Finally Finished

Well it's taken me long enough but I am finally finished with my little needle book. I don't actually know when I started it, early last year sometime. It's nothing fancy. If I ever do another one I will do it differently, not that I need a fancy one, just a better approach. I didn't have everything I needed to make a normal needle book when I started this one but went ahead and started and went my own way with it, which turned out to be a rather lengthy process that discouraged me. So it's just been sitting undone for a long while. I finally picked it up last week and got it finished. I like the fabrics and the colors, and it works just fine for it's purpose, keeping my needles safely in one place. 

I've made good progress on my pink String Quilt for the OMG for January but it is now the 31st and I didn't make my goal. It's still high on my priority list but will take a bit longer to finish. This is an early picture, I can't show any progress at this point because it's a gift and a surprise so will show pictures when it's been given. It involves applique which I have never done very well. It remains a challenge though the open toe foot I got for my Bernina machine is a being a big help with getting pieces attached. I've also been practicing with the apliquick tools I borrowed from my friend Kathy. They take some getting used to. I don't know if I prefer them to needle turn applique, it's been a long time since I've done any of that so will have to try some and see what I think.

Speaking of needle turn - I pulled a very old project out of the closet this week. My first and only applique project until now. I was talking with Kathy who took the class with me and finished her quilt many years ago. She mentioned that old project and I went got it to show her my few pieces, only to find that I had finished two of the applique panels before I abandoned it. I just might have to see if I can get some work done on it this year.  There is a lot more work to do on this and I don't know if I'll get to it any time soon, but I'm glad to have found that I'm further along than I remembered.

I also pulled down a box that got put at the top of the sewing room closet when we moved in 3 years ago. I had no idea what was in it and was somewhat pleased with what I found. The box contained a partly done dress for me and one for my niece who is now in her twenties - toddler size. The size of the dress I was making for myself is way off for the me I am today as well. The cancer experience has changed me and I weigh far less than I did when I started that dress. I don't even know why those projects got put aside and never finished. I suspect I was in the midst of doing them when we made the move onto Dan's mom's property, into a house of our own. Anyway, I was pleased to find them because the fabric for the dress is beautiful, one I have always loved. It won't be a dress now - I've removed all the seams from the pieces I had managed to get sewn and will be using the fabric for a quilt. I don't have a specific plan in mind just yet, but it will come. There were also other stray bits of lovely fabric in the box that I will find a good use for.  

In addition to the mystery box from the closet, I took a couple of storage boxes out from under the bed. They have been holding other pieces of fabric that I purchased long ago for other clothing projects that I never got to. One piece will work well for a back for my Peppermint Patty quilt. It's an extra wide fabric and I have 5 yards of it! It's been sitting in that box for years. There was also another floral fabric that I love in that box. I'm not sure what I will do with that, but now all the found fabrics are in the closet in my sewing room with my other fabrics.

I thought I was nearly done making blocks for my Peppermint Patty quilt but I made a change in the layout and realized that it meant making more blocks. I spent most of the day Friday cutting pieces for the blocks. I pulled some fabrics from my stash and scrounged through what little is left of my pink scraps to get enough for all the needed blocks. Here they are all stacked and ready to be pieced. My plan is to get at least five of them done a day before starting work on other projects. It should only take me a couple of weeks at that rate to have all the blocks I need. 

I've done a little work this week with my pink scraps. Getting the right size and number of scraps for any one block has been a challenge. Guess I could cut my little bits down to 1.5" pieces to use for a postage stamp quilt but I don't know that I have the determination to tackle a quilt with pieces that small. So I only have these few pink blocks to show for RSC January. The paper pinned up with the blocks shows what a nine patch postage stamp quilt in pink could look like. 

I worked on my crochet lap blanket before sunrise this morning. It's been sitting ignored for several weeks. A couple of rows needed to be pulled out and redone and so it sat. I got it back out this past week and spent several mornings working on it while enjoying my morning coffee. I also spent today and last Sunday working on hand quilting what I've been calling my "purple leaves" quilt. Don't know quite why I've been calling it that because the print on the fabric isn't of leaves at all, it's of feathers. Old age? Chemo brain? Who knows, but I realized last week when I was working on it that I was stitching around feathers, not leaves. Anyway, I'm making some good progress on it and am enjoying the break I'm taking from the sewing room on Sundays. I'm anxious to get this little piece finished so that I can move on to my Floral Log Cabin quilt which is going to take me much longer to finish. 

I hope your quilting adventures take you to happy places this week.

I'm linking up with the following blogs as their linky parties come available: 

I'm linking up with Kathy at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching

Alycia at Alycia Quilts for Finished or Not Friday

Angela at So Scrappy for RSC2021

Beth at Love, Laugh, Quilt for Monday Making

Cynthia at Quilting is More Fun than Housework for Oh Scrap!

Fredreique at Patchwork and Quilts for Patchwork and Quilts 

Denise at For the Love of Geese for Put Your Foot Down

Jennifer at the Inquiring Quilter for Wednesday Wait Loss

Judy at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts for Design Wall Monday

Nina Marie at Creations, Quilts, Art ... for Off the Wall Friday

Patty at Elm Street Quilts for One Monthly Goal

Susan at Quilt Fabrication for Midweek Makers

Second Sunday

Well, here we are at the Second Sunday of January and I've managed to stay out of the sewing room today and focus on hand quilting my Purple Leaves whole cloth quilt. I've finished up the lower parts of the hoop where I was last week and was getting pretty close to the edge of the quilt so have moved the quilt in the frame back toward the center where there are more leaves to stitch not so close to the outside edge. As you can see I'm still in Christmas mode. I think I'll enjoy my tree and decorations for one more week but by next Sunday Christmas should be put away. I will probably keep my Christmas tablecloth on the table, but flip it to the back side. I purposely gave it a backing that I could use when Christmas was over. It still has trees all over it, but it's not so obviously Christmasy. 

I stitched on my little quilt for a few hours this morning and have been resting and doing a few other things this afternoon, but am ready to get back to stitching for a while longer now. When I want to watch TV while I stitch I come out to the couch. The light out here is good and the couch has a fold down section where I can very conveniently put all my tools, tea, and snacks. It's a pretty comfortable place to work. The fireplace is nearby too, so the room stays cozy on these cold dreary days. That's my kitty Nigel laying up against the wall - sorry he's a little fuzzy in the picture. 

I don't know how many Sunday's in a row I'll manage to stick to my plan to spend them hand quilting but I'm off to a good start. Ha! Two weeks. 😊 

Well, I hope you are having a good start to your week. Stay safe and Healthy! 

I'm linking up with Kathy at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching

In the Pink

January's color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is Pink and I've been doing quite a bit in pink this week. I found a pattern from Moda Block Heads 3 from last year that I will be using for some of my Rainbow blocks this year. I pulled out my pink scraps and put together 3 blocks on Saturday last weekend. I'm afraid that's all the pink blocks I'm going to get in that pattern because I have insufficient scraps to cover the need for dark, medium, light, and pale pieces in each block. So I've pulled another pattern from Block Heads 3 and will be making a few of those in pink tomorrow. 

I've also been working a little bit each day on my Peppermint Patty quilt blocks. This is a quilt I started years ago when I learned about doing paper piecing with freezer paper. I had done a couple of paper pieced quilts previously using regular printer paper and had a horrible time getting the paper removed. The thought of not having to sew through the paper at all was intriguing to me so I jumped into a new project and got quite a bit of it done pretty quickly. Then life happened and it got put on the shelf, and that's where it's been for years. 

Today I finished my Snowflake quilt top.  I chose to use the alternate pattern for block 4 that designed the center rows on the diagonal instead of straight across as in the original pattern. Not having done that sort of piecing before made for a challenging learning experience. I also wanted to extend the borders so it would fit my kitchen table. I wanted the outer border to be solid blue, but I didn't have enough blue left. I did have some extra rows of blue and white sewn together because I had misunderstood the alternate pattern and thought I needed more that I actually did. That turned out to be a good thing. I knew I didn't want an all white border but wasn't sure how I was going to get the blue in there when there wasn't much left. While browsing through Pinterest, I saw a quilt that had borders with some small squares of color placed in the midst of the solid border. It looked nice and gave me the idea to use the extra pieced strip sets to make 2" blocks in blue and white and put them in the borders. I'm pleased with how it turned out.

After finishing the Snowflake quilt I set about cleaning up the tables that had a bunch of fabrics and lots of scraps piled up all over them. I sorted through what was there and either folded the fabric up to put it in my stash or piled it into my colored scrap bins. What I was left with were several pieces of the extra fabric strips that had been cut on the diagonal for the center blocks before I realized I didn't need them. I played around with putting them together in different pattens and came up with some diamonds. Those were also a challenge because I've just not done sewing on the diagonal like that before. After messing up the first one I figured out a way to get them lined up correctly so I could get nice points that came together as they should. They are on the design wall now beside the snowflake quilt. I think I'll use them to make a runner for the top of my china cabinet. 

That's about all I managed this week. I have other projects to get to so won't be layering or quilting the snowflake quilt this month, though I did purchase the batting and fabric for the back of it. There isn't any blue in the backing fabric, but the snowflakes all over it keep to the theme nicely. 

My One Monthly Goal for January is to finish my string quilt and I started doing a little bit toward that finish today, but I have quite a way to go on that one. I'm playing with Apliquick tools I borrowed from my good friend Kathy. I've only done a little bit but they seem to be promising to work better than needle turn for me. 

Stay safe and well. I hope you have a fun and productive weekend. 

I'm linking up with the following blogs as their linky parties come available.

Alycia at Alycia Quilts for Finished or Not Friday

Angela at So Scrappy for RSC2021

Beth at Love, Laugh, Quilt for Monday Making

Cynthia at Quilting is More Fun than Housework for Oh Scrap!

Fredreique at Patchwork and Quilts for Patchwork and Quilts #34

Denise at For the Love of Geese for Put Your Foot Down

Jennifer at the Inquiring Quilter for Wednesday Wait Loss

Judy at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts for Design Wall Monday

Nina Marie at Creations, Quilts, Art ... for Off the Wall Friday

Susan at Quilt Fabrication for Midweek Makers

Slow Down Sunday

Hello 2021, am I happy to see you! Just a quick post today. I wrote a rather lengthy post on the 31st, a review of the good things in my life in 2020. It also covers quilts I finished at the end of 2020 and more of my quilting plans for 2021. You can find that post here. I realized after posting it though that I had left out one of the very best things that happened for me in 2020.  My birthday/Christmas gift from my husband, Dan. 

It's a beautiful hand made Amish hand quilting frame. One of the lovely things about it is that I can use it anywhere in the house, so today I'm in the living room in front of the fireplace and the TV, that I can watch while I stitch. I've not used it a lot since it's arrival in October because other projects I needed to finish were taking my time. However, I want to make a commitment this year to try to finish the two hand quilting projects that I have partly done. They have both been in the works for many years and it's time to get them done. Setting aside Sunday for slow stitching also gives me the chance to slow down and rest from all the activity going on in the sewing room during the rest of the week. 

The first project I want to finish is my Purple Leaves quilt, it's a small table cover. I loved the fabric so much I couldn't bear to cut it up so decided to make a whole cloth quilt of it. It's much smaller that the other and is on the frame and getting some attention today. 

The other is my queen size Floral Log Cabin quilt that could easily take a year to get quilted even with a commitment to work on it one day a week this year. I've thought for some time now that setting Sunday aside for hand work was a good idea, I just didn't do it. I'm not good at New Year's resolutions but think making such a commitment is about the only way I'm actually going to accomplish the quilting on these pieces. 

I hope this New Year finds you well and happy with lots of fun quilting adventures for the coming months. 

I'm linking up with Kathy at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching.