accent wall turns out - and I know I will - I can paint the little entry wall in October with a decent shoulder. 

So, at least I have quilting/sewing things to post this weekend, unlike last week. I did attend a Quilts for Kids workshop last weekend and taught another volunteer how to piece string blocks. It was good to see old friends after our summer break! Now that the cooler weather is starting, I’m feeling a powerful (nesting?) urge to sew. This past week I was also able to make 4 batches of jam in two mornings: two raspberry, one peach (that didn’t set and is now “peach sauce”) and one raspberry-peach. 

Oops, I got off on a tangent there! So let’s check out the green scrap blocks I did this week. As a refresher, I’m focusing on browns and greens this month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. We only had one green month in January of this year, and green is one of my biggest scrap colors. So, I’ve opted to do more green to complete needed blocks for this year’s planned RSC quilts. In October I’ll focus on black and gray. 

First I completed two more 12” (finished size) Scrappy Star blocks. One is light, one is bright. 

Here’s a photo of the two new green blocks matched up with their brethren from January, olive and dark.

I now have 19 out of 20 blocks complete. Next month I’ll do a final block in blacks/grays. 

Here are three more Color Sticks blocks. 

I’m working on green string blocks for next week, in hopes of making some discernable progress with green scraps. Oh, green! In my scraps, on my walls, in my eyes! I love green!! It’s also my brother’s favorite color!

My friend Nann sent me some batik Scraps (thanks, Nann!), and I’ve been busy this week sorting them into colors and sizes for cutting. I’m going to match them up with more of my African fabrics (both my own and those from my friend Wanda) to make another quilt for myself kinda-sorta like the It’s a Jungle Out There quilt (see 2 posts ago). There was no progress on that this week. But I do plan to make a concerted effort to work on it this week because it’s for my doctor who’s retiring and (see above) I need those cortisone shots. THAT will light a fire under my butt!

Couldn’t resist sharing this campaign sign I saw. Yeah, I’m a crazy cat lady and proud of it! Besides, the cat looks just like our Darla!!

My finger (rotary cutter accident) is mostly healed and doing well. Bruce is doing great, and life is good! See y’all next week or on YOUR blog! 

Creature from the Green Lagoon

Winter has been treating us pretty well so far. It has rained and snowed here, which is good from a water standpoint. And the snow is usually overnight or when we don’t have to travel. So naturally, we appreciate that. Of course, I’m declaring our appreciation to the world because I’m hoping that if the weather gods are reading, they will spare us the nasty blizzard on the day we leave town in a couple weeks. We’re making our annual trek to Arizona to visit family, and last year we had to postpone our departure by a day because of the conditions. Do you think they will be reading my blog? Right. Me neither...

So, I got a lot of quilty stuff done this week. We had our first Quilts for Kids (QFK) workshop of the new year last weekend, and it was fun as always. Because we knocked out the quilting of our 200+ backlog of quilts in December, I was actually able to just sew. I checked out a quilt kit (Gumby-themed, because Gumby’s creator lived in our neighborhood in So Cal when I was growing up. I went to school, with his daughter Ann. Literally, we sometimes walked together to school, although she was a year behind me). Sorry, I digressed there. Anyway, at the end of our QFK workshop, I did get three quilts to bring home and baste, quilt and bind for next meeting.

I finished a couple other quilts last weekend or early in the week. If you didn’t see my last post, you can check it out here, or just look at my Quilts 2020 tab just below the blog header. So, let’s move forward from there, shall we?

My two most recent finishes are two donation quilts. The first, shown previously as just a quilt top, is now done.  It’s a simple brown with blue polka dots fabric made from scraps donated to me by a friend.

It finished at 36.5 x 50.5”. I wasn’t that crazy about it, but after just a basic stipple quilting and a run through the laundry, it crinkled and softened up so much that I fell in love with it. Seriously, this fabric is at least 15-20 years old, and I can’t believe the texture and feel of this little quilt.

Next, the Gumby quilt was finished. There were two different orange fabrics in this kit, and they behaved differently in the wash. I’m not as thrilled with how this turned out, but some kid will love it I’m sure.

This was quilted with just a basic serpentine crosshatch for the body of the quilt and a herringbone loop motif for the green border.

And then it was time to get down to business and finish up the flimsy of the scrappy green quilt. The January color of the month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) is light and bright green. So, I wanted to use up my scraps and as many orphan blocks and bits/pieces as possible. I pretty much got everything in there. The blue strips along the sides will be the binding. They’re just pinned there for show. I’m hoping they will frame the quilt nicely, echo the blue in the inner border and provide sufficient contrast and interest. And also frame up those floating selvage “planets” (hehe) at the top. Yep, I even used those selvage circles from a couple weeks ago! I’m linking up to Scrappy Saturday at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

There is plenty of wonkiness built into this quilt, as I fiddled and cut pieces and wedges to squeeze in to make the math work out. But I did it! The backing was sewn up yesterday, so this will get basted over the weekend.  I’ll also be basting up two more QFK little quilts and the pink and green checkerboard quilt (#15 on my Finish-Along list on the blog post I linked to above).

I’m calling this green scrappy quilt “Creature from the Green Lagoon." This monstrosity sweet quilt seemed to take on a life of its own, so it felt apropos. I’m not sure if I love it or not, although I have to say it was both fun and a challenge to fit all these scraps and leftover blocks and bits into a semi-cohesive whole.

And now, some gratuitous kitty photos.  First, Alfie. He loves nothing more than to snuggle up with Bruce.

And here’s Darla. Miss Darla used this picture as her audition picture for a new feature film called “Downton Tabby”. She tells me she won a lead role playing Lady Kibbleton.  (wink)

Got Green? Place Your Bet!

We are not gambling here at Crazy by Design! The green refers to green fabric scraps, which is the color of the month at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. And “Place Your Bet” is the name that Sarah of Confessions of a Fabric Addict gave to one of the quilts she designed for her Rockin’ Rectangles series earlier in the year. I’m making one for the donation quilt pile, but we’ll get into that later in the post.

For now, let’s talk about the green blocks that have come together in the sewing room this week. First, since I have so many green strings, there are 8 string blocks. They measure 9.5” each.

This year I am taking the 6.5” crumb blocks I made last year and sewing them with black sashing into 13.5” blocks that I call Crumbcakes. I had 16 dark and light green 6.5” blocks that made 4 Crumbcakes. But I sewed 4 more 6.5” crumb blocks, which is what I’m counting in my tally of made blocks, and that got made into another block for a total of 5 Crumbcakes.

The green scraps have been put away for this year, but you can see more fun green blocks at Angela’s Scrappy Saturday linkup.

So now it’s time to Place Your Bet!  As I’ve mentioned before, this year I’m trying to focus a little more (not exclusively, but more) on charity quilts that are either gender neutral or for boys. I realize that in this day and age, the traditional pink for girls and blue for boys isn’t always a hard rule. But what 10-year old boy is going to want something pink and flowery? When Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict introduced her cute Place Your Bet quilt as an idea for a quick donation quilt for Hands 2 Help, I was smitten. I have had way too many car-themed scraps left over from the Hot Rod quilt I made for my brother last year.

I began sewing small strips together with white on either short end. Stacking them this way is called a coin quilt, hence Sarah’s name of Place Your Bet.  I used two constants to tie the myriad pieces together. The first was a dark navy swirly print (in both of the next pictures) and lighter blue-gray with reddish dots (thanks for the scraps, Mari!).

I went through my bin of multi-colored scraps - those that don’t neatly fit into one color category - and added anything with blue, green, red, gold, gray or black. And every single transportation-themed thing I could get rid of find.

It was easy sewing, and by the second afternoon, I had a flimsy. Now, I know it’s not the most exciting quilt, but I think it will be a good addition to the donation pile. The white is Kona White and the gray is also Kona, but I can’t remember which one and I’m not going to go pull out my color card to check.  :-)

I still have to piece the back, but most of it will be this leftover Joel Dewberry print. The rest will be more gray. It’s just pinned over the top for now on the design board. That’s how I make sure my quilt backs are big enough.

I did manage to finish something this week, too. One of my Finish-Along goals for the first quarter of the year is to get at least 4 kennel quilts made using leftover parts (blocks, squares, etc) from the Parts Department. This is goal #11 on my list, which is HERE.

These kennel quilts measure between 12-15” on one side and between 15-20” on the other side. They are scrappy, combining the cat fabric parts with other scrappy leftovers from my stash. Kennel quilts are sewn simply (right sides together with batting, then turned and stitched closed. They’re topstitched around the perimeter (reduces bulk of the turned batting, gives it a finished look, and doubly secures the edges).

Then I quilt them very simply with a walking foot and a wavy stitch. These aren’t washed yet, but they will be before sending them off. The backings are pictured below. These four will get mailed off next week to one of the Nebraska pet shelters that is asking for help because of all the flooding. Must keep the rescued fur babies warm and comfortable!

So, that’s what I’ve been up to this week. What are you sewing? Will you be participating with Hands 2 Help? Do you do other charity sewing? I’d love to hear what you do!

Oh, one more thing..... I had the best day yesterday. One of our local quilt shops, Quilts, Etc., is having their annual March Madness sale yesterday and today. I have been looking forward to this since last year - it is absolutely the best sale of the year of any of our local quilt shops (and there are plenty). I got there 15 minutes before opening yesterday, and there was a line a block long already. Seriously. They had a room of $4.49/yard fabric and even a table of $2.99 fabric for charity quilts (I got some blue elephant fabric from that table). My treasures also included a couple dozen other pieces including a couple large cuts for backing, lots of basics, some pirate fabric and some giraffe fabric for donation quilts, AND the last of a bolt (less than 3 yards) of an ombre fabric (blue-green-yellow) from which I’d like to try some sort of forest or jungle or under-the-sea type quilt. I’ll have to think on that one!

Lots of Green Scraps Tamed

This week just flew by! The weather changed about every other day from rain to warm to snow to warm again. “Warm” is relative - in the forties (Fahrenheit). Nice enough to actually feel the sun and believe that spring is coming. There are a few spring bulbs poking their heads up, so I’m hopeful that Old Man Winter is on his last legs. Serves the old buzzard right!

It was fun to sew with green this week, and that’s about all I did in the studio. Cut scraps, press, sew. First up were the Anvil blocks. That third one down on the right looks like aqua, but it really is green. It’s much more clear when it’s up against blue. I haven’t decided about how to set them yet, but if the blocks are set in 4’s, I’ll have to see how that block plays. If the blocks are set randomly, it won’t matter. 

Next up was the nine-patch variation blocks. I am leaning toward sewing them together as they are shown here, although these are not sewn, just hanging around on the design board. I love these blocks!

And I’ve added a new block to the rotation - garlic knots. I’m using the same 2.5” squares as in the above blocks.  I made 12 of them. 

My Crumbcake blocks - those will be sewn next week - are almost finished. After green, there are only 7 little 6” blocks to sew. I’m thinking I’ll wrap that one up in April, so adding in the green garlic knots this week is good because I was drowning in green scraps. But I’ve got a couple ideas up my sleeve to whip the green scraps into submission! 

Also, I fixed the wonky patch in last week’s selvage block.  Much better 

Have a wonderful St. Patrick’s Day! Do you cook anything special or celebrate in any way? We don’t (but Bruce loves that Guinness beer is always on sale in March!!)

Linking up to Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

Dancing in September - IN OCTOBER

Hi friends! I hope you’ve had a lovely autumn weekend. For those of you impacted by Hurricane Michael in Florida, the Carolinas and other areas, I hope your experience was mild and that you and your families and belongings are all safe. How can anyone doubt that the climate is changing when these horrific storms occur now on such a regular basis? I hope you’re registered to vote and that you will give serious thought to supporting candidates whose heads are not buried in the sand on this issue. But enough said of that...... we’ve got scrappy business to attend to!

First out of the gate is my second quilt finish of the month. This one is a Rainbow Scrap project that I started a year or two ago. After showing the flimsy (in a post called Dancing in September, named after the Earth, Wind and Fire music I was listening to) and remarking how the piecing of it made me happy while I listed to music and danced in the September sunshine streaming in the studio (couldn’t resist the alliteration), my friend Louise suggested that I name the quilt Dancing in September. Thanks, Louise! Although it’s now October, may I present the finished Dancing in September.

Dancing in September finished at 65x73” and was quilted using a simple stipple. The backing is a great black and white windowpane fabric I got somewhere (Connecting Threads?) and the binding used up the last of a green print I had left over in my stash. I am so in love with this quilt!! It’s a keeper.

This is my OMG - One Monthly Goal - for October. Now that it’s done, I can link up to Patty’s Finish-up Linky Party at Elm Street Quilts.

It’s also Goal #1 on my 2018 Quarter 4 Finish-Along Goal List. YAY!! See the quarterly linky party here.

And last, but definitely not least, I’m linking up to Rainbow Scrap Saturday, because this was a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project. Today at Angela’s blog we’re having some serious October sharing’ O’ the green. Our color this month is medium to dark greens, plus dark neutrals. Sew ‘em if you got ‘em!

My plan this month is to get all my RSC green blocks sewn up as quickly as possible. Since this is the last month of color before we spend the last two months of the year completing our projects, I wanted to get those done and out of the way. I’m anxious to begin sewing all the RSC projects together!

So, here are the last four (of the 31 needed) birds for Birds in the Lattice. I hope to begin assembly of this quilt during this 4th quarter.

Next up were my Squared Away blocks. First, I made one additional green block from the March pattern (the top one in the picture below), then two blocks from the pattern Mari and Angela gave us for this month.

I got so excited about these now being done, that I put them up on the design wall. And sewed them together!  I even used my reject block (left column, middle blue one). It looks like I still have to add the 1” white stop border! This is next up to be basted and will finish at 56x56”.

Moving along with more green blocks, I sewed up my strings and ended up with 18 quarter log cabin blocks at 6.5” unfinished.

That brings my total of quarter logs up to 138. I only needed 120 for my original plan, so it looks as though I will be able to enlarge it! Another project that’s waiting in the wings for later this quarter.

And finally, I used my green crumbs to make eight 6.5” crumb blocks. For the project I have in mind, I will need this blocks in multiples of four. That means I’m good in the dark green department, but will have to review my other colors and add between 1-3 of several colors. That means this project, working title “Crumbcakes”, will carry over into 2019.

So, this coming week my goals are:
1.  Sew the borders on the Squared Away, and baste. Quilt and bind.
2.  Sew the California Poppies flimsy (already started, no picture today) and baste it.
3.  Sew the black and white checkered round to All You Need is Love.
4.  Sew the pink hearts round to All You Need is Love.
5.  Finish the plan for my rainbow scrap selvage blocks and pick a background fabric.
6.  Sew black and gray selvage squares for Item #5 if needed.

That should keep me busy!!

End of the Green

This is the last week for our green scraps at Rainbow Scrap Challenge. We will revisit green again later in the year - only then it will be the darker half of the green spectrum. For now, however, this is a recap of what I completed for March:

4 green Bird blocks (10.5”)
11 Quarter Log Cabin blocks (6.5”)
1 Geese Migration block (10.5”)
11 Selvage squares (6.5”)
2 Squared Away Sampler blocks (10.5”)
10 Crumb blocks (6.5”)
3 Linked Squares blocks (16.5”)

That’s a total of 42 blocks.

Additionally, I made and delivered 11 small kennel quilts to Best Friends Animal Society in Salt Lake City. They were my OMG (One Monthly Goal) for Patty at Elm Street Quilts’ program.

But let me show you what’s NEW this week in the finish department, OK?  Originally I planned to finish up my Plus blocks (a 2017 Rainbow Scrap Challenge project) into one large quilt. However, Alfalfa (Alfie) and Darla had other ideas.

Here is PAWSitivity I :

Pawsitivity One measures 48x63”. It’s quilted with vertical wavy lines. The backing is just some baby blue flannel. And it will be donated to a Hands2Help charity through Sarah’s blog  Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

Next up is Pawsitivity II :

Pawsitivity Two measures 58x64” and is quilted with basic stippling. This is such a happy quilt that I can’t bear to part with it! The backing is mostly a cute red floral, except where I had to fill in with the cute yellow floral border fabric. 

But remember that last week I had two other charity quilt finishes, plus a pink charity baby quilt I finished last October HERE, so I have 4 charity quilts to donate to Hands2Help so far. There may be more - I’m planning on it - as I am going to focus some of my time in April to finishing up a couple more. 

At the end of last month, I never gave a recap of my weight-loss efforts for February. And now that March is over, I’ll just combine it all as one. Basically, I’m right where I was at the beginning of February - literally, to the ounce. Down 35 pounds even. I’ve sort of been treading water. Hit a plateau, if you will. 

We went on vacation in February (too many margaritas) and I gained five pounds, but lost it within 10 days of being home. I’ve been walking several miles 3 times per week and biking the same 1-3 times per week as weather permits. I’ve lost inches and my clothes are looser.  Almost ready to go down another size. That’s a win in my book. And now with the weather warming up and great new spring produce appearing in the supermarket, I feel as though I’m ready for Round Two of this health regimen!