Saturday, July 6, 2019

Blocks among the flowers

Hi everyone, and welcome to yet another hot, sticky day.  Gosh, it has been sooo hot and sooo humid all week.  The fourth was so bad that there were a few times I started to think that it was getting hard to breathe, so we skipped the fireworks and watched some of them on TV.  Not the same, but apparently the humidity made it so that the smoke just kind of hung around instead of drifting away, which made everything really unpleasant.  Best to be in the air conditioning, I think!

We did have some house showings on the holiday, but I was able to get in a little bit of time with the machine.  I decided to catch up on the tiny blocks for the RSC19 sampler:


The flowers are loving the heat and humidity, can you tell?  I was too lazy to get down off the deck and take pictures elsewhere, so they're all with the plants today.  Oh, well!


If you recall, these blocks will finish at 4-1/2 inches, so the pieces are really small.  I've been trying to use as many pieces as possible from the square bins, and it's worked out pretty well.  Since these pieces are so small, I can usually trim down the squares to fit, and that gives me a lot more variety, too.  The squares for this checkerboard (which is my own block, not one that Angela gave a pattern for) were cut from the 1-1/2 inch squares, down to 1-3/8 so the block would be the right size.


All of the pieces for the blue blocks also came from the bins, including the accent pieces in the block on the left.  The block on the right is all from the 2-1/2 inch squares.  I made "cheater" hsts for the corners and then cut up a couple other squares for the side pieces.  It worked!  Good thing, too, because I don't have very much blue to begin with and it was just lucky to find matching squares in the bins.


The butterfly had to be cut from a bigger scrap piece, but that worked out okay, too.  This guy gave me some trouble, and there may or may not have been some butterfly parts laying all over.  In the end I gave up and ended up with an imperfect butterfly.  But at least he's still pretty good looking!  What he doesn't know is that he may get remade yet again, if I can figure out where I went wrong to begin with.


I'm so happy that pink is the July color, not just because it's one of my favorites, but also because I haven't packed that scrap bin yet.  It wouldn't fit in the box with the others, so I guess I got lucky there.  The first pink block was so easy that I finished it in just about 10 minutes.  At that rate, I could make a whole quilt from these!  But probably not at 4-1/2 inches each, though.

So, there is the result of a couple of happy hours over the holiday! It was a nice time in the AC, watching the clouds roll in and drop a little more rain, then get plenty hot again right afterward.  I can think of worse ways to spend an afternoon, can't you?

Hope you're having a good weekend and staying nice and cool! Ice cream and Popsicles highly recommended!

Sharing at soscrappy for RSC19.

18 comments:

Jo said...

Good to see you catch up with your RSC. I still have all these blocks to make yet.

Danice G said...

All pretty little blocks. Our weather is rainy as well. And hot. Sewing is always a wonderful way to spend an afternoon.

scraphappy said...

Glad that you are having some house showings. Lots of cute blocks to share this week! It is handy to make tiny blocks when you are trying not to make a mess.

Karen - Quilts...etc. said...

cute blocks! sometimes the humidity is just too much - we spent most of 4th of July inside here too - the humidity is just too much to take at times!

LIttle Penguin Quilts said...

I love seeing your blocks among the flowers! That checkerboard block is really amazing - I'll have to remember it if I need more blocks to finish mine off. Hope one of those 4th of July showings resulted in an offer!

Quiltdivajulie said...

We stayed indoors for the fireworks, too -- several families in our immediate area shoot off huge displays so we could watch from the comfort of our sunroom.

Bernie Kringel said...

Humidity is just the worst. I think you chose the right thing, staying inside.
Love the teeny tiny blocks you are making. I would not love them, if I were making them though.
The butterfly is cute - nothing is perfect so I vote for leaving that block as is!!

The Joyful Quilter said...

I'm SEW glad that you took some time to commune with your machine, Mari!!

Marly said...

They make such a nice display among the flowers, especially the last one.

Katie Z. said...

Lovely blocks!

Sara said...

Your blocks are so pretty and the flowers were a perfect photo setting. Hot and miserably humid here in SD too lately although we had some relief on the 4th. It was actually a pleasant day. But then overnight we had 3” of rain so the last couple of days we’re back to being a sauna.

piecefulwendy said...

Love to see those little blocks lined up with the flowers, so many pretty blocks and fabrics! The butterfly looks just fine to me. I sure hadn't thought about how the humidity would affect the smoke from the fireworks. Ugh. Thank goodness for indoors and AC. We actually were able to open our windows last night and let some cool air in. It's been awhile.

Louise said...

It did get particularly sticky this weekend, didn't it? A/C to the rescue! Glad you were able to stitch a bit. This house limbo must be a bit frustrating.

JanineMarie said...

Oh, squeal, that tiny multi-fabric checkerboard! I bet Angela would like that one for a guest Tiny Tuesday post. I’m tickled by the variety of prints. We just opened the windows again after a week of AC that was welcome but annoying at the same time. It’s good to feel the breeze again. I hope it’s headed your way.

Deb A said...

What a great assortment of tiny blocks you have been making. They are looking lovely tucked in with the flowers. Being inside in the AC is the only way to go when it gets unbearably hot outside.

Shelina (formerly known as Shasta) said...

Your blocks look pretty amongst the flowers. It has been super hot here too lately, but they say it might be cool enough to mow the yard today.

Preeti said...

Such a burst of color in this post!!! The flowers are in full bloom as are the fabrics :-) Cheater HSTs??? You may have some explaining to do. I think that your butterfly has seen some rough days but she is recovering bravely and beautifully - scars and all :-) I believe Janine is the queen of butterflies. I'd cheat from her. I am also excited about the pink this month :-)

KaHolly said...

Delightfully displayed, as usual. Good job catching up, and keeping that focus! Stunner finally arrived in Nova Scotia. Did you send it up?