Works in progress

 Hi everyone! How are you all doing? Yesterday, while I was trying valiantly to teach a class to students who are seriously exhausted, several dump trucks came and dumped fill dirt outside the almost-finished garage. I was annoyed as all get out and happy as a clam at the same time. It was loud and disturbing, but it means that my garage only has one more step to go. So I guess my current mood would best be  described as annoyed-happy. Or maybe happily annoyed?

Today I just have a couple of updates on things I'm working on, a part of my quest to get back to blogging more regularly. We'll see how that goes, but meanwhile, here's one new start:

 

A little while ago, Preeti reviewed the book Diamond Star Quilts, by Barbara Cline, and she was kind enough to let me borrow it so that I could make something small and challenging. I know I don't need to do something challenging right now, but it's not that difficult and it turns out so pretty. The picture above is just a part, and now I'm busy cutting and piecing diamonds from some of my hand dyed scraps:

 

So far, it's fun and a nice diversion. No guarantees that this won't turn into a UFO, though Preeti's quilt turned out to be so spectacular that it's really inspiring me to keep going.

I'm also continuing to work on the fall colors quilt I showed a bit ago:

 

These are all the star centers, so now it's just about distributing the star points around the quilt top. I also think this one is going to be spectacular in its own way, though I admit it doesn't look like much now.

So, what does that leave? Oh, yeah, in between, when I get tired of stitching, I've been cutting these beauties:

 

These are all from scraps, which takes time to cut, and they are for the quilt I'm finally making for our bed. I love all of these colors, but I have a long way to go with cutting. This is about one-sixth of what I need, but cutting can be really meditative, you know?

That's what's happening around here, except for this very exciting development:

 

Did you know that people sometimes sell the things they no longer want, like sewing machines and stuff like this? Very exciting! Further updates to come!

Hope you all are having a good week. Hang in there, and don't forget to wash those hands! 

Sharing at Midweek Makers and Quilting is More Fun than Housework.

Stars on deck

 Hi everyone! Long time no see! You know, I do what I can right now. We're all doing our best, right? Tomorrow marks eight months since they told us we had to leave the building and learn to teach remotely. Who knew it would last this long? I've had enough, though, so I'm just surrounding myself with things that make me happy and eating way too many cookies. Hey-- they make me happy!

 

And speaking of happy. . .there is plenty of sewing going on behind the scenes, but by the end of the day I just haven't been posting. Oh, well! (That's my new motto for everything, by the way.) Today I have an update on one of my RSC projects for this year, the Ohio Stars. This is based on a pattern by Bonnie Hunter that you can find HERE. I've been making three stars each month in the color of the month, and here are the last ones I did in the RSC colors, the yellow:

 

 

I was determined to get those mums in and by gosh, I did. They are fading a bit now, but still very cheerful, especially on gloomy days. Yellow is like that. It just adds cheeriness to everything.

These are all scraps, of course, though somehow they continue to multiply in those new scrap baskets. Once I made the yellows, I still needed a few more stars, so I just pulled a couple of random fabrics. I tried a "neutral" star that I think came out pretty well, and just some random bits that I had close at hand:

I think these turned out pretty well, though that neutral one does look like it's going to melt right into the leaves. And how is that impatiens still alive? It must be a lot hardier than I thought. It's another bright spot, though, isn't it?

I am almost ready to put this together, so I laid them all out on my "design deck," just because I happened to have the box of them out there:

This is not the final layout or even a layout at all, just a way for me to take a picture. And now that I have, I see that I need one more star in each size. I must have miscounted. Not a surprise, really. Hmmm. . .what colors do you think? Maybe a small red or burgundy and a larger dark one as well? I'll have to think on it, but I'm open to suggestion!

Once I make those last two, I'll be able to cut the alternate squares and manage a real layout. I have some small polka dot fabrics to use for the fill-in squares, which I think will make for a fun, happy quilt. Just what I need! I haven't figured out a border yet, either, but I do have some stripes that might be interesting.

That's what's happening here! I wish there were more naps, but there have been quite a lot of walks, and when I was out a couple of days ago, I came around the corner and saw my neighbor's house and yard just full of light and color:

It was a glorious sight that pictures can't really capture, and it was just a lovely moment.

Hope you all are having some lovely moments too, and are staying well and healthy! After eight months, I hope you're staying sane, too!

Sharing at Midweek Makers and soscrappy for RSC2020.

Hsts for fall

 Hi everyone! Yeah, I know, it's been a while. What can I say? Thanks for your emails checking up on me! I'm okay, really. There has been stitching happening, but not writing. I do what I can, you know? And some things are looking up. A huge problem that we were having at work looks like it's going to resolve (hurray!) and I finished an 8-week class that I was teaching, so now I have a tiny bit more time. Zoom remains exhausting, but in between classes I sometimes play videos of my grandkids singing the ABCs. It's not scholarly, but it's keeping me afloat!

Before we go any further, here is a picture of the last of the geraniums:

 

I think they know they're getting uprooted this weekend, so they've decided to put on a last show. Has anyone ever tried over-wintering these? It wouldn't hurt to try, right? I have a new garage to keep them in, after all! (No it isn't finished. Soon, they tell me, but I've heard that before.) Let me know if you have any great semi-southern gardening wisdom.

As for the sewing part of my life, there has been sewing, specifically sewing a lot of hsts:

If you remember, I had planned to make Myra's Sunnyside pattern in dark blues and yellow, but then a friend gave me a bunch of golds, and Myra also posted a picture of the quilt done in multicolors by Tula Pink. So why not change the plan a bit and do something a bit more creative? I pulled out some graph paper to make a coloring page and rooted through the scraps and came up with the beginnings of what will be a fall-colored quilt.

[On a completely unrelated note-- I'm thinking of getting a used Accuquilt just for cutting hsts. Any thoughts or wisdom?]

Amazingly, I had enough scraps in enough fall colors, and here's a small part of what I've got so far:

I'm using the golds as the lights and the fall colors as the darks. I think it's going to work out just fine, don't you?

I also have done a little fabric acquisition in the last couple of weeks. I bought this stack of fat quarters, which is really not like me, but they were so pretty!

This is Apricot and Ash by Corey Yoder. I was thinking of using them to make the Sewcialites Quilt Along, except that I don't like the layout they have. I'll need to come up with a new layout before I can start making blocks. Luckily, I have more graph paper.

I also bought this fat quarter pack:

 

Again, not like me! But they were so pretty and looked so fresh that I couldn't resist. I have no plan for these, but I like them and they make me happy. Is there a better reason to buy fabric?

Well, there's my update! Still here, still stressed, still not sick, still trying to keep a good thought. Sewing when I can. Hope you all are doing the same. Stay healthy and sane, everyone, and remember to wash those hands!

 

 Sharing at Finished or Not Friday

Rising from the leaves

 Hi everyone, and happy weekend! Well, we seem to have made it through yet another week. Every week I'm surprised when Friday comes, but I'm always glad to see it. Our weather here has been up and down, but the one thing that is very evident is that the days are definitely getting shorter. I saw a cartoon this week where a woman is panicky because she thinks it's midnight, but it turns out that it's only 5:30. It doesn't sound funny when I describe, but I definitely chuckled in recognition.

This has been a hard week, but I did manage to finish the Phoenix quilt top! Here it is, out among the fall leaves:

 

It's pretty, isn't it? You can see that we still have a lot of green, but we've also had some leaves falling. Not a lot of pretty colors on our property yet, but there are some around here. I don't really remember last fall, but I really miss the beautiful maple we had in Wisconsin. It always turned such a pretty red-orange.

 

Back to the quilt! This is the Phoenix quilt, a pattern from Sharon Holland that you can get HERE. It was a super-easy quilt to put together. The most time consuming part of it was trimming the hsts, which was strangely peaceful since life is so stressful for me right now. I also had to keep referring back to the layout diagram because I couldn't keep it all straight, but that's probably just me. I kept thinking the blocks were rectangular because of the design they create, but they're actually square, which kind of confused my brain.

 

I made one smallish change to the pattern and used different scrap pieces to make the centers of the flowers instead of what the directions called for. I like how it turned out and added more colors to the quilt. I also thought about adding a row and making the quilt bigger, but in the end I decided that I didn't need a bed-size quilt right now, and I really liked the mix of colors that I already had. Adding a row, though, would be really easy and make this a twin quilt. 

I'm thrilled with this finish and would absolutely make it again. Just a single block would make a nice sized wall hanging, and four of them would be a nice table topper. Next time, though, I would choose a stronger fabric for the corners. I used a pale yellow this time and it's pretty hard to see in the actual quilt. I had such a nice time making this quilt that I also purchased another Sharon Holland pattern, for the Saguaro quilt, and I'm putting that on this list for after the next quilt that I've been cutting out.

So there we are! I hope all of you are staying well and healthy, and that you have something relaxing planned for this weekend. My plan is to try to get a nice nap. They've started putting the siding up on the new garage, and they start early in the morning. But they don't work Saturdays, and I won't be working this Saturday, either!

Sharing at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Finished or not Friday, and Brag About Your Beauties.