No Finishes, Just Starts

Sort of spinning my wheels this week. I had absolutely no finish.  Unless you call completing a fabric order a finish! 😁

Orange minky for the back of space ship quilt. I have now reconsidered and ordered a flannel that I discovered at Katie Mae Quilts. I love it more than the orange minky.  The light blue print is for a pillow case to go with the quilt. I bought a kit for the quilt at a nearby LQS and was thrilled to find some coordinating fabric on line. Win!! I ordered two wide backs while I was online. ..to get free shipping.

I  did start on my purple and lavender slab blocks for RSC18. Looking at these, the lighter lavender floral stripe kind of reads yellow.  I will not fix it , because my plan is a crumby slab block quilt for my own family room. Using up stash is what I am after.

I did put all my En Provence blocks on the design wall so I could put the top together for APQ 2018 UFO Challenge #9

I did complete the top for Joseph's Space Ship quilt and ordered backing fabric.

 Oh and the binding is made, ready to sew when I get the backing pieced and it comes back from the quilter.
I did start on  my OMG February goal.  To get these little wall hangings layered and the applique ready for blanket stitches.

As I was going through my photos, I did find a picture of flannel fabric for a self binding receiving blanket for the new granddaughter of my former boss. I did not take a picture of the completed blankie and matching burb cloth. I was so anxious to get it finished wrapped and delivered to the new grandpa, so he could deliver it when he drove to ND to see the baby.  I will try to have the new mama send me a photo for my files. I'll share it then. Here is the fabric. The pink monkeys and the light is actually tiny pink dots. 

So guess, technically I did have a finish, just no real proof. Does that count?

Whew!  I got winded just writing this. I see a busy sewing month ahead. 

I am linking up with Finish It Up Friday and  Finished or Not Friday!

Stay Busy and Stay Happy

February Goals and Challenges

FEBRUARY is my birthday month.  Lots of new goals, challenges and fun.

I'll be linking this post to Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal February Linkup.
   

I want to get the fabric picked out, the images drawn and ironed on the background for Olie and Lena. These wall hangings from Patchabilities have been in my UFO basket for way toooooo long. I finished Sven in January. I am adding the fringe to his scarf today.

So that is my GOAL....to get each of them to the place of doing the buttonhole stitch applique. If I get them totally finished, I'll treat myself to an extra Hersey kiss!


And the color for the RSC18 is lavender and purple.  My favorite colors, because as I said earlier, it's my birthday month. I am a Pisces and my birthstone is amethyst. I am making slab blocks from scraps. And I have scraps of purple/lavender, because I made blocks for Bonnie Hunter's Mystery last year: En Provence.

 HST pressed and ready and  this is the blocks laid out and ready to web!

Lots of purple and lavender.  I could be overwhelmed by purple and lavender before the month is over!  EEK!
The February pick for APQ 2018 UFO Challenge was revealed 1/31/18  It is # 9  My list is HERE.
If you don't want to click the link, I will tell you that #9 is to sew together the block for En Provence!  Can you believe that!    Wish me luck.! 

I hope I can get most of these completed before the 3rd week in February. We are leaving to visit our DS in Phoenix for 7 whole days + a day or two of travel. (It's my birthday present to myself.) We will fly, but must drive 2 hrs to the airport that flies directly to the Phoenix area with the cheapest price. Keeping fingers crossed for no winter weather as we travel to our airport and then home again a week later. I am so ready for some sun and warmer weather!

It is sunny here in NE Wyoming today, but there is still snow on the ground and more expected tonight!

Stay Busy and Stay Happy

ScrappyHappy Saturday

As if I didn't have enough challenges and goals this year.   I have decided to follow Angela's from So Scrappy, prompts about color each month and make some scrappy slab blocks.  I have no real plan for a quilt, but hope for a rainbow kind of look at the end.  I ran out of light blue, the color pick for January. But I did get  4 blocks, approximately 10 1/2 inches. Plus there is the beginning of a fifth. I'll add to it as I acquire or maybe cut more light blue. I am kind of protective of fat quarters and don't really want to chop them up. But I have been gifted several bags of scraps recently, so there may be some light blue hiding in those bags!  (fingers crossed!)

I'm linking up with ScrappyHappy Saturday on Angela's blog. Come join her RSC18. See her blog or click the button on the sidebar here. 

Wondering what the color for February will be?  Will I have enough scraps to make 4+ blocks? 


Stay Busy and Stay Happy

A Finish - Finally!

 Last February I started on this quilt  It was a kit from our LQS that had recently gone out of business. The pattern is called Magnolia by Blank Quilting. It went together pretty quickly. The blocks are 8.5 inches and it's set, 5X5. Not a big quilt, but nice "couch size".

This is a close up of the setting.  Tumblers hanging in row to the left!  I seem to have more than one project going at a time!

 I got the borders on.  There are 4.  A small  1"black border, then a 2" green stripe, then another 1" black, and fianlly a large 9" focus fabric border!

I cut and assembled the binding, thinking I would get it to the longarmer soon. I love a striped binding, don't you?

I put it away in the drawer with the scraps. I try to save all the fabric until the quilt is completely done. Label and all. And then life happened. A new great granddaughter was expected!  A baby girl quilt needed!  A different month happened and other challenges were presented.

Well, you know the story. A UFO!  Magnolia Quilt 2.0.  I have a few friends with long arm machines. Most quilt only for themselves, but they are taking a bus trip to Paducah in the spring and needed some extra dollars. So I enlisted one of them to quilt it for me. I purchased the batting, pieced a backing from my stash and some left over pieces of the front.  I delivered it to her 2 weeks ago.  She quilted it with a design called Narcissus. Last Thursday I got it back, Saturday I sewed the binding on. Then spent part of Sunday watching football and stitching the binding to the back.

Feet up in the recliner, watching the television makes for good stitching time.

It is finished!

 I apologize for the poor lighting. It's a WINDY, gray day here in NE Wyoming....so no outside photos are possible.

This is part of the pieced backing and you can see the quilting (Narcissus) design on the backing.


I am linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts  Finish It Up Friday and
                                  Busy Hands Quilts   Finished or Not Friday.

Stay Busy and Stay Happy

OMG January Done!

My string blocks for Covered in Love are done. My One Monthly Goal was to make 8, there are 12.  My reasoning was that I found another part of an old sheet for the foundation and the scraps were already all over my sewing room. So I decided to sew until that bag of scraps was mostly gone. I did have to cut a few of the longer strings and in doing so sewed end pieces together to start another set of crumb blocks.  But that is not on any challenge list, it is just an ongoing project.

You can see, I used brights and some darks.  There is white and light tone on tone, some scraps from a Bronco quilt I made, some Christmas fabric, some of the fabric from baby quilts. I love recalling each one.

I hope the recipients of these string quilts with have just as much fun looking at all the different fabrics that will be in the quilts. I have been inspired  to make some for myself and several of my friends are making some also.

I will link this post to Patty's One Monthly Goal link-up, when she posts it in a few days.  Until then,   it will be a stand alone post here.

ps: These blocks are in the mail on their way to Kat in Texas.


Stay Busy and Stay Happy

Scrappy Happy Mug Rugs

A Christmas exchange brought me this pattern and some fat quarters.  There are 7 sayings printed on fabric and 7 simple mug mat patterns.  These are the first two I tried. You can see , I used kind of Christmas fabric but not traditional colors. I think they are really cute. The pattern is from June Tailor.

It's a small finish this week, and I need to learn how to join the end of a binding, not using a diagonal seam. The scraps for the binding were pieced with a straight seam. It can't be that hard! I was worried I wouldn't have enough of the red stripe and I did not have enough of the pink poinsettia fabric. Then when it came time to join the fabric, late Wednesday evening, I could not decide just how to do it. I know there is a way. I will peruse the internet today. Not too  noticeable on these two. My friends say, "who cares".


I will be linking up with:
Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts - Finish It Up Friday
Myra at Busy Hands Quilts - Finished or Not Friday


Stay Busy and Stay Happy

Finish It Up Friday, Finished or Not Friday

I wish I had taken more progress pics. But here is what I have been working on this week. Here I am doing a blanket stitch on the edge of the applique.

I have several of these patterns, some are kits and some are just the patterns. I have a narrow slice of wall in my entryway that is just perfect for the little 6" by 20" minis. Patchabilities has a great selection of seasonal little banners. The kits usually come with special buttons or embellishments. This was just a pattern, so I used some scraps from my stash.

Let me introduce you to Sven. My newest snowbuddy. I still need to add some fringe to his scarf and find a different embellishment for his stocking cap pompom. I am thinking an actual pompom or a pale blue yo yo with a snowflake button.

 My Sven next to the pattern. And don't look and my messy stash of 9 patches~

I will be linking up with:
Crazy Mom Quilts     Finish It Up Friday
Busy Hands Quilts     Finished or Not Friday


Stay Busy and Stay Happy