OH MY STARS!!!!

Never thought I would see the day!

Here are 6, 7 and 8 of the last dozen.   

Then tonight I got 9 thru 12 done.  

Of course making these stars didn't come without problems.

grrrr.....

But now all 110  (5 inch) stars are done

Doesn't look like much piled up like that.  

Now to lay them out into a pleasing arrangement.  

yeah!!!

On a mission.....

Now that I have decided to make my "star" quilt just a lap quilt  and not a queen-sized quilt and have figured out how many more blocks I need, I think I am on a mission to get this one finally done.  

These stars have been done for a very long time and put away in a box.  

I pulled them out to show them to a friend who suggested I NOT put them away again.  

In that box were some fabrics that were pulled to make some more stars. 

There were nine sets of fabrics, so I cut them out; and here are those nine. 

I've done some figuring and if I am correct, I will need 12 more blocks. 

So, last night I matched up backings with star fabrics. 

For fear that these would get messed up, I decided to cut these out this afternoon. 

Well, once they are cut out, the rest is pretty easy, so I started to sew some of them together. 

Here's the layout (these are 5" finished stars)

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From the star fabric you cut 1 - 3" square and then 8 - 1 3/4" squares. 

From the background you cut 4 - 1 3/4" square and 4 - 1 3/4 x 3" rectangles.  

You stitch the (in this case navy) small squares on the diagonal onto the rectangle background to make your star points. 

Here is the back of that star block when it is finished.  I do not cut away the background but do maintain two layers of fabrics for the star points.  

So, as of this post, I have five of the 12 blocks made.

Seven to go!!!  

I think I see a UFO finish in the near future.  

Just contemplating....

Thinking about the next UFO that I want to pick up.  

My friend Sandy is working on some scrappy stars and I remembered I had a whole box of some.

I have 89 - 6" scrappy stars.

If I make a queen sized quilt (I tend to go large), then I would need nearly 200 more.  

I could add a scrappy solid  as an alternating block (but that wasn't the original plan).  My friends and I saw an antique quilt and we were thinking we wanted to replicate it.  

I could make the quilt smaller....just a throw...then I would probably only have to make one more block. 

I could put them on point. 

I could put them back in the box for another few years.  

Decisions....decisions!!!

Too many excuses.....

It's too hot.

I'm too tired.

We've been busy each weekend since the wedding with two to three things going on each weekend...birthday parties, graduations, dinner cruise, etc.

Now I have a friend coming over to sew tomorrow night and I had to "find" my sewing room.

So I got in there to do a little organizing and this is what I got done today.

Finally got the two rows of rick rack sewn together that I have had pinned for a little while now.  Now I have a pink row pinned together.

While I was at it, I realized I was late on one of my birthday star block exchange, so I made that for Gwen in black and white.

If she sees it before she gets it, that's ok.....she deserves to see it since it is late.

Thought I would get the next star made and mailed out, too, so here is Lonnie's in her requested brown and pink (my two favorite fabrics that were in my DD's wedding quilt).

Then while cleaning up a bit, I came across the last Cherry Tree block that I was working on, so I have glue bastes a few of the smaller pieces and I am going to start stitching on those tonight.

That little pile in the lower left hand corner are the pieces I am going to stitch together before applying them to the block.  It doesn't look like it, but there are twelve pieces there.  Flower buds that need to be sewn to their leaves, flower centers to the flower petals, etc. 

So enough with excuses.  They were lame anyways.  I just needed a swift kick to get moving on my projects again and that kick was getting together to sew....always a good thing.  Hope to have some more progress to show you in a much shorter time period. 

Happy quilting



Monday's star

This is Neen's block. 

One more to go and I will start thinking of layouts.

Today's star

Ruthie's

These blocks are going to make a beautiful quilt and all from my friends. 



Three more stars....

Lonnie's

Georgia's

Cathie's

Makes my birthday last so much longer!!!

"They say it's my birthday"....... (sing along)

and this is the mode that I should be in.

the inside of this card says

"On your birthday, remember---

the best things in life are free.

Everything else can be charged." 

Yup...that's me.

Over the last three days  I have received several more of my birthday exchange stars.  Here are the latest and if I have the names wrong, forgive me, but they are all getting jumbled up with their respective cards because I allowed too much time to pass.

Bonnie's

Rebecca's

Joann's

Mary's

Jayne's

and a bonus one from Sandy who isn't in the exchange group, but knew I would need at least one more for a quilt top.

So, that means I have 12 of the 19 (well, I am one of those 19) and one bonus block from a good friend, Sandy.  So....six more to go. 

Oh, while out for a few minutes this weekend, I did pick up some more pinks and browns so that I can hopefully get to finishing that wedding quilt.

That's it for me tonight. 

Happy birthday to me!

Birthday Star Exchange....

I received my second star block.  My request was country reds (no bright reds) and cream/tan.  Isn't it beautiful?

Next are the four February blocks I mailed out.  I think all of the gals have received them, if not...someone is getting a sneak peek.

Another country red and tan (I almost  kept this one....LOL)

Anything green.

Blue; blue/violet.

Red/black

It won't be long and the rest of my blocks will be showing up.  I can hardly wait.  It's like Christmas.