so much all at once!

I feel like I have a lot of balls in the air all of a sudden.  I guess feeling poorly for a week has jump-started my desire to do things now that I'm feeling better?  (I still have upcoming doctor appointments - at the very least I will have established a communication with them if the problems come back.)

To start, tiny stars!  I sewed a lot of rows this week and am almost halfway done sewing rows together.

Two more were completed after this photo, but you get the idea.  I thought I would get to sew yesterday, but life intervened.  And some of the things were more fun than others.  The funnest was a visit to JoAnn Fabrics.  I realized all of their Keepsake calicos were on sale for quite a good price (particularly considering I ALWAYS like the most expensive choices on the shelf the best!) and I decided it was time to get fabrics and get started on a graduation quilt for my brother's youngest daughter - a senior this year.

You may remember in past years that the oldest daughter, Jade, got a Dr. Who quilt.  (She is also the niece that had a baby a few months back and also got a quilt for little Matthias.)  Then a few years later, middle child Alli, got a graduation quilt as well.  So of course I couldn't leave out the youngest.  She is very into horses and actually works at a stable near home as part of her high school curriculum and plans to continue on there after graduation in an internship program that will certify her to work with veterans using horse therapy!  Pretty cool job if you ask me, even if you have to start out mucking stalls.  So when I saw this pattern a few years back, I saved it, hoping she would still be into horses, because it is pretty cool.  (I plan to do the option with just horses.)

I haven't purchased the pattern yet, and therefore have no idea if has specific yardage requirements for the option I'm choosing or not.  But that's okay, I'll just buy some fabric and it will be fine.

I'm not much of a horse person, so I had to snag a photo from the internet to help me decide on colors.  The golds may be a bit too much, but I'll see how things go.  I didn't want cutesy florals much, so I tried for more organic kinds of patterns.  And the dots - that's a pinto, right?!

I had originally planned to use this turquoise in an upcoming quilt-along (more on that in a minute), but decided it would be a nice background and color pop for the horses!

And while I was there - getting such a bargain - I decided that I would, after all, start the quilt for myself that I debated about from my sticks last month.  (We're not talking about sticks much any more, okay?  I warned you I might burn out and I kinda did...)

Originally the plan was to work from my stash for some of the fabrics, but I just decided to have some fun.  I haven't bought fabric for a whole new quilt in quite a while, so it just seemed like a good idea.

The fabric in the bottom of the photo will be the back of the quilt.  I fell in love with it and it is so soft, it just had to happen.

What quilt is it?  It's called "School Bus" and comes from the book Country Girl Modern.  I've had the book for a while and this quilt called to me and helped convince me to buy it.  The pattern also calls for off-white cornerstones, but I couldn't see that here.  I'll construct the blocks and see how things look at that point.  I have enough stash that light colored cornerstones should be do-able without another trip to the store.

The original was done fairly scrappy with the orange and turquoise, but I opted for just one fabric.  For now...

I mentioned I pilfered the turquoise from the Valle Crucis quilt-along pull - well, one of them...originally I had this:

While I liked it, that turquoise for a background just didn't sit well with me.  (The pink on the bottom was to be the back and that may change now, too.)  So I started looking and found something perfect at my local quilt shop!  (I'll shop for quilt fabric anywhere!)

I think this is beyond perfect.  And just about exactly what I was hoping to find.  (Which I am happy for since JoAnn's had nothing remotely like it when I was there later in the day.)

This quilt-along starts next week and that is another pattern I need to obtain.  Guess I know where I'll be headed after I finish blogging!  I expect I'll be making two of these quilts, as I have another pull with different fabrics also ready.  They're small, and I'm crazy, so it should be just fine.

Also while out shopping...  Friday I was in a nearby town that also has a quilt shop and I started my search for the alternate background there.  I hadn't been there in a while, and was actually in town on a day and time they are open, so I popped in.  I (obviously based on the above story) didn't find any background fabric, but I found this:

My holiday-themed mask making started in earnest around Christmas last year, so I don't really have much for Halloween.  And these look so much like my little boy Freddie, how could I not buy a piece to make masks?  (Masks have been reinstated as mandatory for employees at my work - something I expected when they told us we could take them off months ago - way before the delta variant was being thrown to the masses as a scapegoat...so why not continue to look cute and maybe make a few customers smile?!)

Don't you fear, though, mask fabric purchases did not stop there!

You may remember some black and white cartoon dog masks I made for my boss.  When I saw these dogs, I immediately thought of her and figured if I'm making one for me with the cats, another with the dogs for her isn't that much more trouble.

The Lions fabric is a whole other story.  The hubby's management team at work has planned an outing to a Lions game in September.  Spouses aren't invited.  Hourly employees aren't invited.  It's a very exclusive event, apparently.  (Lack of spouses may be a foolish idea since there is a party bus taking them to and from the stadium...how they get home after the party bus drops them off in the parking lot at work, inevitably inebriated, I suppose is not worth the company's time?  A spouse helps make sure someone will be smart about choices...or more likely this time, I'll be driving half a dozen drunk guys home because they're afraid to call their own wives...)

Anyways, the hubby has not approved the idea yet, but I expect there will be some amount of masking necessary, even if it is just outside the box I think they've rented for the night.  And I thought it might be fun if there were coordinated masks to hand out - like party favors?  The yard I purchased should yield 16 masks, and when you get going assembly line-style, they don't take THAT long.  But this is an idea I'll need to ponder a bit over the coming days, as the hubby is sometimes wierd about this sort of thing.  (I get it - I am too.)

Also in my travels, I picked up some wool for my mom.  She had surgery on both knees a few weeks ago (in hindsight, she realizes that was a bad idea) and then pushed herself to get back to normal movement too soon.  Now her doc has put her basically on bedrest, so she is blowing through hand-stitching projects while watching TV on the couch.  She has been doing a wool applique project and, no surprise, ran out of some colors.  The need for gold is what prompted the visit to the black cat fabric quilt shop and then she needed greens, too, so I went to the one closer to home.  No photos of the wools, sorry, but I also put together a goodie bag with puzzle books from the dollar store, fun colored pens, magazines and whatnot and I found this super cool pin magnet:

I found it at Wal-Mart (but you can see the brand there and likely get it elsewhere) and was excited.  It has a suction cup on the back.  She likes to hand-stitch while they travel and since my dad does all of the driving (he doesn't trust her to pull a camper and neither do I!), I thought this would be awesome to stick to the window next to her!  Usually she has pins and needles stuck in the viser above her head, but this is so much cooler and she can pop it off and take it with her much more easily.

(I might also have bought one for myself to stick to my machine or whatever - no sewing in the car for me, I get carsick just thinking about it!)

Apparently this week has been a week of shopping, as the kitties also got some new goodies!

Aiming to give Toby something to help his hunting instinct, I found this Ambush toy at Chewy and ordered it.  He loves it!  I wasn't sure about the amount of noise or if he would like it, but he loves it. It has a little feather that pops out randomly and he waits until it pauses (it does some quick and some slow poke-outs) and snags it and then drags it across the room, backing up as he goes.  It works upside down as well as right side up (though it is louder upside down) and isn't all that noisy.  It times out after 10 minutes and then he looks at you with this pathetic face until you get up and push the button again.  Worth every single penny!  (Gabby likes it, too.)

And Finn loves cardboard scratchers, so when you're trying to make that mark to get free shipping (on an order that started out as needing water fountain filters only), you get him something too.  He looks a bit worried here, but does seem to like it.

Freddie got a trip to the vet this week for his yearly check up and vaccinations.  He was a little sleepy for about 24 hours after, but if I compare that to MY last vaccination in mid-April that had me down for the count for about 4 days, he is doing just fine.  (And he is back to his usual self, trying to trip and kill me and then be offended that I want to pet him once he has been acknowledged...)

Gabby didn't get anything special, but she's had her turn, too, in the recent past with the Churu snacks and a rainbow unicorn...they all get new stuff every so often.  But as soon as I am done typing here, she has requested my snuggles in "her" room and I will start reading a new book.

Later maybe I'll find time to sew some tiny stars?

Happy quilting!

Katie

PS JoAnn's puts a savings total at the bottom of your receipt.  I spent $103, I saved $101.  And I had a $50 gift card, so I left with YARDS of fabric for only $53.  I always love it when I save so much - and if not for the Lions fabric (not on a very good sale), I probably would have saved more than I spent!  Yay me!