Design Wall Monday - 1/30/17

I had a fairly busy weekend & it was a good great thing!

I left fairly early Saturday morning for a FART! I'm sure that you know FART means Fabric Acquisition Road Trip. I just hadn't known exactly how much fabric I would be finding....

I had left a wee bit later than expected which meant the store in Dansville was open so I picked up some vinyl that I'll need to make name badge holders to sell at my annual town clerk's conference. I also picked up a few FQs.

Maybe this would have been more meaningful to photo the backs
with their respective tops. Oops?!

Next I headed way south, almost to the Pennsylvania border to Addison, NY to visit the shop of a friend's sister. The store was having a 20% off sale and she had quite a few fat backs to choose from. I had brought 4 tops with me to pick backings. Of course, I also got another can of 505 - I'll definitely need it if I'm basting 4 large quilt tops. Oh wait, I take that back cuz I have 3 more top/backing sets at home. I probably should have gotten 2 cans with 7 quilts to baste. The kink in all this mess is that I don't have any batting and I just spent all my money on backing fabrics. I'm going to have to buy batting one quilt top's worth at a time...

As I was leaving the store, Cathy told me that there was another quilt shop in town and another on the drive home. Well sign me up! Three new-to-me quilt stores in one day! I picked up a few more FQs at the other Addison store and then  zipped over to Corning Glass Museum. I didn't have time to go through the museum (not at the regular admission price anyway) so I just zipped around the store looking at all the pretty glass items.

3 WOW for the pieced hexie sampler
4 neutrals and 4 colors for stash

Next up was the last store in Campbell, NY where, you guessed it, I picked up a few more FQs.

The last stop for the day was to hike the National Cemetery in Bath - I'll share those pictures later this week.

By the time I got home Saturday evening, I was whooped from all that driving and the heat generated from my debit card so I settled in front of the TV to stitch more of the border on my owl quilt.

Sunday morning was spent alternating between clearing out my bedroom for a major redo, laundry and more hexies! The afternoon was spent watching a double header since both my nephews had hockey games!

All the teammates now have nicknames...
say hi to "Curly Q"
so named for all those luscious curls!

Some time ago, the boys on my older nephew's team realized that other hockey teams (I can't remember if it was the Amerks or ???) dressed up before games so they all decided to do the same. It's so nice to see young men in shirt and ties with shiny shoes :) Can you believe this young man turns 12 next week??!! I've told him to stop getting older but he just shakes his head at his favorite Crazy Aunt Sarah.

Say hi to "Scrat"
Scrat (Ice Age squirrel) never gives up trying to get the acorn
Ryan never gives up trying to get to the puck.

The team for my younger nephew doesn't dress up - but he really wants to. Anything to emulate the older boys! He was so determined to have peeps see him dressed up yesterday that he refused to wear his coat. I supposed it helped that he had just skated hard for 90 mins but I was cold just sitting there.

Scrat and Tortilla

We might or might not be related...

I've joined...Design Wall Monday, Monday Making

Feline Friday - 1/27/16

Oh the weather outside is supposed to be frightful
But inside it's so delightful
And since I've no place to go
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

It doesn't show signs of stopping
And Momma's got some kitty treats for sharing
The lights are turned way down low
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

An InLinkz Link-up

Rose Star Owl Progress

I spent a great deal of the weekend and part of last week attaching the bottom border to the owl quilt.

It really was a case of bribery for most of the weekend: I would listen to one CD of my audiobook while sewing on the mystery quilt and then watch one episode of 'New Tricks' while stitching on the owl border. I resort to this bribery a lot or I'll never work on a second project, including housework.

Anyway...I finished attaching the bottom border Monday evening. Then I started basting more turquoise hexies for a change of pace but tonight I'm going to start attaching the left border.

I still need to create the right border and finish the top border before they can be attached. Then I hope to get another row or so top and bottom to at least get this quilt square, if not "portrait" rectangular instead of "landscape" due to poor planning by the designer (that would be me!). And then I'll fill in the top and bottom with half hexies. The end is in sight altho I know it's still many weeks away...

Design Wall Monday - 1/23/17

Saturday morning -

Sunday Evening -

Oops - I neglected to take a good photo of the finished quilt front. Instead I was still gungho and kept right on going to make a back and size the batting.

Within minutes of finishing the back I was hoofing the block to the fire hall to take advantage of the tables and space to get this baby spray basted.

You can see the quilt is bigger than the tables but I like this as it lets me hang parts of it off the table so I can work on the "middle". It was less than an hour to get this 70x70 quilt spray basted.

I've already started thinking of quilting designs and just need to check my thread stash. I am just about out of my medium gray Masterpiece thread for basic stitching so it's time to stock up :)

I'm also still gungho to finish off some other projects. I have many tops that just need batting and backings. I might be going on a FART this weekend to a friend's sister's store that has 80+ wideback fabrics on sale this weekend. She doesn't carry my preferred batting but what she has is also on sale so I'll need to decide if I want to save money to get them done or stick with what I like...

Feline Friday - 1/20/17

Momma was making neutral 4patches last night for her mystery quilt.
I thought I would give her a paw or two...

She says I'm a neutral myself but I have NO idea what she's talking about.

I'm pretty sure that Z doesn't think I'm neutral.
I'm pretty decisive where that dude comes in to play.

Eventually I just couldn't think about what she said anymore and moved to the "drawer".

Momma says I'm a little chunkers to be on this drawer but I was not neutral on this item either. I WAS going to sit on it and I WAS going to play with her rulers.

An InLinkz Link-up

HeLP for Hexie-aholics - 1/17/17

You know you've hit the big time when Google sends you a personalized birthday message. Wink.

Sorry - hard to get a good photo of the laptop screen.
I swear the bottom left says Happy Birthday Sarah!

That's right! Today is the reason that our monthly HeLP for Hexie-aholics is on the 17th of each month. It's my birthday! It's my birthday!

It's been a quiet day so far... I did brunch and cake with the parents on Sunday and Quilt Guild is tonight. I got my free iced coffee at the cafe this morning (can we say caffeine high?!) and I'll get a free chai at the bookstore this afternoon. It's quite different from last year's birthday post and I'm really OK with that!

The top is actually to the left in this photo.
It still needs one more row of the turquoise to match the bottom.

But just for you guys I worked hard to make progress on my owl quilt borders. I worked my fingers to the bone until I ran out of 2" papers. Now it's time to attach what I have so I can free up some papers. I have about a yard left of the turquoise batik so I've got to finish the right side and then more on the top and bottom to make it rectangular in the "right" way, if you know what I mean.

You knew it would come to this, right? He lasted about 7 minutes before going in to attack mode - must be the papers are more exciting than just the blocks that were out for the mystery quilt all weekend.

Of course I gave the boyz a special birthday treat!! It's the only way to get them this close.

And now it's your turn to share your hexie projects. We don't care if your project is new or a UFO - we just want to share in your excitement at making progress. Well that and the proverbial we (me!) can't resist new project ideas!

Have a wonderful day and you feel like it, please send me some SNOW. A blizzard would be fantastic. This gray rain is not appropriate birthday weather for this snow-loving Capricorn...

An InLinkz Link-up

Design Wall Monday - 1/16/17

I spent Friday evening making the last 2 blocks as well as 4 more purple 4patches so that I could finish making the sashing for this year's mystery quilt.

Saturday morning I laid out the blocks and started adding sashing. Can you see my QCO?

Maybe this helps?

Bleu has started hiding out at the top of the cat tower. This was ZET (Zorro Exclusive Territory) until last week but more and more Bleu copies anything and everything that Z does. I keep telling Z it's a form of flattery...I'm not sure that Z believes me.

It appeared that Bleu was plotting to attack my quilt when I left it out on the floor to run a few errands. I was impressed that it was all still in position when I returned an hour later.

Bleu was a very good boy and walked around the quilt instead of over it the entire weekend.

I spent the rest of the Saturday adding sashing and the first border until it was in 9 large pieces. Woo Hoo!!

I won't tell you that I had to make 2 more pink and 3 more purple tri-recs to get this far. Apparently I can't count very well.

I've started making the neutral 4patches for the outer border but I probably won't get much done before next weekend, too many meetings this week.

The quilt looked the same overnight and for most of Sunday.

Eventually it just became too much for him to walk around so he created some space in the middle. He still never steps on the quilt blocks, just over the corners. Such a well trained little Momma's boy.

Feline Friday - 1/13/17

Happy Furday the Thirteenth!!!

Momma was working on her hexies AGAIN last night. She's feeling a little pressure to have "something" to show for a very special HeLP for Hexie-aholics next Tuesday so I thought I should lend some support to the cause.

This was the best I could do.

What do you think?

How did I do?

An InLinkz Link-up

Mystery Monday and Design Floor Monday

Hello! By Saturday afternoon I had made as many blocks and sashing pieces as I could with the mystery bits that I had completed for clues 1-7. It was time to lay out what I could...

I've already attached sashing to one side of each block.

Love it! Purple/Yellow/Green are my fav colors (in that order!) so this is just the quilt for me. I also like that all the bits are 3.5" - the blocks come together very quickly.

Of course, Bleu thought maybe the blocks weren't laid out quite right.

How's this Momma? Better?

After Bleu helped with the layout I did some math (eek!) to figure out how many more bits of each clue I was going to need to make a 3 by 3 quilt. If my math skills are any good, I think that will net me a 70" square quilt which is plenty big for a couch quilt.

Hey Ma! I'll be here with you while you work on the pink blocks.
We CAN do it together!

On Sunday, I got to work on making the rest of the bits and decided to work on the magenta tr-recs first since it had been the first clue. That and pink is my least fav color so let's just get it out of the way.

OMG - are we done already? I can't take the pink any longer...

You do coordinate your snips to your fabric, right?

I think I needed 28 more purple 4patches. I had just pulled out strips willy nilly and sewn them together with no idea how many twosies or foursies I would get. Well I got 28 4patches and an extra 1/2" of fabric. I couldn't have planned that if I tried.

All that's left to finish is 15 yellow QST. They are half cut out so a few minutes of stitching and I'll have all the bits I need to finish the center. I don't have enough fingers and toes to figure out how many neutral 4patches I'll need but I'll get to that soon enough.

My plan is to lay the blocks out on the floor again (while entertaining Bleu elsewhere. Maybe with Wobbert?) and then lay out all the border pieces to attach to the nearest block. I think  I can sew it together into 3 rows and then sew them together into a finished quilt top. It sounds so much more fun that finishing the center and adding long borders later. I know I'm not the only person to get bogged down with borders...

Linking to Design Wall Monday and Mystery Monday Link Up.

Feline Friday - 1/6/17

If it fits...I sits!!!

An InLinkz Link-up

Working Wednesday

I've been plugging away at finishing Bonnie's mystery blocks.

I've completed 4 already - can't believe how easy these are with all the bits already made.
It's funny how those are 4 completely different yellows but in this washed out morning picture they almost appear the same.

This will be the next block. I'm trying to get at least one block done a night which means I might have the blocks done by this weekend. And then it will be on to sashing.

I've probably got enough bits to make 3 more blocks. I'll need to finish up the bits that I've made and lay them out to see if I need to make more blocks. Remember, I'm only aiming for lap size.

And while I was working on the mystery blocks I needed some leaderEnders so I resurrected my Puss in the Corner blocks. These are made with 2.5" blocks but can be made in any size - 2.5" blocks just happen to be an easy size to cut when I am trimming my scraps down into 1.5/2/2.5" strips. Check out my tutorial if you would like to make some with your own scraps. Or send me your scraps and I'll make even more. LOL! I think I have around a 100 blocks already but I'm going to need a ton more...

The Bibliophile Files - 1/3/17

Hello and welcome to my monthly book report - The Bibliophile Files!!!

I'm happy to say I surpassed my 2016 goal of 84 books and finished 90!!! Whoo Hoo!! I always set the next year's goal the same as what I finished the last year and while I've been tracking for maybe 8 years now, it's gone up every year. No idea how long I'll be able to keep up that upward trend...

How did you do last year? Did you read as much as you wanted? I got lazy this fall and didn't walk as much as I had hoped so I wasn't listening to as many audiobooks as I had hoped either. Today being a new (back to work) year, I went walking this morning and fired up a new book. Yeah me!

As always, click the book title link to it's goodreads.com page for more info on the book.

FINISHED -
     Among the Wicked
     The Woman in Cabin 10
     Courting Trouble
     A Seaside Christmas
     Divine Collision
     The Mayan Secrets
     Born to Die
     Me Before You

IN PROGRESS -
     on my iPhone - This Boy's Life
     on my home stereo - Books can be Deceiving

And now it's your turn -- what books did you read in the last month? Remember - anything and everything counts - novel, magazine, quilt book, cereal box!