pq 12.3 and sticks!

It's colder here than it has been in a year or more, but Miss Gabby is doing well (released from both her collar and isolation) and now that the wind has died down, the house doesn't feel so drafty that I just want to hide under quilts!

Regardless, I've been chipping away at quilty projects (though the desire to just hide under quilts with a flashlight and read books is very much present).

First up, as the title indicates, is Project Quilting.  The prompt this week was "Vacation" and my first thought, since I've kinda turned this into a quilted pincushion challenge, was little beach houses in pretty colors.  So I pulled down the bin of randomness...

...the bin that houses bits I'm not quite okay with getting rid of, but also not ready to chop into 1.5" squares for that bin (and also Freddie when he can get to it)...and found some fabrics.  And I winged it for a pattern and before I knew it, I had some houses!

It always looks so jarring before the seam allowances are taken in something this small - it's 2x4" or so, finished.  But I'm pretty pleased with this so far.  I quilted it quickly and sewed it into a pincushion - make sure you leave a large enough opening to TURN IT, not just fill it with whatever you're using...

If you look close, you can see I left the opening on the top and my stitching wasn't great.  I was struggling, but I'm okay with it.  We'll call it a learning experience, okay?  And I'm just gonna stick pins into it anyways.

With that out of the way, I could procrastinate the February sticks by sewing together the shirt pieces for the January sticks project of the quilt made from shirts!  It ended up short, but I found enough to make it just big enough.

Since the sewn-together back looks much like the not-sewn-together back from my last post, I'll just share with you my method to make sure I load this in the correct orientation.  This is to make sure the side that is a bit longer ends up on the leaders, as I can work with less on the edges.  It will still be close, but I can do this!

And if we're procrastinating, why not share the actual, finished Bringing Home the Christmas Tree quilt?  I finished hand-sewing down the binding and took it out for photos a few days ago.  Right before another predicted snow storm and the week and a half of single-digit-average temps!

And a quick shot of the quilting.  I told you I did swoopy swirls, so here you go!

I'm excited to have this one done and with it having gone so well, I was even tempted to quilt the shirts quilt.  Until I went to order thread and found that a lot of the more neutral colors in the thread I like are out of stock.  So I guess I'll hang onto it for a little longer to make sure the quilts actually on my list get done first.  I'm good at excuses!

With all that done, I couldn't procrastinate any longer, and I moved on to the sticks I pulled (blindly, randomly) for February:

Oh boy did I roll my eyes at the quilt using paper templates.  Remember the star-ish quilt I bought 1000 yards of fabric for last year and then abandoned it because of templates and a bajillion pieces?  Yeah, that was the one I had in mind.  So for days I tossed it around, trying to figure out ANY other quilt I had on my bucket list that could be substituted.

In the meantime, I pulled out what I remembered to be half square triangles in pink and white.

Oh yeah, I remember they were screaming to be made into quarter square triangles now!  Doesn't matter, they need to be used, so I started looking online for ideas and inspiration.  And would you believe that there is very little when you look for "quarter square triangles" other than how to make them?  (And about a zillion mis-labeled other options.)

Eventually I settled on stars and got busy trimming those that still needed it.  Then came the decision about centers.  I have more white, but would the centers look good with white or should they have a color?

To the stash!

Though a little more on the mauve side of things, this actually looked pretty nice with the other fabrics.  But I did giggle some when I saw the date on the selvedge!  I think I got this in a scrap bag from another quilter, because I know I haven't been buying fabric this long (I shared my mom's for many years...), but it felt good to use a good bit of it up no less.

See what I mean?  The star points kinda brighten it up and bring out the less-mauvey tones.

On to sashing?  Do I have enough of the old print?  If I piece some smaller pieces, you bet!

But definitely not enough for the border.  What else does the stash offer?  I don't have a lot in the way of candy pinks.  I've made a few scrappy pink quilts and it seems I lean towards the middle ground on that color.  Not to fear.  I brought out some wilder ones and some more questionable ones.  What did I settle on?

The one I honestly thought would go the least.  But once I got it down, the lighter flowers blended nicely with the mauvey tones and the darker pink, though not a match, seemed to play nicely with the others.  Or nice enough.

So, one stick down!  This will finish about 23x30, so eventually it will be a dolly quilt.

Moving on, I've been researching the watercolor pencils some and the more I learn, the less confident I feel.  I'm not very good at drawing things and the things looking like the things I intended them to be.  So I'm workign up the courage there.  And if it looks awful...well, I've tried something new.  Best case I'll like it and be good at it and do more.

And I'm procrastinating the longarming assignment.  Not just because of the thread situation.  But I do have some ideas how to quilt this one, too.  I just need to get to the point ot being mentally ready.  Because that high from the last quilt faded.

So that leaves me with the paper templates.

*sigh*

I decided to make a test block, using bits from my stash.  All those points to match and fussy templates has me worried.  I did a little template work when I made the Patchwork City top, but I struggled there, and this pattern calls for cutting 128 or 256 of a single template in a single color sometimes.  Can I do that?

I started cutting and though it took a while, I finally had a single block cut.  (A few pieces are missing here, as I made them using the 2-at-a-time half square triangles, despite pattern instructions.)

As you can see, sweet Gabby wasted no time in getting back to work in the sewing room.  I even caught her, while I was sewing at the machine, inspecting the thread.  She got a stern talking-to for that choice!

Most of the points that needed to match did so nicely.  I was careful and making only one block, not mass-production, allowed me to be more careful.  Or, well, prompted me.  You know how you get sewing and know you have to make 4,000 of something and you start getting a little sloppy...

It doesn't look like much here, but when you combine four blocks, rotating them properly, you get an orange star from the triangles.  Or a plus-like design from the greens.

Here began the big dilemma.  I've bought all this gorgeous fabric that I absolutely love.  And the pattern is bright in a gaudy way, but I love the pattern, too.  But I swapped some colors out of necessity (why can't they just make some nice greens in more than the one shade?) and I'm still unsure.  This is a big undertaking.  The cutting alone is a big mess.

So I stalled a few days.  Yesterday I had to work, so that bought me about 9 hours of guilt-free procrastination.  And this morning, chores gave me another hour or so.

But then it was time to make a decision.  I'd been waffling back and forth, telling myself if I get it started this month, I can work on it periodically throughout the year.  Or have my first UFO of 2021.  But what if it is ugly?  What if I absolutely hate it and all those fabrics I am so smitten with (I really am - many of them I'd love to buy the bolt and just put it on a shelf and never, ever cut it.  Ever.) are wasted.  I know some of you will say they're not wasted if I've tried, but they're SO! PRETTY!

Oh, I should go find a photo...hang on...

Those dandelion-ish prints?  And that purple?  And I love me a good grey.  ACK!

Anyways, this morning, after my chores and some kitten loves, I decided I would do this.  I have 18 days left in the month.  I can make a dent.

But first I reviewed a technique my blogging buddy Joanne shared a few months back about cutting using paper templates.  She outlines it really well in the blog post I've linked to, so I'll just show you my pretty photo of not actually cutting anything yet!

It works really, really well!  And bonus for her mentioning that if you need reversed pieces, just cut it two layers and there you go!  Of course, math is hard for me (apparently) when reversing things, so I may have had to go back and cut a second set once or twice...

I cut and cut and then said I would take a break...

There are nine fabrics in all and I decided at four to take a break.

Then Finn needed some snuggles and my mom started texting, so the break I thought I was going to take (to write this blog post), ended up turning into a non-blog break and me needing the lint roller because despite the crazy low temperatures, Finn is shedding like it is midsummer.

Might as well cut a little more, right?

Two more colors done and it was time for a real break.  I need to make sure I can function tomorrow and the next color has a LOT of pieces.  My poor arms!  I hope to get the cutting finished tonight and should get back to it soon, while the sun is shining.  (Yes, sun is shining, but that is NOT making it much warmer outside!)

And that is all for the quilty news.

Finn, though, needs you to know he loves carrots...

I was making dinner the other night and working on the other side of the kitchen, chopping carrots I'd already cleaned and heard a noise.  He had jumped up on the counter (which he rarely does) and was rubbing his face all over the bag and chewing on it a little.  He's done this with a bag of apples, too.  What do they put in the plastic bags produce is sold in?  This cat is so silly and I love him so much.

And Miss Gabby has a glamour shot to share, too...

This was before the release, but I was letting her have a little snuggle time without the cone of shame.  She snuggled me like mad the days she was kept in the bedroom, but is much more aloof now.  (You can see where her arms were shaved for IVs at the vet, but it is already starting to grow back, as is her very bare belly, but I've agreed to not show those embarasing photos to strangers.)

Time to get back to the cutting!  If I can get the cutting done tonight, I can start power sewing tomorrow!

Happy quilting,

Katie