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?

 

Stormy pink January

 Hello all, and happy weekend! Are you having a storm this weekend? We had one last week and it looks like there is another one coming. I'm happy to report that the roof did not leak again. Hurray! The industrial dryers are gone and it is much, much quieter in the house now. The storm left a ton of debris on the lawn, though, and you'll see some of it in a couple pictures in this post. I really need to get those old trees cut down. . .

This week, I sewed! It was great, especially because I put the binding on a bright, happy pink quilt. Check it out:

Does that not shine in the dreary, weak January sun? I am so thrilled that it's finished and that I actually got a picture of it--it's been a bit windy here. We had a huge storm with all kinds of rain and wind and it really did a number on some of our trees. Debris everywhere!

With some of the many limbs that came down!

 

This quilt was made from leftover parts from another quilt-- really!-- and you can read the whole story HERE. If not for the rainbow scrap challenge last year, I'm not sure that those parts would ever have gotten used. They kicked around here for quite a while.

 

 

 The front of this quilt turned out great, but I love, love, love the back! A while ago I mentioned that this could be my favorite fabric ever, and a kind soul gifted me a big piece of yardage. I love it so much. It worked great on the back of this quilt, and I have a nice big piece left over to use in another quilt, too. I am already dreaming of what I can do with it.

This little quilt was quilted for me by Alycia, who hosts Finished or Not Friday, too. The texture is perfect on the quilt, just enough of the swoopy and swirly stuff to complement but not overwhelm. She did a fantastic job! Once this was washed , it turned out even better, all nice and crinkly. 

I am so happy to have this done and to see those weird leftovers turn into something soft and cozy. Maybe this is why I have such a hard time letting go of all the bits and pieces and weird chunks and mistakes. Look what they can turn into! Spoiler alert: I sent Alycia another quilt made from still more leftovers from that same quilt, and it turned out equally awesome.

 

 

 

Everyone have a wonderful and safe weekend! I have to try to get more of those sticks and limbs and stuff cleared off the lawn before the next storm, then I'm planning on cozying up with a nice book in my newly quiet and dry house. Highly recommend that you all do the same!

 

 Sharing at Finished or not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Brag About Your Beauties,TGIFF,  and the Patchwork and Quilts linkup at Quilting, Patchwork, Applique. And soscrappy for RSC24, too!

A small riot of color

 Hello everyone! Guess what? It isn't raining, for the first time in days, literally. Holy cow, it has been gray here. But I'm looking out the window right now and it looks like the sun is out and nothing is falling from the sky. And wonder of wonders, the grass got cut yesterday. I'd say it was knee-high, which would be an exaggeration, but it certainly felt that way.

This is our last week of class, so I haven't had a lot of time, but I did put together a small quilt top from some leftover blocks, and all the rain we've had gave me a couple of really good pictures:

Okay, I don't know whether to look at the flowers or the quilt top! I so wanted to take a picture of last week's purple quilt with these azaleas, but it just didn't happen because of the rain. But just look at them now!

I had these churn dash blocks made, but I never really figured out what to do with them. Do you ever just make something because they're fun to make, but you don't have a plan? That's what happened with these blocks.They're so colorful, and I have been in a "use it up" mode, so I stuck them together into a little top. It's actually about 40 by 45, so it's a decent size and will make a nice donation quilt.

I had no idea I had this very cute border fabric until I started looking through things for a border. When did I get this? Who knows, but it worked out really well with all the bright colors in this quilt top.

I so, so wanted to quilt this up, too, and I have a backing all ready for it, but alas! I had things to grade. With all of the tops that I have piled up, it looks like it's time to have a quilting marathon, too. Just as soon as I finish reading these research papers. . .

I'll leave you with another picture of those beautiful purple azaleas. They're as big as my hand! If you look carefully near the top, you'll find one very happy honeybee, too.  Have a great weekend, everyone!

Sharing at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished or not Friday, and the Quilting, Patchwork, Applique linkup.

Greens with a side of pink

 Hi everyone! It's the second week of March and we're about to have a "cold spell." You know it's been a wild winter when highs in the 50s in March count as "cold." I'm super-thrilled about the noticeably longer days now, though. The sun is now setting after 6 pm! Hooray!

Over the weekend I started looking at and playing with my green scraps for the rainbow scrap challenge. I have a good supply of green scraps, but I used a bunch of the dark green ones last year, and most of the mediums and lighter greens are in small pieces. I managed to get together enough pieces of the same fabrics to make these two star blocks:

 

Darker greens are hard to photograph, but I think you can see them okay. These are 9-inch blocks, and I think they turned out all right. I wanted to have two darker green blocks and two lighter ones, so I also eked out this block:

 

Not a bad start, but I'm not sure I'm going to get another light green star out of these scraps. I'll have to wait until I make the Peace and Plenty blocks to see if I have large enough pieces left over.

Last month I was using up the last of the pinks and I squeezed out two random 6-inch pink blocks:

 

The one on the left did not turn out as expected! Probably not the best fabric for that block, but it does look better in person. Not sure what I'm going to do with the 6-inch blocks, but they're festive and could turn into something fun. They're a good size and easy to make.

Also hiding in that basket were a bunch of long strips of a pretty white fabric with pink flowers. I cut them all to the same width and joined them together and ended up with this:

Just about seven yards of quilt binding! I am a happy camper. Those fabric strips didn't turn into quilt blocks, but they became something useful nonetheless.

And there we have it! A good start on greens and some cleanup of the pinks. Still working on the pink pieces, but I'm sure we'll get there eventually. Meanwhile, I'm looking for a pattern or idea to use up all those little green bits. I'll leave you for today with some pink and green together:

 

The hellebores are blooming! Spring is on the way, cold spells notwithstanding. Enjoy the rest of the week, everyone!

Sharing at soscrappy for RSC23.

A taste of spring

 Hello quilty friends! How was your week? Mine was more of the same, except for that one day where it hit 80 degrees. Not joking! It was a taste of spring that didn't last very long, because although today has dawned nice and sunny, it may snow this afternoon. Again, not joking! It's going to be a good day to read and sew.

The weather was not the real taste of spring for this week, though. It was this happy and fun pink quilt top that I finished just yesterday:

A little washed out by morning light, but is that not very springy? This is the quilt top I made to use up some leftover pink parts from another quilt. Since this is the pink month at the rainbow scrap challenge, I pulled them out and hoped to make something from them. And I did, so I win!

 

The leftover pieces in question were the triangle in a square parts. After many good suggestions, I turned them into some spinny flowers, then strip-pieced the single Irish chain blocks to fill out the top. It was easy and went fast. The border is a long-stashed half yard that gave the quilt a little zip and protected the seams at the edges. I have just enough of the pink fabric left to make a binding. It's smaller than it looks at just about 48 by 54.

 

I'm amazed that there were enough pink parts to make all those flower blocks. I didn't know there were so many! I even had a few left-- and I threw them away. Okay, it was two triangle squares, plus a bunch of cut triangles, but no pink "wings." I just couldn't see keeping them, and I didn't want to make more squares so I could make a bigger quilt. I think I put in enough work to use up those leftovers.

 

So now those pieces are used, and I've almost met all my goals for the pink scraps. I'm still working on the crossed canoes quilt, but a good bit of the pink scraps will be all used up by the end of next week. It's likely that I never would have made this quilt top or used up so many pink scraps without the RSC, so I am thrilled to bits. But not little bits, because that would be more scraps.

Hope you all have a lovely weekend. I have amassed a number of small projects and quilt tops that need to be quilted, so I think I had better start with the basting. Looks like a good day for that, too!

Sharing at soscrappy for RSC23.

Pink scrap energy

 Hi all! Welcome to the weekend. I don't know about you, but boy do I need this one. I'm exhausted from the bureaucracy and meetings, plus I'm trying to get a Big Important Thing done. It's a little much. I've been cheered, though, by some seriously strange weather we've had-- it was 66 degrees yesterday! No way it lasts, but it sure smelled nice outside!

 

You know what else is cheerful? Pretty pink blocks made from scraps! I did get a chance to make some scrappy things this week, in very short bursts. Here is the first block:

How could I resist making a pink star block with a heart in February? This is a block called Hearty by Corey Yoder and it was part of Fat Quarter Shop's Sewcialites sew along last year. You can still get the free pattern (and all the others) HERE.

I also made this block:

 

 

Can you tell I had breakfast on the balcony? This one came from one of my Judy Hopkins block books. I love those books, even after all this time. Very useful!

 

The Peace and Plenty blocks also got finished:

 

 

Check out those metallic stripes! The fabrics for these blocks were chosen entirely based on the size of the scrap. I didn't have a lot of pink scraps that were big enough to cut for the 12-inch blocks, but I think these were good choices.

Finally, thanks to everyone for your suggestions about what to do with the unused triangle in a square blocks. Here's what I chose to do with them:

These look like flowers, do they not? I appreciated all the suggestions for star blocks, and they would have made awesome stars, but the thought of all that cutting and piecing just made me tired. I just wanted to be done with them. Lynne suggested a one-block quilt, and Kathleen sent some layouts, and I kind of combined those ideas into these blocks. I put them together mostly as leaders and enders between the other pink blocks, so it really worked out.

I think I'll set these with some alternate blocks, made with these units:

Unbelievably, these are from the same quilt project, and I have dozens of them. There might be enough for 16-patches, but I'll probably end up making double 4-patches. And then they'll be used and out of my closet!

Okay, the rest of that pink scrap basket is getting cut up into crossed canoes blocks, and then it will be largely used up! That's coming next week, though, because for the rest of the weekend I'm going to read books and watch movies. Hope you are all doing something similar!

Sharing at soscrappy for RSC23.

Pieces of pink

 Hello everyone! I hope you all had a lovely week, though it was quite cold, wasn't it? We probably should expect that in February, but somehow it always feels like a slap in the face when I step out the door. We're expecting it to be 60 in the middle of next week, though, so it's like the weather has mood swings.

 

By now you know that February's color for the rainbow scrap challenge is pink. I love pink and have a whole bunch of it, in pieces, in scraps, in yardage-- and in unfinished projects. But before we get to that, you know I had to dive right in and make a block:

 

 

But wait, there's more! Yesterday I was able to finish putting this one together, too:

 

 

For those of you who are new here, I have one of these blocks that was made by my great grandmother and it's one of my prize possessions. The light makes both of these look a little wrinkly, but isn't the pink fun? Polka dots always look festive, and I just love the raspberry in the second block. I don't know that it's really a star, but it's close enough.

 

Now to those unfinished projects. . . if you recall, my plan is to make as many things as I can each month from the scrap bins in the hope of emptying those babies out. I have a project in progress that will use the pink scraps and is probably finishable this month. Here's where it is right now:

 

 

This is a crossed canoes quilt top that I started last summer. I cut a whole bunch of pieces and made a few blocks, then put it away for a while. I pulled it out this week, ripped apart the blocks I'd made so that I could distribute the patterns and such a little better, and then started stitching some more parts together. Then I stopped before I could cut more pieces so that I could use the bigger pieces for some blocks. When I'm done with those, I'll use up as much as I can of the scrappy pieces that are left. I only made a few of the orange parts for a little sparkle in the quilt, but I'll probably take them out at the end.

 

There's one more pink sort-of project that I'd be thrilled to tackle this month:

 

 

Not a great picture, but all of these parts are leftovers from the last time I tried to make a Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt. I redid the final quilt layout in a much smaller fashion with many fewer pieces, and all of these were left.  They're all the same, triangles in a square, and there are dozens of them. Any good ideas out there?

 

That's all my pink progress so far! How is yours coming along? It's certainly fun to play with this happy color while it's nasty outside, isn't it? 

 

Sharing at soscrappy for RSC23.

A small memorial

 Hello all. I have bad news today, so if you don't like being brought down, go on ahead and come back another time. I won't be mad. I hate bad news, too, especially this kind.

My mother died this week. She had had a number of health problems over the years, and it all finally came to the point of no return. We're trying to be comforted by the fact that she is now beyond the pain and suffering she endured for years, but it's hard.

As a little, tiny memorial, and because this is a quilt blog, I'm sharing a pre-blogging quilt that I made for her in about 2012 or so:

 

Not a great picture, but taken on the clothesline that she used for years and years. And really, I wasn't focusing on getting good backgrounds or pictures. This was a BOM from Marti Michell whose name I really don't remember. Sweet roses? Wild roses? I don't remember, but I think it came in the mail, on paper. How primitive! I might still have those patterns, too.

I do remember that there were these plastic templates to use that made every piece fit exactly. It all went together perfectly, including the sashing, but it was a bear and a half to cut. No strip cutting or piecing. I had it professionally quilted in pink thread, and it has lived on the bed in the middle bedroom ever since. It even has a marker stain on the backing from a careless grandchild. I didn't photograph that, because I know my mom was frustrated that she couldn't get the stain out.

So there we are. I wish I had something happy and uplifting to say, or at least some kind of happy, quilty picture. I promise to be happier after the funeral on the 22nd. A lot of us have to travel, so that was easier than trying to rush in from all corners of the country in just a couple of days.

 

Hug your moms or your mom-like people, or call them, or at least think about them today, okay? And maybe make them a quilt so that you can wrap up in it after they're gone, shed a few tears, and remember all the love on both sides of the machine. 

Peace to all,

Mari

The end of summer

 Hi everyone. I hope you are all doing well. I kind of fell off the grid a bit, didn't I? We have been having a family crisis, so I haven't had much time to stitch lately, especially on top of classes starting, but I did want to pop in and show off the last of the quilts I finished this summer. I have been able to escape from the drama just a bit and stitch a few things, and I finally finished the binding on this cutie:

 

 

Well, I'm pretty down right now, but seeing this quilt finished is definitely cheery!  All along while I was quilting it and finishing it, I thought of it as "the end of summer quilt," but its real name is Synergy, a pattern from our friend Preeti at Sew Preeti Quilts.It's a fun and easy pattern, and you can get it right HERE.

I quilted this on my quilty "playdate" with a Baltimore friend, and I used a panto called Seamless from Urban Elementz to finish it off. This panto is really easy and a lot of fun to quilt. It's very swoopy and swirly. I love the texture that it makes, and the exercise I got while quilting it. It's a real arm workout!

For the backing, I used a nice quiet gray with white polka dots. The front has so much color that I couldn't see using something bright on the back as well. The binding was done by machine and is the same fabric as the pink background. I think it looks good! If you have sharp eyes, you'll also notice that I added a small border all around the quilt, mainly to keep all the seams from popping. It helped a lot when quilting it.

If you look at the background of the pictures, you'll see a bunch of fallen leaves already on the ground. Yikes! I think it's been such a hot and wet summer that the trees around here are stressed and losing their leaves already. There isn't a bunch of color yet, but a lot of the trees are starting to turn. Doesn't that seem pretty early to you? I could do with some cooler weather, but all these leaves are falling waaaay too early for me.

So, there is another cheerful quilt to wind up the summer. It's Labor Day weekend here in the US, so everybody take some time to hug your family and maybe have a barbecue or something, okay? I will be doing the same!

Sharing at Finished or not Friday, Brag About Your Beauties, and the Patchwork and Quilts linkup at Quilting Patchwork Applique.

Clearing out more color

 Hi all! How's it going? Are you just baking in the heat? We had some spectacular storms recently, and it has been quite hot. I think the two have something to do with each other. At least we didn't lose any trees, though there are several down around the neighborhood. The wind got a little scary, but we mostly came through okay.

What's a quilter to do, stuck in the house? I'll bet you can guess. After the success of cleaning out all the dark greens from the scrap bin (HERE), I decided to have a look at some other bins. The blue bin has been a problem for me. I know a lot of people love blue, but for some reason I rarely use it, so there are a ton of scraps in the bin. I was pretty successful using the darker blues (HERE), so now I'm trying to use up the light to medium blues. Check it out:

A hunter's star as a test for a light blue quilt. I'm not sure it works, but it's kind of pretty. A whole quilt might look somewhat like old china or something. I think I need to pay more attention to where the lights and mediums fall in the block so that the edges don't fade away. The beige there is leftover from a backing, and I'd love to use it up as well.

The blue experiment may be successful, so what else can I use up? Can I throw some other color in there? Well, no, but how about a different scrap quilt?

Crossed canoes, using pinks and oranges, plus a couple of yellows thrown in for sparkle. You might not think that the pink and orange would work out, but it completely does! I got the idea for a crossed canoes quilt from Deb, who is doing this block for the rainbow scrap challenge. It looks awesome, and you can see her post HERE. I used Accuquilt dies to cut both the blue and the pink and orange sets of these blocks, and they turned out great and piece together beautifully. Hey, I have the dies, so why not use them?

My plan is to make blocks until I run out of scraps in the right sizes, then cut up everything left into squares for the square boxes. The more scraps used the merrier, but I really have no idea how many I will make of either block. Whatever I get is good, because then they are out of those bins and into something useful. Plus, then I can get some new fabric guilt-free, too!

So, there's some more colors and pieces to play with! Hope you have some, too. This last picture is the gorgeous sunset after our latest storms. Pictures never do sunsets justice, but it was a nice reward after all that upheaval! 

Sharing at Midweek Makers and Oh Scrap!

Pink and green lace

Hi everyone, and welcome to summer. It may not officially be summer, but it's supposed to be 97* today, so I think that counts. I seriously hope no one gets too hot and passes out at baccalaureate tonight. I doubt that the AC in the chapel will keep up. Do you think that I can smuggle in some ice packs under my robe?

Well, thank goodness the sewing room is cooler, and I got to stitch a few things up this week. I'm catching up on the RSC projects, and I made the pink and green stars this week:

 

It has been so wet and rainy that I tried to take pictures earlier in the day, but they got washed out from the sun, and by the time I went back out it was very still and cloudy. This is why the colors of those leaves are so bright. But aren't they pretty with those star blocks?

I swear these were not dragging on the ground! It's an illusion.

These stitch up pretty fast, but I have discovered that I need to be really careful about seam allowances. I cut these with the Accuquilt and there is no wiggle room at all there. Believe me when I tell you that you need wiggle room for those triangles. I'm thinking seriously about making the next size up and trimming them down. Thoughts?

Above is a closer look at the green stars. I tried to go for darker green, but they weren't very twinkly, you know? I kind of prefer the black ones, if I'm honest, and I'm really glad that I'm using all yellows for the stars. It's a nice constant.

There's a lot of green in this post so far, what with all the grass and trees and such. How about a closer look at the pink stars? Here we go:

They are so festive! Pink and yellow might be my favorite colors, and I love them together. Okay, back to the greens:

For those of you who were wondering what I was doing with all those green triangles I was cutting earlier this week, these are the blocks I'm making. They're huge! They're 16 inches finished. I want to use up all those dark and medium greens I have, plus I thought I would throw in a few of those leftover dark blues just for variety. When I'm done with this quilt (which is astoundingly easy), I think I'll just turn all the rest of those scraps into squares and then. . .I don't know. You tell me.

So there we are! Just to end with a pretty pink something, I saw these out on my walk this week, very early in the morning:

I'm not sure what they are, but they are very pretty! They might be flowering pears? Don't know! 

Everyone have a wonderful weekend! Stay inside and stitch, though I understand there are some people in the US who are really cold while we're really hot. Anyone remember when the weather wasn't truly weird?

 

Sharing at soscrappy for RSC22.