Fall is showing its beauty

A drive to the mall on Friday revealed absolutely no fall color.  It's always a nice view, but it was still green.  On Saturday morning, it was chilly and foggy, and when I drove down to the grocery store, the colors had popped overnight.  Everywhere we turn, there are reds, golds, and more.  Yesterday's drive up to the mall (I rarely go there; this was to pick up Paul's new glasses after his appointment Friday), an overwhelming amount of color.  

And the tour buses and RVs are everywhere!  Local restaurants are warning folks about reservations made by tour groups and some long waits to get seats.  But the weather has been so nice that we've been getting some last grillings in before we put the grill away for the winter.  

I got the little yoyo quilt bordered and sandwiched and then started quilting it yesterday.  These yoyos have been appliqued to squares so quilting has been in the ditch and then 1/2" away from the ditch on both sides.  Pretty easy.  I should be able to finish today or tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I'm buried in Robert Galbraith's Ink Black Heart, a 1,000 page mystery.  Galbraith is the pen name for J. K. Rowling who can always tell a good story, but, while this is absorbing, I am getting impatient and want to find out whodunnit!  When I took the hard cover copy back to the library (it is very heavy), I suggested that they allow borrowers to read it over six weeks, rather than the month they've been giving them.  I'm reading the Kindle edition now which is a lot easier to hold!

Another sampler

I've had this little quilt waiting for a photoshoot, but it keeps raining and/or looking gloomy.  So today I laid it out on the living room floor and took its picture.  It's a little sampler that will be joining a few others at Bags of Love, which gives quilts and knitted items (I am also sending a few) to kids going into foster care.

I enjoyed making all of the individual blocks, especially the wonky stars, but I worried over arranging them all together.  It's a mishmash, but perhaps a kid can play "I Spy" with it.

I heard about a program to give "blankets" to new refugees called "Welcome Blankets."  My local quilt shop is a drop off point.  They are taking blankets, afghans, quilts, and more, but they all have to be 40" x 40".  

I had one 24" UFO left hanging in the closet after my summer finishing frenzy.  It was made with some yoyo blocks by quilters in the state guild.  We had a ton of blocks made and created 6 or more crib-sized quilts with them, as well as a little wallhanging for our outgoing president.  Yesterday, I expanded the little leftover quilt top to the 40" x 40" size the Welcome Blankets group wants.  I hope to get it sandwiched this afternoon, and I'll quilt away for the next few days. I find it difficult to go around those yoyos which are appliqued onto the center of 5" black and white charm squares.  That's why it's been a UFO, but I am happy to have a place to send it to.

More yoyos and the RSC

I still have a bunch of yoyos appliqued to black and white squares hanging around, after distributing quite a few at the state quilt guild meeting two weeks ago and making a small quilt for our president.  I had been considering arranging a few to resemble balloons with embroidered strings, but after I laid them out, they still looked like squares with yoyos attached.  I think they'll need to be cut into differently sized shapes in order to work together.

I still have a bag of 72 black and white squares with yoyos to turn into half of a small quilt.  Soni and Jan are making the other half.  That's a project I've set aside for a snowy day when I feel like sewing something mindlessly while watching the weather.  We have quite a few of those in January and February, cozy days when we don't go anywhere and have pancakes for lunch.

Meanwhile, I made a nine patch of some 5" yoyo squares and bordered it with various 2.5" scrappy squares.  Now the little quilt is 24.5" wide, and I'm at a bit of an impasse.  I think I'll add a small strip of bright blue as shown, followed by some scrappy log cabin blocks for the next border.   Adding more color always makes a scrappy quilt look better.

Meanwhile, I'm make some more pineapple blocks, this time out of my many Christmas scraps.   The 6" pineapples are a two-year RSC project, and I've been thinking of making a house-themed quilt for another RSC 22 project.  I have collected several patterns for house quilts and hope to combine variously sized blocks into one quilt made throughout the coming year.  

Awash in yoyos

A few years ago, the president of the state quilt guild asked if folks would like to join her in creating a yoyo quilt, possibly the biggest one ever, that could be displayed at the Vermont Quilt Festival.  People worked feverishly through that year 2018-19 to make yoyos and then to applique them onto black and white 5" squares.  There were a couple of sew-ins, too.  The resulting quilt would have been enormous, so she opted to make a king sized quilt (actually, 112" x 106") that could be displayed at the festival.  She thought that, later, it could be cut into four pieces and given to charity.

I am not into yoyos, but, good sport that I [usually] am, I appliqued some yoyos onto squares for her.  Any leftovers I gave back.  She is no longer the president, and I am the current secretary and live in her town.  The board thought it would nice to show the quilt at an upcoming meeting.   She delivered the giant quilt, two finished quilt tops, one top almost finished, and a huge shopping bag of squares a week or so ago.  I took the tops to a long arm quilter who works with the Dept. of Children and Families to supply "Bags of  Love" to kids in foster care.

But what to do with all those loose squares?  I took a few to my Saturday sewing group, and two people took some home to sew into strips for another top to go to Bags of Love.  I'll take the unfinished top to the October state guild meeting to see if I can recruit someone to put the strips together.  

Today I bagged up the squares, 12 to a baggie, to give away, too.  12 baggies will make another quilt top.  There were still some left overs, so I made a little 20" x 20" something - wall hanging? table topper? dresser scarf?   I'll quilt it soon and bind it in black.  

There are more white squares leftover, so they're in a bag of their own.  I have an idea for using those, too, but not for a while.   As I say, I'm not all that wild about yoyos!