It's finally Fall! - What I've been working on

I had high hopes for the summer, but the weather was too nice to be in my basement sewing studio.

We had a very long, wet spring, but summer was glorious and the warm weather just ended this past week. Unfortunately the last month was smoke-filled due to numerous forest fires near us on both sides of the border. Fall is definitely here, but we may even have snow next week!! Work kept me busy, but now we are winding down a big project, so I'll have more free time.

I finally have felt some motivation to start putzing and getting things organized, and as I'm going along, I finishing a few things.

I pulled out a cutting project that stalled, and in small increments this week, I got it finished up.

It is all the pieces for Bonnie Hunter's Jingle Bell Square, even the sashings.(Pattern found in her book Addicted to Scraps - ps: the book is on sale, with a free pattern as well). I'm saving this to assemble during my Christmas break. I have done some test blocks, so I have 3 of 49 blocks done. See those red/green 1" strips? Instead of cutting out the strips separately, I sewed the strips together and cut the 4 matching pairs. This will save me a lot of time later on.

Strip sets ready for cutting!

A look at my messy work area. I do all my piecing on a 1947 Featherweight.

More projects behind the machine - each basket has parts for future scrappy quilts.

This project was a great way to use up some old Christmas fabrics - a lot came from my mom's collection and from fabric bags she made. She's been gone for 22 years now, so it is going to be a great memory quilt for one of my daughers.

Next up today - opening up my new-to-me 222 Featherweight!  I've dreamed of owning one of these for a long time. I can't wait to try it out.

Have a great day,

Terri

To-Do Tuesday - Week of Dec 29, 2020 to January 4, 2020

 Merry Christmas and very Happy (better) New Year! Let's all hope that we can put the dumpster fire of 2020 behind us, and that 2021 is the best it can be.

Depression raised its ugly head again, and although I was able to function somewhat normally for work and family relationships, my personal well-being took a hit. I was looking forward at the beginning of the year to have a dedicated crafting/sewing space again, but as much as I am happy with it, I was not motivated at all. I've had a quilt beside me to bind for months now, and have only managed to stitch 1 1/2 sides. 

Blogging has always helped me get motivated and accountable to myself, so here I go once again.

Here is this week's to-do list:

1. Box up, sort, purge and organize back room, in preparation for the installation of a mini-kitchen area. This has become a dumping area over the last nine months, and I can't use the excuse of no time anymore! (Keeping it real here!)

Fridge alcove and sink/counter area to the left.

Sink/counter area is now on the right - it won't be big but the sink will be big enough to clean paint brushes and the counter to make a coffee! The front area is only about 7 ft wide, enough for a small table perhaps.

This wall is opposite the counter area. It will mainly be overflow storage for projects and supplies. The garage door can be seen in the background.

2, Finish binding this damn quilt! It guilts me every day!

3. Use a past project UFO  to use as a Leader/Ender project for the week. I've picked On Ringo Lake, a mystery quilt from Bonnie Hunter. I am still on Step 2, and I'd like to complete it this week! 

It has been sitting like this for about a month now. It's not the best pic, it's a bit gloomy today, but you can see some finished units in the upper left hand corner of the board.

Bonus project: I bought a little footstool on Facebook Marketplace sometime ago (maybe a year?), and want to recover the top, make a new lining for the inside and the underside of the top and paint it for my sitting room. I love hand-sewing and embroidery, and it would be nice to keep my supplies handy. I would love to finish this project this week, but only if I get the decluttering done.

It is definitely home-made, but with some interesting details. I'll take of the old cover and pad the new top a little better, I suspect it only has layers of fabric as it isn't very soft as a footstool. I have a piece of fabric I created from selvedges that I think would make a great cover.

As much as that under-top pocket looks in good shape, it is a pretty loose weave and some of the stitching has let go. It's also grimy on the edges and a little musty, so I would like to replace it.

I'm joining the Tuesday To Do Linky Party over at Home Sewn by Us for the first time. I hope to keep it up this coming year as a motivation to move some of my UFOS along! 

The last few years, I have chosen a word to represent what I'd like to achieve for the year. Some past words have been Joy, Nurture, Focus. I'm considering what to use this year, using what I've learned this year. The impact of COVID-19 has changed so much this year, and I'm going to use my blog as a journal this coming year, with some reflections and changes I'm going to make moving forward.

As far as my family and I go, we have been fortunate not to suffer the effects of the disease itself, nor any of the economic suffering of others. We have been incredibly grateful for these blessings, and are doing our part following our government guidelines and wearing masks to protect others, so that maybe our community can reopen sooner rather than later. I hope you and yours remain safe. 

Until next time, 

Terri in BC

Scraphappy Saturday!

Today is the last Saturday of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, and I finally feel like I am getting my groove back.  First, I had to find my room! It had become a dumping ground long before Christmas, and I only had enough room to sew some of those last minute finishes. More on that in an upcoming post!

Last week, I finally was able to start tackling my scraps. I thought this was all I was going to accomplish for the month:

Garlic Knots by Bonnie Hunter (not a free patern)

But then my best friend gifted me with her leftovers from a project, which just happened to include red (we have a deal - she agreed not to throw out her scraps, and I'll let her pick through my stash when she needs something):

And this morning I started cutting down the smaller pieces to fit in my scrap-user's system, and made one more block (in just 15 minutes!)

Then I filed everything away in my scrappy block box. I call it Crummy Monday because I used to tackle all my scraps created in a week on a Monday night, a habit I'd like to get back in to.

After adding my new blocks, I decided to document the progress I've made so far:

Boxy Stars by Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville (Free pattern)

String Blocks (tutorial by Bonnie Hunter here) 

Crumb Blocks (adapted from Bonnie Hunter's Crumb quilt) free pattern

Polaroid Blocks - I'm not sure who started this trend, but here is a link to a great tutorial that demonstrates the way I make them when I have a lot of blocks to do.

 I'm also committing to posting more, for my own benefit. Here are some future posts I have planned:

What I can accomplish is just 15 minutes


How to "make" money when cleaning your scraproom

Table runner made with leftover blocks (a quick tutorial)

 Have a great week,

         Terri in BC

The best laid plans...

I had finished my 4-patches from Step One of Bonnie Hunter's En Provence mystery quilt Friday night, but ran out of neutrals for Step Two. I'm using white and light cream tone-on-tones so Saturday I headed off to Hamel's and between their remnant baskets, their fat quarter selection and their 20% off regular fabric sale, I picked up about 3 more metres.  I also bought myself a Christmas present:

By the Fireplace is a pattern by a local designer, Barb of Coach House Designs.  She actually is located only a few blocks from my home.  It was designed using Aspen Frost by Basic Grey, and Hamels has several kits with this original fabric in it.  I couldn't resist after seeing the original on display as I entered Hamels, so I bought the kit!

Since I was babysitting my grandson, I decided to wait until evening to sew, and we set about starting to decorate.  Unfortunately, I had an accident and ended up here:

Thank goodness my daughter Sarah was visiting and was able to help me out of the house and to the hospital.  I'll be spending the next little while on the sofa like this:

Of course, it had to be my "driving" leg.  Nothing was broken on the X-ray, but until the swelling goes down, they can't tell what kind of damage I did to my knee. It seems to involve the lateral collateral ligament and possibly the meniscus, and hopefully is only a sprain and not a tear. Since it's been two days, and I still can't put any weight on it, I'm not optimistic. This is how I'll be spending the week until my doctor can check me out on Friday when the swelling will hopefully be down. Luckily, I can still work from home so I won't lose any pay.

Until I can find a way to prop my leg up and sit at a table to cut and sew, I'm stalled so nothing to do but surf the net and dream! (and knit, and hand-sew). I found this new-to-me blog, Crazy Quilter on a Bike, who is going to do Motivational Mondays throughout 2017, and will also share tips on how she going to make changes to manage her UFOs, sewing space and keep herself accountable.  I for one find that blogging helps me stay motivated and I am pledging to blog at least 3 times a week, even if I am the only one to read it! 

Linking up to: http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2016/12/mystery-monday-link-up-part-2.html and hope to join back in next week!

Bonnie Hunter's latest Mystery quilt has begun!

Wow, I didn't realize how long it's been since I have blogged.  It's been a busy year and I have been sewing, just not much time for writing!  More about what I have been up to later.

Today is about sharing my progress on Bonnie's newest mystery quilt project, En Provence. Last year, I only made a few pieces and then never got back to it, so this year I'm in, full force.

These photos above are Bonnie's inspiration photos.  Although I love the colours, I have pretty much depleted my purples, greens and yellows with her Easy Street and Celtic Solstice patterns, so I went to my stash to see what I had a lot of.  Apparently, I like to buy turquoise and aqua so I went to the internet and found some images when I googled "sea glass". Trying to find sources for these images is like getting into the endless loop on the phone, so I listed the best one I could find.

(image: postris.com - links back to pinterest)

(image: sealevel320.com)

(image: lighthousememories.ca)

(image: blog.frankiefoto.com)

I've also been inspired to set up a new board on my Pinterest account - I'll be filling it up soon! So many great ideas. Thanks to the photos, I was able to pull these colours from my stash:

It will definitely be a softer look than if I used Bonnie's colours, but I already love it. I'm not sure how they will be used yet, I'm going to wait and select them as the various clues come out.

I also choose to use a sand colour for my constant, so off to Hamels I went.  I found this in their warehouse sale section, just $8/metre:

It's from the Little House on the Prairie line, with clouds and grass and "dunes" that will work perfectly for a beach theme. I'll just have to make sure I don't have the wagon, sod house or Laura Ingalls in her prairie dress showing up!

Because of my sand-coloured constant, I have chosen to only use white and light off-whites for my neutrals. There might be a little grey that shows up as well ;o). They look darker in the picture because our rainy, gloomy winter season has begun!

Bonnie Hunter's 2015 Mystery Quilt-a-long has started! Allietare, Link-up #1

It's that time of year again - when Bonnie Hunter thanks all her followers with a free mystery quilt-a-long! I have participated for the last 4 years, with 2 finished quilts, 1 flimsy and 1 still in pieces to show for it!

This year I had decided that I have way too many projects started, and I wasn't going to do the mystery - but...

I couldn't resist the pull!  I'm only going to make about 1/16th of each of the units, in the hopes I end up with a pillow-size finish.  I haven't pulled my fabrics - I'll do that as each step is released but I did get my first 20 units of Step 1 done. (294/16 = 18.375 rounded up to 20).

How did I come up with 1/16th?  Bonnie usually does large quilts, between a double and queen - so I estimated her quilt will finish at about 80x80; 1/4 is 40x40; 1/16 should be about 20x20 - a nice size pillow cover.

I've used the same grey in several quilts already, and this is the very last of it. I will miss it!

Here are my other Mystery quilts, finished and in progress:

Orca Bay - my first and favourite!  It wasn't until this year that I realized I had made a mistake in assembling the blocks - can you find it? That's the beauty of scrappy quilts - they hide a multitude of mistakes.

Easy Street - the biggest quilt I have ever made.  I upsized this to King-size and gifted it to my daughter and her husband. Quilt-inspector Daisy approved.

Celtic Solstice - I down-sized this one to about twin-size and changed the border. Still in the queue to be quilted.

And finally, Grand Illusion:

I decided to stay within a single designer and mostly one fabric line (Jason Yenter/Shangri-la), but I am not happy working with such limited fabrics. Bonnie's quilts deserve to be scrappy, and appeal to my sense of adventure.  I have finished Step One and working on Step Two.  I'm going to finish up the units I have started, and maybe assemble a smaller quilt.

Be sure to check out what everyone else has been up to at the Linky Party on Bonnie's blog.

  

Yesterday's 15 minutes

I did my mandatory (to me) 15 minutes in the sewing room again yesterday, and it turned into 2 hours.  I grabbed the first thing I saw, and finished up this future cushion cover flimsy:

 

The block started out as "Idaho Square Dance" from Quiltmaker's Addicted to Scraps column (a Bonnie Hunter column) and it just grew to use up the 1/2 pack of a charm pack I received from the quilt guild I belong to. Unfortunately, I don't have any left (unless you count about 5 1" squares in the Omigosh quilt bin), so I'll have to figure out something for the backing.

 

I'm going to quilt it with "organic" straight lines (fancy way of saying I'm not stressing if they aren't straight and evenly-spaced), then I'll finish it up and put it away for a Christmas present.

Merry Christmas from BC, Canada - I'm joining Bonnie's Christmas Eve Linky Party!

Today my muse, Bonnie Hunter is hosting a Linky Party to share our favourite Christmas sewing projects!  I first discovered Bonnie in 2010 when I discovered the wonderful world of quilting blogs, and I haven't stopped sewing since!

 

I first learned to sew when I was a child, and designed and made my own Barbie clothes. I made Christmas presents for my daughters every year, even if I didn't do any other sewing for the year.  Since my sister and I became grammas six years ago, we revived our mother's tradition of "goodie bags" but the bags are now pillowcases!

 

 

This year's lineup - packed and ready to go!  I'm glad I have a room in the process of painting and new trim so that I can hide everything.  My sister and I have a deal, she does the shopping and I supply the fabric and make the pillowcases (I think I get the better end of the deal cuz I hate shopping for anything other than fabric).  They're just filled with small, inexpensive items like toothbrushes, socks, a small toy, coloring books and crayons, etc.  It gives the kids plenty to do when we have our joint family gathering on Boxing Day (the day after Christmas for my American friends).

 

 

 

Last year's lineup.   The two purple ones went with my Easy Street quilt that I gave to my daughter and her husband (I like to make matching pillowcases when I gift a quilt, and use one to wrap it in.) The last one is a Super Mario pillowcase for my oldest grandnephew, to go with the quilt that is still under construction.  Now that the Christmas sewing is done, that's the next project on the list.

 

 

The kids love their pillowcases so much that they insist on having a pillow in each one.  My grandson now has six pillows piled on his bed!  My daughter wants to kill me - just kidding!

 

 

Christmas 2014

 

I also make pyjamas for the kids every Christmas.  Zoey calls these ones her "Frozen" pyjamas because they have snowflakes on them and insists on wearing them every night, even during the heat of summer.  They still fit a year later - I'm glad I made them a bit big.

 

 

The Christmas project I am most proud of is my tree skirt.  (I must remember to take a picture of it quilted.) It is foundation-paper-pieced from a Judy Niemeyer pattern and I love how it turned out.  I used all batiks except for the white areas, they have a silver snowflake pattern printed on the white.  I love how it sparkles under the tree.

 

Have a wonderful Christmas, Kwaanza, Hanukkah, Diwali, Solstice or other holiday you may celebrate as this year ends, and I hope you have the best year ever in 2015! 

 

Slow and steady will get me there!

As I have done in previous years, I am using Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt as Leaders and Enders while I finish my Christmas sewing.  Last night, I finished a Christmas Countdown calendar from a panel for my oldest daughter:

 

 

I put my snips to show that behind each door is a little pocket, created by folding the fabric. She plans on putting little notes for activities they can do leading up until Christmas.

 

 

I did a fold over of the backing to create a self-binding, and I tried something new - making a mitred corner with the self-binding.  It was a little tricky and not perfect, but with practice it will improve.

 

Tonight I finished the five pillowcases I started on Sunday:

 

 

And I managed to get 30 more HSTs done on my Grand Illusion quilt.

 

My sister and I use the pillowcases as "Gramma goodie bags" for our family get-together on Boxing Day.  She's in charge of finding the goodies (little gifts like colouring books, small toys and socks) and I make the pillowcases. My mom started this tradition when our kids were little, and we are carrying it on in her memory. I've written about it before - click here.

 

 Two pillowcases were already done, and I only needed to make four, but I made an extra Olaf one. Now I've decided to use the Olaf ones for my older grandkids on Christmas Day, so I have to make one more for Boxing Day!

 

After I finished up for the evening, I got the next 20 HSTs ready for sewing.  Now I have no excuses when I have 15 minutes of free time! 

 

Grand Illusion total:

 

50 of 280 Half-square triangles done

100 black squares cut

Still need to buy yellow fabric (waiting for my local quilt shop's Saturday sale, on the first of every month they have all regular price fabric 20% off)

 



Grand Illusion Week #1 Link Up

 

I didn't think I would be starting Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt with the rest of the world because I was supposed to be on a beach in Mexico, but a "Series of Unfortunate Events" allowed me to join the fun (read more here).

 

 

My fabrics have been chosen - all from my stash.  I still need to get the yellow constant, but I am using these beautiful Jason Yenter prints I bought late last year.  I'm going to substitute the pastels for the neutrals (and I still want to get a soft blue), and I'm using blue instead of the aqua.  The yellow I want to get is a creamy yellow, like butter, which is in the backing fabric on the bottom and in the background of the top piece of pink fabric.  I have 4 different tone-on-tone blacks/dark greys, including one that has a cat and one that has sharks!

 

 

I've done all the cutting for the first step, with the exception of the yellow.  It's not a problem because until I get all my Christmas sewing done, these will be my leader/ender project.

 

 

I will be piecing on my 1937 Featherweight that I acquired thanks to Bonnie introducing me to vintage machines. I do the majority of my sewing on this little beauty!

 

 

Last night, I was ready to start!  I've started the 5 pillowcases I need to make for Christmas and in between, I fed those HST through the machine!

 

 

I had 20 done in no time!  Thanks, Bonnie, for another beautiful mystery quilt.  I can't wait to see the reveal!

 

Linking up to Bonnie's Monday Link Up - check it out to see how many others are participating this year!