President Hoover Historical Site

I'm on a LONG road trip with my husband this week. He had a couple of meetings for work - one in Iowa and one in Wisconsin.  We've now crossed Iowa completely twice, and are spending the night in Omaha before heading north to South Dakota and home.

This morning we visited West Branch, Iowa. I stopped in a very cute quilt shop and then we both enjoyed the Herbert Hoover historical site.  You can park and take a walking tour of his birthplace (house is pictured here), his father's blacksmith shop, the Quaker Meetinghouse - and the presidential library and museum.  Well worth the time spent here. 

We've also visited the Amanda Colonies on this trip, played one round of golf in steamy hot conditions, been in the middle of a tornado warning, eaten in a couple of really good restaurants, and I've been in 5 different quilt shops along the way.  He was humorist me since I rode along this week. It's been a pretty good week but I'll be glad to be home and sleep in my own bed tomorrow. 

Halloween bag

 

Our youngest grandson Jack needs a bag for trick or treating.  I've made them for the other kids and his mom asked me to make one for him too.  I think this is the fabric that will end up being used.

 

I had plenty of this gold left over from another project so I've cut enough for the handles and the lining. It plays nicely with the black cats and the spider webs. The pieces are cut, but I didn't have enough interfacing so this will be set aside until I can buy some. Without the interfacing, this bag pattern is too soft and flimsy.  

Saturday Sampler mystery quilt

 

I'm all caught up with the sections for the current mystery quilt we're doing for Saturday Sampler.  We've been making small units such as half square triangles, and the rectangular diamonds. This month we sewed those into 2 different sections.

 

Of course I had to start playing with the layout possibilities.  This is the option that seemed to work out the best so far.  But I have no idea whether or not this is even close the real outcome.  Guess we'll find out in August - can't wait. 

Prairie Sky

 

Prairie Sky is a new small quilt from Kim Diehl's Simple Whatnots #6 collection.  It's approximately 10.5" x 12.5".  Right now it's bound and finished, except I'm trying to decide if I want to do a little hand quilting on it for more texture.

 

I missed the class in June and had to just pick up my kit.  The class is great because Gwen gives us tips to make things easier.  Kim Diehl's patterns are generally pretty easy as long as you keep your patience with the small pieces.  In this case, the foundation was 2.5" squares and rectangles.  Easy peasy! Then I realized that all of the tiny light colored pieces were applique. What!!!  I don't mind applique, but these pieces were in that 1" category. 

 

And I have to admit that it wasn't as bad as I expected it to be.  I realized that I could just do these in rows, going up one side and back down the other.  And I think it's adorable now that it's done.  Looking ahead at the rest of Collection #6 I'm thinking this isn't the last applique we'll be doing.

Sewing help

 

Yesterday afternoon Sammy came to help me out. My geriatric cat doesn't venture down to my sewing room as often as he used to.  He is a big boy - just over 20 pounds - and will be 16 years old around Labor Day.  My sewing room is in the basement and he is pretty slow on the stairs, especially going back up.  He needs help getting up on my ironing board these days too, but once he's there he settles right down to some serious napping and supervising. And that big, long body takes up pretty much the whole space.

 

For a lot of years he would follow me into the sewing room and sit in the middle of where ever I was working. If I was trying to cut fabric then he would sit or stretch out on my cutting board. If I was sewing, then he would lay on top of the quilt, or sit so he could look through the throat area of my machine. And if I was pressing something then he would stretch out on the ironing board with his tail swishing close to the hot iron. 

 

Now when Sammy does show up in my sewing room he'll talk and talk until I lift him up there. Then he settles right in.  When he finally gets bored - or annoyed because I move his tail to press something - he'll walk across to my sewing table which is lower, and jump down.

Quilt of Valor #1

 

The first of three quilt tops is done.  Ladies from our guild had this one put together in two halves on Saturday. This morning I sewed the halves together. And there was enough of the navy blue sashing so I added one final outer border all the way around.

 

This one is ready for a backing and quilting.

Working on Quilts of Valor

Our guild had a short work session before our meeting to work on the tops for our Quilts of Valor.  We got a LOT accomplished in about 2.5 hours. 

The panel was donated by one member (Ellen) and the 12" blocks and navy yardage were donated by another member, Mary.  These are going together for one quilt.  Just a couple more seams and this one will be a finished top. I took this photo before the navy sashing was added.

We put 70 Garlic Knot blocks together for another top, and have 30 more stitched into rows for a third quilt top.  Sylvia, Peggy, Ellen, and Gwen all sewed up a storm while Ruby and I pressed, cut sashing, and rearranged blocks.  And we do have more blocks to finish that third quilt but ran out of sewing time.  We were hoping for 2 Quilts of Valor, so 3 is really a lovely surprise development.

And during the meeting another member (Nancy) donated a large gorgeous piece of blue yardage for a backing.  We have some terrific people in our guild.