Distracted by clutter

 Yesterday afternoon I played cards with 3 friends.  We try to get together for cards and friend time at least 2-3 times per month.  Conversation turned to "hoarding", as a couple of us know someone personally with this issue.  I'm not in that category, but I do have more clutter than is necessary.

I decided today I need to clear out some of the excess clutter in my home office at least.  And I started with this basket, which was supposed to hold art supplies for the grandkis.  How did it become the repository for orphaned cords?  Do you have this problem too?  Random lengths of network cables. Car chargers for cell phones long gone.  And obviously someone - my husband - has been dropping lanyards and name tags from conferences and meetings into that basket too. 

My reward for clearing out some of this mess?  I'll make that final Sewcialites block in the batiks so I can finish up that quilt top this weekend. And tonight I'm going with a friend to the Show Choir performance, and just relax.

This n That . . .

I think Mother Nature is having an identity crisis!!  You know, it was just a bit over a week ago that I was griping about winter hanging around. Saturday and Sunday were lovely spring days in the low 70s.  Yay!  And now we've skipped over spring and have summer, for a few days at least. By the weekend we might see 60s again.  

No sewing happened at all on Wednesday.  I spent the entire morning at my computer working through a self-paced training for group leaders on their new nomination and award tracking website.  I was required to do this training - and pass the practice assignment - before they would release the "live" site for our group.  The training was not difficult, just time consuming.  

Once I had it all completed, and approved, I logged in - to find over a dozen Quilt of Valor nominations had been "assigned" to our group.  Yikes!!!!  We currently have 8 quilts ready to present, with 4 of those spoken for already in May, and 1 in early July.  A couple of the new ones are local people, but most were in the Sioux Falls area, so I'm hoping to re-route some of those requests.  We're a small group and all of these requests are a bit overwhelming.

I did trim get this Quilt of Valor ready for one of our members to bind.  The blocks were made by various different members of our little group, assembled by another member, and quilted locally by The Pin Cushion.  Definitely a group effort.

It's Wednesday already

 April is a busy month for our family with birthdays.  Today is my husband's birthday!  We met 50 years ago as sophomores in college. How did we get to be this OLD?  Spring has finally arrived here, with temps warm enough to melt the snow.  The golf course isn't fully open yet, but I'm guessing he'll be spending some time on the driving range as his birthday fun activity.

Last week's Sewcialites 2 block was #23, Changeling Star.  I have all 4 versions made, and I'm excited to see the final block tomorrow.  My 3" versions turned out even cuter than I hoped.  

I've been working on assembling the rows for the 6" batik version.  Because it was 85 degrees out yesterday, I had opened the windows in my sewing room.  Of course, this being South Dakota, the wind was also blowing about 30 mph.  Just as I took the picture, a gust of wind rearranged those bottom rows.  Basically all I need to do is add that last block once it's released, and sew those bottom 2 rows together.  Then I'll add the 2.5" black border all around. 

Because this is square, and I prefer rectangular quilts, I'm playing with some ideas for a top and bottom border to add some length.  I have plenty of the batiks and the black left, so something will work out.

This might even be a finished quilt top by the weekend.  I'm hopeful anyway.  And the red/white version has a partially assembled top, so that one should be easy enough to finish soon.  The 9" green blocks have no plan yet, and neither do the little 3" bright ones with the black background.  

Humble Homes is finally a flimsy

 This project has been a thorn in my side for several years.  And I'm happy to report that it is finally a finished top.  I might need to celebrate!

Humble Homes was originally purchased as a kit on a shop hop, but it was quite a few years ago.  It was started and stopped more than once.  It's been a long journey.

The kit had laser cut house and tree pieces - but without any fusible on them.  The pieces were floppy, wrinkled, and a bit ragged on the edges.  I pressed them all, but packed it away for another time.  This was going to require a lot more prep work before I could sew.

Then I decided I didn't like the colors at all for the house blocks - purple, brown, gold, etc. It was like they just chose anything ugly to get rid of.  And they were mostly bigger prints. Yuck!!  I bought the kit because I liked the blue houses in the pattern picture so this was disappointing.  I tossed those ugly house pieces, and started pulling out blue options from my stash.  The pieces were traced onto fusible, and ironed onto the blue fabrics.  Then I put it away again for a year or more.

Next time it saw the light of day I cut out all those houses.  I bought the 5 yards of background the pattern suggested.  Note to self - that was a lot more background than was actually needed.  Everything was put away again after cutting the 11" by 57" strips for the rows of applique.

It has been on my UFO list for at least 4 years, but in 2022 I decided to just dig in and finish it.  I'll admit that my patience with applique is on the short side.  Well, 3 of the 5 rows were completed before I ran out of ambition.  That brings me to 2023 - and some determination to finish this quilt once and for all.  It is a flimsy, and I'm so very happy that I changed out the house fabrics, and that I chose to keep the border simple.  It's a flimsy, ready to quilt - and I actually still like it. 

Design Wall Monday - April 10

What's on YOUR design wall this morning?

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

Happy 10th birthday to our twin grandkids - Olivia & Jonah.  We celebrated with them on Saturday, along with an Easter supper with the whole family.  I love it when my daughters and sons-in-law do the main cooking, and I just brought side dishes.  Grandpa took all 5 kids to a park to fly their kites, since it was finally a warm spring day. 

Sunday afternoon was devoted to sewing time while I watched The Masters golf tournament on TV.  I’m going to FOCUS this week, with 2 primary goals in mind.  If I can meet those goals, then I’ll allow myself to work on something else.

Goal #1 is to get the outer border onto Humble Homes.  I chose a rich blue batik from my stash.  The strips are cut so it shouldn’t take much time to sew them together and then onto the quilt.  I want this quilt ready to go to the quilter this week.  This particular quilt has been on my UFO list for 3 or 4 years, so it's beyond time to get it done.

Goal #2 involves the Sewcialites 2 sew-along.  I have block #23 done in the 6” size, but still need to make the other 3 block versions.  This is Changeling Star by Andy Knowlton.   I really like this block, and look forward to getting the other color versions made this week too.  The final block - #24 - will be released at the end of this week.  I’ve decided on a layout for the 6” batik blocks, and got a good start on it.  A few of the blocks will probably get rearranged before sewing any more rows together, as I want a good balance of color. 

This butterfly layout was something that Pat Sloan showed online, and it’s going to work out just fine for the batik blocks I think.  I googled "alternate layouts" for Sewcialites, and found several interesting options.  The math was easy to figure out for the butterfly - 6.5” unfinished Sewcialites blocks, mixed in with squares, half-square triangles, and quarter-square triangles the same size to make the butterfly take shape.  The butterfly body uses some of the purple batiks that I've used in some of the blocks.

I’m adding narrow sashing and cornerstones as well, which I cut 1.25” wide.  The black “wings” and sashing are not a batik, but was in my stash.  It has a subtle black on black dot, so it gives a nice texture rather than stark flat black.  And there is still plenty of that black for an outer border.  The cornerstones are the same gold batik in the blocks.  

RSC Week #14 - more purple

 I played with purple a little bit this week, and played with a partial set of RSC blocks, and finished up assembling rows on a non-RSC quilt top.  Lots of variety.  

Six small hearts were added to the project box for this month.  They won't be added to the quilt until there is enough variety in the colors for another row.  

Three new Pyramid blocks - 2 purple and 1 red - were added to the stack. 

When I attempted to hang them in the closet on the skirt hanger, I realized that there were a LOT of these blocks, so I took them upstairs and layed them out on the floor.  There are 35 of them, but I do still need more to make a nice big quilt.  Guess I'll have to use 2 skirt hangers to old them all nicely. 

That was the end of purple for this week, but here is Humble Homes with 5 complete rows.  The pattern called for a 2.5" "stop" border using background fabric all around, and that is done.  It does give that whole center the illusion of floating.  I think I've made up my mind that the outer border will be plain and simple, rather than pieced and complicated.  As is, this is approximately 64 x 72, so with a wider outer border added it will be a fairly large quilt.

What fun things can be found in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge world today? I find new inspiration every single week from these other quilters.
https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/

Humble Homes - 4 rows

There are now 4 completed rows of houses and trees on the Humble Homes quilt, with one more to be finished.  That 5th row has the houses ironed on and I've begun the applique for the trees.  Guess it pays off to focus for a change.

There are 2 different backgrounds used, but they are so similar that it will be difficult to notice.  This final background strip had to be pieced, and hopefully that won't be noticeable either once it's all quilted.  The seam will be in the center.   

 

The pattern has a fancy braided border on all 4 sides, mixing blues and greens.  I have enough fabric to do that, but am not sure I actually want that fancy border.  A simple border might work out just fine, and would certainly be quicker.