A Whole Lot Of Scrap Busting

Shoofly

10.5 inch blocks

Red is the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color for this month so I've been mostly working with red scraps to make my blocks. Then I noticed I was close to my target on several block sets so some other colors crept in. 

Shoofly

10.5 inch blocks

I have been making these from 4 inch width scraps since last year. I have a box of scraps that width - most have been given to me by others - that I've been trying to empty. To make the Shoofly blocks I've been pulling out the longest strips in the color of the month and one other color. 

My goal was 35 blocks and now I have made that goal and I have a complete block set for a 5 x 7 layout. For now the block set will go into the SAR (Some Assembly Required) bin. 

Now I can mark this block off my list of RSC projects. 

Broken Dishes

7 inch blocks

With shorter 4 inch width pieces I've been making Broken Dishes blocks in the RSC color of the month plus one other color. I've also been making these blocks since last year. 

This week after I made my blocks with red scraps I noticed I only needed 12 more blocks toward my goal of 88 blocks...

...so I made 12 more blocks from the remaining scraps in the 4 inch width scrap box. 

Now this is another block set completed and ready to go to the SAR bin.  They will be set 8 x 11. 

Hollow Nine

10.5 inch blocks

These are made with 4 inch squares. 

I made 3 blocks with red squares and then decided to look through my cut squares to see if I had enough squares in any colors to make more. 

So that's all I could make with what was already in my 4 inch cut squares bag. My target is 24 blocks and now I have 22. I'll look through the rest of the scraps in the box and cut more squares for those two blocks and get them made so these can go into the SAR bin. 

So now I have completed almost all of the RSC projects I had going with 4 inch width scraps but I still have lots of smaller bits in the box. So now I need a plan for those. 

The smallest pieces will go into 4 x 2.5 bricks. I recently started making Bricks and Stones units using black 2.5 inch squares and 4 x 2.5 bricks as a way to use up some smaller 2.5 inch width scraps. 

The strip on the bottom I usually make with the pieces less than a square when I make RSC blocks. I save those up and eventually make a quilt with them when I get enough strips. I think my next one might have strips of varying widths alternating with strips of Flying Geese.

16 Patch

6 inch blocks

RSC color alternating with green scraps in the blocks. 

I think I have been making these as an RSC project for a couple of years from whatever shows up in my 2 inch width scraps that is long enough for a block.  When I started these I had a lot of green scrap chunks to use up so that is how I decided on green as the alternating color. 

I started the month with 111 blocks toward my goal of 120 or 130 blocks. After I made my blocks with red I noticed I only needed a few more so made a total of 19 blocks.  I must not have taken a picture of the other 7 blocks I made this week even though I propped them up for a photo.Well, anyway, I made my goal of 130 blocks to be set 10 x 13. This is another block to check off my RSC project list and will also join the other block sets completed this week in the SAR bin. 

Easy Breezy

6 inch blocks

I started making these at the beginning of the year with 2 inch width scraps. I now have 42 towards a goal of 120 or 130. 

Rail Fence

4.5 inch blocks

New Project

After I completed the 16 Patches made with 2 inch width scraps I assessed what was left in that scrap bin and decided to start making  Rail Fence blocks with black centers. 

Cheerios

10.5 inch blocks

I've been making these since last year and set aside any sets of 4 - 4.5 inch squares I come across to make these blocks. I think most of the squares I used in the red ones I made this month came from others. 

This is one of those blocks I make until scraps run out or I get tired of making them. Then I divide them up into different comfort quilts. I now have 73 blocks.  How about that...I could use 20 in a child's quilt and 48 in a twin sized quilt and have some blocks left over! Maybe that's what I'll do!

And sew on...

RSC ScrapHappy Saturday

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REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

My husband John is the treasure. In June we will celebrate 52 years of marriage. 

John has dysphagia (difficulty swallowing food or drink) caused by radiation he had many years ago for oropharyngeal cancer. He ended up in the hospital a couple of times a couple of years ago and one of the times they put in a G-tube and the other time he was malnourished, dehydrated and had aspiration pneumonia. After they put in the G-tube he was bolus feeding (injecting liquid diet into tube with syringe several times a day); however, he could not tolerate that rate of feeding and was aspirating most of the liquid into his lungs.  Then they put him on a feeding pump to slowly pump liquids into him over a 12 hour period. And he has to stay sitting at about a 30 degree angle during that time and an hour or so afterwards so he spends most of his days and nights in a recliner. He is still weak but since he has gained a little strength and weight he is able to get around without a walker; however, a short walk outside or anywhere else wears him out. 

Yesterday he had a visit with the pulmonologist, who tries to keep him from more hospital visits with aspiration pneumonia, and Dr. said he is making a referral to a speech therapist. They are hoping he can start doing some kinds of exercises and work up to maybe being able to swallow soup without aspirating. In the meantime Dr. said to start reading out loud and/or singing in the shower. John seemed happy with the news that he might someday be able to swallow water or soup without aspirating or coughing it up. He is rather frustrated with being tied to a food pump for so many hours a day.