Three New Foothills Blocks

Last night, I went down to my sewing room for an hour after supper and made 18 flying geese so I could finish off three more blocks for my Foothills quilt.  I am using my husband's shirts for this quilt.  He lost some weight and had to replace his shirts with some that fit better.  I confiscated the cast-offs and had been saving them to make a quilt.

My first attempt at assembling this block did not work out so well...thank goodness for my trusty seam ripper!

That's better!

The blocks in the original quilt had interesting placements of contrasting fabrics.  I am trying to have fun with this too.

That's four blocks done now...only 21 to go!

You can sign up to join in on this quilt along with Mary Elizabeth Kinch at this link:  http://www.maryelizabethkinch.com/qal-registration/

Near the Finish Line

Later today, the 2018 Winter Olympics Closing Ceremony will take place.  I have spent a lot more time than usual in front of the TV the last couple of weeks watching curling, skating, skiing, snowboarding, etc.  While cheering on the Canadian Olympic athletes, I have been adding lots of stitches to my Snowmen/women picture.   Last Sunday, I finished off all of the snow. 

Later in the week, I worked on the outlining of the birds, snow people and their scarves.  There is still some work to do on the flowers in this part of the picture.

On this snowman, I need to add fringe to the scarf and outlining to the hat.  There are also some brown vines to add to the mitten/arm on the left. There is a bird sitting on one of the vines that will soon appear as well. I just noticed there is a half completed bird sitting on his hat too!

Once all of these last little bits and pieces are done, there are French knots to add to the birds for eyes and in several spots for bird seed.  With any luck, I will finish off these final details this week. 

The kit came with some seed beads to add as snowflakes in the sky around the snow people but I am not sure if I will add them or not.  I will have to decide after the stitching is done.  I will be linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning.  It's always fun to see what everyone has been up to each week.

Making Parts

I have been heavily into parts production for my Foothills quilt-along blocks.  The original antique quilt has 25 blocks but I am not sure if I will just make that many or if I will try to make this quilt big enough for a bed. I have lots of shirts so there is no shortage of fabric!

I made a dozen hourglass units for the block centres.  Each unit is unique--I don't want any matched pairs.

I have 15 sets of 4 HST's done (not including the set in the completed sample block.  I'm aiming for contrast in each HST, not necessarily a dark and a light.   The dark rectangles on the left are for the centre bars between the HST's in the blocks.  Some of them will be dark and some will be medium.

Here is a picture of everything on the design wall.

I will be doing some more cutting next for parts for my blocks. I will assemble blocks when I have almost all of the parts made.

I checked with Mary Elizabeth Kinch about showing a picture of the quilt on my blog.  With her permission, here it is:

Chain and Bar Quilt, Maker Unknown, Alberta, c. dates not specified, cotton, 185.5 cm x 179 cm, from the collection of University of Alberta Museums.

 Isn't it wonderful?  The woman who made this quilt used every last scrap of some of those fabrics and then had so make a few substitutions in some of the blocks. It would be fun to examine this one in person, up close and personal.

Stitching While Watching Olympic Curling

My husband, my daughter and I are big curling fans and have been watching the Canadian Olympic Curling teams play with great interest.  Tonight, I stitched on my snowman picture while watching a close game between the Canadian and Swiss men's teams.  Unfortunately, Canada lost this game, but I did get quite a bit of stitching done.  I only have that small area of white to do to complete the snow in my picture.  There is another curling game or two to watch tomorrow so I may be able to finish it then.

When you compare the first picture to this picture from last week, you can see that I also added a bird to the picture this week.  I will be moving on to outlining once the snow is done.  This picture may get done by the end of February, with any luck.

We had some freezing rain earlier this week so I grabbed a picture of the ice on this pine tree needle.

I will be linking up with the other slow stitchers at Kathy's blog in the morning.   My friend, Karen, is coming over to do some sewing in the afternoon tomorrow.  I have started a new project using some shirts--you can see a picture of my first block in my previous post.  I will be making more parts for this quilt tomorrow.

Basket Pincushion and a New Quilt Started.

I needed a quick small gift for someone and decided to make a pincushion.  I found several little 4" basket blocks in a drawer in my sewing room and picked out this one to quilt.  The backing is a solid blue to match the flowers on the basket.  I like making pincushions!

I met Mary Elizabeth Kinch at the Gwen Marston Beaver Island Quilt Retreat several years ago.  I have one of her books and love admiring her large quilts made with many small pieces.  Every Christmas, she does a series of blogposts about 12 different antique quilts.  This past Christmas, one of her favourites was one called "Foothills".  She recently decided to do a quilt along http://www.maryelizabethkinch.com/qal-registration/ to make this quilt and I signed up!  I have a collection of men's shirts that have aged appropriately and are ready to cut up to make a quilt so I will be using them for this project.

I don't have a lot of time for sewing these days so this is what I accomplished one night this week. There are a lot of shirts in my collection so it takes a while to pick out the 7 fabrics needed for each block.  I finally made the flying geese and hourglass block for this block tonight.

I like the splash of brighter colours in the middle of the block!

I made a few parts for my next 4 blocks...

I am going to continue to make lots of parts and then will figure out how to combine them to make the blocks.  I have not made much of a dent in the pile of shirts yet...

It's Still Snowing...

In the warmer weather, we like to sit outside in our gazebo and read or stitch. It is much too cold and snowy to do this now!  I took this picture on Friday and since then, we have had quite a bit more snow.  All of this snow puts me in the mood for a hot cup of herbal tea and a cozy spot by the fireplace while I cross stitch some more snow on my snowman picture.

 It feels like I have been working on the snow in this picture forever, but really, I am getting quite close to the end...

This little bit is all I have left to do!  There are a couple of birds to do as well--one in the snow and one on the red mitten.  I also have to outline these two snowmen and the birds at this end of the picture.  I will keep plugging away at this project.

I finished up the last of the 54 churn dash blocks for the swap I am participating in at Fun with Barb. (see my sidebar for the link to her blog)

I will put them into the mail soon...I'm going to use a zip loc bag and try to get as much air out as I can so they pack up as small as possible to save on postage.

My daughter sent me flowers this week for my birthday...Aren't they beautiful?  Maybe Spring is not too far off after all.

I will be linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning.

This and That

I have been working on a few projects over the last couple of weeks, when I have some time to head down to the sewing room.  Christine and I got together one night this past week to work on our Churn Dash blocks for a block exchange with "Fun with Barb".  I have made 36 blocks so far out of the 54 that I need to make for the swap.  Here are some samples...

I cut out 12 more blocks and partially sewed and pressed them...I hope to get these blocks put together by the end of the weekend.  Then, I will only have 6 more blocks to make.

Last week, I managed to get all of the slab blocks together for the quilt for a new refugee that will be arriving shortly. 

My husband had to stand on a chair to hold up this quilt! I will get the backing soon and it will be off to the quilter's house.

Two weeks ago, my counted cross stitch picture looked like this:

I managed to add some more snow and finish off the red bird.   The snow is a bit monotonous but looks good when it is done. I still have to do the outlining on these two snow people and the birds at this end of the picture.

My daughter found some interesting cross stitch patterns online so when this is finally done, I might purchase one and make it next.

I will be linking up with Kathy and the other slow Sunday stitchers tomorrow.