This and That

         I just realized it has been over a month since I wrote a post for my blog.  Just in case anyone out there has noticed, I will catch you up.  I'm not sure my pictures are in the correct sequence, but it will be a brief overview.

    There were peaches to be harvested before the squirrels, raccoons, and/or deer ate them first.  Then there were peaches to be peeled, bagged and frozen as well as jam to make.  My grandsons would be terribly disappointed if there was no peach jam.  

    Then, there was Drama Camp for all of the younger members of the family. This crew is composed of granddaughters, great niece and great nephews.  They were here from Sunday thru Friday, as well as one of the Moms.  Cooking for 9 every day was a pretty full week.

 

   I have completed a few sewing projects.  This is a table topper I made for my neighbor.  Her husband passed in February and this is made from his ties.  I had never done anything with ties before, but it went very smoothly.  She has it displayed on an antique desk which belonged to her grandmother.

 

   Here's an idea!  I was constantly chasing a Kleenex or paper towel to erase writing on our kitchen whiteboard.  That led to wondering if a scrap of batting would work, then this happened.  1-1/2" squares from the scrap bin and a piece of scrap batting makes a great eraser.  That is a magnet holding it on the board.  Shall I patent it?

    I was invited to Gina's to sew last week, so wanted to take her a little something.  She loves pincushions as much as I do, so I whipped up this little Broken Dishes block from some batik cut offs I scavenged from Quilt Camp in May.  I think she liked it.

 

Birthday Blocks from 2013!

  So glad to get this put together and quilted.  This is my declared UFO for quilt guild (check) and moves me to the baggage car on Stashbusters (check), as well as finishes one of my oldest UFOs (check) and finally, used some stash (check).  It is a little larger than I usually make, 80" x 80".  

    That was my July.  How was yours?

Judy

Nautical Knots

      I don't think I am the only quilter who has been obsessed with the latest internet buzz on the garlic knot block.  Bonnie Hunter featured them on her last quilt cam, apparently, and I keep seeing references to them on Facebook, chat groups, etc.  I looked for my issue of Quiltmaker that was supposed to have it in the Addicted to Scraps column, but couldn't find it.  Its in this house somewhere, but thats another subject.  I did see a post from someone else that said it is a traditional block called Arrowhead Puzzle, but my 501 Quilt Blocks book didn't have it.  After chasing this block all over my house and the internet, I finally decided to draft it myself and get it out of my head. How hard could it be?  Its just squares and rectangles.  My first adventure with it took place with my scraps from the Seven Sisters topper from our guild workshop.  There were some 2-1/4" scraps, which I cut down to 2' and made a Christmas Knot.  It finished at 6-1/2" and is cute as a button.

     I thought this would satisfy my obsession, but alas, it wasn't to be.  With the 4th of July rapidly approaching, I had a yen to sew with patriotic fabrics, so out came the red and blue scrap bins.  Suddenly, this little table topper appeared on my design wall.  I'm calling it "Nautical Knots".

     Just in case, anyone else is having garlic knots or arrowhead puzzles swarming in their heads, here is a short tutorial on the one I drafted.

Fabric requirements:

Nautical print - 1/2 yard

Red accent - FQ

Kona Snow background - 1/4 yd.

For each block, cut the following;

6) 2-1/2" squares of nautical print 

2) 2-1/2" squares of red accent

4) 2-1/2" squares of background

2) 2-1/2" x 4-1/2" rectangles of background

Make 2 small blocks in this configuration with a background rectangle and square,

plus a square of the nautical print.

     Make 2 small blocks in this configuration with two nautical squares, an accent square, and a background square.

Make a larger 4-patch with your four components in this configuration.

     This completes the 8-1/2' knot block.  To make the topper, make four of the knot blocks and arrange with the four blocks as the center.  My inner border was cut 1-1/4" to finish at 3/4" and my outer border was cut at 3-1/2 to finish at 3".  The topper will finish at 23".  

     If you get the urge to make one of these, be sure to share it in the comments section.  

Have a great 4th of July!

Judy

                                                 

Seven Fancy Sisters

     My Quilt Guild recently sponsored a workshop featuring the Seven Sisters quilt pattern which requires Y seams or a partial seaming technique.  This is a quilt pattern I had always admired, but found very intimating because of this technique.  Kelly Ashton (Kellyquilter.com) taught the class and soon had all of us sewing partial seams like pros.  Here's a photo of us at the end of the day, proudly showing our progress.

     (Photo is courtesy of Kelly Ashton Quilting Lectures and Workshops Facebook page)

   The emails have been flying as friends are finishing their projects.  I will share the ones I have received to date.  

        Becky's

          Cynthia's

Gina's, in progress

.

      And mine.  

      I have had these fabrics since last summer, ordered from the Renee Nanneman website. I love that tree print with the black background.  It just had to be the border.  I was happy to have a fun project to test these lovelies.  The stars and background only required a few 2-1/4" strips for the diamond and triangle shapes, so I have a little of each print left for another project.  I actually trimmed down the scraps to 2" strips and tested a block that has been the subject of lots of Internet chatter for the last couple of weeks.  Can you guess?  More about that in a subsequent post.

Judy

RSC June 2016

     Better late than never, right?  I was traveling the first two weeks of June, a driving tour of the National Parks of California.  We saw some beautiful country, my favorite being Yosemite National Park.

Just beautiful, isn't it?

     I came home with a cold, so it took a few days before I was ready to attempt catching up with my sewing.  After checking my stash for the beach colors designated this month, I thought about just skipping June as there was one piece in an aqua and it had cows on it.  Not exactly beach style.  I couldn't believe how very little blues and greens there were in those shades.  Lots of olive and leaf greens, lots of navy blues and country blues.  Obviously, some stash enhancement needs to happen.  I did find a panel I recently purchased to make my charity boy quilt.  It is a port scene with ships, etc. so added some strips of coordinating colors and that took care of that personal commitment.  

Just a flimsy at this point.  I think some little boy will have fun with it once it is quilted and bound.

My two Father's Choice blocks were difficult too, as beach colors don't usually reside in my Civil War bin.  I did find some blues tending toward a teal to make those blocks.  They sew up so fast now that I've made six months of them.  

     

     I now have twelve of these and plan to have twenty-four by the end of the year.  It should make a large quilt depending on the setting.  I've been thinking about that a little, mostly about some type of sashing.  Any suggestions? 

    Linking up (very late) with SoScrappy.   http://superscrappy.blogspot.com/p/rsc16.html

     There is a lesson in this blogpost.  When you get discouraged about being behind on your projects or your commitments, you just ......

Start stitching,

Judy

RSC 2016, May

     The Rainbow Scrap Challenge color for May was green.  It was exciting to think about my Civil War blocks because I could use that interesting "poison green".

But when I began thinking about what to do for my little boy charity quilt, I was at a loss.  I looked through my green 2-1/2" strips and was not inspired.  They were all olive greens, suitable for use in my usual color palette, but not for a child's quilt.  There were no primary or leaf greens to be  found.   I finally thought of my Christmas stash and found some better greens there, more of a forest green.  Who knew shades of green had so much personality?  Some little rail fence blocks later and a cute  "wheels" print and I had a flimsy.  This paragraph makes it sound so easy, but the truth is those green and gray blocks were stuck to the design wall for two weeks, waiting for inspiration to strike.

     I found a cute dinosaur print for the backing at Sew Sweet on Saturday so I'm ready to finish it after I return from my vacation. 

I will attempt to link to SoScrappy.http://superscrappy.blogspot.com  Be sure to follow the link party to more RSC fun.

Judy

Bricks in the Barnyard

     You may remember back in September when my quilt guild hosted Bonnie Hunter for a trunk show and two days of workshops.  The first day was Bricks in the Barnyard and the second, Smith Mountain Morning.  I had a bin full of homespuns, so knew I wanted to use them in Bricks, but had decided to do a smaller version.  How many large quilts does a woman need?  It has only been a year or so since I did the Split Nine Patch in the barn raising setting, so wanted a different setting for this one.  Here is what I chose.  

I really like it, though not so crazy about the error I made.  I had made it to that corner with the quilting when I discovered it, although it took me awhile to decide what was wrong with it.  Can you see it?  What did I do wrong?  

Do you ever just want something finished?  I was working on that braid border and was so over it.  So I just quit!  Sometimes we just have to take charge.  There are no quilt police.  So I seamed my two partially built braids together (that was a trick which involved some partial seaming) and put them in the center of the backing.  The sides are unbleached muslin ( I bought a bolt of that in one of my moments of insanity).   

I will admit, though, that nothing highlights your quilting like muslin.  

Done is better than perfect.  Now I can 

keep on stitching'

Judy

Quilt Camp 2016

     Quilt Camp in Arrow Rock is my favorite time of year.  It doesn't get any better than May in Missouri, then you add in good friends, shopping and quilting and you are getting close to perfection.  I teach a Mystery Quilt class, so get to meet many of the participants.  We had such a wide variety of students this year with even Hawaii and New Zealand represented, as well as many mainland states.  As many of you know, I live in a historic village with lots of 19th century buildings.  My classroom was in the building known as Brown's Chapel.  It is a historic building which served as a church for the African-American residents in the 19th, into the 20th century.

Doesn't it look inviting?

    Here is the mystery quilt for this year.  I call it Village Life and designed it to use a layer cake with a background and a border fabric.  I used a Bonnie and Camille fabric line called Hello Darling.

Here are some of the others in various stages of construction.  There were several who got it to the flimsy stage.  

     I didn't take pictures until the final day, so not all of them made it into this post.  I'll try to do better next time.  

    This is our Challenge Quilt contest  displayed in another of the historic churches.

     This is the inside of the chapel with mystery quilts in progress.  For lots more pictures, see the Arrow Rock Quilt Camp Facebook page.  For information about next years camp, see www.arrowrockquiltcamp.com

Thats all for now.

Judy