Lupins and 4 Finishes!!!

Four more lupin blocks made this week--I am not sure where I bought this purple fat quarter.  Here are samples of all the blocks I have made so far...24/48 blocks made.  I am half way there!  I have a few red-violet fat quarters in my pile so the raspberry lupins will blend in more once those are added. 

I finished the starfish baby wash cloth.  It is actually light blue...not gray. 

The "Let it Bee" cross stitch is done too.  I almost forgot to add the antennae!  I will frame this in a small hoop and hang it in my sewing room. 

I purchased a pattern for a blackwork project to work on next...I am in the process of getting my supplies gathered and hope to work on it this weekend. 

My daughter also finished her Nashville cityscape.  She has started a new project...not a cityscape.  I hope to share a picture of it next week. 

Finally, my Tula Pink 100 Modern Blocks sampler is completed!  I spent a few hours this week hand sewing the binding down.  I took this picture while standing on a ladder to get a full view of the quilt. 

I used three fat quarters of ombre fabric for the colourful bits in most of the blocks as well as my extensive collection of black and white fabrics for this quilt. The binding is the same darker gray solid as in the horizontal stripes.  

The colourful fabrics on the front and the backing fabrics were all designed by Tula Pink.  I purchased the three fat quarters for the front at QuiltCon 2019 in Nashville.  

My quilt was custom quilted by my friend, Julie C.  Each block is different and the background areas all have horizontal lines.  This quilt will go on our bed--our first new quilt on the bed in many years.  I have several quilts that fit our bed and rotate them about once a month so every quilt gets a chance to be on display and lay flat. I love looking at all of the blocks and finding little scraps of fun fabrics and admiring the quilting on each one. 

My friend and I go for a physically distanced walk every morning and today was foggy.  Water droplets clung to the spider webs we saw along the trail so I had to take a few pictures. 

I will be linking up with Kathy on Sunday morning along with all of the other Slow Sunday Stitchers.  

Paige at Quilted Blooms has a new link up on Fridays for people to share their finished quilting projects. Thank Goodness its Finished Fridays--TGIFF!!!

Have a great weekend!

Slow knitting and stitching.

 I now have 5 sets of 4 lupin blocks...I made one at 6:00 o'clock in the picture above this week.  This fabric has Celtic knots on it and was purchased in Inverness, Scotland when we were there last summer. I had picked out a different fat quarter to use for this week's blocks but when I went to cut it, I found that it was not big enough...I need at least 21" in length for the strips for these blocks.  Funny how fat quarters can vary so much in size. 

I did some knitting this week on the starfish baby washcloth...it's about 2/3 finished.  

My daughter continues to work on her Nashville cityscape in counted cross stitch. It is getting close to being done.  The patterns for her cityscapes are from Awesome Pattern Studio. 

My cross stitch bee is done except for the words above the bee and a small amount of outlining on the wings.  The words on the pattern are "Bee Well" but I am thinking of something different. 

My big accomplishment in the sewing department this week was to make and add the binding to my Tula Pink 100 Modern Blocks sampler quilt.  This is a huge quilt-- 100" square!  I have started the hand stitching and have one side done and have turned the corner to the second side.  I will be working on this for slow Sunday stitching with Kathy and the gang tomorrow. Maybe, I will have it done by next weekend. 

I did some weeding in my garden beside the front porch earlier this week and a couple of days later, broke out in a rash with itchy blisters...poison ivy.  I noticed that one on the weeds I was putting into the compost bag had the telltale three leaves...I went inside to wash my hands right away but it was too late. Calamine lotion is my best friend right now.  

The fall colours are just starting to show in our neighbourhood this week.  We had frost on the ground this morning so more are sure to follow. 

Have a great week!

Lupins, a Bee and a Sheep

 My lupin block collection continues to grow...although, this week, the blocks were made with Finn's assistance, which means they took a lot longer to make than usual.  This week's blocks were made with a purple grunge dots fat quarter. 

So, now I have a total of 12/48 blocks made for this quilt.  Here are the three lupin fabrics I have used so far:

I have a FQ chosen for my next set of blocks. 

I started a new counted cross stitch project this week--a free pattern from The Blackberry Rabbit (Sorry, I can't provide a link to their website as they are creating a new website at the moment.) The bee will have a wreath of flowers around it and some words above it. 

Last week, I said I would be starting a Bee facecloth...my attention got diverted and I am making a sheep facecloth instead.   I am about half done. 

The London Modern Guild has been doing a year long HST (half square triangle) BOM (Block of the month) over the past year.  I made my final block this week and played with my 12 blocks on the floor when Finn was not looking.   

Here is the first layout I tried:

I will do more playing before sewing the blocks together.  This will be a baby quilt...I will likely add a border before quilting it. 

I picked up my Tula Pink 100 Modern Blocks Sampler quilt this week from the long arm quilter.  I will be getting the binding put on this quilt by machine early next week so I can sit and do the hand sewing out in the gazebo.  Each block is custom quilted...here is a sample. 

I am excited to use this quilt on our bed!  It's the first new bed quilt we have had for several years. 

I have joined the book club at the library and we will be discussing this book on Tuesday morning.  I am about 2/3 of the way through it so far and will finish reading it this weekend. It's a good book--I would recommend it!  As you can see, I have a reading buddy. 

The sedums are starting to bloom in our garden. I took these pictures in the morning after it rained. 

I will link up with Kathy and the slow Sunday stitchers in the morning.  I used to get emails notifying me of your comments but must have done something to stop getting them.  I am not sure how to start this up again...if any of you have any ideas, please let me know in the comments.  I sometimes can find your emails to respond to your comments on your blogs, but sometimes I can't... so I apologize for not responding to every comment.  I find I cannot comment on any blogger blogs at all.  I do read everyone's blogs though...

Take care and have a great week. 

Taming the UFO Pile

My goal for the next little while is to tame the UFO pile.  I have made lots of quilts during this COVID-19 pandemic but most of them have been gifts for friends and family.  Now that all those gifts are done, it is time to tackle the UFO's.  First up this week, was borders and backing for the batik Scrappy Trips quilt that I started earlier this year.  I had to purchase the fabrics and then wash them before ironing, cutting and sewing. 

The backing was done with one seam and then I took it to the long arm quilter's house.  She let me know today that the quilting is done so I will pick it up tomorrow.  This one will be donated to our local hospice and will be washed a lot so the binding will be applied by machine...no hand stitching. 

Next up was my Tula Pink 100 blocks Modern Sampler quilt.  We had to move all of the furniture in the living room so that I could lay this monster out on the floor to make the backing. 

It took three widths of fabric for the backing and I found the perfect fabric in my stash for the label.  The turquoise accent piece beside the label matches one of the colours in the backing. I will write the information  about the quilt on the label before it is quilted. 

The London Modern Guild is having a fabric post card exchange so I made my post card this week.  I will put it in the mail this week.  I don't know the person that will be receiving this postcard so I can show you what I made. 

The third UFO of the week was started 3.5 years ago.  I signed up for a broken dishes block swap with Barb at Fun with Barb and the blocks have been in a zip lock bag all this time, waiting for inspiration to hit.  This week, when I was out for a walk, I got thinking about the blocks and an idea came to mind. 

I made four blocks like this:  

I am still figuring out what I will put between the blocks and as a border...stay tuned...this top should be done by next week. I am still contemplating quilting ideas as well.  I bought Jacquie Gering's book Walk 2.0 this week so I may peruse it for inspiration. 

I finished my green facecloth last week and started a new dishcloth --I am using a new pattern this time.  So far, so good.  The pattern is showing up as expected!  I will be doing some more knitting tomorrow for slow Sunday stitching with Kathy and friends. 

We finally had some rain this past week so the gardens are flourishing.  

Finn is getting his hair cut this week so here is a picture of him before the appointment.   Such a cutie!

Take care!

Sewing Day

I spent Monday at the weekly Oxford Guild sewing day.  I try to go every week, but was doing some volunteer work during November and December on Mondays, so have not been for a while.  It was fun to get back into sewing after the holidays.  I have been working on Tula Pink's 100 Modern Blocks sampler off and on since March 2019.  On Monday, I finished putting the top together...here is a peek at part of it.

I will be making the backing this week and then taking it to the long arm quilter's house.  I will show the entire quilt when it is done.

The Elgin Piecemakers had their annual post-Christmas dinner at a local restaurant earlier this week.  We meet later in the month and will be handing in two blocks for comfort quilts this month.  I had shown my green block in a previous post (here) and here is my completed black, tan and purple block.  I used my new drunkard's path rulers to make this block.

I did some more embroidery on the weekend and hope to add more to this picture before this weekend's slow stitching post. 

My next UFO challenge is to make a quilt out of these spinning four patch blocks which I made at least two years ago.  I am contemplating three different fabrics for a checkerboard layout...  Option 1- a grey print (excuse the shadow!):

Option 2- white background with blue dots:

Option 3- a blue print.

Here is where you get to weigh in---which one do you prefer???  Or should I use two of them in a pieced block in between the spinning four patches?
Until next time...

Busy Week with lots of Sewing!

I must say that retirement is agreeing with me!  I spent one day this week sewing with members of the Oxford Guild where I worked on the assembly of my Tula Pink 100 Modern Blocks sampler.  They had nice long tables for me to lay everything out for measuring the strips that go between the rows of blocks.  I could not do this at home.  I managed to get almost half of the quilt assembled by the end of the day and hope to finish the quilt top this coming week. 

I am still walking an hour every day, even when it is cold out. We had some snow this week... I had to bring my boots up from the basement.  I managed to get the front gardens cleaned up and the leaves raked before it snowed.  I attended not one, but two quilting workshops this past week.  Friday, I spent the day with Bill Stearman taking his Double Disappearing Nine Patch class.

Here are some sample blocks that I made in class.  He provided kits (for a fee) which included all the parts needed for each block.  The colourful fabric was hand dyed by Bill.

I have some ideas for baby quilts based on the DD9P method he taught.  They will have to wait until I finish a few other projects first.

Today, I took a Weight of Love class with Libs Elliott at the London Modern Guild.  I spent much of my time this week picking out 17 fabrics for the quilt and getting all of the pieces cut before the class.

Darks:

Mediums: (the blue and green solids on the left are lighter than the ones in the picture above...just hard to tell in this picture!)

Lights:

The prints were all purchased at a quilt show in Ailsa Craig earlier this year that featured quilts from New Zealand.  One of the vendors imported some NZ fabrics for her booth.  There was a lot of cutting for this quilt!

At the workshop, we did lots of block assembly first and then laid them out on the design walls/floor.

The blue sticky notes helped me keep track of the blocks.

We learned how to sew the blocks together with Y-seams.  I didn't do too badly with my first attempt!

I will get back to working on this quilt after the Tula Pink sampler is done.

I sat down to do some counted cross stitch tonight and noticed that I had a stain on the Aida cloth--likely dried blood from poking my finger.  I used some Oxyclean gel to remove almost all of the stain and then rinsed it out and laid it out to dry.  No stitching tonight.  Hopefully, it will be dry by the morning so I can do some stitching tomorrow.

I will be stitching along with Kathy's Slow stitchers tomorrow.