Design Wall Monday - April 28

There will be 2 priority projects happening this week.  Hopefully I'll make some good progress on both of them by the end of the week.  

First of all, I have the strips cut for the 3rd row for Saturday Sampler.  The next step will be to sub-cut the wider strips into the 60 rectangles needed and then mark the unusual stitching line on 30 lighter colored ones.  Getting the angles right on this one involves some very specific instructions and I need to NOT rush as I work on them.

The other priority project is to continue working on the Lone Star quilt.  I'm ready to sew the strip set for the 5th star point.  This has been a slow careful project too because I don't want to mess up the color placement.  On Saturday I took this section to the quilt shop and auditioned several grey backgrounds, finally choosing a medium grey.

When I need a break from careful precise sewing, then I'll work on some small projects too, such as mug rugs or placemats.  Over the weekend I took that oversized table runner parts (deconstructed the week before) and made 2 placemats and 2 mug rugs.  There are 12 more 6.5" blocks made from the scraps, ready to become more mug rugs.  

And with the new month looming I'm guessing there will be a new Circle of Friends block posted by Carol Doak for that sew-along.  I haven't counted by the May block might be the final block for this one.  She has already announced a new paper pieced sew-along will be following.  I have been enjoying this one so will probably continue.
 

I'll have another quilt to bind as well because the batik Hunters Star quilt will be ready to pick up today from the quilter.  It will be good to be able to check off another UFO from the list.

And since the color GREEN was chosen for May for RSC, it's time to look and see what PIGs or UFOs are hiding in my sewing room with a lot of green that I can focus on next month.  I'm confident there will be plenty of things to choose from.  LOL

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

https://songbirddesigns.blog 

RSC25 - Week #17

I have a finish!  I started making these blocks for a Quilt of Valor during the blue month, and continued until I had enough.  A member of our QOV group picked up the flimsy and backing to quilt it.  A couple of days later she brought it back with gorgeous star quilting.

I added RED binding and finished it off this week.  It turned out very pretty.

Hollow 9-patch blocks are a good scrap buster.  I had made only 2 each month so far this year, but knew that I had some made last year and tucked them away somewhere.  I found them and was a bit disappointed that there were only 10 blocks in the bag.  However, in with the missing blocks was a picture of a possible layout along with my notes.  

My plan is to make sets of 4 and then add a narrow light sashing and colorful cornerstones. I've begun sewing what I have into sets of 4 blocks.  Then I'll have a better idea of what colors I should focus on when digging into the basket of 2.5" squares during the rest of 2025.  

A flimsy with plenty of red has been finished.  This Quick Strippie was quick to assemble this week because I already had the strip sets made the week before.

   

One red Night Vision block - with bonus pinwheels - joined the party.  This makes 29 of the Night Vision blocks, and there is just 1 more set remaining of the black and white squares I had cut last year for this project.  I'm still thinking of how I want to layout these 9" (finished) blocks for a quilt.  And whether or not to use the pinwheels with them or in something separate. 

I have a good start on my son-in-law's Lone Star quilt.  It's a rainbow - just not scrappy.  Although that would work too!  This was my primary project this week.  So far half of the star points are assembled.  The edges of those some of those diamonds are on the bias, cut from strip sets of 5 colors, then rows cut diagonally from those strip sets.  And I've had to do a lot of measuring and pinning to get them to match up.  I still haven't decided on a background color but am leaning toward a medium to dark grey.  I'm wishing that I hadn't used black in the actual star because black would have been a good background to make the colors pop.  

 And finally - there is this . . .  a braid strip made completely from scraps.  I was looking at a book I have on braid quilts, and remembered that I had bought the tiny little ruler too.  So I just had to pull out some strings and the ruler and play.  I have no clue yet what I'm going to do with this but it made a good leader/ender while I worked on other projects this week. 

I'll be linking up today with Rainbow Scrap Challenge:

https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/ 

Lone Star progress

 

So far I have 3 of the star points sewn for the Lone Star project.  The 8 colors are going to spin outward in this one, so the strip sets are a bit tricky.  I sure don't want any of those colors in the wrong spots after a lot of stitching.

Thankfully I printed out some coloring sheets for this project and colored them with those spinning colors.  As I've worked my way around sewing, I've noted which strip set goes where on that coloring sheet.  And I'm carefully only laying out one star point at a time so I can keep track of where I'm at.  So far, so good.  Next up is star point #4.  

RBD block #13

Happy anniversary to daughter #1 and her husband. 

Fifteen years ago today we were all on a beach in Jamaica for their wedding.  Three kids and 3 dogs, a couple of lizards, and an aquarium full of fish keep them really busy now.  

Amanda Niederhauser designed the 13th block for the 2025 Riley Blake challenge.  Her version has a more scrappy look in that center, but at the last minute I decided to make mine with just the one print.  I am excited that there are only 3 more blocks for this year, and then we play with the layouts.  

Midweek check-in

 Even with all the cleaning and decluttering going on around here I've found time to sew.

The Mickey Mouse flimsy is done.  This is a Quick Strippie from Mary Quilts.  It's a free pattern and perfect for showcasing a fun novelty print in those wide strips.  And it uses just 3 yards of fabric - one yard of each.  I even pieced a backing for this one, so the top and back are hanging together on a hanger waiting for it's turn to be quilted.

And - look!  The first star point for the Lone Star quilt is done.  Making 10 different strip sets is the time consuming part of this, and matching all those seams ON THE BIAS is the tricky part of this project.  But it will be worth it.  

Two more placemats got binding.  These have a bowling fabric.  

The one thing I've been avoiding so far this week - cutting the pieces for the Saturday Sampler row for April.  But I will get to it.   

And it's time to make this week's block for the Riley Blake challenge.  Don't want to fall behind on anything.  LOL

Tuesday clean-up and progress

We spent Easter weekend at home, working on some junk purging around the house - just the two of us.  Our basement storage area is organized and uncluttered for a change.  And I've added all of the items purged - either trashed or sorted for the rummage sale - onto my declutter spreadsheet.  I'm up to 179 items purged.

Each year our community does a city wide clean-up day when people can put large items out on the curb for disposal.  For $10 added to our garbage bill, the city will pick up those large items on our designated garbage day.  The funny thing is all of the "scavengers" - folks who drive around and pick up things they think they can use.  We began putting things out on Saturday afternoon along with one of our neighbors. We had a lot of broken office stuff - old printers, office chairs, shelving units, etc.  By Sunday evening nearly everything was already gone that both houses put out. Our designated garbage pick-up day is actually today, and there is almost nothing for the city to collect from us. 

A little clean up happened in my sewing room over the weekend too.  I really need to do some purging of quilting and craft books again.  

One item that kept getting moved from drawer to drawer in my sewing room, and never finished - this snowman themed "thing".  This was a UFO from at least 20 years ago that was sandwiched with batting and backing and pin basted.  The bag even contained the binding all prepped.  It's such cute fabric, but was too wide and too narrow to be useful as either a wall hanging or a table runner - about 30 x 45.  What was I thinking?  That probably explains why I never finished it.  So on Sunday evening I took the seam ripper to this thing, and it's destined to become something useful.  Maybe a couple of placemats or something.  But it is NOT going to be taking up any more space as is.

I did finish a couple of small quilting projects too.    

One of the placemats got its binding.  This was another orphan block, and I even had some scraps of the red print so it's big enough for a placemat.  There are 10 finished placemats in the donation stack now.  And there are more of them in my sewing room ready for binding. 

And another doll quilt is finished and ready to wrap around a stuffie. This cowboy boot fabric was the leftover from the pillowcases I made for my great-niece for graduation.  

Design Wall Monday - April 21

A new week has arrived, with both new and continuing goals. 

The new project I've started involves a rainbow of solid colors.  I spent time this weekend cutting strips to make a total of 10 different strip sets for this project.  It's a Lone Star design, and will be a gift for one son-in-law to honor his Native American roots.  My daughter requested it, and helped choose a design for it.  I'm excited to get it going. 

There is a lot of binding that could happen during the evenings this week.  The red/white/blue Buckeye Beauty was quilted last week by one of our members and I'm going to add the binding to it.  I also have a couple of placemats and a doll quilt that need binding.

And this month's row for Saturday Sampler is on my To Do list for this week.  I haven't begun to even cut the pieces for this one yet.  And this month's row has a LOT of pieces in it.  

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/