Squirrel Strikes Again

This post is definitely not about Star Wars (Squirrel, not Empire).  Hah!  My Connecting Threads order arrived Friday, so I pulled out that layer cake. I made two test blocks of “A Formal Affair” mentioned in my last post. Easy peasey.  Then suddenly I had made thirty blocks. Thirty?!

Squirrel! And just like that I have a new project. 

I didn’t neglect my other projects, though. I made one more Double Delight block and finished FMQ on the Farmers Daughter quilt. Well, just the middle. I will solicit help from my friends at a quilt guild meeting tomorrow night. I want suggestions on how to quilt the border. Do you have any ideas?

Sew Speedy---NOT

Quilting bloggers triumphantly display quilt after quilt they have finished. After all, that's sort of the reason why we blog about our sewing projects--to display our masterpieces. I get so many ideas for patterns, color combinations, alternate border designs and quilting motifs. Thank you to all of you who post pictures of your projects. I truly enjoy them!

My finished quilt volume is not nearly as high as most of the popular quilting bloggers. I have a full-time job and lots of outside interests, so I usually finish only five to seven quilts in a year. But I do enjoy the process.  This year I gave myself permission to work on multiple projects at a time, hopefully leading to me completing more quilts with the leader-ender method. Right now it just feels like I am forever making blocks.

I do not have a finished quilt to announce, so I will just tell you what I am working on.

1. Block of the Month projects

Pat Sloan's Out of this World Block #6 - DONE

June's Blue Rainbow Scrap Blocks - DONE

2. Double Delight - more blocks completed for a cumulative total of 14 out of 50.

3. Autumn Stars / Farmers Daughter fabrics - FMQ done in blocks, need to work on sashing and borders. Once that is done I will post a pre-binding picture.

4. New "Squirrel" is Tri Love Triangles, a 1000 Pyramids style quilt. I found a sale on Moda solids which saved me nearly 50% the cost of the fabric bundle that was no longer available anyway from Birch Organic Fabrics.  The only tedious part of this quilt is all the cutting; I am only halfway done. The stitching will hopefully go quickly so I can present this as a wedding gift for a friend. In between sewing Tri Love, I will finish a few more Lady in the Lake blocks and hopefully add borders to a couple almost-finished flimsies so they can go in queue for FMQ on my midarm.

Do you have a wish list of quilts to make sometime in the future?  I certainly do. My wish list is usually inspired by quilting blogs. There are a few designs that have been on my wish list for several years. One of these was Double Delight by Bonnie Hunter which I finally decided to start late in 2018. Today I noticed FIVE quilts on the list featured plaids, so Plaids are likely to be my theme for 2020. There are also three Christmas themed quilts plus a couple string quilts on my list.

Recently I added another quilt to my wish list.  Connecting Threads had a sale on precuts recently, so I bought a layer cake to make "A Formal Affair" by Creek Side Stitches. Nancy at Grace and Peace Quilting blog made a lovely version HERE. This will probably be my next "Squirrel" project. 

What quilts are on your wish list?

May Day Fun

Most of the first day of May was spent at work. As soon as I got home, I threw ingredients in the pressure cooker to make posole (spicy Mexican soup) and headed to the sewing room. Following my quilting plan, I started working on my first priority - making the block of the month for Pat Sloan's Out of This World project and six RSC blocks.

May's OOTW block "Astronauts" is done. Pressing the units with an iron rather than finger-pressing helped this come together perfectly, rather than the disjointed intersections I created in last month's block.

Orange is the color Angela chose for May.  The six RSC blocks are prepped and ready to sew --- and one block is done already. It was amazing how quickly I was able to gather enough scraps from my stash.

As soon as these are done, it will be time to sandwich Highland Fling and get that baby quilted. Then I will knock out a few Double Delight and Lake of the Lake blocks, and/or maybe a few En Provence pieces. Or maybe add the final borders to a couple projects waiting for attention. I have a couple "squirrel" projects clamoring for attention, quilts to give for a wedding in October and a baby due in December, both friends from my church. 

Before April ended, the last stitch went into the bind of April Showers. Here is a final picture:

I'm calling this quilt DONE even though I still need to add a label. I like to print unique labels on fabric, making six to eight labels per printed sheet. I have at least four quilts that need labels, possibly more. And these are iron-on labels, so I don't even need to stitch them down.  Or should I?  Do any of you have experience with iron-on fabric labels?

If you are a voracious reader like me, you might be interested in the Flashpoint Series by Rachel Grant. The first book in this series, Tinderbox, is set in Djibouti. I like the author's sense of humor (Camp Citron vs the real Camp Lemonnaire) and the heat (pun intended) between the main characters. The US has only one military base in the African continent and it is located in Djibouti, a tiny country across from the bottom tip of the Sinai peninsula.  I enjoy fiction that expands my knowledge of world history and geography within an entertaining story. This one is exciting and very interesting which bodes well for the rest of the series. Right now it is $0.99 USD on Amazon for Kindle.

Spring Has Sprung

The weather has been so lovely here in the South. It is spring and the flowers are blooming like crazy! Early April was filled with azaleas, and now the roses are in bloom. Next up are my spirea bushes (they smell so good, too).

Last week I finished up Pat Sloan's Out of This World block for April. I'm not too happy with my precision on those pesky flying geese for OOTW, but Done is better than Perfect.  Maybe it's time to change that needle. LOL

On Saturday, I finished up my aqua RSC blocks. I am planning on eight colors in these two RSC projects, so that means I am halfway there. I can't wait to see what color Angela picks for May. Maybe pink?

On a higher note, Saturday was gorgeous flying weather so we went up in the air. We hopped to various local airports and filled the airplane with lower-priced fuel. Just like you do with your car, we pilots search for airports with better fuel prices. Airplane fuel (100-octane low lead) is about $1 USD more than auto fuel runs and I usually need at least 20 gallons, so it pays to find the best price.  And it was a great excuse to go flying.  We soared over a nearby lake and watched all the boaters enjoy some time on the water. As for me, I enjoyed my time in the air.  Once again, I was too absorbed in the experience to take pictures to show you. I saved them instead in my memories.

April Showers

Hello from the land of the Master's golf tournament. Yes, I live near Augusta, Georgia. This past week I avoided going out to dinner, not just because of my trying-to-be-keto diet but because all the local restaurants were packed with golf enthusiasts. Personally I prefer golf to be miniature.

Staying home gave me a chance to catch up with sewing. Over the past couple of weeks, I followed a whim to sew fabric grocery sacks. A quick web search yielded lots of patterns and tutorials. I printed three and decided to try two of them. My favorite was the simplest one. And being me, I added a few improvements. While making the last couple of bags, I took lots of pictures with the idea of creating a tutorial. Soon. Those of you who have written a tutorial have my respect and appreciation. Time for me to give back to my five or so readers (lol).

The grocery sacks were tested recently and I am so proud of them!

Below is one I made from the other pattern. There was some extra fabric left, so I made a little zippered pouch to go with the bag. This set was gifted to my favorite sister-in-law.

After the shopping bag diversion, I finally got back to quilting the gray, yellow and teal quilt dubbed "April Showers".  Fittingly, it was raining when I put the last stitch in and quickly sewed on the binding.  It still needs quilting threads knotted and clipped, but I can at least see the finish on the horizon.  No pics until I finish it!

Which quilt should be next under the Juki mid-arm?  Patty Cake, In the 'Hood, or Farmers Daughter Stars?

Plugging Away

As an accountant, I try not to use the word "plug". LOL Yet I feel that I am "plugging away" or chug, chug, chugging away at life, either doing the myriad chores that keep myself and surroundings clean and neat, or by taking small steps toward personal goals.

Today my arms are a bit sore after tackling spring cleanup around the yard. I trimmed bushes, picked up sticks, pulled vines, shuffled mulch and checked the sprinkler system.  My body was dragging so much last night that I knew a hot bubble bath was needed. Ahhh, that was quite a treat and let me drift off to a nice, healing sleep. Happiness is a bubble bath and fluffy bath towels.

My contentment grew when I realized that I had made progress on all of my monthly quilting goals. The block-of the month projects were done (at least for March), I made several blocks of Double Delight and Lady of the Lake, and I am nearly finished with the quilting on April Showers (trying out the name of that 54 degree gray/yellow/teal quilt). I even made units for En Provence and am nearly ready to quilt the latest "squirrel". Tonight is a quilt guild meeting during which I plan to cut more units for En Provence.

On a higher note, I finally got in some air time. Saturday's attempt to go flying was foiled when the battery was found to be dead. We plugged in the charger and resolved to return on Sunday. All went well on Sunday and the engine sounded great. The weather was a bit windy, but it was blowing almost straight down the runway. Well, as soon as we rose above the ground effect, the turbulence began. Clear air turbulence, ugh!  About 10 minutes of random wing lifts and being shoved around up, down and sideways, I called it and headed back. Hey, at least we were up long enough to remember what the view was like from above and to splash oil through the engine cylinders. The snapshot below shows my airplane looking wistfully at the sky, waiting for the chance to return.

Are you ready for April? The azaleas are in bloom around here and my garden is sprouting up. The weather is warm and sunny, no longer whispering about dipping below freezing at night.

Green is for March

Even though I've been quiet, I have not been idle, at least in regards to quilting. This month Pat Sloan had us make FOUR large blocks for Out of this World mystery quilt. They were the same pattern at least. Next month she is unveiling the layout and I hear these big blocks will be the corners. Interesting!

Next I pulled green scraps and made most of my green blocks for my RSC 19 projects.

I also found time to assemble the four blocks from Highland Fling, this year's mystery quilt from evapagedesigns.  Beth gave us several layout options but I chose one of my own. Eventually I will quilt it so it does not linger long as a WIP.