Plants and Quilts

 I had to show you a picture of my beautiful Siberian Irises.  I took these pictures yesterday morning when it was still wet from the rain.


Cleaning in the sewing room included putting a binding on this quilt.  My friend Rachel got me into using the hair clips to hold the binding in place. I love that I don't get stuck by pins anymore.  I bought the hair clips when Hobby Lobby had them 50% off.  Love those deals!  And the clips work so well that I need to get more so I have enough to go around a larger quilt.  I'll have to watch for another sale.

Sewing Is Done.

I have the rag quilt done and clipped, just not washed yet.  I like the way it turned out. Plus I used flannel I had in my stash.

I've been toying with the idea of counting how much stash I use, but I really don't want to take the time to add up how much stash I actually have.  So I won't worry about it and I'll just enjoy using it.

It's Getting There

Made more progress on my rag quilt tonight.  I have all the blocks sewn into rows and am now sewing the rows together.  I have 4 rows done.  I know I'll have this quilt all sewn by this weekend.  Just when will I get it washed I don't know, as I hate to go to the laundromat.

Sewing Along

Thought you might like to see some of the other dog flannels I'm using in this rag quilt.  I cut and sewed more blocks last night and again tonight.  Hope to have it done this weekend.  At the rate it's going, should happen.

WIP or New Project?

I don't know whether to call this a work in progress (WIP) or a new project.  I have had the jean squares cut out for a couple of years.  I had boxes and boxes of old jeans from my son, my husband and myself, that I finally cut into 6.5 inch squares a couple of summers ago.  I made one rag quilt here in 2009 after cutting all the squares. 

I want to make a quilt to be used outside by the kids if they need to sit down and cool off.  Especially now that the weather is getting warmer. (We take books outside for the kids to read or be read to and it would be nice to have a blanket to sit on.)

Friday night I cut some dog flannel into the 6.5 inch squares and tonight I started sewing them together to make a rag quilt. Not so sure I want to clip all the seams so I just may find out how much it will fray without all the clipping.

Cleaning, well, sort of.

I spent some time cleaning today, in the house and in my sewing room.  Well, sort of.  I had a stack of batting pieces that I either could stick in a tub/bin or I could get busy and sew them together to create some "new" batting.  I opted to make some "new" batting.  I have never done this before.  (I have a bin in the basement of pieces that I've been going to do this with someday.)

So I took the leap and sewed the pieces together.  I don't know why I always had thought that it would be so hard.  It wasn't.  One goal for this summer is to sew the rest of the pieces together and use them instead of having them sit in a bin waiting for the perfect time.

Onto another topic - do you ever get in the mood to go fabric shopping?  I was really having a time of it on Saturday.  I've been trying hard to use what I have and not buy new until I get some of my stash used.  Instead, I started reading blogs and looking at new fabric EVERYONE else had.  While doing this I found a nice pattern that is perfect for a batch of fabric I had bagged. I knew it the minute I saw the pattern.  And the amazing part, all the fabric I needed was in the bag AND IT WAS THE RIGHT AMOUNT! 

Now I'm dealing with startitis. (To quote The Yarn Harlot.)  And Heaven knows I don't NEED to start another project.  I have too many UFOs/WIPs as is......

Not Random

I really have tried to be random with the string blocks I've been making, but I couldn't do it with these three blocks.  The pig block really ended up balanced and organized.  But I love them.

I made another 10 blocks this morning so now I have 100 string blocks done.

Guess it's time to clean. 

Repairs And String Blocks

I repaired two more aprons for school.  The kids pull the apron over their heads and the edge is starting to rip.  So I cut off the top part, removed the stitching and reattached it.  Ready to use again.

I started out with the plan to make 2 more string blocks and then clean.  I ended up making 10 more blocks.  I really was going to clean again, but that didn't happen.  Maybe tomorrow.....

Cleaning

Last night I spent my 15 minutes cleaning in my sewing room.  I put away all the strips I had cut for the jigsaw puzzle quilt.  I had a number of 2.5 by 2.5 squares cut, so I set up a little tub for those, put the longer strips back in the tubs according to color (dark, medium and light), and then I made one string block.  (I had to do some sewing!)

It Came!

Guess what I got in the mail today?   My new book that I won from Adventures in Oz or Ruby Slipperz .

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!!

I'm so excited by the projects in the book.  There are 25 quilt and craft patterns, it's going to be hard to decide which one to try first.  "Fresh Cuts" by Debbie Mumm has a very different look for her.  I remember her as more country or folk arty.

The owl on the front of the book is a pincushion that I really want to make up.  Maybe something "wise" in my sewing room would help me be "wise" too.  Or use my scraps "wisely".  "WHO" knows what things I may learn.

It's Finished!

I'm so glad the quilt is done!  I took a picture of my grandson with the quilt that is going to his preschool teacher.  She will be retiring at the end of this school year and she has been great.  He was pretty happy to sit with the quilt as it was kind of cold this weekend up in Minnesota.

I haven't been able to blog the past few days as blogger was down.  Losing my info on my dashboard was some sort of glitch that was happening and it seems to be fixed now.  I guess I wasn't the only one having problems.  (Which is nice to know it wasn't ALL user error.)  I feel like I was kind of out of touch for a little while.

Update

Thought I'd let you know how things are going.  I got the binding sewn together last night, pressed it this morning and attached it this evening.  I'm now ready to sit down and do the hand sewing. 

Except it's REALLY hot here.  Yesterday the temperature hit 95 degrees and we broke a record.  I refuse to turn the a/c on this soon, we wait until June 1st, but it's been hot.  The temperature was 75 degrees when I got up this morning at 5:30 am.  So will have to try and sew without the quilt on my lap, if that is possible.

I WON!!!!

THANK YOU SO MUCH ANNIE!!!  I'm so excited!!!!  I won a giveaway at "Adventures In Oz" .   I will soon be the proud owner of a book by Debbie Mumm called "Fresh Cuts".  Looks like it has some fun ideas.  Will let you know more about it once I have it in my hands.  LOL 
I'm working at getting my binding sewn together tonight. And I hope to get it sewn onto the quilt.   Yesterday I did get one string block made.  I thought that was pretty good considering all the commitments my husband  and I had.

Happy Mother's Day!

 First of all:  Happy Mother's Day!

Hope you are having a great day.

I finished quilting the jigsaw quilt yesterday at A Quilting Place.  I love how it turned out.  Jackie is so nice and patient with you while you fumble around trying to remember what to do next.

To the right is the backing fabric.  Not sure if you can see the quilting, but I used red thread.

Now onto the binding!  You have to say that in a Buzz Lightyear
voice.  (Can you tell we just watched "Toystory 3"?)

Again

It happened again yesterday, I lost all of my reading list on the Dashboard.  Try as I might, I couldn't get it back this time.  So I added all of the blogs I follow to my blog. (Off to the side.)  Sorry if it seems a little cluttered at times.

I have time scheduled today to go to "A Quilting Place" this afternoon to quilt on my jigsaw quilt.  My machine does not have a stitch regulator and I'm still not the best with that.  Pretty excited and nervous.

I also have 6 more string blocks done.

Math

OK, don't hold me to this, but I think I need 192 string blocks to make my twin size quilt.  The blocks will finish 5.5 inches. According to a chart I have, a twin size quilt measures 63 x 87.  So 12 blocks across and 16 blocks down.  Guess I need to make a few more blocks before I start putting this quilt together.  I may even want it to be a little bigger than what the chart calls for, we'll see.  And I have another two blocks done.

Magic

Not exactly sure what I did, but it seems to be working now.  Weird.  But loving it!  We'll see what happens tomorrow morning. 

Oh I did find some backing fabric tonight at Hobby Lobby, it is jigsaw fabric, a perfect match for the front.  And I made 2 more string blocks.  (I count fabric buying as working on my quilts, don't you?????)

Sigh

Just to let you know, the reading list did not come back.  I don't have all the blogs I read listed on my blog page.  If I click on Google Reader, I can find them.  Now to figure out how to readd the list without a ton of work.  Sigh.  Makes me sad. :-(

Madder Than Mad

I am so mad this morning.  One of my "get ready for work" routines includes checking out quilting blogs for about a 1/2 hour while I drink some coffee.  I go to the dashboard and it tells me:

"You are not currently following any blogs. Use the "add" button below to enter blogs you'd like to follow in your Reading List. Learn more "

All the blogs I follow are GONE!  I'm hoping this is just a glitch and that they show up later today, because I don't remember them all, ---- I HAVE THEM ON MY READING LIST!!!!!!!!!   URRRGH!!!!!

I Forgot

I forgot to blog last night.  At least I didn't forget to do my 15 minutes of sewing/quilting.  I made a couple more string blocks.  I really do need to sit down and do the math of how many blocks I need for a twin size quilt. 

Took the picture this morning.

Happy May Day

 My husband came by the sewing room as I was rooting through my scrap bins of strings.  He stopped.  "What is THAT?"  he asked.  "Is that scraps?", in a voice that sounded like he couldn't believe what he was seeing.  Me: "Yes".

"See what I'm making from the scraps?"  as I showed him the bin with about 50 string blocks in it 

"What are you going to do with those?"

"Make a quilt."

"Wow, you're so talented".

"THANKS!"

I love seeing what you can make from "nothing". (AKA: scraps)

Have a Happy May Day!