Steady on - future could be bumpy

Ok  finished the Sticks and Stones quilt top yesterday morning.  What a - not sure what to call it - I like it, but I'm disappointed that I couldn't do it like Jenny Doans did in her video ( with blocks alternating between vertical and horizontal).

It's not a very good pic... will try to get a better one once it's quilted.  It was really quite a pain to do but only because the 2 1/2" precut strips were not all 2 1/2"... a couple of the purple strips were 2 1/4" and a few  other strips were only about 2 3/8".  Of course, that made it hard to match them up with the white 2 1/2" squares and that's also why I couldn't alternate vertical/horizontal... when I did try it, the horizontal blocks were 3/4" too short - and that was with VERY SCANT 1/4" seams.
Right now, I'm thinking that I was to quilt it with feathers in the diagonal.  Not sure what I want to do on the borders.  You probably can't tell from this bad pic, but part of each border strip is solid white fabric while the rest of each strip is done piano-key style with pieces cut from the remainder of the precut strips.

So, after I finished that, I decided to work on a UFO and pulled out the second garden quilt that I started sometime last year.  Here's the first one  (again, not a great pic)... top is finished and waiting to be quilted.

 The first time, it went together pretty easy; this time, not so easy.  In the lower right side of the pic, you can kind of see the Ohio star corner block.  ( Ignore the green print - it's not part of the quilt)  I started making them for the second quilt last night and it wasn't coming out right... needs to be 8 1/2" x 8 1/2" square. For some reason, the center square was off by at least a half inch.  So, I took it apart, made new center blocks cutting them at 3" instead of 2 1/2" and then cutting it down once I had the four together and that worked.  Only one completed last night, so have three more to do today along with doing the 'checkerboard' border before I can finish assembling the top.

I really like this pattern... I did do it a little different than usual ( and called for in the pattern directions); I used fusible for the shovel ( top border) on both quilts, but then decided that I didn't want the stiffness that comes with using fusibles so I cut out the fabric shapes and glued them down before stitching.  I was able to try out a few different stitches to applique the shapes and even did some bobbin work using Ricky Timm's Razzle Dazzle threads.  Before I put the tops onto Mo'e for . quilting, there are tiny buttons to hand stitch on.  I thought I would add them after quilting, but they are so small that I should be able to sew them on before quilting and quilt around them.


I also took a few minutes to trim some strip blocks for the Strips for Siren quilts that I've been encouraging guild members to make prior to next month's sew in when I hope we can join them together and make at least two quilts for our local homeless shelter.


This weekend, about 1/2 our guild members will be going up north for quilt retreat.  I am not one of them.  I'll stay home and have a 'quilt retreat' of my own.  Once I get the garden top done, I'm going to pull out the San Antonio Star by Bonnie Hunter and see if I can get that top finished... I have flying geese for the border to finish and have at least two orange sections to  sew on between the star 'arms'.  I can't remember how many flying geese are required, but  it's something like 280.  Thank goodness, most of them are done.