April’s Last ScrapHappy Saturday! Purple Crumbs and Purple Strings!

As I sewed my Rainbow Neighborhood houses, I made crumb blocks as Leaders and Enders. I promised Cathy K that I would make at least one purple string block! Well, as long as there is a mess in the sewing room and the string bags are handy, I might as well make more than just one!

Seven crumb blocks that are trimmed to 6 1/2” square. And 6 string blocks that are trimmed to 7 1/2” square because that’s the size all the rest I make are and the phone book pages are cut to that size.

That plus a 5th and secret 6th house block are what happened this week. My purple basket is a bit lighter, but not empty! Sigh! 

I’m linking up with Angela and Scrap Happy Saturday . 

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

Finished or Not Finished Friday.

It's the last weekend in April. I may have something to show here. I have a small finish and then of course some "not finished"!  You know that is my middle name, right?  "Not Finished" I even have the tee shirt that says "Queen of Unfinished Projects"

I finished a single placemat and two napkins for this month ABC Table Scraps Challenge over at The Joyful Quilter.   I purchased a Go Big cutter from Accuquilt and took a little bit of time to try it out. I hope that it will be used more. So far, I only have one die. 

That's one!

There was finally this flimsy finish!  Nothing like taking forever. A backing will be constructed and batting purchased, then my friend will quilt it!

Mr. Busy had quite the time holding it for me on the back deck in the wonderful Wyoming wind!

And some house blocks were constructed. The first week in April a purple and yellow house. I have fixed the lawn. It now is the proper depth to make this block 16 1/2 " square. 

Then the second week, a blue house with occupants!  

The third week, a pink house was built.  It's a busy rose covered cottage?

And this last week, there was this orange/peach/rust fallish looking house. I found cloud fabric at a LQS, and had to cut two 5 " square cut at different diagonal for the left and right upper corners of the roof part, so the clouds would be right side up!

So I’ll quickly link this post a day late to Alycia Quilts and the Finished or Not Finished Friday event.

Now I’m on to Saturday and maybe some ( very little) yard work! 😀

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

ABC Table Scraps Challenge for April. Purple, Y and/or N

The Joyful Quilter hosts a challenge every month coordinating with So Scrappy's color of the month plus an added prompt or challenge.  This year she has been adding letters of the alphabet.  April's color is purple, and Joyful added the letters Y and N. 

So I put on my thinking cap and decided I could make a placemat in purples. I purchased a Go Big AccuQuilt cutter with some "windfall dollars" and it came with a die to make flying geese. Well, heaven knows I need help with flying geese!  I would have told you that my problems were probably with  accurate cutting.  Now, I'm more prone to believe it's accurate sewing!  Anyway. I cut purple and a floral purple for contrast and made geese with purple sky and some with floral sky. I used a pattern , sort of, provide by Accuquilt.  I fudged with the center square, because I ran out of the floral scraps that I was experimenting with. 

I backed it with a mini lavender and white gingham or is it called baby gingham check? I quilted it with some fankenbatting made at the Spring Sew last week and a tighter serpentine stitch, cause I liked how it looked. Then the binding was built by striping some cut off triangles into 1 3/4" strips. The strips were short, lots of joining seams, but luckily no seam landed on a corner! Whoo Hoo!

Now, what do I do about the "Y" and the "N"?  I have a placemat that is mostly purple, the floral has a yellowish background.  So......how about a set of YELLOW NAPKINS!!!  OK!  Judy!!   You can do that!  Diann at Little Penguin Quilts just talked about a double sided napkin tutorial a few days ago.  Yep, here it is. from Made with Moxie

Yellow side of the napkin on the left and the yellow with a bit of purple on the right! 

Linking up with The Joyful Quilter on the last weekend of the month! 

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

I like Thursday ~ foreign language?

ME GUSTA LOS          EL JUEVES

I Like Thursday in Spanish.  and  French

j'aime le jeudi

I'm joining LeeAnna at Not Afraid of Color. and others today for a chance to answer the prompt about if a speak a foreign language. And also to share some things in my life that I like or am grateful for.  If you want to join in or just look to see how other bloggers answer, go visit

No, I don't speak a foreign language. I took 2 years of Latin and 2 years of French in high school. They didn't offer Spanish then, only French and German. I can count to ten in Spanish. I can decipher some French and Spanish words due to the rules I learned in Latin class.  I  learned that I like words. Oh,  how I wish I was bilingual. I wish I spoke Spanish. When our kids were 6 and 3 we spent 8 months in Nogales AZ while Mr Busy worked for a company across the border. I felt very out of place and wished then that I could speak the language spoken there.  Now I think our country is diversifying quickly, and I have had the chance to know several people who are bilingual in English and Spanish. Our school system has one elementary school that is a dual language immersion program school. Most of you are probably already aware of this idea, but if interested here is a link to our school.  As I understand it, 50% of classes are all in English and 50%  are in Spanish. I have 2 young mom friends whose sons are attending that school. I think there is an application process, not everyone gets accepted. 

I finished listening to Watership Down. I enjoyed it very much. Have you read it? I see that there is an adaptation of the story on Netflix. I wonder if it is any good. 

Next on my reading list is:

    The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith

and another essay or  two of Ruth Bader Ginsberg's.  "My Own Words"

Mr Busy and I watched Season 3 of Tom Clancy's  Jack Ryan. We binged it all in about 3 nights!! 

And we have just started Rabbit Hole with Keifer Sutherland.  We have only watched the pilot, and boy were we blown away!  And hooked!!

In March my brother and sister-in-law took a learning trip to New Orleans.  I think it was called Road Scholar. At least that what she hashtagged in her Facebook and Instagram posts.They took some cooking classes at the New Orleans School of Cooking......and shared a recipe which needed this ingredient. I. ordered some and am looking forward to trying to make Shrimp Etouffee in the coming weeks. 

I'm also anxious to get the grill back out on the back deck and ready for  BBQ weather. Burgers and brats inside are just not the same. 

I'm participating in Sandra Walker's Rainbow Neighbourhood QAL. My blocks so far:

It's going to be a fun little quilt!  My photos make the houses look wonky, but they are not. They are 16.5 inches square. ( Now that I have gotten the  grassy strip the right size! ). LOL!

Stay Busy and  Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

To-Do Tuesday #137

Linking up with To-Do-Tuesday and our hostess, Carol at Quilt Schmilt-For the Love of Fabric. 

April 18 to April 24


1. Finish ABC Table Scraps Challenge ✅ 

      The project is done, but no photos til Friday.
2. Finish November stitchery ✅  

a

Pardon my shadow. 

3. Stitch on Spring Stamps from Pinker n Punkin. ✅  

Progress made.

4. Get blue borders on Long May She Wave.  ✅.  

Just as we started to take a photo, the wind came up!

And then it got worse....back inside we went!

5. Make House #3 for Rainbow Neighbourhood QAL ✅

My photo looks a bit lopsided. It really isn't. But this house is rather "busy"!  Maybe I should tone down the next 5 or six????  I keep thinking I am finally going to use up that mauve-y pink in the roof...but there is still more!  😆

    

April 25 - May 1

1. Write post for ABC Table Scraps Challenge

2. Look for backing for  Long May She Wave

3. Quilt more on Precarious and write an OMG post!

4. Start on December stitchery for A Year in the Garden

5. Make one purple string block, at least. 

6. House #4 for Rainbow Neighbourhood QAL - 




Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

April OMG Finish

 

My OMG for April was to quilt at least one of the color bands on Precarious. I have been procrastinating and procrastinating. 

But as of 4-25-23 5:00 pm  MDT, I am at this point.

It's not perfect. But I am satisfied for my first time on a quilt bigger than a baby quilt or table runner.

It's a struggle for me to constantly rearrange the quilt under the presser foot and on my lap or over my shoulders. I have ordered quilt clips. They should be here tomorrow my email notice says.  Then I will go on to the orange strip. 

      Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal - April Finish Link-up

No doubt my May OMG will be more of the same. It's the only way I will stay with it. So many projects pulling me in so many directions!  You know how I feel, don't you?

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

Slow Sunday Stitching 4-23-23

I haven’t made much progress in my Sunday Stitch but I am enjoying it. I’m linking up with Kathy and Slow Sunday Stitching to share my S-l-o-w progress and to check out the stitching of some others. 

This is Spring Stamps from  Melisa at Pinker n Punkin Quilting & Stitching and if you go to here to her April 22nd post, she has the links to the whole SAL in one post. Very convenient! If you’re just getting started or a slow stitcher like me, it’s great to have them all together. 

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

Rainbow Scrap Challenge ~ Purple

I’m linking this rather pathetic post with Angela at So Scrappy! I did sew, but now you know one of the reasons it takes me so long to complete a project! 

Well, I still haven’t done my 2 selected items from my UFO list.

1.  Make multi colored strings

2. Stitch on the Bee-utiful Bee blocks. 

I did make some crumb blocks, and a purple house block ( hey, QAL participants, do you see anything wrong with this block?) 

or this blue house block? 

Neither did I til I put this week’s pink block up on the design wall!  My grass on the first two blocks isn’t deep enough. So on to the seam ripper. It’s a good thing green is a favorite colors. I’ve got more green fabric. I was judiciously using up scraps. My eye didn’t even tell me the block was not square but a rectangle! Gee Wiz!

and a Table Scraps project.

      You’ll have to wait for a photo til next weekend! 

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

H2H Check In 4-21-23

A quick check in with Hands 2 Help!

This one I call, Any Kid. There are both boy themed fabrics and girl themed fabrics together. And there are no pink border fabrics.

And this one is One Lucky Girl! Definitely girl fabrics. Cinderella, a fairy godmother, kitten ballerinas and some pink used in the borders. 

I’m hoping after quilting and a run through the washing machine they will fit the parameters for The Little Lambs. If they are still too big I will send them to Quilty Hugs for Happy Chemo. This is a pattern/ tutorial used by Sylvia at Treadlestitches.
She links to a Tutorial for Happy Blocks. from MaryQuilts.com. They are 40x48 before laundering!

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!

Judy B. 

I LIKe Thursday ~. Scents and Smells!

Welcome to I LIKE Thursday, hosted by LeeAnna at Not Afraid of Color! LeeAnna gave us a prompt for today!


"make a list of some of your favorite smells.... scents...


Lilacs in the yard. But not too close. I can’t have them indoors. Although my brain likes the smell, my sinuses do not!

Stargazer Lilies - my sister’s favorite and their scent reminds me of her.

Bath and Body Works.   White Citrus. 

It’s now retired and availability online only! Not sure for how long, I should probably order  5-6

Fresh Lime on/in anything makes me happy! 

Fresh cut lumber. Pine or oak especially. And campfires too! 

Snuggle fabric softener. I used to notice that smell while riding on the back of our motorcycle. I could always tell if there was a laundromat close by! 

In searching for an image to share, I came across the description of the scent of the original blue sparkle. It’s white floral and citrus! That makes sense!

Old Spice After Shave. Especially on Mr Busy! It’s an old fashioned smell, but one I really like! 

I’m listening to the last of Watership Down and was tickled to see this rabbit hop across the yard. We have several rabbit families that live down the lane. 

When I was at the library last week I asked it I could take a picture of one of their displays. 

Our library is going through some big internal and administrative changes, but I hope they never change this kind of thing! 

Mr Busy and I have found a new favorite dill pickle slice. It comes in a plastic tub and is sold in the fresh cooler section. In our store, near the Claussen pickles and brats and lunch meat..

There was lots of dill sprigs, slices of garlic and a grape leaf! Really yummy! 

I’ve probably rambled enough today!  Check out the list of I Like Thursday participants on LeeAnnas blog, Not Afraid of Color

Stay Busy and Stay Happy and Healthy and Hopeful!