2017 UFO Challenge Update

Judy at Patchwork Times is doing her 2017 UFO Challenge 

and I'm playing along.

I'm not a great player but I'm trying.

Last month she chose # 11 which is my Scrappy Stars.

I had a bunch of 3" string blocks and crumb blocks so I got busy.

I saw a quilt Bonnie was working on and I loved her stars so I made mine like hers. 

My quilt top is a cuddle quilt,not bed size.

I'm pretty anxious to quilt this one.

I had all the blocks complete before retreat.

I thought it would be fun to show Bonnie how I was setting my blocks.

I haven't seen her finished quilt.

I just know that this is as far as I'm going with mine.

Daisy tested and approved. 

Now I can get  out June's UFO and get busy with that.

I have 6 complete blocks and parts for several more.

This is UFO #7,

Deli Geese Project, a free design from Pat Speth of Nickel Quilts.

I started March 2014

If you search her archives. these are still available.

(While going to get the link, I noticed an new project has started.

Do I dare look???)

I've decided to march forward with another cuddle quilt.

I'll figure out how many more I need and get busy, 

I'm sure I have enough charm packs and squares to make more than enough blocks. 

Retreat Prep

It all started very innocent.

I just needed some strips.

Just a few to get me started.

But I got distracted.

Like normal.

A little over a year ago, I started Bonnie's Garden Party Quilt.

You can see her's here and in her latest book. 

I made 45 blocks before I discovered I had the corners wrong.

Last weekend I took all those corners off.

Next trip to the beach, they will get replaced,

because I forgot them there.

I decided to work on the 9 patches at retreat.

So I started pulling what I needed.

I didn't have very many wide strips.

I have a drawer stuffed full of neutrals so I pulled those out.

And I got busy.

I decided to cut those pieces less that 1/2 yard into strips for all my sizes.

1 1/2", 2 1/2" and 3 1/2"

Sometimes I had barely anything left.

Other times, there were strings.

Glorious strings!!!

Now there is more room in the neutral drawer and more variety in my strips.

This morning I decided to stay quiet so the men of the house could sleep.

(Oh you goof--I'm talking about the husband and 3 male dogs.)

I need these for my On The Road Quilt.

Strings and crumb blocks to be turned into hexies.

I can't believe how many I made in just an hour.

What fun I had early this morning. 

These are now in their new homes.

Breakfast is over.

I made these muffins this morning.

 OMG Delicious!

Now to get real serious and get some stuff packed up.

Garden Party is ready to work on.

I have some Garlic Knot blocks to complete.

I need to pack at least one or 2 more just in case.

The sewing machine needs cleaned and bobbins filled.

It won't take long to be ready to go.

Is it Thursday yet???

Design Wall Monday

Now that Allietare is a finished top,

I am deep into Pineapple Crazy again.

I am so close to having all my blocks finished!

I only need 9 more pineapple blocks.

I have 5 triangle border blocks in progress

with the last 10 waiting.

As my granddaughter says,

I'm super duper excited!

It was fun to use the triangles from Allietare for the neutral corners.

Those are gone.

I took a sewing break yesterday to do some cutting.

My next project uses these half square triangles.

I posted this picture on Facebook with the caption of 

I wonder how many half square triangles are in this basket.

My original intent for these were as leaders/enders.

I didn't intend for it to be a contests but my silly friends turned it in to one.

I know what I'll be sewing on soon. 

Guess I'll have to cut more tumblers for leaders/enders.

It's Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times.

I'm going to refill my coffee cup and hang out with my friends for a while.

Have a great day!

You'll find me in my sewing room later this morning.

Design Wall Monday

Last week's sewing time was spent making 8 more Pineapple Crazy blocks. When I was getting ready to put them in the bin, I decided to de-paper the 5 triangle blocks that were in there. That lead to pulling out new triangle block papers which lead to sewing one more triangle block which lead to starting 5 more. LOL  One of the 5 is finished, the others are waiting their turn.

I cleaned up all the scraps and crumbs and put all the Pineapple Crazy-ness away for a while.  With the 5 that were finished at the other day and these 8, I am up to 60 pineapple and 7 triangle blocks complete. I can actually say my bin that holds these scraps and crumbs is starting to shrink. I'm even thinking about mixing in some more scraps next time I work on these.

And I just realized I am over 1/4th done with the pineapple blocks. Yeah me!

Now it's time to concentrate on the quilt for hunting club and to get a couple quilt tops quilted.

See what everyone is working on at Patchwork Times.

Design Wall Monday

Once in a while I get the urge to sew on my Pineapple Crazy blocks. My grand plan was to do at least 5 a month but that hasn't happened.  Since finishing 2 UFO tops last week, I needed something small to work on so I pulled out the Pineapple Crazy bin and got busy. These little buggers take a long time to sew. But I love digging through the crumbs and scraps and have no problem with anything goes. I'm in the mood now, I just might start 5 more.

The 5 blocks complete and de-papered. I also took the other 50 blocks and de-papered them. That in itself is a big job. It took 2 movies to get them finished and boy oh boy did I make a mess. Even though I tried to contain it, it still looked like it snowed all over the floor. This is one of those Why didn't I think of this sooner! moments. So now as the blocks are finished, they will be de-papered.

See lots of fabulous design walls at Patchwork Times--I love Judy L's star blocks!

National Sewing Month-Day 1

September is National Sewing Month.  Isn't it fabulous that we have a whole month to celebrate what we love to do.  I've loved to sew since I was 6 years old.  I cannot remember a time in my life when sewing wasn't at the forefront.

I'm going to celebrate National Sewing Month by trying my best to sew every day.  Today I have just a little bit of time so I thought it would be fun to start my next batch of Pineapple Crazy blocks.  I'm off to a good start on these using little crumb bits for the centers.

Now I'm going to put my pjs on and maybe knit for a while.

Design Wall Monday

 Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville has been a huge influence on my quilting life.  I love scrappy and I am loving doing Bonnie's quilts with small pieces.  When her newest book, String Fling arrived in my mailbox and I opened the book, Pineapple Crazy was the page I opened to!  It was meant to be!

I remember her posting about her little pineapple blocks a few years ago. I knew then I wanted to make these blocks!  After searching her blog, I found this post and  this post.   I sure there are more.

Pineapple Crazy has begun!  I don't know if you can see it or not but at the top of the blocks, I wrote how many to make and beside it is the number I am working on.  And the one corner with the 2 pink lines, that is so I know to make that a dark corner.

I started doing just 2 blocks but I don't work like that so now I am working on 5 and will probably go up to working on 10 at a time.  Each will have a red center.  After working on this far, I remembered Bonnie had written an errata for this block.  The numbers are wonky so I will just go with what I know about paper piecing instead of following the numbers.  No big deal at all.

2 done, 222 to go.  That doesn't scare me one bit.  I love these blocks.  I love taking itty bitty crumbs of fabric and making something fabulous.

I am working out of these 2 little baskets right now.  I think I will have to get a bigger basket for the creams but the colors are just fine.  It's amazing how much I can cram into that little basket.  These are just trimmings from my latest fabric cutting sprees.  I have boxes, bags and bins of scraps and crumbs.  I can't wait to see if this project makes a dent in those.

See what others have on their design walls this week by visiting Judy L at Patchwork Times. I love Monday in Blogland!

Design Wall Monday...

..on Sunday night. Jo, over at Jo's Country Junction hosted a Crumb Along that started last September. I love crumb quilts so of course, I jumped right in with both feet. I keep a bin of completed crumb and string blocks so i had a bit of a head start. After a while, I got sidetracked-like I do do easily-and didn't complete my top.

Then she posts a Crumb Quilt Roundup where we can show off our completed quilts and enter for some great prizes. I like prizes. I like completed quilts. So...I spent Saturday joining my blocks. In my crumb block bin, I have border pieces that I've made on phone book pages. I grabbed a stack of them and joined them to make borders.

See those butterfly blocks throughout the quilt??? Those were gifted to me several years ago by a gal that tried to teach me to paper piece. I wasn't a very good student and never caught on to her way. I thought this would be a good place to use those blocks. I had to take the heavy interfacing that she used off the back and resew several of the seams. No offense to her, but I really like the Carol Doak method better.

Sunday morning, I sewed all the borders on and now have a completed top. Then I had to kick start myself and get the quilt done that has been hanging on on the quilting frame for way too long. It's taking longer than I thought it would because of the dense quilting so it will be done Monday morning.

Then this quilt will get loaded on and quilted. I need this done so I can try for one of the prizes. Yip, it's all about the prize.

My funny moment of the day...I had stopped quilting and was stretching and looked up on my shelf of bins. I spotted a big bin labeled crumb and string blocks.........I had 2 bins??? Yes, I did. The bin is now close to the sewing machine so when I take a quilting break I can sew a few blocks together. Soon I'll have another quilt top this size or larger.

Design Wall Monday

Crumbs! I'm playing with crumbs. Remember Jo's Crumb Along? I'm a little behind. I want to make some like she showed,--stars, triangles, pinwheels, maybe a few more geese.

I haven't had a lot of sewing time this week but when I did sew, I mostly played with crumbs and strings. This weekend is another retreat-I know, lucky me! And a few of us are going to sit together, dump out our crumbs and strings and go crazy. How much fun will we have?!? I am going in with a plan, the other gals are crumb beginners. I know for one of them, this is a major milestone but she is super excited and I am excited to show them how to do this.

I'm going over to Judy L's now to start checking other design walls......I should be there for a while.

Design Wall Monday

I added a few more crumby flying geese to the crumb blocks bin. These blocks will finish at 6" but here there look like they are about 24". It was really hard on Friday to stop with just one block. But I did it~and then Saturday I made 3 more and put them up on the wall. Every time I looked at them I wanted to sit down and make more~~but I didn't!

I worked on this instead, April's UFO Challenge project. I am doing the quilt as you go method that I learned watching Betty Cotton on Sewing With Nancy several years ago. After doing one quilt this way and saying I would never do another, I decided to give it another go. And you know what, I'm having a blast doing it this time!


All blocks are quilted, the short sashing is made and 2 blocks are connected. The border fabric is just hanging out there to see if it will live with this quilt........I'll decided after I put on the inner border. I can't wait until I can get in there today to do more! There are no beans to can, zucchinis to take care of or tomatoes to peel. It looks to be a sewing room kind of day!

Go over to Judy L's and see her colorful design wall and then visit other great quilters to see what they are up to.

Jo's Crumb Along

Jo, over at Jo's Country Junction is hosting "Crumb Along With Me".

(Clicking the box will take you to her first post.)

You know I'm playing along.

Last month I made these crumb blocks. Still I have no idea how many blocks are in the bin but I could not resist these cute flying geese that Jo is showing us. I have a little bin that I have been putting my crumbs in so I will work out of that until I need to dig deeper.

When I start sewing these crumb blocks, the hardest part for me is stopping! I have other things that need my attention so I am limiting myself on how many blocks I can sew at a time. Today I am picking the number 1. That's right. ONE block today. Believe me if you want to. :o)

Design Wall Monday

Design Wall Monday on Sunday Evening

This morning I went into the sewing room to do a bit of cleaning up and put up a new shelf. I did that and decided to sit down and sew a few crumb blocks from the bits and pieces that were in my little basket. These darn crumb blocks are like those potato chips that you only want to eat one of but you know, even before the first bite, that you will be out of control in no time! So after 1 string block and 17 crumb blocks and a quick photo, I put the blocks away.

I have no clue how many blocks are in the box. Probably enough for a nice sized lap quilt but I'm not counting yet. One day I will get the box out and start sewing the blocks into a top. I already have string strips sewn for the border so it will go together really fast.

Fun and Finished!

I am so happy to have this crumb quilt finished! I'm happy it didn't turn into a UFO, I'm happy to have fewer crumbs, I'm happy to say I can now do free motion baptist fans (one of my goals for this year)!!! I had so much fun. No stress at all (after a while). I used a very bright lemon yellow thread and the batting was pieced from several other quilts. Totally stash. And Done!

2 finishes in one week. Something has taken over my brain! I guess I better go in and get another quilt ready before the mood leaves me!

Stash Report 6.20.10

Wow. today is not the 20th, it's the 27th! Did I lose a week somewhere.....if I edit the title then I have to have Judy change the link so I'm just going to leave it be and embrace my dorkiness.

This week I focused on my crumb quilt. You would think after this quilt that my crumb bucket would be empty but it isn't. There is a whole lot of room in it but it is no where near empty. I really like the way this one turned out. It's fun to pick a fabric and know what I used it in or where/who I got it from. Too bad I can't say that about all the fabrics.

I managed to finish this top, made the binding and the backing is almost all put together. That makes the stash report look good to me.

This week's report:
Used this Week: 12 yards
Used Year to Date: 151 yards
Added this Week: 0 yards
Added Year to Date: 133 yards
Net Used for 2010: 18

If you go to Judy L's page, you can see her report and the report of others.

Design Wall Monday

My design wall has changed a little since last Monday. I rearranged a couple of the rows and they are now all sewn together. I made a couple more 3" blocks but not enough yet. I found some fabric for borders 1 and 3 and it is waiting to be cut.

The sun has found us and we have spent hours outdoors absorbing our Vitamin D. I spent lots of time last night massaging away the Charlie Horse that moved into my left calf. But the garden looks amazing and my flower bed makeover is looking pretty good. I hope today it will be complete!

Head over to Judy L's, look at her fabulous design wall and then check what everyone else is working on.

Design Wall Monday

Hurray, blogger is back working again! I would hate to miss a Design Wall Monday post! I decided yesterday to start putting together some of my 6" crumb blocks. I have them pinned in sets of 10 and the pile was toppling over. I grabbed 2 sets and sewed them into 2 rows. Then 2 more sets until I had 8 rows. It didn't take very long at all. Then I started sewing the 3" blocks for the borders.

A few weeks ago, my friend Sheila gave me a bunch of fabric for borders and backings. I think this quilt can use up some of that. I'll have to hang a piece of it and see.....still in the planning stages for now.

Today my EQ7 arrived in my mailbox.....woe is me. I cannot play with that right now. I just got home from town with a car full of veggie and flower starts that must be planted in the ground today while it isn't raining. It seems we are only allowed one dry day at a time around here.

Hop over to Judy L's and see what everyone is up to.

Bbbaaaaaaaa

I am such a follower! I was minding my own business yesterday, checked Diane's blog to see how she was doing, thinking maybe she posted snow pictures. No snow but she did have a very inspiring and taunting post! McTavishing, a super cute dog and jelly roll sampler block with a taunt.

Well, I have a few jelly rolls in my fabric stash so I thought that would be a great project. I clicked over to Moose on the Porch Quilt Along 2010 and started reading. Then I read scrappy and remembered a bag of blues and whites/creams that I bought last year at the guild's sale. A big zip bag full of 2 1/2" strips with squares and 1 1/2" strips. Plus I have lots of blues in my stash. And she is posting a new block every 2 weeks. I like that! So I'm following along with this Quilt Along!!! Bbbaaaaaa Go ahead, click the link, become a sheep like me.

Monday and Tuesday I made 40 more crumb blocks. I now have 100! With enough crumbs and strings for 560 more. ;) Still, I wonder if I will ever see the bottom of the bin, the more I dig, the bigger the mountain gets. I'll just keep making them......they are like potato chips, you can't eat just one.

Design Wall Monday

I couldn't stand it, I couldn't leave all the crumb blocks in their bundle of 10. I had to put a bundle up on the design wall to see what they looked like together and to wonder if the idea I have is going to work. I'm thinking of picking a light and a dark fabric to sash the blocks with and then setting them light, dark, light, dark. I'm also thinking about just sewing them together as one very gigantic crumb block. I have time to think about it. 60 6" blocks are not enough. I have enough fabric for about 600 more blocks!


After finishing the purple hat, I got out this ball of blue to make the boy's hats. I had made Elliot's hat from this yarn and then the dog got ahold of it. I wanted to cry but instead put it in the garbage--the hat, not the dog. Damn dog! He does like what has the kid's scent on it. He is getting better now but sometimes I wonder if he will ever out grow the puppy stage!

Grab yourself a cup of something and visit Judy L to see what she and a bunch of other creative friends have on their design walls.

Design Wall Monday

I want to know who stole January away! Did that month go by fast or what!

I hadn't done much sewing last week but on Saturday afternoon I played for a while--ok, it was midnight when I turned off the sewing machine! I played in my string bin and my crumb box. Here are a few of my blocks. They just go in a pile until there is enough to do something with. Sometimes I get the bug and just sit down and sew away on those little blocks.

I got an email yesterday from my blog friend Diane saying she had been making crumb blocks. She is showing them on her design wall today. They are so fun to make. We thought it was rather spooky that we both were doing the same thing without knowing.

The scrappy block on the left is hopefully the last of the leftover bits from Quiltville's Orange Crush Mystery . That block will go into the 9" block bin. Next to that is the beginning of a 2 1/2" strip bin clean out using Quiltville's Boxy Stars. The lighter blue fabric is at least 10 years old and that is the last strip of it. There is a little left that will be made into 2 1/2" squares and bricks.

Go to Judy L's Patchwork Times and see what everyone has on their design wall. Judy has a quilt on her wall that is definitely on my to make list.