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June 20, 2025
More of the same................. from Exuberant Color


Are you tired of seeing this binding?  Me too.  I didn't spend much time on it yesterday but did get a little over half of one long side stitched.  That leaves half of a long side and a short side left to stitch.

I checked the rain gauge yesterday morning and it had .6" in it.  Not enough for our suffering lawns.  Now we are in for a week of mid to high 90s, cooling off to mid 80s, all starting tomorrow.  Also very high humidity will accompany it.  


Meanwhile the basted, next in line to be quilted is ...

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June 19, 2025
Binding more................ from Exuberant Color


My binding choice is looking good on the Crooked Cobblestones wall hanging.  I finished the long side and also finished one short side and turned the corner onto the next long side.




While my daughter and granddaughter were visiting we went over to the next town to the furniture store and sat in many recliners to choose one that fits me perfectly.  My old recliner was at least 31 years old and just not comfortable anymore.  The furniture store is family owned since 1886 and they offer free delivery and free removal of the furniture you are replacing.

We finally ...

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June 18, 2025
Binding started...................... from Exuberant Color


Yesterday afternoon I put the very first Crooked Cobblestone quilt on the design wall and put the new one next to it (before binding was started).  I was pretty sure the new one was longer.






Later in the day I sewed the binding on and started the hand stitching.  I have one long side almost finished.  It will probably take me at least 4 nights to get the hand sewing done.

I checked my tomato plants and there are 22 little tomatoes on the three 4th of July variety plants.  There are blossoms but no tomatoes on the Rutgers or ...

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June 17, 2025
Binding choice.................... from Exuberant Color


I searched through my green batiks and none of the darker ones that I thought might work looked right.  This one ended being the best choice.





I only got one corner trimmed because I had company yesterday.  This gives you a little idea what it might look like.  I'll know for sure if it is the final choice when I get the rest of the trimming done.

I watered all of my flower pots and tomato plants yesterday morning.  We had mid 80s yesterday with 90 predicted for today.  We have hopes of rain tonight and tomorrow.



I finished ...

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June 16, 2025
No more markers...................... from Exuberant Color


Do you see any safety pins marking centers not quilted?  No, I don't either.  I finished all of the quilting yesterday.  Now I need to trim it and hopefully the piece of fabric for the hanging sleeve is still where I think it is.  Right now I'm thinking some shade of green might work for the binding.  That would go well with the backing fabric too.


I found 2 more small Peony blooms while roaming through the backyard garden.  I didn't remember that I had a white one over by the southwest corner.

I'm seeing buds ...

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June 13, 2025
A little progress................. from Exuberant Color


A friend came over yesterday and we planned a quilt that we have both made before, both of us have gifted the quilts, and we both want another that we can keep.  We  had Subway sandwiches for lunch and had a lot of fun. 

I got 8 more centers quilted after I wrote yesterday's post and then got 10 more quilted last night.

I'm just adding 3 closeups of some blocks in the quilt because there isn't much else to show.



Now I have more than half of the centers quilted, 86 done, 76 to go.






I ...

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June 9, 2025
Small finish...................... from Exuberant Color


The binding was finished last night on this batik table runner.  It is 14.5" x 38".



I considered the purchase of the backing fabric a mistake, but it was perfect for this table runner.


Just in case you wanted to see the front and back together, I took that photo too.







Even though radar showed us in a rain storm, all we got was a few drops, more like a mist.  I stepped outside to take a few photos.  The Annabelle blooms are growing and they are still lime green at this stage.


The pansies loved the rain from ...

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June 5, 2025
Backings , cross seams.................... from Exuberant Color


I took the easy route and made the backing out of the lavender Martha Negley print.  The other 2 fabrics would have been time consuming and I wasn't sure I would even like them pieced together. The backing is seamed and pressed and as soon as I cut the batting, it will all be ready for the longarmer.





I also chose the backing for the table runner.  It has some of the same colors that are in the top but will be interesting on it's own when the table runner is flipped over.

I spent an hour putting ...

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June 4, 2025
Lots of seams............................ from Exuberant Color


I had a few sewing sessions yesterday, first finishing the 10 vertical seams between the columns and then sewing 8 cross seams out of 15.  One more day of sewing on this one.




I cut the border strips and sewed them onto the table runner top.




I'm still trying to come up with a backing for this quilt.  I have 5 1/4 yards of a matching print in lavender if I want to stay with Martha Negley fabric but not match colors front and back.  This would continue the soft pastel look.



I found a one yard piece ...

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June 3, 2025
Border and layout................ from Exuberant Color


I looked through my stash of batiks for more of the background fabric to make a border, but didn't find any.  I found this other batik that looks good with it.  The table runner top is about 12" x 36" right now so I think a 1" finished border will be enough. 







I got all of the Tilda squares up on the design wall yesterday afternoon.  You might notice there is a slight diagonal pattern of the fabrics.  I had 11 piles of 16 squares.  10 of them were all alike and 1 of them had 2 sets of ...

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May 31, 2025
Small stuff................. from Exuberant Color


Yesterday morning I worked in the basement. again trying to get things put away and get table tops cleaned off.  In one box I found the batik pieced sections that made these blocks.  I sewed the blocks and then made them into a table runner top.  I will look for the light fabric I used for the background and if I find it, I'll add a narrow border all around.






Last night I quilted the Australian/Aboriginal table runner and sewed on the binding.  I'm almost done with the hand stitching on the binding.





While I was in ...

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May 15, 2025
A lot of trays.................. from Exuberant Color

I continued on with my sorting on the 2.5" x 4.5" rectangles which I usually use for colorwash wallhangings.  They are all batik fabric.  The brown and purple fabrics are on one tray each.



Yellow/orange and pink/red each have their own tray.  When I'm actually ready to use these I'll pull 3 empty trays to use to spread out most of the pieces from one tray in single piles instead of overlapping piles.




It took 2 trays for all of the blues.








The greens filled 2 trays and they are prettier than they look ...

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May 14, 2025
Behind the scenes work..................... from Exuberant Color


I have been avoiding a lot of the behind the scenes work that leads up to a successful quilt.  I have the choice of not posting on my blog until I have a project in progress but I choose to continue to post every day, a safety net for me.  There are a few of my readers that contact me if there isn't a post some morning and ask if everything is OK.  Occasionally I forget to click on Publish or forget to change the time of the post to 3:30 a.m.

Last night my task while ...

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May 8, 2025
Sorting and stitching........ from Exuberant Color



These trays are the 2.5" x 4.5" rectangles of batiks, most of which will be used for colorwash.  There was one tray of a previously cut group and I added another tray and worked the newly cut rectangles into them.  On the right is the stack of trays with one color on each and they are a mess and need to be sorted and straightened.  I'm spending a couple hours a day on organization in the basement, nothing to take photos of.


Last night I continued on the hand stitching of the binding of this Bow Tie ...

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May 3, 2025
Small projects................. from Exuberant Color


 I finished quilting the second table topper last night and will get it trimmed today and get the binding sewn on.  This one is more scrappy where the first one had matching strips at the corners.







I pulled out all of my trays of 2" x 3.5" rectangles and worked on feeding the new cuts (shown at the center on top of the trays) into their color group.  The trays were all a mess, not straightened up after making the last quilt.


This is what they all look like now, ready for the next project.

Now I need to ...

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April 27, 2025
Lots of pink...................... from Exuberant Color


I have 6 Redbud trees in my backyard and I didn't plant any of them.  This is from the north end of my backyard looking south with my house on the left and garden to the right.  My backyard isn't very deep and half of it is garden.






This is south facing north.  The farthest Redbud on the right is the only one left from years ago.  I think it was here when we moved here but I'm not positive it is that old. (I have lived here 53 years).  The one in the middle (which is ...

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April 13, 2025
A finish.................. from Exuberant Color


This quilt is all batik, made with 2.5" strips in a pattern I call "the other 16 patch".  The true 16 patch is made of squares.  There are 32 blocks each made with 2 different batiks so there were 64 strips total.


There is one full width strip and 2 leftover pieces from previous backings on the back of this quilt.  It is 62.5" x 70.5".  It has Hobbs 80/20 batting in it and it was longarm quilted by Robin Diaz.


I mentioned digging out ditch lilies a couple days ago.  They are day lilies that ...

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April 12, 2025
Binding finished, and more to start.............. from Exuberant Color


The binding is finished on the batik quilt and I'll take photos today.  This is the time of year when the sunshine coming in the windows warms up the house and the heat doesn't come on.  That makes the basement quite chilly.  Since we are still going down in the 30s at night, the heat will come on in the morning and that's when I'll go down there to take the photos.


The two Tilda quilts are back from the longarmer and I have chosen the binding for both of them.





This is the last Sedum ...

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April 7, 2025
Cutting, sorting, binding................. from Exuberant Color

Yesterday morning I die cut 17 more fabric strips into rectangles and squares for Colorwash.  I had previously cut 43 fabrics and have 43 more fabric strips to go.  Since I usually use only one of each print in a colorwash this 100+ group of cut pieces are just a portion of what I will need.





While the washing machine was running I looked through some embroideries I have done in the past for these 2 pieces.  I want to do another quilt with this style block.  The one on the left was a sample block for a quilt I ...

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April 6, 2025
Cutting. hand sewing.................. from Exuberant Color


I pulled out these 3 dies to start cutting a pile of batiks.  They are all pieces less than 1/4 yard wide, most between 3 and 6" wide





I pressed this pile of strips a couple weeks ago so it was time to do the cutting.  I'm doing 1 hour a day and have worked on it on 3 days so far.


There are 4 pieces of most of the fabrics and only 2 of a few.  These will be worked onto the trays of pieces that have been cut over several years.  As soon as the pile ...

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  • batik
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