Stopping To Stitch and Smell The Roses

This has been my summer project. I started making these "Rose Petals" last year to use up rose themed scraps and #10 crochet cotton. I've been using 4.5 inch scraps and have not run out of those yet. If I do I have a few smaller chunks I can use. I think I have 73 Rose Petals now and am working toward a total of 120. I will sew them together 10 x 12 and then crochet a border for a nice throw. 

I've used up three partial spools of a variety of pink crochet cottons. And as you can see I'm running low now of the spools I originally pulled out of my stash. I need to go through the two boxes again and see if there's anything I missed. Then I suppose I will move on and use white or cream.  When I was working in town I used to stop by the thrift stores every so often and pick up crochet cotton as well as other threads that is why I have a lot of partial spools. I used a lot of it when I crochet a shoe box of Barbie Doll clothes when the granddaughters were younger. And one year I made a lot of embroidered pillowcases with crocheted trim for Christmas gifts. I also used to crochet motifs for crazy quilting. Maybe I should tie a quilt with some of it. 

And every once in awhile I stop to smell the roses that the deer, rabbits, beetles and aphids leave for me.

Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is More Fun than Housework

Purple Haze

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge color of the month is PURPLE. 

I started my work with the 2 inch width scrap bin.  I didn't have many purple scraps in there so I cut a 2 inch strip for my Single Wedding Ring blocks from purple scrap chunks.  The blocks finish at 7.5 inches. 

 But these Sixteen Patch blocks all came from the 2 inch scrap bin that I am trying to empty. I think these blocks have been a RSC project for a couple of years so I'm hoping to have 120 of them by year end.  I believe I only have 41 more blocks to go. 

Purple haze, all in my brain

Lately things don't seem the same...

Rainbow Scrap Challenge ScrapHappy Saturday

Serendipity

It's a finish! 

Serendipity

61 x 85

I started this in May 2019.  You can read in that blog post about the reason I started making it, how it got the name Serendipity, how I made my blocks, how I DIDN'T make my blocks and the vintage quilt that inspired mine.  I think the block is a Stone Mason's Puzzle variation. 

I had so much fun making it that I finished the flimsy a few months later in September 2019. 

I quilted it on my DSM with swirls. Since my "neutral" in this quilt was blue-green (aqua, turquoise, teal) and since I had a partial spool of  blue-green thread I used that on top.  I had a partial spool of variegated blue thread I used in the bobbin. 

I had just enough of this fabric in my backings stash. I had to piece it and I'm glad I didn't have any cut up birds where I did the piecing although there are a few bird butts sticking out on the left hand side that I could not avoid. 

I think you can see the swirly quilting a little better in this photo. 

And of course the binding is scrappy blue-greens. 

Finished or Not Finished Friday at Alycia Quilts

Peacock Party at Wendy's Quilts and More

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is More Fun than Housework

Wednesday Wandering

I hope you are able to celebrate the day! 

We've had several unseasonably cool days so most of my time has been spent in the gardens instead of in the sewing room although I have been working on binding a quilt. You will see that finish on Friday I think. 

It's a Flimsy! HRT Ragout

HRT Ragout

60 x 80

It's a flimsy! 

I started making these Half Rectangle Triangles  (HRTs) in September 2018 as a Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) project to use scraps from the 4.5 width bin. 

I used a Tri-Rec ruler and cut a few pieces facing the wrong direction but I included those anyway. 

There's quite a mixture of prints, colors, neutrals - all from the 4.5 inch scrap bin which I hope to have emptied by year end. 

Since the start in September 2018 I just made a few HRTs each month using scraps from the 4.5 inch scrap bin in the RSC color of the month. Sometimes there would be lots of scraps in a color and sometimes hardly anything. I just used what scraps were in the bin only. 

I sewed the HRTs together randomly. 

I hope to finish this quilt this month so I'll declare it my 

OMG (One Monthly Goal) at Elm Street Quilts. 

Frippery

Frippery

It's a finish!

62 x 83

Last year I received a box of scraps that included some 4.5 inch shirt squares.  After I finished my quilt Scared Shirtless in September of last year I used the leftover solids...

...and sashed some sets of four squares.  And then left those blocks at the end of my ironing board until I could decide what to do with them.  (Ooops...I see a safety pin. As I quilt on my DSM I mark spots with a safety pin where I need to bury my knots. I guess I missed this one.)

In February of this year I decided to clear off the end of my ironing board and do something with the blocks and I ended up with a flimsy.  I first cut more squares from my box of old shirts and made enough blocks for a good sized donation quilt and then basically I kept sashing sets of four blocks until I could sash no more. 

After all the squares were sashed then my next set of four blocks was sashed with a wide floral and solid four patches as cornerstones as you see above. 

Then four of those blocks got sashed with a skinny solid and a floral cornerstone like the dark blue you see here...

...and the darker brown you see here. 

Then finally those blocks were sashed with the skinny floral with solid cornerstones. 

Then I backed it with a sheet and quilted it on my DSM with horizontal and vertical lines in light gray thread. I had just enough of that wild floral to use for binding. 

Finished or Not Finished Friday at Alycia Quilts

Peacock Party at Wendy's Quilts and More

Wednesday Wandering

I've been working on clearing out my 4.5 inch width scrap bin. This is probably (or maybe not) the last quilt I will get out of the scraps in there. It's a simple Coin type quilt. The layout will be six blocks across and 20 down for a finished quilt of 60 x 80.  I made 60 blocks in the L-D-L-D-L combination and 60 blocks in the D-L-D-L-D combination. 

Any pieces left that were two squares or less were cut into squares. Looks like scraps that are around awhile get a little hairy.  I'm not sure what I will do with the squares except store them in a container for awhile with the other sizes of scraps. I do have a bin of 4.5 inch units of different types I've also been trying to clear out (so far I've made Whigmaleerie and Pea Soup flimsies) so I toyed with the idea of alternating some of those units with squares but I'll save those thoughts for another time when it's not too hot to think. 

So now my 4.5 inch bin has strips that will yield more than two 4.5 inch squares and a bag of pieces less than a 4.5 inch square.  I will sort the bag of pieces into colors and sew them together into strips because I've been doing that for a couple of years now with my various widths of scraps and I'm thinking this year I will make a Coins quilt with everything I find in that box.  I'm not sure what I will do with the remaining strips...store them with scrap chunks from now on since I keep scrap chunks by color? Or make some four patches with some? Or HSTs? Or...again, too hot to think clearly!

When it's too hot to think I take a walk in the flower garden and enjoy the sights, sounds and fragrances.  A monarch posed for me on the Joe Pye Weed. 

I liked this photo because in the top right I can see a hoverfly (or maybe it's a sweat bee) ready to zoom in and there's already a bumble bee in shadow already on the flower. 

I used to go around the property and try to identify weeds that were native so I would know if they were pretty weeds or nasty weeds when I found them sprouting up in my flower garden. About five years ago when I learned about Joe Pye Weed I dug a little piece of it up from the side of our field and put it into the flower garden so I could attract pollinators and butterflies and see them in action. Now I have a giant patch of it. 

Skipper twins or boyfriend and girlfriend? Did they just stop over for a snack while on a journey to elsewhere or are they here to stay for awhile? 

Remember those five inch pieces I had left over after making my Churn Dash flimsy earlier this year? I've slowly been making Hatchet blocks and have 155 toward my goal of 252. I still have some scraps and keep a little basket of them cut into five inch squares paired with their 2.5 inch corners near my sewing machine to use as leader/enders. I cut a little each day and iron the flippy corners in half diagonally and use the ironed line as my stitching line. 

Postage Stamp blocks are also leader/enders. I usually have a pile of them that need rows sewn together at the back of my sewing machine. Ooops...you caught me...I do sew over pins. 

I've been clearing out my 1.5 inch width scrap bin and most pieces are little more than a square now. I cut a few squares each day to add to my pencil box. 

I also have been cutting some of my 4.5 inch rose themed scraps into squares. I match up two squares and sew them together right sides together leaving a little opening for turning right side out. This is another leader/ender. I use the squares for my crochet fusion quilt I work on in the evenings. I blanket stitch around the edges and then crochet around the edges. Later all squares will be joined together. 

I dug a hill of potatoes (only 49 more to go) to see what was in there. I let them dry (or cure?) on the deck table. Shouldn't leave them too long or they will turn green. I don't think I ever peel homegrown potatoes- french fries, mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, augratin potatoes- they all contain peels around here. 

I pulled up about a third of one of four rows of onions. One row we have been eating for about a month as green onions. 

Now that all my chicken scratch is finished I've been sloooooowly working on getting my quilt sashed. Maybe someday soon Grandma's Apron Strings will be a flimsy. 

I save a lot of my zucchini, squash, pumpkin and melon seeds for planting the following year. I labeled these seeds as butternut squash. Wrong!!! That's an Emerald Gem cantaloupe - an heirloom variety that has been around since 1886.  

This is a Butternut squash. And to think a few weeks ago I thought I was going to have to hand pollinate my vining crops. Oh, I'm getting hungry for candied squash. 

I've also been trying to pair up a few flimsies with some possible backings so I can get those pieced and then move forward to pin basting. 

And from time to time I still stop and smell the roses.