What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

 The end of the year is a good time to look back at what we have accomplished in the past 12 months.  Cheryl at Meadow Mist Designs hosts and annual "Best of..." party and so I will be linking this post up to her blog.  I have done lots of machine sewing, hand stitching and knitting this year and it is hard to pick out which projects were my favourites.  Here is my best effort!

1. My favourite hand stitching project was "Love Birds"--a counted cross stitch picture that I made for a friend's daughter and her husband ...

 I have accomplished a lot this week, but not not much of it was in the sewing room!  I did do some mending, made a quilt back for a comfort quilt, and sewed a hanging sleeve on a gift.  I delivered 113 placemats to Meals on Wheels organizers on behalf of the Oxford Quilter's Guild and volunteered at the local Christmas Hamper program for a day (this is a weekly event until Christmas).  Today, I cleaned out some of our gardens --cut back dead perennials and filled several brown bags with garden debris and leaves.  Last Sunday, my husband ...

Hazel 6 months old

Maybe it's the new kitten we adopted? Or maybe, we have adapted the slower pace forced from Covid surges.  

Either way - we are looking forward to new projects and new opportunities in 2022!  Watch this space for more details.

I was pleased with Carol's mention of my social media posts in Issue 146 of Quiltmania.  It was fun to see which thumbnail photos she selected.  It was a complete surprise to me!

More on this issue HERE

There are six other ...

 Each year, the Elgin Piecemakers Guild issues a challenge to their members.  This past year, we were given a piece of insulbrite thermal batting and asked to make something for our kitchens using scraps.  On Thursday night, we met in person for the first time in ages and revealed our projects.  There were oven mitts, hot pads, a casserole carrier, tea cosies, etc.  Many in the group used selvages in their projects.  I decided to raid my denim stash (from old jeans) for my lasagna pan hot pad.  I have a large orange lasagna pan and always have to use ...

 It's been a busy week here--we are having our three bedrooms painted this coming week and then new carpeting will be installed in mid October.  This means that everything must be moved out of all of the bedrooms and closets.  This has resulted in lots of purging and trips to the thrift store to donate items we no longer need. Lots of work, but all of our efforts will pay off in the end.  I did take a few sewing breaks this week and managed to finish off the charm square quilt top.  I made this quilt by the ...

At one time, I would purchase precuts when I liked a certain fabric line or sometimes people gave them to me as gifts, and I may have won one or two in a door prize draw at a guild meeting.  I have been working over the last few years to use these precuts up so I don't have any left in my stash.  I have had a farm themed charm pack on my sewing table for a few months now so I could look at it and decide what to make with it.  This past week, while talking to ...

 I finished off the zigzag quilt top and pieced the backing from leftover fabric from the front of the quilt. Nice to use up some fabrics from the stash that have been there a while.  I still have some HST's left and may make a few more placemats for Meals on Wheels with them. 

I hope to get this one quilted this week--my sewing machine is back from repair and this will be a good test for it! The quilt top is 56" square. 

Two more blocks were put together for my Rainbow Scrap quilt... dark green and orange ...

 Last week, I had started making some HST blocks in navy, forest green and burgundy with tan as the light half of each HST.  At that time, I had thought I would need over 100 units to make the quilt I was making.  Turns out, I need 225 to make the quilt 15 by 15 units.  I churned out the 225 units early in the week and started playing with them. There are many possibilities for quilt designs with HST's but I decided to make  zigzags. The first 5 rows are sewn together and the part that's missing ...

 Not much happened in the sewing room this week.  Major dental work on Tuesday followed by cataract surgery on both eyes on Thursday meant I spent lots of time lying on the couch and not much time sewing/knitting.  The good news...my tooth no longer hurts and I can see much better!  I am supposed to be limiting my screen time so this will be a shorter post than usual.  Hopefully, I will be back in the sewing room this week. 

I made one block this week for a travelling quilt project that I am doing with 5 other ...

 And just like that, Love Birds is done!  I took a picture of me making the last stitch in the Bride bird's hat. 

The fabric is white but the lighting in my sewing room tonight was not the best for taking a picture of the entire wreath with the Love Birds in the middle.  This project was stitched on 14 count white Aida cloth and took 6 months to complete.  I will be washing it and then taking it to the framers sometime in the next couple of weeks. I am going to take pictures of the framing options ...

I am very close to being finished all the stitching on this project...a wedding gift for a friend's daughter and her husband. (They got married in November 2020.) I have been working on Love Birds since Christmas. 

The pineapple blocks are all done!  Each block will finish at ...

 The Rainbow Scrap Challenge colour for June is Purple so I made two purple blocks for my project this week...one is purple (violet) and the other is magenta (red-violet).  Some of these fabrics have been in my stash for a long time and others are more recent acquisitions. 

Here are the 8 blocks I have made for this project so far. I will keep making one or two blocks a month until the end of the year and then put the top together.  I really like building a quilt this way--just a little sewing and cutting each month and ...