Monday Meanderings 9 - 5 - 2022

Do you have weeks where your planned activities don't actually get done, or at least not all of them? That's what I've faced this week. Here's what I wanted to get done this week ---

8/29/22

✅Make some composition book covers - 2 are done and I rewrote the directions to get a nice tight cover.

Continue working on challenge piece inspired by a card - HA! Didn’t touch it — again. (I might make progress after I finish this post....)

✅Finish sewing Ombre log cabin blocks together in columns - still need to get a couple of columns done.

✅Sew 1 Picket Star top together - Done! 

Start on Sept UFO challenge piece. - Didn’t even get it out.  Sigh.

So no, I didn't get all of the goals done but I did make some forward progress. I decided to revise the composition book cover directions I had after Sue Daurio shared she'd just gone to a class on making covers.  She was kind enough to send me a picture of hers.  It looked so different from what I made I decided to try to figure out how to make it.  After many trials and errors I succeeded.  Here's the piece before sewing it all together.

And below is the front of the finish one. I used interfacing instead of using lightweight batting.  Sharon and I are doing these together for an event coming up.  I'll be trying the batting on my next cover.

 

The Picket Star blocks were made by the FCQ Equilters for me about two years ago.  I have enough for another bigger quilt.  I was able to get these 9 blocks together this afternoon but not until making 2 more and taking 2 apart to the four squares in the block. One block needed each quadrant  trimmed to the right size. The other one had too big of seams. I am happy with the end results. I added two of the gold blocks although looking at it I realized all three of the gold blocks are mine.  Should I add a border to this or let it stand as is?  It is currently 52 by 52". I'm thinking I might want to do borders only on the top and bottom to make it rectangular. What do you think? 

Before the end of August I finished another smaller quilt.  This was a block of the month from the Country Piecemakers guild several years ago. Each participant bought the book The Anniversary Sampler Quilt by Donna Lynn Thomas.  We made a block or two each month.  I decided that I wanted a 5 by 5 setting and needed 25 6" blocks.  As I finished all the blocks I liked from the book I chose blocks from other sources to make up the 25.  I made this quilt specifically to use some of the 5 yards of cotton fabric I purchased at a children's dress manufacturer many years ago. (As in at least 25 years ago!) I tried using it as the sashing but it looked awful. (You can see the "attempt" here.) The purple looks much better.

The quilting design is Random Clams by Jessica Schick.  I used a soft pink So Fine thread. The bat was a Quilter's Dream polyester.  It really shows the quilting well.  The quilt is appx 40" x 40" which fits perfectly above the fireplace. 

Thanks to my favorite quilt holder for once again holding my quilt. It's easier when it is small like this one. After he held it, he hung it above the fireplace.  It's a little bright and "springy" for September.  But I was tired of the quilt that was there. 

Here's the ancient fabric backing!  The fabric is 60" wide.  Um, I have to admit I have about 3 yards left.  I'm going to reassess the tops I have ready to quilt to see if any of them would look good with this as backing fabric. 

I'm linking to my favorite parties for the beginning of the week. You know the drill.  Take some time to visit some of the bloggers who link up with these parties.  I find so much inspiration when I surf these sites.

 

Oh Scrap

Monday Making 

Design Wall Monday 

To Do Tuesday

I finally remembered what else took up some of my time this past week.  I entered two quilts in Virginia's State Fair.  I've never entered either a state or county fair before.  My local guild, Virginia Star Quilters, has a booth at the fair and wanted members to enter some of their quilts.  I spent part of the week sewing sleeves on, making labels and driving it over to a member who was willing to deliver the quilts.  Pat and I will be manning  the booth at the beginning of October.  It would be fun to win a ribbon but I'm not counting on that happening. But I'll let you know in a few weeks. 

Happy Quilting All!  Bonnie 

 

Monday Meanderings 8 - 16 - 2022

Quilting seems to have taken a backseat to reading recently. At the end of this post I've listed a few books I've really liked recently.  But now, let's see how I did on my goals. 

8/8/22

✅Finish new charity quilt to top stage -- done, need backing 

✅Sew August UFO challenge together, add borders, figure out backing -- all done backing is ready to load

Make August BOM from A Quilting Life & ✅RSC blocks -- RSC done but need to do A Quilting Life block

Quilt one of my quilts -- nope, nada, didn't do it

✅Work on grand’s Christmas ornaments -- one is almost all done, second one is in progress

Not too bad.  We also had an overnight visit from our daughter's family on their way to the beach house.  It was a win, win.  They got closer to NC and out of the horrendous DC traffic the day before they had planned to drive and Saturday's drive was much shorter. We enjoyed seeing and catching up with everyone. 

Here's the final top.  The borders were leftover from a wide back. 

And here is the quilt top with the backing I found that will go with it. Thank you Nann, who blogs at With Strings Attached, for the fabric. A surprise box of fabric arrived a year or so ago.  I've pulled fabric from it off and on. I saw this one and knew it would work well with this challenge quilt. 

And next up my goals this week. 

8/15/22

Quilt charity top for guild

Make August BOM from A Quilting Life

Quilt one of my quilts

Make a list of all finished tops and figure out backing sizes for them

Continue to clean off front of cutting table

Begin challenge piece inspired by a card

I'll also continue to work on the Christmas ornaments for the grands but I'm not listing them every week. 

Notice that clean off front end of cutting table.  I spent several hours working on cutting up bits and pieces of fabric as well as putting fabric back on the shelves. I can see the difference but I'm not sure anyone else would notice it!  But I'll try to get through more of the mess on that end of the table. I can almost see the cutting mat under the fabric. 

One of the projects I am working on was making a sample cover for a composition book. Sharon and I usually go in together to make a little gift for fellow retreaters.  We'll be going the first week of October so it's time to figure something out.  She suggested the cover and sent me a link for the directions. Here's my first attempt. 

It looks nice but it took quite a long time and that didn't include the flying geese.  The directions called for binding the edges which just added a lot of time. (You can find the free directions here.) I made this one without having a composition book around.  After I bought one (not on any school special) I realized the inside fold over that went on the covers didn't work because the covers were heavy cardboard.  We'll be changing the width of that piece so it is easier to get it on the book.  And we'll probably be buying composition books on back-to-school specials and they won't have stiff covers. We hope to use up leftover blocks to make these covers.  I think it will be a terrific way to move out some fabric. And, I'll be checking the box from Nann for some fabric too.  I have another one started but haven't been motivated to finish it yet.  We've made some changes to make it go much faster. We'll split the 25 we need between the two of us so it won't be that much work. 

Back to books.  I generally have two to three books going at a time -- generally one audio book and 2 books on Kindle or, gasp, an actual book.  Because I read so many books, I tend to keep a list of books read by year.  It helps me when I try to figure out whether I've read a book or not.  Case in point is Nine Women, One Dress by Jane Rosen. I wanted to read it before offering it up as a book club choice for Sept. I started it and then realized I'd probably read it and sure enough, in 2019 I had. (But I'm reading it again because I don't remember all of it!)   I'm also offering up Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman.  They are miles apart in style and story but both are good.  I'm guessing we'll choose Nine Dresses. It's entertaining, a fast read, and our public library has multiple copies of it. Another great book I recently finished is Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus.  It was set in the 1950s and '60s and shines a light on how women were treated as "mere" housewives rather than serious scientists. Both libraries I use had long waiting lists for the Kindle books and audio books. (one was over 70 people for 5 Kindle books.) If it sounds interesting to you prepare to wait but it was really worth it.  What are you reading these days? 

Hopefully you are reading some blogs along with interesting books. Here's the Linky parties to check out. 

Oh Scrap

Monday Making

Design Wall Monday 

To Do Tuesday 

That's it for me.  I have a book I want to read now. (Ok, only after I do some blog surfing!) 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie