Eureka! I Have Found It!

First things first. After probably about two years, while looking for a misplaced pattern, I found the missing Awesome Land blocks. All 81 of them with a side sashing attached!!! I was sure I must've left them at a retreat because that was the last time I saw them. These blocks were listed on my 2021 UFO list so I presume I made the blocks during RSC2020. Here they are laid out on my living room floor yesterday. I am so doing my happy dance! I will work very hard to have the top done by year's end.

Yesterday I worked very hard finishing Block #8 of the BOM at my LQS. It is called Illusions Sampler.

Block #8 Illusions Sampler

I don't quite know why I did Block #9 before this one but now I have the first nine blocks done. These blocks are 24" square - HUGE! Here they all are, in no particular order.

I have to tell you a "funny" story. At my quilt group the other day, one lady had all 12 of her Illusions Sampler blocks put together and the borders on. When she showed it at show 'n' tell, I couldn't believe I saw a HUGE boo-boo right in the middle. It was Block #8 which I had been working on so the mistake was glaring to my eyes. I now had quite the dilemma -- do I say something or not? Well, since it was only a top & not yet quilted AND because it was right square in the middle, I braved it and told her. Now it's on her to fix the mistake or not. Has this ever happened to you? Not making the mistake but letting someone know that they did when they were so proud of their work?

The other big news around here: This morning I woke up to SNOW! So pretty! Just a heavy dusting but the grass is covered up so it counts in my book. Hard to believe but a few days ago we broke the High Temp record with 83 degrees. Crazy funny!

Gracie & I have a FUN walk ahead of us this morning. Wishing you a great week!

Linking up with all the RSC quilters HERE!

January is for RED!

As usual I'm behind the power curve! Ugh! I saw the hints about what January's RSC color was going to be but I wasn't 100% sure. Several days later it was made clear to me but I still lagged behind on what I planned to work on this year. But FINALLY it all came together and I believe I have a plan. Yes, a plan but no scrappy sewing ... yet.

I will be making scrappy, strippy units for a streak of lightning border. At least that's what I think it's called. This border will go on the RSC2020 String-X top. Here's a picture of String-X laid out and ready to sew together. I think my border plan will set it off nicely. There will be a narrow border in between the blocks and streaky border.

I did manage to make some progress on 2020Twisted and there was plenty of red. Unfortunately it was EXTRA RED because I was seeing RED. The first time I sewed these blocks together, I sewed all (yes, ALL) the corner units upside-down. It took longer to rip it all apart then it did to sew up the first time around. After all apart (again) I stacked these units up and went to bed. These absolutely will get sewn together correctly in the morning!

All sewn up correctly now.

I decided to lay them out with friends to see what I've got going. I didn't have enough room to lay out the right side but I think we can get the idea of what's going on here.

Look at all that RED! These blocks will be laid out on point. I've got most of the pieces cut and ready to sew up to make the setting triangles. Stay tuned!

Have a great weekend. I'll be reading plenty of RSC blogs over at Angela's SuperScrappy link. So much fun happening over there!

FNwF & RSC

It was so nice to get together last night with my sewing friends near & far. Cheryll is so sweet to host this event monthly. If you go to Gone Stitchin' you will find a lot of fun things going on! As soon as I got the invitation, I knew what I was going to work on .... and I actually did what I was planning to do!

First up was to finish off my pair of knitted socks. Here's a picture of one, the other is soaking for blocking. I'll post a complete write-up when both are all pretty & blocked!

Since I knew that wouldn't take too terribly long, I ran down to my sewing space and finished sewing on the binding of Snowmen & Churches. All I had left to do was sew the two ends together and then sew down the last 10 or so inches. On to hand sewing the binding down! Yay!

I'm looking forward to finishing this one up. I started it many moons ago. There will definitely be a final post just as soon as I git 'er done! This quilt is my bonus project for my LQS's 2020 UFO Challenge and it is also part of my 2020 PHD. I'm itching to get done with this quilt so I can get back to finishing up the Tiny Tuesday quilt!

I'm also sharing this post with all the RSC quilters on Angela's So Scrappy blog. I figured since I mentioned Tiny Tuesday this post will be OK to share there too!

Until next time, make it a great weekend!

Still Not Much Progress ...

Again I have a lame post for RSC. Having just returned from a two-week vacation, trying to get back to normal has been my focus. The laundry is caught up, there was some food shopping, and I got back in the routine of my morning walk (and Gracie loves it!). Then there were appointments to be met: Gracie went to the groomer and smells so good and no longer tap-tap-taps on the hard floors; Fred had a tele-appointment with his PCM who said he needs to find an endocrinologist, which is on top of his kidney surgeon telling him he needs to find a nephrologist; and I made an appointment to get my hair cut. Hot diggity! I've been managing my bangs  myself during the pandemic but I hadn't had a haircut since before it. Ta-Da!

I did get one sock into the blocking phase -- and remember, it has a bit of yellow in the yarn.

Here's a picture of the blocked sock and the unblocked sock. Blocking makes such a beautiful difference! The pattern becomes so much more defined.

I did want to show you that I actually did a little work on Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I found 9 yellows and cut out the pieces required for the Awesome Land blocks. Then I realized that I had run out of  the black & white HSTs! That will need to be done now before I can continue.

Other than that, I've really been trying to keep my nose to the grindstone with Tiny Tuesday quilting. I'm getting there! Hope to have a finish by next week!

I'll be linking up with So Scrappy HERE. Next on my list is seeing what the others have been doing and catching up there with my cyber friends! Have a great weekend!

Red is Coming to an End

We are nearing the end of September which means the end of "Red Month". My fellow quilters are betting on yellow for October. Will they be correct? We will find out from Angela on Thursday, October 1! And speaking of Angela,  she has provided our Linky Party for us Rainbow Scrappers to share our RED and whatever else we have going on. You can enjoy visiting at SoScrappy here too!

I finally finished up ALL the red Awesome Land blocks. Last but not least was #9 who is dressed for Christmas!

And here it is with the other eight red blocks.

This being the 9th month that I've been working on these, I've grown quite a stack!

I'm looking forward to October's color (yellow?) and then trying to figure out how I want these all laid out. Probably won't finish until sometime next year.

In the meantime, I've been happily knitting along. Finished my socks! The one on the wooden form is just finishing up blocking, still a little damp. The other one is done!

Pattern: Destination Unknown
Designer: Very Busy Monkey
Yarn: Blue Moon Socks That Rock Lightweight

These socks are going to be so WONDERFUL this winter. They're soft, they're squishy, they're beautiful!

Afternoon Delight had another block finished this week. This is #27 and check it out -- bits of red!

I hope you stayed with me this far. Here's the biggie for the week ..... drum roll, please! My Tiny Tuesday quilt top is all together! So many fun little blocks. So much fun working on this top. Thank you, Angela, once again for helping us all stay on track. This was the official (?) RSC2019 quilt.

So cute all dappled in the sun & shade

My layout

I can also share with you that yesterday I got it pin-basted and I'm itching to get started quilting this one up. The size at this point is 59" x 78". That'll make a nice couch quilt when I'm done!

Fred & I decided Thursday was going to be the day for us to get our bloodwork done for the doctor. We were both due in the Spring but due to COVID & honey's kidney woes it was delayed. We like to celebrate getting our fasting bloodwork done by the vampires by treating ourselves to breakfast out. We went to the usual IHOP to discover that outside dining was the only option. Thankfully we were a late breakfast couple because only 6 of the 10 or 12 outside tables had guests. It was a beautiful morning and we had great service from Mary.

Ahhhhhh! Food & coffee at last!

Honey enjoying the fresh air & my company, of course!
(Still got the red theme going! Check out the red umbrellas!)

Fred is doing much better, Thank you all for the prayers, hugs, and best wishes. We see the kidney doc this Wednesday and hopefully we will be DONE! Fred still needs to put back on some weight, gain some strength, drink more water, and stay off the smokes! (Don't I sound like such a nag?!? Lol!)

Wishing everyone a good weekend!

RSC Purple Coming to an End

Feeling pretty good about this month's Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I think every participant had good production this month. Here's mine ...

All seven purple Heartfire blocks have been completed.

All 9 purple Awesome Land blocks done.

I finished up Oh My Stars! just in time for Show 'n' Tell at my LQS's UFO Challenge. We meet using Zoom and this 100" x 100" queen-size quilt was really, really hard to hold up to show everyone but I managed. Look! It even has purple in it! After we had all shared our show 'n' tell projects, the next number was announced -- #4! That's my Tiny Tuesday quilt from last year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge. Currently it's a pile of 44 blocks. I put a purple one on top in keeping with this month's color.

I'll need to come up with a final plan for these. Then work to get this top put together and then get it quilted, bound, and labeled. I'm already trying to come up with a plan!

In June my guild started a block of the month (BOM) and I decided to jump in by keeping true to the colors of the RSC. There were two blocks for August and the first block I did was a Pineapple block which I did it in purple, August's RSC color.

The second August block was called Castle Block, I believe. Also done in purples.

Since I was on a roll, I went ahead and sewed up Brave New World. It was the block for June and the RSC color for June was pink.

Soon I'll be working on Crystal Star for July in Dark Blue. September's block has been announced from guild but we won't know the RSC color until September 1. Until then, I'll wait patiently. I wonder what color Angela will choose!?!?!

As a little side note, I also finished up another Liberty Tuffet top. That tiny star in the middle finished at 2-1/4" square. It's SO TINY!

OK, Angela, what color's next? Linking up at SoScrappy HERE and will enjoy looking over everyone's purple progress!

FNSI & Beautiful Purple!

 Yesterday I spent the day with eight friends. We had fun sewing, laughing, eating, sharing stories, etc. Today will be more of the same. Some won't return but others will join in. We're allowed a total of 10 so we keep it to that.

I worked on purple for Rainbow Scrap Challenge. My purples are really coming along. I actually finished these four and the final three are in this stage. In no time I'll have all 7 purple hexies for the Heartfire quilt. I also used Awesome Land blocks for my L&Es and managed to complete 2 of those. Sorry,  no picture.

When I got home, I fixed something to eat for DH & me and then went straight downstairs for a couple of hours. I'm still trying to get Star in a Star quilted so I can get to the binding! I'm supposed to have it ready for show 'n' tell Tuesday morning. Instead of streaming in music, I streamed in the Cardinal baseball game. I was downstairs for the first 5 innings when I needed to come up for air! Ha! If you need me Sunday and/or Monday, you know what I'll be doing! Nose to the grindstone or actually needle to Star in a Star!!

Linking up with  @ So Scrappy and also with Wendy @ Sugarlane Designs. There's loads of fun stuff to catch up on at both of these links!

RSC Saturday & PHD mid-August Reports

 Here I was so excited about PURPLE being August's color for RSC and all I got done for that was cut a mess of strings for the Heartfire hexies. Progress is progress though, right?

I did manage to get together another Easy Breezy block. Guess I could should have made sure the stripes were coordinated. Oh well! I did notice that I need to cut more background fabrics. I've got several baggies with squares at the ready but no background fabrics set.

How did I manage an Easy Breezy L&E block without any sewing progress towards RSC? I quilted up my 2nd adorable Liberty Tuffet! If you noticed that my seams don't seem to be perfectly aligned, I noticed that too. I'm OK with it ... looks like my flag is flying proudly!

I've got another project that has kept me occupied this week. Harmony kicks off Sunday morning at 9am central time. I'm so excited to be sewing with Gudrun Erla of GE Designs again. Joining me again also will be my sister! Most of my fabrics are starched, pressed, and cut. Since I mis-cut two pieces, I've got two small pieces drying with starch and they'll be properly cut tomorrow. Here's my scrappy palette.

So what has kept me REALLY BUSY this week? Progress on my PHD!  I've been SO BUSY quilting Star In a Star!!! So many bobbins have been emptied!!! The Celtic knots & borders along with the inner backgrounds have been quilted. I'll be starting the stars next and will move to the outside borders. Pretty sure I'll be finishing this monster off with a scrappy faux-piping binding. Still trying to decide which colors to use for that!

Here's my PHD (Projects Half Done) report for mid-August:

1. Get Star in a Star to the finish line. Working VERY hard to get this done by August 25th. Not only is this for PHD, but it's also the project for the UFO Challenge at my LQS!

2. Quilt, label, & bind Hope. I basted Hope with InvisiFil wash-out thread so I could get my basting pins for Star in a Star. Does that count for progress? I think not!

3. Stay caught up with Afternoon Delight applique blocks. One block is almost finished being appliqued with one left to go.

4. Get 7 Heartfire hexies done in RSC color PURPLE. Some strips cut. Other than that, no progress.

5. Get 9 Awesome Land blocks done in RSC color PURPLE. 5 of the 9 are done.

So I've got my work cut out for me for the last part of August. Guess I better set myself down at the sewing machine! Have a great week!

Linking up with So Scrappy for RSC and Quilting Gail for PHD.

RSC PURPLE

First week of PURPLE! I was thrilled to remember that I had a bag of scraps donated to me from my sister which had been gifted to her from her mother-in-law. So I dug through, unpinned what was pinned, and look what I had!

There were loads of approximately 6" blocks and some leftover strips/lengths. Looked to be the perfect Awesome Land opportunity! Ta! Da! Five out of nine already completed!

Since then I've starched the strips. Next up will be Heartfire hexies out of these fabrics. In between the Awesome Land blocks I managed a couple more Easy Breezy leaders & enders.

I also finished piecing another little tuffet.

I'm looking forward to seeing what all my fellow RSCers have done with purple this week. Linking up to see with Angela at SoScrappy!

August = Purple!

Friday evening, Angela let the cat out of the bag that the Rainbow Scrap Challenge color for August will be PURPLE! I will be looking forward to working with purple fabrics in August because it is one of my favorite colors. It will also be a great month for visiting all the Rainbow Scrappers to see how they work with purple. But first we need to wrap up July's color - DARK BLUE.

I was happy to take this month off because I needed to catch up my Heartfire hexies. I managed to get all 7 green blocks sewn for a January catch-up last week. You can see those blocks HERE. This week I played around with a few smaller projects and check it out! There's DARK BLUE in the midst!

The block on the left upper corner is Easy Breezy, Bonnie Hunter's Leaders & Enders block for the year (July 2020 - June 2021). I'm going to concentrate on oranges and blues for my blocks. The 4-patch in the bottom left corner will be the center of the next Easy Breezy block. Just look at those adorable animals ... I spy a giraffe AND an elephant! I'm using these blocks for leaders & enders at my sewing machine upstairs, where I do most of my piecing.

The Half Square Triangle in the bottom right will be used in another of Bonnie Hunter's quilt patterns. It's called Split 9-Patch and is one of her many FREE quilt patterns which you can find HERE. There are a lot of HSTs in this pattern so I had a stack of them going. I'm using this pattern for my leader & ender at my sewing machine downstairs. This is where I do my machine quilting and also where I sew on borders, bindings, and where I also sew together large quilts. This  Split 9-Patch project will probably take me a LOOOOONNG time to finish since I don't spend as much time down here!

The upper right and bottom middle blocks will be little pillows or pincushions. The top one is complete except for the pillow finishing and measures approximately 3-1/2" x 6". The 2-1/4" star will have red & white stripes attached to be flag-like. I plan on using these as little pillows in a basket. The pattern is called Sweet Liberty Tuffets and you can find the FREE pattern HERE. They're really fun to make and don't take any time at all! I'm thinking you could make these in Christmas colors or even Halloween fabrics! Lots of fun!

Speaking of fun, I'm very excited because Gudrun Erla of GE Designs has announced that she will be doing another Sew-A-Long Day on August 16th. It will start at 9am Central Time with clues given every 2 hours. She will be sharing all the details this Tuesday, August 4th at 7pm Central Time on her Facebook Group page (Gudrun's Quilt Crew) to reveal the pattern, fabric requirements, etc. You can bet I'll be there and,  just like when I sewed along with her last sew-along Hope, I'll be sewing with my sister who lives in Texas! But wait! There's more! I'll also be sewing with my BFF who lives in Ohio! She will probably have to set her alarm because that is 8am Eastern Time! Lol!

In the meantime I finished up Winnie the Pooh. That's right! I saved my finish for last. It is quilted, labeled, and bound. Unfortunately it's in the wash right now but I can share a couple of pictures that I took last night while finishing up the binding. Stayed tuned for the photo shoot later.

Polly Loves a New Quilt!

In other good news but not quilty, I got to "harvest" a zucchini this week! I'm having trouble with the flowers falling off but no fruit. I'll water more frequently, I guess, to see if that improves my production! Thank goodness for my rain barrels!

My red giant hibiscus bloomed this year! It's a favorite of the Japanese beetles so I'll have to take care of that next week if we get some sunshine.

This week I spied a visitor soaring through our backyard. Hubby actually got a decent picture of this Broad-Winged Hawk before it didn't like being the center of attention and flew away.

Have you stayed with me this long? I just noticed some more quilty pictures to share with you. I'm all caught up with the applique blocks on Afternoon Delight, the block of the month from The Quilt Show.

Block 22

Block 23

Block 24

August blocks will be released today sometime. I think there are only two again which is manageable for me. Unfortunately, these past two months I've been supposed to be making twelve double 9-patch blocks along with the applique blocks! That means a total of 36 DNPs by the end of August! Oh no!!!

For real that's the end of this post! I'm linking up with Angela at SoScrappy HERE. Can't wait to see everyone's joy at the color purple for August and to see their wrap-ups of dark blue!