A new finish!

Last year I inherited yards of beautiful Christmas quilting cotton from a friend of a friend. My intention was to make each of my girls a Christmas quilt. I order the pattern Those Trees by Zen Chic - a simple minimalist design that my girls like. However, Christmas came and went without those projects started. 

A couple of weeks ago, I pulled out the pattern and some of the material and started on one. Here is the sneak peek I posted of it. 

Since we were going up to our friend's cabin in the U.P. I thought maybe I should just gift it to them (although it was Christmas trees rather than just trees.)  I showed it to one of my daughters and she said that she would like it 

(I explained my original intent.) So I got busy! 

Using the same pattern modified, I drew out a pattern that would work and found fabrics in my stash. 

It came together fairly quickly...in time for our trip UP North. 

Pictures were taken at our friend's cabin in the woods ~ a beautiful backdrop for this quilt!

The backing has a small bit of piecing using the fabrics from the front.

This quilt is machine pieced and machine quilted following the diagonal lines of the trees and FMQ inside the trees. 

It is a cozy, lap sized throw for the cabin, finishing at 43" x 51"

I'm linking up to Can I get a Whoop Whoop? and Finish or Not Friday

So the Christmas quilt is still waiting the finishing stitching on the binding....

Meanwhile, I paper pieced another of the text blocks for the Quiet Play Pattern Club.

School starts next Monday for me...only a few more days! I will miss the summer!

My August RSC Blocks

I can't believe that it is already a week into August! The summer is flying by!

The August color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is light blues. 

Although I have lots of blue scraps, light blues, not so much. 

Here is the Reverse Star block.

And the Waterfront Starburst block.

Linking to Scrap Happy Saturday!

Also on August 1st, the cutting instructions for the Meadow Mist Mosaic Mystery Quilt became available. Here are my cuts. 

I still need to cut one of those stacks of background squares into triangles and some borders but I will wait on that until it gets closer to the next step. 

I'm linking up here.

Not that I don't have enough to sew, but I have been back at natural dyeing. I have been trying different materials to dye. I have used black beans, grapefruit (also used oranges but I overdyed the fabric), marigolds, turmeric, madder root, and avocado pits. I also experimented with adding iron and washing soda to change the colors. 

For the second dye bath with marigolds, I decided to try a shibori technique using rubber bands. Below is the results. It is such a pretty yellow with fun markings!

Natural dyeing has been fun...makes me feel like a scientist!

I'll leave you with a sneak peek at what I'm working on...

and a picture of my grandson! Isn't he adorable! 

Another finish from my 2019 goals!

Back in January, I posted that I wanted to make the Optical Illusion BOM 

(January block) from Heleen Pinkster Quilt Design and in April I had the flimsy done. It was then that life got too busy and it was set aside in the UFO pile. 

I finally got to sandwiching and quilting it! 

I used both FMQ in the center, an all over curly cue design, 

and straight line quilting in the borders. 

All the blue fabrics came from my stash except for the Kona navy border. 

(I ran out of navy in my stash)

I also pieced the back with most of the leftover fabrics. 

This quilt finishes at 48" square. It will be gifted to a dear friend who is going through cancer treatment as a comfort quilt. 

I also finished another block for the Quiet Play Pattern Club. 

I just had to make this cute pin cushion in tomato red! 

I still used a rainbow of colors for the seam ripper. 

I also do quite a bit of charity knitting with my Knitting Club. This baby blanket was so soft and cute that I needed to share! 

I have been busy in my sewing room so I will be back with more soon!