Lew the Ewe #1

Short post with a few pics.  Just so excited to get this one - and in one day ( well, I loaded it onto Mo'e last night).

Meet Lew the Ewe #1.. he's #1 because I bought three of these panels in three different colors.. pink, blue and green.  I also bought the co-coordinating print for the green and pink panels.. couldn't find the blue at the time.  I'll do that one last and probably use some of the left overs from the first two.

that's it for today.... MAYBE I'll have something to share tomorrow; probably not, but it could happen.

take care...
STAY SAFE...
ttyl.......

Still on lockdown

It's not that much different than our daily lives ( hubby's and mine, that is) - other than three concerts that we were looking forward to have either been cancelled or postponed til October and I won't let hubby go grocery shopping with me now.  He's 82 with MANY medical problems and I don't want to risk it.

In the meantime, I've been busy and usually too tired at night to post on my blog, so tonight, you're going to get several days in a row... 

I'm still working on the flower petals for the quilt in the pic below.  Mine will be smaller... 4 rows across by 4 rows down.  I think I have enough petals for 10 flowers so still have more to do.

Then I got this bunny quilt by Elizabeth Hartman onto Mo'e and had about half of it quilted before we had several days of rain.  With all the moisture in the air, the arthritis in my back and legs told me that quilting would have to wait.

I think I need to have my friend, Katie, come over one day  (after we're off lock down) and help me figure out why the right side is lower than the left... it comes out even in the end ( when I trim before binding) so I haven't worried about it before... it was driving me nutz this time.

Back to the flower petals and centers again....

Then, while cleaning up my sewing room... well, I STARTED and did get quite a bit done, but it's still not clean.... anyway, I found this project from 2016.  Since I couldn't long arm, I decided to work on this... I thought I only had eight blocks left... yeah, eight blocks and thirty-six (36) applique'd circles... sigh.  And those piecing blocks aren't all easy peasy; the last one took me over an hour.  When completed, the quilt will measure 37" x 37", so you can see how small these blocks are... about 3" each.

This morning was cool but not that damp, so the bunny quilt was finished, washed and dried... and is being held up by my sweet hubby.  This is going to a little girl in St. Cloud, Mn. - one of these days.

The little girl would have been the older sister to the twin great granddaughters that we lost recently.  The quilt below was to go to one of the twins.  When I ordered the panels, I didn't know they were both girls so I ordered one in pink, one in blue and this one in green.  Now, I just want to quilt them and put them away.  I'm sure someone in the family will have a(nother) baby - and I'll be prepared.

It's going to sit there resting tonight.... I might be able to get to it tomorrow or it might have to wait til later in the week. 

So, that's what I've been up to.  I didn't want to make face masks like so many others are ( I don't know why, just didn't) but I did donate my elastic and bias tape collection to a gal here in town who is making the masks for medical personnel and some for the general public.

I'm going to sit back and relax for a few minutes before Buddy ( our dog) tells me it's time to go to bed so he can have his bedtime treat lol.

take care....
STAY SAFE...
ttyl....

Mandatory Lockdown - Day One

Ok, first off, I want to share what was on Mo'e for about two weeks... I was dreading going over all those pieces in the center; knew it was going to be bumpy.  Finally realized that all I needed to do was raise my foot just a couple of hairs.

Yesterday, as I was starting to clean up the leftovers from the above project and the Project Quilting 11.6 ( the one I forgot to link... sigh), I decided that I would make a mug rug for a quilting friend that I know loves purple ( she even 'threatened' to sneak over and steal the lapquilt shown above when I wasn't looking lol ).

So, today, I decided that I wanted to work on something more than I wanted to clean my sewing room.  As a kind of compromise, I used a bit of the fabrics that I had pulled for the PQ 11.6 project..
and it was going great until I sandwiched the top, batting and backing and proceeded to quilt on my domestic....
What you see is all four pages of the pattern stitched to the back of the quilt... sigh.... I know, it's not the first time, not even the second time I've done something like this.  I thought I was doing better... guess not.

Here's the project all done... and without the pattern papers on the back.  I stitched two white bone rings to the upper back so that it can be hung. 

Then, I decided that I really needed to get to working on the bunny quilt... have had it loaded for a couple of days, but couldn't decide what to do in the borders... at first I thought CARROTS, but then I realized that a carrot would be great for each of the four blank end blocks.  So, it was back to thinking... I finally gave up and decided to do the same pattern as I did for the PQ 11.6 project.  I like it... it may not be the best choice for this quilt, but it's for a 3 1/2 yr old little girl and I don't think  she's going to care.
I'm going to try and work on it a little more each day so that I can get it done and get something else loaded onto Mo'e. 

And, completely off the subject of quilting... I just have to share this photo that was taken by someone in our small town.... I know nothing about it... just that it looks like someone took the front half of an airplane and installed it onto a vehicle of some sort.

take care...
Stay Safe...
ttyl......

Project Quilting 11.6

Well, it's a good thing that I'm on EST because both my phone and my laptop are giving me problems putting photos onto my blog.  My project was done before noon my time, but it's been taking FOREVER to get the photos to post.

Anyway... here's my final project for the challenge... well, the first eight blocks anyway... those were done Monday.
Tuesday, I managed to get one done before having to take hubby into the E.R. because he thought he'd broken his hand somehow while napping in his recliner on Monday.  Turned out that he had cellulitis(?) .  After giving him a brace for his hand and a script for antibiotics, we were able to come back home ( after a stop at Walmart for script and some 'extras').  Later that day, I was able to make one more block.

I think it was Friday before I managed to get all the blocks and the borders done.

Yesterday was spent partly on piecing a backing...oh my, that's not going to work.  Geez, the pattern called for 1 5/8 yds for the backing and I was using 2 yards and still didn't have enough... good thing there were still some pieces left ... I've never had so many seams in a backing.

Oh yeah, when piecing strips together, make sure you're doing it right.  I was supposed to sew two ends together, NOT down the length; luckily, I caught myself before I even hit the halfway spot.

Before I could load the quilt onto Mo'e ( my mid arm), I had to finish the quilt that's been on since last month ( or maybe the month before)... just as I'm about ready to take it off the frame, I spot THIS....  ok, not that big of a spot, fix it now - don't wait.

Finally got the project quilt loaded onto Mo'e, basted along the two sides as far as I could without rolling and across the top then called it a night.  Oh yeah, I made the label, too.

Early this morning, I grabbed my tub of binding scraps and stitched about 7 1/2 yds together -- better more than not enough.  Then watched a couple youtube videos for an idea on what to quilt... Thank you Beth Maitland!!  And thank you to my quilting friend, Katie, for the cheering and encouragement - I really wasn't sure I was going to get this done in time.

Here it is being held by my hubby DONE DONE DONE!

It's called "Can You Find It?" and I found it in the May/June 2017 issue of Quiltmaker magazine.

Now, I have to go back and finish the little purple flower quilt ( shown above with 'eyelashes') and then work on my scrappy flower blocks while I try and clean up the piles of fabric I pulled out to do this challenge quilt.

Take care....

ttyl....

OH SHOOT!!  In my rush to get my blog posted, I completely forgot to link it over to Project Quilting.... oh well, at least the quilt is done ( it was on my 'one of these days' list).

Succumbed to the Squirrel

There's only so much sorting of scrap bins that one person can do without getting BORED... well, at least that's the case for me.  I've sorted out my blue scrap bin then my yellow/orange/gold one.

The result was listening to the 'squirrel'... there was a magazine open to a pattern that I thought... "Great! I can make this quilt and use up some more of the scraps"... and it did use SOME plus some yardage from my stash.

  I was so focused on making the blocks and then the sashing and borders that I failed to notice that I was supposed to use the border fabric for wide sashing along with the black w/ white dots.  It finished out at about 40"x 40" so still a good size for a baby quilt. -- In my defense I was also listening to/watching Last Tango in Halifax on Netflix.  

I'm happy with it.  Now, I need to make the binding and label before I fold it up so I can hang it on a hanger for my waiting in line rack.

Tomorrow, MAYBE I'll feel up to finishing the quilt that's been on Mo'e for two weeks.  I THINK I have an idea for the final Project Quilting challenge and I'll need to use Mo'e to finish it....

that's it for tonight...
take care....
ttyl....
STAY SAFE!

Sewing the blues away

Since I had the blue scrap bin out for the teal flower petals on Sunday night, I decided it was time to clean it out....

Yesterday morning, I grabbed my roll of adding machine tape and started stitching bits and pieces of blues to it....

by the end of the day I had these six rows done...

The three on the right are much longer than the two shorter ones.... I'd guess them to be about 40" long.

I was back at it today... toiling away....found these bar blocks left over from some project and decided to square them up and stitch them together....

and made a mug rug...

Oh LOOK! The bin is cleaned out.... but it took awhile.... sorted pieces into squares, string strips, other strips and some got tossed into the fabric 'trash'.

Here are the strips that are ready to be sewn onto more adding machine tape

and here's the rest... squares larger than 2 1/2" and wider strips.  Looks so much better....

 I also made another of the adding machine tape strips ( the third one that's longer )

I also found these wedges and decided to play and see what I came up with...

Not sure what I'm going to do with it.... probably find some white to cut into a wedge for each end and then make it into another mug rug.

Since I still have all those blue strings left, I will probably make a couple more strips tomorrow... I have a project in mind for them, but going to let the idea 'percolate' for a bit before I decide.

While all this sewing has been going on, I've been watching/listening to Anne with an E on Netflix.  I didn't think I'd like it, but I'm really getting into it.  It's been a lot more interesting than I thought it would be.

That's it for tonight...

take care....

ttyl.......

Productive weekend

Before I start 'talking' about this past weekend, I want to share my RSC 2020 for this month ( which I forgot to post about earlier)

I had to scramble around to find a scrap piece of teal, but I found one strip just wide enough to do the flowers and I grabbed some scrap greens for the leaves.  The pattern is this month's BOM for fatcatpatterns.com sew along.  I can't remember the name of it, but most months have cats on them.

Ok, after my little OOPS! in finishing the PQ 11.5 last week, I decided that Saturday I would just 'putter'... I have a small waste basket on the table by my sewing machine that I have been tossing scraps into; it was starting to overflow so it was definitely time to put them into something.

The blocks and the adding paper strip were what I came up with.  If the strips were too short to add to the string blocks, they went onto the adding machine tape.

Ok, enough of that... on to something else....

In a plastic tray ( similar to a kitty litter tray), under the table next to my sewing machine is a collection of Christmas fabrics... all less than a yard, I believe... along with a pattern for an Ugly Christmas sweater mug rug.  Everything, except for the felt I chose to put on the back ( you can see it's edges around the sweater) came from scraps.  This was a lot of fun to make and I can see myself making more throughout the year so that I'll have a small collection come Christmas time.  These sweaters are anything but ugly.  

The pattern is by Cynthia Staub of Quilt Doodle Designs.

Next up, another new to me project... this one using two fat quarters and some scrap batting.  It's called a 'Storage Pod' and I found it on www.fabriceditions.com.  This is a pic of it almost finished... all that needed doing was stitching 1/4" around the top and stitching closed the opening in the lining.  I think it turned out cute.... haven't the slightest idea what I'll use it for, but I like it well enough that I've picked out two more fat quarters to make another one.

All of the above was on Saturday.... on Sunday, came this....

I had some vintage strips that were given to me by a 'fabric fairy' at some point in time... they were pink with tiny hearts.  Since the strips were about 4" wide and quite long, I'm going to assume they were intended for a quilt border - why they weren't used is anyone's guess.  I trimmed them down to 2" strips and used them for sashing and inner borders.  Using the adding machine tape strips that I made the day before, and adding ones I'd done at earlier times, I was able to make the outer borders.  My vertical sashing strips didn't all line up like they were supposed to, but I honestly did try to line them up correctly. 

I had every intention of blogging last night, but I 'made the mistake' of going back into my sewing room... can't remember why, but I ended up making some more flower petals for the quilt pattern below.  I had started it last month and spent the guild's sew in weekend tracing all the petals and centers onto paper back fusible only to forget about the project once I got back home ( there's been a lot going on is my excuse).  Last night, I did the orange and the blue flower petals.  The orange was from a piece of yardage ( think it might have been 1/2 yard) instead of delving into the orange/yellow scrap bin - not what I intended, so I think I'll be going and getting into that o/y scrap bin to see if I can come up with enough to mix in with these orange petals and make two orange flowers. 

You can't see it in the photo but under that top blue flower petal are 9 other petals that are in the teal range- yes, I found some more...

And that's it for my productive weekend.... other than a little cleaning in my sewing room... emphasis on little because, of course, I kept getting distracted.

take care......
ttyl............

Project Quilting 11.5

When the challenge was announced, I had just finished this single basket... so, when I heard that we were to make something to give away, I thought I'd do the second basket as the challenge... 

 

I completed the second basket and decided that I could do better.  After working on a couple of other projects, Wednesday, I decided I'd do something else for the challenge... a cross wall hanging that I've been wanting to make for my oldest daughter. 

Well, this cross ended up being another PITA pattern for me.  It seemed so simple when looking at the cover picture with the pattern, but trust me, it wasn't as simple as that.

I had more of some strips than needed, some that were cut at the wrong size ( what the pattern called for) and the center pieces were supposed to be 6 1/2" x 6 1/2" on the top and 6 1/2" x 18 1/2" on the bottom BUT the directions told me to cut them at 4 1/2" x 16 1/2"!!  Well, no wonder some of the pieces didn't fit...... arghhhh

I finally had it figured out... using colored pencils and coloring strips on a paper graph helped a LOT.

Went to hang the fourth section (lower right) up and it was longer than the third (lower left).  I quickly calmed down and looked back at my chart... OOPS!  I had left off a strip at the top of the third section.  It was laying there right next to my machine, but so were other strips that I didn't even need.

I quickly added the strip and everything fit together like it was supposed to.

Because there's already a quilt on my mid-arm (Mo'e) and this is a smallish (29" x 36") quilt, I decided to quilt it on my DM... here it is all ready to go.

I just did stitch in the ditch around the green squares and rectangles and then went back and did some straight stitching following the 'lines' in the green pieces.  I love how it turned out ( the quilting part that is)

Got the label, hanging sleeve and binding on... hung it up on my design wall for a final photo......

and then realized that I had put the label and the hanging sleeve on the wrong ends!!!!  Sigh :( .  

Since they are both double stitched into the binding, I would have to take the binding completely off to correct it and that's not happening.  The next time I go over to Walmart, I'll look for some white 'bone' rings and sew one in each correct upper corner.  It's still going to my daughter and when I tell her what all was going on while I was doing this, she will understand.  ( We were expecting identical twin great granddaughters but got news this morning that the mother went into labor at 22? weeks and the twins won't make it & she's fighting an infection that could kill her.)

So, I've shut my sewing room down for at least today... I don't want to mess up another project.

take care....

ttyl....

Finally Finished!!

I'm afraid to look back to see just when this quilt was put onto "Mo'e"; I know it was there in December.... and there it sat, untouched, until last month.  

I don't know exactly what happened, but I was using black thread on the top and yellow in the bobbin and the tension was perfect... until I got to the second bobbin ( both magna glide prewound), then, no matter if I tried adjusting the bobbin or the top tension, little pin dots of yellow continued to show up on the quilt top... not ALL the time, but a majority of it.  That bobbin ran out and I inserted a third one... back to perfection again.... arghhhh.
After stitching all the black, I went back and then stitched with green thread on top and continued with yellow in the bobbin... lastly, was the yellow on top.  I'd pretty much run out of ideas as to what to stitch in the yellow.  It really needed to be tacked down but I didn't want it heavily quilted - and not barely quilted either... so, the only 'happy medium' I could decide on was to do a medium meander.
As soon as it was finished ( binding and label), I popped it in the washing machine and then dryer in the hopes that it would 'puff' up enough to hide those annoying yellow pin dots.  Sigh... it didn't. 
I entered it in our guild's quilt show which is coming up in a couple of weeks and it will show just as it is.  I've heard of some quilters who will use sharpie markers to cover up "Oopsies" like my yellow pin dots, but I'm not going to do it.  My son will probably inherit this quilt eventually and he won't care about them.

Soon after I got this off the frame, I loaded another one on... much smaller and one that shouldn't take as long to do... I have about half of the borders done, but I overdid it getting the last quilt finished and just don't feel I have the strength to stand long enough to work on it right now.  I'll get to it - maybe next week.

In the meantime, I've got some other projects started and finished and am working on my RSC today... had a hard time finding any teal fabrics, but finally found one strip - just enough.  And I've finally made up my mind about what to do for this week's Project Quilting challenge.. washed the fabrics and ironed all but one so I can get to it either today or tomorrow.

And, on that note, I'll say....

take care.....
ttyl......