Another finish!

It felt so good Saturday to put the last stitches into the hanging sleeve of Pixilated Holland!  I added Dutch tile squares cut from my old kitchen curtains for the border and then quilted it in vertical straight lines with variegated blue thread.  I just went parallel to the seam lines, and I'm pleased with the result.  You can barely see the wobbly lines now that it's all done.  This was just the right size quilt for machine quilting on my Elna.  I'll take it to guild tomorrow night to get a good picture.

As is usual for me whenever I finish a big project, I took a break from quilting yesterday.  We went to Paul's sister's for brunch, I did a load of laundry, and then I sat down to read for the rest of the day.  I have a few ideas of what to work on next, but it does feel weird not to have anything hanging in the closet waiting to be finished.  

But I am not feeling smug about it since I have 18 items on my UFO list - projects mostly half done, including several project boxes whose contents might end up being small quilts.  I'll take a look today, especially at the box of log cabin blocks made in rainbow colors since Christmas.   Speaking of that holiday, I do have a tree skirt I want to make for the library's Light Up the Library display//raffle.  And what about those shopping bags I planned to make the library staff?  Oh, boy.  I really don't feel smug now!

25th "anniversary"

It's hard to believe 25 years have passed since the Twin Towers and the Pentagon were hit.   I was in Washington, DC on 9/11, meeting with other state library people and the feds when we got the news.  The feds all left, and we couldn't get hold of our families by phone for a long time.   We watched TV together for a long time, then decided to keep working.  Without the feds, we got a lot done.  But I'll never forget the quiet streets in a usually bustling city.  Almost nothing was open, but thankfully the hotel treated us with kindness and food.

The state library people bonded during the days we couldn't get out of DC.  That's me, second from the left.  We got our work done and then we just hung out together, all ten or eleven of us.   Nothing was open so we couldn't visit the Smithsonian or any other sites.  After a few days, stores and restaurants reopened.  I ran out of money because I used the time to shop for fabric and things for our B&B.  We couldn't fly out of DC, so each person had to figure out transportation home, by train, bus, rented automobile. 

With a suitcase heavier than when I arrived, I ended up taking the train home, a 14 hour trip through New York City.  It's usually about 12 hours but we sat on the train waiting to go through the city for two extra hours.  In December, when we met again, I took the train, too.  Because of our strong bond, many of us still get together every Monday afternoon via Zoom.  What an experience!

Early holiday season prep

I spent most of yesterday updating the mailing list for the Friends of the Library's annual Light Up the Library fundraiser.  We write to merchants, clubs, and individuals, asking for decorated holiday items and gifts to display for two weeks before we raffle them off.   Judy and I added some names and deleted others that hadn't participated in the five years we've been doing it.  Because Paul and I have a couple of trips planned this fall, I'm trying to get all of the paperwork done sooner than in the past.  Or is it really sooner?   I do hope to have the initial mailing ready by the end of September. 

In between that chore, I did a little bit more quilting on the Pixilated Holland quilt.  Even though there are wobbles in the straight lines I'm doing with variegated thread, when I look at the quilt as a whole, it looks pretty good.  I have only a few lines left to do and then I can square the piece up and bind it.  The question now is:  flanged binding or no?  I'll do a little test before I cut the strips.  The quilt is only about 42 x 49" so it won't take much fabric either way.

I was pleased to get a call last night from my sister in law Linda who had received the origami bag I made and sent to her.  I wish I had taken a picture of it.  Just forgot!  I admired a similar bag made by a quilter I met at the Vermont Quilt Show in June.  She showed me how to fold a rectangle of pre-quilted fabric to make such a bag, and I still have the little piece of paper she folded to show me.  I had tried to make one before but gave up as the folding was a mystery to me.   I will hang onto the little paper pattern and the link as I'd like to make one or two more sometime.  Quilters are the nicest, most helpful people.

Rainbow baby quilt

The sun was shining brightly yesterday so we finally managed to get a photo of the finished quilt.  It's going to be a boy, so little Daley will be a big brother.  They had a gender reveal party over the weekend - amazing how American activities have slipped over the Atlantic to the Netherlands.

I love the striped binding and was happy to find the stripes slanted on the bias.  In pawing through my stash in search of something fun, I noticed several other striped fabrics just waiting to be cut into  binding.  Since I have several rainbow scrap challenge quilts on the slow go, I'm sure I'll be using them soon.

The back was made of a bunch of 10" squares my former neighbor Carol gave me as she was packing to move.  She was sorry to be so drastically downsizing, and I hope her new place has more room than she thought so she can build a new stash there.  I arranged the squares as a nine patch initially and then cut them, disappearing nine patch style.  I like the way the quilting stands out.

Happy Labor Day!  I hope to get out and do a little shopping.  We need some new sheets for the guest bed (we're still using some from our B&B days), and I want to get some mum plants for the front (actually the planters in the driveway).   Then I'm going to make some chili - there is definitely a touch of fall in the air every morning here.

The end of a busy week

It's Saturday!  A day to catch up on things like laundry, vacuuming, and a little cooking.   If I'm lucky, I'll get a little sewing in.  The rainbow baby quilt is all quilted and bound, but it's going to be gloomy and rainy today, so I won't take a picture until the sun comes out.  

After finishing the quilt, I got sidetracked this week hemming some jeans for Paul and doing a few other mending chores.  I put off picking up the two quilts Marie finished quilting until this Thursday - I was feeling overwhelmed by the mess in the quilting room when she told me they are ready.  Maybe I'll even get the bindings cut before I pick them up.  

I took a little time this week to organize things and made a plan to finish the blue and white Netherlands quilt I started earlier this year.  I'll add a couple of borders and then decide how to quilt the wallhanging-sized piece.  The pattern for the country was created by a Vermont quilter, Karen Abrahamovich, who also created one of this state.  I have an early version of that pattern which I intend to make... someday!

Before I work on the Netherlands, I'll turn my attention to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  This month's color is purple which is great for me since I have a lot.  For that I am working on several quilts and try to make:  five log cabin blocks, two Traffic Stop blocks (a Pat Sloan pattern), two flowering snowball blocks, and one improv house.  That's a lot of UFOs, I know, but I plan to keep some of them going into the winter.  The log cabins will probably be put together before the end of the year.

We don't have any Labor Day weekend plans which is nice.  I hope to catch up on some reading, too, and may even clean up the gardens a little.  Hope your holiday is a relaxing one!

Quilting the rainbow

I sandwiched the rainbow baby quilt yesterday and started to quilt it.  Earlier in the day I bought the batt at the local quilt shop.  I needed a 60" x 60" batt fpr this little quilt which  measures about 49" square.  While I was there, I also found a fun striped fabric with many of the colors in it which I may use for the binding.  If not for this quilt, then for another.

The Quilters Dream batt is 100% cotton, and what a difference it is from the 80-20 batts I'm used to using.  It's much flatter and more solid which works well so far.  I started by using white thread on the top and cream on the bottom - so far so good, with no cream peeking through to the tp.  When I get to the various colors, I'll switch thread colors, although I will probably use cream for the yellow since I don't have any yellow thread.  I'm just stitching 1/2" from each seam.

I'll continue quilting with the white today before we head to the neighborhood annual summer picnic.  We have 18 people coming today for barbecued chicken catered by Randy the Racin' Chef.  Last year only two men came, but this year there will be four.  Most of the women are the same ones who come to the monthly women's lunches, and I'm disappointed that none of the newer neighbors are coming.  Summer is a busy time, and now that school has started again, everyone is getting their final gatherings and trips in before fall foliage season.  

Back in "business"

Our internet, TV, and landline were all down for three days last week.  It wasn't a total tragedy because my cell phone is on a different carrier.  But it was an inconvenience.  Spectrum was "upgrading" the system, but I was still able to get email and play New York Times games on my phone.  We have a TV with a digital antenna in the basement, so we only missed Jeopardy one night, much to our relief.  But it all recalled days gone by when our homes were quiet and our lives less distracted.  Not a bad thing!

I got some sewing done, too, this past week.  I finished the Rainbow baby quilt top and hung it up in the closet to wait for quilting.  I have a bunch of beige squares that I got from my neighbor Carol that I'll sew together somehow for the back.  The parents to be requested a beige quilt with the previous baby, so I'll do the same this time - bright back, beige (ugh!) front.

Meanwhile, I got out a box marked HSTs and sifted through all the cut-offs and leftover half square triangles.  The tiny ones, mostly likely from a long ago Bonnie Hunter mystery, were thrown out which I should have done ages ago.  If I still had a dog, I might have used them to stuff a dog bed.  But I know I'll never do anything with them, as there were potential HSTs in larger sizes.  I'm not sure where I'm going with the ones I sewed together, but I now have a collection of 9 patch blocks made of HSTs.

Then I turned my attention to starting a new row-by-row quilt, my 2026-27 guild row robin project.  My theme this year is "Fall" which includes colors I don't usually use together.  But my stash holds quite a few oranges, browns, beiges, greens, etc. to use up.  I'm telling the other quilters not to focus on Halloween, so I left out any fabrics directly related to that "holiday."

It's really difficult to take a photo of something so long and skinny, but you get the idea.  My initial row turned out to be 48.5" long.  The blocks were 6" baskets set on point, making the row is about 9" high.  I could have made maple leaves, but I thought I'd leave that for someone else to make.  I also made a small strip of 2.5" yellow HSTs (from the aforementioned box) that I will save for another row when the row robin return to me.   One of the members of the group wants people to attach their rows as her quilt moves along, but I'm asking everyone not to do that with mine.  I'd rather put the rows together myself, maybe with a bit of sashing in between the rows.