Small people quilt

 Hi everyone! How is your summer going? Has it been too hot for words? Yeah, same here. We actually spent a couple of weeks visiting our grandchildren, and I hoped that the shores of a Great Lake would be cooler, but apparently that 'lake effect' thing was broken because it was sweltering.

 

Being the amazing grandma that I am, I took a sewing machine and a bunch of scraps and fat quarters with me to fill up some of our time on rainy days. They loved it! I let each of them make a small quilt any way they wanted and it turned out great! They really took to the lessons and enjoyed mashing down that foot pedal. They also showed remarkable color sense! Take a look at the three little quilts:

 

Aren't those great? If they look wavy to you, I swear it's the ground, because there was no way that I was going to let them turn out crummy, you know?

 

This one is from the 6-year-old:

 

The colorful strips are off-cuts from another project that ended up in the bag. She put them together in the order she wanted and used a couple of the white strips after I suggested it. I expected her to alternate the colorful ones with the whiter ones, but you can see she had her own ideas. I did let her 'help' stitch everything together, with her sitting in the chair and me off to the side. Not great for the back, but great for the kid! The quilting is just a few lines of the serpentine stitch. Check out little miss personality's choice for the back: 

 

 

This is the 8-year-old's quilt:

 

Stripes and florals! What great color sense! It's so funny because she was so precise and every square was put together individually in it's own place. A lot of short seams, but by the end I think she could have done it herself. I drew the quilting lines and she mostly followed them. (With lots of help and supervision!) There are a few wobbles, but I believe she may have natural talent. Here is her backing:

 

Those two are doll quilts, already well-used, but my 10-year-old grandson obviously was not going to make a doll quilt, so we're calling this small masterpiece a wall hanging. He and I use the Merlin app together, so he made a bird:

 

This was a blast to make. You'll see that he's quite a literalist, so we had to look up what a cardinal looks like and try to copy it exactly. He was quite directive and it took a little while to figure out how to do the black on the breast and the little cap on top. It took him a long time to choose the beak and the legs because apparently I need more colors. I did the quilting, except for around the green edge, which is all he was really comfortable with. He did give me a LOT of directions, though. It took some convincing, but I did get him to let me put a few 'feathers' on the bird, too. And look what he found for the back:

 

 

Serendipity! This is my favorite bird ever, and it was so much fun to watch him picking fabrics and giving me directions on where everything goes. (If you want to make birds, I used Lynne's tutorial, which is HERE.)  Two suggestions if you're going to sew with kids: use your walking foot, which prevents wrinkles and tears, and set your machine speed to slow, because they really do like to use that foot pedal.

 

But wait, Mari, don't you have four grandchildren there? Yes, but number four, an 8-year-old boy, was so completely uninterested it wasn't funny. Not his thing, but you should have been there to answer all his questions about how the machine works when I was cleaning it! He was amazed that I could take it apart AND put it back together.

 

Now that the scraps and I are home again, I have to finish off an absolute behemoth of a quilt for my nephew and his new wife. It's easy, but it's huge. He's 6'5" and she's 6'1", so it's king size. Huge! I am chaining myself to the sewing machine until it's done. Wish me luck.

 

Since it's still sweltering, here's a nice lake picture to cool you down as we cruise into August:

 

 

Have a great day, everyone!

 

Sharing at Alycia's for Finished or Not Friday. 

Small update, big blocks

 Hello all, and happy summer! I wrote today's post earlier and set it to post while the hubs and I took a bucket-list trip to Iceland, but it didn't post! And there I was in Iceland with only my phone and I'm too afraid to try posting using that. Ah, well. I hope your Memorial Day weekend was relaxing and meaningful. And please tell me that no one left the potato salad out in the sun!

 

As for me, well, we got everyone graduated and  I spent a few days getting stuff from the library to work on this summer, then I logged off, closed the door, and locked it. For some reason that felt amazing this year. And then I packed a bag and headed for Iceland, which felt even more amazing, if that's possible.

 

Of course I came right home after the library and caught up on my RSC blocks. Here are my pink and orange ones, although I've been thinking of them as raspberry and grapefruit. Am I hungry? Are you?

 

 

As you can see, I also planted some flowers in the planter box. We can see them from the living room and they are so cheerful! Heaven knows we need that around here. Now, someone tell me how to keep it from becoming a salad bar for the deer. I planted "deer-resistant" flowers, but somehow that never really means anything.

 

These blocks are huge and will finish at 16 inches, which means big pieces and easy sewing. This is the Fireworks pattern from Sew Preeti Quilts, and there are no templates, which helps my overwhelmed brain.

 

I pulled the other blocks out and took a "family picture" of sorts:

 

 

I plan on making 9 of the big blocks, so I am halfway finished! Hurray! I see that Angela has posted "pastels" for June's colors, which is great for June brides but not so much for my quilt. I don't think a pastel would look great with all those jewel tones. Maybe a yellow green that would look more like a peridot? Or a tourmaline kind of color? If you have a suggestion, let me know! 

 

Hope you all are enjoying the summer so far. I know for a lot of people it doesn't really start until the kids are out of school, and around here that's not for another two weeks. And because I mentioned our trip to Iceland, here is one of the astounding places we visited:

 

 

Bucket list indeed!  A little wet but worth it!

 

Sharing at Angela's for RSC26. 

Pink flowers and yellow blocks

 Hi everyone! I hope it's been a nice week where you are. We had a freeze a few days ago (!!) here in Maryland, but I have been too busy/ lazy to get any plants in yet so I was just cold, not traumatized. At least there was sunshine!

 

Continuing in my quest to keep on keeping on, I've made a few more things in the last couple of weeks. We're coming to the end of the semester, so 'just blocks' is okay with me right now. Take a look at the next step in the Angela Walters' Build a Quilt:

 

 

Check out those azaleas! Can you even see the block past those beauties? The bushes are really old and scraggly and every spring I think "I need to cut down those ugly bushes" and then they spite me by blooming really profusely. The deer have eaten them so only the tops bloom, so there are flowers kind of floating in mid-air on top of basically bare branches. Someday I will cut them down-- just before I move.

 

When I first showed the Build a Quilt blocks a couple of weeks ago one of my friends got a hold of me and told me she had gotten the Build a Quilt from last year, but she didn't like the fabric she chose so she never made it. Have you ever done this? Of course, you can't cancel, so she sent me the kits for all 10 blocks from last year. (Thanks El!)  I made the first three so far:

 

 

A little washed out in the sun, and not my favorite colors, but they look okay! I can at least get a charity quilt or something out of it. This is a better representation of the colors:

 

Not my favorite, but not bad! Like I said, probably a nice charity quilt. 

 

Just to end on something really pretty, I was out walking and took some pictures of the cool spring blooms and look what happened:

 

 

Serendipity! Truly one of the best pictures I've ever taken (except of my favorite people.) I never planned to get such a great picture, but sometimes things come together. These are apple blossoms on a tree down the street and I'm pretty sure I've never seen apples on it.

 

Everyone have a great week and a great weekend! I'm going to write a final exam today. Can you feel the excitement?

 

Starting blocks

Hi everyone, and happy weekend! First, thank you all for your kind messages from my last post. I really appreciate all the warm thoughts and encouragement. It was nice to read all of that and really do appreciate all your kindness.

 

So, I signed up for a block of the month from Angela Walters at Quilting is My Therapy, mainly because I liked the fabric. And sometimes when your brain is overloaded it's nice to have someone tell you what to do. I've finished two blocks, just in time for block three to get here:

Hey, look, our friendly garden turtle wanted to be in the picture too! He's waiting for flowers but it's not quite time for those yet. The blocks were easy enough and turned out nicely, and the right size, but when I opened the envelope, here's what I saw:

 

 

Usually, a BOM will have pieces of fabric with it, but this is the first time I've seen it as a panel with just enough fabric for you to make the block.  And I do mean just enough. There were some techniques in there that I don't use, but with this you must use those techniques or you won't have enough fabric. There's a lot of 'make it bigger and trim it down,' which I don't usually do, but not enough for me to make hsts the way I usually do. Block two was the same way. Is it weird, or is it me?

 

Oh well, it's only one block a month and they do turn out well.  I think I can take it.

 

We did have a few flowers just starting in the garden. Last year I transplanted a bunch of daffodils from the side of the property and one of them is now blooming:

 

 

Along with a very tiny bleeding heart:

 

 

They'll both get bigger, right? 

 

With that, have a very happy Easter if you celebrate, and a great weekend all the way around. Our daughter and granddaughter will be here and I might cook something, but I do have pizza in the freezer!