What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

First,  my apologies for the late post.   We are on island time and I lost track of my days!  Thank you to Joan for putting all this together!  She always has the best groups!

However,  I was in a bit of a home unproven work and travel frenzy and my planned project never made it out of the starting gate.  However,  I did manage a bit of slow stitching on a herd of kitties!  Full disclosure, my friend did the creative work on these little guys,  I’m just (awkwardly and slowly) doing the final stitching.

Each cat is designed ...

The girls in the hive finished making the blocks for the warm colorway of Scrappy Batiks and laid them out on the design wall last week at social sewing. I think this is the final layout we ended up with. Edna reminded us to turn some of the blocks to feature the diagonal chains. She's now working on sewing the blocks together.

I dug 3 Sedum plants to send home with them today.

While I watched 2 shows on TV last night I sewed 8 more 3" nine patches and paired fabrics for an additional 8 blocks.  I didn't get the neutral quilt top pressed so I'll do that today and post its photo tomorrow.

It was 28 degrees when I got up early yesterday morning.  I didn't see any frost on the ...

Make lemonade from lemons, right? And I’m a huge fan of lemon pie.

Fifteen years ago I started a quilt (actually, several quilts were started) and did not finish it. This was back in the days of owning a quilt shop where my eyes were bigger than the time I had to get things done. 

A book by Sandy Bonsib—“Sweet Treats”—had several easy-to-make quilts, each based around two blocks, and all named for pies and other desserts.  

At the time, I thought it would be a good idea for a club at the quilt shop. I started ...

Over the millennia and different cultures, people have created labyrinth designs on walls and floors. This ancient tradition endures in new buildings, parks, computer games and from today also in quilting! read more

 It's actually not raining! 

I hadn't done anything in the sewing room for a few weeks, I've been obsessed with the cross stitch. I woke up this morning early-ish and said, I have to sew today!

It saves a lot of up and down, as I can stack the templates beside my machine instead ...

Oh dear, over half way through April already! Time, slow down! 

After days of rain, yesterday was a glorious sunny day and I spent time down by the pond watching the ducks float about. As usual they alarm very easily so this was taken from far away. I wonder if they could be the same ones we see there every year. I identified (with help from some of you) American Black Ducks for the first time visiting us last year. 

 Hello Everyone,

The first machine started up around noon on Sunday and the girls started in quilting for the next five days.

Melody brought a quilting puzzle and many joined in putting it together.

At 6pm, we went to my cabin for an appetizer dinner.  Melody made 'Shrimp on the Barbie'.  So cute, Melody and the shrimp!

As always, the girls outdid themselves with wonderful appetizers and desserts.

The snow melted and the weather was beautiful and ...

The Merriam-Webster dictionary says the meaning of this word is

a: being without company: LONE

too many lonely nights at home

b:  cut off from others: SOLITARY

the train stopped frequently at lonely little stations—Robert Hichens

2: not frequented by human beings: DESOLATE

a lonely spot in the woods

3: sad from being alone: LONESOME

He was feeling lonely without his wife and children.

4: producing a feeling of bleakness or desolation

Over the past couple of days, since my realization that going alcohol-free can be lonely, I have thought a lot about ...

Good morning, my friends. That title up there is a lie. When we took off yesterday, I was unaware that the City of St. Louis spans two states. As it happens, we're staying on the Illinois side in the little town of Cahokia, Illinois. Apparently, Cahokia is also known as East St. Louis. No matter. We can see Missouri across the river from where we are.

So let's talk about yesterday's drive, shall we? We headed out US 65 until we reached I-44. The road looked like this most of the way, and we were to stay ...

Good morning, my friends. That title up there is a lie. When we took off yesterday, I was unaware that the City of St. Louis spans two states. As it happens, we're staying on the Illinois side in the little town of Cahokia, Illinois. Apparently, Cahokia is also known as East St. Louis. No matter. We can see Missouri across the river from where we are.

So let's talk about yesterday's drive, shall we? We headed out US 65 until we reached I-44. The road looked like this most of the way, and we were to stay ...

 Tomorrow, Tuesday April 23, 2024, is National Picnic Day!

To celebrate myself and six other shop owner friends have decided to do an online Facebook Live Shop Hop. The way this will work is that each of us will go live on our respective Facebook pages one at a time, starting at 11 am MDT. Each of us will entertain you for about an hour and then send you over to the next shop. The schedule is as follows:

I do not get sampler quilts very often but they do remain my absolute favourite to quilt for the simple reason that I don’t have to repeat one quilting motif in several blocks to give the quilt a uniform feeling.  With a sampler, such as this applique quilt, I can go bonkers and do something different in every block.  I just loved working on this one.

I only took photos of some of the blocks to try and show the fun I had.

Did you know that June Tailor quilt as you go patterns are a perfect place to explore the technique?

I was able to sew up the Sophie Bag Pattern and it really turned out super cute!

The batting that is included has all the lines you need to cut and follow when sewing it up. No need to think, measure or mess up while sewing. It’s ready to go and that makes the Sophie Bag Pattern a great one to start for any level of quilter.

What is the quilt as you go technique

The quilt as you go ...

It's been a couple of weeks since I've posted a Monday post on just stitching stuff.  The eclipse trip, along with prep and recover from knee surgery has limited my sewing room time.  So my stitching efforts have been focused on my long term travel project.  My goal was one full thread of stitching time each day while we were on the road. The first top wing of the butterfly was finished off last week.  

Since I had to go off my anti-inflammatory before surgery, it was really uncomfortable to manage the stairs, so I kept to the ...

This is another of the charity quilt kits Sparkle Jane and I created several years ago. One of my goals this year is to get them all put together and delivered to people who can use them.

The colors scheme came from the tipi print–too cute! Some colors are all the same, and some are mixed scraps. Works for me!

There is nothing wrong with simple quilts. They have their own appeal.