New quilt for a new year!

This was a planned new quilt with a friend and my mom.  Mine is going to be burgundy and sand colour.  My friend and my mom will both being doing theirs in blues.  We were all going to start this quilt in Jan/2026, when we get together monthly to sew.  I started a block between Christmas and New Years, as the sized of the units were bothering me.  

I needed to know for sure it was going to work, before the other two went ahead and started making units.  I am glad that I did, as the nine patch units would have all been too big for the rest of the units.  And as the nine patch unit has to be divisible by three, I had to reconsider the sizes of all the other units, to avoid having to cut ridiculous sizes. 

Above is the main block.  An eight point star, with an hourglass unit for the centre, diagonal strings for the corners and straight strings between the star points.  The background in this case will be the burgundy with highlights of sand/beige.

Then we have the second alternating block.  This also has an hourglass unit for the centre, nine patches for the corners, and straight strings for the rest of the units.

I first posted about this quilt on August 9th, called Burgundy scrap quilt, if you want to read more about it.  In that post, I have a picture of the full quilt that I printed up using EQ.  I'm hoping this quilt will make a dent in my burgundy and sand scraps.  Two colours that I don't often use.

Take care everyone.  Hope you all had a great time celebrating and bringing in the New Year!!

I started a wool appliqué quilt called Of a Feather

I was sitting here reviewing some of the drafts I had, sitting in my folders and noted that I never did post anything about this quilt.  It was just before my life was in an upheaval, so I understand why.  I am writing this ahead of time to post on January 1st, as I doubt I will be up early after a long night, bringing in the new year.  Happy New Years everyone!!!  May this year bring you plenty of happiness and prosperity!

We, as in Halton Hills Quilters' Guild, had a speaker by the name of Sharon Fisher of Gardening Mum Quilts on Oct/2023.  Her trunk show was absolutely breathe taking.  She did many things, but primarily wool appliqué.  She does a lot of Sue Fargo patterns with loads of embroidery.  Sharon does do private workshops or group classes, and classes through the Creekbank Sewing Centre too.

I signed up for a class called Of a Feather.  This class started in March/2024 the 3rd Saturday of every month, for 9 months.  Or was that 10 months?  I can't quite remember.  This is the pattern book we had to purchase.  It's not my usual type of quilt or even the subject matter, and the in your face loud colours, but I really wanted to learn how to do all those fancy embroidery stitches.

As well as the book, you could use your own fabrics and wool, plus all of the embroidery floss/threads that you needed, or you could purchase a basic kit.  The basic kit contained all the background wool, the wool for all the appliqué, the black on white cotton used on the background and the various cotton colours used in some of the blocks.  

On top of all of that, you could also purchase kits with the rick rack, kits with the embroidery threads and kits with specialty threads for certain blocks.  Let me just tell you that it was extensive!  I've never invested this much into a quilt before......and hope not to have to in the future either.....lol.

Here is a close up of the first block.  Do you see the intense amount of embroidery on the wool appliqué?  Tons of knots on the berries and fancy stitches on the bird.  Many that I've never done before.

Come Sunday, the next day, I had the black on white cotton shapes all attached to the background.  The rick rack was also attached and I was just getting started on the wool appliqué.

By April 13/2024, all of the wool applique and cotton overlay were finished.  Yeah!!  I had it all done and ready to go to class on the 3rd Saturday of April.  If you compare my block here with the completed one above, you'll see how much of a drastic difference there is, when it gets completely finished.

We were instructed in the first class to have some extra wool on hand to learn and practice all the various stitches.  These are the wool practice blocks I made for all the fancy stitches.  I am going to use them like a sampler, for the various stitches.  I made one practice block per bird block.

In the end, I didn't make it to the class again.  That is when my life became an upheaval.  I have since though, met up with Sharon at Creek Bank Sewing Centre, when they were having a customer quilt show, from all the classes that were taken at the store.  

It was so nice to see her again.  She mentioned that if I needed anything to move forward with the quilt, she would be there for me.  I thought that was nice of her.  She also said that they have meetings every Thursday, for people who may want to come to do some sewing or get help with various stages, and that I was more then welcome to attend.

I may take her up on it at some point, but for now, I am concentrating on dwindling my Works in Progress list first, before I get into Of a Feather.  I may even attempt to do all the appliqué parts first, as I am pretty verse in doing that part, and then seek her help with the fancy stitches.  I also have Sue Spargo's embroidery book of stitches, that I can check out, to try on my own too.

Take care everyone.  This year I challenge you to try a new technique!  Whatever hits your fancy.

Green pinwheel block

In an effort to try and finish as many smaller quilts as I could, before the end of the year, I pulled out this piece.  This started out as a square that my daughter made when she was younger, that she was going to make a pillow out of.  In the end, she didn't really like it and put it away.  When we moved here to this house and I started unpacking everything, I came across this green pinwheel block and a blue pinwheel block.  

I asked my daughter what she was doing with it and she just said, "you can do whatever you want with it"....lol.  She knew that, as I was unpacking my quilting stuff, I was sorting everything and dealing with what I could, instead of just shoving everything in a box in the back of some corner to be forgotten forever.....lol.  So I put this and the blue one in the orphan block box to be dealt with later.

I feel the reason she didn't like what she made, was because it was....shall we say....to much green...  I thought so anyways....  I decided to take off that last green border and work with the smaller pinwheel block with the first two borders.

I went into my cupboard of yardage, which is dwindling down quite substantially, to see if I could find something to coordinate with this green.  What I came up with was a piece of froggy fabric, that I have been using, over and over again, and it just won't go away....lol.  It's a cute fabric, but there was just too much of it, that it's been in many of the quilts I've made.

I wanted to keep the design simple so that I could use up more of the froggy fabric and so it could be large enough to see many of the frogs as possible, without being overly overwhelming.  I chose to do a very large froggy border, broken up by a small green border.  It definitely added colour to the "all green" of the original block.  I did the binding in green as well, which you may have noticed on the post of a couple of days ago.

It is a simple cheerful NICU quilt which will be going to Project Linus.

Stay tuned for tomorrows post, where I went back in time, to something I started back in March/2024, and haven't shared with you yet.

Take care everyone.

Progress on the 2nd Monkey Bar quilt

I finally got around to finishing off the 2nd Monkey Bar quilt.  I posted about the first one with slightly different fabric choices on Nov 16th, called I got some progress done.  This one, I just finished a couple of days ago and proceeded to quilt it the same day.  

Yesturday, during our group sew day, I made and attached the binding by machine on both sides.  Something new I am doing.  Previously I've sewn on the binding by machine on the top and my mom would tack down the binding on the back by hand.  I finally decided to give it a go, by machine on both sides.  It's great and quite a time saver!!

On this quilt, I ran out of the brown fabric with the large red polka dots and the solid red that I used on the first Monkey Bar quilt for the first border.  So this time, I decided to use the brown for the nine patches to alternate with the red polka dots.  Then I used the same brown for the first inner border.  As the inner border was brown, I had to choose a different colour for the last border and came across this tan colour that coordinates with the bars with the sock monkeys.

This toddler sized quilt will be going to Project Linus.

Take care everyone.

An extra Saturday sewing day on a Monday.....lol

When our Saturday sewing day group, were talking the last time we were all together, we realized that those of us who work full time, all had the week between Christmas and New Years off!  So, what is one to do......well, take advantage of the opportunity of course......lol......and plan to have an extra Saturday sew day!!  But this time on Monday!

Thanks to one of the members who suggested it, this Monday sew day was going to be a pot luck lunch on top of an all day sewing day.  Unfortunately, the weather was not very cooperative, and some were not able to make it.  The roads were slick and the winds where high, but we still had a couple of die hards in attendants.....lol.  

One of them stated that she lived in Winnipeg at one time and I believe Newfoundland, so what we were experiencing today was nothing for her.  Lol....I thought that was funny....what we won't do, to get in some sewing time with friends.....lol.  I am glad that it was not cancelled, as I do enjoy our get togethers.  I'm just sorry everyone couldn't make it to enjoy a bit of celebration, sharing food, but they were in our thoughts as we ate.

Today I was able to finish three more bindings.  The last ones for a bit.  Until I can finish up some more quilts.  These ones are two NICU quilts and one toddler size.  All are going to Project Linus.  I'll share more about the individual quilts in a later post.

One of the ladies was working on a new quilt in blue, that my mom and I will also be doing, but we are starting ours at the next Saturday Sew Day in January.  Mine will be burgundy and sand and my mom's will be in blue.  Here is a picture of one of her finished blocks.  I first posted about the pattern for this quilt, back on Aug 9th called Burgundy scrap quilt, if you want to read more about it.  So pretty!!

The other person who attended was working on her Smith Mountain Morning blocks.  She has really been working hard on them!!  She arrived with only 12 blocks left to assemble and left with all of them complete!  I'll post more about those later, as she wants to lay them out and send me a picture of it.

After the ladies left, I finished off the last of the above three bindings and decided to get into the Scrap Attack quilt blocks.  Each one takes a while to do.  I am trying to choose fabric colours that will help blend the blocks together a bit, but that is sometimes hard to do, with the variety of everyone's fabrics.  The blocks have to blend with several other blocks that touch and extend the design across the quilt.  Here is the one I finished today.

For the point down the centre, you have to coordinate the triangle piece with the other three triangles that form the one block.  Then for the "wing" type pieces on the side, you want to try and used some colours that will be connected/touching the neighboring blocks, though sometimes it can't be done as one end may have green, and the other end has purple.  In these cases you just have to pick one colour to work with the block on the left, and the next row choose something to work with the block above.  

It is a scrap quilt, but even scrap quilts have some elements of coordination.  It helps it be cohesive, or at least somewhat cohesive.....lol.  To some, they just look like a big mess of colour....lol.  I get it!  Scrap quilts are not for everyone.  I have to admit....it is harder to achieve the cohesiveness, when there are a lot of hands in the making of the blocks, and everyone using their own fabrics and their own interpretation of what the block should look like.  Somehow, I'm hoping it will work....lol.

All in all, I had a very nice day.  Relaxing with friends, sewing, sharing ideas, sharing food, and chatting.  I'm already looking forward to our next meet up next month.

Take care everyone.

Set backs and moving on!

My daughter has now gone home, we have a few more days before we get back into the celebrations with New Year's Eve.  My daughter will be coming back in three days for the celebrations.  So I figured I would get some more stuff done in my quilting.  I am still trying to get as much as I can done, off my list of Works in Progress, but not stressing about it though.  

I took my time yesturday morning to putter around picking things up, sitting to have my morning cup of tea and then having a late breakfast, before heading downstairs to sew.  I had big plans to start quilting my king sized Christmas quilt......"had" being the operative word.....here is where the set backs start.....  I realized quite quickly that I wasn't prepared to do the quilting.  I didn't wash the backing yet!  Oh well, that's easy enough to fix.  Cut the backing off the bolt and stick it in the wash.  

No use stewing about it.  Yes, it was frustrating, so I decided to have another cup of tea and relax a bit.  I'm not one to just sit around doing nothing for long, so I started to pick up some stuff and prepare some bindings and sort things out to be done.

With the wash done.  I proceed to load up the backing onto the longarm.  Cut the batting and load that on..........bleep!@#$@#$#@%$........another set back.  The backing has shrunk.....a lot!  This set back is a bit more frustrating.  I didn't want to piece this backing.  But nothing to be done about it.  I just wasn't up to the task at the time.  I needed some time to work this all out and plan how I was going to piece a column to go on the back of this quilt.

To uplift my mood and take advantage of this new found free time, I decided to have some fun playing a bit and pulled out my next main project.

Do you remember these blocks?  They were gifted to me by the members of the Halton Hills Quilters' Guild, in appreciation for my roll as president.  My 2 terms (4yrs) were done and this was their gift to me.  The members made a bunch of blocks and I am now trying to make them into a cohesive whole.  I last posted about them Aug 27th, if you want to read more about them.

I pulled them back out and put them up on the design board.  Shuffled a few things around and lay on the floor, after putting those lower blocks up, to just admire the jumble of colour.  It's still not quite working for me, but I find that as I start putting the blocks together, they do start messing better.  I still need a bunch more blocks to be made and some more time to let what is done, sit and brew in my brain some more.  Playing with these blocks helped settle my mood some.

Not wanting to waste the rest of the day, I get up, unload the longarm of the backing and batting, then loaded up a different quilt.  I proceeded to quilt a total of five small quilts, before I shut that down to have dinner.  By this time my mood is much better and I am feeling more like myself.  I've figured out what the game plan will be for the backing.  

After dinner I gave it one last push to get things done and sewed binding on two of the recently quilted NICU quilts.  The day didn't start out that great with the set backs, but in the end, it was salvaged by some time playing with blocks and the feeling of accomplishment with finishing off some more quilts.

Today, I am once again, going to tackle the Christmas quilt.  Wish me luck for a smooth time of it!  I have the binding for this quilt already cut and ready to attach.  Now I need to get the quilt quilted.  Backing up first!!  We are moving on!

Take care everyone.

Working on finishing some small details

As it turned out, I did get in some sewing time yesturday, as the kids headed out for a bit, to do some boxing day shopping.  I personally refuse to go out into the insanity of all the crowds, line ups and chaos, seeking leftover sale items.

So I stayed home and worked on these three bindings.  Three more NICU quilts to add to the Project Linus pile.  Labels are also done and they're ready to be delivered when we get notified.  I like how it looks when they are all lined up like this.

I also put together the pieces I had cut, of the two last remaining NICU star quilts.  They've been on my sewing table for a good long time.  At least a month, if not, longer!  It was about time to get these together.  Picture below is of one of them.

Once I finished these, I went upstairs to get a late lunch started for when the kids got back.  I was making one of their favourites, fully loaded fries.  I managed it just in time, as they walked in, I was taking it out of the oven.....I like when that happens.

We spent more time together talking about everything and nothing.....lol.  Just having together time.  Later on, the kids decided to learn a new game, that my daughter got for Christmas, from her significant other's side of the family.  We all went downstairs.  Them to play the game at the table and me just on the other side of the wall to settle in, and do some sewing.  While all this is happening, we are all playing a Pokémon party together.....multi tasking.....lol....and still doing it together.   

After the games, we have dinner time, more chatting and together time, then my daughter gets ready and heads back home.  It's been a busy day, full of cozy togetherness.  I love when we can get together with no particular agenda.  Just being together and doing whatever.  It brings such joy to my heart.

Take care everyone.