At the Crossroads

Taa-daa! Carolina Crossroads is a flimsy!  I finished adding the borders yesterday and prepped the backing. Now it's time to call Cindy Carrey of North Star Longarm Services to finish the quilt. The deep blue and bright orange combo is very striking. Maybe this quilt will bring some good luck to my favorite NFL team: the Denver Broncos. There are 50 blocks in this quilt so this it is fitting that this quilt is being completed before my 50th birthday.

I had a lot of fun digging through my blues to get a variety of shades and prints.

The outer border is a deep tone-on-tone blue stripe. Because of the stripe, I decided to miter the outer corner even though the inner borders were not mitered. This time I followed directions and the miters turned out great. The pictures are before ironing; they were flat after ironing...and a quick fix of a wobbly seam line.

Next up is a concerted effort to finish Celtic Solstice before Bonnie's new mystery quilt begins. As for Mystery 2014, I have all the fabrics selected. I am opting for deep, saturated coral, teal and green with golden yellow rather than pink, spring green and light turquoise. I just felt in the mood for richer colors.

Oh, and I finally finished the blocks for Mocha Swirl, too. Now I am searching for the perfect larger print for the outer border. I also put in some time on Blueberry Hill (Jamestown Landing) and Colorado Sunshine (Floribunda).

On a higher note, my hubby and I flew to Bloomsberg to check out yet another college town, sans daughter this time. We circled town a couple of times and talked to various people at the old, country airport. It was a nice flight, although a bit nerve racking to fly the low final approach over a river. This college seemed to be much smaller than my daughter wants, so it's not on our college tour schedule.

We visited Shippensberg University's Open House last weekend with our daughter. She seemed to enjoy this trip more than the last school we visited. It helped that a friend of hers was there (they swore to be roommates if they both went there) and she saw a former classmate there, too. I had also arranged with a friend of mine to meet up with his daughter's roommate. She hung out with us during the dorm tour and at lunch, giving us the personal perspective that you don't usually get on these generic open houses. That made a big difference, too. Another bonus is that there is an airport nearby, not exactly within walking distance but close enough. It's a great substitute for that three-hour drive.  Guess I need to make a red, white and blue quilt!

More, more, more!

I spent several evenings this week and most of today working on Carolina Crossroads. All the blocks are done, plus several setting triangles and all of the corner units. Check this out:

Look carefully and you will see three Crossroads blocks made incorrectly. I didn't even catch them when ironing the blocks. I totally recommend taking a picture so things like this can be spotted.  Here is the "after" picture.

This quilt looks so good, I am extending another row of Crossroads blocks. Somehow I had ended up with two extra Carolina Star blocks, so will just need to make a couple more. 

If you plan on making this quilt, here are a few tips.  

1) You may need slightly more neutral than Bonnie's pattern directions. My quilt uses the same neutral throughout, and I ended up buying a bit more to extend. I had only a sliver left (string size) after cutting all the strips per the pattern directions.

2) I hope you love making nine-patches because you will be sewing about a million of them. Don't despair; the end will come eventually.

3) Sew the hourglass components and trim them to size. You won't regret taking time to do this.

4) Be consistent with your pressing direction. I pressed IN on the crossroads blocks and OUT on the star blocks.

5) Have fun! This is an easy quilt in spite of all the pieces and triangles. I sewed all the strips sets before cutting, made about half the hourglass blocks and 9-patches, then started making the blocks. I made the rest of the components using Bonnie's leader/ender method. 

If you've made this quilt or Bonnie's Crabapple Trees quilt, you have also experienced the mysterious charm of sewing tiny 1-1/2 inch squares.  I don't know what it is about those buggers. It's kind of fun to see them suddenly grow into a 9-patch.

Crossroads Update

Below is my progress on Carolina Crossroads. Ten more Carolina Star blocks to go!

Last night I posted a Challenge on Bonnie Hunter's Facebook site. I dared other quilters to make this quilt in the colors of their favorite sports team. Wow! Lots of likes and comments!  

Flying and Crossroads

Today's weather was beeeaauuutiful!  Cool, crisp air, sunny skies and light breezes.  I did some landing practice in Nine-Zero-Bravo this evening. She hopped in the air and bobbed up to pattern altitude as I turned from crosswind to downwind. She didn't want to land until I was able to slow her down enough to kiss the ground. Ahh, there's nothing like some air time to reset one's attitude about life.

Saturday's weather was gray and rainy, so what's a girl to do when she is stuck inside?  Sew, baby, sew.  And that I did.  Carolina Crossroads is progressing nicely.  I have all 25 Crossroads blocks (the O blocks) done and 2 of the Carolina Star blocks.  Only 14 more Carolina Star blocks to go and a bunch of triangle blocks for the on-point setting.  Here is a preview:

If you read Andee's blog (moderndiary.blogspot.com), you've seen multiple green & yellow quilts dedicated to her favorite pro football team.  This one is dedicated to MY favorite team - the Broncos! I've been a fan since the early John Elway days.  It has been fun watching Peyton Manning make the team exciting again.

Began Carolina Crossroads

I was making such good progress on my UFOs that I let myself begin another project. <sigh> I know, I know. This year is supposed to be about finishing up, not making my To-Do list even longer.

But I really have accomplished a lot....

The little fox quilt is now a flimsy, ready to be quilted.

I finished another block for Colorado Sunshine (a/k/a Floribunda).

The Mocha Swirls quilt needs only 12 more blocks and I decided to just repeat some fabrics rather than buy more fat quarters. I resisted. My stash is big enough.

So....

I ordered orange fabric and a white with a soft gray print which arrived promptly from Connecting Threads.  Then I began cutting the blues in my stash and filled a box with various strips and blocks. Last night and today I sewed and ironed. Even after all that cutting, I will definitely need to cut more blue strips. It's unbelievable how many strip sets are required for this quilt!  Here is my inspiration: