Slowdown Sunday

 

There are so many projects that need to be done in Virginia. The mower was broken so we had quite a wheat filed going on. A giant rainstorm tried to wash away the driveway and then some trees fall down. I spent a couple of days cutting downed trees into logs. Then, when I was nice and exhausted, our kind neighbor with a tractor came to help us dig up the old drainpipe under the driveway to put in a bigger and longer version where the water wanted to go. Boy is my back mad at me today. Our dirt always seems to be more rocks than soil. I guess that is what happens when you live on the side of a mountain. 

I think that makes today a perfect time to finish up the hand quilting on my hexie diamonds. All that is left is orange, red and the black ending border. I was smart enough to pack up the correct thread colors which I keep in this adorable tin that came with the scissors. I use a button magnet to keep the needles handy and make sure it is all in my "on the go" zipper pouch for sewing on the go opportunities. I have some cheap school scissors that I use on flights in case TSA objects to sharp objects. Dental floss also has a built in thread cutter in case of emergencies. I am quilting in straight rows with matching 12 wt. pearle cotton thread, so the quilting goes pretty quickly. I marked the rows with a fixion pen, but it is pretty easy to find the center of each block. I have been finishing the edges as I go to the point that Kurt woke up in the middle of the night and pulled it out to snuggle up. He seemed confused when I told him it wasn't done yet. It is a good thing that I used wonder clips instead of pins to keep that last edge secure. 

We are enjoying the deer and they are enjoying the garden. I found some more plants on 75% off clearance at Rural King, so I we will see if they have enough time to grow anything. I think there were peppers and tomatoes. We covered everything in the raised beds with fences and netting to try to keep the wildlife away. Did I mention that my back is really unhappy that I overdid it?  Back to hand quilting with rest breaks to stretch and recover.  I have been streaming quilting videos on youtube. If it weren't for graduate school and my job it would be fun to make some youtube videos. Maybe when I retire?  My next set of classes don't start until next week, so I have plenty of time to relax and enjoy. I plan to enjoy every minute! Are you taking some time to recharge your batteries today? Be sure to visit Kathy for slow stitching Sunday if you are looking for some hand work inspiration. 

Sunday Slowdown

When I was clearing out and organizing for the new year, I found these hand applique baskets that have been done for quite a while. The last time I rediscovered them, I planned a layout and I figured out that I needed 4 more. I made the 4 more, but then set them aside again. I don't know why. 

Yesterday I submitted all of my work for grad school. It was an easy week. A very short paper and a presentation with a script. Easy and fast. So today I get to play before I start on next week's work. There were not a lot of choices for sashing, because it needed to read as solid. There was enough of the teal and so that won. Most of my yardage is for backings and borders. I usually work from the scrap bins. The cornerstones came from the pink scrap bin because it is still January and that is the one that is available. I don't know if you can see the backgrounds, but they are all different pastel dots. I had some multicolored dots for the setting triangles and so this one is ready to sew together. I tend the make the setting triangles extra large so that they can be trimmed up later. I think this will be one to hand quilt. Maybe a nice Baptist fan? Definitely something nicely traditional. 

Yesterday I went to a luncheon for Cuban missionaries. My friend Linda was organizing it and my friend Sherie was there from a different to support the cause. We used to work together and had so much fun collaborating. She retired though and we fell out of touch. Everyone who retires seems to be loving life all the time. Every so often I wonder why I keep working. Work is a tomorrow problem though, today, I will start sewing some rows together. Right after I go and visit Kathy at Slow Stitching Sunday to see what other handwork people are up to this week. 

Sunday for the Slowdown

It was a long week back at school. It is cold which is unusual for here. Getting back into the flow of things again will take a bit longer I think. I am thankful to have a weekend, even a cold and rainy one. My slow stitching time today will be devoted to hand stitching the binding on my first ever quilt. If I get energetic, I might even try a bit more hand quilting. Hand quilting is not easy through high loft polyester batting, but we live and learn as we evolve in our quilting. I am enjoying the idea of turning my first attempt at quilting into a finished project. It only took a bit more than 25 years. 

If you have more than one RSC25 project in the works, or have a few ongoing projects from years past, these tracking sheets are a great way to keep track. Stephanie makes them for us each year and there are several formats available depending on whether you want to use them electronically or print them and go analog. 

Rainbow Scrap Challenge Tracking Sheet in word

Rainbow Scrap Challenge Tracking Sheet in PDF

Rainbow Scrap Challenge Tracking Sheet in pages

I randomly drew the powder room as the next project on the "To Do" list. Honestly I thought it was in pretty good shape. It is just a half bath on the main floor that doesn't get used much. I keep some extra guest towels on the back of the potty. 

Then there is a little corner shelf for sunglasses, sunscreen and TP. Kurt has decided to turn old TP rolls into fire starters and so I will donate these to his new craft project. 

It was quick work to sort through the sunglasses and sunscreen. I am not sure who thought that bug spray, aloe and lotion should all start living in there, but they got moved out. There were some sad and broken sunglasses that have gone away. I really need a few matching containers that are slightly larger to hold those, so I will keep my eyes open. I am not much of a shopper, but maybe something will turn up. 

Then it was just a quick scrub, wipe down and polish to make everything all shiny. It was a quick one today, which is good because my first assignment for statistics is an essay that needs a bit more work. There is a group chat for the class and the professor seems to be fairly strict in her grading. Honestly, I thought I would be doing some math, but so far it is not that at all. 

Slow Stitching Sunday - A Finish!

 

I took the last stitches in the Leap Year quilt last night and ran it through the wash. I use Crayola washables to mark the quilting lines. Those are all gone now and all the wear and tear from being carted around for years and years is gone now.  I started this quilt in 2016, appliquéing a circle in each block to represent whatever was going on in the sewing room on that day. For the most part it represents the Rainbow Scrap Challenge colors of each month. 

The quilting was done with perle cotton in a rainbow of colors. Diagonal lines form crosses through each block and then a scalloped half circle form the border. I love the way the quilting crinkles up after the wash. Even if it does take me years to finish a hand quilted project, it looks great when it is done.  I am going to link up with Slow Stitching Sunday at Kathy's Quilts today, so be sure to head over and see the lovely hand sewing projects that are in the works

I started an organization project for the new year. I brainstormed a list of all the projects that need to be done in house - areas of chaos, backlogged clutter, messes galore. Rather than trying to tackle them all at once, I wrote each on a piece of paper. The idea is that I will pick a random task when the urge strikes and then do that thing. Yesterday, the job was the downstairs bathroom. It is connected to my sewing room and doesn't get used very often. We redid it a couple of years ago, but never fully finished it off. So first I cleared out all the randomness before giving everything a good scrub. 

I found some bathmats that used to live in a different bathroom and made a plan for towel holders and a tile backsplash. 

Kurt is going to do the backsplash for me and hang the towel bars, but it all looks a lot better and should be more useable now that it isn't a dumping ground. I also added two more jobs for me to the stack, the door needs to be painted and the walls need a second coat of paint. Today's project is sheets. That is another dumping ground that needs a good clear out. Wish me luck! 

Slowdown Sunday

 

I was so excited to get the blue row sewn on last night that I wanted to finish up the purple row today. The blocks are not sewn together quite yet, but they are all ready and stitched to the white joining triangles. I started a bit of cleanup of the wooden bowl where I have been throwing all the pieces as I work on this quilt. It was a mess! I did a quick sweep and started to collect together like piles of random scraps in the sewing studio. I feel that I should definitely do a clean up this week before I am back at school full time again. 

We got new bedroom furniture last week, so that room is a mess as well. We took our oak bedroom set to Virginia because it had a mountain vibe, so we had been using Sydney's old set for a while. She wants that back now for an unfurnished college apartment, so we picked out something new with a bit more of a beach feel.  Before you say, "Wait, that doesn't look like a mess!"  I threw everything that needs to be sorted into a giant stack to deal with later. We need a mirror or some art to put over the dresser, and perhaps some pillow shams. Kurt is not a fan of throw pillows, but something other than just wrinkled pillowcases would be nice. 

I have half days most of next week and then Friday is the official back to school day for everyone. It will be our first year with a new principal and assistant principle along with 7 new teachers. So much change.  Hopefully all good! For today, I am enjoying women's Olympic gymnastics and some nice relaxing EPP.  I am also headed over to Kathy's Quilts to join her weekly link up for the first time in absolutely ages!  Looking forward to catching up on other people's slow stitching.  

I just realized that I was wrong about the color for August. It is going to be orange! I worked ahead and was already in September in my head.  

Sunday Funday

 I finished quilting two tops yesterday.  That means today is for binding! I love binding.  I am going to sit on the balcony and look at the ocean and sew the day away.   

The sunrise was beautiful today.   Just a peek above the clouds.  

And then just minutes later it was showing its colors.   

Now back to quilts.  Frameshift got little contiguous half melon wedges on the nine patch area, and zig zags surrounded by ribbon candy for the sashing strips.  

Here is the back, a frame around orange and yellow.  

And her is the front.  I think that I have a nice yellow and green stripe for the binding.  I do enjoy striped bindings.  This was from the 2020 RSC.  All of this year's quilts were finished right on time thanks to all that extra time at home from March until July.  

Then the Row by Row Sampler quilt from 2016 got finished right after dinner. I loaded it on the frame sideways and then just quilted each row based on the block pattern.  It went quickly as it isn't a large quilt.  I can't believe that I am just now quilting the 2016 sampler quilt!   It feels good to be clearing up some of the quilting backlog.  No photo of the back of this one as it was quite dark already.  I'll get a final photo after the binding.  I have a dark purple that sort of resembles the hand dyes that will work for this one.  

I'm off for a grocery pickup, but then I will spend some time checking in with Oh Scrap! and Slow Stitching Sunday before the day gets away from me.   

Superbowl Sunday

 

We were lucky to get in our morning walk before the rain started this morning.  It is really pouring now!   I hope it has moved out of Tampa ahead of the big game tonight.  

I don't really follow sports all that much, but I have some hand quilting to enjoy during the game and we are having appetizers for dinner while enjoying the commercials as a family.  I finished the December block during some family TV time last night and decided on half circles for the border.  I'm still trying to decide whether the circles will be a single or double row.  Plenty of time for those decisions.  I think I still have three more months to finish before the border becomes top priority.  

Yesterday I worked on pieced backings.   This was the challenge quilt for RSC in 2016.  It has been done since then, but just sat waiting for its turn on  the quilting machine.  I added a thin grey border, more for ease of quilting than for aesthetics.  

Then I found some extra hand dyed fabric and used it to spice up the backing.   

Frameshift was next on the list.  It was from the RSC in 202, and I got some fabrics last week to put together a backing.  I just don't have any large quantities of fabric on hand these days, so backings is a good excuse for necessary shopping.  

The floral is heavy on pinks and limes, but I am trying to enhance my scrap stash in the areas of yellow and orange, so I got some of those instead.  So now I've got two more quilts ready to go the next time I set up the quilting frame.  I've got a quilt that I said I'd finish for a coworker of my husband, so I'd like to get several quilts finished while the frame is assembled.  

What are your plans for today?  I'm off to check out slow stitching Sunday with Kathy and Oh Scrap! with Cynthia before I see if there is enough yardage squirreled away somewhere for another backing. Then there is laundry, an online tutoring session and a grocery pickup.   

Pink Play Day 3

 

We were off to a late start on our beach walk this morning.  It doesn't get as hot right now, so there isn't quite the same rush to get home before it is too warm.   

My husbands company sent a tin of peppermint bark as a holiday gift.  The peppermint bark is quite tasty of course, but look at that adorable tin!  It fits my hexies perfectly.   Am I the only one that gets a huge kick out of adorable containers?   I got a nice start on my pink hexies for this month and even cut a few more fabrics as I was sorting through the pink bin.  

 

There are lots of pinks in there, but they are all well sorted and organized.   I think that went through it when I made the bin during "safer at home" this summer.   I have dug out plenty for strips in all the sizes I need for this year's blocks.   

I still have quite a few crumbs to take care of though.  I think that they will get trimmed to 4 inches and framed with some white?  Maybe I will alternate white and black for a checkerboard?  Or maybe I will use cornerstones?   Playing with crumbs will be first on my list today.

Yesterday was all about getting new projects for 2021 organized and started.   I had quite a few empty bins waiting for projects and they are all sorted for my new projects.   I tend to work on a project for each strip size these days, so I continued with that plan.   The bins are numbered, labelled and ready to go with the appropriate strip size and partially assembled blocks.   

I have tutorials for most of my plans posted as links on the RSC21 page.   So after digging a bit deeper into Bonnie Hunter's Garden Party block, I found out that I had misjudged the dimensions a bit.   I remembered that it was based on a 1.5 inch base but that there were some slightly wider parts.  For some reason I was sure that the corners were wider.  Now that I look deeper, my block is not actually the same as Bonnie Hunter's block.  Thanks to Cathy for information on the original source of the pattern.  I found that the original quilt was in Quiltmaker #163 which was published in the May/June 2015 edition.   It is available on the Quilting Daily website as a digital download.    Still, rather than remaking the 12 blocks that I have already made, I am going to call mine Garden Trellis rather than Garden Party and just keep moving forward.  It is quite similar except that the flower petals are a bit thinner which will result in more negative space between the blocks.  

How are your 2021 plans starting to shape up?  I will link up at Oh Scrap!  and Kathy's Quilts to see what other scrap based and hand sewing projects are underway for the new year.