Monday Meanderings 3 -- 24 -- 2025

Spring has come!  The cherry blossoms are getting ready to bloom in Washington, DC and our front yard.  It will be beautiful once the blooms come. Tonight I noticed there were some blooms and surprisingly some were already on the ground. Must have been the wind.  Although it has been a nice week weather-wise I spent a lot of time in my studio.  It's been a good week getting my goals done. Here's my list from last week. 

3/17/25

✅Quilt another of my quilts — quilting done, binding to come.

✅Start sewing March UFO blocks together — the half log cabin blocks are now a top! 

✅Bind baby quilt — done! 

Make a couple of placemats — didn’t get to this one. 

✅Finish sewing the lining in the needlepoint scissors case — finished this cute little case. 

Here's last week's quilt.  It hasn't been trimmed or bound -- that's for this coming week's goals.  This is Pat Sloan's pattern, Traffic Jam.  I changed it to use 2" squares since I had a bunch of them to use up. 

The quilting design is Saffron Blossom by Apricot Moon. One of the things I added to this quilt is a lot of little squares that have surprises in them: an elephant, a fish, a mouse. Any little animal I had in my collection of 2" squares I threw in. Whoever receives this quilt will find a lot of cuteness among the squares. 

On Sunday afternoon I finished my March UFO top. It is my half log cabin. Here's the quilted top. I haven't even trimmed it yet. It's on the goals list for this week. 

I've finally finished a cute needlepoint scissors case. This was a freebie project from a cruise many years ago.  The project came completely finished except the needlepoint design. I've been working on it for at least 5 years. I finished the needlepoint last year. I knew I would need to line it to protect my scissors from the stiff needlepoint canvas.  Here's what the out side looks like. 

The design is stitched with floss rather than tapestry wool.  I'm happy to have this one finished. I knew the needlepoint canvas would be rough on my scissors so I lined it with some velvet like fabric.  We took another cruise on the same line with stitching sessions on sea days so I got a new project. It's suppose to be a glasses case but I've dismantled it so I can use it on a tote bag I'll make for it when it's finished. And here's the inside of the scissors case. 

Now on to this week's goals.  It took me a while to come up with this list.  I decided not to make it too long this week. 

3/24/25

Make 2 RSC yellow blocks

Quilt and bind one of my quilts 

Mail blocks to FCQ Equilter 

Cut out a new quilt

If I make it through this list I have another top for the quilt guild.  Or perhaps I'll quilt another of my tops. I have 28 tops waiting to be quilted.  Did you notice the purple backing on my quilt up there? ⬆️ There's a big piece left over. I've used almost 5 yards of the original 15 but I'm going to have a lot of scraps and pieces leftover. 

Another great week stitching every day. Here are the stats:

W/ending 3/23/25. 82 days of 2025

• 15 minute days/Mar = 7/7
• 15 minute days/2024 = 82/82 days
• Success rate = 100%

Here are two more quilts from the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Show. First up is On Eagles Wings by Beth Filko. Notice the use of string blocks.  

I took this picture for a friend who enjoys doing wool work.  I really liked it although I probably would never do anything like it. 

On Saturday we volunteered at the local food bank to pack student food boxes. They are given to school kids to augment their family's food. We signed up for 2 hours but we were done in about an hour and a half.  We and a group of students from Mary Washington Univ. packed enough boxes to fill 6 Gaylords. From what I found on line Gaylords can be 40 x 40 x 40" or bigger and generally are on a pallet so they can be transported by forklifts. After they were filled they are shrink wrapped to keep everything controlled. The staff was very happy we finished the packing early and had been cleaning up as we went along so there was no mess to clean up at the end. Pat already volunteers two times a month on weekdays.  We might continue to volunteer on a Saturday each month if we can. Evidently weekend time slots fill up fast. 

Hum, there are several Gaylords behind me. Me keeping boxes on the line.

I'm linking up with the following Linky parties: 

Stitching Stuff

Oh Scrap! 

Design Wall Monday

Monday Musings 

That's it for me today. 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

Monday Meanderings 3 - 31 - 2024

I'm back!  I missed last week because I was traveling and didn't want to drag my computer with me.  So over the next few weeks I'll share our family vacation to Panama and Costa Rica.  Just let me say we had a fabulous time. Our family included our son and his family and our daughter and her family, and us.  There were 10 of us although for a few days Pat and I were in Panama City by ourselves.  I'll be sharing some photos over the next few weeks.  

It was hard to figure out what I was doing before we left.  Here's the last goals list I posted on March 18th. 

3/18/2024

✅Finish another loom hat -- Done and turned into From the Heart.

Bind Spider Web quilt -- Started but not finished.

✅Bind 16 patch r,w,b quilt -- Done!

Bind Zigzag quilt. — Didn’t happen. 

✅Work on needlepoint scissors case -- Needlepoint part finished.

I made three loom hats over the weeks before we left. I turned those in before I left. 

Here's a picture of the needlepoint scissors case I've been working on since 2017. These come as kits and use embroidery floss instead wool. The designs are already made into the finished project, in this case a scissors case. You can see the excess canvas on the side and bottom.  I'll line mine at some point.  I need to see if I have some fabric I can use.  I'll keep you posted! 

Here's what I think I'll be working on this week.  I am not sure what I should be doing except the quilting for my neighbor. We'll see if I make progress on all fronts. 

4/1

Finish binding on Spider Web quilt

Bind ZigZag quilt

Clean up sewing table 

Make miscellaneous blocks 

Start knitting new hat 

Quilt customer top 

I don't have pictures of several quilts I've finished since the beginning of the year. Sadly it's suppose to rain for the next few days. Eventually I will get photos and share them. 

Even though I was gone for a week and a half I did get some stitching done during our vacation. So here's where I stand for the last two weeks of 15 Minutes to Stitch. I decided to continue the weekly reports so here are the last two weeks.  

Week Ending  3/24/2024

• 15 minute days/week = 5/7 days
• 15 minute days/March 21/24 days 
• 15 minute days/2024 = 80/84 days
• Success rate =95.2%

And for the Week Ending 3/31/2024

• 15 minute days/week = 3/7 days
• 15 minute days/March 25/31 days 
• 15 minute days/2024 = 84/91 days
• Success rate = 92.3%

Even though we were gone 10 days I was able to stitch on my needlepoint case several days, four days and at least 15 minutes, if not more.  

On to my travelog! Pat and I spent 2 days in Panama City.  We had a private tour of Old Town and some of the outlying areas.  First up is a pic of the tourists and a statue of Thomas Herrera. In November, 1840 he became the president of the State of Isthmus (now Panama) for a little over a year. Prior to this time Panama was part of Columbia and went back to being part of Columbia after that until 1903. 

Old Town, Panama has numerous old churches we were able to visit.  One was the Church of Saint Joseph. Although it is known for its beautiful Golden Altar I was taken with this piece of art.  I believe it was made with pottery and is displayed on the left side of the church.  You can learn more about this church and its beautiful altar at Famous Historic Buildings.

We had lunch at an outdoor area near a big fish market.  The area was pretty large and several different restaurants were operating there. From what I could tell one restaurant had the first three rows of tables, then there was another one with some rows and at least one other with another group of tables.  At the beginning of the rows there were staff from each restaurant trying to get the customer to sit in their section. Our guide said the restaurants served similar food.  We all enjoyed our lunch. 

I'll continue to share our trip but tonight I'm worn out.  We flew overnight Saturday and arrived at home at 6:00 am Sunday. I was able to get a couple of hours sleep on the plane and about 4 hours on Sunday. 

I'm linking with these parties. 

Oh Scrap

Stitching Stuff

Design Wall Monday

Monday Musing 

Goodnight All! 

**addendum -- evidently I was really tired... the date should be 4 - 1 - 2024 but I'm not messing with it now.  Sigh. **

Happy Quilting!  Bonnie