Economic Upturn

I have been helping the economy a lot since I have been ill.

I have been trying to find fabrics which would look good in the RSC blocks Saw Toothed Square.

There is an orange, but I am not too sure of it, a poison green, some grays, blues, pinks, I think it will all look good in the quilt.  I don't think aqua, or lime green were common colors pre 1900. 

 I got a stack of Flow by Zen Chic in Orange in 1/2 yard cuts on sale, I love paying only $18 for 3 yards of good quilt fabric. 

I knew I had one more set of microwave bowl cozies to make and I know my daughter loves sunflowers and also love Van Gogh.  I think these will make wonderful microwave bowl cozies for her and her family. 

 I got this very sweet fat quarter bundle of Strawberry Fields Revisited by Joann Figueroa of Fig Tree & Company.  Seriously could you pass up this fat quarter bundle for less than $14.

I also scooped these two from the same shop.  You can't see it but the white is a tone on tone.

I also purchased a couple of cones of Superior threads bottom line thread.  I love using it in my bobbins, and since I am constantly changing thread stands back and forth, I also picked up one of their thread stands so now I don't have to move my thread stand constantly when I switch machines.

I also have purchased some patterns.  I saw this as a kit a few years ago and loved the colors, one of those times where I wished I had just bit the bullet and bought the kit.  Simple quilt, I think the colors are what makes it so cool.

I also bought some patterns from Buttermilk Basin.  I love the trucks and purchased the ones that I really liked and would want to make.

January 26th was DH and my 4th anniversary.  Life was a bit out of control so it was hard to do anything special.  Down the road was an Estate Sale, he went to check it out and brought me this home.

Love all the wooden spools!  Those are hard to come by anymore.  He also found a small Olfa Cutting mat in excellent condition. 

I also won this sweet book from Cheryl's Teapots2Quilting when she was a blogger during the  I Love Precut Quilts  blog hop. 

I have thumbed through the book.  I see lots of possibilities. 

Finally I didn't purchase this, it was sent to me by my mom for my birthday.  Mom has started FMQ and the ladies she quilts with swear by these chaco liners.

I think they will be a neat tool to use. 

Do you think my shopping has helped the economic upturn?

Intentions

I am sure we have all hears the aphorism "The Road to Hell is paved with good intentions."  I was going to work on finishing up quilts this year.  I thought I may start one or two, but I really was going to finish something this year. 

Then yesterday on Facebook I saw the post by Amy of the Sew Incredibly Crazy and Friends BOM.   The theme for the 2017 BOM is Surf, Sand and Sea, you can find out about it here.   With everyone's super cute sunshine blocks.  Made me want to sing "You are my sunshine, my only sunshine......".  I then went to put some fabric away and found a marvelous blue that would work for the background, and I knew it was meant to be.   I got this blue from Barbara at wont-to-be quilter.

Curses on  you Amy for making such a cute block and my weak mindedness that I had to make one too, and join the fun. 

Do you ever swear you aren't going to start something new and bang you see something so cute you just have to do it? 

February RSC

The color for the month of February is aqua.  I will just say I had a tough time finding anything that remotely looked like a reproduction which was aqua.  I finally settled on this, I will call it dark aqua.  Artistic License right?

Since I was still behind from last year I made another which is kind of a rose color.

I don't have many fabrics which are kind of reproductions so I have been doing quite a bit of stash enhancement/

Farm Girl for February

I have been sewing my farm girl quilt.  In my mind, at least, planning trying to decide on which blocks to make large, and which blocks to make small.  Maybe add some other blocks into the fray.

I made the Out to Pasture Block.

And the Baked With Love block at the end of January.  I actually got my Strawberry block done just a day or two later, but didn't have time to show it.

I even took a picture of all of my farm girl blocks.

 Thursday I decided to make the pumpkin block.  I wanted a big pumpkin, since we grow big pumpkins on our farm.  I started going through my scraps looking for 2 1/2 inch strips or squares.  I even cut into some fat quarters and yardage to get enough pieces.  Luckily for me I also had fabric from quilt guild that needed to be cup up into 2 1/2 inch strips, 4 1/2 squares or 10 inch squares.  If the 2 1/2 inch strip is not at least 12 inches long I throw it into my scrap bin and take something out of my stash which is at least WOF for a substitution.  I managed to come up with 30 different orange scraps! 

Um looking at the picture it kind of looks like a huge orange apple doesn't it?  YIKES!  Oh well.

I started working on the Canning Jars block in the 6 1/2 inch size.  Yep not a fan of the 3/4 inch squares that are used to make the jar bottoms.  But I will persevere.

Here you can see some of the fabric that I purchased lately to assist in making my canning jars.  I really need to avoid looking at the sale pages when they are 40%-50% off.

My canning jar block.  Cherries, strawberries, apples and pears, carrots, raspberries, and bumble bees (when I was a kid we would catch bumble bees to let loose in our flower garden).

And another pic of all of my blocks.

I am thinking of doing the chicken foot block, and perhaps the teapot.  I kind of like using them as leader and enders and vice versa while working on the ocean waves quilt.

Catching Up

I have had a lot going on and if I blogged about it all at once, this post would go on F-O-R-E-V-E-R!

Let's start with the AU passed away on February 8, but before he did he kind of ran DH and I ragged for a couple of weeks before we eventually put him in the hospital.  Then we were at the hospital every day dealing  with him, and eventually hospice.  I ran so much that I ended up with pneumonia.  After a couple of trips to the ER, and a visit by the local paramedics I am feeling better.  I think me being ill helped the AA adjust to the new status of her life.

I didn't sew for several days, yes I was that sick!  But I am getting back to normal.  When I look back at my recent posts I realized there is a lot that I haven't shared and it has been over 2 weeks since my last post.

I will start with my attempt at getting some Christmas presents done before December 24th.

Microwave bowl holders.  I shared my initial attempts here. I finished all of them.  Two with the green looking roses and gray chevrons, and two with gray roses and green chevrons.

I then saw Barbara's bowl cozies at Wont-to-be Quilter and loved her fabric.  I found some on Ebay, and made a set of 4 for another daughter's Christmas.  They are huge baseball fans. 

I have one more set to do for another daughter, I have fabric ordered, and I decided I wanted a set for me too. 

This is the fabric which I am going to use to make mine.  The flowers have little aqua dots and I love the chicks. I am thinking of using an aqua for the inside.

I will say I was so ill I didn't go to guild this month, and I didn't even finish up my guild block until the day of the guild meeting and it was touch and go, because I was that ill.

I will turn it in anyway the next meeting and it will be given to whomever won the blocks that night.  I will be playing catch up, cause I will be behind March's block, so next meeting I will have March and April to do.  Oh my!

Finally I got some fun mail from my Valentine JulieRose at JulieRoseQuilts.  Talk about bringing a smile to my face and making me feel so much better.

It is a wonderful mug rug, love the black and white print, and the polka dots, and oh heck!  I just love all of it.  Thank you so much JulieRose.

I have other things to show but perhaps in a later post, I have a chicken house to move tonight! 

Ocean Waves QAL Part 2

I have been cutting my little heart out. 

This is my pile of blocks.

I finally had a chance to start to sew.  I decided I was going to get as many HST ready to sew because I want mine to be kind of scrappy within each quadrant.

This is what I have prepped so far.  I sew some, then cut my squares in half, then trim.  I think I need some more solids so I ordered a black, a color called mango, a green called leaf, and a brown called weathered teak.  I hope it gives it lots of variety. 

These are the trimmings from the pile above.   I am kind of champing at the bit to be able to put a few blocks together.  I always marvel at the people who make one quilt at a time.  Cutting all of the fabric and then just sewing.  I am too impatient I always want to sew.  I finally broke down and put together a 1/4 block to see how it looked.

I am kind of loving it.  One down I think if I calculated correctly 143 more to go.