New Year's Eve

It's New Year's Eve and I spent some time sewing yesterday.  I finished one more sampler block.  I am out of leader and ender 9 patch squares.  So I decided to bag up the rest of the squares I need to finish the 9 patches I need for Rick Rack Nines from Bonnie Hunter's book "Adventures with Leaders & Enders". 

I don't have as much variety in squares that I want, so I'm going to spend some time today cutting some squares from my 2 inch strips.  I follow Bonnie's scrap system, which you can read about here.  Sometimes I worry about cutting too many squares, but so far I seem to use them up.  I can even see the bottom of the basket!  So I definitely need to cut some more squares.  I used most of them for this quilt.

Hope you have a wonderful New Year's Eve!  I'm sure I will be like my grandkitty, asleep before midnight! Or maybe not, it depends on my sewing.....

2018 Resolutions

This time of year I try and plan out some quilts or clean or organize.  But this year, my 2018 Resolution is simple, blog more.

I work on projects all the time.  I tend to jump from one thing to another, but I don't write about it.  So my "diary", this blog, isn't up to date on what I have worked on or what I have finished.

I plan on writing something, with or without pictures.  I just need a log for me.  I get to the end of the year and I can't remember what I did this past year.  So - no matter how little of a Post, I will write something.

For now, I am catching up on my sampler blocks.  I have 3 more of the bottom one to do.  The picture was taken inside as the weather here is cold.  According to the app on my phone the temp is 3 degrees but because of the wind, it feels like -22 degrees.  I plan on sewing this New Year's Eve.  Maybe even doing a little cleaning in the sewing room.  It could use it.

Check out Moda's blog, asking if you are sewing over New Year's.  You could even win some fabric.  Good Luck!

Frugal

I felt like the frugal quilter a couple of weeks ago.  I had a shopping bag of batting scraps in my sewing room. 

I started sewing these bit and pieces together to make 10.5 inch squares to use in a new rag quilt I want to make.  I have a bunch of flannel that goes together and I want a new king-size quilt for our bed.  

I used a zigzag stitch with the pieces butted together.  I caught the two pieces of batting with the stitch.  You can also overlap the pieces slightly and stitch them together.  I had enough scraps in the shopping bag to make all the batting squares I needed, 144!  I'm pretty excited I didn't just throw those pieces away.  Some of the pieces were big enough I didn't need to sew them, just cut the size I needed, but most were pieced.  

Wings Of Hope

For about the last 10 years I have helped my friend Patti make items for Wings Of Hope.  This group provides support for women who are having treatment or have had treatment for breast cancer.  We make these items to give to the guests at the Survivors Dinner in October.

This year we made fabric boxes.  I made 15 total using this YouTube video by Laura Ann Coia of "Sew Very Easy."  Laura's instructions are very easy to follow and the boxes come together fast!  Here are the ones I made.

Have a great day!

Hello!

Hello!   I've been sewing and taking pictures, you just wouldn't know it by what's on my blog.  First up, my 100-Patch quilt.

I finished my 100 patch quilt!  The tutorial is here, at Wedding Dress Blue.  A big thank you to Wedding Dress Blue for this great tutorial.  I love this quilt.  It did use up a ton of my 2 inch squares, but the basket is starting to get full again.  

I started this quilt in 2015 by sorting my squares for the 100-patch blocks into bags.  I tried to get only one fabric of a kind, but a couple of blocks received some duplicates.  I used any holiday fabrics, old fabrics that have been in my stash since the beginning of my quilting journey and new fabrics. I pieced this as a leader/ender until the blocks were finished.  Then I started to seriously put it together.

This quilt is going to be my Retreat quilt, the one I take in case I need an extra covering.  

Sunday Strings and More

So 2 more Sunday String blocks were completed.

Plus more progress on Lozenge blocks.

I've been spending time taking care of produce.  We canned 4 quarts of tomatoes, the first of the season.  Last year I discovered that you can freeze potatoes.  It seemed like our potatoes were early this year, which works out for me.  Potatoes are all in the freezer ready for use this winter.

Retreating

The end of July found me Retreating.  Some friends and I stayed at Log Cabin quilt Shop in Exira, Iowa.  So much fun!

I worked hard at this....

I ended up having wonky problems, so spent some time bonding with my seam ripper.  Ugh!

But I did get something accomplished,  I made 2 pillowcases out of Rudolph fabric.

So nice to have a Christmas project done!