Very Belated Look at Finished Quilts From 2022

It's way late to do a end of the year wrap up post so if this isn't your thing, please feel free to move along. It's mostly for my own records anyway, since quilts tend to get lost in the shuffle if I don't keep track. Last year ended with a respectable 15 quilts totally finished up. Not my best number, but definitely nothing to sneeze at. If I wouldn't have gotten so sick, there would possibly have been another to add to the list. Apparently it wasn't meant to be!

2022 Finishes (1)

As per usual, I find myself reaching for a mix of applique quilts to put in the hoop and then, maybe a totally machine pieced quilt just to change things up. As the years go by, there seems to be less and less quilts without some form of applique involved in the making. Hmm... I wonder what that says about me?

2022 Finishes (2)

I always keep a master list of completed quilt tops which is supposed to have the projects listed in order of completion. This helps ensure that I don't end up neglecting a quilt top well beyond the point of being impossible to drum up interest in quilting on it. This list is, of course, cheerfully ignored at whim. Mostly tops are pulled out of the drawers depending on whatever color and mood {or vibe} that I'm currently searching for. Or if a quilt is destined to be gifted. Sometimes that moves a quilt top up to the top of the list in a hurry!

2022 Finishes (3)

Quite to my surprise, the quilt top list shrunk last year--down to 20 unfinished quilt tops! And two of those tops were given to me by my sister a couple years ago, so really. They don't even hardly count.

So..., the 2022 Finished Quilt details:

• 7 Lap Quilts
• 7 Bed Quilts
• 1 Comfort Quilt
• 9 Quilts completely hand quilted
• 5 Quilts mixed hand quilting and machine quilting
• 1 Quilt completely machine quilted
• 8 Quilts gifted, gently used or newly finished

Towards the end of the year I had quite a few ideas and goals for the winter quilting efforts and going into this year. All of that has been turned upside down and now I really don't know if I'm coming or going. I had to cancel the winter quilting meetings at our church after losing the entire month of January. Thankfully, everyone seemed very understanding. Am finally starting to feel somewhat normal again, but am still not at 100%. Have only left the house five times in fact since this all started, but I'm getting there! Which, frankly, is a huge relief. I'm asking everyone to please give comment amnesty for past posts. Have so appreciated the kind comments, but did not have the energy most days to try and 'catch up'. 

Cheddar fabric

I also wanted to give a shout-out to Lizzy at Gone to the Beach blog. She has a very charming blog that I have followed for years and years. At some point this winter, she had offered to send me some pieces of cheddar colored fabric to help out with a specific project where the stash totes were seemingly lacking. By the time we had made proper connection, I tried to tell her that I was actually currently too sick to be working on any quilt project. She insisted, I couldn't resist and these fabrics have been such a joy to me just to look at, even if only wistfully in passing. Really, really sweet of her to share fabric so generously! 

Still haven't done anything meaningful with that project yet, but you know me. It's only a matter of proper time and focus. If I have any big plans for 2023, it's to take time, try and be mindful and not be in a big rush to check things off a list. Thanks to all who keep checking in with the blog. I'm not ditching it, I promise! {Though the posting might be slow for a bit.} I am reading and trying to catch up on quilting blogs now and finding myself missing some older blogs that have totally drifted away. There are a lot of things still needing my attention before I can dive into quilting at full throttle and well, guilt free? At least I am slowly starting to get in a bit of hand work most evenings. Have missed it so very much.... 

Baskets and Flowers

It was lovely to have company for a nice long weekend. The nieces are growing up way too fast! Can't believe one of them is already driving.*sigh We are getting too old! Most of the time when we have guests, I can get out the quilting and do a little stitching. This time I just mostly curled up in the corner of the couch and settled in for the good visiting.

A Tisket, A Tasket basket blocks are done

So yeah, in terms of quilting, there is lost time. In terms of quality of life stuff? Who cares? At some point last week I stitched the last little bit of binding down on Spring Flowers. It was very satisfying to have another completion for the year. I feel very dithery and not very focused lately with the quilting stuff. It's just all sort of whatever feels right for the moment. But even more so than usual.

Spring Flowers is a true blue finish!

I'm pretty sure this quilt will be given away eventually, but not sure to whom. Yet. I really like the sweet flowers and spunky vibe, but I'm not super attached to it if you know what I mean. Some day, a person will cross my mind and I'll think of this quilt and just that easily, a match will be made. I almost gave it away already and then changed my mind. This quilt deserves to have somebody that truly loves it. Just haven't figured that part out yet.

Totally completed!

Loving that this quilt was started with the leftover cut-out circles from another quilt project. That does seem to be my modus operandi these days! Maybe my creative imaginings are getting dull and there needs to be a weird challenge in order to get something started.

Tried to keep the hand quilting low key

Oh well. We can't be 'on' all of the time, can we? This past two years has been such a roller coaster of emotion, it's simply incredible that so many of us even show up for any little spark of creativity. Lately, all I want to do is avoid any hint of the news and hibernate at home with my new Libby reading app. Where oh where have you been all my life? Just kidding. I adore reading physical books with actual paper the very best.

Looking very snuggable

The quilt meetings have been fun and also a little tiny bit of a drain on my time. You know me. It's hard to have deadlines when it comes to my quilting.*Ughh Makes me want to rebel which is really a terrible, terrible idea when I'm the one {supposed to be} trying to keep the momentum going for everyone else! 

Just sewing to sew

I was feeling so restless the other day that I grabbed up the bag of practice strips from the free-cutting demonstration day and just started sewing. All the strips are 10" long which is a bit limiting, but I'll figure something out eventually. Paired with a cream fabric, all the uglies should be toned down and maybe even start to look interesting. Maybe. I don't even care. It was just something to do while I soothed the soul and got myself ready to dive into the Improv. Class work. I think it takes more time to figure out the plan of attack than it does to do the actual work!

The latest in the hoop

Oh well, I wouldn't have it any other way when I see how much fun people are having. That makes it all very worthwhile. As you can see, I'm still plodding along with hand quilting on the occasional evening. Moving a little slower with this particular quilt than normal {'cuz all the reading distraction}, but it's wonderful to see progress. Just a little bit more and like always, it will probably motivate me to kick it up into a higher gear. Oh, I'm out to the border already? That means I'm almost done!*wink  Don't we wish!

 

Is It Really March Already?

There's been a lot going on at the home front lately. Nothing new and earth shattering, just the normal things that burn up the time. I put the last of the hand quilting stitching in Spring Flowers and found a little moment to machine sew the binding on. Maybe I can hand stitch the binding down later this week when my company gets here.

Spring Flowers moving along

One of my sister-in-laws will be here for a long weekend and other family will be in town too. Second weekend in a row for out of town company. Always nice to have a bit of hand work ready to go for these times. When my hands are busy maybe my mouth will be less so? lol

Big Kiss getting ready for the hoop!

I also managed to get the Big Kiss quilt sandwiched and pinned. Went ahead and kept the Batik backing, though I did soak it in boiling water for several hours, refreshing when the water cooled. So far it's behaving nicely, though not quite as easy to quilt through as a normal 100% cotton fabric. Or a woven fabric backing. Thank goodness it's not a large quilt!

Always enjoy seeing the applique bits

Lovely to work on a colorful quilt after the softer colors of the previous one. It's good to mix things up and keep things interesting. Still working on the Improv. quilt for the quilt meetings. It's driving me crazy to keep to the slower pace, but I am super glad that I went ahead and decided to make a new quilt alongside of everyone else. Much, much easier when it comes to the demonstrations.

Improv. Quilt strip sets getting cut

And.... somehow I found myself jumping into a brand new quilt project. It's improv. strips too, but these are 17'18" long instead of 10". This is something that I've been thinking about for most of a year. Probably be for my youngest sons, thus the color choices. He always somehow ends up with blues and golds and browns. Good thing he likes them!

The new Improv. quilt

At this moment in time I've got all the slabs sewn. I'm doing repeats of fabric instead of mixing them all up and I think that's going to work very well with what I have planned, but we'll see. For now, it's a little bit boring!

Probably have too many slabs!

As you can see, I snuck a plaid shirt in with the fabrics. I love the look considering it's intended for a mans quilt. Am currently trying to decide if I want to have straight cuts on the ends of my cross-cut strips or if I want to go with the more organic look. Does it even matter? Questions, questions.

Testing out the strip sets

Here's the videos my daughter helped me put together for the last quilt meeting. She was very insistent that this would be a good thing. Hmm... Prior to the meeting we knew there would be two to three people absent and I'm not thrilled with the calls for 'catching up'. Also, I wanted everyone to have the option of refreshing their memory in case they got stuck. This phase of cross-cutting the rows seemed important for everyone to get right.

1st part of Cross-Cutting the strip sets

I typed out a sheet and drew some diagrams as well, but some people are more visual. As you can see, I was TERRIBLY nervous to be doing a video {and this was our 2nd take!} So crazy. Can't think of the proper words for what I'm doing and my mind is just doing a constant stutter. Like I'm looking down at myself thinking, what is she doing????  I think I've relaxed a little bit in class by now and it always helps to go around and personally help people after demonstrations. Then I can make sure they are 'getting' it, they can ask questions while they are attempting to do what I just showed them, and no-one feels ridiculous. One on one just feels more natural all the way around.

2nd part of Cross-Cutting the strip sets

Please don't be too critical of our video. Oh my goodness, I can't even believe I'm showing you this! My daughter is not a pro. I am not a pro. No money is exchanging hands! We are just doing the best that we can and hopefully helping a few people learn how to quilt. Also, in class, I always try to go through things a couple of times and of course, tell them, {over and over} there are many ways to do things. I am showing you this way for the purposes of this quilt! 

While walking around and helping after, some people were eventually {instinctively} using the right sides of their mats to line up the slabs and/or whatever else made the most sense to them personally. Which I love and encourage. I tried to show how to straighten the ends of the cross-cut rows using 'just the ruler' and some people liked that better. I know I do. The beginning quilters however, liked having the crutch of lining up the whole row along a horizontal line and cutting along a bold vertical line. Whatever it takes! 

So far there is a very good feeling at classes, lots of smiles and camaraderie. Most are moving along with the project without feeling pushed or pressured so I've had to back off of trying to hurry it along at a faster pace. I come home after the classes all wired up and can't turn off my brain for a couple of hours. Did I do that right? Am I really encouraging them to enjoy quilting? Ahhhhh.....

I am really enjoying the colors of my project, but I've already made one almost exactly like this design-wise. I'm finding myself wondering what I can do in order to spice things up. Of course I am.... Hmm... maybe I can make an applique centerpiece and leave the middle out? If it was oval that would be even more interesting, just have to cut the center out instead! Lots to think about for sure. Hopefully we'll all have a brand new quilt top by the end of March. When/if that happens I'll try to post a pic of all our finishes!

New Applique Beginnings

 As per usual, the lure of the applique trips me up. No matter which projects are supposed to be 'next' in line, you can guarantee there'll always be time found for applique prep. Gotta make sure the hand work bag stays full!

The start of Orphan Annie

Orphan Annie, the pink tulip blocks {above} are one of those impulse things that I so love to do. The tulip shapes were cut-outs from the AHIQHourglass/Tulips quilt and I just can't bear to throw them away. Ughh! Can you even imagine? So I sewed up some scrappy backgrounds {20 in all}, in odd, random greens and green blues just to change things up. I'm using darker olive green fabrics for the leaves and a dark teal blue for the stems. They look fun to me even though the tulips are going to be very short, shallow blooms!

A Tisket, A Tasket

Then there's the 'A Tisket, A Tasket' project starting to take shape. I wanted to make basket blocks, but not really. Maybe something that tricks you into thinking it's a basket? After dithering over free cut triangles or the wedges for the base of the basket, I finally fell down on the side of the wedges. So much easier. And then of course I had to go ahead and add applique handles because why not? And now it's definitely a basket. 13 of them if you care about the total. Yeah. Color me surprised. Mostly, I've just been hankering to give that dark greenish/brown fabric a play. While not a huge fan of yellow and blue quilts, this is one challenge that doesn't scare me. All you have to do is add a basket or flower element and I'm all in!

The start of Country Stars

Next up is the quilt project that I will be calling 'Country Stars' because I can't really call it by its real name {Mrs. X's quilt}. I don't think she reads my blog, but just to be sure we'll keep it anonymous. And yep. It's brown.... Lots and lots of brown and oldish, sweet, sappy colors and prints. That's what she prefers so I'm gonna rise to the challenge and smile while I'm doing it. Reminds me soooo much of my older quilts. Wait? Didn't I make these stars once before? lol  

Uh huh. I've seen her roam around my living room where all the older quilts live and ooh and ahh. Okay. I give up. Apparently the newer quilts are just too bright and boring. Thankfully there are only 5 of the stars to sew as this is not something I'm terribly good at. In case you think that I've totally lost my mind, bear in mind that there will most definitely be some applique added on to the border surround. Maybe I can spice things up there in that area?

Ring Around

Another project lurking in the background forever has been these Melon Patch background blocks. After getting rid of the original backgrounds {and going in a different direction}, these little medallion 'starts' have been haunting me. 20 of them. Just too intriguing not to do something worthwhile with them! So I gathered some lovely fabrics together and conjured up a plan to make some wedge unit arches. This one is called 'Ring Around', loosely based on a quilt in a Kathy Doughty book, 'Adding Layers'. All the inspiration for the wedges is from the book, but the end result should look a little bit different. The fabrics looked much more interesting before I cut them out than they do now.*sigh  This might be the biggest flop of the year, we'll see.

Lillabelle blocks

Then there is 'Lillabelle'. This is part of a new series I've started with larger circle cut-outs because I just cannot resist the challenge. The siren call is pulling me in no matter how much I try to go do something else! When Gold Crossroads quilt top was finished up, there they were and who am I to say no? Absolutely no will power when it comes to these sorts of projects. And so you can see that this series will just sort of self generate. After these flowers are sewn on, the back side will be cut out and wallah! That will be the start of the next in the series, only this time they will be in the cheddar range instead of cream. And then the next, and then the next. Right now these blocks are quite large, 20" or so, but we'll see what happens as the series continues.

Spring Flowers getting sandwiched and pinned

With the hand stitching on Petra's quilt winding down, it was time to get another top ready for the hoop. Spring Flowers caught my fancy and so that is that. Decision made!

Sweet flowers

I don't think there will be any attempt at fussy stitching, just echo quilting etc. I'm looking forward to having a quilt in the hoop without a deadline, self-imposed or otherwise. Still wondering what in the world happened to make me want this wavy, striped fabric on the outside of this very calm and peaceful quilt. There are times that I make my own eyeballs twitch. Can't even imagine how the rest of you feel following along with all my odd and somewhat unexpected tangents!

Still Playing With Fabric

Here I am with another finished quilt top. This one went together very easily after the details were sorted out.

Spring Flowers

I don't have a lot of time for writing this post, so will try to be brief.

Looking across...

Part of me is unhappy with the harshness of the finished look, but the other part of me is pleased to see something semi-coherent looking. You know how it is when the original idea drifts away on moonbeams. Finished is better than perfect!

Lots of energy in that border...

The bright, chrome yellow inner border is really interesting resting against the zingy brown and cream striped fabric. So much energy going on that it almost makes me cross my eyes. I'll almost definitely be giving this one away some day in the future as it just doesn't feel quite 'me'.

So hard to get a good picture of this one

So happy to see the flowers doing well in a quilt of their own though. Each quilt project seems to want to teach me something. Am I listening and learning?

T-blocks

Another oddball project going on in the quilt room is these new little T-blocks. The block itself has been on my bucket list for years and years and these colors were inspired by a fave shirt that my dad wears fairly often. As I have played around with adding in additional colors and attempting a potential layout, the temptation is pretty strong to toss them and give up. Sometimes the summer brings some very, very strange color palettes into being around here. The plan was for a nostalgic, retro vibe to hopefully meld with a soft, mellow tone and look. 

Love Apples for the win

Yep. It ain't happening. Too much crazy stuff going on around here of late, my brain totally feels like mush. The only thing that feels good to work on is these Love Apple blocks. Other projects were probably more in the 'priority' stack, but who cares about that?

The dreaded paper work is finished up through what I consider to be phase 2, which is amazing. So many hours to get there. After a long Labor Day weekend, I hope to get started on the third phase and then we're off on a week long work-week away from home {for the husband}. There will be visiting with family during that time so that's a bonus, but as soon as we get back then I hope to dive right into phase 4 and then that will be the sum total. My goal is to be completely through it all by the end of September. If I don't lose my mind and all my marbles in pursuit of reaching that specific goal.

An interesting thing happened this week when we had unexpected guests. Just a short visit, but it quickly became apparent to me that the woman friend was in desperate need of a hand work sort of hobby. For her mental health and well being? I let her lead the way in indicating interest, but before she left, I had given her a crash course in needleturn applique, scribbled notes in a quilt book and tried to hit the high notes on how to acquire a bit of fabric. Yep. Crazy, crazy days. I sent her on her way with one of my quilts, a little bag of fabric scraps plus all the encouragement I could muster! Have you ever met someone who was bursting at the seams to use their mind, heart and hands to create? Believe it or not, I was trying very hard not to push anything on her. I think it was as good for me as hopefully it was for her. Cannot wait to see where her creative journey takes her in the next year or two!

This year is definitely taking a toll on me as it no doubt is for many of you. Sometimes I walk into the quilt room and just blindly reach for something to chain piece. Other nights I sit down to hand quilt and find myself fiddling away on my phone for way too long. Just have to hit reset and dive into the things that pique our interests, whether the current projects move forward or not. At times like these, I feel very relieved to have stacks of fabric marinating on the counters and hand work all prepped and ready to go....
 

August Update

Decisions, decisions. It was either take the time to go quilt or take the time to actually write a post. Today I decided the post had to come first. 

Seedpod Flower quilt top is done!

What can I say about this quilt top? You already know that the flower itself was kind of an impulse, use-up-the-abandoned-bits sort of start. 

The full view

You also know that the inspiration pic was one that I fell head over heels in love with a very long time ago. Or did you? Regardless, I'm pretty impressed to actually see this interpretation finally come to reality. I do so adore a scrappy, utilitarian sort of look!

Scrappy goodness

I suppose this quilt would have looked fine without the Seedpod Flower center. Maybe. At this point I can't even imagine the quilt without it though. Once I wrapped my mind around how it all needed to fit together, then the top went together relatively easily. The anxiety and avoidance up to that point was stupid. Why do I always tend to overthink?

Trying to UP the 'busyness' factor with the prints this time!

All the economy blocks are the same size which means the horizontal rows are the exact same width. That was an important detail moving forward. The random placement thus relies strictly upon the differences in the various lengths of the connecting rectangles. 

A new color palette for me, but somehow it seems to work!

While they are not nearly as tall as the ones used in the inspiration picture, these started out from the scraps leftover from cutting the economy blocks. That was a good place to start. Hard to throw away the very narrow ones!  And so... determining approx. vertical measurements for the connecting rectangles became unexpectedly very simple. After all, I really didn't want the differences to be super extreme. A couple inches at most and there I was. Easy peasy.

Looking across...

Crazy how the bright, sparky applique addition to the inside border brightens everything up. I do wish the very slight, lighter blue outline above the curves still showed, but it ended up being turned under for seam allowance. This was just another one of those impulse rabbit trails that turned out to be a wonderful idea in the end. Sometimes it's nearly impossible to keep myself from traveling down the path of 'I wonder if x, y, or z would make things look better....'. 

Sometimes it works to the good and other times I find out that it's clearly wasted time. Never really know till you try though! I love how the yellow in the applique surround is more citrus than the rest of the yellow golds in the quilt. Yet it works as a very definitive framing for the Seedpod Flower, which of course, is the star of the entire quilt. Why not emphasize that even more!

This quilt top has a very distinctive mood, one that I can't quite put a proper label to. Is it retro? Vintage? Does it just convey fond memories of my grandmothers house dresses or perhaps it was the aprons she wore? Whatever it is, the mood as a whole, brings a smile to my face every time. 

Working on Spring Flowers

Another project that I've been spending time on in Spring Flowers. After seeing how washed out the flowers looked, I decided they needed a little bit of pzazz added in somewhere. After debating several different ideas {most of them ridiculously complex}, I ended up going with a very simple rail fence sort of block as the alternate. Lots of turquoise used to wake things up, but I also made sure to add insome clashy blue. For value and interest of course. There's just something about doing the unpredictable that always strongly appeals to me when it comes to quilting! The long narrow strips of the cream background fabric were added in after I realized that the flowers now needed some breathing room. So glad I had enough of that particular fabric because everything else just looked sloppy.

Auditioning border ideas

The brown and light cream striped fabric was something that I locked onto early on in auditioning border ideas. There's just something about a good striped border that speaks to me. Lots of ideas in play until abruptly I was completely done with dithering. The pink/rose fabrics were totally scrapped and simplicity became the name of the game. While I kept the strong chrome yellow, narrow, inner border {the blendy mustard gold fabric that seemed obvious was boring}, everything else got stripped down to basics. Will see how this border turns out in the end, but the thrill was just gone. Oh, and all the other orphan bits were dumped back into the totes too. So done with this particular project.Time to move on when it's not fun anymore!

Peachy Cameo in the hoop

The hand quilting is moving quite slowly on Peachy Cameo, but there's nothing very complex about what I'm doing. Sensing a theme here? One last hoop on the blue circle areas and then I'll be working on the two outside borders. I think they both will fit into one hoop {as far as width} so that's good. We're entering the long, long home stretch!

A closer look

As you can see, I often take the clamp off of one side when hand quilting. In this case, two of the blue 'circles' are right where the clamp would be, making it impossible to quilt in that area if it were to be attached. Honestly, I don't know if this is laziness or efficiency, but with this sort of quilting, having one clamp off is rarely a problem. The funny thing is, after all these years of working with only Perle Cotton thread and a long needle, my stitches are getting smaller. Still not super close together, but it's not exactly big stitching any longer. Oh well. Love the look regardless. All that instant texture is very addicting!

Will try to catch up with my emails and reading and/or commenting on other blogs in the next couple days. Have seen several posts in the Bloglover app that feel important to comment on, but the time simply hasn't been there. With time being diminished for quilting around here, often times there's really only one choice!

A Good Finish

Not getting very far with the paperwork, but at least there has been time spent there. Just like with quilting, I figure every little bit accomplished equals forward progress. In better news, there's a new quilt finish! This has been such a cheerful quilt to work on. Can't believe it didn't end up in the hoop much sooner. Totally sanity saving, believe me! Why do people tend to believe that yellow isn't a positive mood enhancer?

Sweet Tarts

Maybe it's the combination of yellow and pink that works all the charm? This was a quilt top that was maybe started back in 2018? Can't find the original post now and don't want to scroll through pages and pages to find it. The beginning was sparked by an attempt at improv., free-style cut baskets and one of those stacks of simmering fabrics that are always begging to be next in line.

The full quilt

I seem to remember struggling with the inside of the baskets. Flowers? Leaves? And then somehow that morphed into adding little baskets too. Why not do both? There was a rough drawn design at one time, but it didn't take long to figure out that all the other border ideas didn't quite belong in this particular quilt. There is generally always that point in sewing a quilt top together, where the whole thing just kind of shrieks at you to 'go away' and leave it alone. Pretty please and thank you, with a cherry on top.

Close up of the little baskets

I loved the idea of framing the little baskets in simple half-squared triangle borders and using the bright, intense cheddar fabric just made the most sense at the time. Been itching to use it for years! And that pink floral fabric was just pleading to be included too. Didn't really know the very best use, but finally settled on super easy blocks. I like how the floral acts more like a background fabric in these understated blocks. Sometimes this sort of simplicity feels a bit like 'cheating', but what's the use of pretty printed fabric if we can't enjoy it?

Loving these larger baskets

I hand quilted around the edges of the baskets in organic, radiating rows {like usual}, but left the inside area free this time. It looks a little bit rumpled in the pics, but looks great in person. It's interesting when there are areas not quite as heavily quilted as the surroundings. See how the fabric looks so much lighter inside the baskets? It must be the thread color I used that appears to darken the outer basket fabric. It's a variegated cream/tan/light brown thread that seems all but invisible, but apparently not!

So happy with the cheddar/pink mix

After I posted the picture of this quilt being 'next up in the hoop', an observant reader emailed me and let me know that the cheddar triangles frame {on the very bottom right little basket} had a row turned upside down {check the second picture in the post}. Super kind of her to give me a heads up before the quilting actually happened!

In the end I decided to leave it be, though you can bet that I considered it very seriously for well over a 24 hour period--pretty much the time frame where it would have been the easiest to start ripping things out. It's something that I find to be charming and whimsical in another persons quilt, so whats the point of being fussy in mine? And there you go. Sometimes the mistakes just have to become part of the quilt around here. I had this feeling that it would be something to regret if this quilt ended up looking a little too perfect. And you know that I sometimes rip things out. I do! And would have this time for sure if I thought it would be something to bother me forever.

Some quilts just need the hand quilting love...

So funny that I had actually never noticed this mistake until the exact moment that it was pointed out! This quilt didn't seem demanding at all about the binding and so I went ahead with the scrappy look that seems to be my fall-back these days. There were several orphaned binding pieces in various shades of pink to make up the needed length. One of them is probably a little bit on the 'too light' side to perfectly compliment the quilt, but does it really matter? This quilt is striking enough not to have to rely on binding color for needful spark. For the life of me, I cannot figure out why those two little totes never seem to run out...

This one might have to stay with me

You may have noticed the sweet vintage-look floral used as the backing fabric. It's something that was bought last year at a senior citizens rummage room sale. Love it so much! Totally made my day to use it so successfully, though it probably would have been a fun challenge to incorporate it into the front of a quilt too. I had to smile at one of my daughters when she first saw it. Her face! Apparently this floral is an acquired taste. And here I thought it was absolutely fantastic!

Spring Flowers

All 18 of the Spring Flower blocks are finished up now too. Once I started hand stitching the leaves to the background it went really fast. Of course it helped that I was stuck in a vehicle for most of two days traveling to and fro a family funeral. While this was a very sad occasion, it wasn't exactly unexpected as the health issues had been ongoing and/or progressing for a little over five years.

All orphaned 'cut-out' circles and scrap bin fabric leaves

Of course, there's never enough time with loved ones, and I don't have a clue what to say to my sister.that would be the least bit comforting. Losing a companion is heartbreaking under almost any circumstance. We were just relieved that the graveside services allowed accommodation for all of the family who wanted to attend. Even a month or two earlier, the numbers would have been severely limited which would have made a distressing situation even more traumatic. As it was, my sister had to make unhappy choices within the Covid safety rules and just do the very best she could within those boundaries.

As far as these quilt blocks are concerned, something needs to be done to wake them up. I'm completely rethinking the colors/ideas for alternate blocks. Right now the blocks look very soft and cozy close up, but absolutely boring from a distance. Am keeping them on the wall until something interesting floats through my brain. Not feeling especially creative right now, but the hand stitching and hand quilting feels super soothing. Gotta take the 'feel goods' where you find them these days. And the rare moments of inspiration too...