Happy New Year!

I'm looking forward to a year with less conflict and stress.  If our national leader can't supply that, I will try to do as much as I can to bring peace to our home.  As a naturalized citizen (since age 3!), I am a bit worried about crossing the border into and out of Canada this summer, but that's far ahead.  I can think of worse places to be than Ontario!  My word for the year is "Explore," as we are planning quite a bit more travel than in 2025.

Yesterday I finished making blue log cabin blocks and put them away with the red blocks in an empty (yes!) project box until February rolls around.  I don't know if I'll stick to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge all year, but I'm starting out that way.

I moved on to work on the Triple Barn Star quilt in blues.  I have some speckly fabric for the background and then chose coordinating prints and solids.  I ended up cutting all the fabric I need, which is something I rarely do when starting a quilt.  My usual method is to cut as I go, but this appears to be a medallion starting in the middle.  The pattern is designed for layer cakes which I almost never buy, but I did use quite a bit of stash.  And I still can't close my blue tub!  I have plans for more blue quilts later in the year, though.

Today I'll do some housekeeping and get ready for our open house this afternoon.  I'm anxious to put the charcuterie board together, and I have lots of cookies to set out as well.  The ice for the punch is ready to go.  Hope you have a fun First Footing (a Scottish tradition bringing good luck) planned, too!

Favorite reading in 2025

Everyone seems to be posting lists of their favorite books read this past year.  Quite frankly, there was no one book that I feel stood out for me.  If I had to choose one, The Women by Kristin Hannah is probably the book I think about most although I felt the last half was a little predictable.  Perhaps that's just because I lived through those years.  The most disappointing book for me this year was another about the era I lived through, The Book Club for Troublesome Women by Marie Bostwick.  I hope her next book is a little more lively.

I still read a lot of mysteries and have joined a new book group that focuses on that genre.  It meets in the daytime, too, which is nice in winter.   That group has introduced me to some new authors as well, including some not at all "cozy."  The most unusual one was set in the Dark Ages - Ariana Franklin's Mistress of the Art of Death dealt with an independent woman who serves as a coroner in England, something totally unheard of at that time.   There were a lot of words I had to look up so I was thankful for my Kindle's ability to do so.

I still love books about Aunt Bessie on the Isle of Man by Diana Xarissa Dunn and The Secret Book and Scone Society books by Ellery Adams.  I dip into those in between others.  The new series by Elly Griffiths, beginning with The Frozen People, shows great promise, and I can't wait for the next one.  The characters try to solve cold cases by moving back and forth in time.   Very original!

New Year approacheth!

Happy almost New Year!  We don't do anything special on New Year's Eve although I usually make something special for dinner.  It really is an ordinary day/night for us.   On New Year's Day, however, we invite friends and neighbors over for "First Footing" in the afternoon.  Before then, I'll bake cookies and maybe a cake for the event.  Last year we almost ran out of chairs, and it was incredibly fun.  Attendance will depend on the weather, of course.  Neighbors will come in any case, but some friends will wait to see how the roads are.  One neighbor may even bring his guitar.

Meanwhile, I'm still clearing out UFOs.  I finished another small (57" x 57") rail fence top made of blocks I won at the fall state guild meeting.  For most guild meetings, state or local, I usually make the raffle block but don't put my name in to win all the blocks.  

This time I really liked the blocks, so I did and was happy to win all 16 blocks.  Actually, it was 14 blocks with a bunch of additional strips.   The quilter who put them in said they were DIY blocks which I didn't mind.  Yesterday, I finished the piano keys border and pieced the back so that next week I can take it to be quilted. 
 

That leaves just one sampler waiting to be finished and quilted.  I hope to get to that soon.  In the afternoon, I worked on some hand applique on a small quilt for the guild round robin and started making some string log cabin blocks.  I plan to make those following the rainbow scrap challenge in 2026.  

The January RSC color will be blue, so I chose red for December since my red string bag is overflowing.   If red comes up soon, I'll change my blocks to burgundy or pink.  I have plenty of strings in all colors to keep me busy.  I square them up after every round and am making them all 8" finished.  Last year I made triangles out of strings and have quite a few with no real plans for them.  Maybe I'll use them as a border for the log cabin blocks.  

Meanwhile, we have been planning a bunch of trips for 2026, realizing that we had better take some before we get too old to go anywhere.  We both have high school reunions this year (60!) and want to take a cruise on the Mississippi River.  We also plan to go south for a few weeks this winter and to visit my mom in Colorado.  May your 2026 be full of fun, too!

  

Playing catch up

Merry Christmas!  Yes, I'm still around, but until the beginning of this week I've been spending a lot of time at our public library working on Light Up the Library.  It was a success, with 67 items in the raffle, including whole Christmas trees and lots of gift certificates to local businesses.  It seemed like every day we had some emergency (theft, late entries, etc.).  But now the Friends of the Library's coffers are a little fuller and able to fund some fun programs.  Our next project will be sponsoring minigolf in the stacks during February school vacation.  That should draw quite a few kids and their parents to the library.

Meanwhile, back at home, I've been chipping away at projects in the sewing room, and I'm pleased that I was able to finish two little quilts this week.  Both will go to Bags of Love.  The first was made of orphan blocks from the pizza box marked "year's end."  At first, I really didn't like it, but now that it's done, it's grown on me.  There's certainly a lot to look at.  I quilted it in irregular vertical lines which was somewhat tedious.  Guess it's good to have some mindless sewing during the busy holiday season. 

The second quilt top was made of flannels that came from Sylvia's mother who is now in a nursing home.  Sylvia brought me four large tubs of fabric which I used, took to the free table at guild meetings, and gave to the ReStore.  These flannels all seemed to go together, so I made a 40" x 40" rail fence quilt.  I've never made a top out of flannel before, and, while it's soft, it was difficult to cut and sew precisely.   My even feed foot was a god-send.

That leaves only two more tops to quilt in the closet and a third that Marie will be quilting soon.  I'd like to get at least one more top quilted before I start anything else new.  I have three future quilts on my mind for 2026 already, including some strings for which I plan to follow the Rainbow Scrap Challenge to use up. 

I got out the first of the two in the closet - another rail fence in whites and blues.  I won the blocks at the state quilt guild and put them together right away.  Now I see it's a little small, so I'm going to add a stop border and then do varying piano keys around the outside.  I have a lot of coordinating fabric but not enough to make one or two the final border.  

To make my Christmas even nicer, I sold a bed-sized quilt, the Exploding Heart, to a friend of Chris' who was so entranced she wants to buy another for her daughter.  I will dig into my stash of finished quilts and give her a choice.  Then another friend of his wants one that's currently on display in the library.  I have to figure out what to charge for each quilt but I am happy to free up storage for whatever I make in 2026.  Happy New Year!

Slow but steady

When I get a chance, I keep working on the black and orange sampler I started in the fall of 2024.  I ran out of background fabric when I was working on the first border, but it arrived yesterday so I hope to get that on today.

I bought the fabric some time in 2024 (or maybe 2023?), so I didn't think my LQS would still have it.  Etsy seemed a good possibility, and I was lucky enough to find some more.  As usual with most Etsy orders, it arrived promptly.

While I was waiting for it to arrive, I finished piecing the next borders so that I can get those on also, if not today, then tomorrow.  I will use more of the orange polka dotted fabric for the back and then take it to Marie to quilt when I get a chance.   It will be nice to have it out of the way.

I have a few more projects languishing in the sewing room, including a small flannel pink and brown rail fence quilt.  I have already cut the pieces into logs for the quilt that I'll give to Bags of Love eventually.  And, of course, there's always Dear Jane to work on.  I have four more rows to make before finishing the center.

This winter I hope not to be tempted by anything new except maybe Karen Abrahamovich's Holland quilt in blue and white.  It's been on my to-do list for at least two years, and it should use some of my huge stash of blues.  I have a few ideas for a medallion quilt with this as the center.  We'll see how they play out.

A fun day

We had a very busy Saturday, starting with grocery shopping and then going to the library to turn on all the lights.  Later in the morning, we met some dear friends, both also retired librarians who live in the Burlington area, at our library to see the Light Up the Library display.  Bob loves Christmas and enjoyed bidding on various goodies in the display.  We all went out to lunch and caught up on goings on.  It's always fun to get together with them.  

Later in the afternoon day, some other local friends, Bill and Diane, invited us to go to an art gallery opening of an acquaintance.   Cara Armstrong is a professor of architecture whose recent sabbatical on neuroscience and architecture resulted in a series of digital paintings.  She draws on in iPad and pops paint into the spaces using a program.  These paintings were all about 4' x 5' and very interesting.  At one time she quilted her drawings but now uses digital art.  Here are a few of her works, with my favorite first.

I can see this as a quilt, with the very detailed drawing of the farm painstakingly done.

Can you see the quilt making inflluence in these two?

The last painting reminds me of Montpelier with its mountainous neighborhoods.

We had a great time at the show and enjoyed Cara's talk very much.   Afterwards, Bill and Diane wanted to go to a local diner for a bite to eat.  I just had a glass of wine because I was still full from lunch.  We stayed at the diner until closing time, talking about all sorts of things.  

Snow day = sew day!

I woke up far too early today and, after doing a little bit around the house, decided it was too snowy to go to my regular check up.  When I called the doctor's office, the receptionist didn't seem surprised I wanted to cancel and rescheduled me for January right away.

I went upstairs and got to work on the Orange Polka Dot quilt.  It's made of guild blocks of the month and some instructions the guild received from Kristin Laura Designs.  The block which I put on the bottom right was demonstrated at our last guild meeting.  It's larger than 12" finished, but I wanted to try making it anyway.  

It has aspects of Dresden Plate and is just as easy.  The ones shown at guild were in Christmas colors which I always like.  But I needed one block to add to the 15 I had made between Sept., 2024, and now.  I appliqued a cornerstone where one might have gone if it had been 12" like the other blocks.

Of course, I need a little more of that speckled black background to finish putting the top together.  I think it will be a good "stop border" and then I'll add at least one more border.  That should get it up to 60" x 60".   Of course, I bought the speckled fabric at least a year and a half ago, so I doubt my local shop will have it.  I turned to my old friend Etsy and soon found another yard and a half which should be enough.

Here's a "rough draft" of the top without borders.

-7

The photo doesn't show the orange in the polka dots very well.  But they are there.  And I have about 6-7 more yards.  I'll use some in the back, but I really would like to find another nice project for that fabric.