Just can't stay home

Tuesday began as a stay-at-home-and-sew kind of day - until 9:30 AM.  Then a friend called to ask if I wanted to ride along as she went to a quilt shop about 90 miles away.  Duh!!!  Of course I said yes, and she picked me up an hour later.

It was a good day for a road trip.  She had looked in both of our local shops for very particular fabrics for a graduation quilt with no luck.  But today she found what she was looking for at the shop, and I found what I didn't know I was looking for. LOL  Actually I took along my 2026 SAHRR project to look for a border for it.  The last prompt was "Quilter's Choice", and I had decided my choice was just one wide border.  But nothing in my stash looked right.  That fun bubbly print will now be the final border, and that purple stripe peeking out on the left will be the binding.  So - success was had.

But of course I couldn't stop there.  The fabric for another 3-yard quilt (for a kiddo) came home with me.  And I curated a small stack of random fat quarters, including some neutrals to replenish those in the stash.  This yardage was added to my stash report promptly, on the IN column.  Hopefully most of will go on the OUT column soon too.

Once finished shopping we went to lunch and then headed home.  A fine day!! 

Shadow Star QOV progress

Shadow Star is the UFO I decided to move to the flimsy stage this month.  A couple of blocks had been made when I began this project, with the rest of the block parts all cut out.  Then it all went back into the project box over a year ago and has been neglected ever since.

Do you ever set something aside so long you don't remember what the plan was?  I was thinking there would be 12 blocks with maybe sashing, cornerstones, and a simple border.  But luckily I had a book in the project box with a layout marked.   

                   

Circle of Nine is a really amazing book, showing ways to lay out sets of 9 blocks in interesting ways.  I've used it before, and even had a couple of sketches inside with ideas I had worked on to use different layouts.  Now I'm really excited to get this one rolling along again. 

There are now 5 completed 12.5" blocks for this project.  I need to trim those 2 sets of flying geese units, and then the final 4 blocks can be assembled.

This is the layout I had marked in the book. The red star fabric will be those gold spacers, with the blue used in those corners and for binding.   

Monday - catching up

I can't remember the last time I didn't have anything at all to post for Design Wall Monday.  But that's the case today.  Being gone for 5 days - even when we're only 75 miles from home - takes it's toll on routines. We left Wednesday and got home last night.  College basketball conference tournament time is our annual "thing".  It was fun - but exhausting. 

The Jackrabbit men lost in the first round unfortunately.  But the SDSU Jackrabbit women upset the #1 team from NDSU to win the conference tournament title.  That is 4 years in a row as Champs!!

Now that we're home I have lots of laundry to do, and will need to get groceries at some point today.  But I do plan to take my coffee to my happy place (sewing room) for a little while this morning to play with fabric. I was going through withdrawal.    

RSC26 - Week #10

Not the most productive start to the red month, thanks to coming down with a nasty cold.  And for being gone to college basketball tournament since Wednesday afternoon.

But I can share one RSC finish - Zipper!!  I made the blocks a couple of years ago, assembled it into a flimsy in 2025, and now it's finally done. Yay!  This will be a donation quilt.  It's 56 x 84, made with blocks that finish at 8 x 12 as they all use 2.5" strips.  But the blocks could just as easily be made with 1.5" strips for tiny blocks or wider strips for BIG blocks.  Very versatile, and a block pattern I know I'll use again.

There was very little sewing done this week but I did play with red strings a little bit. These don't require much brain power so are ideal for sewing when I was under the influence of cold medicine. Brenda from Conquering Mount Scrapmore does a lot of video tutorials on free blocks.  Last week she was sharing about these diamond shaped string blocks.  Her blocks had the strings going the long way on the diamond, but I chose to do mine across.  The 6.5" square string blocks are for a WIP that I have been working on. 

One set of binding strips are cut and ready to add to another UFO quilt.  Cutting strips was also an easy thing to do when feeling a bit foggy.  LOL
  

Two sets of red binding are ready to hand over to QOV members to bind a couple of quilts recently back from the quilter.  And the parts for 1 new red Snail Trail block are ready to sew.  Next week will hopefully be more productive.  

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

https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/

Finished (or Not) Friday

I finished binding the Zipper quilt last weekend, so I can happily check this one off the UFO list for this year.  That makes 2 done, and lots more to go.

Zipper was a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project a couple of years ago, with each block using 2.5" strips.  These were really fun blocks.  And they can be made bigger or smaller without needing any fancy math skills.  That's a win, right?  And Zipper will be donated. 

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

https://alyciaquilts.blogspot.com/  

Next UFO projects

There are always several UFOs in my sewing room.  Things I started and then set aside for any number of reasons, or for no reason other than I can't resist a squirrel.  I'm trying each month as I finish one UFO, to choose the next one to work on.

Shadow Stars is one of those abandoned UFO projects.  It's a Quilt of Valor begun about this time last year, but I only got 3 blocks made at the time. The pieces were even all cut for the remaining blocks. Since RED is the Rainbow Scrap Challenge color for March, I decided to choose this UFO to be next in line as it has lots of red. 

Today is Day 2 of the Summit League basketball tournament.  It's my husband's idea of an ideal vacation.  Sigh!!   It has always been fun to spend 5 days at the tournament because it has been a reunion of extended family.  Due to a variety of circumstances this year I think we're the only ones attending, although we'll try to have some grandkids come to games with us.

Plus I'm finally getting over the cold I caught over last weekend, so it's probably OK that we're not hanging out with lots of family members.

Under the weather

Thank you to my husband for sharing his cold with me!!

He felt so miserable early last week that he even moved to the guest room to sleep.  But unfortunately he has passed it on anyway. By Saturday evening it was obvious that I was getting very congested.  Sunday I never ever got dressed. No fever, no chills, no sore throat, no deep coughing - just that sinus congestion.  My nose is red and tender.  Monday wasn't a very ambitious day either although I did get dressed and I did get some binding strips cut. 

But I'm determined that today I'm going back downstairs to sew for a little while.  With a big box of tissues of course.