En Provence, Clue 1

This is my seventh year of making Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt.

Roll, Roll Cotton Boll:

Orca Bay:

Easy Street:                                                                                                                                                          

Celtic Solstice:

Grand Illusion:

Allietare:                                                                                                                                                   

Roll, Roll,  Cotton Boll,  Orca Bay, and Easy Street have been quilted and are in use in my house.  Grand Illusion  was donated to charity.  Allietare and my two Celtic Solstices are still just tops hanging in my quilt closet (along with many others).

  I  completed my four patches for En Provence with 6 to spare.  I use Bonnie's approach to neutrals, so I have some colorful 'neutral' four patches.

Linking up:  http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2016/11/en-provence-mystery-monday-link-up-part.html

http://www.shecanquilt.ca/2016/12/the-december-scraptastic-tuesday-link.html

Harvest Home Pin Drum

I took a finishing class yesterday for a pin drum from Beth Ann Seal of Summer House Stitch Workes.  The pre-stitching was done ahead of time.  This project is called Harvest Home.

The class was a lot of fun!  I liked Beth Ann a lot and would take another class from her.  Almost everyone had her drum completed in about 3 hours.

I was happy that I got my rows to match up on the seam, and I also liked using wool for the ends of the drum.  If you have ever tried to make a cylinder shape with a cotton or linen circle, you know how difficult that can be.  The wool was very forgiving.  If I make another drum, I will use wool for the ends!

The only part I wasn't very happy with was the end.  You cut a slit right into the wool and stuff the shape.  My slit was a little big, and my closing herringbone messy.

  But the mess is at the bottom and won't be seen by very many people when it is in my cabinet.  If I were to make this again, I would put a few more coins in the bottom for weight.  It stands up ok now, but more weight would help.

Stash Report, Smart Phone Quilt

I got another  three blocks done this week for my Smart Phone Quilt, so now I have a choice:  put together a 4 x 4 quilt, or make 4 more blocks and make a quilt I'm happier with.  If I finish this quilt now, it will just go into the closet with about 15 others that need quilting.  I have no need for this quilt myself and no recipient in mind for it.  So I think I'll just put it away again until I feel like finishing it.

The downside of putting this aside for a while is that the look of the apps changes often.  This quilt may be obsolete before it is ever finished!

Used this week: 0
Used year to date: 79.375 yards
Added this week: 0.25 (green for Smart Phone Quilt)
Added year to date:  86.875yards
Net  Added:  7.5 yards

Linking up:  http://www.patchworktimes.com/2016/11/20/stash-report-november-20-2016/

http://www.joscountryjunction.com/ufo-progress-8/

Smart Phone Quilt

I pulled out my Smart Phone quilt blocks this week to see how many more I needed to make.  I counted them twice, and I had 11 which meant I only needed to make one more.  Then I could make a small 3 X 4 block quilt, and it would be done, if smaller than the one I originally intended to make.  So I spent about 6 hours putting Google Maps together.  It was a challenge, especially the 'g'.

Right before I finished it, I put the 11 completed blocks on my design wall, and realized there weren't 11, there were 12 blocks already done.  Which means that now I have 13 blocks done.  Change of plans!  Now I need 3 more to make a 4 X 4 block quilt.  But I really don't want a square quilt, and a 3 X 5 quilt would be too narrow to look right, so I think I'm going to make a 4 X 5 block quilt.  UGH!  If this keeps up, I'll have the 4 X 6 block I originally intended.

Linking up:  http://crazymomquilts.blogspot.com/2016/11/brushstrokes-quilt-complete.html

http://www.joscountryjunction.com/ufo-progress-7/

Stash Report, Harvest Home

I finally finished the cross stitching for Harvest Home.  I've had the kit since September, and the finishing class is the 19th of this month.  For some reason, the stitching seemed to take forever. I was working on it regularly at first but found myself playing Words with Friends in the evenings instead of stitching.  Yesterday I forced myself to sit down and stitch during the day.  Two hours of dedicated stitching time made a huge difference!

Used this week: 1.0  yards (binding 2 quilts)
Used year to date: 79.375 yards
Added this week: 2.5 yards (backing Mod Bear Paw)
Added year to date:  86.625 yards
Net  Added:  7.25 yards

Linking up:  http://www.supermomnocape.com/vintage-embroidery-monday-stitchery-link-party-83/

October/November Goals

In October, I wanted to

1. Bind Scrappy Mountains Majesty.  DONE!

2. Sew strips to Goose in the Puddle's backing to make it wide enough for quilting.  Not done, but I thought about it a lot.

3.  Keep up with RSC.

4.  Keep up with Mod Bear Paw.  The top is done.

5.  Get the rest of  Talkin' Turkey blocks done.  Figure out the rest of the parts.  Decide if I have enough cut. 

I got the rest of the Talkin' Turkey blocks done, but I did not figure out what else needs to be done on this quit or what else I need to cut.

6.  Bind Emily's Christmas quilt,   DONE!                                                                                               

In November I want to:

1.  Pull out Smart Phone quilt and decide how many more blocks I need.  Make a plan to finish this.

2. Sew strips to Goose in the Puddle's backing to make it wide enough for quilting

3.  Keep up with RSC.

4.  Finish Harvest Home.

5. Piece the backing and get Mod Bear Paw to the longarmer.  

I'm keeping my goals for November simple because Bonnie Hunter's Mystery comes out this month.

I

Science Fair Bound

I finished the binding on my Science Fair quilt today.  This quilt was made with a  jelly roll of Bella Solids. I was happy with the colors, but the fabric itself seemed thin, and I'm not a fan of the pinked edges.  Also, I didn't notice that there was a slub in one of the binding strips until the quilt was almost done.  I'm not going to take the binding off and redo it, because it isn't that big a deal, but I wish I'd caught it earlier.

The backing is raspberry minky.

This quilt will be a Christmas gift for my niece Emily.  I still need to make a label, but it has been washed already, and I'm very pleased to say than none of the fabrics in this quilt bled, unlike the last few quilts I made.  All 15 of my color catchers came out clean!  Why so many color catchers?  Because they are cheap, and I have had a few bad experiences.

I am counting the binding as an October finish even though I technically put the last stitch in today.  

 This is a Jaybird Quilts pattern and uses the Hex N More ruler,  The good news is that I've now used this ruler on 3 projects, which is my new goal for any specialty tool.

The first was Gravity:

The second was Daybreak:

I am a big fan of Jaybird Quilts' rulers and patterns! 

Linking up: https://sewfreshquilts.blogspot.com/2016/11/lets-bee-social-149.html

http://crazymomquilts.blogspot.com/2016/11/brushstrokes-quilt-top.html