Loud and Noisy

 My laptop sounds like a freight train...run through the middle of the house...I don't think it's supposed to sound like that. It takes at least 3+ minutes to open any application...some, like my beloved Excel, won't open at all. I think my laptop is over 10 years old (originally Windows 7)...she's been hardworking and fun but I think it might be time to for her to retire. Shhhhh....don't tell her but I'm going to buy a new laptop tomorrow. There may be bad words said later this week as I try to set the new one up.

Did you sew on National Quilting Day? I did. I've actually done pretty good this past week and sewed a bit every day (more like every night, I'm a late night sewer).

I tacked down Angela's quilt and donated it to Quilts for Kids.

So cute.

I made two pillowcases and also donated them.

 

 

I love the sheep with the stripes!!

Got my March Aunt Daisy units done.

 

I still have to trim them to size.

And got two of my March UFO blocks made.

 I think I have four blocks left. I'm going to try to make one a day. Then maybe next weekend I'll put the quilt top together.  We'll see.

Okay. My laptop is getting louder and louder, I better hit Publish before it blows up. YIKES!

I'm Tired

 I spent all of last week in Palo Alto California and drove home today. It's about an 8 hour drive. The weather was good and traffic was light but it is a long drive.

My friend Angela has a garage sale / estate sale / free item knack that is almost magical. She's the one who rescued a Singer Featherweight from a dumpster last year.  A few weeks ago she went to an estate sale for a women who taught adult ed sewing (mostly garment sewing) and who was a quilter. The day after the sale ended everything was free. Angela couldn't stand that all the left over fabric and other sewing related items were headed for the landfill so she took it all...

This is a very small part of the fabric she picked up. She also got a huge bag of upholstery batting, a large roll of Hobbes quilting batting, lots of different types of inter facings and stabilizers, quilting books, and garment fabric. It was fun to sort through it all. A lot is going to be donated, but we both kept a lot.

Angela is a beginning quilter so a lot of the week was spent teaching her. This is what her dining room looked like for most of the week.

She made the heart and did the in-the-ditch quilting, I did the stipple quilting, and she learned how to add binding.

She also learned how to add borders.

And quilting with a walking foot.

One item in with all the scraps was all the pieces and parts for a rooster pin cushion.

I made it. So easy.

Speaking of pin cushions...my secret sewing last week was this folded star pin cushion.

I saw a tutorial from Shabby Fabrics a few weeks ago and loved this pin cushion. The fabrics are all from my stash. I knew when I put all the brights together that it had to go to Stephanie. I also got to have lunch with her while I was in California and gave it to her then. 

I've only been home a few hours but I miss my friends already!

Short and Sweet

 Lots of flying geese, lots of cutting, and some secret sewing, so not much to show this week.

Still need to square the last batch (flock) of geese and sew them into twos. Got all the hour glass units cut and the diagonal line marked.

This is Bella pretending to be a lap cat. She does pretty good until she sees a bird in the backyard.

Hopefully I'll have something a little bit more interesting to show next week.

Gonna be a Busy Month

 

I'm doing a lot better. I finished putting together the top of my February UFO Challenge project.

Bella is such a ham! I had hoped to have it quilted also, but I have a good excuse to procrastinate...keep reading.

I think the yellow pop border helps tone down the yellow in the quilt. I love the fabric I found for the border. Don't tell anyone but I bought it at Joann's. I know, no more fabric snob. Oh well, it was the perfect fabric for this colorful quilt.

And I picked up the perfect flannel back at the last Quilts for Kids meeting.

Want to see a magic trick? Now you see it...

And now you don't!

I decided I wanted a real long arm quilting machine so I have ordered a Handi Quilter Moxie. It comes with a quilt frame so I needed to sell my old one. WOW! took less than one day. Major happy dancing occurred. Hmmmm, wonder if I should have asked for more $$$. Don't care I'm so happy it sold so quickly and the person buying it was happy too. I am keeping the Juki, love that machine.

The Moxie should arrive later this month. I plan on giving her a good workout, as I have at least 8 quilts in queue!

The March UFO Challenge number was #3 (hmmm, coincidence?) which happens to be the Daphne quilt I started last year. All of the blocks were cut out last night along with fabric for the rest of the Aunt Daisy double flying geese units. The second step for Aunt Daisy was released today - 64 hourglass or quarter square triangles. Yikes!

I see lots of piecing and squaring up in my future.

90% Better

 

 Thank you for your well wishes. I can stand, walk and sit for longer periods of time without any pain. Surprisingly what bothers my hip is sewing. Must be the pedal movement. So I'm limited to 15-30 minutes of sewing time, but unlimited cutting, ironing and squaring up time.

It's surprising how much you can get done in such a short amount of time (and a week to do it in). The sashing has been added to the cat sampler quilt.

 

 

I've also gotten the borders and binding cut. 

 

Found the cutest border fabric at Joann's. This quilt is going to bright!

Half of the flying geese for my Aunt Daisy quilt are made and squared up. 

I love my Bloc-Loc flying geese rulers. Makes it so easy to trim these to size. I'm hoping to have the rest cut out by the end of this week.

I also made four pillowcases to donate to the Kiwanis Quilts for Kids program.

Every time I go to the monthly meeting I swear I'm not going to bring anything back with me. I'm weak. I picked up fabric to make more pillowcases.

The sheep are soooo stinking cute! There is enough there to make body and cuff from each piece.

A panel and coordinating fabric.

The green in the upper right is an ombre - I'll use that for the back.

I know I said never ever again. But I picked up six small quilts to be quilted, plus some flannel for backing.

These are nicely made and should be quick to quilt. Jo Anne, the project coordinator stopped by today and dropped off another quilt plus back for quilting and a kit that requires some fussy cutting. I'm going to be busy.

Now I need to get the Juki back from her spa vacation. She's been goofing off for far too long.

 

I'm a Wuss

 These are my new best friends...

The couch, my Kindle, rice bag, Cold & Hot Menthol Patch, and naproxen sodium (generic Aleve). I forgot to include the ice pack. Bella is under the quilt hogging both the quilt and the couch - which she has done all week.

I pinched a nerve in my hip and until yesterday I have not been able to sit or walk for any length of time without very sharp pain. Today has been much better but I'm still uncomfortable. 

I did manage to cut out half of the Aunt Daisy double flying geese blocks and prep my February UFO early last week.

Hopefully I will be able to sit long enough to do some sewing soon. (I'm soooo bored of reading!)

Hope you all had a lovely Valentine's Day. I'm going to go hug my ice pack. ;o\

Third Times the Charm and Other Random Things

 

Okay, my third red and white project I was willing to give up.

I cross stitched the blue couch pocket (I have no idea what these are called) over 35 years ago...remember Creative Circle? I have always liked / used mine and thought I'd try my hand at making one using the last of the chicken scratch embroidered red gingham. I ended up making two. Really easy to make and I thought they turned out fantastic. I took the one on the right to the guild exchange and the person who received it loved it.

 Good thing I love red gingham cause this cute cat apron was what I received. Everyone was so creative...there were aprons, table runners, mug rugs, bowl cozies, pot holders and more.

I decided to make myself a sewing mat. I'm hoping if things are in pockets Bella won't be able to get at them.

How does she do that! She wasn't there when I focused the phone camera on the mat. So maybe it won't work.

 

 

 The fabrics are from a Tula Pink bundle gifted to me from Donna. I plan on making a matching pin cushion and pop-up basket. It was fun to use such bright fabrics.

I've been collecting blue reproduction and shirting fabrics for a while. I thought about making a scrappy jewel box or Jacob's ladder quilt with them. Obviously not very excited about making the quilt cause those blues have been sitting around for a few years.

 

Shasta of High Road Quilter shared a link to a quilt she is planning on making. Well, I fell in LOVE!! The quilt is Aunt Daisy, you can find it here. Yes, I'm going to make it in blues, and yes, I'm going to make it king sized. Vanessa's quilt along is a unit-of-the-month which will make this very large quilt very doable. All my fabric is ironed and ready for cutting the first unit - double flying geese.

I saw these at Joann's last week...thought they were soooo cute but did not buy either.

 

I took the Juki in for a spa treatment. My mom complains that the prices of everything has gone up since Covid. She's right. The repair shop had the following sign posted: