Tuesday, April 29, 2025

Flimsies in Waiting

 Lots of flimsies are waiting  to be quilted.

They have all moved to my work room quilt rack.

This post Next Up to Layer from a while ago,

featured  a few tops I finished and their corresponding backs.

Here is a compilation of what needs to be quilted.

The backs being ready 

makes an evening pinning frenzy much more fun.

Here are the five tops that have backs chosen/ready.



                                                                               



These are the tops that need to find  a back!








It always seems to be the part of quilting that takes the longest,

deciding which back to put on which quilt!

It is an agonizing thing for me to find the perfect back.

I don't try to make them match the front,

but I do like them to compliment the front design in some way.

Either picking up a colour, picking up a pattern,

or even picking up the general theme of the front.

Sometimes it's even the recipient that dictates what the back will be.

So this post will be a nice place to keep track of what I have

that is ready for layering.

I went to a guild Zoom presentation recently 

and the presenter was a very vibrant quilter from California.

She quilts under Pride and Joy quilting.

The most important take away for me

was her attitude about the outstanding projects

She moves on to other projects as soon as she wants.

It takes the joy out of things if you make it a job or a task. 

I really embrace  

that take on how to view your UFOs.

So this keeping track of my flimsies 

is only be a pleasurable task  for me and 

not a what I have to do type reminder.

Here are the last two added to the list 

and then on to some stitching!




Stay safe and sew on !

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Let's Get Some Stitching Done!

 I am just really itching to get stitching

My month-long holiday,

recovery time from the month of holiday, 

and catching up with family 

has kept me out of my sewing room way too long.

First up is some mending.

Redoing the bottom of some snow pants for next winter,




and putting some flaps on coverall pockets.

Finishing up a couple chores will let me get back into

quilting some tops.

In the meantime though, I found quite a few

new projects to fill my time.

I came across a quilter at Heartstrings doing a bunch

of different colour rail fences.


They would be good for a late night

stitching marathon, to get me back in the groove.

I did manage to finish up two charity tops.






I'm fast becoming a binding Queen!

Stay safe and sew on!

Linking up to :

To Do Tuesday

Design Wall Monday

Sew & Tell

Monday Musings




Wednesday, April 23, 2025

Pin Me Up & Show Me Off

 Over time I have discovered that 

many quilters seem to be

avid collectors of small items.

Personally, I seem to collect

buttons, beads, pins and odd costume rings.

I also seem to accidentally, collect commemorative pins.

You know the ones who have tucked away somewhere

from shop hops, quilt shows, shopping trips, special 

fund drives and special occasions.

They lived for a long while , stuffed in a drawer.

I finally found a great solution used by a few 

of my Quilting buddie.  

Put them on the wall hangings!  

So here they are !

The first is small wall quilt,

made by retired art quilter, Lorie S. 

 The perfectly pieced triangles are a 

great backdrop for these cute shopping and friendship pins.



The next display area is a small quilt I used to cover

one of my sewing machines.

The quilt itself is a memento of  great times,

 and the pins add to its charm by highlighting other adventures.


Many also get displayed on 

some of my nametags,

The pins get shown off at

 meetings until the 

lanyard gets too heavy and 

I have to move some of the weight to the wall displays.










Tuesday, April 15, 2025

Happy Holiday!

 Well there's nothing like being off the grid for a 

month to recharge your batteries and inspire your creativity.

A tropical trip with many adventures, both culinary

and active really sparked some 

interesting brain activity and memories.

A lovely tropical cruise provided

beautiful vistas,


 fantastic flora

and many animal encounters.

These nectar loving birds, Purple-throated Carib,

 were delightful to watch.



I hope you all missed me and now 

it's time to get back to blogging.

One of the highlights of the trip,

was a stop at the Caribbean Boutique Factory.


It wasn't actually a factory but a storefront and 

shop with demonstration area where 

visitors could peruse a wealth of beautifully

artistic batiks and learn about the 

process used to create them.

All the designs are individually drawn

using straight edges and freehand together

to create unique views of the islands.






Then, sequential alterations of dying and wax applications,

create the intense buildup of colors,

culminating in unique artistic pieces.






There are many all over patterned fabrics as well as

thematic art pieces suitable for framing.

It was a delightful visit.

Stay tuned for some more tales of  

our tropical adventure.


Linking up with :

Monday Musings

Monday Sew & Tell

Design Wall Monday

Wait Loss Wednesday

Put Your Foot Down

Free Motion Mavericks

Stash Report

Oh Scrap

Stitching Stuff

RSC 2025

Quilting & Patchwork

Design Wall Friday

Bolt To Beauty

Finished or Not Friday


Sunday, March 16, 2025

Fabric, fabric everywhere!

 

Wow, I see this year is 

really slipping away from us!

I am finally ready to make a sash report.

My goal was to not buy any fabric,

but I did end up with 2 m purchased for

donation into a raffle basket for the quilt show.



Does that even count?

I also ended up with about 2 m of free fabric

 from the give and take table at retreat.

It's teally ambiance was just too much for me to resist.



So my total for the year so far:

Fabric Purchased: 2 m

Fabric In to date: 4 m

Used to date 2024 : 2 m donation

                                           6 m twin log cabin

Scraps in : .5 m

Scraps out : 0   m

Net Fabric In:  -1.5 m


I've more stash than I can actually count 

so this year's goal is to:

Sew it up, quilt it down or pass it on.

Sure sounds good to me!

Now, what to do with these buttons!



Stay safe and so on!

Linking up with:

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Monday Musing

Design Wall Monday

Sew & Tell

To Do Tuesday

Wednesday Wait Loss

Needle & Thread Thursday

Put Your Foot Down

Free Motion Mavericks



Tuesday, March 11, 2025

Sea Glass is Rolling

 This found quilt is taking up a lot 

room on the design wall.


Last week's layering created a big wind and

took most of my laid out design down. 



Back up and working, it is about at the halfway mark.




The first corner finished up was

really a boost in enthusiasm!

It was lost in the archives for years

so any bit of progress is a finish!

Getting back to it after the Log Cabin finish,

 brought to light a few variations,

and you know how I love variations!

It turns out that I started my rows with the 

wrong colour squares. That calls for just a little bit of reworking

of the layout for other rows. It also makes it difficult to 

work from the lower right corner, 

without making the same mistake again.



It  seems that there are a different number

of rows across the quilt from one side to the other! 

That will result in either another added or 

one taken away somewhere. This is definitely turning to

 a little bit of an adventure.



I guess that's a bit predictable because 

sea glass rolls all over the ocean before it 

ends up on a beach to be admired.

Wish me luck and calm currents

while I finish up this greeny-blue beauty.

Updated!

Here it is all finished and ready!

It is in Scrap Basket Beauties by Kim Brackett


Stay safe and sew on !


Linking up with:

To Do Tuesday

Monday Musing

Design Wall Monday

Sew & Tell

Wednesday Wait Loss 

Needle & Thread Thursday

Put Your Foot Down

Free Motion Mavericks

Beauty Pageant

Finished or Not Friday

Off the Wall Friday

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Patchwork & Quilts

Oh Scrap!

SR.S Pitstop





Monday, March 3, 2025

Tower of Power


Organization is so empowering!
I was gifted a big tower of drawers.


            It precipitated a reorganizing of the sewing room. 

           The question for now is to what to put in the drawers.

               I think I will reevaluate the chunk piles

       that I have in my stash closet. My BB
recently took all her chunks and
cut them into workable strips,

and I think that might be the direction I am headed.

To start off, though, I'm getting projects ready for a retreat.

The chunks will move to the top of the list

if I get done with that.

My most popular size of scrap is 2 1/2".

I used up a goodly supply last year making

the stash buster Irish Chains.

There are still copious amounts of strips remaining.

Organization is great, but I feel that being

organized won't help you get anything done if

you don't spend time in the sewing room.

One particular blogger I follow, Kate over at

Life in Pieces

encourages us to track how much time we spend sewing.

A small goal will encourage us

all to make some time to get some stitching done. 

When we do that we often find that getting a little

stitching is good for our soul and ours psyche.

I think I will sort some more chunks

by color to ease up some of the stress

in my sewing room.

The center section is already color sorted,



but the two sections to the sides are

a jumble of recently acquired chunks from various sources.





I'll also may start storing 2 1/2 inch strips by color.

It would make for easier and

tidier set up when I'm ready to sew.

I will let it happen organically when

I'm working on projects.


Stay safe and sew on


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