Monday

Go to Small Quilts and Doll Quilts to see what others are up to.

On my wall...

The 365 Challenge.

Over the past few days I have been working on the center Medallion borders and corners.

This is Border 2.

I did not care for the way Border 2 looked so I redid it with different fabrics. 

Here is the center Medallion with all 4 Borders and Corners.

I am going to replace the lower right corner with another 6 inch block. This one doesn't seem to fit well since it is blue and cream only and the other 3 corners have brown and/or red in them. I will be mindful of fabric selection when making 6 inch blocks so that one will fit in this spot better.

I have also been re-organizing my 'stuff'. 

So many projects!

 

Everything on the quilt frame went back into the pie safe, plus a few more projects.

Starting at the top left - tub of fabrics and batting for Bowl Buddies, fuzzy backing piece, stacks of black, gray, practice sheets, and white.

2nd shelf - 6 projects, including the Quilter's Exchange from this year and last year.

3rd shelf - stacks of white and off-white background fabrics, fabrics for 3 baby quilts.

4th shelf - binder totes with filed papers, big boy (man) quilt FQs, flannel exchange FQs and binders with knitting and quilting patterns/ideas.

The binders are getting overfilled so I bought another binder today to help with that.

More projects in this cube. The bottom box on the left holds Civil War Repro fabrics. The box on top of it holds fabrics and towels to make some kitchen/tea towels. On top of that is a photo album I plan to cover as a fair project. I will use it to store photos of the quilts I make. And, on top of that are pages and cut fabrics for the 365 Challenge.

So many projects, so little time.

Since my brother's passing I have been more mindful of taking walks around my yard to enjoy the flowers and critters. He was interested in conservation and protecting the bee population. He and his wife had moved to a 22 acre spot in the country. He had planted 2 areas with wildflowers native to his area. He had bee hives, chickens, ducks and turkeys. He was planning on getting some goats and possibly a cow. 

So everyday I take a walk around my yard, fill the butterfly and hummingbird feeders 

and just look at nature.

Here are some of the things I have seen lately.

Lilies - they grow wild in the ditches up around here, but I have some in my yard.

Yellow Lily

Clustered Bellflower

Yellow Siberian Lily

Butterfly Feeder surrounded by Milkweed

Rose and Clustered Bellflower. Look closely at the dead rose stem on the left.

Butterfly just emerging from cocoon.

Clematis

Columbine and Hostas

My Heart is Broken...

On Friday, May 26 my youngest brother was killed in traffic accident. He was on his way home from work, riding his motorcycle, when a young woman driving a van pulled into his lane to pass a semi truck and hit him head-on. It is thought that he died instantly. He was a wonderful man, husband, father. He was my son's hunting buddy, more like a brother than an uncle. He was active in his community - retired after 25 years as a security officer at the university in the town his family currently lives in, 17 years as a part-time police officer in the town they lived in before moving, active in other police work and training, Habitat for Humanity volunteer, Stride coach (mentoring youth), Conservationist of the Year last year in his county, active in Pheasants Forever and National Wild Turkey Federation, among other things.

He has given so much of himself to others. He loved life, had a great positive attitude, and treated every one with respect, even in difficult situations. At his visitation there were several young people there who he had had contact with when they were in college. They said he changed their lives for the better. I always knew he was a wonderful guy, but I did not realize how many people he had touched with his good deeds and positive attitude until I began hearing their stories.

My niece posted this on her Facebook page. Please read it and do any of these things you are able.

Everyone keeps asking my mom and I if there's anything they can do for us. Neither of us can ever think of anything. Lying here trying to sleep I finally thought of a few requests:
1) Be patient and attentive while driving
2) Do not pass unless you're 100% sure
3) Teach your children to count motorcycles
4) Go find your dad and give him a hug
5) Never leave your loved ones without a hug
6) If you love someone, tell them often
7) Do not litter, recycle if you can
8) Plant a tree if you can
9) Be kind, always
10) Find humor wherever you can
11) Tell people about Pappy (the nickname given to him by his co-workers when he attended a meeting in his overalls)

He will be greatly missed.

Levi and Mike hunting

 My son Levi, on the left, with his Uncle Mike.

He was a safe rider and was wearing his helmet and safety gear. He taught motorcycle safety courses.

I am concerned for the young woman who hit him. This is a memory she will have for the rest of her life.

Neexxttt....

This one is for a teaching co-worker who retired. It was a big project to take on at the time and those of us involved thought we had an extra year, but she decided to retire a year earlier than planned. What?!?!
It has taken a long time to get the blocks from her friends and family. As a result, I kept pushing other projects (for other people) in front of it. Now we have all the blocks and the top is pieced. Some blocks are pieced, some appliqued, some made with fabric markers and/or paint, some are embroidered by machine, some embroidered by hand, some have special elements like sequins or beads or trapunto-like stuffing, some printed on special fabric for ink jet printers. The blocks that are printed on fabric (Colorfast fabric sheets for ink jet printers) are stiff and any stitching holes remain - so no mistakes!
I had decided simple quilting in just the sashing and borders would be best so that the blocks would stand on their own and the special elements would not be disturbed.
I was going to machine quilt it on the frame - easy, fast. HA.
I had not gone far when I realized that would not work - or at least not look well when finished. The stiffer blocks were bunching up and there was going to be puckering on the back.
Off the frame it came, stitching removed and it is now on my floor frame and I am hand quilting in the ditch around each block and will quilt around some elements in each individual block.

I have quilted around Curious George's kite, the heart in the block above George, and a line in the music in the block above that. I am also quilting an X in the corner stones.

 This is my block. It represents her love of children and country. At some point in her day her class sang songs, often patriotic ones.

This is the center panel before it was completed. She often said "Kindergarten is, you know, the garden where the kinder grow". The flowers at the bottom are thumb prints of the students who were in kindergarten her final year. The sun and clouds are thumb prints of students she taught in 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade her final year.

I think she will love it, but I need to go work on it and get it finished.

Monday...

...again. I don't know how the weeks get away from me, but they do.

I have been busy!

I worked my way through a pile of mending - patching jeans, a couple of lines of stitching in my quilt apron to make a smaller pocket for the seam ripper, taking up 3 shirts so they fit better in the underarm area. Seems I don't have quite enough to fill in the top part of most shirts when I buy the size that fits my middle parts making them gap in that area.

And, then there is the quilting.

I finished this T-shirt quilt for my co-worker. Her daughter is graduating high school this year.

My co-worker loved it! 

Then I decided to work on the 365 Challenge. The challenge is going again this year and most of the blocks are the same. But, I am so far behind I am being lapped. 

This is the unit for April 1st - 2016.

Not this year's, LAST year's. Oh, well. I really think I want to finish this. 

It just might take me ... forever.

I like to cut pieces for 10 days at a time. 

I find it easier to pick up a day and make a block quickly.

 

I think part of the reason I am struggling with this project is that for some of the blocks 

I chose fabric that doesn't have enough contrast. I plan to remake them.

Quilt Retreat was 2 weeks ago, but I failed to take photos of what 

I did there so I will save that for another post.

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