I got sixteen quilt tops sewn this year but only 5 quilted and bound. I have not been working since the pandemic started, so I have less money for longarming. Here are the quilts I finished in 2020:
Batik Sew Many Strips:
I have done no stitching at all since I finished my wool table runner. My plan was to start Sue Hillis' Dark Shadows, but the fabric I ordered never came in.
In the meantime, I should have been working on an old UFO, Eileen Bennett's Southern Sampler.
But this sampler is full of queen stitches, and I just couldn't face them.
A friend of mine just gave me a sweet little Christmas embroidery kit. I may start that.
Hope I have some actual stitching progress to report in 3 weeks!
To see what others in the group have been working on: Avis, Claire, Gun, Carole, Sue, Constanze, Christina, Kathy, Margaret, Cindy, Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Hayley, Megan, Deborah, Mary Margaret, Renee, Carmela, Sharon, Daisy, Anne, Connie, AJ, Jenny, Laura, Cathie, Linda, Helen
I finished the third step in Bonnie Hunter's Grassy Creek Mystery.
I almost decided to scrap this quilt when I saw clue 3. Most of the time, I can do the units the way I prefer: oversize them and trim to the correct size, but the measurements were irregular this time, and I couldn't figure out how to do that. I ended up using Bonnie's method and hope they turn out the right size.
I was slow starting Bonnie Hunter's new Grassy Creek Mystery, but I got caught up on the first two clues this week.
I started Metro Rings about a year and a half ago when I was playing with my Quick Curve Ruler. I wouldn't say this quilt was exactly a failure, but I am not happy with my piecing on this one. I did my best, but there are lots of places where my points don't line up. There are also some very thick intersections. The pattern called for two more rows, but I was ready to stop. I think I could benefit from some lessons on how to use this ruler.
I got One Nation back from the framer this week.
When the leaves start to change, my camellias start to bloom. I have two of them in my yard. One is a spindly pink camellia that blooms prolifically. I have tried to get it to be bushier by pruning it, but it insists on growing tall and sparse. This plant has been blooming about a month.
I've gotten the rest of the pumpkins and the last bird blanket-stitched. I've also finished the vines and berries on both sides. I ended up buying a white Clover marking pen to draw out the vines. It worked ok, but skips on the wool.
I just finished my Blue Ridge Beauty top. This is a Bonnie Hunter pattern found in her Adventures With Leaders & Enders. I made mine smaller than hers and used all scraps and stash. I'm still having to force myself to sew most of the time. I tried to work on this quilt an hour a day. It took me about 6 weeks to complete.
This quilt is 71" x 83".
I finished My Big Toe's Nothing To Fear today.
I made this project for one of my sisters. It will be under the tree this Christmas with a 'From Santa' tag on it. In our family, we draw names for Christmas, but if you find a small gift that is perfect for someone else, you put it under the tree as a Santa gift. There are no rules for Santa gifts. Some years there are a lot, and some years just a few. Santa gifts are sometimes funny, sometimes practical.
Last year the five girls in my family got rain gauges from Santa. One year my brother-in-law got a light for his toilet. The first Christmas I was married, Santa brought me a bag of potatoes. (We had gone to my in-laws that year for Thanksgiving, and I was amazed that they did not have mashed potatoes. I thought everyone had mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving.) I usually try and find some tacky Virginia Tech ornament for my brother to get from Santa. Santa usually brings my mom at least one puzzle. If you don't want someone to know who Santa is, you have to use different wrapping paper than what you use for other gifts and sneak the gift under the tree.
I've been working on The Victoria Sampler's Gingerbread Stitching House for several years. A lot of that time, the pieces were tucked away in a box because I was too afraid to start the finishing. This week I pulled it out and got to work. This piece stretched my finishing skills. I would give myself a B- on finishing, but it is mostly done now.
This little house took me about 3 afternoons to put together.
While I was waiting for cross stitch fabric to come for my next project, I started a wool kit that I bought a few years ago, Primitive Gatherings' Old Crow & Company table runner. Because I have only done one other wool project, I made sure to follow all the instructions in the kit, including using Lite Steam-a-Seam 2 fusible web to adhere the wool pieces. Big mistake!!! Now as I sew through the wool, I am also sewing through the Steam-a-Seam, and my needle gets sticky. There is no going back now, but I am not enjoying this project.
I have finished most of the stitching on one end of the runner. Now I need to find a good way to mark the other vines. Since the wool is black, there is no way to trace them, and my free handing of them isn't great.
Sunday afternoon we had to euthanize our 17 year old dog Chase. Chase was about a year old when we adopted him from a rescue group. We had been looking for a small dog that wasn't a beagle. Around here, the small dogs are hard to find. If you want an old hunting dog or a pit bull, there are lots to chose from. A rescue group called SHARE had several dogs in crates outside a Pet Smart. I was the scout and went alone to check out the dogs because I didn't want our kids to fall in love with a big dog. I first walked right past Chase because I thought he was a golden retriever puppy, and we didn't want a dog that big. When I talked to the lady in charge, though, she told me he was fully grown at about 25 lbs. I called the rest of my family to come and see him. There was another couple interested in him, but when they saw our boys with him, they decided we could give him a better home than they could.
Chase was supposed to belong to our second grader who had lobbied hard for a dog. But as any parent knows, most of the responsibility for pet care and all of the expense falls to the adults in the family. Chase soon became my dog. I was the one who cleaned up after him, took him to obedience classes, fed him and walked him. He was my shadow during the day when the kids were at school. We walked two miles most mornings. He was the reason I walked when it was cold out. He was the reason I got up early in the summer before it got too hot to walk. Chase used to do a little dance when I got the leash out: he was always ready to go!
Chase was pretty healthy most of his life, but about age 14 he developed heart disease and high blood pressure, which was controlled with 3 medications. This summer he tore his cornea, which meant eye drops for two months and an operation to sew his eye shut. Chase's illnesses didn't slow him down much at first, but towards the end of his life, he only walked about a block at a time. He still did his dance when I got the leash, but he was slow.
A month ago, Chase's mouth started to swell. The vet assumed it was an infected tooth. When I took him in for a cleaning and tooth extraction, they found melanoma in all 4 quadrants of his mouth. Sunday morning, it was obvious he was in pain, so we called a vet who came to our house and put him down.
I miss him terribly. Intellectually, I know he is gone, but I still find myself getting ready to feed him or let him out. Chase will be our last dog.
I finished binding Sew Fresh Quilt's Forest Friends last week. This is my niece's graduation quilt. It is 63"x 78".
I finished Bram Bones this week, in time for Halloween!
Stash Report:
I worked hard on Monster March this month and got it done.
