August UFO is completed!!!!!

I finished the binding on this quilt last night. So nice to have a finish of this UFO started back in 2012.  The 12 inch blocks are from Lori Smith patterns and I used a bundle of FQ from the Kansas Troubles line to make it. Lots of days hand quilting this one while waiting in the car lines at PreK on both the kids.... Such memories. (Hard to believe they are already in 2nd and 3rd grade!) I loved how the quilt as you go worked with this and will be using that technique again... probably with my dresden blocks.

I had a pleasant surprise in the mail yesterday... A fabric package of these pretty batiks from Sally.
A big thank you! They were a fun surprise in the mail (somehow I missed your e-mail letting me know I got picked as a winner!).  So many pretty colors... it will be fun picking out a project for them.. you know, since I got a finish in this post that means I can start something new =)

The kids have been in school for a week now... and I have walked about 2 miles each day after dropping them off and before logging into work. I have to say... I find I have a lot more energy later in the day if I get my walk in. I'll have to be good and walk on the weekends too - especially since I really want to get some yard work in this weekend (while I have helpers and the truck to dispose of it to the yard waste at the recycle center). 

Tomorrow's post will be my experiences with Inklingo. =)

Slow stitching Sunday....

I admit, I had to do a little fast stitching today to get to some slow stitching. Fast stitching, you ask? I had to cut and prep a binding. Yup, a binding and you know what that means. Almost a finish!

The scrappy binding just got sewn onto the front of my Lori Smith blocks that I did as a quilt as you go process. I am so happy to have this UFO almost to a complete stage.

This morning I did finish hand stitching one of the blue appliqués down to the background and have just prepped one more blue to stitch as I have time. I added the blocks around the pink and purple this morning. I'll pull some black and blue sometime this week to finish off the others into 16 inch blocks. There are 4 still waiting for middles and their backgrounds....I'm sure they will get completed in the next two months as yellow and red have yet to come up in the RSC Challenge this year, and those are the remaining colors of my dresdens - red, maroon, yellow and brown.

Linking up with Kathy's Quilts and the other slow stitchers today. Head on over and take a peek.

Wednesday August 10 2016

First day of school! The kids were excited to go this morning and were up, dressed, had breakfast, packed their lunch, brushed teeth and hair and had sneakers on by 6:50! That will not happen again until the first day of school next year. We got out the door around 7:10 and dropped off a little after 7:20. I got home and had a lovely walk (I promised myself I would walk every day after dropping them off to school this year.). Then a quick shower and logged into work in a very quiet house. Boy, that was so nice.

Some pics of the kids - before leaving and waiting in the car line to open so we could drop them off.

Lots of cars waiting in line at drop off ... and I had a surprise at pick up. The middle school next door is getting out 20 minutes BEFORE elementary this year instead of 20 minutes after. Can you say... TRAFFIC? Oh boy... good thing I love hand work and decided to make a lemoyne star block a day in the car line this year. I am having a little issue with printing, but I'm sure it was user error yesterday.  I did manage to get 8 shapes printed out with inklingo and hand sewn. Just need to press and prep some background for the squares and triangles to make it a block. These are small - finishing at 4.5
inches. I'd show a picture... but I can't seem to find the little bugger. Did I mention they are small? The first one is a purple dot and blue flowered print with purple flowers. I'll post a picture once I find it =)

Maybe I'll try printing again tonight... or make the binding for this UFO.

Yes, finally at the binding stage on this guy. I learned that a 2 inch strip on the back to connect is much easier to work with than the 1 inch or 1.5 inch in the tutorial I used.

QSQA - top finished waiting on binding.

The back.

These are Lori Smith patterns that I made with a group over at Jo's Country Junction back in 2012. I used a line of fabric called Kansas Troubles. I love the shades - very country looking. The back is homespuns that I had in the stash. No rhyme or reason... just picked one and went with it. These 12 inch blocks were all hand quilted and then put together. I will use this method again.. but I'll make sure all my blocks are the same size first! Started in January 2012 and hopefully will be finished in August 2016. 

A rainy Sunday....

Perfect for being inside and relaxing with some slow stitching. I made great progress on my UFO this week. It is now a set of 8 and two sets of 4. I am using the Quilt as you go method from this tutorial. It is great.. I just changed the back sashing strip to 2 inches rather than the 1.5. It was a wee bit too small to hand stitch down with the smaller strip. The other thing I learned... the next time I will make sure all my blocks are trimmed to the same size! It was iffy with them being all hand quilted and coming up a little small when I made the blocks. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel with this. My hope is to get the bottom 2 sections together this morning and then join them all. Ideally.... I'd add the binding today too but we will see how the day goes.... Grandma returned the kids yesterday after a 2 night sleepover. The house was so nice and quiet. I'm sure it will be a board game and movie day.

This was from a quilt along at Jo's Country Junction back in 2012 using Lori Smith patterns. They are all 12 inch blocks done with Kansas Troubles fabric.

I just have a bow to add to this 1857 appliqué block before I start on the next one. Oh, those two dresden need to be hand stitched to their backgrounds as well. The stem and flower in the middle were stitched up last night.

Then...there is the newest hand quilting project. I pulled out this other UFO and started hand quilting it this week. I have 2.5 blocks done of the 9.  I'm doing the 5 connector ones first and then will do the stars. Thinking a little gentle curve in the white border. No clue on the blue border but there is plenty of time to think on that.

Plenty of choices. Head on over and see what other things are being slow stitched today at Kathy's Quilts.

August UFO....

I have a challenge going on my FB group of Quilting in VT as a UFO Challenge. I started it in June and got my Floating cubes to a top stage, completed it in July. So for August.... I am pulling out a UFO I tried to do back in January. It is my Quilt Square Quilt Along blocks that I did maybe 4 years ago with Jo's Country Junction. She picked a pattern each month to make and I did all mine in Kansas Troubles Fabrics - which I love the color and values. I decided to try hand quilting with these and did them as each block was done while waiting on Pre-K lines for Aidan and then Emily. That led me to finally try the quilt as you go method to start putting them together. I have them all in sets of 2's and one is a set of 4. I think one set of 2 needs to be taken out and aligned better as well. That one is missing from the bottom corner. Lots of little things.... but very doable to get done this month and then add a binding I hope.

February OMG (One Monthly Goal)

I got sidetracked last month with my chosen goal but I got my 2 other hand work projects to a top stage in January - midget appliqué quilt and hand piecing the trip around the world blocks together.

This month I picked Hugs and Kisses to be completely done - finish hand quilting, make and add binding and a label, wash and use!

I looked at my Hugs and Kisses quilt that I am hand quilting this morning. I have 33 peels left on the outer border and then..... I can make and add the binding and label. 

Linking up with OMG for my February goal.

January 31.... already?

Wow, where did this month go? I had hoped to get my quilt square along quilt finished off this month as my UFO project...... but I am OK with the little progress I had on it. I made that initial start of QAYG and it was pretty easy. No fear in the way to finishing this one off now.  It should get finished in February since the other two big hand work projects are to a top stage now. I can concentrate on this UFO again. I plan to work on it today to finish stitching the back sashing on this set of 2 and four. Tomorrow lets me get the other 3 sets of 4 ready by machine for more hand stitching this week.

Back ready for hand stitching of the black.

Front photo of 4 and backing of 2 QAYG.

I got my midget appliqué blocks into a top last Sunday  night. This is a completely hand pieced top over the last year! I decided it needs a border with some appliqué vines in two corners with some flowers... but until I can figure out the color it will sit. Ideas on border color welcome. Binding will be yellow I believe.

I finally got my trip around the world blocks into a top last night. This baby is also all hand pieced last year and finally to a top stage. It is 90x90 and will got into the queue for hand quilting along with the above quilt.

Yesterday since Emily got her room cleaned up before the bday party her reward was sewing. She wanted to make a house block like me and picked out her colors. We really need to work on seam allowance but pretty darn good for a 6 year old on her own machine!

I think it will be playing in the soil for a bit today. I picked up some pansy to put in my front triangle bed and some geraniums to pop into pots on either side of the garage. I am also turning over the garden and replanting a bit so some tilling and prepping going on back there. I picked 2 broccoli this morning and have more ready for later in the week. Aidan has replanted some of that in his section of the garden. I added potato's in a little square of Emilys section. I think I finally have this gardening thing figured out down here in the south! Time for a quick lunch and then getting my hands dirty. Yes, I know most of you are in snowy regions.... but they are saying it might hit 80 this week! Winter in Florida - freezing last week and in the 80's this week. Crazy.

Aidan and I were playing Skip-Bo this morning and he grabbed some pretzels for a snack. I only eat them with boursin dip as pretzels are not my favorite thing. I found this recipe that is pretty close to the one I remember from up north at the craft fairs in the fall. I had all the herbs and just added a splash of worchesterire sauce at the end. I swapped fresh garlic for garlic powder. Yummy, yum yum. Good thing there are 2 bags of pretzels in the pantry (how that happened I'll never know!).

Linking up with the other slow stitchers at Kathy's Sunday Slow Stitching party. Won't you join us?

Happy New Year!

Quilt Square Quilt Along - Lori Smith 2012 UFO

It has been a very lazy morning in my jammies doing... well, not much of anything. Grandma had the kids overnight and will be returning them soon. I really need to tackle cleaning more of the house and put the Christmas tree to bed until November. First on the list.... update the blog and decided on my UFO list for the year. I decided to pull out my Quilt Square Along blocks this month and see where I am and what needs to get done. I have 16 blocks completed =
12 inch blocks made and hand quilted. I am planning to do these as a quilt as you go top.... you know back in 2012 when I started them! I checked the three packets of patterns by Lori Smith and I have 2 appliqués and one pieced block to go. Now the decision. Do I say 16 is enough and start sewing these together into a nice 4x4 setting with sashing or continue on? Yup - I'm going to call the 16 blocks a 'quilt' and maybe make the other two or three blocks as individual 12 inch little blocks. I have a spot in the dining room above the bookcase of cookbooks that the little 12 inch blocks would look perfect in. Ok, decision made. Sorry for the bad photo - my camera is protesting it is full and won't let me take pictures.... so I had to go through the blog and find this one.
Now to find that tutorial on how to put these little buggers together in the quilt as you go method!

Edited. I am linking this post to the OMG - One Monthly Goal for the month of January. I guess I better go find that tutorial again and pull the fabric for the sashing and start getting this baby into rows! I really want a finish this month in my UFO tab.

Design Wall Monday

I finished the hand quilting of the cables on this little 12 inch block last night. I now have 16 blocks made using the Kansas Troubles fabrics. Do I continue on and make the two appliqué and another 2 blocks.... or call it done and start putting them together? Decisions, decisions.....

Wishing a Happy 5th Birthday to Emily. This was the cake she selected for her school party.

Slow Stitching Sunday

I made some progress this week on the Quilt Square Along Block. I had taken out the straight lines on the inner border and added the wavy mountains. I like them much better. I followed along the creams in the hst border and did an x in the corners.

All of this is free hand quilting - I'm too lazy to plan things out =). I searched in a book to find a cable and then I just drew them based on the picture. I have two sides with the five cables that I hand quilted already. The other two I drew were the first ones and had six cables.... I need to use a damp cloth to get rid of those marks and rework them as five cables so I can finish it up today.

Next in line is this little T wall hanging that I did through the 'Lets Book it' Link Party over at Vroomans Quilts. This is from The Civil War Sewing Circle by Kathleen Tracy. I love the hand quilting on the one in the book and will follow that for my quilting.

Head on over to Kathy's Quilts and see what other slow stitching projects are being worked on this week.

Slow stitching Sunday....

This morning I did a little prep work and figured I'd show how I prepare my hand pieced hexie parts.

First I grab some 2.5 inch strips - They are a little big but are handy. I need 17 inches for 6 hexes.
I made a template using my 1 inch hexes adding 1/4 inch all around. I trace 6 of them lining up the sides for easy cutting.

Then I stack my fabrics - 5 today and cut them out. The way I line them up it is easy diagonal cuts each way.

Then I flip them over and place one of my 1 inch hexie parts on the middle and trace around with a pencil.

Once that is done - I put them in groups of 6 matching prints and add a yellow for the center. Hand work all prepped for the week!

I also did a little hand quilting this week and have made a little progress on my 12 inch block. I hope to get a few more stitches in on this tonight. For now - it is off to work to give one review and interview another. At least it is a short day. Kids are in route to Grandma's for the day. Hope Greg enjoys his peace and quiet this afternoon! We had a nice family day yesterday and all went to a birthday party for one of Aidan's friends at the park yesterday afternoon. After a walk around the park in the afternoon and then an evening walk for us while the kids were on their scooters it was a wonderful day. This morning - the earliest up was Aidan after 7 and he just took an iPad into the play room until the rest of us got up. Emily woke up around 8 - the last one up today. Much better than their usual 6AM on weekends!

Head on over to Kathy's Quilts and see what other slow stitching is being worked on today.

My Lori Smith 12 inch blocks.......

Since I pulled out the last block I have made to be hand quilted this weekend I figured I'll pull them all out and see how many more there are to make before I can start putting this one together. I know I have two more applique blocks to work on and after checking the patterns I have one more pattern block to make from the third pattern. That leaves one block for me to come up with! That will give me 20 - 12 inch (ish) blocks to sash and put together as a Quilt as you Go quilt. I used a big FQ stack of Kansas Troubles fabrics that I purchased years ago before kids at the Vermont Quilt Festival. I have some left in the drawer but I am not sure if I want to go scrappy for the setting or bite the bullet and find some online to purchase for sashing and a border treatment. I started making these with a group of people on-line back in 2012 with Jo at JosCountryJunction as the host. 

The backs are all different colored homespun prints in the maroon, blue and green range and I think I'll use a brown or black to connect them on the back.

I also finished off the blue dish cloth on Saturday. I've started another one in blue but have a skien of pretty pink waiting in line. I am guessing I need to make some crochet towel tops for Mom to go home with her to Vermont, too. Those can easily be worked on at night if the cat's don't play with the yarn too much!

While I was preparing this post, Emily got some of the Birds in the Air blocks out to play with. This is what she came up with and then took a picture of. Just like her Mommy! They are now all picked up and tucked back into their drawer. Someday that one will get put together and I really want to do an allover baptist fan - freehand and hand quilted. Someday....

And yes Mom - I did go to the gym this morning and got a good workout while the kiddo's were at school. Now I just need to remember to water the garden every morning =).

Lori Smith Quilt Blocks.....

I made another one of the 12 inch blocks this week. This is a star block from her #6 pattern of little quilts. The hardest part of all of these is to select the colors. I went with hers for the green and red in the middle and then decided to surround it with blues and golds with a final green border. I think it came out pretty good. That leaves one more pieced block and two applique ones to go.

I started the hand quilting on last weeks in the car line today. This is about 10 minutes worth of work. Those little 10 minutes of time really add up.

The little girl is down with the bug now. She just had a high fever and her medicine this morning didn't stay down - but everything else she has eaten today has. Lots of crackers and toast.
Now the boy is getting restless and wants to do his HIPPY lessons and then I need to have him do his homework.

Wednesday, Wednesday.....

Another block for the Quilt Square pile was completed this week. This one was a cross between Lori Smiths design and mine. I had four leftover hst's and made two of these little squares in the middle. They were 4.5 inches and one of her designs had a star that size with some borders. You guessed it, I just popped my squares where the stars were and made my own block. Another one down... five to go!

I finished off the hand quilting on the log cabin from last week. Now to decide how to quilt the new one.

Slow stitching Sunday

I forgot how much I missed working on these small 12 inch blocks by Lori Smith. I started them last year and have hand quilted each one and plan to sew them together in a quilt as you go method. First, I need to make a few more of the blocks so I have a nice sized quilt when I am done. This is the log cabin block and I am just doing two rows of hand stitching in each log.

Head on over to Kathy's Quilts and see what others are slow stitching on this weekend.

UFO Block Wednesday...

Since the Grandmothers Choice BOW is done I am at a loss as to a Wednesday post. I decided to have Wednesday be a UFO progress update and hopefully that will get me working on some UFO's so I can eventually get them crossed off the list as completed.
This week I pulled out the Lori Smith 12 inch blocks that I was working on last year through Jo's Country Junction. 

I had actually completed all the blocks on the first pattern but had finished the first one into a little quilt before deciding to hand quilt each one and then put them together into a quilt top. That meant that I had to make another little log cabin block. I had so much fun hand quilting this one that I can't wait to get this prepped for some hand quilting. I used a very old line of the Kansas Troubles fabrics that I had purchased at VQF way before the kids were born..... so it is at least 5 years old!

All the blocks from  Lori Smith's Quilt Squares #1

Two log cabin blocks.

From pattern two I have all the blocks completed except the applique one.  Now that I learned how to back baste I have a feeling I should be able to get that one done now. The third pattern also has an applique block and a pieced block that need to get put together.  That will give me 18 - 12 inch blocks. I may have to create a few more to make the quilt a little bigger!

Grandmothers Choice - Mr. Roosevelt's Necktie.

This week's block was very simple to make. I decided to make this one purple since I've had a few green's the last few weeks. I really like this block and think it would look really neat in my rainbow scrap challenge as a rainbow quilt or as a monochromatic quilt top. I would have laid them all out but I keep forgetting I need to applique that star onto the background. If you want to see how some of them are finishing, go check out the website today and see the four variations.

I did finish hand quilting this block on Sunday night. I am all out of prepped blocks from my Lori Smith patterns. I think it is time to pull them out and make a few more!

Quilt Square Along Reveal

 Today is reveal day for the November Quilt Square Along over at Jo's Country Junction. Head on over and see an amazing quilt block parade.

This month I got one block done and hand quilted! I used my new hand quilting needles and after a little adjustment to them I really like how they work. They are clover black gold needles and they work wonderfully.

Here is all the blocks I have done so far this year. I seem to be missing January's and have no clue where it is hanging out in the sewing room. The bottom two just need their hand quilting.

Slow Stitch Sunday

I've been doing some slow stitching this weeks since the kiddo's have been a little under the weather. I have noticed that my stitches are getting a little smaller and more evenly spaced on this one. Maybe less seams or I am just getting better with practice. This block is 12 inches finished so each of the stars is around 4 inches.

A close up of one of the stars.

Head on over to Quilter Kathy's to see what others are working on today.

Quilt Square Along Block done.....

I got this months block done with a bit of time to spare! I really like how this one came out with the scrappy squares. There are 105 tiny pieces in this 12 inch finished block. The pattern is from Lori Smith - Quilt Squares #6 - pattern #1. Now if I can just remember to put the applique block from the last set of patterns in the living room so I can get that one done this month too!

VTQuilter - Lori Smith Pattern. 12 inch block.