In the Nick of Time

October is almost over and yesterday was the last Saturday for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge ~ Scrap Happy Saturday! 

I had to get my dark green blocks completed!

So I carved out a bit of time this week to catch up, once again, on the blocks. 

Here is the Plus Blocks: 

and the Flying Geese Block:

I usually make a few more blocks to add to the size of the quilt even though this was the last official color of the month. 

I will link to Scrap Happy Saturday at So Scrappy. 

 Now on to catching up on my Temperature Quilt!

Update!

It seems like forever since I have had anything to post about. Life just seems to get busier and my best intentions seem to go by the wayside. 

Until this week, I have had only little snippets of time to sew. So instead of starting a new project, I have been working on making progress on my little blue neighborhood. I could do a house in a small amount of time so I got several done. The next thing I knew, the population had grown to 100 little blue houses! 

After looking at the 100 houses and my almost diminished supply of different blue scraps, I decided that the neighborhood had reached it's quota. 

I sewed them into a 10 X 10 grid of houses. 

I then searched for a border that I thought would frame the neighborhood. I decided on a diamond chain border. Before I was even finished with it, I knew that it would need something more. 

Years ago, I framed my landscape quilt with a double border with mitered corners. I would do a mitered border but I would do a triple border. 

I love how it turned out! 

Each house is 4", the diamond border is 4", and the triple mitered border is 

2 1/2" making the quilt 53" squared.

I started making the blue and white houses back in February 2016 as a 'fill in' project when I didn't have enough time to work on anything else. I last reported on the neighborhood in August with 81 finished houses. I didn't really see the end of this project until I reach 100! 

While putting it together, I did find 3 duplicates fabrics, so I made 3 additional houses. The duplicates will probably end up on the back of the quilt. With 100 fabrics over almost 4 years, it was getting difficult to remember if I had already used certain fabrics. 

Next step...on to the quilting!

Linking up to To Do Tuesday @Stitch All the Things and Linky Tuesday @ Freemotion by the River

Doing some catching up

It has been a while since I have update my temperature quilt! My summer plans were to start and complete a few quilts. In doing so, it was hard to sneak in time to do the regulars like my temperature blocks. I did, however, continue to log the highs and lows of every day!

I spent the last few days catching up on it...cutting all the block pieces and piecing them together, then the rows and finally adding them to the top! 

Here it is!

Look how warm our summer has been! I think we will have at least another row of those warm colors before the colors start to shift back to the cool yellow and greens AND before getting into the cold blues. 

Since we are in September already, the Rainbow Scrap Challenged announced a new color ~ dark blues. Plenty of those in my scrap bin! 

Here is my flying geese block.

I really like this block and will probably add more blocks to make the size of the quilt bigger! I will be limited by the amount of the crosshatch fabric I have left.

I also finished the Plus blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. 

Only a few more months to go!

I'm linking up to Main Crush Monday at Cooking up Quilts, Making Monday at Love Laugh Quilt, Moving It Forward at Em's Scrapbag, To Do Tuesday at Stitch All The Things, Linky Tuesday at Freemotion by the River, and Scrap Happy Saturday at So Scrappy

After a Small Hiatus

First , let me tell you about our news and why I took a small hiatus from blogging (quilting and knitting, too) to visit family in Austin. We have some pretty exciting things happening there! My DD2 and SIL are expecting their first child AND our first grandchild in January! They are very excited as are we! 

Baby K Bump! They are not finding out the sex of the baby so we all will be surprised upon arrival!

These are a few of the things my daughter has made. She indigo dyed the onesie, made the teether/pacifier leash with teething beads and stitched one of her ultrasound pictures of Baby K! 

We were able to be in Austin for one of the ultrasounds! Things sure have changed since I had my daughter 30 years ago! Pretty amazing!

My SIL practicing on Miss Sadie!

MORE exciting news from Austin is that my DD3 was cloaked with her white coat at the ceremony officially starting her entry into Pharmacy School. In 4 years she will be a PhD! 

We are incredibly proud of her!

Since I have been back, I pieced another baby quilt! 

I love the churn dash block and this block came up on my Pinterest feed and I knew that I needed to would make it!

I had the perfect fabric in my stash...a sweet baby pink fabric with little flowers and the same fabric in a soft yellow! 

And guess what I did with all the HST cutoffs from the Churn Link block? Yep, I made them into small 4" churn dash blocks. 

These will be pieced into the backing! 

More on the technique I used to pieced these small blocks coming!

Happy Quilting!

A finish!

I'm excited to show you my latest finish! Last Friday, I showed you the spiral quilting on my quilt, Blush. Today, I'll can show you it all finished! 

I added quilting in the white borders around the 4 patch blocks, in the sashing between the blocks, more quilting in the white borders and in the ditch of the piano keys. 

The quilting in the border corners of the 4-patch blocks reminds me of  arrowheads. Sometimes I get stuck on how to turn the corners when quilting. Do you feel this way too? 

The quilting in the sashing are flowers that mimic the flowers in the fabric. 

I quilted flying geese in the borders and also a rope. Lots of different elements. 

The fabric line is Blush by Basic Grey and it was the first fabric bundle I purchased way back when I was a fairly new quilter. The background is Kona White, I think the inner border is Kona Bahama Blue, and the binding is Kona Chocolate. 

The back was pieced using all the remaining fabric from the line and a few coordinating pieces from my stash. 

The quilt finishes at approx. 51" x 61".

It sure does feel good to have another finish before school starts!

I'm linking up to Linky Tuesday at Freemotion by the River, To Do Tuesday at Stitch All Things, Color Inspiration Tuesday at Clever Chameleon Quilting, and MCM at Cooking Up Quilts.

Under my needle

After finishing my Rhythm in Blues quilt and catching up on my RSC blocks, I had time to start a new project. 

I challenge myself to work from what's in my stash as much as possible. 

In my stash, I was gifted a large amount of fabric with bees on it. 

Did I ever mention that my husband is a hobby bee keeper with some friends? We have been around bees and harvesting honey for many years. I'm sure most of you have heard of the situation with bees dying and campaigns to save the bees. So I decided to use the 'bee' fabric to make a quilt. 

I found the pattern Pinwheel Puzzle by Elaine Theriault in the March/April 2018 issue of McCall's Quilting magazine. I made it a bit smaller than the pattern and then added the words Save the Bees on the side. I used the book Spelling Bee by Lori Holt for the letters. The top is finished but it needs to wait for quilting until I finish what went under my needle this morning...Blush!

I pieced this quilt back in May but it has been waiting for quilting. I pushed the Harry Potter, Rhythm in Blues and KF Mini ahead of it so it starting nagging begging me to start quilting it. Yesterday, I got busy and sandwiched it and this morning it went under the needle. I quilted the spirals in the centers of the 4 patch blocks. Borders and sashings are next. 

I'm linking up to Finished or Not Fridays at Busy Hands Quilt, Can I get a Whoop Whoop? at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Off the Wall Friday at Creations.

Here is my entry for Pets on Quilts 2018! 

Nellie loves to sit on the quilt and rest her head as she watches out the window! Feel free to vote for her! Head over to see all the cute furry friends!

New monthly color and a neighborhood update!

August is here and a new color has been announced for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge ~ ORANGE!

I was able to find some time yesterday to work on my RSC blocks! 

Plus Sign blocks

Flying Geese Block

I'm linking to Scrap Saturday at So Scrappy. 

I'm excited to announce that my little neighborhood has grown. Another population explosion and we are up to 81 houses! 

I still haven't run out of blue scraps! Each house is made out of a different blue fabric mostly from my scraps. My friend, Joy, gave me a few of her blue scraps to add to the neighborhood. I'm always looking for more so I can keep expanding my neighborhood! Since these houses are only 4 1/2" unfinished, it doesn't take a big scrap. 

Do you have some blue scraps to share?   

Linking to Show Off Saturday at She Can Sew