WIP Wednesday

 Hello, everyone! I'm still here, just not sewing very much these days. My part-time job is going well. I don't know how people find time to quilt after working full-time. This job thing is really cramping my quilty style!

I needed to buckle down last weekend and make progress on this Stacked Squares graduation quilt for a friend. I picked up a fresh box of safety pins yesterday at my LQS that will be closing soon. (I could cry!) All my old pins are tired up in another basted quilt. It was quicker to buy new pins than to finish that other quilt. Anyway, the batting is in the dryer to relax the folds, then I'll be ready to baste this one.

By the way, by cousin received his blue Stacked Squares. His latest prognosis is quite good and he's hoping to attend a family reunion in August. Thank God!

 

There's another deadline looming on a project I haven't even started to cut out yet. It's something I've never made before (a liturgical stole), so I'm procrastinating. I'm running out of time, though.

 

I've been slowly making progress on the scrappy spool blocks. I've been piecing them as leaders and enders. 

 

I've completed 27 of the 48 blocks and my mitered corners are improving.

Wednesday will always be a day off for me, so we'll meet here for weekly updates!

Blizzard Blues

For us quilters, a blizzard means we get to stay home and sew! I finished this piece this morning while switching between local news and the weather channel. We were spared the worst of the storm, but there's a decent amount of snow here in southern RI.

Anyway, here is the newly named Blizzard Blues. I would take pictures outside, but it's still too windy.

I might have mentioned here and on Instagram that I found this basket when I was cleaning up after Christmas. My note cracks me up! I stink at mystery quilts, and this is as far as I got with Bonnie Hunter's 2011 mystery Orca Bay.

 I had so much fun playing with these bits and pieces.

I enjoyed quilting this one, too. I did lots of stitching-in-the-ditches which is just tedious. Then I tried a new fill in the squares. Really not perfect, but I like it.

 

The triple swaggy thing in the setting triangles is kind of cool. Three passes (forward, back, forward) meant I could move right from one to the next without stopping.

The circles in the blue border were challenging and not well-executed. They look OK in this pic, but let's not get too close, OK? That combination of straight and serpentine stitches in the outer border will be repeated again someday, maybe in a different combination or spacing.

 

I didn't have a big enough piece of blue for the back, so I added a strip of red at the top and for the sleeve.

 

And there we have it. All from stash with scrappy binding, batting pieced from scraps. This puppy will benefit from blocking. The right side is a little wavy.

Blizzard Blues

Started January 9, 2015

Completed January 27, 2015 during Winter Storm Juno aka Blizzard of '15

40" square

Quilting Early

This quilt will be a gift at the end of the month and most of the quilting is already done! Not procrastinating? Who, me? Maybe I'm turning over a new leaf.

I used blue thread on the blues- a swirl in the squares and a heart in the triangles. White thread is stippled on the white and cream pieces. I haven't stippled in years. It's OK. I'm thinking with all the curvy quilting in the body of the quilt, I'll try some straight, diagonal lines in the borders.


Pete's goal for the track and field season was to qualify for the state meet. We're really proud of him for making it! Here he is throwing the discus, just a few hours before leaving for the class trip to Washington, DC.


The goldfinches have arrived home for the summer. My sister-in-law in North Carolina is annoyed that she has all these songbirds in her yard in the winter, when they are drab looking. As soon as they start to brighten up, they head north to our house!

It's suddenly warm and sunny. It looks like a beach day!
Tina