April is Flying By!

Where has the month gone?  I haven't a clue.  My daughter and grandkids visited for 8 days and the next weekend my other daughter and husband were here.  I went to two quilt shows and did yard work.  Now I am getting ready for a quilt retreat this weekend!  It's taking me awhile to cut out my project, the 6" blocks for Farm Girl Vintage.  I have 3 blocks made and will take the other 45 blocks with me to sew up.  It is time consuming to cut out sampler blocks!   

My big finish for the month was my Fire Island Hosta.  Below are photos of it with closeups of the quilting.  I had fun with free motion.  It's hard to stuff a 100 X 100 quilt through my Pfaff Grand Quilter, but I did it!  I set up extra tables around me to hold the bulk.

 I had pre-entered the quilt in the Palouse Patchers quilt show in Moscow, ID.  I am not a member of the guild due to distance but this is the third time I have entered in their show.  I am glad I had the deadline or I wouldn't have gotten it finished!  The photo below is a bit blurry, but you can see my ribbons I shockingly won!  All voting is done by members before the show and viewer's choice is voted on Saturday by quilt show attendees.  Since I had company I didn't get to the show until Sunday and I also needed to pick up my quilt that afternoon.  I won Viewer's Choice - Large quilts and First in Machine Piecing!

Below is my favorite quilt in the show.  I loved all the detail and I didn't get the name of the quilt!  I like to take pictures of the tags so I can remember these things and I didn't do it.

detail of the above quilt.  I loved the rivet accents.

I got this old UFO quilted in March and finished the binding in April.  It was from 2000-2001 and was a row robin with the Pat Sloan Yahoo group back then.

This is also the last picture of our cat I accidentally  took.  I had him put down last week at age 17 1/2.
We got him at 5 weeks old.

quilting detail in the border

I also finished my Folk Art Album quilt in memory of my friend Debi.  She gave me the kit.  I started it in 2009!  I hand stitched all the wool applique onto flannel.  I just stippled the backfround for some dimension.

Folk Art Album

quilting and stitching closeup

an outdoor shot of the quilt

I went to the Seaport Quilters show last weekend in Clarkston, WA.  It was fun to meet up with my friend Mary from Washington!  I was also with three local friends, and had a great day.  

Now to some non-quilting pictures!  My husband loves to take our grandson on adventures with a neighbor and his grandson.  They were dressed as Daniel Boone and went looking for treasure with maps and yes, that is a pretend hatchet!   They walked a long way through fields, woods, crossed a creek and there was a clearing where they somehow found the makings for grilled cheese sandwiches, Jared's favorite food!  The boys found a treasure box with chocolate coins and real coins and thought it was great fun.

My daughter and I drove to Sandpoint, ID, my second trip that week, seven hour round trip!  We picked up sandwiches and ate them on Lake Pend Oreille. Nicole went with us, and was a pretty traveler.  She loved the sand and the play equipment at this park.

Nicole at Lake Pend Oreille

Jared was a Fireman for Halloween last year and brought his costume so he could go to the volunteer firefighters meeting with Grandpa.  He loves to be with Grandpa and we were doing some farming during the time he was here which thrilled him.  He rode in trucks and tractors.    

Doug, Jared and Nicole.  She was actually dressed for bed but loves being outside.

When our younger daughter was here the next weekend we went for a walk. This windmill was originally put up by Doug's father and grandfather in the early 30's.  They sold the property in the 40's and we acquired it in 2010.  There is a house on the property we rent out and we farm the fields.   Doug rebuilt the base for the windmill and all the blades are in good shape.  It doesn't actually pump water now, but it's a great keepsake.  In the field behind it we have the first release of Huffman wheat planted, named after our son Brad.  Here is the link to the blog post I wrote about the wheat. 

Check out Patchwork Times to see what others are working on.

Spring Break and Machine Quilting

I am on spring break this week!  I started my vacation by finishing machine quilting and getting the binding sewn on by machine on my Folk Art Album wallhanging Thursday night.  It looks ruffly, the binding and sleeve are not stitched down.  I did a lot of texture quilting, which is not really visible but I showed a block in my last post.  I still haven't tacked down the binding. This is such a special quilt to me!

Friday I had major oral surgery.  I must say the relaxation drugs worked well, and I don't remember much of Friday.  By Saturday I was up, although in pain and decided to machine quilt instead of stitching binding down. I was supposed to "take it easy" and what's easier than machine quilting!  I know it stresses some people.  I had this quilt basted and ready for quilting.  I have someone who wants to purchase it, it's a row robin from the Pat Sloan group around 2000.  It also needs its binding stitched down now.  I did some different texture quilting in the rows and border, I will get a better picture when the binding is finished.

I want to get started machine quilting my Fire Island Hosta and needed a backing.  One of my goals this year is to not buy backing.  I had to for the Folk Art Album quilt as I wanted a nice flannel.  Other than that I have a huge amount of fabric I need to use!  I took all the leftovers and figured out to cut them in multiples of 4" finished and then started laying them out.  Some pieces were a full 20 1/2" so that was my goal block size for assembly.  The backing is 104 X 104.

This is another quilt I may have shown before.  It's simply straight line quilted and it's from leftovers of another project.  It needs binding stitched down too and will be for a donation.

Our oldest daughter and two grandkids are coming for a visit late in the week. We haven't seen them since Christmas.  We are very excited to see them. Nicole will be two next month and Jared is 4 1/2.  His vacation from preschool is next week.  He called yesterday with plans for he and grandpa.  He loves our farm trucks!

Check out Patchwork Times and Cooking up Quilts

Machine Quilting and Wondering

My design wall was empty so I put up some 9 patches made from leftover Kaffe fabrics and the black mini dot fabric that is my new favorite background.  I had been sewing them as leaders and enders.  I have no clue what I am going to do them, so they will marinate on the wall, waiting and wondering what they will be, until I need the space again!

I started machine quilting my Folk Art Album, quilt yesterday.  I found a post about this quilt from 2014 hoping to have the quilt done by the end of that month.  I'm only about a year and a half off!   I'm getting closer now!  

Here is one of the blocks quilted.  The color is more true in the above photo.  I am just doing a stipple in the background after free motion quilting around all the shapes.  I am doing a continuous line in the sawtooth sashing.

Linking up to Patchwork Times.

Design Wall Monday, August UFO #18

My design wall hasn't changed too much in the last couple weeks.  I decided to add some blue into the brown/gray/black scraps and I love it!  I need to sew some groupings together, I think it will be easier to work in the longer strips.

I have done some stitching on the Folk Art Album borders.

On the floor is my 18th UFO of the month.  I must have really started a LOT of projects in the early 00's!!!  This is  a stack and whack in my favorite colors.  I'm not sure why I stopped at adding the corner triangles and borders.  The fabric was with it!  Another project to finish....











I planted coleus in one of my deck planters this year and it's done well.  I read about wintering over or over wintering, depending on where you look, so I think I will try that this year. 

Design Wall Monday, August UFO #4

On my design wall is the quilt I put up yesterday for my August UFO#3. It's going to stay there until it's finished and the story behind it is on yesterday's post.  I also have some leftover bits of the two quilt tops I finished last week.  I put them up to see how they would look and I like it.  However I think my brain really needs graph paper to plot and plan after I finish sewing some more 4 patches and count all the pieces I have available.  I think it's the anal math part of me coming out instead of trying to just wing it. Below these two pics is my August UFO #4.  I grabbed a top out of the cupboard of MANY quilt tops to be quilted and laid it on the floor.  I LOVE this quilt top, now I need to quilt it, yeah along with my daughter's wedding quilt and all the other quilt tops I have! 

Linking up to Judy L.'s Design wall Monday here.

Folk Art Album - wool applique on flannel

Bits and Pieces of Mocha Meringue leftovers

Sand Castles - UFO #4  this is an OLD quilt top and I forgot how much I loved these florals!

August UFO #3

UFO #3 is a goal I have to finish before the end of August.  I hope I can make it!  The pattern is called Folk Art Album by Primitive Gatherings/Lisa Hoefler Bongean.  My late friend Deb bought this as a BOM before she died but never got it started.  She gave it to me and passed away Feb. 10, 2010.  It's wool applique on flannel and stitched with Valdani variegated pearl cotton.  When I finish stitching the borders I will attach them and then fix the corners.  I'm getting there, two of the borders are done!  Excuse the threads and such, I just threw this up on my design wall.