My projects at the moment

In early May I only had two long term projects going, everything else was finished. One of those projects, Tiny Log Cabins, is done and now LOTS of other projects have been started.

I have 5 quilts in the to-be-quilted pile:

Irish Chain with Solids has a red border.

Magic Star now has a white border, added since this photo.

I purchased a kit for a small flannel quilt a few years ago at a shop going out of business. Pink Puppies was fast to put together.

I began making some monochromatic string squares a while back, using four squares in a block. This past week, I made more squares and put the blocks together. Colored Strings is a finished quilt top.

Missouri Star Quilt Company's Rhombus Gemstones was fun to make. I used a Grunge jelly roll, Bella white, and MSQC's rhombus large template.

 

I have three quilts that are long term projects - they have small pieces. I'm making a dent in the tiny scrap bin!

Little Squares is still in progress.

There is Easy Breezy that I think I called Easy Peasy before. I have about 30 blocks done.

I began Aspen which was inspired by Amanda Jean of Crazy Mom Quilts.

I'm also making a dent in slightly larger scraps. I started another Bonnie Hunter design, Basket Weave Strings, a few days ago.

I've been playing with Missouri Star's Circle Magic. I have a few 'blocks' finished.

I am still working with Christina Cameli's Pathway. Instead of the pillow that she demonstrated in the class, I am using the technique in a quilt.

I've also been knitting. I'm making Michelle Hunter's Building Blocks afghan and hoping to learn things along the way.

I also began a sweater for me - Petite Knit's Anker's Sweater.

And what would life be like without more masks?

Right now, I am enjoying making more than finishing so that's what I'll do! Who knows - there might be more starts before anything gets finished. A new pattern book is arriving today!

Note: Blogger still seems to have issues with font sizes so it is what it is.

Tiny Log Cabins quilt is finished!

I began working on some tiny log cabin blocks about a year ago. I think I had 64 blocks done when the pandemic began and finished the other 80 in the last few months. I found sewing them to be very therapeutic.

The 1" square center of each block is a white fabric with tiny red squares. The block finished at 4" square. For the light side of the blocks, my criteria was white, beige, or soft colors. For the dark side, I wanted bright colors. Once in a while, a piece of fabric was used on both a light side and a dark side - that's character, right? Tiny Log Cabins did make a dent in my tiny scraps. Yay!

I decided the quilt needed borders and auditioned different colors. Everything I tried looked good but I liked this red the best.

This donation quilt is 58" square. 

The finished top sat for quite a while because I couldn't decide how to quilt it. I've always wanted to do a giant spiral on a quilt so when I saw a photo online showing an off-kilter quilted spiral, it hit me that this would be a good time to try one. 

My spiral is centered - I thought it needed to be with the design of the quilt. I used my new echo quilting foot and free-motion quilting for the entire spiral. Using the foot was a bit of a learning curve and I had lots of problem on the center of the spiral. When I finally got the foot adjusted correctly, things went much better. I think I mentioned that I'd probably never do another one but then I looked at the finished quilt and decided I might! I used Aurifil #2600 Dove Gray 40-wt thread to quilt this and Aurifil #2600 Dove Gray 50-wt thread in the bobbin. 

The back is a blue with small, blended white spots. The binding is a striped fabric from my stash.

Not much else is new around here. I'm still dehydrating and freezing produce although it's winding down. I still plan to find and preserve potatoes, apples, and pears. These pictures show the last of the tomatoes, corn, and beans.

I'm still making masks but not in huge numbers.

We did order a new fireplace for our patio. Last Monday, Ray and I put it together. 

I think S'mores are on the agenda for later this evening.

A Quilting Finish

Things got busy around here this week but I have a finish! The teal, green, orange and yellow quilt is done. 

I saw a picture of a quilt that I liked a couple of years or more ago and printed it. I couldn't find any information about who designed the quilt or if there was a pattern and I still haven't. Here's the picture.

I used a little math, redesigned a little bit and made my quilt using scraps. The center of the original quilt looks like it was pieced. I found a piece of fabric in my stash that had the four colors I wanted in the quilt so I used that. The quilt is flat but I didn't smooth it out on the 'bumpy' grass. 

I machine quilted this with a large meandering stitch and Aurifil #2600 Dove 40-weight thread. It's seems like a long time since I did any machine quilting and I really enjoyed it. 

The back is similar to an orange grunge I was going to use the same backing fabric for the binding but I liked the black and white in the original picture so I used a black and white stripe. 

This quilt has been added to the donation pile.

I'm still keeping busy taking care of produce - dehydrating, freezing, and eating! 

Our Illinois grandsons visited for three enjoyable days this last week. The older one was here for two days and used the Cricut to cut a piece for the guitar he is making/building. He also made waffles for us! We played Farkel and he helped me perfect and sew his mask pattern. 

The other two boys made S-mores cookies with the 6-year-old doing all of the measuring and breaking the egg while the 10-year-old did all of the mixing. They both worked on making and rolling the dough balls in graham cracker crumbs and preparing maybe eating the marshmallows and Hershey kisses. They also sewed scraps together while I was perfecting their mask patterns. One had a chain of scraps 53 1/3 feet long. He measured it and wrote down the length - important stuff! Later he pulled out the slip of paper to accurately tell his parents about his accomplishment. The 6-year old with a little guidance from Grandpa sewed most of his strips side by side and ended up with a nice, large rectangle of strips. We played Double Ditto a new game that we all enjoyed and Frisbee. That evening we had a picnic and were able to play miniature golf on our way back to their home. In a perfect world our other grandchildren  would live close enough to come visit for a day or more every so often. 

The mask making is picking up again because all of the grandchildren will need them for school. I am making custom fitted masks for each of the kids and they are choosing fabrics. Here are some of the latest.

Each of the masks will end up with elastic or lycra for the ears or with elastic or lycra around the back of the head. No one wants ties which I understand because I don't like ties either. The kids will each decide which mask has what.

And... today I emptied the sewing machine room. New shelves are being installed tomorrow and that room will be in order and clean by tomorrow night. 

Sunflowers, quilting, and more

Does anyone else find it hard to blog these days? Life goes on but we don't have much excitement - maybe that's good! 

Last week we went to a sunflower maze at Straddle Creek Gardens in Lanark, Illinois. This is Ray's picture of the entrance to the maze.

There were just a few people there, early on a gorgeous day. The 'maze' was really a walk through the sunflowers. 

Whenever there was a fork in the path, a question was posted. Depending on your answer, you went right or left. We pursued all wrong paths and all right paths. 

The wrong paths were very short, maybe 20-40' in length and worked great if a group was coming; they could pass without being near us.

I've been playing with some Magic Star blocks. Joy of The Joyful Quilter fame shared a tutorial last March. Using two 10" squares, I quickly and easily made these two 9" blocks.

I had a plain orange layer cake and decided to use it with white. I played with a variety of layouts and settled on this one. 

I think I'll add a small white border and put this top in the to-be-pinned pile.

I don't have any quilt finishes but I have other finishes. First, I'll share the first Jesse Masks for DS1 and his family. The picture was snapped before I added ear/around the head straps. School is coming and kids need masks. These are custom-made according to each person's face measurements. Measuring and fitting long distance has been interesting. We'll know this week if the masks fit.

I finished this cotton/silk sweater for me. It is extremely comfortable and feels nice even in hot weather.

I also knit this hat from some leftover yarn I had. I'm not sure who will end up with it; I need to keep my hands busy so I made it.

Hopefully I'll have a finished quilt to share in a few days. Have a great day! 

#StaySafe #WashYourHands #KeepYourDistance #WearYourMask 

An update and a finished table runner

A couple of weeks ago, a 'local' quilt shop had an online demo for making slab quilt blocks. I have done this before and decided it was a good activity for me right now. I decided that all of my pieces would be squares or rectangles, something I have never done. 

After making four large slabs, I decided that I would not have enough scraps of this color to make a quilt and I really didn't want to cut into yardage. Then it occurred to me that I needed to make a table runner for a new piece of furniture. 

The color was perfect and I had plenty of scraps to make the 23" by 63" runner. I free-motion quilted this with the open paisley motif. The paisley motif is a favorite of mine and I was anxious to try open paisley. I used 40-weight, Aurifil #2600 Dove gray thread.

The front of the quilt uses batiks with a gray grunge for the sashing and border. The backing and the binding are a cotton from my stash. I'm not a purist and have no problem mixing batiks and regular cottons.

Now the quilt resides in its intended place. The batiks pick up the colors in the wall hanging, an old church window.

Another view.

And one last close up showing the quilting.

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Other than quilting...

I've made just 5 masks since I last posted! I think we have 12 masks in our inventory at the moment. I leave the elastic loosely knotted on the masks until the new owner adjusts it. They can then move the knot into the casing. I don't know if we are done making masks but it is nice not to be making masks or waiting for supplies on a daily basis.

Ray and I made 2 fleece blankets. We have a young friend, Brynn. Every year she has a day for her friends to meet and make blankets. Then Brynn takes them to UW Children's Hospital in Madison, Wisconsin. Brynn has spent a lot of time as a patient in this hospital and enjoys donating the blankets. This year we aren't gathering together; we need to make them on our own and get them to Brynn.

And we've been cleaning. Yuck! Well, it needed to be done. Every closet, cupboard, bookcase, file cabinet, piece of furniture, every nook and cranny on the main floor of our house is getting cleaned. I think about 2 more hours and this will be done! The upstairs of our home is my studio - all 3 rooms. They get cleaned often and the four huge dormer closets get done every few years so we'll pass on the upstairs. The basement is on my list but we'll take at least a week off before beginning. 

I hope you have a good weekend.

#staysafe #washyourhands #wearyourmask #bekind