Dipping my toes into purple

 

I stopped at The Pin Cushion to pick up my last Saturday Sampler block pattern the other day, and just had to browse.  A little retail therapy is always good, right?  One of the things that caught my eye and came home with me was a purple fat quarter.  

This month's Rainbow Scrap Challenge color is purple so I guess it was on my mind. But this yummy batik is such a pretty color - more orchid rather than a deep saturated purple.  I had to have it.  And it made a gorgeous Ohio Star block to add to the collection.  It will also appear in at least one of the Gingham blocks for sure.  

Can't wait to lay all of these blocks out to see what they are looking like.  Maybe after work today I'll have a chance to do that. 

Beads quilt layout options

So far I've tried a couple of different layout options for the bead blocks.  I'm glad I made the extra pink and yellow blocks for this one. 

If choose this layout I'll need to cut the corner setting triangles 2 different sizes.  Luckily I have plenty of the background left to do that.  For the purpose of the photo I've just used the extra side setting triangles to see how it looked.

The other layout option is long and narrow.  It looks OK too, even though I didn't lay any corner triangles out before taking the photo.   I like the size of the top layout better, but like the symmetry of the second layout.  I will have to play with these a bit more to decide which I like best. 

It was a very productive morning.  The other thing I managed to finish is the 6th Grade quilt top.  I still plan to rename this one.  I picked out a fun backing at The Pin Cushion today and left it to be quilted by Bonnie.  The backing is one I've used before and it has lots of the same colors as the quilt top. 

I've linked up with http://superscrappy.blogspot.com/.

RSC20 - Beads

After making 5 of the 7 pink bead blocks I just had to look into the charm packs I'm using and see what is left to use.  There are 2 pink charm, 2 yellow charms, and 2 red charms left in the packs.  And then there are a bunch of multi-colored charms that read very light. I'm not so sure those will have enough contrast with the white backgrounds.  

With 21 completed blocks, it was time to lay them out and see what I actually have.  On a side note, the 2 darker blue blocks were not from the charm packs, but pulled from the scraps during the "blue" RSC month.  And there is that one flowered light background bead block on the left that definitely reads a bit too light and washed out.  

Here is my thinking in order to make a kid sized quilt:  pull out the 1 floral and 2 blue blocks, and then make the 6 remaining pink, yellow, and red blocks from the charm pack.  That will give me just enough blocks to make 8 rows of 3 across.  Add white setting triangles, and maybe find a color to add a final medium sized border and the quilt would be a good size for a child.  

I can save those lighter charm squares and make another set of bead blocks with a darker solid color background.  Or I can add them to the random scrappy charm square container for some other future project.    

I've linked up with Finish (or Not) Friday:  http://alyciaquilts.blogspot.com/

Time to sew - finally

There were more choices in orange than I originally thought, but I had to dig deeply to find them.  

I was gone last week from Monday afternoon through Sunday afternoon, so there wasn't any time at all for sewing.  Training and "annual" staff meetings were on the calendar, followed by the annual employee party on Saturday night.  The party was pizza and bowling, and staff was encouraged to bring their family.  Our kids and grand-kids came and had some fun.  But I was going through a bit of withdrawal from sewing. 

So - it was extra nice to have Monday off yesterday after an especially busy week.  I finally got to spend a couple of hours sewing after the hubbie left on a road trip for work.   Two new orange gingham blocks were added to my RSC collection.  And I also managed to make 2 blocks for Harvest Road, which I'll show off tomorrow.  

Now it's time to go get a much overdue haircut and color. Then back to work this afternoon again.