Holiday Weekend Progress

Lots of sewing went on over the Thanksgiving weekend.   Gotta love having 4 days in a row off.  =)

First project that I worked on was getting the remaining flying geese sections for the wedding quilt sewn.  I paper-pieced them so that I could make sure all were the same size.  I now have between 230 and 240 of them between both layouts for them (star points and pinwheel blades). 

All of them have been trimmed to size and the paper torn off of them.   I've started sewing the rectangle of background fabric to them and realized I still need to cut a bunch more in order to have enough......so digging thru the stash for different creams has begun as of this morning.  I'm using different "sets" of fabric on the points and the pinwheels to make it easier to make all fabrics in the blocks different.   I don't have as many different fabrics for the background as I do blues, so this helps me to keep from having the same fabric in adjoining blocks.

Next up was making the three remaining hat box blocks I needed to finish this quilt (the diagonal ones from lower left to upper right).   And then putting the top together.  Current size is approx. 48" by 66".  I'm debating about putting a border on it or just calling it good and quilting it as is.   this will most likely be sold, but might donate it.

I also worked on two little mug rugs, but don't have pics of those.

Gratitudes:
1. Three weeks till vacation

2. No argument on need for service calls for the house (electrical and a door problem) by management company, just waiting on calls now to have appts scheduled.

QuiltMaker's 100 Blocks Vol. 16 Blog Hop Winners

Thank you to everyone who took the time to enter the giveaways on my blog during the blog hop!

The three winners have been drawn and emails have been sent out to them telling them and asking for mailing addresses.   If I get no response from any of them, then I'll draw a another name and try again.

The three winners are:

       Tricia L - Rose Fabric and coordinates
       Karen T - Set of Green FQ's
       Nancy B - The copy of the magazine to be sent from QuiltMaker

Congrats everyone!


Gratitudes:
1.  For all those who take the time to read my blog.

2.  For all the blessings that I have in my life.

Moda & Aurifil Challenge Mini Quilt

I saw a challenge posted online that Moda Fabrics and Aurifil Threads were running this month in celebration of all that went on at Fall Market and the new fabric lines from Moda.   They blogged about it here.

the two main rules were - you had to use Moda Precuts and Aurifil thread to make a finished quilt, and the size was to have a perimeter between 40" and 100".

Well, there aren't a lot of challenges that I shy away from, and as it happened I had a few Moda precuts (alright, more than a few) that I hadn't done anything with since getting them one or another.  So I decided to challenge myself.    Well in looking at what I had, I realized why I hadn't done anything with them - most of them are not fabrics that I'd normally work with. 

However, challenging oneself occassionally is a good thing.   The one I decided to work with is called Botany.   And I pulled two Aurifil threads to work with - white for piecing and the variegated peach for quilting.

I decided to make 4 sawtooth stars blocks to form my quilt.  I used 5 different blues for the stars - the center for all four blockswas from on charm, and each block used another charm square to make the star points.  Two different fabrics were used to make the background of the blocks.  13 charm squares were used for the top.

Back of the quilt was made by sewing 9 more charms together in a nine-pach.   The binding used 6 more of the charm squares cut in half and then sewn together.

All total I used 28 out of 42 charm squares in the pack.

The peach Aurifil thread blended in with the peach in the blocks.   Finished size of the quilt is 12.5" square for a total perimeter of 50".   Now to decide what to do with this little quilt.

@modafabrics, @aurifilthread, #ModaAurifilMiniChallenge

Gratitudes:

1. Warmer weather today

2. Good thanksgiving service today at church and all of my friends there.

Progress and a new quilt

I've been able to get some quilting time in before work the last couple of days and have been making progress on getting flying geese units made. 

I've finished sewing 32 or sew flying geese, have 13 more that are pinned to the pp patterns and ready to sew, and approximately 90 more pieces of blue ready to sew (the pile in the back left). 

To have enough to finish the quilt though I'll still need to cut about 15-20 pieces of blues big enough for the geese.   And I know I'll need a bunch more blue cut for the star points.    Next up will be making a bunch of the flying geese that make the star points so that I square them up and then get more blocks put together. 

 And I'll also be starting a new and what has to be a quick project that has a due date.   Moda Fabrics and Aurifil thread are sponsoring a challenge for quilters to make a small quilt some where between 10" square to 26" square.  People are to use one of Moda's precuts and Aurifil thread to make it.  Entries are due before the end of the month.

I'm nuts, and I like a challenge, so I've decided to enter something for it.   As it happens I have a handful of Moda charm packs (among other precuts) and I decided on this one, and pulled these two Aurifil threads to use in making it.   Will use the white for piecing and the variegated peach for quilting it.    Finished mini quilt will be 12" square and there will be four 6" blocks in it.

Will be printing out my pp'd patterns and figuring out the size of cuts that I need to make today and will start work on it tonite after I get home.  =)

Gratitudes:

1. Only one month till I'm on vacation!  Oh wait, guess that means I should think about Christmas gifts....lol.

2. Being awake after a night where it was hard to sleep.

Scrap Happy 15th........

The next biggest scrappy project on my to-do list is this quilt.  Thankfully it is only 25 blocks that are 15" finished.   But then there is that pieced border.....lol......   This will be for my niece and her fiance and will be their wedding present.  It should finish out at 85" square.

The main colors in it will be assorted cream tonal fabrics for the background.   The stars and pinwheels will be scrappy blues, aquas, teals, and purples, with a touch of orange.

Here are the blues I've pulled to begin with all from the three 2 gallon bags of blue scraps in my stash.   I'm alternating between precutting the cream tonals and the blues/purples into the sizes needed for the quilts at this point. 

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This is the first block of 25.   15" finished size and uses 24 different fabrics in it.    There are three basic blocks in the quilt, all variations of this one (number of outer flying geese sections varies between them).

Anyone want to guess how many different fabrics will be in the finished quilt?


Gratitudes:

1. For my family

2. For a normal platelet (and not just my normal) count for the first time in 3 years

QuiltMaker's 100 Blocks, Vol. 16 - Heartbeat Block & Giveaways (now closed)

My work has taken me to a number of different states and towns within those states, much as a road trip when you go on vacation does.  I've been accused of being part gypsy because I've moved around so frequently, and in many ways my life has been a big road trip - a few yrs here, then a few years in the next place and so on.  I've enjoyed all of it (well, maybe not the 70-80 mph winds in the winter time in Wyoming) and have been privileged to make some good friends along the way. 

One stop of my life's road trip was spent teaching pre-engineering at a vocational school in a very small town in Wyoming.  While I didn't stay there for long because of circumstances, I was fortunate to make several very good friends at the school where I taught.  One of them, Barb (in the middle of the pic), is always on the go doing something - she is a nurse and works at the hospital, and she also teaches the CNA classes at the vocational school in where I taught engineering for 10 months.  The last several years her students have decorated the hallway leading to their classroom with garland that is shaped into the output of an EKG.   It was this display that the design for this block came from.


This is a shot of one of the sample blocks I made while testing the pattern.

I use red, white and blue fabrics to test my block patterns because then the blocks will always go together in quilts for injured veterans.













I've just set the blocks together, but with coloring reversed on alternate blocks so that the color bands flow across the quilt.   This quilt layout reminds me of the large cities where I've lived over the last 40 years of my road-tripping life - Phoenix, Boston, and the Dallas area.   All are busy cities with lots of buildings and traffic and the 'heartbeat' of the cities is very active and busy.

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Next up is a layout showing what can be done with the block when you play around with which sections of the block that you use.   This layout was designed to use a large scale print as the background and allows the maker to feature large sections in the solid white squares.

This layout reminds me of the slower pace of life in the towns of Lafayette and Fort Wayne.  Both are smaller than the big cities where I've spent so many years of my life, but I've made some really good friends in both of them.  And Lafayette is where I went to grad school at Purdue for my degree in education.   Both towns are unforgettable stops along the road trip of my life.

For this layout of a table runner, I played around with the sections of the block so that only one band of the color goes across the layout for a table runner or bed runner.  This simple layout reminds me of the time I spent in Wyoming and of living in the small town of Rawlins out in the middle of nowhere in I-80.     Again another unforgettable stop along the way of my road trip in life.

And finally, by once again using only part of the sections of the block, along with a few additional blocks made this 36" square table topper.    The additional blocks used in the setting were the 4 corner blocks (small green squares, small pink triangles, and large background squares), the green square in the middle of the quilt, and the pink/green rail fence blocks.  Fabrics for this all came from my stash.   I've named this one, "Heartbeat of a Friend" and it is in honor of all those that I've been privileged to call my friend over the course of my life's "road trip".

I hope you've been inspired by the sample layouts that this block allows you to make.  And I hope that the different layouts inspire you to experiment with the block and come up with a layout that makes you think of your "road trip" and friends.

And now for the giveaways to celebrate my 5th block published, the first giveaway is for a copy of the magazine QuiltMaker's 100 Blocks, volume 16.   This will be mailed out from QuiltMaker.  To enter use the rafflecopter widget below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And the second giveaway will have two winners - One person will win a lovely assortment including a 1 yard piece of a rose print, a FQ of the same print and three coordinates.   A second person will win a 4-FQ set of green prints from Benartex.  Enter through the rafflecopter widget below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Gratitudes:

1. For all those that keep me inspired to keep on designing.

2. For the inspiration that comes from friends and all that I see and do along this road-trip we call life.