Green Scraps Chapter II

Wonky Windmills

8 inch

Last week I dug into the green scrap bag and worked with all of the 1.5 inch scraps I found. This week I worked with the 4.5 inch green scraps I found. I started making Wonky Windmills last year. I'm using gray scraps as the background for these blocks. I'm using a stack and slash method to make the Wonky Windmills from 4.5 x 5 inch scraps. I'll make them from scraps all this year and toward year end I'll see how many blocks I have and how many donation quilts I can make. 

Flowers

8 inch

The green scraps I used in these came from a little box of floral scraps I've been using to make these Flower blocks. I'm aiming for a twin sized donation quilt. I've also been making these since last year. 

Kaleidoscope Blocks

8 inches

I made the two red Kaleidoscope blocks last year from scraps I had laying around my cutting mat. That was to remind me to add this block to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) roundup.  The green 4.5 inch scraps came out of the green scrap bag.  I'm using yellow scraps for the alternate and corner pieces in all blocks. Again these blocks will go into a donation quilt. 

Claudia's Scrapbuster

9.5 inch

These blocks are made with 4 inch, 2 inch and 2.5 inch pieces. I started making them last October to use a baggie of 4 inch squares as well as a little box of 4 inch width scraps that I seem to have accumulated mostly because I never really have made many blocks that use 4 inch pieces. I usually have a block going for most every size scrap I encounter. 

The tutorial for the block is found at Create With Claudia. 

I'm just going to make blocks each month in the RSC color of the month until that baggie and box of 4 inch scraps is used up and then decide what to do with the blocks.  For now it's all about using scraps and making blocks and enjoying the process! 

And sew on....

RSC ScrapHappy Saturday

******

CELEBRATE!! (my word of the year)

Jan. 12 - Tyler Daniel, 8 lb. 3 oz., was born to my niece Katrina and her husband! They live in a distant  and warmer land called California so I just have pictures of Tyler to cuddle. 

Jan. 13 - Today is my oldest son's 50th birthday! (And I thought I was 50 until I realized mom and son can't both be the same age). 

 

Wednesday Wandering

Gardens are a lot of work. 

But sometimes I get to stop and smell the roses. 

Despite some early deer and rabbit damage I have to say the roses this year do not disappoint.  

I am so thankful the Japanese Beetles have not been around to eat them either. They have been a terrible pest the last couple of years. 

Each variety of rose in the garden has a different scent. 

I haven't seen this Winchester Cathedral rose in bloom for a long time. Several years ago it was severely damaged when a tree fell on it. Then I babied it and when it started to make a comeback the deer and rabbits ravaged it several years in a row. Then the last couple of years the Japanese beetles have visited in droves and devoured most of my rose buds. I'm an organic gardener so the cure for Japanese beetles is to pick them off by hand and throw them in a bucket of soapy water. 

Winchester Cathedral is supposed to be a shrub rose and this is about the shrubbiest it has been in years. I am so very thankful I have roses to enjoy this year. 

Martagon or Turk's Cap Lilies

I've planted mine in a shady area.

They have a slight fragrance. 

There are several clumps of a miniature Asiatic lily in bloom in the fairy garden. This one is in front of a miniature rose in bloom and next to Edelweiss.

This clump is blooming near the dianthus in bloom. 

How do I know this is a fairy garden? Well, do you see the fairy door and the little pathway leading up to it? 

The Foxglove are really quite nice this year. I started these from seed. The bees dart in and out of the gloves. This Foxglove variety is a biennial and this is their second year so I finally have some blooms to enjoy. I find these very difficult to start from seed that is like dust and have had several failures in the past. I am hoping the Foxglove like where they are and will reseed themselves. 

I love Delphiniums. I used to have a big patch of them mixed with poppies and daisies but they all disappeared after a tree fell on them one winter. Now I'm trying to get a new patch started. The pale yellow flowers are a perennial foxglove.

Blue Tradescantia or Spiderwort and ...

...white Tradescantia.  I recently found a red variety and planted that last week but it does not have blooms yet. 

Dutchman's Pipe in bloom. It is supposed to be a primary food source for the Pipevine Swallowtail butterfly.  Dutchman's Pipe vines are rather invasive so I have to work hard to control it as well as the Trumpet Vine on the same trellis. 

On a different trellis Jackmanii Clematis is blooming.

And underneath the Clematis the Yarrow is starting to bloom.

I've been harvesting a bowl of strawberries every day. And every day hubby and I eat a bowl of strawberries. I think now I will freeze the daily pickings. 

We've been eating a lot of radishes and green onions from the garden for lunch every day and in salads. But now that it is getting hot I pulled up the last of the radishes. Some smaller ones I left to go to seed and I will plant those seeds later this year for a fall crop of radishes. 

I have Buttercrunch lettuce I let grow into heads but the darned rabbits (or is it a groundhog) have been eating the leaves and I haven't. I put a little fence around them and now the heads are starting to grow again. Buttercrunch is slower to bold in warm weather, thank goodness. 

Meanwhile we've been eating leaf lettuce from this patch of greens as well as some mustard greens from a different patch. The salad is oh so yummy with a little oil and vinegar dressing mixed with herbs from the herb garden. 

And something has been eating my pea vines down to the ground over and over again so they are pretty short. However, I think I will have some Sugar Snap Peas ready for harvest soon.  I have some Snow Peas on a different fence that are in bloom. 

I am so thankful we finally had a good heavy rain yesterday. The garden is thankful too. 

 

Feeling Flowery

 The latest AdHoc Improv challenge is "Feeling Flowery" - make something flowery.   I have something in mind that I've wanted to make for a very long time but while I plan that out I thought I had better move along a few flowery UFOs. 

This is as far as I've gotten with this pansy quilt. I started making those six inch blocks in 2013 and stashed them away for a long time. In March of last year I combined those blocks with some squares of large print fabrics and ended up with a top 42 x 54.  Now I want to add a solid border and some broderie perse. 

 I don't have any large pieces of any one purple so I guess I'll piece together several different small and wrinkly pieces of purple I found in the stash today for a border. I just have to decide how wide. Six inches? 

 I have several scraps with large pansies I'm going to cut out for the borderie perse. I'm kind of scared to do this step and that's why this has been sitting around as a UFO. I love broderie perse but have never done it on a large scale - just a few bits and pieces here and there mostly on crazy quilt blocks.  Today I told myself anything I do will be better than leaving the darned thing laying around unfinished for several more years. 

 I think I have also found a use for these old worn out pillowcases I made long ago. There's still some good parts with flowers I can use for the borderie perse! 

 Flowery UFO #2 , Moon Garden, started out as a medallion quilt along where everyone starts with their own center block and then every month we are given instructions for a new border. I started out with moonflowers for my center. All went well with the first border but the instructions for the bow tie border were incorrect - bow ties were supposed to be made of 2 inch pieces and not 2.5 inch pieces. I modified my border to use the bow ties I made with incorrect instructions and notified quilt along hostess of the error.  After that I lost interest in the quilt along. 

So now this is a design opportunity. I can add what I want for borders. But I can never think of what to add and that is why I thought a quilt along would be nice to try out some new and different border ideas.  (Sigh). 

I had decided to make the entire quilt in black and white and call it Moon Garden and quilt it with some glow in the dark threads I've had glowing in my thread drawer for ages.  So today I dug out some black and white fabrics...

 ...and I decided the next border will be these little 4.5 inch finished flowers. I'm not sure I have enough of that black polka dot for 40 blocks but I'll use it until it runs out and go from there.  And I have an idea for the next border too.  I'm not sure how many borders there will be. I don't want a big quilt...maybe a nice throw sized one. 

Flowery  UFO #3 has been thrown in a box for awhile.  All the pieces and parts are cut and made but I ran into a problem when I went to assemble all those pieces and parts. (Boo hoo)

 Quilt is called Now and Later by Kathy Doughty. I don't think the instructions are right. I went looking for errata but found none.  I also searched for anyone else that had made this quilt so I could see if anyone else had problems with the instructions. But I couldn't find anyone else that has made it. 

The pieces don't fit together correctly.  Today I took out all the pieces and parts and measured them to make sure I cut the right sized pieces that are cut twice on the diagonal and I did.  I've appliqued all 12 tulips to the triangles and center square and I don't have much of that background fabric left but I'm going to try to figure out how to get all these parts into a top.  (I think I can, I think I can, I think I can). 

My reward for getting the three UFOS to flimsy stage will be a new start - that new flowery quilt I've been dreaming about. I've been taking lots of flower garden pics as part of the planning process. 

Stitching

I finally had time to work on some stitching on items that are not Christmas presents.  I finished a 4x6 block for Maureen in a RR on Kathy Shaw's list. Maureen made the block. I did the stitching. 

I added a little bit of everything - cast-on stitches, bullions, silk ribbon, spider web wheels, beads...

And this is a new stitch I'm trying - Ship-ladder stitch. Kerry Leslie presents new stitches every so often on the CQI Yahoo Group and a tutorial on her blog. I made the stitch going down one way then back up the other way, joined them in the middle with a few lazy daisy stitches. Boy, when you take a close up pic you can really see the flaws! 

The Latest Craziness

This is my work on Peggy Sue's block for the sewing themed RR.

This is my section of Peg Sue's block done by the entire group.

This is the entire group block after Ruby, Carol and me. Lorrie and Ruby need to add to it now.

This is my work on Susan's winter themed block. For the pine sprigs and holly leaves (those are holly leaves, I hope) I used one strand of white plus one strand of some flourescent green metallic type thread in order to hopefully look like they are kind of snow covered. 

On Paula's rose block I added more silk ribbon overstiching the leaves that seemed bare with the chain stitch I used. I feel better about it now.

Also, previously I thought the pink stamens were too pink so I toned them down with some acrylic and added some yellow beads to the center of the rose. Wendy suggested nail polish, but, alas, I don't wear it so that's how I ended up using acrylic. I thank Wendy for the idea. I was going to completely redo the rose. I feel better about the rose now too.

And, now off to some sane quilting before the guests (family) arrives to celebrate my granddaughter's birthday this evening. My baby will be 7 (going on 13). I spent a few hours at Toys R Us last night after work looking for gifts for her birthday, my other DGD's birthday in 5 weeks, Christmas and the advent calendar. Quite a few of the gifts will turn them into crafters, I hope.