Keeping up with Marigold

The Marigold mystery from Meadow Mist has been very easy to keep up with so far.  Last month we made 9 blocks.  And this month again we're making 9 blocks, but slightly smaller ones.  There are 4 Chain blocks. 

And there are 5 star blocks.  This block differs from the August star blocks by the points.  Last month we did simple Sawtooth Stars with Flying Geese for points. This this time the points were made with quarter square triangles.  

The Past Presidents' quilt trunk show

Our guild meeting on Saturday was so much fun.  We're a small group, with only a little over 40 members.  On average we have about 30 at monthly meetings.  A few of the ladies had a great idea - to have a brunch and invite past presidents who may not live around here or are no longer members.  And they asked them to bring their President Quilt, containing blocks made by members during their tenure in office. If they were in attendance, they came up with their quilt to show and talk about.  I took pictures and lots of notes. 

The Heartland Quilters Guild began in 1992.  The  very first president in 1992 was a lady named Elaine, who was still very active when I joined in 2011.  She has since passed away, but we do have a couple of ladies in the group who were charter members from that year.  The 1993 president was Louise who has love Sunbonnet Sue patterns for many years.  So it was only fitting that she received Sunbonnet Sue blocks for her president quilt.  Some have lovely little embellishments, and all have signatures. She hand quilted her quilt.  She mentioned that19 of the ladies who made blocks for her quilt that year have since passed away.  

In 1998 the president was Gladys.  Her favorite color is navy blue, and her blocks were all made to look good on a navy background.  

Ruby was president in 2003.  She has a love of butterflies, and her butterfly blocks were absolutely delightful.

Brenda has actually been president more than once.  But the first time was in 2005, and her blocks were made with strips of red (her favorite color at the time), with a signature in the center.  The ladies also provided an extra strip that she used in the border.  She was just learning applique at the time so she put an applique in the center and corners.

2007 was Karen's turn as president.  Her quilt has hearts all over it in bright colors, which is what we still expect to see with many of Karen's projects.

Karen even put a picture of all of the officers from that year on her label.

2008 was Alice M, and her quilt has a lot of sentimental memories.  Her mother had just passed away, and she had inherited all her mother's fabric as none of her siblings sewed.  A friend asked for a piece of fabric to make her something special, so she gave her a flowered piece as her mother loved flowers.  

Most of the blocks - including the one made by the friend - contain florals.  And the buttons in the sashing all came from her mother's stash.

2009 president was Kathy S.  She loves blue and yellow, and her blocks are hats in 2 styles, with a label that said "Hats Off to a Great Year!".  Kathy moved away a few years ago, so it was really awesome to see her again and get to catch up.  BTW - her shirt says Holy Scrap, and she commented that she has no stash at her new home - just ASSETS. 

Deb S was in office for 2010, and her set of blocks were spools.  She has been president more than once as well over the years.  

Brenda was back as president in 2011.  Her quilt is all purses in several styles, and the backing had a fun purse and shoe print.  The appliqued purses were simple shapes but lent themselves to some very clever embellishments by people.  This was the first president's block that I was a part of, as this was the year I joined the guild.

Alice N was president for 2 years in a row - 2015 and 2016.  She loves house blocks, so the first year we made house blocks for her.  When she received them at our Christmas party, she was instructed to NOT put them together because the second year's blocks would blend nicely.  She created "neighborhoods" with her houses.  I really love her layout.

Deb B (we have 6 ladies named Deb in guild) was also president for 2 years, over the Covid pandemic.  Her first act as president was to send out a message to cancel the next meeting. We met outdoors in a park over the summer, and then eventually moved our meetings from the public library to a church.  The first year she received the flowers, as she loves to garden. The second year we did 9-patch blocks the same size.  She added some word sections from a panel.  This quilt makes me think spring.

Maureen came on board in 2022.  She is a Navy veteran, who also grew up on the eastern seaboard.  So a love of the ocean was a good plan.  We got a variety of sea creatures to applique, with instructions to use batiks.  There were whales, starfish, and other random fish and they were simple shapes to applique.

Once she received the blocks, she added people snorkeling to her quilt - one for each member of her family.  Don't you just love how creative these ladies get?

2023 Deb S returned as president and she loves to applique, and loves bunnies.  So the block pattern we all received had a bunny with a little yo-yo tail.  We were instructed to use bright spring colors. 

She loved the bunnies, and added flowers to the border.  One the back she added a unique label because one guild member gave her 2 bunny blocks.  The extra block had a bunny lying down, and words added that said "the only good bunny is a dead bunny!".  It made a perfect label for a fun quilt. 

Brenda was president again in 2024.  She's a good sport to be willing to take that on 3 times.  Her latest set of blocks were 6" Honey Bees in a rainbow of colors.  We received the background fabric with the Lori Holt pattern.  This block is the 6" version of the 12" ones I've been making for RSC this year.  The little ones are so much cuter!!  Brenda has a plan for her bee quilt. 

And that plan involves the beehive block and some flower blocks, also from Lori Holt.  I'm betting she will have it done in time for our 2027 quilt show.  It will be a really fun quilt.

Peggy was president in 2025 and she won't receive her blocks until our Christmas party in December.  So it's still a secret.  My block is finished and handed over to the current officers.

The committee (Sandy, Janelle, Peggy) did a wonderful job planning and organizing this event.  We had a yummy brunch of breakfast pizza and fruit before the trunk show.  Then after seeing all the quilts we enjoyed cake and more coffee while we talked about all the beautiful president quilts, and reminisced about the ladies that were not there.  Some of our past presidents have passed away, some have moved away, and a few had conflicts that kept them from attending.  

Design Wall Monday - September 7

We're in a drought again this year, but overnight Friday/Saturday we got 4.5" of rain.  That is more than we had all this summer combined.  You know it's dry when that much rain falls in a few hours and we have no puddles anywhere.   

The fall activities for grandkids are kicking off this week, with cross country and football.  I'm not promising to get to every sport every week, but we'll go to some.  I also have a follow-up appointment with the ophthalmologist to check for proper healing.  And we're into week 10 of PT for the Achilles tendonitis, which is definitely improved.  You know I'll be sewing in between all the coming and going.

The September block patterns for the Marigold mystery (Meadow Mist) were posted last Thursday.  The parts are cut for the 2 different blocks.  There will be 4 of one block and 5 of the other, just like in August.  But these finish at 6", and the August blocks are 8".

All of the applique for the snowmen have been ironed onto the fusible.  There are 4 large snowman faces, and 4 small ones.  This week's task will be to do all the trimming so they will be ready to lay out on the background. 

Only 1 small snowman has been trimmed so far, but you can get the idea. Each one gets a black smile, a carrot nose, and a 2-color scarf.  

What happens when my design boards are full, but I wanted to begin working on 2 purple Honey Bee blocks for RSC on Sunday?  That is why I buy dollar store paper plates.  They are really great for sorting the pieces for projects.  Two blocks, two plates. 

 I'll also continue on 2 WIP projects.  There are 4 rows assembled so far on that brown plaid lap quilt.  And I decided to also work on a 3-yard quilt that had the parts cut already.  This is a baby quilt with elephants, and the pattern is Happy Blocks - a free one from maryquilts.com. Both of these projects will be good to work on when I need a break from tiny pieces (Marigold), applique, or from purple.

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

https://songbirddesigns.blog 

RSC26 - Week #36

My habit of cutting ahead has been paying off again this week.  One design board was filled with purple parts.  That meant that with a spare 15-20 minutes these 3 Buckeye Butterfly blocks were all done. I'm getting close to having enough of these blocks for a quilt. 

The purple Ticker Tape blocks were quick finishes too.  I'll need a few more purple ones, but this is a good beginning.

The Gameboard block and Hollow-9 were not already cut out, but the right size pieces presented themselves as I worked on other things.  

These were mostly small blocks with quick finishes. The design board still holds parts for several Tulip Swirl (4") and Scrappy Stars (9").  Some of those may be sewn this afternoon when I get home.  This morning is our guild meeting for September, and we're having a Past Presidents' Quilt trunk show and brunch.  Hopefully there will even be some ladies attending who've moved away since being our guild president.

Some cutting of purple for next week's RSC blocks has taken place - mostly with the larger blocks (12" finished) I've been making this year.  Honey Bees, Snail Trail, Scrappy Stars, and Catnip parts have begun to take over the design boards.  

Let's go check out more Rainbow fun . . .

https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/

 

Finished (or not) Friday

Hmmm . . . how did it become Friday again already?  Welcome to September.

The landscape is beginning to take on some fall colors already.  There are 3 Hosta plants in from of our house, of 2 different varieties.  The smaller middle one blooms in late July, but the 2 bigger ones bloom in late August.  I love the flowers on them.  But I noticed this week that the leaves are getting a bit of fall color showing up.  And it's not just these Hostas, as there are 2 maple trees down the street that have begun to turn orange.

One major accomplishment this week was dropping off 3 quilts to be quilted.  One was a Quilt of Valor, so I won't be able to count that as one of MY finishes when it comes back.  But the other 2 were medium sized "kid" quilts that will eventually be donated or gifted.  Salt Water Taffy and a Churn Dash flimsy (from the closet) will be good ones to have done before the end of the year. 

The binding is done on another QOV.  This one was a set of star blocks made by our group members during a block drive a couple of years ago.  One member assembled them into a flimsy - 5 blocks wide by 6 long.   Isn't it great how all these different fabrics play together?  There is another similar flimsy in our stack yet waiting to be quilted - someday.

I do have 2 "near" finishes - a table runner and a medium sized quilt.  Both have binding attached.  The runner is trimmed but the quilt still needs to be trimmed.  It always feels good to have nothing but hand stitching the binding left to do on a project. 

For more finishes, please visit:  https://alyciaquilts.blogspot.com/

A little progress everywhere

Progress is happening on several projects this week, and I actually have one empty project box waiting for something new.

Salt Water Taffy is now a 52 x 64 flimsy. The extra jelly roll strips of the solid colors have been turned into binding.  Yay for an empty project box!!!  Of course there is another possible project waiting to fill up that empty box.   

A good start has been made on quilting the little Halloween runner.  Maybe I'll even get to the binding stage yet today. 

  

My reward for this progress - and for sewing a few purple RSC blocks - was to cut into that squirrel project.  The plaid was "gifted" to me, the brown was a recent purchase, and that blue came out of a scrap bag also gifted to me.  The blue will just pop up randomly.  The tumblers are all cut from 5" strips.  So far there are 2 rows sewn together.  I think this will make an easy lap quilt with a nice masculine feel. 

Garden Stars

Garden Stars is a BOM from Carol Doak, going on via her Facebook group. This year she began the BOM with a block that will repeat in between the monthly star blocks. That way we can work on them gradually through the year.

The September Star block was actually posted a couple of days early, and this month I didn't procrastinate.  For this one I used only half of my "colors".  I have 2 shades of each (yellow, orange, aqua, teal), but only used 1 of each in the block.  

So far I'm keeping up with the single block each month. Some folks have ALL of their alternate blocks finished already.  Not me!  I will need to make 1 or 2 more each month for awhile.  But Row #1 has a good beginning.  The dark background print in the middle alternate block is a dark version of the yellow print in the background of the monthly blocks.  Each row will have 5 blocks total.