RSCing: keeping busy in the darkest of winter...

technically, we were supposed to be sitting in the airport at Buhbenshwar, India right now... but because of a hiccup with B's visa, our trip is postponed for a couple weeks until we get her paperwork straightened out.. 

so, it's off to the sewing room i go, with some "extra" time on my hands, and no shortage of scraps, fabric, thread or ideas! not too bad of a delay, i'd say! 

i made some progress on the scrappy 5 patches. i'm loving the contrasts and unusual combos. it's not a RSC26 sew, if we want to be that technical about it... but since i'm going through my 3" boxes anyway, and with the goal of actually USING the fabrics, it seemed to fit into the assignment... 

lurking above these on the design wall and patiently waiting are the paper pieced schoolhouses. they were pieced during RSC22. using Kona school bus, i made a few each month in the appropriate color. this project has stalled out, but i do plan to get back to it sometime... 

my scrappy bear paw is coming along nicely. the claws of these paws are a consistent black (gold polka dots) and each set within the paw is the same. too much scrappy can be quite chaotic and unsettling...

below is a picture of a quilt Rachel made, pictured in the book A Quilter's Field Guide to Color . this is the inspiration that is giving me direction on how i want to proceed, and how i'd like to end up... we'll see how these blocks progress over the year... 

there's SO MUCH FABRIC in my sewing room. not a problem, really, but i need to get some quilts out into the world! i've always lots of ideas flowing (sometimes rushing!) through my brain, and although i start lots of quilts, and have lots of ideas, i do try to keep organized, with good notes with each project. one thing i enjoy (besides all you guys!!!) is the UFO Bingo on Facebook. it's a fun way to get some stuff done; i've participated in this for maybe 5 years or so... today i plan to get my bingo card filled out... make sure you hop over to Angela's and see everyone else's colorful blocks!

 

for the love of quilting...

getting ready to post again! after a 6 month hiatus (longer, really...) i have some pictures and RSC quilts to share. i'll be back soon to fill in all the behind-the-scenes details!

this summer i was able to zip down to Baltimore to visit family, and i was thrilled to take down T's {finally completed!} I Spy quilt. 

he really liked it, and we go right to work playing I Spy with sister E, Aunt A & Mommy. 

a quick photo shoot up in his room. (and you can see a quilt hanging on the wall- i made it for T's daddy, Nathaniel WAY WAY back- circ. 1990s, i'm sure... ) 

one of my RSC23 projects was the scrappy hearts. on a Saturday link up i saw that Diann was making them too.  when i saw how she was putting her top together, i was inspired to make alternating blocks in Irish Chain fashion. (click on the picture to enlarge) i used black as my chain, completing the pattern into the edges. i'm very pleased with how this quilt turned out. although it's not quilted and will be in the flimsy stage for a bit, it's been claimed by my youngest daughter, B. 

the pixelated heart quilt has been a *slight obsession* with me, you might be able to say... this one was a kit i purchased on a whim. i supplemented the LV background squares with my extensive I Spy stash. 

above are the final 2 I Spy quilts for the last 2 granddaughters: A and S. they're 4 & 2 and were not yet born when i made the first 4 grandchildren their I Spy quilts. although they're pictured here in the flimsy stage, i just got them back from the quilter this week. i'll get the binding on them, and gift them very soon. 

again- pixelated heart in a rainbow inspired layout. all the blocks are 5", and i've used my EXTENSIVE I Spy fabric collection. with the completion of these 7 quilts for my grandchildren, plus one for a young niece last year, that brings my I Spy plans to a rest for a bit. my youngest 2 daughters are 17 &18 so it will be awhile before there are more grandchildren. i've sorted and saved some of the favorite blocks for A & B's children, and stored the remainder of the blocks away for awhile. 

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finally, my last I Spy quilt for awhile- and a super favorite of mine! i LOVE doing quilts with LV, and when i saw Cynthia's pattern in a recent American Patchwork & Quilting magazine (can't remember which one) i knew instantly i had to make it! again, i used my 5" squares. i think the pattern called for 3" finished squares, but the bigger squares made a nice sized quilt, which we'll use as our sofa/TV quilt. VERY VERY happy with how this one turned out! 

 

and finally- not hearts, but another finish... the Baltimore gang has a cute little Craftsman house with a beloved pear tree in the backyard. Granddaughter E had asked for "pear placemats" for her 5th birthday.  (what Grammy wouldn't move heaven and earth to make that happen?!) i finally got around to making a table topper and buffet runner for her mommy, DIL P. for her 30th birthday. 

so: that's a highlight of the quilty happenings around here. life is busy, full and happy. thanks for stopping by and reading all these ramblings! click back on over to SOSCRAPPY and see what everyone else is up to... 

HST: 3/6/9: So. Many. Triangles!

one of my RSC22 projects this year was these HST triangles. i STILL have many 3" squares, despite piecing SO. MANY. TOPS. with numerous iterations of designs based on 3" squares since RSC14. this year i switched it up a bit, and made those squares into triangles. (me so clever...)

the "design", or at least the idea behind the design is based on this tutorial. 

this finished flimsy is a bit different than what i had originally envisioned, including a few twists and turns along the way, i'm happy with how it turned out. 

using my design wall, i started with the palest pink in the upper left hand corner, trying to gradually and seamlessly (haha) transition to black in the lower right hand corner. 

with the addition of a few {rainbow} white spacer blocks in some of the rows, i'm very happy with how this quilt turned out. there are a few triangles/colors left over; perhaps enough for a colorful sofa pillow?

 i'd like it to be at the top of my "to be quilted soon" list, but we'll see how that ends up working out... 

making progress: one stitch, one block, one row, one flimsy at a time...

our life gallops on, one week at at a time (or really, one day at a time, just like everyone else...) and i'm able to spend some time in the sewing room a few nights a week. i appreciate the quiet time, and some time to be creative. i have a few finishes to share this week!

the Shoo Fly {Churn Dash}remains one of my favorite blocks. in fact, i have several quilt tops cut out, and kitted up in this block/pattern. so many variations, and i love this layout especially. (of course, i can't take credit for this clever design. i saw it over at Alycia's awhile ago and it really appealed to me...) 

my Framed 4 Patches danced their way through all the colors of RSC22. (except for brown and black) and i pieced them into a quilt top. 

the Kona colors that frame each monochromatic 4 patch are: black, pepper, ash, snow, charcoal, lighthouse and slate. (or something very similar to those colors... can't remember ATM.) 

if you look VERY CLOSELY, you can see that the first row is in rainbow order. (meaning the colored 4 patches) for the remainder of the quilt, i just made sure that the colors were evenly sprinkled around. this quilt will go into our church sewing group, Scraps to Wraps, and be tied and given as a local donation when a need becomes apparent.  This top seems as if it could be appropriate for a child, or even a teen boy if necessary. 

 one last picture of the Churn Dash quilt. Welly. (short for Beef Wellington) is usually sad when we take Daisy out of the pasture for quilt/miniature donkey photo shoots. he hangs around the fence and bawls. But: he matches the quilt so nicely, doesn't he? he's a curious steer ( i think they all are) and was happy to be included. (i even gave him an apple when we were done!)

COMING SOON: i finished my HST 3/6/9 quilt! i'll get a picture up later today.... 

and of course, as always, i'm linking up to RSC22 rainbow parade over at Angela's blog! 

Hands2Help Comfort Quilt Challenge: 2022

 i love to piece quilts; i love to gift quilts for donation! (after all, there are only so many quilts that one family, one person, one sofa, one rocking chair can use, right?) 

about 7+ (?) years ago, i was the quilting teacher for our local Ben Franklin store, teaching 8-12 quilting classes a year. after awhile, that petered out, but i still have the quilt samples i made to advertise and teach the classes. 

i never came up with a home for many of the quilts; i just wasn't sure what to do with them... they're all pretty small (no bigger than 36"- 42" square) and it's an eclectic bunch. 

although every one of them is brand new, never used, some have been lonely and forlorn for quite a long time. (yikes! i didn't realize it was SOOOO long until i looked back through my blog!) 

so, it's certainly past time that they found a home where they will be loved and used! 

after looking through the suggested donation list that Mari provided, i figured Little Lambs Foundation was the best choice for these smaller quilts. 

i know these are not your typical baby quilt, but I'm hoping that they'll bring some family and the baby some comfort, knowing that someone cares... 

just plugging along quietly in the background...

i'm thrilled to have a flimsy finish to share today! I've been working on these wonky star blocks in the COM all RSC21, and finally finished the blocks last month. (was it really that long ago?!) 

             

Daisy {the miniature donkey} is *always glad* to see me head out to the pasture with a quilt. she knows that for just a little co-operation, and minimal lip quivering, she'll be rewarded with some special treats! 

we also have our big, galloping, goofy and friendly steer, Wellington Xaviar Basset. (Welly for short) but he's not nearly as cute and he's much more muddy (and other brown stuff, too...) so, he dones't usually get to be in on the photo shoots and treats.

it was quite the puzzle to get the blocks together and blending (colorwise) on the design wall. (some sneak peeks of that over on Instagram) the quilt (unfinished) is 68" X 87", and it took 3 evenings to carefully take it off the design wall and bring it to the sewing machine and sew it together, with lots of partial seams. thankfully, i got it right the first time, and no major seam ripping was involved. phew!

it took several iterations of block and color arranging to get the color flow to go the way i wanted... then, there was more digging in my 3" square stash, and finding other bigger pieces and colors in my stash to get enough blocks in the right colors to fill in the blanks. 

here is a "detail" shot of the 4 corners of the quilt- the pics should supersize if you click on them...

just in case you're interested in seeing some of the different fabrics!

i will admit, there are just a few duplicates in this quilt (not counting the wonky stars, of course) ...at least 2 that i know of... 

 but other than that, i'd say it's a safe estimate to say that there are over 700 different, unique fabrics in this Rainbow wonky stars quilt. 

i plan on quilting this one myself (soon?) and entering it in our local County Fair in July. then, i have a special recipient in mind, so I'll keep that a secret for now. make sure to go see all the other colorful, rainbow finishes this week- it's a colorful time of year!

Rainbows, Everywhere!

it's October (almost November) in RSC Land: and what does that mean? time to get all those monthly RSC blocks into tops! all year i've enjoyed playing with my scraps and squares, and i've been making waffle blocks, (2 different versions) and also the shoo fly and donut blocks. 

last week inspiration and motivation hit like a ton of bricks, and all in a rush, i pieced 4 different RSC tops, using up nearly all of the blocks i pieced this year. (go, me!) 

This waffle block quilt is about 62" X 75". i used my stash of 3" squares in the COM, making about 2 blocks each month. the brown waffle stripe (strip) is the same in each block. i only had to make 2 more blocks to complete this layout. 

i'm definitely working through my pile of 3" squares. i'm even considering taking a break from piecing RSC blocks with the 3" squares next year (!!!) and focusing on crumbs and strings instead for RSC22...

(as i'm writing this post, i realize i should take a better picture of this quilt, so the details of the fabrics can be seen better... this quilt is at church now, but i'll try to post a closeup soon...) 

since i can never leave well enough alone, (and tend to be that annoying firstborn overachiever) i did TWO waffle block quilts. For the second one i used the COM as the waffle strips, and 25 LV (low volume) squares, again making 2 blocks per month/color. this quilt i also pieced an additional 2 blocks to complete the "rainbow" layout. 

AND: after the 10+ months of piecing, i had 188 of the donut and shoo-fly blocks. (Kona lighthouse is the grey i used, in case you were wondering...) i was a bit stumped on how to put the blocks together, undecided as to whether i wanted to do a GIANT quilt, or what my other options might be...

then: A FLASH OF LIGHTNING, and a CLAP OF INSPIRATION! i was working from my Farm Girl Vintage book, making pear placemats for my 5yo granddaughter Es birthday (more on that later) and i saw this sawtooth star quilt layout in the back of the book. i realized that if i "pretended" my donut blocks were the big stars (by combining 4 donuts) and treated my shoo-fly blocks as the smaller sawtooth stars, i could use this design as my layout! 

i quickly got a "volunteer" to help me lay out the blocks on the design wall, and i was (am!) thrilled with how it turned out! after the year of piecing these blocks, we had lots to choose from, and combined the like (monochromatic) colors to make the layout here. 

after sewing that top together, i realized that there were (of course) many blocks still left over. so we just reversed the design, so to speak, and substituted the shoo-fly blocks for the large star, and the donuts for the smaller star. ( i'll say, though, that i like the first layout better... the donuts combine better than the shoo-flys) 

so, the end of this RSC21 story is that we have 2 waffle quilt tops for local donation through our church sewing group, S2W. and my long arm friend, Karen, adopted the 2 donut and shoo-fly quilt tops for an upcoming MCC auction. 

 i'm looking forward to RSC22, and starting some new projects (!!!). (i'll confess, tho, i still have a few RSC 19 block piles to get into tops, and a growing stack of leftovers and RSC orphans that need a purpose...) 

it's fun to visit the  RSC Saturday link-ups every week and see what everyone else is working on- you just never know when a great idea might explode! 

quilty friends and cheerful company!

recently Katy and Deanna announced a QAL- and the timing, sizes of the components and the quilt itself just seemed to perfectly fit my schedule, stash and need! (i'm always enthusiastic about QALs; it's just been a while since I've actually participated in one... i always have high hopes... ) 

a couple years ago, i purchased an AccuQuilt Studio 2 cutter. pricey? you betcha! BUT: worth every penny. i've since added more dies to my repertoire- but my favorites are the squares (i have the 3" & 2½" sizes), the churn dash (12"), tumblers (6"), rectangles (3" X 6") and a few other random dies. 

i use the different dies alot- for {some} personal quilts, for MCC donation quilts (fundraising auctions), and for quilts and quilt kits to be sewn & tied into comforters for local donation and world wide through MCC. 

anyway! katy and deanna are 2 of my favorite bloggers. (really!) so i was happy to see that their QAL would work well for my schedule, my fabric and my dies! i decided to go with scrappy browns and reds, with a consistent neutral to keep things a bit calm for the eyes... 

i picked the backing and binding, too, and was all ready to go. 

one good thing about participating in the QAL, was that katy gave specific directions on how to sew the 4 patches together. i'm certain i would have sewn at least 2 of the columns the wrong way, and need to rip out A.L.O.T. 

 a couple beauty shots later, and my (60" X 80") top is ready to go to S2W (Scraps to Wraps) with me on Wednesday. we'll all work together to get it tied, and sent off somewhere in the world where it will be used and appreciated! 

so, in conclusion: make sure to click back on over to katy and deanna's blogs, and see all the other #twobyfourQAL quilts that have linked up. 

and remember when i said that i really enjoy QALs? well, here are some previous quilts (either a *free* pattern or a QAL) that i did with Deanna over the years...

Calico Rose for a friend

Growing Up Odd (i'm just now realizing that i never got a good picture of this completed top...) 

Film at Five

thanks for stopping by! i'm glad you took the time out of your day to see this little quilty corner of my world. come back soon!