September UFO finished and Some Slow Stitching

Last week, I mentioned that I was doing a UFO challenge with a group of friends starting in October.  Since I have way more than 12 UFO's, I decided this week to get one done for the month of September! I quilted the Barn wall hanging earlier in the week and did the binding and hanging sleeve as well before changing the calendar to October!

 Here is a picture of the finished wall hanging with part of it covered...I'm not revealing who this is for just yet. The barn is quilted with vertical lines and the roof has horizontal lines.  

I played bobbin chicken while quilting and binding this quilt and won!  Not much thread left on the bobbin by the time I was done!

I found some leftovers from the zigzag quilt in a drawer this week and used them to make three more placemats for Meals on Wheels recipients.  I still have a bit more binding to hand sew down on the last one. The backing fabric is the same on all three.  The placemats are reversible. 

My knitting is to the point where I had to stuff the bottom part of the snow person.  Yikes...now my mistakes are a little more obvious!!!  It is what it is...I am learning.  I just have to do the head and then a hat, scarf and face. 

I pieced the backing for the charm square quilt I showed in last week's post.  This quilt is my October UFO --I hope to have it pin basted tomorrow and start the machine quilting with my walking foot. I am sticking with my goal to use only fabric I have on hand and not buy anything.  I had one yard of the flower fabric and used the yellow to make the back big enough. This picture only shows part of the back. 

Like many quilters, I am not a big fan of mending.  A while ago, Finn the grand-dog smelled something good in my daughter's coat pocket (it was not food!) and decided the best way to get to it was through the lining of her coat.  He also chewed a hole in her pocket.  The pocket was fixed by machine, but the lining holes were patched by hand.  A friend had a piece of black lining fabric that was big enough to cover the holes and was kind enough to give it to me.  There is no fabric store in the town where I live.  Thanks, Pam!

When I finished the patch on the lining, I noticed the seam in the armhole had come apart, so I fixed that too. 

A friend and I walk every morning at a local park and we often see birds, squirrels, chipmunks and rabbits. Sometimes, there are deer and one time there were coyotes. This week, we saw a groundhog.  

It's a beautiful place to walk.  Some of the trees have started to change colour, but not very many. 

Finn, as you all know, loves a nap and a snuggle.  

My daughter has been working on her cross stitch picture of Dubrovnik...only a few more colours to go. The white areas will all be filled in with stitches by the time she is done. 

 

I will link up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday stitchers in the morning. 

Two Finishes!

 Last week, I gave you a sneak peak at a gift I made, and, now that the gift has been given, I can show you the finished wall hanging.  I used up some more of my 30's prints for this one, although the barn fabric is just from my red drawer.  I quilted the barn with vertical lines to look like barn boards.  The silo is quilted with horizontal lines.  The little basket block was in my spare parts box--I made many basket blocks years ago with my friend, Christine.  This was a good opportunity to use one for a barn quilt for the barn.  The recipients loved their new wall hanging.  I can't wait to see where they put it in their house when we can go to visit them. (The barn block is a Lori Holt Farm Girl Vintage pattern)

The second finish of the week is the zigzag quilt. I quilted it with dark green thread in the darker zigzag and with tan coloured thread in the lighter zigzag.  My kitchen floor has good light in the afternoon to take a picture and see the texture of the quilting. The binding is the last of the dark green fabric I used on the back of the quilt. 

I spent a couple of hours hand stitching the binding down for my slow stitching this week. 

The Elgin Piecemakers Guild did a swap of neutral 5" blocks a couple of years ago and I used up all my black, gray and white ones in a previous project which you can see below.  I still have about 150 beige, tan and brown blocks in a pile waiting to be made into a quilt. 

I took out the remaining blocks this week and looked in my stash for setting fabric possibilities.  I found some gold fabric which looked ok. 

Then, I happened upon some rust coloured grunge fabric that has been in my stash for a while.  I think this quilt will have 9 or 12 nine patch blocks with the rust coloured fabric in between, as shown below.  The blocks are just laying on top of the fabric for this photo. I will use up the extra blocks on the back of the quilt. 

I am going to be starting a new embroidery project this week, a gift from my daughter for Christmas.  I wanted to finish Love Letters before starting another hand stitching project. I hope to have some progress to show before next weekend's Slow Sunday Stitching link up at Kathy's blog. 

We took a drive in the country this week and saw this old barn. 

Finn is his usual cute little self...this week, he helped our daughter read a book. 

Have a great week!

Weekly Report from the Sewing Room

There were some changes in my plans this week... When I tried to get the right size of knitting needles for my next cloth pattern, the local knitting store was sold out.  I have my name on the list to get them when they arrive from the distributor, but like many shipments these days, things are taking a little longer to arrive.  In the meantime, I wanted to knit something, so I made another simple dish cloth using blue variegated yarn. 

Here is my completed project, just finished today.

Blue was the theme colour of my week as I used a blue 30's print as the border for my farm girl vintage blocks.  The first knitting picture above shows a close up of the fabric.  Here is the second quilt top.   I added some embroidery to the barns on both quilts and made the backings...these are ready to take to the long arm quilter's house.

Christine and I were talking this week and decided that we would make a quilt for the Maritime Modern Guild to give to people affected by the shooting tragedy in Nova Scotia two weeks ago.  She and I are each making 14 blocks like this, in all different blue fabrics with a white background.  Nova Scotia's flag is blue and white.

This heart pattern is from Jaybird Quilts and is available for free on her website.  I used her Hex 'n more and Sidekick rulers to cut out the pieces for the block.

Here is my selection on fabrics I will be using for my blocks.

I just happened to have a piece of Nova Scotia tartan in my stash which will be perfect for one of the hearts in our quilt. I managed to get all of the heart halves cut out this morning and will cut out the backgound pieces tomorrow. These blocks are quick and easy to sew together.  We will sew our love and support into each and every block.

Finn continues to enjoy the sunshine and warmer temperatures.  He would spend all day every day outside if we let him.

As long as the weather is favourable, I am managing to get out for a long walk at least once a day.  This week, I saw some turtles sunning themselves on a log in a pond near the walking trail I was on.

I have a quilt being quilted right now and two more will be going to the long arm quilter's soon.  I purchased backing for the gray and turquoise quilt today as well as more thread--I have been doing a lot of sewing lately and have burned through a whole spool of white thread recently (1000m).  There should be some finishes to show shortly.

My daughter has finished cross stitching another cityscape--this one is Washington, DC.  We were there in 2008 during the March Break for a few days.  She has ordered more threads, Aida cloth and a few more patterns to work on next. I remember visiting all of these buildings when we were in Washington.  (She did not have one colour that she needed for this picture, but it is in her thread order so she will add it when it arrives.)  I think her stitching looks fabulous!

I will be linking up with Kathy and the Slow stitchers in the morning.  I will try to do some cross stitching on the next Linen and Thread ornament at some point tomorrow.

Slow Sunday Stitching and Knitting

Hello!  We had a glorious sunny day yesterday and much of the day was spent outside, cleaning up the gardens, walking Finn and reading in the gazebo.  We even ate out lunch outside on the patio for the first time this year.  There was no stitching or knitting of any kind yesterday, but, today, it is raining, a perfect day to stay inside and do some slow stitching.  

I finished my basket weave dish cloth this week.  You can really see the pattern created by the variegated yarn, now that it is done.  I have a new knitting pattern for a face cloth which involves seed stitch that I am going to try next.  I spoke to my knitting friends about how to make it so I think I am ready to tackle this new pattern.  I hope to start that today. 

I worked on the March ornament for the Linen and Thread sampler for 2020 this week.  Here is how it looks right now.  I am not happy with the black bars and will likely remove them and the swag under the left tulip.  I will likely not do the outside border on this one and just call it finished after taking these stitches out.  Time to move on to April!

I try to spend at least an hour at my sewing machine each day, but, sometimes, Finn has other ideas.   I managed to get the sashing and cornerstones made for both of my Farm Girl Vintage (block patterns by Lori Holt) wall hangings and one is put together.  Here is the last block that I made earlier this week.  I did not have very many red 30's prints so I used the other red fabrics in my stash. 

Here is my first set of cornerstones... 

And, here is the first top, all together, except the final border.  My friend, Christine, has some fabric in her stash which I am going to use for the borders on both quilts.  I will give her something out of my stash in exchange.  

I have a long arm quilter lined up to do the quilting on these two wall hangings and my snowflake quilt.  I will be doing a porch drop off to her this week.  

One rainy day this past week, I made some minestrone soup.  I love homemade soup!

My pasque flowers are blooming this week.  I love the feathery leaves. 

During this time of staying home and increased anxiety and worry, I am thankful for hobbies to occupy my time.  Stay safe and healthy.  I will link up with Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching crew. 

Slow Stitching and Some New Blocks

How are you all doing?  I'm trying to keep busy--I walk Finn every morning and sometimes in the evenings too.  In between, I read, knit, cross stitch, sew and do odd jobs around the house.  My husband is working from home so Finn and I can't have any wild parties...LOL!  

The basket weave pattern is showing up more on my dish cloth this week. I am getting better at this pattern now and it is going a bit quicker. I may need to make a couple more cloths this way to get it into my muscle memory!

I added more stitches to my counted cross stitch ornament as well.   I am trying to make each star a mirror image of the one in the adjacent corner.   There may have been some unstitching a couple of times this week when I did not get it quite right.

I started a new quilt this week by making a few blocks from Lori Holt's book, Farm Girl Vintage.   First up, a milk can...

I dug into my bin of 30's prints for these blocks. Next, a chicken.

Then, a couple of barns and silos: (the red on the barn is a small scale check print that I found in my stash--it's not a 30's print but it goes...)

The gray in these blocks is leftover from the turquoise, gray and white top that I showed in my last post. 

I made the basket blocks years ago and dug them out to use as barn quilt blocks.

The canning jars are fun to look at...The purple on in the middle of the bottom row is made from a real 30's print that was actually made in the 30's.  It was given to me as a gift from a friend.

The last block is in celebration of homemade baked goods...something a lot of us are doing more of lately!

Sometimes, when I sit down to read or knit, Finn sits on my lap--he thinks it's time for a belly scratch. 

Finn is pleased to announce that he has a new cousin!  Kindle is a new addition to the extended family...Skye is happy to teach Kindle the ropes, including how to sit on the stairs and chase a ball. Finn can't wait to get together to play with his cousins but for now, pictures will have to suffice. 

The daffodils are putting on a great show in our gardens right now.

I will link up with Kathy and the slow Sunday stitchers in the morning.