Quilted Jonquil

I finished up the alternate First Saturday block last night.

And just for fun, here’s a couple of neat antique quilts I’ve found on eBay.

I completed my First Saturday BOM last night but still need to do the alternate block.  This is our 11th block so Saturday we will receive our final blocks for Asian Attitude from The Quilted Fox.

I’m ashamed to admit I have the blocks from the past two BOM’s still not made into completed quilts.  One, at least, is only waiting for borders.  The next First Sat BOM begins in August and here’s an EQ drawing of the Wild Fox quilt…..looks like a fun one but I’m thinking the main block will be challenging to piece!

I also made another 12 1/2 X 12 1/2 RAINBOW around the block while making the First Sat block leader/ender style.  Goes nicely with the block I made this weekend, don’t you think?   Might have to make two more…….

Not much on my design wall today.  Check out Judy’s DWM post for links to quilters who just might have a bit more going on than I do

The wonky log cabin block is for Anna Maria Horner’s RAINBOW around the block effort which you can read about here.  The pinwheels, all 4 of them, are all the further I’ve gotten on the Pinwheel Party quilts.  I’ve been giving my left hand a rest for a week or two since I’ve been experiencing pain when holding down rulers for cutting and holding fabric when appliqueing.   I’m thinking I need to get one of those hand support gloves to help…..I’ve not been happy about this break

I finished the half hexie top.  I’ve named it Pop Beads because it reminds me of the plastic beads for toddlers that you pop together.  It looks better in person…..the horrible lighting on my design wall makes the dark pink  appear a bit drap in the pictures.

I did get Sophie in better running order and finished the Pirate Downy quilt.  Sophie is not back to normal because quilting from right to left causes the thread would break so I quilted only moving left to right.  I’ll load up a practice piece and see if I can’t get Sophie running perfectly again.

Since I finished the half hexie top I have an update……

Stash Report – Note to Lori: I haven’t received my giveaway fabric so I don’t have to count it yet.

• Added:  0      Cumulative Added:  97 yds
• Used:  4  (Pop Beads top)      Cumulative Used:  20 yds
• Net Out/(In):   (77 yds)
  

We had a kitty visitor again this weekend.  Rail thinks my freshly quilted log cabin is the perfect sleeping place

All I can say is, “Wow!!”  I won my first ever giveaway blog way from Blue Nickel Studios June 9th and now I’ve won my second blog giveaway from…..Blue Nickel Studios again.  Thank you, Scott.  Click over and check out Scott’s blog and browse through his posts.  He posts amazing photos and makes wonderful quilts using some of the fabulous modern fabric lines coming out these days and using modern & free style piecing.   Check out this post to get a sample

I won fabric from Anna Maria Horner and she is from Middle Tennessee where they experienced flooding recently.  She is providing this opportunity for quilters to help flood victims with her “RAINBOW around the block” project.   A wonderful way to help out those close to home if you’d like to sew a couple of blocks   I will have my first RAINBOW block ready for Judy’s Design Wall Monday tomorrow

Have a wonderful Sunday and thank you to Scott, again!!!!

I had high hopes of getting the third Downy top quilted last night.   All signs were positive….a spare piece of batting was the perfect size, the provided backing was wide enough so I didn’t have to piece it and Sophie was running well the day before.   I realized I wouldn’t have enough of the blue Aurafil thread I had been using so I switched the top thread to a Superior variegated blue thread and kept the blue Aurafil in the bobbin.  Well, the variegated thread frayed and broke almost right away.  Last time I tried Star thread this happened and I immediately went back to Aurafil and everything was fine.  This time I thought I’d adjust the tension, thinking I can make this work, after messing with the tension, changing the needle and much frustration……. I took out what little quilting I’d done and switched to a green Aurafil for both the bobbin and top threads.  No luck, the thread was still breaking and I was getting skipped stitches   It’s not like I’m even quilting something that would cause needle flex!   Sophie, I’m sorry, if you only like Aurafil, I’ll never use anything else but please, please, please start working like my perfect little Sophie again.

Another Design Wall Monday.  Go to Judy’s DWM post for links to other DWM posts.  Here’s my design wall.  Yes, the half hexies are hiding behind the Downy Touch of Comfort quilt.  I was too busy bonding with Sophie to get the rows sewn together

I quilted this it with free style flowers and I’m pleased with the way it turned out.

I  also finished the log cabin quilting and a second Downy quilt.

Here’s the finished tile block.  I had lots of fun working on this and have another one started.  It will be awhile before I work on a third one as I have another Vicksburg FREE BOM ready to applique.

I continued working on the half square triangles for the Pinwheel Party sashing.  I hope to have the pinwheels for at least one of the quilts done by this weekend by working a bit each day.   I’m quilting one more Downy top tonight and then maybe one other charity quilt before I load up another one of my quilts.

Here’s a shot of the quilting I’m doing on the log cabin quilt.  Don’t inspect too close as I’m an amateur but still in all I’m pretty happy with it.

A while back a gray striped cat adopted us and we named her Rail.  Mind we really didn’t want another cat but she needed a home as she was dumped, along with her kittens on our street.  Our neighbors, the husband which is allergic to cats, took a liking to her as she would join them on walks with their dog…..the cat has a lot of dog traits.  Over time they discovered that as long as the husband washed his hands after touching Rail, he didn’t suffer allergic reactions to her.   So a little over a year later, they officially adopted Miss Rail kitty with the understanding we would provide cat sitting services when they are away.  With that set up, here’s a picture of Miss Rail making herself quite at home in our house this week while her parents are away.

This quilt is perfect for napping

She is a cute little thing.  Of course I have to include some gratuitous pictures of the resident cats or suffer the cold shoulder from one or both them.

What quilt block???

I got off the quilt block so she'd better leave me alone!

It' soooo hot!

And I tried auditioning some fabric for alternate blocks for another 9-patch quilt but I’m not loving it.  What do you think?

Can you believe it’s the middle of June already?  It was hot and humid outside this weekend but in my sewing room it was nice and cool   Here’s my design wall.

All the pieces have been sewn into rows on the half hexie quilt.   Once I got into the zone, I could pretty much line up the two hex pieces by eye which sped things up a bit.    I alternated sewing the hexies with the HST’s for the Pinwheel Party sashing.

There are 188 HTS’s in the stacks above….just waiting to be cut apart, ironed and squared up.  These will be the sashing cornerstones…. too cute!  I also finished the 12th and final blocks for the both the PP quilts, yea!!

I also spent so time with Sophie working on the quilting for this log cabin quilt (pic taken before quilting).  If you remember, last weekend didn’t go so well but this time it went much better and the quilt is about half way quilted.  Please visit Judy’s Design Wall Monday post here to see more Design Walls

I finished block 7 of the Vicksburg FREE BOM on the MetroLink this morning.

I realized, horror of horrors, I would finish the last leave well before arriving at work leaving me with no hand work!!  I dashed downstairs, quick cut a square of background fabric and stuffed a handful of scraps in a bag.  Whew!  Saved by the tile quilt.   There are several folks working on modern tile quilts as can been seen here.   I had a heart go all wonky on the Vicksburg block above so I’m using it as the first piece of my tile block.  Think I’ll leave this project in my work bag permanently to keep me out of trouble just in case

Just this past weekend I was thinking I’ve never won a blog giveaway.  Some of the giveaways are so wonderful they make you really want to win.  Well today, I did win !!!    !!!  Yippee!!!  THANK YOU, THANK YOU to Scott Hansen of Blue Nickle Studios.  I won the giveaway on this post.  I love that I won the post with the pictures of nickels being painted blue   Here’s the goodies from Market I won.  Looks like a purple bag….I LOVE bags….you can NEVER have too many bags

And here’s a picture of those goodies with the bag of fabric I won!!! You can never have too much fabric either.   WOO HOO!!