Five Shadows

The weather keeps jumping all over the place! Today we had several times of heavy snow, then sunny skies, and back to the snow, and then repeat it all over again, then even a few minutes of sleet mixed in! It was a good day to stay in and work on quilting projects!

And here is what happened this previous week -

To-Do Tuesday, March 7, 2023

1. Celebrate birthdays! ✔️
2. Work on daughter’s house. The project that keeps going on and on! ✔️
3. Finish Dancing Star quilt top. ✔️
4. Evening stitching Featherweight. ✔️
5. Friends from TN are to visit next week, (Sunday-Saturday) prep for their arrival! ✔️

To-Do Tuesday, March 14, 2023

1. Got to keep plugging away on daughter’s house.
2. Stitch up some charity quilts or keep cutting?
3. If my friend gets her quilt top finished we might be visiting another friend who will let us quilt the top on her longarm.
4. Featherweight embroidery.

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Carol of Quilt Schmidt.

Birthday celebrations! Hub’s birthday was Saturday and mine is today! And three of our five children are born in March on the 14th, 19th, and 21st! We had hoped to have a family gathering Sunday the 5th but two of our kids families have picked up the dreaded Covid bug. We’ll have that family gathering once all are well. We are praying for swift and complete healing. They have all had the vaccine and boosters, so hopefully that means a milder case of the bug.

Here’s what my week shaped up to look like -

To-Do Tuesday, February 28, 2023

1. I suppose I should move working on daughter’s house to the top of the list. There is wallpaper paste and bit of paper to remove which I really have no desire to do. But I can tell you it is a much nicer (cleaner!) job then demoing plaster walls! ✔️
2. Maybe work on charity quilts  ✔️
3. Or pull out the other project I hoped to work on last year.  ✔️

1.  Work is progressing on our daughter’s house! Here are a couple photos if you are interested.

There are two bedrooms in the front of the house, second floor. This is the smaller of the two. The window opens to a Three Season Room. The door is to an odd shaped closet built into the eaves. It’s being ripped out to reconfigure for better storage. These are 100+ year old plaster walls on lathe. What a mess to pull out and clean up! Two good things about pulling out old plaster walls are  1. we can add better insulation 2. it’s easier to rewire to upgrade electric.  Some of the areas between studs had NO insulation!

Now, if you can imagine, compare this photo to the first. This is the larger bedroom and there was a wall where there are now only studs on the right of the photo. This is the same space as the closet in the first photo. Dead wasted space here. This area will be reconfigured so there will be identical storage in both bedrooms making use of the space in the eaves. This room has the door to enter the Three Season Room.

Just for fun -

My daughter pulled this lovely hexagon wallpaper out of what will be her bedroom! Can you believe she would do such a thing!? Ok, I really don’t blame her. The hexies would be better as a quilt than papered on a wall.

2. I did work on charity quilts!

This pattern was offered earlier this year by Wendy Sheppard as a charm pack weekend quilt along. I changed it up a bit to make a larger quilt at 39 1/2″ square instead of 33″ square. I used Moda’s charm pack Poems from Pebbles by Malka Dubrawsky.

Same pattern, different charm pack! I used Dance In Paris by Zen Chic. I widened the sashing from 1″ to 1 1/2″ to again enlarge the top this time to 42 1/2″ square.

3. And I started a new project!

I started on this hand embroidery project. The kit is from The Featherweight Shop which I bought for evening stitching in 2022. I am just how starting it as I was first stitching the EPP Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden in the evenings. Now that the Homage top is complete I’ve moved on to embroidery. The pattern is photoed in neutrals, but the kit was also offered in brights with Lori Holt fabrics. I’m going with the brights.

PLUS I worked on one more thing. I pulled out a PUP (Previously Unfinished Project) from 2013.

10 years old! This is Dancing Stars a paper pieced pattern by Amy’s Creative Side. I had 25 stars made up so I’m going with this layout. I need to cut the set triangles and finish sewing the rows together.

That was a full week! And here’s what is coming up -

To-Do Tuesday, March 7, 2023

1. Celebrate birthdays!
2. Work on daughter’s house. The project that keeps going on and on!
3. Finish Dancing Star quilt top.
4. Evening stitching Featherweight.
5. Friends from TN are to visit next week, (Sunday-Saturday) prep for their arrival!

What will you be working on?

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Carol of Quilt Schmidt.

It’s a windy March like day here. Only thing is, it is still February!

Here’s my list from last week and what I accomplished.

To-Do Tuesday, February 14, 2023

1. Can you guess?! Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden of course! I was hoping to finish up the piecing by February 18th. Doesn’t look like it will happen, but I’ll give it my best! ✔️
2. There has to be an end to my daughter’s house remodel. Only if we can get the plumber and electrician to finish up for inspections! Then drywall can go up and it will look so much better.
3. Maybe, start a new quilt, or pull out a PUP. BUT I really want to just focus on Homage. ✔️

1. Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden. I didn’t meet my February 18th  self imposed goal. But …

Weeks 1 – 49!

Week 50 stitched.

And week 50 attached! Two more weeks to complete!

Week 51 progress. I hopeful that I can complete the last two weeks of this quilt and have them attached to the top this week!

2. Daughter’s house. The electrician is scheduled for March 10. Things are moving along. Slowly, but moving forward. My latest job there has been pulling out nails from trim we hope to reuse. Trim and at least 2 feet of the bottom part of the walls in the three bedrooms have to be removed so electrician can remove old knob and tube wiring and replace with the new wiring. It’s messy work. The plaster falls apart and the old insulation falls out of the walls. Did I say messy? And so dusty!  It will be a while before any drywall is going up. I remain optimistic that the is an end to this project.

3. Start a new quilt, or pull out a PUP (Previously Unfinished Project.)

I pulled out this quilt top that I sewed together a few years ago to follow along with one of Angela Walters Quilt-a-longs. I changed the pattern up a bit but never followed along! This week I added an outer border and this time hope to follow along with a different quilter. Dorie Hruska is offering a free Quilting on the Line class. I’ve marked the squares, sewed up the back.  I still have to sandwich the quilt before getting started on the quilting.

Today I’m getting a much needed hair cut. Then will most likely head over to my daughter’s house. This evening I’ll be back to handstitching Homage.

Here’s the list for this week that looks like last’s week’s.

To-Do Tuesday, February 21, 2023

1. Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden – will I finish the piecing this week?
2. Sandwich the PUP I pulled out last week. Start playing?
3. On going work at my daughter’s house.

How was you week?

I’m linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Carol of Quilt Schmidt.

Three days into the New Year! And here we are at To-Do Tuesday with a new host! Let’s welcome Carol of Quilt Schmilt for the Love of Fabric for taking on hosting TTD in 2023! Thank you Carol!

I use To-Do Tuesday as a way to keep track of what I’m working on, and to keep motivated to see a project through to the end. Finished! is a good thing! If you have not heard of TTD follow the link and see what others are up to in their quilting and crafting world.

Here is how I ended 2022 -

To-Do Tuesday, December 27, 2022

1. Keep stitching away on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden!✔️
2. Bind Nutcracker, Christmas Countdown. ✔️
3. Come up with a list of PUPs – Previously Unfinished Projects! to work on in 2023! I’ll post about that soon! ✔️

1. I’m plugging away on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden.

Week 39 stitched! This is an English Paper Pieced projects, and I’m using 1/2″ hexagon papers.

Here’s the quilt with weeks 1-39 all stitched together! I completed to this point New Year’s Eve at about 11:30pm! I had set a personal goal to get 39 completed before the new year!

Plus I made progress on glue basting and starting the stitching of week 40.

When will this quilt be finished? Anyone want to make a guess? There are 12 more weekly patterns to complete this quilt top.

2. Nutcracker, Christmas Countdown

Here’s my Nutcracker all stitched with binding, and hanging in my living room. Thank you Helen Godden for another wonderful Christmas Countdown!

3. I’ve written a post about all the PUPs – Previously Unfinished Projects I hope to finish and also new quilts planned which are mostly for charities, and also some Christmas gifts for family. Take a look if you are interested.

Plus I did start a new quit this year -

This is a small Irish Chain quilt kit I purchased last Autumn. I added border fabric to enlarge the top to ~39″ x 49″ to be a charity quilt.

That brings us to this week’s list of what I want to work on -

To-Do Tuesday, January 3, 2023

1. Stitch stitch stitch on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden! This was last year’s quilt-a-long and I have 13 weeks to finish! I started late and never caught up. So now it carries over into a new year!
2. Sandwich, quilt Irish Chain quilt. Maybe bind?

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Carol of Quilt Schmilt. Go take a look at what everyone is work ing on and join in the party!

I’m making a list and checking it twice. Actually several lists of quilts to make headway on in 2023.

My first list is of Charity Quilts. Earlier this year I cleaned up my sewing room and organized fabric leftover from finished quilts. I put all those leftovers arranged by color into ~11″ x 13″ open bins purchased from Target. While cleaning up, I tossed fabrics, patterns, and kits into a pile that I thought would make good charity quilts for several organizations to which I donate. I came up with a list of 23 possible quilts for charities.

I have finished and donated 7 quilts from that list since September. That leaves 16 quilts to continue to finish this upcoming year.

Today I started this quilt using a Pods kit put together by Maywood Studio.  Pods were new to me.

I could not pass up this cute little kit. I’m thinking it might have been in a clearance section of a new-to-me quilt shop I visited this summer. This simple Irish Chain uses Christina Cameli’s Moongate fabrics. I do like Christina’s fabrics and patterns! I’m adding a border also from the clearance section of the shop. The finished quilt will be about 40″ x 52″ instead of 30″ x 42″ as per the kit.

For the organizations I donate to, quilts have to be at least 36″ square up to lap size. Those 36″ quilts get put together rather quickly.

In 2023, I hope to expand/improve my FMQ and ruler quilting, while having fun finishing the charity quilts.

The second list is of finished quilt tops, most have backs and batting ready for quilting. There are 17 quilts on this list. Sigh. I have nothing more to say about that sad state, other than I must start quilting those larger quilts. One was to be a gift to my eldest son, and one is for my husband. Hubs will be the first one I quilt in 2023.

The last list is of PUPs. Previously Unfinished Projects. I can see six of these projects from where I am sitting. These have been set aside for numerous reasons like being asked to make a t-shirt quilt, help with a gift, etc. One of these was started in 2012. From this list I’ll start by picking a favorite and get back to it!

Next is the Christmas list. I would love to make an Advent calendar for my grandkids. I made one from felt years ago when my kiddos were littles. I’d like to update it to a quilt. I’d also like to make several stockings. I have a bag of Christmas projects and gift ideas, I’m not even counting, but I know they are there.

I could have a fifth list – of newly purchased patterns & fabric. I can’t resist a good sale and LQSs have been holding them this month of December! I’ve added at least four more quilts to my stash this month!

That’s a total of 50 quilts is some stage of making. Whether its fabric & pattern purchased, self planned quilts, tops is some stage of piecing, and tops ready to sandwich & quilt. I think I might be crazy! Keep me OUT of the quilt shops! Here’s hoping for lots of progress on these lists in 2023.

I’ll be posting on To-Do Tuesday linky party with the progress I make throughout the year. Carol of For the Love of Fabric will be the new host of To-Do Tuesday starting January 3rd. Go check her out!

To all my quilty friends, Happy New Year!

Week 37 attached to quilt!

Week 38 stitched!

Weeks 1 through 38 attached! And I have some of Week 39 glue basted. If I was keeping up with this quilt-along I’d be working on the last week of the year, week 52. How long to you think it will take for me to finish this top? I sure hope I have it completed before the end of February 2023!

2. Countdown to Christmas with Helen Godden

I’ve completed the FMQ for each day of the Christmas Countdown. He needs binding and a hanger. I might get to that today.

3.  Anniversary!

Hubby and I celebrated by braving the weather. Many businesses were closed due to the severe weather. A favorite Chinese restaurant less than a mile from our house was my idea for lunch. It was closed. But another Chinese restaurant just a mile from our house was surprisingly open. We headed there. Everyone was driving way under the speed limit being careful and taking time. We enjoyed our meal and brought home leftovers for supper. This was not our usual celebration, but turned out nicely. Happy 45th wedding anniversary to us!

4. Christmas was spread out through several days. Several but not all of our adult children came over for our traditional Christmas Eve meal before heading to our Candlelight Service. Christmas Day only our son and his family who live 3 blocks north of us came over. We enjoyed the afternoon with them. On the 26th my daughter & SIL hosted our family Christmas. Good food, conversation, games, gifts and a Nativity puzzle were enjoyed by all!

Over several days of family visiting this past week we completed this puzzle.

We had a Lego puzzle and this Lori Holt puzzle and one guest selected Lori Holt’s to work on. We finished it Christmas day.

We didn’t finish the Nativity puzzle at my daughter’s house – and I should have taken a picture! 5 of us through out the day made good headway on it!

To-Do Tuesday, December 27, 2022

1. Keep stitching away on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden!
2. Bind Nutcracker, Christmas Countdown.
3. Come up with a list of PUPs – Previously Unfinished Projects! to work on in 2023! I’ll post about that soon!

Merry Christmas and Happy New year!

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Linda of Texas Quilt Gal. This is Linda’s last week to host TDT. Go take a look and learn who will be our next host. And join the party!

House guests! My son’s in-laws are visiting from Arizona, and are staying at my house for a few nights while my son’s family heal from a few bugs they picked up. I tell you, the littles pick up just about everything and then it passes through their family. The latest was pink-eye. Uck! And one had a stomach bug. Let’s hope they all clear up and stay healthy!

I’ve not been in my sewing room much, but I have been hand stitching on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden.

To-Do Tuesday, December 13, 2022

1. Hand stitching Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden, EPP project. ✔️
2. Meeting with two quilting groups, Wednesday & Friday. I’m taking the EPP project to work on both days!  ✔️
3. Keep up with Countdown to Christmas with Helen Godden. ✔️

1. Progress on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden.

Week 36 complete.

Weeks 1 – 36 attached.

Week 37 completed and I’m in the process of attaching, but no photo yet.

2. Both of my quilting group Christmas parties and sewing days were so nice! We exchanged gifts and all were nicely received. We enjoyed good food and our time together chatting and sewing.

3. Hello Godden’s Christmas Countdown

I’ve FMQ my Nutcracker through day 21. I’m enjoying all the little bits of FMQ.

That’s all in my sewing world for this past week – even though I’m ever so late posting. Today is Thursday and we have a winter snow storm heading our way with snow & ice in the prediction. Hubs and I will be all cozy at home. My guests are moving to my son’s house today. Christmas programs are already being canceled with the storm in the forecast. That makes me wonder if there will be Christmas Eve and Day services at my church.  I do love the tradition of a Candle Light Christmas Eve Service. I’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

So! Merry Christmas everyone! Oh Come Let Us Adore Him!

To-Do Tuesday, December 20, 2022

1. Stitch stitch on Grandmother’s Flower Garden.
2. Keep up with Countdown to Christmas with Helen Godden.
3. Enjoy our wedding anniversary! 45 years on the 23rd!
4. Enjoy Christmas hopefully with family!

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Linda of Texas Quilt Gal. Thank you Linda for all the time you have put into hosting TDT! Merry Christmas!

Another week flies by as the end of the year approaches! December always passes too quickly in my opinion!

Here’s what I accomplished this past week in my little quilting world.

To-Do Tuesday, December 6, 2022

1. Hopefully make progress on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden. ✔️
2. Now that I have a Christmas Countdown going – keep up with it!  ✔️
3.  I’d like to say work on a charity quilt, but I don’t know if I’ll get to it. ✔️

1. Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden – I did some stitching but not as much as I had hoped.

Week 35 is attached to the growing quilt.

And week 36 is under way. That is not a lot of progress as in one week’s time I like to stitch up a week and get it attached to the quilt. And start another week. Oh well. I hope to make up for lack of work on HGMFG this week as I have two quilting days with friends.

2. Helen Godden’s Christmas Countdown

I’m calling my Nutcracker Nutty and he is up to date with all the FMQ. Days 1-13.

3. Charity quilts

Quilt no. 1. I taught my DIL, Kim, how to grid quilt her finished quilt top using a walking foot.

Scraps from my stash were used to create this colorful quilt. The grid quilting is one inch on both sides of the diagonal seams and then down the center of the blocks for stability.

Leftovers found in my binding box were used for a colorful binding. That makes one colorful quilt measuring 49″ square. This was one of 27 quilts donated to a local charity. We delivered the quilts for our Women’s Ministry group on Monday. Kim’s donations in the past have been knitted items. This is her first finished quilt! Although she does have several other quilt tops in progress!

Quilt no. 2. I finished piecing simple borders around this cat panel.

Then my DIL had fun with FMQ. Her first go at FMQ! Nice job Kim! This will be a future hospice donation. 35″ square.

On to other creations – I have two Christmas parties this week with my quilting friends. We do a small gift exchange in both groups. I’m making little ivy ornaments to attach to the gift bags.

Four for Friday. I’ll photo the bags and share next week.

To-Do Tuesday, December 13, 2022

1. Hand stitching Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden, EPP project.
2. Meeting with two quilting groups, Wednesday & Friday. I’m taking the EPP project to work on both days!
3. Keep up with Countdown to Christmas with Helen Godden.

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Linda of Texas Quilt Gal. Linda is stepping down from hosting at the end of this month. If you are interested in taking over this linking party, please contact her.

Welcome December! Oh how quickly this month fills up with lots of holiday extras! I was slow going this past week on quilting as I filled up time with some fun outings with friends and family. My son’s house was part of a Holiday Tour, 10 houses in a historic neighborhood in our town. I did the neighborhood walk and tour with two friends and we even took a horse drawn carriage ride. Next up was taking our grands to the Botanical Gardens to enjoy the Christmas decorations.

Our ladies group at church put together these Reindeer bags as gifts for teachers.

The bags are filled with treats, encouraging words, quilted mug rug, and gift card for coffee/tea.

We made 42 mug rugs or coasters, if you like, for 42 bags gifted to elementary school teachers.

To-Do Tuesday, November 29, 2022

1. Continue Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden. ✔️
2. Decide on a few little gifts for a few friends.  Not decided yet, store bought or handmade. ✔️
3. Quilt & bind one charity quilt. ✗

This week I didn’t get much accomplished in my quilting world.

1. Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden

Week 35 is stitched up and I’ve started to attach it to the quilt. But no photo.

2. Gifts for friends. I decided on buying a few little sewing notions for several friends, and travels mugs for a few others.

3. I did touch a charity quilt this week. But I did start a Squirrel. I knew it was coming – Helen Godden’s Countdown to Christmas. I was thinking of passing on it this year, but decided I’d be mad at myself if I didn’t jump in.

If you follow the link above, you can download this free Christmas Countdown. This year we are FMQ a Nutcracker.

I used Crayola Crayons to color in my Nutcracker. Each day Helen demonstrates FMQ in one of the small areas of the drawing. This is a December 1st – 25th countdown and is rather low key once you have traced the Nutcracker on fabric, sandwich, and stitch on all the drawn lines. Then the fun begins of a small fill each day.

To-Do Tuesday, December 6, 2022

1. Hopefully make progress on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden.
2. Now that I have a Christmas Countdown going – keep up with it!
3. ?? I’d like to say work on a charity quilt, but I don’t know if I’ll get to it.

Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays Friends!

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Linda of Texas Quilt Gal.

I hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving & weekend! We had two days of delicious meals with family and friends. More about those below.

To-Do Tuesday, November 22, 2022

1. Today I start cooking for Thanksgiving! ✔️
2. Keep moving ahead on Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden. ✔️
3. Will I sew on anything else this week? Time will tell. ✔️

Focus this week -

To-Do Tuesday, November 29, 2022

1. Continue Homage to Grandmother’s Flower Garden.
2. Decide on a few little gifts for a few friends.  Not decided yet, store bought or handmade.
3. Quilt & bind one charity quilt.

Linking to To-Do Tuesday hosted by Linda of Texas Quilt Gal.