Gifted, Shared, Loved...

i've been absent from bloggy land, and missing my RSC friends. i'm back with a plethora of catchup posts! mostly from RSC23...

 

 

granddaughter L turned 5 in late October. i mailed her 2 of my favorite quilts from RSC22. 

just 2 very simple designs; i like to focus on color and contrast, rather than fiddly piecing. 3" squares, and 3" HSTs. she loved them!  no pics of the colorful backing, though...

my favorite DIL turned 30 (!!!) the end of July. P had commented in RSC21 that she really liked the scrappy twinkly stars that i was making- so obviously, the quilt needed to go live with her! (full picture of this quilt in my header photo, but now it's finished, not just a flimsy...) youngest grandson T had to get in on the happy occasion... 

Daughter #2, A, turned 17 June 29. (see, i'm really behind!). as a budding young writer, the Full Stop quilt seemed like she was the best one for it to be loved by... she was really happy! 

sharing and gifting a favorite quilt to one of my loved ones is the best ever. it's great when they find a home to go to; where they'll be appreciated and used. 

June 30 my youngest son passed away tragically and unexpectedly in a motorcycle accident. although i kept sewing along with you all, i just didn't have the energy to blog for awhile. 

i'm doing ok, and so is the family, though it was quite a shock, and so sad. 

 

the above 2 quilts were not pieced as part of my RSC shenanigans. the first one is for a great niece's baby in CA, the second (Baby Shark; inspiration found here, although now that i revisit Katy's post, i realize she used HSTs, not isosceles triangles... ) was pieced for the Nebraska MCC quilt sale, and is on its way into the world...) 

i appreciate the friendship and camaraderie of all my RSC bloggy (and Instagram!) friends! go see what every one else is up to- you just might be inspired! 

it's a double rainbow!

i have TWO finishes to share today!  the first is a flimsy, so maybe technically not a finish? but it's high on my list to get done, once i make some final decisions about where it's going to live, and with who. (whom?) 

Angela designed this quilt #fullstop as part of RSC21. i chose to do my punctuation marks in a consistent Moda grey, instead varying the colors of each of my rows. ( i used more stash that way!) to round out the rainbow, i added a few filler rows: the lime green, aqua and the medium blue. i forgot to measure the quilt's final size, but it's somewhere around 64" X 70". it's more squarish than rectangley... 

another change i made was to omit the row of colins ::: (maybe that was the aqua row?) i felt they were too close to the quotation marks """, periods ... and semi-colins ;;;. unfortunately, the row of semi-colins is nearly lost in the purple row. 

i had in mind all along to either gift it to a History teacher friend (who seems more like an English teacher type) or a shirttail relative that is an actual English teacher. but: both my girls seem to really like this quilt, and i'm contemplating giving it to one of them... 

actually, in processing and typing out the above, i think i'll go with my original plan. both girls, A & B have heaps and hoards of quilts. i should spread the love a bit, i think. i plan to quilt it in straight lines through the rows, and maybe even do some big stitch quilting with pearle cotton. we'll see... i 'll keep you posted! 

the above quilt, Rainbow Rectangles, is genuinely finished (quilted AND bound!) and was made by my youngest daughter, BJ. she's 14 and i think this is maybe her third quilt? she doesn't LOVE quilting but she doesn't DESPISE it either. she likes to make things, and really enjoys the satisfaction and beauty of a completed quilt that she made herself. 

this quilt was made all from scraps/stash, and we used my studio2cutter and the 3" X 6" (finished) rectangle multiple die.  *the above links are not affiliate links; i just really love my S2C! even though the cutter can be quite spendy, i've been careful to choose practical and versatile dies, and i get alot of use and enjoyment out of my cutter.*

if you're on the fence about getting a cutter for yourself, i'd HIGHLY ENCOURAGE you to take the plunge. (but wait for a sale, is also my two cents worth...) 

BJ laid out the rainbow rows top to bottom along her quilt to get the maximum impact of the rainbow asn the quilt is on the bed... the above and below pictures are a bit closer up, so you can see the wide variety of fabrics included in her quilt. 

it's SO COLD here this weekend: supposed to go down to 0° the next few nights. YIKES! so i'm sure i'll be spending some time in the swewing room, or maybe also huddled under quilts! 

linking up all over the place this weekend! grab a cup of coffee, settle in and see what everyone else is working on!

Alycia @ Finish It Up Friday

Michelle @ Brag About Your Beauties

Kelly @ My Quilt Infatuation

Angela @ So Scrappy (RSC22)

### !!! """ [[[ ]]] *** ;;;

i was procrastinating *just a little* bit on my Full Stop quilt for RSC21. finally yesterday, i buckled down and worked out the kinks, and really moved this quilt forward. very, very happy with it now!!!

(there are a few quilts to be seen if you check out the hashtag #fullstopquiltalong, there are a few of these RSC21 quilts popping up over on instagram) 

first up was to decide on the layout of this quilt. i know aqua is coming up yet this year, and i wanted to work in the aqua and BOTH blues. so far that lime green (between the yellow quotation marks and the green brackets) is the only "place holder" row. 

hopefully, it doesn't look too out of place (it will probably fall smack dab in the middle of the quilt) or too belly-button-ish. 

last week A had an orthodontist appointment, so we took the opportunity to go to a fabric store. (our LQS closed a few years ago, and we don't really have one in handy distance anymore). i'll admit to purchasing the purple and orange yardage for this quilt; i just don't really have those colors in abundance in my stash...

 you can see that i changed up the red exclamation points a bit- a combination of not liking the angled version, and being too lazy to figure out the freezer paper directions. once the exclamation points are sewn together in the row, they won't look so chunky. 

the semi-colins did get a bit lost in the purple, but i have no complaints about the blue asterisks! 

go see all the other beautiful rainbow creations...