Sewing with the granddaughter

Sophia and I finally got some sewing time yesterday, and plan to do lots more today.  She had that wrestling camp Tuesday.  And she has been going to the gym with grandpa each morning to get in her workout.  Wednesday afternoon we did go to both quilt shops here in town, where she chose fabric for a couple of projects.

Sophia's first project a year or so ago was adding borders onto a panel to make a throw quilt - which I noticed she has with her right now.  Her second project was making herself 2 pillowcases.  She decided she's ready for an actual pieced project. So we looked at some of the 3-yard quilt patterns from Fabric Cafe.  Tic Tac caught her eye, and at C.O. Textiles she fell in love with this Halloween line.  That black one even glows in the dark.  And ironically those colors are nearly a perfect match to the picture in the book.  This is a great project for learning to follow a pattern to cut the pieces for a quilt. 

At The Pin Cushion the colors from the Hue line really called her name.  She has always loved to draw and paint so it's not a surprise to be drawn to this color study fabric.  Her plan is to make a pillowcase with these.

One completed pillowcase later . . . plus a cute little drawstring bag made with the leftovers from this pillowcase.  We will run to Walmart today to get the cording for the drawstring.  Then she is going to begin working on the pieced quilt project.

Rodeo parade float

The Pin Cushion decided to enter a float in the Corn Palace Rodeo parade this year, which had an overall theme of America's 250th birthday.  The gals featured the Quilts of Valor program with a couple of veterans even riding on the float. Our group was delighted to lend them some quilts to use.  It won 1st place in the "retail" entries.

From the front you can see one of our local veterans.  Two more were on the other side.

One side showed off several quilts.  I love the big banner they created above the quilts down the whole length of the trailer. 

The other side looks just as good.

From the back this gorgeous quilt really looks good.  I think this one was made by a shop employee last year.  It was the perfect end cap for the float.  These ladies did a wonderful job with the float - and with their prize winning painted windows earlier in the week.   

Binding the Blockheads quilt

Today is the first day of the Quilting Across the Dakotas shop hop, with 49 shops across both North and South Dakota.  Sophia and I plan to visit both local shops this morning and see if there is a small project she would like to work on.  All the shops always have some extra fun things featured during this month long shop hop. 

I have PT again today at 12:15, or we could do a little road trip to Chamberlain.

Binding did happen finally, and I'm pleased to be able to check another large UFO project off of my 2026 list.  I need to take this along to the Pin Cushion so they can mark it off my PHD list as well.  

This is the Blockheads 6 quilt, which I will donate to our Quilts of Valor group.  I've mentioned before that I like to do test blocks in red, white, and blue so that they can be used in a QOV.  I also like to do the same thing occasionally with a sew-along. 

In this case I wanted to do the sew-along but didn't have any good ideas of what colors to play with that would be different than my usual.  So - red, white, and blue was my Plan B - which was going back to RWB.  

Ella and I did go to the basement sewing room for awhile yesterday while Sophia was gone to the wrestling camp.  Two more bindings were prepped.  The yellow one will go onto my Hollow-9 lap quilt, and the red striped one will go onto another Quilt of Valor.  The strips were already cut, so I needed to sew them together and then press them.  

Settling in

It's hard to even get a binding stitched . . .

Sophia arrived yesterday, along with this little gal for the week.  Ella is settling in here although she's quite aggravated by all the cats that hang around out on our back deck.  The nerve of those cats!!

On a side note - I'm trying out something new for the Achilles inflammation and for arthritis pain, based on the good results a friend reports.  One of my best friends has terrible arthritis in her hands, and has been using Frankincense balm for a few months.  She says it has made a huge difference in how her hands feel.  I noticed she doesn't drop her cards like she used to when we play Hand and Foot.  So, I'm going to try it myself.  Can't hurt, right?  Plus it smells good and feel good on my skin. 

Design Wall Monday - July 20

There isn't much on my design wall this week, as it will be a really busy week with other things going on.  I have an appointment this morning at the ophthalmologist, followed by some much needed grocery shopping.  And I need to replace my vacuum cleaner that is dying, which means a trip to Walmart.  On Tuesday I have a manicure appointment, Wednesday and Thursday I'll have PT again.  

Granddaughter Sophia is coming later today to spend the week with us.  She has a wrestling camp in town, plus she wants to do a little sewing.  I've been on a cutting tear all week, so I cut a couple of doll quilt kits that she could work on if she wants.  Or we can find something else that she might want to make.  We can shop my stash or visit the 2 quilt shops in town for something fun. 

The Hollow-9 lap quilt is finally quilted, and I have bright yellow binding cut for it.  This was on my goal list months ago, but it kept being set aside.  Time to get this one done, and donated.

We'll see if I accomplish anything else this week, but I'll still have things to share during the week: pictures from the QOV float in Saturday's parade, a QOV flimsy assembled, etc.

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

https://songbirddesigns.blog 

RSC26 - Week #29

Not nearly as much aqua happening in my sewing room this week as I had hoped.  The catnip block is done.  The fabric in that left side cat is questionable, but I'm going to leave it.  I debated with my self before sewing that one onto the others, and considered switching it out with a different fabric.  But I've decided it's OK,

The past couple of months I've neglected the Gameboard block set completely.  The last one I made was red.  But an aqua one has been added.  And a couple of Hollow 9-patch blocks and Vintage Spool blocks happened too.  

Digging into the little basket full of leftover 6" string blocks, I got the idea to make placemats with some of them.  I had only 3 aqua/teal string blocks left, so they were paired with 3 black ones.  Aqua Hollow 9's were added to the leftover orange string blocks for the other placemat. After taking this photo I pulled some binding (also leftovers), and attached the bindings to these so they are ready for a finish.   
 

Most of my week was actually spent dealing with scraps - but of the red, white, and blue kind of scraps.  I cut kits for 2 Quilts of Valor, and yesterday I cut the parts for sashing, cornerstones, and a border for 1 more QOV kit.  The parts for LOTS more blocks for my own QOV projects happened too.  One would think that would have tamed those RWB scraps and stash.  NOT enough taming, but I'm getting there.  At least it's sorted into more easily searched bins now.  The lids actually close now too, so I guess it's a sign of progress.

Can't wait to see what color we'll be playing with for August.  In the meantime let's go check out more Rainbow fun . . .

https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/

Finished (or not) Friday

I did a lot of binding this week so there are some finishes to report, although I've already shown a couple of those finishes.  

 One more doll quilt has been finished.  This one had been sandwiched for several months, but not quilted.  That owl fabric was left over from a baby quilt - and there is still more of it in the "novelty kid print" drawer, waiting. The block was from a 3-yard quilt book by Fabric Cafe.

 These placemats are also done.  There are a couple more that are quilted but without binding yet.  My donation pile of placemats is getting bigger.  

Earlier in the week I cut and kitted up a Quilt of Valor for our group to make.  Then yesterday another QOV kit joined that one.  That means that just this week I've cut about 10 yards of fabric into kits from the QOV bins stored at my house.  And that fabric is still overflowing the bins, but not by quite as much.  LOL

I've been working on sorting and organizing things in my sewing room for about a month - a little bit at a time.  The sorting piles have been growing, but this week I feel like I've made some meaningful progress, at least with the Quilt of Valor fabric.  One task has been to collect all of the precuts, all of the purchased kits, all of the panels, and all of the orphan blocks - and get them organized TOGETHER.  So, this 12" canvas cube now holds all of the precuts and purchased kits.  The panels and orphan blocks will go into another cube.

And I'm finally getting the yardage organized too - one bin for all of the blue, and a separate bin for the reds and lighter patriotic prints.  It will be so much easier to find what we need once this is done. Then I can put together a couple more kits for our members to make, using the yardage and some panels.  

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