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! 

finishes and progress!

life has been busy here... a "big" upgrade started here in our house 2 months ago, when the 4ft.  lightbulb in the laundry room died. what started as a quite simple "hey, Dave, can you please put a new light in the laundry room fixture" turned into:

1. buying a NEW light fixture for the laundry room. (in the 13 years since it was installed, those 4ft bulbs became obsolete, requiring another fixture altogether...) 
2. drywalling the laundry room ceiling
3. finishing ALL. THE. TRIM. in the laundry room
4. painting the laundry room ceiling
5. installing new "luxury" vinyl plank flooring in the laundry room
6. closing the access hole between the  laundry room and the master bathroom
7. installing new "luxury" vinyl plank flooring in the mudroom
8. finishing ALL. THE. TRIM. in the mudroom
9. painting all the trim in the laundry room (white)
10. painting all the trim in the mudroom (tan)
11. painting the bathroom ceiling (!?)
12. painting the bathroom wainscoting
13. replacing the sink base cabinet in the kitchen
14. getting a new sink/faucet for the kitchen
15. installing new quartz countertops in the kitchen
16. installing a new granite island countertop in the kitchen
17. finishing ALL. THE. TRIM. in the kitchen
18. painting all the trim in the kitchen (white)
19. painting MORE trim in the kitchen (yellow)
20. i think that's the end of the list... 

so, actually, our *tiny* home improvement project became a lot like the book If You Give A Mouse A Cookie. (there are several books like that- If You Give A Moose A Muffin... If You Give A Pig A Pancake...) I'm sure you're familiar with these delightful children's books...

anyway- NOT complaining at all! we really stalled out in the home improvement/DIYprojects in the last 10 years or so. it's really nice to have these 3 rooms DONE! 

so: on to the quilty stuff- i know that's why you really came! 

February is aqua- and i have more than i thought... i made all these HSTs, in the "magic numbers" of 3, 6 and 9. (read more about them, and magic numbers here.)

while cleaning/tidying some of my baskets in the sewing room last month, i came across these fabric sayings on a panel. i divided them up into quilty sayings, Christmas sayings and bible verses. i decided to work with the quilty sayings first. 

i remembered that i had some pieces left over from a Kona cotton honey bun after piecing this quilt for my 3rd granddaughter, AK. i thought to improvise log cabin piecing around each saying. again, i used the "magic numbers" theory, cutting each block/rectangle some variation of a 6", 9" or 12" square or rectangle. 

 and finally- here's the shoo fly and donut quilt (one of them) that I pieced during RSC21. it's all finished and on its way to the PA Relief Sale. 

so, now you're caught up on the recent happenings in our neck of the woods. (mostly, anyway!) thanks for stopping by. I'll be linking up to Angie, our hostess with the mostest for all things RSC. and stay tuned: i started a few more RSC projects that I'll be sharing about shortly... 

if you care to see our kitchen in its raw, recently purchased state, and follow along on our progress in fixing it up, just click here. 

and here's a bit of the back story (and cool features!) of our mud room. (just read the first couple posts. they're the most relevant)

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! 

finishing ALL the purples:

from the lightest (and darkest) pinks to nearly brown...

life is busy- but i do find some time to have some quiet time up in the sewing room, and keep up with my RSC projects. it's something i really enjoy! 

i added a few more twinkly stars to the growing, colorful pile. instead of keeping the blocks all 3x3, 4x4 or even 5x5 i decided to make them all random, according to the shades of the COM that i had. 

then, at the end of the year, i'll piece the blocks all together randomly, higgelty-piggelty style. i think it will be more interesting that way anyway... 

i made a whole slew of purple donuts and shoo-fly blocks, too. very happy with them as well!

 4 more waffle blocks join the wings, waiting for breakfast time in December. haha. 

i also finished a lingering RSC UFO- from 2019! i made a large pile of 9 patches- both light and dark, planning on making them into a tablecloth. we're having a *modestly sized church/family picnic* tomorrow {what was i thinking?!} and its debut is planned. stay tuned for a post about that. (the quilt, not the picnic, necessarily. i haven't' taken a picture of the quilt yet.. ) 

click on over the our favorite spot for Saturday mornings and see what everyone else is working on! 

land of the free; home of the brave...

did not intend to make such a patriotic looking post with these blocks, but here we are...

all my red blocks are now done for May RSC21, and i'm "circling back" to catch up on the blue donuts that i forgot to show from last month...

when i first started my RSC21 projects, i was definitely liking the shoo fly blocks better than the donuts. but looking at the picture above, the donuts are beginning to grow on me! 

 we're almost halfway through the RSC year, and i'm getting a nice little stack of blocks for future quilts. go see what everyone else is working on- and be inspired! 

so many quilts- all off the UFO list!

several Black Fridays ago, i purchased 2 FQ bundles of Good Neighbors fabric from Connecting Threads. the bundles sat for a while {ripening} while i pondered what i'd like to do with them. 

Finally,  i decided on a churn dash block for one FQ bundle, and a 2by4 Block layout for the other. 

(loosely based on the tutorial found here.) there's lots of these 2X4 quilts floating around in SM Land, and i do really like the pattern! 

and above: a few close-up beauty shots of these quilts. the 2x4 is quilted with baptist fans, the churn dash is meandering circles. 

both these quilts are destined for the Guest Room- one for the double bed, one for the twin. as soon as we actually have guests, that is...

i recently finished this 4 patch quilt- it's got a strong coffee vibe going on. i used 2 charm packs of Moda's Bistro, along with some Kona solids and other random, matching prints. 

the 4th quilt shown has been done for a long time, ( i wrote about it here) but i just recently decided on a home for it. it's baby sized, and uses a Moda Bistro charm pack as well. i'm thinking to give these 2 quilts to my son N, and his to-be-born son, due in June. N is a coffee aficionado, buying and roasting his own beans. with a new baby boy on the way, i thought it might be fun for them to have "matching" quilts. 

a bit of yellow to go with the winter-y weather (but watch out for the yellow snow!)

i've finished out my yellow RSCing for February. i'm happy with my (larger than expected) selection of yellow squares. 

14 shoo fly and donut blocks were added to the pink ones from last month. (i still prefer the shoo fly over the donuts, tho...)

i decided to make several of the wonky star blocks, in order to use 1 of each of my different yellows. super happy with how these blocks are coming along!

 i added 7 more waffle blocks- in 2 different "colorways". i have some more quilts that i finished this week (pictures coming soon!) and some other exciting news, too! 

click on over to Angela at soscrappy to see all the other cheery yellows from this wacky weather week!

also: defintely not QUILTY, but we're ready to rent out the little farmhouse in New Albany. the kitchen is done, newly "renovated" and with a fresh coat of sunshiney yellow, it's so charming! 

thought i'd share since it's a happy yellow to go with all our other yellows for February. 

a quilty snack: {shoo fly} PIE, DONUTS and WAFFLES!

there is something exciting and even exhilarating about starting a new year of Rainbow Scrap Challenge! new fabric! new colors! new project! new blocks! 

i'm starting off strong with pinks: first up, a twinkly star. scrappy AND wonky. i've not done one of these blocks before, so i'm looking forward to a colorful year. 

*** edited to add: does anyone know of a UFO Finish-along for 2021? Like the kind where you pick 12 projects, and then a number is drawn each month to let us know which UFO to work on? Judy used to do them ages ago, but hasn't for a few years. I know Connie is doing a Dirty Dozen, but that's already started. i love to work along with other quilters- the "pressure" and "accountability" work really well for me. thanks in advance! ***

 

i have done LOTS of 9 patches over my RSC career (this is my 8th year sewing along!!!) i did mention before that this year i intended to "kick it up a notch" so to speak, and include some triangles with my blocks. 

i have a Studio2 cutter (highly recommend) and i've had the 3" square die cutter for a while. i recently purchased (on sale; BOGO) the 2½" finished triangle die to pair with my squares. 

i had a grey piece of yardage come through my sewing room, and i snagged it for my RSC21 donuts and {shoo fly}pie blocks. i cut up enough squares and triangles to keep me piecing these quilty snacks for awhile. no rhyme or reason (or plan) on which i'll piece, or how many. it just depends on how many of each color square i have. i've completed 6, of these 2 different blocks, but still have about 8 more to piece. i don't know where all the pink blocks/fabrics came from... (there were A.L.O.T.) it's a mystery! 

another new-to-me block for RSC21 is the waffle block. Millie, our darling cat, loves quilts + sunshine.  the sewing room is a win/win for her! more on my waffles in another post... 

as i mentioned, this is my 8th year (!!!) i started out with Angela and RSC in 2014. so many 3" squares, so many blocks, so many quilts have gone under my needle and out the sewing room door in that time. 

but still the scraps and squares persist! (not complaining, just explaining, as my MIL would have said) i guess i have made some progress in the last few years- the above pictures are my "stash" of the 3" squares; they overflowed their suitcase into a deeper drawer at one time. (more on that suitcase later, too...) 

this metal drawer is the shallowest of my wire storage units, and with the addition of waffle blocks to my RSC21 plans, i managed to *use* nearly *all* of my Low Volume blocks. but, with that, i THINK I SOLVED THE MYSTERY OF OUR SCRAPS, AND WHY WE ALWAYS HAVE MORE. 

that's a post for another day, and i'll be back soon to tell that story!