RSC26 - Week 12

Red is one of favorite colors, so it was definitely fun sewing this week again.

The "catnip" block with red kitties was a priority this week.  Every time I look at these blocks I just have to smile. So cute and whimsical. 

Give It a Whirl blocks are adding up.  With the addition of these 2 red ones there are 36.  Because they are only 8" finished, I'll need a few more yet to make a decent size quilt.

Hollow-9 blocks are adding up too.  I was digging deep in the 2.5" square bin to find red.  Last year I used up a ton of red squares in the strawberry blocks.

There was plenty of red sewing NOT part of RSC was for another Quilt of Valor.  The stars and the 4-patch blocks are 8" finished.  There are still 4 star blocks and the remaining 4-patch blocks in both red/white and blue/white on the design board waiting to be sewn.  I can't wait to lay this one out.   

 

A RSC quilt from a previous year is now checked off the UFO list.  This is Triple Triangles, made with string triangle blocks.  

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

https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/

Finished (or not) Friday

The binding on this finish was done a few days ago, but I saved it for a sunny day in order to get a decent photo.  Thursday was photo day.

Mother Nature has been a bit psycho this week - snow early in the week with negative temps for low.  Now it's sunny and will be near 80 today.  Will it really be nearly 90 tomorrow?  

Triple Triangle was a fun Rainbow Scrap Challenge project.  The blocks are triangles made with strings, framed in a variety of black and white prints. That blue sashing came from the stash, and so did the black and white outer border.   But I couldn't resist buying this colorful backing for it when I saw it.   

This isn't a huge quilt - 54 x 65.  But it's a good size for a kid to snuggle into.  And it's another UFO to check off that list. 

As for things NOT finished - or even started yet . . . this little kit showed up in the mail this week.  It's the April mini quilt in that Year of Spools series.  This might just be the cutest one of the bunch so far.  I'm hoping to work on it over the weekend.

With so many projects always going on at once around here, I should NOT admit that I added 3 new patterns to the mix this week.  One of them was a free download, one was a not-free download, and the last one will come in the mail in a couple of day.  What fun would it be if there were not any FUTURE PROJECTS waiting in the wings?

Check out more Finishes (or Not) today . . .

https://alyciaquilts.blogspot.com/  

Just 1 little finish

 

Just 1 small finish to report so far this week . . . a little doll quilt for donation with it's critter.  That makes only 2 so far for 2026, although there are tops made for 4 more.  And there is a bag in the closet with a few more little stuffed animals to go with them.

Featured quilter

One of the local quilts shops (The Pin Cushion) is featuring the work of a different quilter each month this year.  I'm really honored to be the March featured quilter.  That meant going through my quilts to find a mix of large and small items to share. For the whole month the classroom is hung with my projects.

The big wall in the classroom has the large quilt with appliqued houses and pine trees, all done in blues and greens.  And the small projects on the left are a patriotic Lone Star wall hanging and a paper pieced round table topper.  On the right side is a Hawaiian applique table topper, a Stay At Home Round Robin projects from about 2023 (?), and an Easter table runner that is applique on an ombre fabric.

The table in the classroom is draped with my very first quilt, made in Home Ec class when I was in high school decades ago.  

The only reason I know the year is because I embroidered my name and date on the back of this crazy quilt.

Another wall holds the Sammy's Secret Garden quilt that was a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project a few years ago.  The cats and other blocks are all from Lori Holt's Farm Girl Vintage books 1 and 2.  The Christmas table runner to the right is also a Lori Holt pattern.

The Halloween quilt is a One Block Wonder, using a panel.  Well actually it used 7 panels, one kept whole and 6 to make the hexies.  Hanging from the corner of the door is a bag I made from a charm pack.

The paper pieced quilt was the project from the Alaskan cruise with girl friends a few years ago.  And hanging above that doorway is a wall hanging with appliqued Dresden blades and randomly cut leaves and stems.

Hand quilted and appliqued Santa and reindeer are the basis of this wall hanging that I made about 25 years ago. For many years it hung above our piano at Christmas.  The piano is gone but the wall hanging still comes out. 

And finally, above the French doors from the classroom into the shop - this watermelon table runner.  It's also hand quilted.  Again, this is something I made almost 30 years ago but still get it out in late summer.  It was a pattern in a magazine.  

This and that

Monday morning was a good one for sewing, with progress again on multiple projects.    

Because I was out of binding to do in the evenings, I pulled out one of the doll quilts that I made earlier this winter, and got binding put on it. Since it's only 25" square it probably will only take 1 evening to hand stitch.  

The block for Saturday Sampler for March is done. This block is 15" finished. Anthologie is the pattern we're using this year, and it is a sampler type of project with a mix of traditional blocks plus applique. Some blocks require multiples, but there will be only 1 of Le Fleur.

The 12" Farm Girl Vintage blocks have been sewn into rows.  There are 6 rows of 5 blocks, so it will be 60 x 72, unless I add some borders to make it bigger.  That decision can wait until I see how it looks without borders.

Four of the 12 blocks with white stars are all done.  These will go quickly in between other things because the parts are all cut and layed out on a design board.  They're only 8" blocks so they make good Leaders/Enders.  

At Sew Vintage on Saturday afternoon I found myself reminded of a scrappy RWB project that has been going on in my sewing room for a number of years now. 

For several years as I've worked on blocks for Quilts of Valor, there have been corner triangles trimmed off.  I can't just throw them away, so they become 2.5" HSTs that get trimmed and dropped into a big bag on a shelf. A big variety of reds and blues are sewn to a bigger variety of light neutrals. 

This is the ongoing project that has been tucked into that bag with the HSTs.  Every so often I add another row to it.  There is no plan in my brain yet for how large I want to make this.  But it has been fun to watch it slowly grow. I'll probably add a couple more vertical rows to it this week since red is the RSC color.  

Design Wall Monday - March 16

This week my To Do list will include making the 1 block needed for this month's Saturday Sampler task.

Choosing the colors for this block was probably the hardest part.  This will be a 15" block, and has pretty easy components.

Yesterday I cut all of the pieces needed to make the 12 star blocks for the 3rd week's prompts for the Quilt of Valor I'm working on with Alycia.  I'm using just 1 background fabric (white), and just 1 blue.  But the reds are scrappy as I try to use up some leftovers from other Quilts of Valor projects.  I've already made the 12 blocks with white backgrounds and blue or red stars.  These will all have white stars. 

Working my way through some UFOs can be satisfying - IF I manage to move them to the finish line, or at least a quilt top.

Next UFO in line is the set of 12" blocks I made years ago in our Sew Vintage group using the Farm Girl Vintage 1 and 2 books by Lori Holt.  At the time I made both sizes of blocks - 6" and 12" - see above photo.  The small blocks became a finished quilt right away but the big blocks have mostly been laying in a project box ever since.  

A year of so later, I pulled out a barn block and 8 animal blocks to make a quilt.  This was the first project made using that Circle of Nine book that I used last week for a QOV. The spacers and borders on this layout are slightly different than my new QOV version.  On a side note - do you see the Honey Bee block in there?  I'm using that same block pattern for the RSC blocks I've been making in blue, green, and red so far.  

But . . . there were still over 40 blocks waiting to become something.  Now's the time!!  Setting aside several food-themed blocks from the pile, I layed out these 30 so far. More rearranging is needed before I begin to sew anything together.  And that still leaves all those food-themed blocks.  Hmmmm . . . that means one more quilt doesn't it?

In between working on all of this there will be plenty more RSC blocks in red.  

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

https://songbirddesigns.blog

RSC26 - Week #11

Today is Saturday Sampler and Sew Vintage day - my favorite Saturday of every month.  Totally quilt focused all day!  

Two red Snail Trail blocks were the very first thing I sewed this week after being gone for 5 days, without any stitching time.  Do you feel withdrawal when you can't sit at the machine or do any hand stitching for several days?  I definitely do.    

Later in the week I got 2 more of them sewn, so now there are 4 of each color Snail Trail blocks - blue, green, and red.  Plus 4 brown ones I did last fall during the dark neutral sewing month.  These are 12" blocks. 

Two red 9" Scrappy Stars were made in between other projects.  I already had 2 red ones made, plus the blue and green ones.

These are going to look good with lots more colors mixed in.

Waking up way too early on Thursday gave me time to finish a couple of quilt tops that were already nearly done.  And then there was time to make the Honey Bee blocks that were cut out.  I had planned to work on them over this weekend, but now they are done.  These 12" finished blocks are faster to sew than they are to cut.  

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

https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/