A couple of projects

This is going to be a busy week, with a meeting, a pedicure, and the library Fall Festival booksale.  So I probably won't be able to keep up with my almost daily big block making or other projects.  I'll be lucky if I make dinner a few of the days.  Here's the latest big block, a 16" Dresden Plate in burgundies, inspired by Karen's recent block.

I usually hand applique Dresdens onto their backgrounds, but I just didn't feel like it.  So I carefully machine stitched it, including the center using matching thread.   I also did a 12" raffle block in fall colors the same way for the upcoming state quilt guild meeting.  They turned out fine, but I will know they are machine done!

I love the fabric I used in the center.  It's black with burgundy/purple maple leaves, a gift from another Karen in Canada.  The background fabric has teal, green, and burgundy; there's plenty left for a few more projects.

For one of my local guilds, I've volunteered to make a block of the month for the program team I'm on.  The December meeting is the Tuesday before Christmas when people are rushing to finish things.  So I've settled on a wintery theme and have been trying various snowflake blocks.  So far this is the "winner," but I may try a few others.  The block finishes at 11" but I'm going to try to adapt it so that it ends up at 12".  

It goes together fairly easily, log cabin style, but those diagonals may be a problem for beginners.  I'm going to suggest appliqueing them, so I'll give that a try, too.

Finished and unfinished

 I forgot to take a picture of the Christmassy mug rug I made for Leigh in a swap, but, thankfully, she did.  She has a black dog so I used doggy Christmas fabric.  Because she lives in Australia, I didn't want to do anything wintry, either.  I wrapped the mug rug in some more of the doggy fabric which I love.  The dogs are kind of wacky.

The dog was paperpieced, using a free pattern I found online.  Leigh's dog is a cocker spaniel, so I probably should have made shorter legs, but that would make the mug rug a little smaller than my usual 6" x 9" size.  I have fun quilting the ears and making it scrappy.

I've been chipping away at my 16" sampler blocks and made this Drunkard's Path the other day.

I got the idea from a new book, Crumb Quilts, by Emily Bailey.  All of the quilts in the book are made with "crumbs," snippets of leftover fabrics, but my block is just made of scraps.   The designs in her book are really great, especially the diagonally striped drunkard's path bed-sized quilt in many colors.

I got the book because I'm thinking of joining a crumb block swap in 2022, but I must say Bailey's directions for making crumb blocks are a bit too brief for me - only two pages long.  I need a little more guidance because my first three blocks were really bad.  I ended up throwing one away, and the third one has gotten a brief stay of execution.  I'll give it another try soon.