Finish It Up Friday and Finished Or Not Friday 11-2018

I am always glad to have a plan.  I was hoping to have lots of photos to show on this first Friday of the month post.  You know what they say about best laid plans.

We traveled the first part of October and visited our son and daughter. Our son had a milestone birthday and is by himself. So of course I made him a quilt. He lives in Phoenix, a may not really need a quilt.  But now he has one!

We were home for one week and I was planning lots of projects for a 4 day retreat in the Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming (it's my home state and only 60 miles from home). We always have lots of fun and usually accomplish a great deal. But the Friday before the Monday of our first day, they had a water well or water line problem and had to cancel. Because they also host hunters and hunting season is in full swing in this area, we could not reschedule right away.  Now we are looking at a couple of option in the coming 3 months..but driving is "iffy" in Dec and January.  It could be lovely, but it could also be treacherous. I am not sure what we will decide. We meet on Wed the 7th for our regular monthly get-together.

One of my project to do at the retreat was to have 8 blocks complete for CiL Block Drive.

These are Grown Up  I Spy blocks. You can read more about this project here and  here. They have been sent off to Kat.   The new block drive is in full swing and I am gathering fabric for it.

The last Friday of October, my sister lost her husband of 31 years. He had been failing for a while, but boy is it hard!  I want to "hover" and "be there", but she is 2 hours away and hates to be "hovered over"  So I will be available to talk, to text, to support her in any way I can.

And now it is November and there are lots of new challenges to keep me busy. My new One Monthly Goal is to get HALF of Rick Rack Nines put together.  You can see my post about that one HERE. 

I have a local challenge due to be revealed on the 18th of this month at our Quilt Chicks gathering.
It is this quilt and it is done.

The stripe binding is laying on the top in this photo but it is quilted and bound. I know I have a photo of it complete, but I can't find it this morning. I will take a picture at the reveal day and then I will have one.

binding the Magnolia Quilt

My project #4 for the All People Quilt UFO challenge is to make a heart shaped large pincushion. It is ready to go.  I have had this fabric for maybe 15 years, it's time to use it!

Sew it's time to get busy and finish up some projects. And Christmas is only 7 Fridays away.!!



Stay Busy and Stay Happy

I'm linking up with Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts, Finish It Up Friday and 

Myra at Busy Hands Quilts, Finished or  Not Friday

OH, and I finished reading the Storyteller by Jodi Picoult and The Dry by Jane Harper.  Both really good. 

June OMG Finish

My June goal was to get the binding on my daughter's quilt for her graduation, and to complete the stitching on the July Calendar Girl. You can check out my post here!

They are done!

 I decided to use the gray larger print for the binding. I had enough and I like the dark framing effect. The small pops of white, black and teal are wonderful too.

Even the label is done!  I tried a new technique of redacting the personal info. I had never tried that with a photo before, but I have a new iPad (since Mother's Day) and I gave it a try. I guess if you really want to know, you can still see it. I will have to refine that in the future. How do you cover up personal stuff in photos?


The stitching is mostly done on this little cutie. The original pattern shows a yellow button in the center of the hanging star, but I can't locate one locally that is the correct size and shade of yellow. I will keep looking! I am not sure what this stitchery will become. A pillow cover, a framed picture for my July Great Granddaughter's room, or maybe I'll put all the girl's stitching's in a wall hanging. This is the first, so I have a few to do!

I think she's pretty darn cute!

I am linking this to Elm Street Quilts, One Monthly Goal- June Finish Link up.


Stay Busy and Stay Happy

Spinning my wheels

It seems I have been spending lots of time in my sewing room. But nothing completed to show for it. Does that ever happen to you?

This week I finished the piecing on the 5 yard quilt I was working on last week. I added the pale gray 4 1/2 " borders and wanted to decide on the backing. I ordered a wide backing with these wonderful words several weeks ago, not knowing what I would do with it.

But when I finished this quilt for my daughter, I knew that this was the perfect backing. I laid it out and realized that because it was directional, I would have to order more of this fabric . So this week, I ordered more fabric. When it arrives, I will piece the backing and get it ready to go to the long arm quilter.

I got started on my April OMG . I trimmed the batting and backing and tried to square up this quilt. I am not sure what happened, but when I tried to trim it by squaring up the corners as I was taught, some of the edges were way narrow. I  knew it I trimmed them that way, the 1/4" seam allowance would not be sufficient when I attached the binding. I thought, I worried, I weighed different scenarios. I decided to add strips of fabric where needed. Luckily, I still had all the leftover fabric. I was able to cut some 1" strips and add them to the edges of the places it was too shallow. I did not take photos, but it worked. If you look carefully at this corner you will see a tiny sliver of matching fabric that was added to the edge. I wish I knew how to add arrows and such to my pictures!

Wednesday, I got the binding attached at a sew-in with friends. It really helped having 8' banquet tables to lay the bulk of the quilt on. I will continue to hand sew the binding to the back as I watch TV or Netflix or Amazon Prime....actually I worked on it Thursday while stitching with some other friends. We meet every Thursday to do hand sewing. Embroidery, binding, even some knitting or crocheting gets done, while we chat and chat and chat.

And I started on the Yellow or Gold slab blocks for the RSC18 challenge for April. These are in various stages of completion. My basket of yellow has plenty of pieces still in it.

And I cut the setting squares and triangles for Rick Rack Nines from Bonnie Hunter's book, Adventures in Leaders and Enders. Making scrappy nine patches has been my leader and ender project for the last 2 years. My design wall will not be big enough to hold all the blocks. This is the beginning of 8 rows. there are 15 rows. The quilt will be 102 x 102 with borders!

OOPS  the bottom right has too many scrappy squares!  Glad I took this photo!

I have started to put it together. I have the left bottom corner triangle sewed to the first row and the second diagonal row is added to that.
This could be a problem....already there is an error in the lay out! But at least I noticed it before it is sewn. This quilt is put together on the diagonal as you can see.  Bonnie suggests doing 1/2 to the diagonal middle and then the other half, then joining the long seam at the last. It will be a while. I have made a copy of the layout chart in the book, so I can have it close to me at the machine. There is a pattern.

I will be linking this post to Myra's Finished or Not Friday, at Busy Hands Quilts  and
Amanda Jean's Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.

I know all of  these are not finished, but I will be done with the binding before Friday is over.

I have to get groceries today, go to the library and I have a hair appointment . I woke up to 3+ inches of snow AGAIN!  Blaaah!

Stay Busy and Stay Happy