I'm Still Quilting

 I keep running out of time to write up this post. The 'Folksy Tree & Baskets' quilt top is finally finished! All the applique done and dusted.*sigh

Getting the birds stitched down

I am so thrilled about the birds on this quilt! They look very fat and happy.

And a finished quilt top!

It just feels like they make this very brown and blue quilt come alive.

So happy with the scrapped together
background fabric look

When all the birds, berries and leaves on the tree were attached, then I realized that the baskets needed just a little bit extra. 

And the very subtle addition of blue leaves

But not TOO much, if you know what I mean. The blue leaves were the easy, peasy way to add in the little bit of color that properly ties the baskets back in with the rest of the quilt--instead of them just being a glaringly bright, creamy white distraction. 

Crossing my fingers this quilt will look
extra cozy whenever the hand quilting happens!

Or whatever. I just know that I like it ever so much better now! Sometimes these little details sort of sneak up on us, but they are actually just as important as some of the other more obvious ones.

Glad that I saved these basket cut-outs so they
could enjoy a quilt of their own

Still super happy about the lone basket lying on its side at the top right of the quilt. Why don't I do that sort of thing more often? It seems to add a wonderful dash of character to the quilt....

Loving these colors too

Overall, this quilt ended up being really folksy and fun looking, while still holding it's own as the depository of many oldish and long-languishing fabrics. It's really quite satisfying to finish up these sorts of quilt tops! Just don't think they'd feel nearly as interesting to me in all brand new fabrics. Although, I suppose it's not totally out of the question!

A very basic quilt top

I also managed to sew together a very fast and easy 'boys' quilt top. It's deliberately done very mishmash, scrappy and utilitarian style. I'm imagining it hand quilted in a naïve, organic style that will hopefully hold to the unpretentiousness of the blended fabrics. Still need to put together a baby girls quilt and maybe one more baby boys quilt. None of them are going to be very fussy though. This is going to be the year of the more minimal looking baby quilts. And I mean that. ha!

Starting to get to the point where I can cut it up!

On my wall this past week is the log cabin look piece that is potentially going to be cut up into a largish looking basket. The handle will be cut out of a blue/green fabric in whichever of these fabrics has enough leftover! The birds jumped onto the wall after I cut them out of the backside of the Folksy Tree and Baskets quilt. The wings were a quick addition just to see if they were worth holding onto for use in yet another quilt some day. I'd say yes, these are definitely keepers!

Playing with the color layout on the border

And another project which also managed to get some traction, is the Joy Basket quilt. All of sudden after always, always envisioning multiple rows of border surrounds, I dove right into a scrappy hst border.

How about if I put all extra hsts on the bottom?

I think it was because I finally realized that the border make-up wasn't all that important to me after all. What I really wanted was lots of color and zest. So I impulsively started cutting out free-style improv. hsts in various paired fabrics. It is taking quite a bit of time to sew these together, but I think I'm up for the challenge! After some darker quilts, this is absolutely making me remember why I adore color in quilts.....

The Finished Baby Boy Quilt and Free-Cut Strips

The baby quilt is all done finally. It's bound, washed and even has a label! The binding was the last little detail to get figured out and luckily I had the perfect fabric waiting in the wings. On its own, it was an uninspiring piece of fabric, but for the purposes of this quilt? Just what was needed.

Grandsons baby quilt is done!

I struggled with this quilt all along. Mostly because baby quilts can be difficult for me these days. There's just no room for expanding on the original idea and that just feels a little suffocating! And it was a boy quilt so that feels even harder. As per usual, I gathered together fabrics from what was at hand. Then I went looking for more.

Simple quilting here in this area

I was able to use a couple fatquarters my mom gave me early this spring and also, managed to buy just a couple pieces that seemed necessary to convey the color palette my DIL wanted. When the quilt top stage was finally achieved, I have to admit to feelings of abject failure. Why oh why didn't I just keep going with the overall block theme and leave off the outside border inclusion? 

Want to know a secret? Because it was a very old fabric that I was quite determined to use up and this seemed like the best quilt opportunity ever. Huh. So muleheaded when I get an idea in my head. Was it worth it? Hmmm.... Ill let you decide.

Decided to add more quilting texture into the border 

Thankfully, after the quilting texture jumped into the quilt and the washing revealed the quilty goodness, I was able to stand back and view the quilt a little more kindly. Yes, it could have been better, but overall, it's a warm, boyish looking quilt. Goal accomplished. After all, a baby quilt doesn't have to be the best of all of our efforts. It just has to be sweet, cozy, cuddly looking and not too special to be used!

Crumpled and cozy looking

Bonus, my DIL seemed very, very happy with it! Gotta love that. Goes wonderfully well with the newly finished baby room decor of highland cows and little cowboys.*sigh  Also, what a relief to know that even though it was late by my standards, it was good timing for her.

A little bit of the back showing

In other news, our daughter gifted us with a trip to Alberta, Canada. We drove up to Banff {with her} from our home here in Washington. Very fast trip, but such a lovely drive and all the mountains and glacier fed lakes that we saw were just incredible. We were in awe! Wish we could have had more time to explore, but it was definitely a trip that we will treasure forever.

Lake Louise, Canada

I know this will make some of you uncomfortable, but we are actually quite poor at the moment. Which made the trip all the sweeter as it wasn't something we would have been able to do on our own! Though my husband is doing better now, he has had lots of sickness in the last several years with this past winter being the absolute worst. We really almost lost him and so our time together seems very precious. All the lost work, together with the poor economy, rising inflation etc. and we are just struggling financially. As I'm sure others are as well. I mean, have you noticed the price of groceries and fuel?

Got to start somewhere!

Which brings me to quilting. So very thankful for my totes of fabric. Even without buying a single piece of fabric, I can probably keep making quilt tops for at least a couple years. They might be 'interesting' color palettes, but then, that's my thing, right? No worries there. And then there is the bins of scrap fabric. Surely that could keep me occupied for another year or two? Ha! Not that I'm complaining. It is what it is.

The completed slabs of fabric strips for cross-cutting

I came home from the trip with an overwhelming need to get busy in the quilt room. Kind of like an ache in my heart just to play with fabric. I wandered around sort of aimless though, until finally making myself pick a project and sticking to it. Can't imagine why I landed on a project that featured so much blue, can you? 

Getting the baskets joined together

I free-cut strips until I had enough to make at least ten slabs of the mixed blue and violet fabrics. As always, it was tricky getting started, not knowing how exactly to set things up in order to not waste fabric. Eventually I decided that these final strip sets needed between two to three strips of blue for every addition of the violet ones. I know they are a little blendy looking in the blue sections, but that is by design. Hopefully this results in a calmer, cozier vibe for the baskets without competing too much for imminence.  

Each row of baskets will be slightly staggered if I can just figure out how to do the layout. Then there will be a section to the right with more of the dark brown fabric {no baskets at all}. This will be the 'background area' where I intend to cut out and applique a largish folky looking tree and perhaps a bird or two. It's all doodled onto a piece a paper, but putting it into fabric is wonderfully challenging as always....

Good Vibes Getting to Finished Quilt Top Stage!

What a summer. I really need to quit having any expectations and just learn to go with the flow. Had to have my computer worked on last week and for some reason our internet is moving slower than molasses the last while too. We're supposed to have fiber optic in our area of town some day in the future. Knowing this county? It's still gonna be a few years.*sigh

Coronacrazy progress

We've been having a heat wave, but there's still hand quilting in the evening as long as the air conditioner keeps working. I was finally getting into a groove with Coronacrazy {all that stitching over applique gets a little tiresome}, when the baby quilt decided it was high time to be first in line. Well, or me deciding to quit procrastinating? 

Baby quilt in the hoop

I usually don't have two quilts in the hoop at the same time, but my grandson is three months old today! So crazy how slowly things have been progressing this year in the quilt room. Just can't seem to get back in the normal rhythm at all. I'm blaming it all on my husband! He has a funny way of constantly disrupting my schedule. It's not always for a long length of time, but once I get distracted from a specific goal....

Good Vibes is a finished quilt top!

I previously stated expectations for the next Bramble Blooms prompt. Was hoping to have a post up by the end of June or first of July, but yeah. It's not happening. It's coming along, I promise! Just needed to clear a couple things off the list so my brain can relax and figure out how to write the next post.

Loving these colors

One of the few things on the list was this Good Vibes quilt. It's part of the Circle Game series that I've been doing for quite awhile. I take the cut out circles from behind one quilt and try to use them to jumpstart yet another quilt. 

There's just something about tulips

This particular quilt also somehow morphed into a chance to try my hand at making 'awkward' looking tulips once again. The first quilt with something similar was Spring Forward, an olderquilt that has lived in our living room ever since being finished. It's a sweet, whimsical quilt that always makes me smile, so why not go that route again?

Very cozy

There's definitely something about working with these very large circles that intrigue me. They also sort of make me feel half crazed because they are just too big. I mean. How many different ways can you re-imagine these things in a quilt? But you know me, try, try again until it's not fun anymore! When it gets to be tedious, then I'll probably quit. Maybe. Sometimes the challenge just seems to spur me on!

So awkward looking!

I had the idea for the little cross blocks at the top and bottom of the quilt almost from the start, but wasn't sure how they look color-wise etc. After seeing the appliqued border tulips start to come into play, then it got a lot easier. The brown was the obvious choice, especially with the peachy background color. I'm really liking the simplicity, especially when paired with the up/down placement that helps turn the corner into a happier vibe. It clearly brings a little extra energy when you deliberately choose not to place them exactly side by side. Really easy thing to do, but ahem! It helps tremendously to measure properly before cutting all the little extra pieces.

 I'm still sort of laughing at the brownish peach background fabric behind the tulips though. Don't know if you noticed, but that fabric is definitely different than the background at the top and bottom border of the quilt. It has got to be one of the most unlovable fabrics of all time. Someone gave it to me years ago and I've never found a quilt at all receptive to using it until now. In fact, I was pretty sure it would pull the entire vibe of a quilt down if I did use it! So thrilling to finally find an excellent use for it and see it making magic with the rest of the quilt. Yay! How does that happen? Oh, I just adore working with different color palettes and seeing various colors and tones sort of wake up and start smiling. Isn't working with color the very best thing about quilting? 

Binding prep always feels good

I won't tell you how many mistakes that I made bring this particular quilt top together. How the border math did NOT work and I had to puzzle piece too much of it together. Somehow we have managed to come out the other side now and I am super happy with the quilt top as a whole. Am really looking forward to seeing it with the quilting texture some day! 

Don't know if this makes sense to any of you fellow quilters, but I am now in a much, much better mental space to tackle the writing {and organization} for the next Bramble Blooms post! It really helps me to work on several different projects {all at the same time} for some reason. Always has! When I just try and focus in on one thing, then my brain starts feeling super sluggish. I only have one more thing on the list before moving on, and that would be fully completing the baby quilt. Another couple days and hopefully that quilt should be totally wrapped up! Then we'll see about the next phase of BBII....

Sporadic Quilting These Days

Just gonna catch up for a minute and then disappear for a couple more weeks. I can't seem to keep up with everything going on lately, so if it seems like I've been checked out for awhile, that's probably why. I'm not at total overwhelm, but close.*Ugghh  What has happened to my life? Plentiful quilting time seems like such a luxury these days!

Another border for Peace Always

I did get all the little baskets appliqued and sewn onto the 'Peace Always' medallion quilt. Started way back when and moving forward very slowly! It's such a bright, happy quilt so far and the yellow backgrounds to the baskets just make everything pop. Love it so much already! Crossing my fingers the next border surround won't dampen this quilts enthusiasm.

ready for some handwork

'A Tisket, A Tasket' is ready for hand sewing the binding on. I've already mentally prepared to give this as a wedding present and now we know the wedding will be this fall. Lots of time to get the binding taken care....

Baby quilt on the design 'floor'

I am sooo behind on everything these days. Finally, finally got started on my grandsons baby quilt. Was wanting to keep it very simple, but as always, I try to work in the mommas preferred colors. My DIL is probably the only person in the world that I will make an effort to do that. It's so much harder for me to start somewhere besides a stack of fabric that is calling my name. I still have to sew the rows together and then add on the last two borders, but much progress has been made by this past weekend. I'm thinking it will end up with some machine quilting and then a bit of hand quilting to cozy it up.

playing with fussy cut applique ideas

On a whim, I cut up a piece of fabric my mother gave me this past winter. Lots of lovely flowers that were making me wonder what they might look like fussy cut and appliqued onto a pieced background. Hmm... what about 'Old Fashioned'? Such a simple quilt, I'm sure it would appreciate a little extra time and attention. Still haven't settled on exactly how I'll approach the layout, but it will definitely need some interesting leaves and lots of stems cut out and sewn down!

Next up in the hoop!

Next up in the hoop is Coronacrazy. It's been at the top of the hand quilting list for well over a year and I've just been finding one excuse after another to avoid doing it. Finally got it sandwiched and pinned, all snugged into the hoop. Hope it turns out well! I'm thinking about putting it into the NCW Quilt show this summer. Haven't went since 2019, so it might be time. We'll see. I love putting my quilts into shows where I can see them hang, but always feel a little bad that I'm not part of the guild. Oh well. It's too far away and their meeting times would never work for me and my commitments. Just easier to pay the fee per quilt and hope they don't turn me away!

Am trying to work on the next prompt for Bramble Blooms too. Will hopefully have something up and present by the end of June or perhaps the first week or so in July! So far, I'm not finding it difficult to work with those older fabrics. It just feels like I need a lot more time with the pondering....

 

All the 2023 Quilty Finishes {Finally!} & A Little Bramble Blooms Progress

 A belated look-back at all the 2023 finishes here at Quilty Folk! Once again, life has gotten in the way of my quilty forward progress. What a shock and surprise, right? I must be human.

2023 Finishes--A

It was a very slow year for quilt finishes, coming in at 10 quilt total. Considering all that went on last year though, I feel like it was an amazing feat. 

2023 Finishes--B

Since I'm throwing this up on the blog for my own benefit, it's probably best to keep it brief.

The 2023 Finished Quilt Details:

• 3 Baby Quilts
• 1 Lap sized Quilt
• 6 Bed sized Quilts
• 9 Quilts totally Hand Quilted
• 1 Quilt mixed Hand and Machine Quilted

As a note of interest, I gifted 12 quilts last year, which is more than I finished. Hmm... You'd think the stacks would be smaller by now? But no. That's not how it seems to work. Gifting quilts is really good for the soul and making friends though, so I guess I'm fine with that! Another item of note is that the quilt top drawers are getting easier to shut. By the end of 2023, there was only 20 tops left and 2 of them were donations from my sister a few years ago. Not really something that I'm stressing about ever finishing if you want to know the truth of it. Like I've mentioned before, they will probably end up as quilt backing some day. I'm just not that invested in them!

Another interesting thing is that I finished quite a few larger quilts last year. With lots and lots of hand quilting. Even if hardly anything else got done, I still managed some hoop time. That's NOT been the case this year. My hand quilting time has dropped to just a couple evenings a week the last couple months. So many things are getting in the way of my quality hoop time. Just drives me crazy, but what do you do? 

Just for the record and journaling purposes: I started out 2023 sicker than I've even been and of course that took awhile to power through and catch up from. Then we had our youngest sons wedding at the end of April. Our oldest daughter had her first child in August and somewhere in the middle was two wedding weekends for a niece and nephew who we feel quite close to. Lots of family shenanigans to attend to as well.

Unfortunately, the year also ended with my husband being sicker than he's ever been and now, somehow we're already in February of 2024. Whew. I'm still right smack in the middle of caretaking, which is not nearly as fun as quilting. We are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel and feel thankful for any improvements as they are all quite hard won. Thank you all once again for your many messages of love and encouragement in this hard time. Priorities definitely ebb and flow throughout our lives don't they?

Moving along

Starting the Bramble Blooms QAL seemed like an exciting adventure back when the momentum was carrying me along with the inspiration and initial drive. Now, it's one of the few quilty things that I can think about without feeling completely overwhelmed and uninspired. Most days. Maybe just a little bit blank around the edges of my brain sometimes? Or panic that I might be letting you down? Uggh. There's so much to appreciate though: Using up the Oldy moldy fabric, an easy-peasy medallion quilt plan of attack, Improv-ish, open-ended, loosey-goosey style? Nothing to fret about or bother getting overly excited about, right? Except for the issue of time.*sigh

So yeah. Time is definitely problematic these days. Both for finding enough time in the day to do the applique work and then the computer time for posting. Wowsers, has that been a tough one! I keep telling myself that I did in fact warn everyone about the slower pace of this QAL. It's either bag the whole project or just keep plugging away at it and find the joy where it comes. You know me. Gonna keep after it until the challenge runs cold.

The picture above is the current state of my BBI. Both the top and bottom borders have been stitched down and all that is left for stitching on the side panels is the leaves. I have them pinned where they will probably stay. Still deliberating whether or not to remove a leaf or two from the top and bottom border and thinking yeah. Might as well leave them alone now. Afterall, it's extra work to take them off! 

Also, I keep making these flaky little mistakes {so surprising considering my state of distraction these days}. Right now the quarter triangle corner blocks are just a wee bit too small for seamlessly sewing onto the centerpiece. I've already cut the coping border down once, but may have to trim a little more off. Or maybe trim a bit of fabric off of the outside of the applique borders? Regardless, this phase of the quilt is very, very close to being done. 

I don't know about you, but I'm really liking the end result thus far! As per usual, I am a little shocked and dumbfounded by how interesting this older fabric can be made to look. It's nothing new to me as I've had this result before. But it always, always amazes me because in the fabric stack, the whole thing just looked pretty dismal if you know what I mean! 

I managed to squeeze in enough time to scroll though all the blogs and instagram accounts that have been linked up to the QAL. Very exciting work! Many lovely, exciting creations to contemplate and be inspired by! Wish I could be more present on the blogs especially but maybe later. I'm very encouraged by the creativity and courage many of you have displayed in branching out with this strange little QAL.  I'm hoping that if you manage to push through with the details in the first quilt, then my thoughts pertaining to inspiration and the connection to series work will start to coalesce in the 2nd and 3rd. It's a bit of a slog at first I know, but we have to get some foundational work in place before we can begin to build on anything personal.

  

I can't promise any hard and fast date, but my plan is to move directly into action with the next border phase of BBI. There is quite a bit of organization involved so please bear with me. Crossing my fingers I'll have all the details together before the end of February at the very least if not the six weeks I was originally hoping for. Don't be afraid to email me if you have a late start and want to be added to the link list!

Connecting to Creativity

Well, that month went by in a screaming hurry! I ended up spending most all of August with my daughter in Oklahoma. Waiting for her to have her baby and then helping out afterward. So thankful to have the time and opportunity to make it all work out.

The sweet new grandbaby

Meet Miss. Gracelyn May! We just love her so very much. She's a little sweetie and definitely kept us all hopping for the first couple weeks. You know how some babies just take a little more time getting adjusted to the real world. Gotta get the mom and dad trained up properly! The picture below is with Ellie, another one of our {four} granddaughters. She was sooo fascinated with her new little cousin. We loved having her help too!

Lots of love from her older cousin!

Finally made it back home to my tired and grumpy husband. It's the longest I've been away for all of our married life, but he was totally on board with what I thought was needed. He actually survived fairly well and the house wasn't too terrible. Our youngest daughter had kept tabs on that. {If I could add heart emojis here, I would!} Still, I had mountains of laundry to do and some things that needed set to rights. Still do actually, but one thing at a time!

Probably won't be using the scrappy circles after all

I didn't get hardly any quilting done during the month of August {tiniest bit of hand quilting}, so you can only imagine my longing to dive right back into quilting. After a quick perusal of the quilting WIP's list, I decided what was needed most was something completely carefree. 

Working on the centerpiece

On impulse, I grabbed a bag of orphan blocks, bits and bobs that I had grouped together a couple months ago. The entire bag was thrown together based on color compatibility and not much else. Basically, I just started throwing things on the wall, moving things around until there was some good energy.

Top and bottom border sewn on, working on the sides

Then I started figuring out how to sew it together! First the middle improv. strips went together. Lots of partial piecing and trimming up in order for it to lay flat. Had to introduce one similar-look light tan fabric and then later, a couple darker prints in the border, but otherwise, this entire quilt top is strictly made out of orphaned parts and pieces!

This is the completed background centerpiece minus a 
thin piece of purple I'm gonna add up on the right corner

After the middle part of the quilt was sewn together, then I made an executive decision to trim it to straight. I waffled about that for all of ten minutes or so and then finally flipped the top over and bit the bullet. Why flip it over? Mostly so I didn't have to worry about what was being cut off! ha! Just couldn't face trying to sew the outside borders onto the quilt if I had to do too much easing and coaxing. 

Adding the applique bits that look interesting

Now I'm in a frenzy {a very slow, methodical frenzy} to add leftover applique bits and pieces to the center of the quilt. The whole process has felt amazing. I can't really adequately explain what this has meant to me! Very free spirited and fun just because of the loose, open ended determination for the outcome. It feels like it has woke up my sleeping creativity in just the right sort of way. Not sure what it's supposed to be or do or even end up looking like, but I'm totally okay with that. How about that? We're all good over here in this corner of the quilt world after all!  Maybe by next week I'll have my head above water enough to finally go check out all the blogs I've been neglecting....

All the Baby Quilts

So I got all the baby quilts done this week, labels and all! It felt really good to get these checked off the list.

Prickly Pears is done!

The first one is Prickly Pears, the baby girl quilt. It's made out of the cut-out pears from behind another quilt I made.

Loving the floral

You might think the gray pears are odd, but I really, really like it! I tried to use brighter, bolder prints for some of these blocks, even if they almost clashed. It ended up with a good cozy vibe and the backing fabric will hopefully make my daughter smile!

Who wouldn't want bikes on the back?

The second baby quilt finish is the Improv. Log Cabin quilt. The strips were not cut straight or measured at all. 

Improv. Log Cabin is done and dusted!

And in fact, the center Monkey Wrench block was improv. as well and never straightened.

Always a fan of Log Cabin quilts

If the quilt seems a little bit 'off' then that is why! Nothing to be ashamed of though, it just adds character. I did end up snipping a tiny hole in the backing fabric when pinning the quilt though. Just cutting a thread and missed and cut into the quilt.*sigh

How bout the dark backing fabric?

Thankfully, my daughter doesn't mind patches on things. Uggh. So annoying. The third baby quilt is made out of leftover blocks that have been languishing in the orphan bit totes.

Wish Upon a Star

It has a much softer look and feel, but it holds its own with the others just fine.

It's finished!

This one is being gifted to a long time friend of ours for her second baby. I rarely make or gift baby quilts to anyone other than family because our family is so very large. Well that, and I prefer making my big 'ol creative adventure quilts more.

The backing helps add to the baby feel

The backing fabric is a soft, babyish star fabric. Except that it had a surprisingly tough weave and was not the easiest to hand quilt. Got it done though! Yay!!

Hanging sleeves for the quilt show

I've also been working to get hanging sleeves on a couple of quilts. Not something that I particularly enjoy, but it needed to be done....

The Mountains Are Calling in the hoop

And last but not least, I've finally dove into the hand quilting part of the wedding quilt for my youngest son and his new wife. It's more a 'guy' quilt and I'm crossing my fingers the new DIL won't mind too much! {I plan on giving her a girly looking quilt later on.} Feels good to get this much of the freehand Baptist fan quilting accomplished. I'm loving the texture already! No marking whatsoever here.

Ok, that's it for now! We're just barreling through summer with hardly any time to breathe. Gotta get back to the to-do list and check a few other things off the list that aren't quilty related...