There was almost no sewing done last week...I tried to sew the guild community service blocks yesterday but there was a problem...

These were precut by a guild member - one block per baggie. A rail fence block must be square...these were 5 x 6 inches. I had picked up four baggies and they were all the same.

I've made a little bit of progress on my English Garden blackwork. Tuesday morning I worked on the far upper left section...Tuesday afternoon I took it all out. I consistently missed a stitch in each flower...eight flowers...adds up. Jack and I are good buddies.

Garage sale finds...love the greens.

Donated blood on Friday...8 units equals one gallon!!! Add that to what I donated in Roseville and I am over ten gallons!!!  Yay me!!
 

I tried to work on my July UFO - Aunt Addy. I started with Plan A.

But I wasn't sure I had enough of the tan fabric so I auditioned Plan B, C and D, didn't like them so I went shopping.

I really like Plan E's gold fabric I purchased with this floral from my stash...I like it too much...more than I like the blocks. Soooooo...

 Back to Plan A. I went back over my math and decided to just go for it. Luckily I had enough of the tan with a little bit left over. This week I'll get the top pieced. I may put a thin border of red between the tan and brown border fabric.

My cat is weird.  No bugs or lizards. But she sits facing the door everyday. Maybe she's holding down the carpet so it doesn't fly away. ??

More Finishes

 I finished my artist trading cards (ATCs) yesterday.

We will trading the cards at our August 2nd guild meeting. They were pretty easy to do with minor hand cramps cutting out the sewing machines.

I also also made a back, quilted, bound and donated the largest of of the three quilts I made from Donna blocks to Quilts for Kids. Love the polka dot back.

I also pieced a simple quilt for my guild community services.

The tumblers are made from flannel, a little stretchy but it turned out cute.

Blocks for another guild community service quilt. I picked up more at today's guild meeting. They make perfect leader-enders.

Bella sits, facing the front door and just stares at it...guard cat? no, she's hoping a bug or lizard will crawl under the door into the house. She does the same thing in the garage. She has better luck in the garage.

Artist Trading Cards

 

I keep thinking today is Sunday...

Last week was a busy week. Tuesday I took a road trip to a not very close quilt shop that is going out of business (well, moving to Idaho). I was good and bad. The good, backs for four quilts - the three quilts I finished last week got the same back...9 yards of the gray dots.

The stripe is from my stash and will be the binding on all the quilts.

And four yards of this blue for the Christmas Paisley quilt (the colors are way off in this picture but it is a perfect match).

I also bought a quilt kit for the fabric (pattern is too cutesy for me but I love the fabric), some shirting fat quarters, and four yards of a tweedy looking black that I just love. I don't feel bad about the purchases as everything was 50% off.

Nancy drove up Friday for a quick visit. She is getting read to move to South Carolina and wanted to visit while it was a six hour drive versus a 6 hour flight. Friday we gabbed and gabbed, Saturday we drove up to Crater Lake - so sad, there are three larges fires in the area, you couldn't see the other side of the lake due to the smoke, Sunday was a sew day and she left early this morning. It was so great to see her. I'm looking forward to visiting her in South Carolina and seeing her new house next year.

My quilt guild has a new challenge and I joined in. Have you ever make Artist Trading Cards (ATCs)? I haven't. The challenge was issued last month and we are trading the cards at our August 2nd meeting. While Nancy was working on a baby quilt for a grand-niece I made a proto-type.

Not overly "artistic" but it will have to do. I spent today making 17 more. I have the buttons to sew on and a signature card to attach then I'll be done. I'm pretty proud of myself that I didn't procrastinate and fret on the design until the last minute.

I had another new visitor...

Mama kept a close eye on Bella while the little one played all over the yard. Too cute!

Quilt Five - The Last One

 

The last for the moment anyways. According to my spreadsheet I still have 11 items that need to be quilted and I'm about to add three more.

This is my version of the Fat Quarter Shop's Threadology quilt. For the most part I really like how this one turned. This is another quilt that had tension issues. I had already trimmed the quilt when the long arm quilter offered to fix the quilts. This one isn't as bad so I'm letting it be. I love the backing fabric I found for it.

I knew it!

I knew I already had a background fabric for the ornament wall hanging! I found a baggie that had what I thought were scraps. When I looked closer I found the green fabric I thought I'd used in another quilt AND all the strips were already cut for the ornament wall hanging. I don't think this will get done this year. I'll probably add it to my 2022 UFO Challenge list.

I was actually looking for a specific project, got fed up searching all the tote boxes and decided to number and inventory everything in my tote boxes....yup, two days later everything is listed in a spreadsheet: kit description, pattern if any, and a detailed list of all the fabrics with yardage. I will not embarrass myself by telling you how many totes/kits/yards of fabric I have. Lets just say I need to make sure I never buy fabric again and have to live for another 20 years minimum to hopefully finish them all.

Speaking of UFO Challenge, July's project is to do something with my Aunt Addy blocks. This was a Kathleen Tracy mystery but I wasn't crazy about the final layout. I know what I want to do but don't have a background fabric I like...so much for the never shopping again thought.

This past week I made my second set of blocks for the Daphne quilt by Shabby Fabrics. I think I was suppose to make these last month...oh well.

While visiting Donna last month, she decided to clean out her closets and gifted me a number of kits that she was no longer interested in. She also gifted me 70 already made blocks. I'm going to turn them into donation quilts.

First top is finished. This is a smaller version of how the blocks were supposed to laid out.

I'm also going to make two smaller quilts using this lay out and adding a border. One is almost done.

Isn't she the cutest! This little stinker showed up at my back door yesterday. She really really wanted in the house. Bella was on this side of the screen door. The kitten would hiss at Bella then beg to come in...hiss at Bella some more then bang on the door to come in...too funny.