Five Shadows

A few things got added to my week that changed my sewing plans. Those few things were my son and his family coming for a visit  Thursday – today! Instead of sewing, I had grand children to rock, read stories to, bake with, and play with during their stay with us. Did I mention in an earlier post that they are moving back to our town? They did some house hunting during this visit.

I did sneak in building another teddy bear for the terry cloth baby quilt.

This one is peeking around the border.

Tomorrow I’m sewing with friends. My project will be starting the newest baby quilt.

I’m using Tula Pink Spirit Animal fabrics and a soft pink for the back ground and backing.

How was your week?

How did I do on last week’s To-Do List:

1. Finish terrycloth robe baby quilt.  ✗
2. Start baby quilt for newest great niece.  ✗

To-Do List for this week:

1. Finish terrycloth robe baby quilt.
2. Start baby quilt for newest great niece.

I’m linking to To-Do Tuesday and Linking Tuesday.

March goal met! Which was to finish the Chopsticks quilt top. I did that plus pieced the back!

I’m really liking this top now with the added oranges!

And what about this back!?

I’m sure you can tell that the center strip are the triangle pieces cut off the sides to square up the top. The light print and dark green print were both used in the top. The orange floral was just a perfect match to finish up the back, and was the end of a bolt – meaning sale! from the LQS. I usually don’t make symmetrical backs, but for some reason this one went in that direction. I’m planning to practice several different free-motion quilting motifs in the triangle blocks.

Linking to One Monthly Goal hosted by Patty of Elm Street Quilts

What do you do with a bath robe when asked to turn it into a baby quilt?

How about an applique Teddy Bear popping out of a pocket?

My plan is to use the robe as one side of the quilt, and the Moda Grunge Hits the Spot as the other side of the baby quilt. I removed the pockets and belt loops from the robe which will let me cut a 33″ x 35″ rectangle from the robe, and also cut strips to use for a border on the Grunge side of the quilt.

I’m thinking Teddy is looking kinda cute with his embroidered eyes, nose, and mouth!

How did I do on last week’s To-Do List:

1. Start baby quilt for newest great niece. ✗ Oops! Got bumped for the robe quilt.
2. Practice FMQ! ✔️
3. Quick trip to watch grand kids for our son & DIL. ✔️

To-Do List for this week:

1. Finish terrycloth robe baby quilt.
2. Start baby quilt for newest great niece.

Linking to To-Do Tuesday and Linky Tuesday.

Hubs is home this week. We originally talked about doing a short, maybe 3 day trip, but he opted for a stay-cation. That is fine with me, because I’ll put my time into sewing!

Chopsticks is moving along. I like it so much better with the added orange fabrics.

I still have a way to go to complete this top.

Here’s another idea, how about shopping during my stay-cation!? A new quilt shop opened just 30 minutes from me. The Red Barn Quiltery, and they are holding a Grand Opening this week.

20% off everything! How’s that for celebrating!? What a great way to hold a Grand Opening! I bought thread, needles, and pins. Photo from shop’s site.

Plus I might have bought a few things at a shop hop last week …

25% off rulers and 50% off the rotary cutter!

Now back to regularly planned sewing!

I hope your are all having a grand week of stitching!

How did I do on last week’s To-Do List:

1. Catch up on Angela Walters’ FMQ Challenge Quilt Along – Yes? No? At least I’m working on it!
2. Piecing Chopsticks top – still working on that too!

To-Do List for this week:

1. Finish up Chopsticks top.
2. Practice FMQ!
3. I love a spray basting wall for larger quilts

Linking to To-Do Tuesday

My goal for March will be to finish piecing the Chopsticks quilt top.

I might need one more row of blocks, 10 triangle blocks, so the quilt will fit a bunk bed.

Linking to Patty’s One Monthly Goal over at Elm Street Quilts. Hop over and join in!

What do you do when you are happily sewing along, think you have all your blocks completed, lay them out, and gah! Don’t like the quilt!?

What I decided to do was buy more fabric!

The Chopsticks quilt just did not have a good balance in the orange color family.  When I laid out the blocks, I saw my mistake. Sorry, no picture. I had a nice range of greens, but only 2 oranges the exact same color. This quilt needed more variety in the orange family.

Today I pieced the additional orange blocks. The blocks are going together rather quickly! Tomorrow I’ll lay them out and hopefully make headway on sewing the top together.

Fabrics for back and binding. I hit a good sale on a shop hop last Saturday. 25% – 50% off!

How did I do on last week’s To-Do List:

1. Piecing Chopsticks blocks. ✔️
2. Finish piecing top for Angela Walters’ FMQ Challenge Quilt Along. ✗
3. Hosting Curvy Quilters group. ✔️

To-Do List for this week:

1. Catch up on Angela Walters’ FMQ Challenge Quilt Along
2. Piecing Chopsticks top

Linking to To-Do Tuesday and Linky Tuesday.

My goal for February was to organize everything for the temperature quilt I want to stitch this year.

I pulled fabric from my stash, and bought the rest in 1/3 yard pieces.

I even got the fabric organized by temperature in to this little storage bin.

I dug around the studio for needles. And then bought better needles while on a shop hop.

I started stitching with a 12 weight thread from my stash, then bought Presencia thread for hand embroidery,which is working out much better.

After playing with the pieced hexie shape, I changed it and settled on the wider base center, instead of the ‘V’ center.

I have settled on using the high temp and low temp for each day. The center piece of the hexie is the high of the day, and the two side pieces are the low of the day. I’m stitching them together with a thread the color of the low for the day. I’m only using four thread colors.

Now that I’m all settled on fabric, pieced hexie shape, needles, thread, and technique, it’s time to get cracking and caught up. It’s slow going right now, but with making 365 hexies this year, I figure I’ll be a pro by the end of the year!

Instead of using a whip stitch on the back side to attach the hexie pieces together, I’m doing an embroidery stitch on the right side. I’ll show more about the stitch once I’m better at stitching the hexies together. One of my goals for 2018 is to learn, and hopefully enjoy handwork!

I’m linking to One Monthly Goal over at Patty’s blog Elm Street Quilts. Go check out the other goals meet for February and join in for March!

This past week I got just a little bit of sewing done, even tho I had grandiose plans.

I did some shopping, to finish out the color way for the temperature quilt I’ll be working on this year.

28 fabrics for the temperature quilt

I fiddled with my hexie design for the quilt and have modified what I originally planned. And I shopped for better needles and thread. Here’s a shout out to Carolyn’s Cottage Cottons quilt shop for the embroidery help I received for the hexie piecing.

Presencia 12 wt. threads & John James Embroidery needles. I stumbled upon Cristy’s video on how to stitch together hexies using floss and hand embroidery. So that is what I’m playing with. I’ll do a close up when I’m a bit more confident. I’m really liking the results!

Progress on Chopsticks – During the last Curvy Quilters sewing day I cut all the triangles and sashing for Chopsticks. I also got a bit of sewing done on the blocks. It is going together much quicker than I expected. I should be able to make good headway on it at the sewing day I’ll be hosting this week.

I hope to finish up these blocks this week.

And surprise! Can you believe it? I have started another new project. I jumped in and joined Angela Walters’ FMQ Challenge Quilt Along. I’m still piecing the top, then the FMQ will start!

Fossil Fern Prints surrounded by creamy Moda tone-on-tone. I’ll be adding a print for corner stones, border, back and binding.

How did I do on last week’s To-Do List:

1. Pack and ship the Mt. Paran embroidered blanket.  ✗ You would think packing and shipping would be a simple thing. But, I’ve decided to wait for my son to take some good pictures for me before shipping. Maybe that will happen this weekend.
2. Finish shopping for fabric for the Temperature quilt and attack the Hexies! ✔️

To-Do List for this week:

1. Piecing Chopsticks blocks.
2. Finish piecing top for Angela Walters’ FMQ Challenge Quilt Along.
3. Hosting Curvy Quilters group.

Linking to To-Do Tuesday and Linky Tuesday.

This week I completed two each of two block designs from the Letters to a Soldier Book by Jodi Barrows.

I’m calling this my Hummingbird quilt because I fussy-cut hummingbirds to piece into as many blocks as possible.

Since I’m using Jodi Barrows’ Square-in-a Square method and rulers, I’m going just a bit slow as I read and learn her method. One thing has become apparent. I will not be able to quickly chain piece certain sections, as I must be aware of placement and orientation of the hummingbirds. Also, my points are not yet perfect, so I need to take note of proper cutting.

My quilting day with friends was canceled today due to snow. I decided to use today to finish several quilt backs for quilt tops I completed last year.  I’m folding the top & back and placing them on hangers. Attached in a plastic bag, are binding, thread for quilting, and any ideas I have for the quilting. I’m smiling at the new organization, but it doesn’t mean finished! At least it is a step in the direction towards finished! In the mean time, my sewing room is looking less like a crazy pile of abandoned projects!

I need to figure out the next project for the monthly quilting day with friends. The Hummingbird quilt takes too much concentration to work on while chatting with friends. I’ve already started 2 new projects this year, the Hummingbird quilt, and the Temperature quilt, but I’d like something brainless to work on while gathering with friends. I have at least three quilt projects pulled together with fabrics and patterns.  I suppose I just need to figure out which one I love most and start prepping it.

How did I do on last week’s To-Do List:

1. Work on Hummingbird quilt. ✔️ 4 blocks completed!
2. Work on back for Chic Country quilt.  ✔️ Plus organizing several other backs.

To-Do List for this week:

1. Pet fabric and figure out what project to prep for sewing club days.
2. Quick trip East, so not much else will be accomplished.

Linking to To-Do Tuesday and Linky Tuesday.

Goal setting.

I thought I had my year planned out for 2018 with all my quilty goals for the year.

Then up pops a Temperature Quilt from 2017 on Needled Mom‘s blog.

Now I just HAVE to make a Temperature Quilt! Gah!

Needled Mom made a Temperature Quilt for 2017 using a flying goose block. She divided up the thermometer in 4 degree increments selecting a different fabric for each increment. She used the high of the day for the goose and the low of the day for the sky. This year she is making a Temperature Quilt with Square-in-a-Square Blocks.

Her sister joined in making a quilt too. Since one lives in CA and the other AK, their two quilts look way different! Take a look at Needled Mom‘s blog.

I’ve settled on using a pieced hexie. I took advantage of Paper Pieces 25% off sale they offered earlier this week. Seeing their sale kind of clinched it for me, that I should jump in and make a Temperature Quilt this year!

This all leads to my One Monthly Goal for February.

For February, my goal is to organize this project!

I’ll need to pull and purchase fabrics while waiting for the hexie paper pieces to be shipped. I’m using Kona Fabrics color chart panel to select fabrics to represent the temperature increments.

Since I’m already over a month behind, I hope to get fabrics sorted this weekend & start some piecing. If I had started at the first of the year, I would only need to piece one hexie a day. Hopefully over the next few months I’ll be able to get caught up.

Above is the hexie design I plan on using.

Linking to One Monthly Goal sponsored by Elm Street Quilts.