Goodbye June!

What a crazy month this has been!   It's seen it's share of celebrations (2 birthdays and one wedding anniversary), 2 sets of night duty, and a whole lot of gardening!  In between, there have been random bursts of quilting, a bit of knitting, LOTS of garden "stuff", and a new-to-me stitching project.  Seeing as this is primarily a quilting blog, maybe we should start there.  I've managed to keep up with most of my monthly challenges (just don't ask about my temperature quilt...)  First up, I'll share my "Patterns by Jen" monthly colour challenge.  This month, the fruit / vegetable was the pumpkin - and I chose the most obvious colours to make it (dark orange for the skin, lighter orange for the inside flesh).  I'll admit, I wasn't careful enough putting it together, and managed to sew one half-square triangle unit on backward...  (I caught and corrected it!)    

The colour for June's Rainbow Scrap Challenge was purple, and, once again, I made 16 half square triangle units with low volume fabrics, and (4) 9-patch blocks (2 with dark corners, 2 with light).

                                                              

I also finally finished up 2 quilt tops from Bonnie Hunter's 2020 leader-ender challenge (Easy Breezy).  One top is a generous throw size, and the 2nd is a smaller square throw (I'm considering making it a bit larger...).                

I'm still working on my temperature quilt, but had to wait for more fabric - and just haven't had time to get back to it.  Tomorrow is a holiday, so maybe then?

And finally, a quick peek of my blackwork project - more news on that in my next post.  Each block will eventually be bordered - lots more to do!

Thanks for reading !

May "doings"

This post is only a few weeks late - working nights for the past 4 weeks has messed with my head and my timing (and anything else that I find convenient...😉) .  In that time, I've sewn 2 sets of blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, and 2 blocks for the Monthly Colour Challenge.  I also made (or finished) 3 quilts for Victoria Quilts through Hands2Help.

First, my blocks for RSC - the colour for April was blue and May was red.  

Red (cherry) was the challenge colour  for April   and brown (potato) for May.

I have pictures of two of the quilt tops that I made for Victoria Quilts.  I'm thankful that there was a Canadian charity to donate to this year again.  First is this "Twist" quilt - the Pattern is from KatyQuilts

This second one is a Warm Wishes quilt - I was aiming for something a little "masculine" - hoping that this navy, cream and rust will fit the bill.  Both of these tops measure approx. 50" x70".

Apparently I didn't get a picture of the 3rd quilt and the package has been sent off.

Going forward, I have a stack of "Off the Quilt Path" blocks ready to assemble into a top; a purple and white jelly roll project started - and my temperature quilt is getting bigger every day.   I also have 2 leader-ender projects underway....  Masks are still getting made as needed - hoping that we'll be able to do without them before Thanksgiving? Christmas?  Hubby and I have both had our first shots and 2nd ones are booked!

Thank you for stopping by!

And this was March!

I can't believe that we're almost through the 3rd month of 2021 - and yet, there's been lot of stuff happening here, so I guess we really are.  Between knitting, quilting, keeping a bit of order in the house and even making a few birthday cards, it's been a busy time.  It seems like forever since I made / had time to make cards, but with 3 birthdays in the family in 4 days, I didn't have a reason to NOT make a few!

Maybe I'll start with one of the cards - made for my sister.  She's a gardener - hope she doesn't mind the dandelion fluff!

A week or two ago, we had an announcement in church that a member was recently diagnosed with cancer - so they needed a prayer shawl.  Our craft group hasn't been able to meet for more than a year, so it's up to me to supply a shawl.  Good thing that the yarn is at my house until we can get back into church.  I have it just over halfway done: 

I've also got a bunch of different quilt-y things going on.  There's the Monthly Colour Challenge from PBJ - this month's food / colour inspiration is yams - deep red-orange and lighter orange - and this is my block: 

I'm also participating in  Angela's So Scrappy challenge - this month's colour was green.  Once again, I made 4 9-patch blocks and 16 Half Square Triangles.

And finally, one of my bigger scrappy challenges right now is "Off the Brick Path" - it alternates 4.5" windmill blocks with 4.5" low volume squares.  One block ends up with 5 windmill blocks and the alternate block has 5 lv squares.  This quilt will probably be part of my donation for Sarah's annual Hands2Help campaign.

My March temperature quilt row will be up next week

Linking up to Quilting is more fun than housework.

More finishes!

 

I thought that i"d take a few minutes to share a recent finish and a special project.  

I bought the fabric for this first quilt about 12 - 15 years ago at Fabricland.  It was great quality and I knew that it would become a quilt, just not sure what or how.  Fast forward to a few weeks ago, and I saw a quick and easy quilt picture on Jo's Country Junction - and I knew what to do!  The main fabric is "zoo" animals.  I added sashing in Kona Blueberry and cornerstones in Kona Peach and bound it with the same Konas.

I've enjoyed seeing quilt pictures in the snow, so I took that quilt, and my Trip Around the World quilt from a few weeks ago, and headed out to my back yard.  Hubby told me in the morning that we'd received about 8" of fresh snow overnight, so I grabbed my coat and boots and my 2 quilts and set out - into approx. 14" of snow and drifts...  There's no way I could plod through that, so back to the house - there was a leaf rake - that would work wouldn't it?  Haha - not really...  I did knock down some of the deepest drift and soldiered on - hope it was worth the journey!

And finally, I got a request for a prayer shawl - a young woman recently diagnosed with cancer was starting chemo and a friend thought that she'd appreciate a prayer shawl.  I found the perfect yarns and spent the next week knitting a "Dot Stitch" (pattern on Ravelry) prayer shawl for her, and it's been delivered!  Each cancer has it's own coloured ribbon assigned to it (we all know the pink ribbon for breast cancer) - and the yarn that I used had the colour for her cancer as one of the main colours!  I'll continue to pray for her until her chemo is finished. 

Thanks for stopping by!  I'll be linking up to Sarah's post.

Keeping busy...

I've been busy with several different projects.  Let's start with the blocks for Kat's January / February block drive for blocks for Covered in Love.  It's an organization that provides quilts to comfort palliative patients in hospital - the families can take them home after the patient passes.  This block was different - it's foundation pieced right onto the batting!  We were asked to choose a colour with 1-2 contrasting strips.  I chose teal and just cut strips - and ended up with enough to make 3 blocks.

Then there was Jen's Feb. block and colour - yellow.  The block is comprised of 4 small spool blocks sewn together after being rotated.  

Angela's SoScrappy colour for February is also yellow.  In January, I chose 2 different blocks to work with each month = Half Square Triangles and classic 9-patches.  The HSTs will be combined with low volume fabrics; the 9-patches will use differing shades of the colour of the month (2 each of dark corners and 2 with light corners).

All of these blocks were sewn with fabrics from my scraps - and I'll be linking up with Cynthia on the weekend for Oh Scrap!

I'm hoping to post more projects in a day or two...  Thanks for stopping by!

January wrap-up

 The first month of this new year is (thankfully!) behind us - and we are one month closer to spring.  I just wanted to quickly share what I worked on and finished this month:

Canuck Quilter (Joanne Kerton) designed a temperature quilt last year - and I decided that this is the year that I am going to make one.  I bought all the fabrics, and have the first month done!

It's not very colourful - our temperatures have been very mild so far this year.

I've also decided to join 2 challenges - the first one is Patterns By Jen's Monthly Colour challenge.  She chooses the block; the colour is inspired by fruits and vegetables.  January's block was based on the eggplant - and this is my block: 

The second challenge is Angela's So Scrappy challenge - she chooses a colour and we're free to choose a block (or more!) and use the colours to construct those blocks.  January's colour was pink - and I chose half-square triangles for one set of blocks, and nine-patches for the other.  I'll be making 4 nine-patch blocks - two will have 5 dark squares and 4 lighter squares, while the other 2 blocks will be reversed.  These are the blocks I've made: 

And finally, I quilted 2 quilts that I had pieced in the fall - along with a bit of a typo in one of the fabrics!  The first quilt is a (planned) scrappy Trip Around the World, and the second is made of leftover jelly roll strips from another project.  

Did you find the mistake?  

Thanks for sticking around - this post ended up being a little longer that I expected!

It's been FAR too long...

 I see that it's been almost a year since I last posted, and it was tempting to just pull the plug, but I'm going to give it another chance.  Part of the problem is that I haven't been able to upload pictures from my phone to the desktop (and typing a blog post on my phone is NOT going to happen!).  I'm not sure why I tried it one more time just after Christmas, but, voila!  I was able to get my pictures downloaded!  I promise to not overwhelm you with pictures and posts of all the things I've been working on since Feb. 2020.    Maybe I'll just pick a picture and start there - okay?

At the beginning of the pandemic, it seemed like everyone and their brother (sister?) was sewing masks.  I had a long to-do list and I assumed that the people who were already sewing masks had the situation under control, and I didn't need to sew any.  But, I could donate fabric to the cause - and because tightly woven cotton had been requested, I went to my stash of batiks.  I saved out a few really special ones and decided that I was going to use them up while I had them out.  I had 2 or 3 Bright Hopes blocks on my design wall, but they only measured 6.5" - and, while I wanted to use that pattern, those blocks would be far too small.  I had to fiddle with the block pieces to get the parts the right size - but it seemed like I had enough blocks in no time.  I tried to create a secondary pattern with the layout, and ended up having to alter a few blocks to make it happen - but I finally got the top done, and then quilted and bound it right away.  It's been put aside until I can donate it.

These are also donation quilts - the first one was started in 2019 and put away as I didn't have enough blocks.  It was started as a project for National Sew a Jelly Roll day - but I only had a part jelly roll, and I needed two more strips to finish the quilt.  I finally decided to just order some coordinating yardage - I ended up making 3 blocks with that colour, and used it for the border too.  The second one was for a donation quilt drive organized by Suzyquilts, and was a quick make.  The fabrics are all Kona cottons and were all in my stash!  I used my BlocLoc rulers to square up ALL those half-square triangles, and then just grabbed blocks and sewed them together.  Both of these quilts went to Project Linus. 

And now, I'm heading back into my sewing room to finish my scrappy Trip Around the World quilt.  I'm hoping to have it finished this week! 

 

Well, hello there! Long time, no chat...

It's been a very interesting, and challenging, few months - but renovations are finally happening, workload has decreased significantly, and my health has thrown us a few curve balls - but I'm back!
I've been keeping quite busy - finishing a few quilts, doing a lot of knitting and crocheting for our church craft group, and spending time with my family.  The most fun news is that we'll be gaining a new family member in October!  There will definitely be some wedding sewing going on!
I've got pictures of some of my latest projects - but we're having issues downloading photos from my camera to the computer.  It's so much easier to share them on my IG account...
So, where to start?  I finished 2 small quilts for Project Linus (no photos unfortunately), made a few quilty gifts for Christmas - my youngest daughter wanted a hotpad large enough for a 9"x13" casserole dish:

On the spur of the moment, I decided to make 2 of these little wall-hangings from the Temecula Quilt Company: - they measure approx. 12 x 14 inches.

Our youngest grandson LOVES pandas, so when I saw this hat, I had to make it for his 3rd birthday! 

I taught a group of grade 6 students how to sew!  Their school offers a 4-week program that allows the kids to explore their interests, learn new skills, and maybe even introduce them to the thing that will become their career!  The first week, we made infinity scarves; the second week we made pillows from donated blue jean legs; and the last 2 weeks, we assembled charm squares into 4-patches, which then were sewn into 16-patches - and then into quilt tops for Project Linus.

There has also been some knitting happening - a couple from our church support a girls school in Kenya.  Our church craft group has been asked to make sweaters for the girls to wear to church - and 4 or 5 of the ladies took on that challenge.  We ended up donating 12 cardigans for the cause!

I am currently working on a Temperature Quilt - I see the afghan and scarf patterns every year, but they didnt appeal to me - and then I saw that Canuck Quilter was offering a free pattern for a temperature quilt, and I knew that I had found my pattern!  I hope that we get the camera issue resolved soon so that I can share pictures of my progress!  

And, just after Christmas I saw posts from the Mennonite Central Committee, looking for volunteers to make comforters or quilts to go to the Ukraine.  I had a few new patterns to try out, and I got 2 quilts done for them - and a third one almost done.  Again, as soon as we can figure out the issue that prevents me from transferring pics from the camera to the computer, I will get them into a post.

So, you are all caught up with my doings!  The making continues... 

Thanks for sticking around and popping in!

Remember me?

It's been FAR too long, hasn't it?  Partly because I post to Instagram more often when I have something to share - it's so much faster!  Also, we're still going through the longest renovation known to man - or, at least it feels like it!  We started in March, and, after a few weeks of intense tearing out of walls and ceilings, etc. we've come to an almost complete stop.  We are at the mercy of the gas company, and can't move forward until we have a functioning furnace (and we've had a few cool nights this week!  Let's get going folks!)
The side effect of this is - I have no sewing room.  I realize that not everyone has a designated space for sewing, storing fabric, etc. but, until 6 months ago, I had a 10' x 12' room, a large storage closet, and a design wall.  Now, I have a corner of the dining room table, and storage in our unheated enclosed porch.  Not exactly conducive to working on larger projects....  And yet, I'm blessed by having what I have, so don't feel too sorry for me!
Anyway, I have managed to make 2 wedding gift quilts - and I've been doing some small scrappy projects.  A bit of knitting has happened too...
So, here's what I've made - wedding quilt #1 - this couple got married in May, but I just finished the quilt in the wee hours of this morning.  It's an easy make from a pattern online by Christa Watson.

This one was given to a young couple from church at their wedding a few weeks ago - the pattern is called "Lovebirds" and was designed by Leanne Parsons (Devoted Quilter).

And, unfortunately, a member of our congregation lost her mom, and needed a prayer shawl.

                                                                                                                                     

The summer has also been busy with the garden, my two fantastic grandsons, a bit of medical drama, and watching the life cycle of the monarch butterflies as they flit around our milkweed plants!   Life has been (mostly) good!

Linking to Confessions of a Fabric Addict (Can I Get a Whoop-Whoop) and Alicia Quilts (Finished or Not Friday)

It's been a BUSY week!

After almost a month of no sewing action at all, I finally took time to pull out my small machine, cleared off a corner of the dining room table, and pulled together a few quilt tops for the 2019 version of Hands2Help.  Thankfully, the Canadian charity (Victoria's Quilts) this year requested 50" x 70" tops, as opposed to quilts.  It's probably also a good thing that I tend to be easily distracted, because I managed to find several projects that I had started a year or two ago and then abandoned because something more exciting (or necessary) showed up...
So, are you ready for "show and tell"?  First is a quilt that is 100% brand new - I bought all the fabrics 3 weeks ago, and made up this "Warm Wishes" quilt (a former Project Linus quilt pattern).  I tried to find a focus fabric that was gender-neutral - it took me 35 minutes to find this print, and only 5 more to find the 3 solids to go with it.

Next is this "Precious Gems" top - it's a layer cake pattern.  I had all the blocks made up last year, so I only had to sew them together to finish it.
Then there's this "Plus" quilt.  I had cut a lot of the 5" squares last winter when I was making a masculine one for the local hospital Pediatric Critical Care Unit.  However, once I started laying the blocks out, I realized that I needed a LOT more, so I spent a few hours pulling assorted fabrics and cutting squares.  Once the blocks were laid out, the sewing happened pretty quickly!

The next one was almost a freebie - I won a FQ bundle from Art Gallery Fabrics when they introduced their "Indigo and Aster" fabric line.  I chose to use the more masculine fabrics, and supplemented those fabrics with other AG fabrics that I had in my stash - the white fabric is consistent in all of the blocks.

Next up is a "leftover" quilt.  A few years ago, I participated in a mystery quilt, and completed the top, but never got around to quilting it, because I had made it really big!  I ended up removing a few rows, making a "new" top in a great size for completing and donating.  I put the excess section aside, and came across it a few days ago.  The section was too small for a quilt, but I poked around a little, and found 6 more blocks and 2 more that needed to be assembled - so I stitched them up, added them to the original section, and it ended up big enough for another top!
Now I'm all "sewn out" - and I have a few baby boy sweaters to knit / finish up in the next week or two, so the machine will go back into it's corner....  Hopefully it won't be long before it gets called out of retirement!
Linking up to Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Quilting is More Fun Than Housework.
Thanks for stopping by!

It's been a busy month!

I thought that I'd better make an appearance here before you think that I've fallen off the face of the earth....   March has been a very busy month, but not exactly in the way that you'd think....  We've undertaken a HUGE reno project.  Back in the early 70's when this house was built, the gas company was on strike, and so no furnaces or gas services of any kind could be installed.  Consequently, the house had electric baseboard heaters in each room - not a big deal when the monthly electricity bills cost less than a week's worth of groceries for a family.  Now however, the price of hydro has gone up a LOT, and we've been watching the monthly bill get higher every season, it seems.  Come to find out that the insulation is also in need of a major overhaul...  So, we're putting in a furnace, re-insulating the basement walls, and replacing the wiring and some of the windows.
Have you ever put a furnace into an existing house?  No?  It means opening up walls to run ductwork into rooms - and we have 3 levels...  So, everything in our basement, family room and sewing room had to be "evacuated" so that ceilings and interior walls could be removed.  Ductwork and furnace installation started yesterday, and should be done in a week or so.  Insulation, wiring and drywall?  who knows....
All this to say that not much stitching has happened.  I had signed up with Leanne Parsons @devotedquilter to do a QAL of her Medallion Magic pattern.  The fabric is bought, but I have no idea where my pattern is right now.  I also signed up for the 2019 Hands2Help challenge again this year, and managed to make a small quilt with fabric left over from a baby quilt I made 3 years ago, and a few burp pads for one of the charities - Jack's Basket, so they'll be going out in the mail on Monday.

 
 I also did up a few blocks for Kat's block drive for Covered in Love

and finished a pile of blue Raspberry Kiss blocks for Dara @stitchedquiltingco - she'll make them into quilts for families of fallen Canadian police officers.

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I've also been working on some knitting - prayer shawls mostly - and a baby sweater has been started for a baby due in mid-April - I'll share photos when they get finished. 
Linking to Quilting is More Fun Than Housework and Confessions of a Fabric Addict