TheNext Project...

... is this.

My friend's mother made this little lap-size quilt for her great niece. She wanted something simple so I helped her figure out a simple 5 inch square layout and then figured the yardage. My friend took her to Joann's to pick out the fabrics. I cut the squares and border pieces. She sewed the squares and border. She did not use 1/4 inch seam allowance. She did not use the same size seam throughout so this quilt is a little wonky. I am sure the great niece will not care, she is 7 months old.

The top is quilting cottons in yellows, greens, blues and red ( the red shows pink, I could not get the colors to adjust). The back is Minkee - a bright fuchsia pink. The binding is a medium mottled blue flannel.

The quilting is almost half finished, then I do the binding. I hope to have this finished and delivered by the end of the week.

I worked a little more on the Christmas paper piecing. I think I will be putting this away for awhile since I have other projects that have deadlines.

I think I need a border of some sort between the center block and the trees,but I am not sure what. I will think about that when I pull it out again.

Quilter's Exchange Blocks

I am trying to organize my Pinterest Boards and I don't think I have posted all of the blocks that I have made so far so here goes.
We are all using Johnny Around the Corner as the frame and our own 6 inch blocks in the center. I chose Dancing Shoofly.

 

January

 

February

The block on the right is mine.

The block on the left is call Crystal. The maker has since changed her block 

as she found this one too difficult and time consuming to make. 

 

March

 

 

April

 

 

May

 

June

 

July

 

 

August

 

 

September

 

October

 

 

 November

 

We decided to skip December since our meeting day fell on Christmas Eve,

so this is the for the January exchange.

There are 16 of us participating so we are nearing the end; only 3 more to go.

 

Paper Piecing

I like to paper piece. I hate to throw away the little scraps I end up with from projects, especially batiks. Paper piecing, especially small blocks, works well to use those small scraps.
I have been printing out these paper piecing blocks from Block of the Day. Here is a link to today's block. You have to sign up. Every day a link to a new block is emailed. You have until the end of the month to print the block. I have been printing them for just over a year now and some of the blocks are repeats. I am slowly piecing them.

 I am making another angel for the upper left and will fill in with the dark blue 'sky'.

There is a block for Mary and Joseph. I may not end up using them because I think they are in the manger with Baby Jesus. :)
There are more cabin and tree blocks.
There are more ornament blocks.
There is a block for a snowman and a candle.

Right now I am thinking the manger as the center with angels above and Mary and Joseph under. Then some sort of border. Then the cabins and trees as a border around the center. Then another border, then the ornaments around. I am not sure the ornaments fit in but we will see.

Or, maybe the ornaments and Santa need to be a separate project.

I am also working on the Pat Sloan 182-Day Solstice Challenge which you can find here.
The challenge is on block 2.
Here are mine so far. I am using Civil War fabric scraps from my stash.

On the right is Block 1 - Churn Dash.
On the left is Block 2 - Day Into Night.

On My Wall

Visit Judy's page here to see what other quilters are working on.

I am working on this t-shirt quilt.

It's another big one - close to100 inches all around. I need to sew on the top and bottom borders then it is ready to quilt.

My goal this year is to finish up UFOs. I have a lot. I stopped counting because I found that to be depressing. I seem to always put other people's projects before my own. Right now I have this T-shirt quilt, 2 more T-shirt quilts to make and quilt, a top that needs quilted, and a retirement quilt to construct and quilt. The retirement quilt has been in the works for a while, but I was waiting for everyone to send me their blocks. While I was waiting I pushed the other projects in front of it. Now I have all the blocks I can proceed with figuring out a layout.

I got interested in Pinterest a few years ago. I started out with a few boards. As I added more and more pins I created more boards trying to keep things organized, especially the quilt ones. I now have 81 boards. The biggest board has 105 pins. It is food pins and I have started new food boards so I can better organize them so I can better find what I am looking for. I know that may not be a lot, compared to some boards I have seen, but I find it easier to find pins if there are not a lot of pins on a board.

Last year I started a board for things I want to try soon - 2016 Pins to Try. Last night I went through and deleted pins I was no longer interested in, moved some to specific boards and what was left went into a new board - 2017 Pins to Try. I then deleted the 2016 Board. Some of the pins are multiples of an idea, some are techniques I want to try, some would make great gifts. There are currently 58 pins on that board. Right now if I tried one a week I would have them finished by this time next year. I know I will add more, but I think that is a good goal. And, it sounds doable, until I remember I go back to work on Jan. 2 and all my energy gets zapped by the end of the day. But, then there is summer break and I have more free time. Until I agree to do another project for someone. But, I am getting better at saying no. I have been telling people I am not taking any more projects until summer 2018 and then I refer them to another quilty person I know. I figure if they don't want to wait that long, it's ok.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas with friends and family and that you have a great New Year!

Nothing To Do

Because I have nothing else to do (hysterical laughing) I have made this...

...from Pat Sloan - One Hundred Eighty-Two Day Solstice Challenge.

I have a small stash (it fits in a box so it is small, right?) of Civil War fabrics from the Civil War Sampler. The blocks are done, but put away while I worked on THE QUILT.

And, this quilt, Old Crow.

I seemed to pick up fat quarters whenever I saw one I liked. Now I need to use them up.
I think this project will be a good way to use them up.

Done and Delivered

This quilt has been delivered to the owner. He seemed very happy with it. He said his wife will love it.

Then, he told me they are moving. They will still be in the area, will still have the animals. And, the barn looks a lot like this one. They won't have the orchard, though.

I am very happy to be finished with this project. I enjoyed working on it...most of the time. Searching for just the right fabrics and patterns. Putting it all together was like working a puzzle. Machine quilting it was a challenge on my frame. I have a Mega Quilter with a 9" throat and I knew I would be lucky to not have turn it, but I did get lucky. I hand quilted the details of the barn. The animals have button eyes.

I did not have enough of the fabric I planned to use for the fence. But when searching for it on-line I found something that I like even better. I wanted to use the same blue for the binding that I used for the hourglass blocks on the sides so I ordered more. I did have enough. I realized two things as I was loading it on the frame - 1)he batting I had was not wide enough and I didn't want to piece the batting. 2) I didn't have enough of the thread I wanted to use for quilting.  Time lost while I waited for those to be delivered.

I grew tired of working on it, but loved it when it was finished. I was kind of sad to see it go, but I hope his wife and family love it.

He has promised me a picture of his family with the quilt.

Design Wall Monday

 

Nothing on my wall...

... but I did put the final stitch in this quilt today.

These pictures are when it was on the frame being quilted.

And, after quilting.

There is another row of hens on the other side of the quilt with a nest of eggs in the bottom nest.

There is a sun star at the top right corner that doesn't show in the picture.

Also, under the fence where the pigs 

are is a row of green and gold 'fields'. 

It is made in the same manner as 

the 'sky' at the top.

It's big. It more than covers my king-size bed. I have no place in my home big enough to get a full picture of it.

My plan had been to take it to school and ask the the secretary's two sons to hold it so I could get a better picture. Problem with that plan is that school has been cancelled yesterday, and again tomorrow, because of poor road conditions. It is so cold in my part of the country that salting the roads is ineffective. The roads are basically skating rinks.

I don't want to wait too much longer to let the guy know his quilt is finished, so hopefully I can get decent pictures on Wednesday.

While working on this quilt I discovered that I most likely did not have enough of the fabric I planned to use for the binding so I ordered more. And, oh wait, I don't have enough thread either!

While I was waiting for those items to shipped I quilted this little quilt for one of my quilt friends.

 She made it as a block of the month at a local quilt shop that is now closed. The fabrics are much prettier than this picture shows.

And, I made some bowl buddies.

This one is for a co-worker who is a Cubs fan and her daughter attends the University of Illinois. Cubs fabric was a little hard to find. I finally found some from an on-line shop but it sold out before they processed my order. Then I found it quite by accident in the local Wal-Mart, so I got 2 yards. And, it is wider than 45 inches.

 These are for a co-worker to give as gifts. She has fleece blankets in these colors that she is giving as part of the gift.

In the midst of all of this, my mother-in-law left this world. I am at peace with this. She was not the person she was before her fall/broken hip/stroke 3 years ago. Her suffering had increased the last few months so I am certain she is now pain free and enjoying being reunited with her friends and family who were waiting for her in heaven.

I have always said that sewing/quilting and knitting are my therapy. I even more thankful now to be able to do those things.

THE Quilt

Work continues on THE QUILT...
I have enjoyed making all the different animals and units for this quilt. I have not enjoyed as much the making it all fit together part.

The barn center with sawtooth border.

The flag, orchard, sun, turkeys and hearts. This ended up getting put together differently than pictured here. You can also see some of the chickens.

Chickens, pigs and barn. I have had to add extra blocks to make it all fit together. This has been fun, but time consuming, trying to figure out what size to make. I think I have taken most seams out at least once. The green and gold strip hanging from the ironing board are the fields that go at the bottom. There is a similar strip of blue sky at the top.

Today after getting the pigs, fence and fields units added I realized the quilt is 106 inches long. That is as long as I want it to be to be able to quilt it on my frame. It measures 85 inches wide. I want it wider than that. I will be adding borders to the sides only and using the fields and sky as the top and bottom borders.

A nest of eggs to represent future grandchildren.

I have a red fabric that I really like and had planned to use in the final borders, but it just does not go well with the reds in the barn and chicken blocks. I plan to possibly extend the sky and fields strips after adding the hourglass borders. I am thinking I might like that look better than extended the hourglass borders top to bottom. I am hoping to bind it in the blue.

The blue in the hourglass blocks is the same shade as the blue in the pinwheel blocks even though it shows up darker in this photo.

I am excited to be almost finished with piecing this top. I think the quilting will take much longer than I anticipate - it usually does.

I have enjoyed this quilt, but I will be glad to get it finished.

Design Wall Monday

to see what others are working on go to Judy's page.

On my wall is this...

I am constructing the barn for the quilt I have been asked to make. I have been putting this off and couldn't figure out why because I have really enjoyed making the other blocks. I think it may be because I am trying to make it too detailed. This is the last major thing I have to make before I can start putting it all together.

I had some issues with my machine when I was finishing up the turkey blocks -  kept getting a foot control warning, skipped stitches when doing the buttonhole applique stitch, thread breaking. I rethreaded, changed thread, bobbin and needle and still had the same issues. So, it went in for service. The repair guy didn't find anything wrong with it except that it needed a good cleaning. That is good! And, it has worked well since I brought it home, but I have not tried any applique stitches yet.

I am wondering if the frequent stopping and starting to turn the piece when appliqueing caused the foot control to be confused or overheat or something. Also, wondering if the fusible web may have caused the skipped stitches. I used Steam-A-Seam 11 Lite, something I have never had a problem with before. But, they took it off the market for a short time and brought it back. I wonder if it is made differently and might cause an issue?

You can stop reading now if you don't want to see my little rant.
I'm tired.
I HATE when this happens:

It seems that I am the only one who can change empty paper tubes. This one is in the garage but it happens in the kitchen and bathroom, too.

This also happens with the laundry, dishwasher and recycling/garbage bins. I have let these things go for days to see if someone else will take care of it... nope. I can give my husband a bit of a break this time of year because he is very busy farming - sunup until sundown. My son, no excuse.

Late to the Party..

Seems that since school/work started back up again, I am always late posting for Design Wall Monday.

Anyway...
... here is what I have been working on.

This is the bag I received in the latest exchange for the Quilters Exchange group I am in. Pretty Christmas-y colors without being just for Christmas.

This is my block. I have had a lot of fun making my block for each exchange. I usually try to fussy-cut that center square. It ends up finished size of 1inch so sometimes it is hard, but this flower was perfect!

I have also been working on the farm quilt. This is the flag that will go in it. I like the looks of this, but I am concerned that the white background of the star will disappear when it is pieced into the quilt... unless I do something different. Like, sash the flag with something, but what?

Or, instead of a pieced star, just a square from the blue with white stars fabric. But, then I feel like it needs a few more red and white stripes at the bottom. Either way, I think it needs another white and 2 more red stripes at the bottom.

The little hexie flower you see was a free hand-out at the quilt show I attended a couple of weeks ago. The kit included hexie papers and fabric squares along with directions. I got it stitched up in an evening. I like the fabric that was included in the kit. It is a cute little hexie block, but now I don't know what to do with it.

It measures 4 inches. The kit suggested appliqueing the hexie block to a 5 inch square and making it into a pin cushion. I don't need another pin cushion and I don't know any else who does either. Hhhmmm.