Secret Santa Sew Along - It's a Flimsy!

It's a flimsy!

Secret Santa

43 x 56

A mystery quilt and sew along from Temecula Quilt Co. 

 Do you recognize the block as Burgoyne Surrounded? 

I really don't like to do sew alongs or mysteries any more but this one struck my fancy -- little pieces and I could use some of my Christmas fabrics and have a little fun. You know I want to empty all those holiday fabric bins! 

I wish I had some smaller print light Christmas fabrics but I didn't so used what I had. Most of my Christmas light prints are used up now. I used a variety of snowflake fabrics when I got to the sashings.  I have a couple of large prints I can piece together for the back. 

It's kind of small but when finished might look nice on the back of a chair, on a table or on my lap. Or I'll give it to my daughter who loves all holidays and holiday decorating. 

It's About Time

 I finished six Christmas stockings. 

That was my goal #14 for 

Q4 Finish Along

 Forty years ago when my son was four years old and my daughter was two years old I made them these Christmas Stockings. Santa has filled them with goodies every year since then. They have held up pretty well except some of the stitches in the embroidery of their names are missing. 

Six years later another son came along and every year since then I've been telling myself I really need to make him a special Christmas stocking since he has worn out many a cheap felt dollar store stocking. 

And finally...this is the year now that he's 34 years old. 

Johnny has always loved cats. While going through Christmas and cat fabrics I found enough bits and pieces of  Laurel Burch fabrics to put together a stocking for him. Won't he be surprised. 

 I thought I had enough six inch Christmas nine patches to make six stockings but I only had enough to make four.  There's two for my granddaughters, one for my grandson and one for my son-in-law. 

I had some six inch squares of snowmen and snowflakes to make a stocking for my oldest son's girlfriend because I know that's something she likes. 

Now everyone will have their own special Christmas stocking for Santa to fill. 

And I know what they will all say on Christmas day when they see them...

"It's About Time". 

Playing in The Woods

The Block Lotto block of the month is a tree. 

I made three for the lotto drawing. 

Then I made a few for myself out of Christmas fabrics since I challenged myself to use my holiday fabrics this year and these blocks are easy-peasy to make.  Three of them are a little different since I evidently had a bout of dyslexia when I cut them starting at the wrong end. I'll probably make more trees. Not sure what I'm going to do with them.  I don't really need another Christmas quilt.  And I have no wall space for wall hangings.  Place mats ? with napkins? and/or buffet runner? Christmas tree skirt of Christmas trees for a gift? Hmmmm....

While I was making the trees I had memories of playing in the woods when we stayed the summer at my grandparents' house.  Oh that was fun! Now I have my own woods and rarely play there. 

Four Place Mats

Four Halloween themed placemats

12 x 18

In an effort to use my holiday fabrics this year (a Holiday Cheer Challenge) I made these place mats out of scraps for my Halloween loving daughter - family of four.  Her daughter, my granddaughter, was born on Halloween.  They love to decorate (I don't) and collect a lot of vintage Halloween items. The cat fabric in the center of the stars is a small feedsack piece my daughter found at a garage sale.  

I used some bigger print scraps for the back sides, zigzagged together little bits of batting and quilted with some loops and stars on my DSM (the other day when I quilted Cattywampus). I didn't have any  Halloween pieces big enough to use for binding so found an orange dotty fabric.  And since I prefer binding sewn down by hand that's what I did. 

Now back to dreaming of spring.

This was my goal #6
for
Q1 Finish-Along

Valentine Castle

 I was digging through my Valentine fabrics and found a ziploc bag with one Castle Wall block made with Valentine fabrics.  Evidently I haven't made any more since December 2014 according to an old blog post. 

These are big 20 inch blocks. I think I'll make 12. 

Now I have 3 blocks in my Valentine Castle.

Sew, Stitch, Snap, Share!

A New Flimsy! Happy Christmas!

Christmas Happies

Happy Christmas

58.5 x 65

 A few weeks ago I found 56 of them in a Christmas project box and then made 34 more. The 56 blocks were old ones swapped long long ago. 

This year I'm trying to clear out a lot of old holiday fabrics and projects - a self imposed Holiday Cheer Challenge. 

I'm thinking I'll piece a backing for this from all the miscellaneous bits and pieces in that Christmas project box. 

It's a Finish: Bootiful Dreamer !

 Bootiful Dreamer

a Halloween 16 Patch

60 x 72

Machine quilted

 I decided to try to use up all my holiday fabrics in 2018. I declared it my Holiday Cheer Challenge. It will be fun to see how many things will get made that include holiday fabrics. The holidays include Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Easter, Fourth of July (patriotic) and St. Patrick's Day.  Not only will I be making some new things but I hope to also finish up some old things. 

 This Halloween 16 patch used up quite a few bits and pieces of fabric I had left over from making quilts and pillowcases for the grandkids, trick or treat bags and other miscellaneous items.  My oldest granddaughter was born on Halloween. She's a real treat! 

I quilted it on the machine with alternating up and down loops in each square.  I meant for them to be oriented up and down like you see here but I evidently put the quilt in the wrong way when I started to quilt so they loop sideways but it's the same effect.  I need to work on making my loops the same size but sometimes it's rather difficult to push a large quilt through a small harp. 

I used up some Halloween fabric on the back too.  It's actually a quilt of it's own - a giant four patch. 

It's a little blurry but you can see the four patch consists of monsters and creepy things in jars. 

And that's my first Holiday Cheer Challenge completion!  I think I'll make a tab to keep track of all the holiday cheer. 

This was listed as my goal #5 

for 

2018 Q1 Finish-Along

and

18 in 2018

What's In The Box?

 This year I decided I would try to use up  all my holiday fabrics - a self-imposed Holiday Cheer Challenge.   I have a Christmas project box that I haven't been into for ages so decided to get it out and check the contents.  I didn't find a Partridge in a Pear Tree but did find: 

 56 Christmas Happy Blocks (swapped long ago with 4 inch centers and 2 inch sides)

 7 Christmas Happy Blocks (from who knows where with 4.5 inch centers and 2 inch sides)

 8 - seven inch Ornaments (in a bag along with some green background fabrics from the thrift store)

 1 Vintage Spin block (untrimmed and centerless.  I think I was going to make a Peppermint Twist quilt??? because I found the block on top of)...

 ...a pile of peppermint fabrics. 

 47 - Five inch swapped Christmas Charms

 14 Delectable Mountain blocks ( leftover from making a Delectable Mountain quilt of Christmas fabrics. Some blocks were swapped.)

 A big uncounted pile of 6.5 inch swapped squares. 

 29 - Four inch HSTs (left over from making a tree skirt plus three corner pieces cut off of tree skirt to make an octagonal shape. Not sure where fourth corner went???) 

 19 - 10 inch Roman Stripe blocks (I don't even remember making)

And that's the end of the box contents.  

So, what to do...what to do...

I made 34 more Happy Blocks to add to the 56 that were in the box.  Now I have 90 for a 9 x 10 layout (58.5 x 65).   This will make a third Christmas quilt for me. And that is how many grandchildren I have so when they get older and have their own homes they can each have one. 

I'm thinking about what to do with the rest of the box contents and my box of Christmas fabrics.  Time will tell. 

It's a Flimsy! - Trick or Treat

Trick or Treat

60 x 72

It's a flimsy! 

Again today it's too cold to go out and hang it on my clothesline to take pics so you will just have to believe me when I say it's a full fledged flimsy. 

I want this year to be a year of holiday cheer. I'm going to try to clear out all the holiday themed fabrics I have in boxes and drawers.  I'm calling it my Holiday Cheer Challenge.  I started this easy 16 patch in Halloween fabrics in December.  I cut pieces to have on hand so that I could sew something easy and mindless while my brother was here visiting from Florida and between visiting with family and friends. I sneaked in a few minutes of sewing here and there and completed all my blocks before year end. 

 And I followed through and pieced a backing too.  I made a giant four patch from the monster and creepy jar fabrics. 

This made a big dent in my Halloween fabrics - especially all the small bits and pieces that were leftover from making the grand kids pillowcases, trick or treat bags and quilts.   

My daughter made off with my Halloween quilt - Black Widow's Wedding Party - a creepy wedding ring quilt with glow in the dark fabrics  and quilting - so I guess this will be my quilt when I get it finished.  

 I still have Halloween fabrics to use for my Holiday Cheer challenge.  So I made up four Halloween placemats for my daughter.  She brought me that orange feedsack fabric with the black cats on it. It was a small piece I think she found at a garage sale. So I used it in placemats for her family of four.  

I made these 12 x 18

I was going to make reversible placemats with the same design on the back as the front but I have some small pieces of Halloween fabrics with a large print so I think I'll use these fabrics on the back of her placemats. 

 In an effort to clear out the Halloween drawer I "refiled" some pieces. The two in the top left are now in the fall themed box, the pile of purples in the top right are going into the purple fabric milk crate, the orange with pumpkins is going into the orange/yellow milk crate and the bugs, spiders and bats are going into the critter basket.  I could have put those purple spiders and cats in the critter basket but I'm low on purples so that's how I decided. I put a piece of Dios de los Muertos fabric in the travel fabric box. 

I store my fabrics (greater than a FQ) by theme and then by color. I store my scraps by size with all colors mixed- normally 1.5, 2.5, 3.5 and 4.5, chunks (less than FQ) , light strings, bright strings, selvages, waste triangles).  

But I still have quite a few Halloween fabrics in the drawer. I'll probably make myself a table runner and set of 8 placemats since I also have lots of little pieces of batting to use that are too small to piece together for a quilt.  I might make a pillow or two for my Halloween loving daughter since I also have lots of tiny batting pieces I can use for stuffing.   I might even have enough fabrics for another quilt.  Who knows what will come out of my Holiday Cheer challenge.  (I also have Valentine's Day, Patriotic (Fourth of July), Christmas and St. Patrick's Day fabrics to use). 

And leftover from making all those 16 patches are some 3.5 inch scraps for the 3.5 inch scrap box. You will see those later in Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects. This year they will turn into bow ties, rail fences and snowballs - all on-going and carry over from 2017 RSC projects that use 3.5 inch scraps.