In the sewing department…I’ve really done nothing this week. The summer schedule is kicking my sewing time to the curb.
Carver’s ball schedule kicked in last week and he had a game one of the evenings so I went to that…I had my kids all here for supper two of the nights. I had Kalissa’s kids most of the days last week and will again this week. It’s all okay. It happens.
As of yesterday, the flying geese were still sitting on my kitchen island waiting for me to iron them. I didn’t even get that done during the week. AHH!! Gannon and I walk and Carver rides his bike to ball practice. Practice is an hour and then we walk back. That takes most of the morning time up. So even little tasks like ironing haven’t gotten done.
Finally on Sunday afternoon I carved out a few hours and decided I better just get these ironed.
I got that done and then…I started sewing them together.
If you missed my much requested tutorial on flying geese, you can find it HERE. If you missed my tutorial on bonus triangles, you can find that HERE.
I sewed and sewed as quickly as I could as I was going to the movies later in the day. For the most part…I didn’t get a lot done that looks like anything but I’m taking it as progress. I think these next couple of weeks are going to a little busier that most so I don’t think there will be a lot of progress on the sewing front. We’ll see.
I did manage to get a few more rows machine quilted on my double wedding ring quilt but that too didn’t get finished…and so it goes.
It’s far enough that it is now off the floor and that’s what I really like. Then I don’t have to worry about Rosie damaging the batting.
I did some work on EQ (Electric Quilt), the quilt designing software. I got two ideas floating around in my head for a couple of simple quilts that would use up a lot of strips which is awesome because once I get the UFOs in focus, using up some of the strips is next on the list. I’ll share those another day.
That was short and sweet for this week’s sewing update. Please share what you’re working on. I’d love to know.
Quilting QOV for our veterans
Good for you!! I appreciate that you’re helping out our veterans!!
I’m making a “Nine Sisters” quilt for an incredible lady in our church. It can sure be hard to find time to sew much, but I’m always amazed when I see the whole thing coming together.
I’m working on the Redbird piece as well as my bigger piece. I’m a little off track on my “knitting a pair of socks each month” goal, but not irretrievably so. I am trying to use up the random bits of cotton yarns hanging around – I used to teach knitting and crocheting- by mostly making potholders. I finished a quilt for a June born son and I have another ready to assemble. I also have a blue and white Irish chain quilt in progress. In addition to all that I’m cutting blocks to make eye spy quilts. I’m determined to decrease the fabric in my stash so I can start over with a more curated selection and actually make some of the 50 quilts I have my eye on! My two youngest were in Little League. Some of my best memories. I got a lot of knitting done during practices for sure, lol.I’m wondering if my grandson will play. Blessings!
I’m finishing a log cabin quilt. I have to put the final border on it and I realized that the fabric is directional. So I have the fabric and I’m doing the math on the best way to do it with as little seaming as possible. I want the sides to be without seams and I’m making sure there is plenty left for the top and bottom. Next up is a Storm at Sea quilt made with blue, green and purple batiks. I have a huge collection of various blue batiks that have green or purple so that how I’ll cut up the fat quarters, I’m not particularly picky about where they go, I think it will work out OK.
Last night I finished a top that’s 9- patches on point, with sashing between rows. Tonight will be piecing the back, laying out the sandwich, and basting. Saturday I have pieces cut for a batik rail fence top, but it might be about a week before I start.
Like you, Jo, I am working on several projects. I have a quilt started that will be for a fundraising auction (March 2023), another for a baby and I have a couple of little dolls for my great granddaughters started, and then just started making a bopple ball for a gift. In the meantime my “sewing” room is a total mess.
In between grand babies all day and sleep I quilt for others. If I am doing and edge to edge design I can sew for myself. I finished a Pat Sloan sew along everyone else finished a month ago. Woo hoo! I have a halloween quilt ready to start that is also a sew along but I have not been along with that for a month so I will start and go at my own snails pace. I have the book and can go back to the Moda blog and Pat Sloans videos for tips as I do. Weekends are kid free so I did do gardening. First time in over a year and I got quilting done too.
I have to sandwich a quilt top and then quilt it on my mid arm. The pattern is free online, plaidish from Kitchen Table Quilting. And I have a small quilt retreat planned with friends at my family’s cottage, so I have to get ready for that.
I make tops of any size for our church quilters to tie. Last week I got a twin size top done.
Clipping a rag quilt. I only do a bit at a time – my hand gets tired!
I am working on Hunter’s star string quilt. I hope it comes out as pretty as yours
I saw a quilt on another blog that gave me an idea for a donation quilt. It uses jelly roll strips. I upsized the width of the strips to get the same look but done faster. It’s a free pattern called Treat Strip Jr interweave from Timeless Treasures.
Since moving into our new house in April I was appalled to discover how many UFO’s I found. We’d been living in a tiny house for almost 2 years during construction, it took that long due to Covid issues. My longarm had been in storage, but not my sewing machine. I’ve been trying to longarm some of my tops, quilt for charity and help my husband put in a yard. It’s all going slowly! Enjoy your grandchildren, have fun sewing and cross stitching.
I’m also trying to finish up UFOs and for this month I pulled out “On the Bright Side”, the quilt that you & your daughter had published in AP&Q back in 2018. I have it all cut and many of the little stars made, but MANY more to go! Lol
I finished cutting out a quilt from a years-ago issue of AP&Q, ‘Tuscan Sunset’, in batiks and sewed an “audition block” – it’s a pattern my daughter picked out. I finished a mid-sized cross-stitched sampler last week and started a small kit that has been laying around for a few years. This week (I hope) I will “proofread” a large cross-stitched piece and get it ready for framing – ‘Summer Breeze’ by Paula Vaughn was worked on over several years and is now finished, but I want to double-check to see if I got all the backstitching done.
“Other things” are taking over and who knows when I’ll have a chance to get back to the quilt, but it will happen… life just happens, doesn’t it? :)
I’ve been working on hexies – doing simple grandmothers flower garden blocks. Needed 12 as I’m teaching the senior group that I go to on Thursdays to make the hexies and what can be made once you get those done. I needed to have the 12 as I’m going to applique to tea towels and need to be able to show how it’s done, plus I’ll have a couple extra just decorated with simple strips of pretty fabrics. The first class was this past Thursday and all of the ladies did just great with their sewing and were very enthusiastic at the end, marveling at how relaxing it was.
I have finished up 4 donation quilts, all lap size up to 60*80. I hand stitch my bindings so it’s been a good use of TV watching butt time ;-)
And I’ve read 1.5 books. I’m the “paper in the hand” book reader. I lose audio books when doing anything else and sitting/listening is boring.
Yea for grandkid time! Wishing you a fabulous week.
Amazing how much time grandchildren take that we grandmas are happy to provide. Our grandson is a little younger than Carver and I have him parts of 5 days a week so a lot of my time is spent with him. With school being out he will be here more. Guess we better sneak some lessons into the mix as he will be in kindergarten in the fall. The quilting is languishing but I have finished 2/3 of BBD “Spring Fling” in the last couple of weeks. Watched a Winston Churchill movie with Hubby and read 3 non fiction books on the early days of WW2 and a “snack book” I picked up on my way out of the library. I can read and stitch at night but have never cared to sew at night.
Weeks like this can be frustrating but cooler weather and slower times are not that far off really, Jo. I say for having kiddos and morning ball practice you got a goodly amount accomplished.
You ask what we’re all working on. Well I did my first garment mending project last night and it was enjoyable. Plus it turned out really good, bonus! I used a lightweight sturdy leftover yarn and a long sashiko needle along with my mending loom made by katrinkles on Etsy. Knitting wise I am still working on my Solar-T and today I plan on picking up my Blessed SAL and hope to get it finished between today and tomorrow steady working on the stitching thereof. I want to get started on Redbird!
I’ve been working on a bunch UFO tops that I have AND several that others have given me for various reasons. Sunday, I quilted my #13 on my NEW Q’nique/Grace combo (with robotics!!). I practiced on several smaller pieces that I had ‘acquired’ from others as small tops or panel tops or a couple of tops that I constructed out of parts that people had abandoned – undone and needing lots of repair on points and seams. I also have been making frankenbatting and pieced backs of random fabrics – so satisfying! So Saturday afternoon I loaded a queen sized UFO – ‘Elvira’ from Gudrun’s quarantine sew along. Of course along with finishing the quilting, there is binding! So even though I love hand binding – I embraced the machine binding process on 12 of these quilts and hand bound one, so I am all caught up with that too. Next up – I have a scrappy disappearing rail fence in RW&B ready to load – and it will likely be a QOV. And no worries – I still have a dozen tops that need to be quilted so plenty of practice for me. Today – no sewing as we spent most of the day ‘putting the rest of our crops in’ in our garden. I am not sure I have ever finished this late in June, it has been so cold and wet in SE MN. I have SO many quilts I want to work on/start but I just really needed to clear the decks, I was getting overwhelmed and I just couldn’t keep up quilting them on my sit down anymore, it was just getting to be too hard on my back and shoulders.