Getting ready for the 4th

Three rows done, 4 to go on my Charlevoix quilt. I'm very happy with the design of this one. 

Henry went strawberry picking with Al and I. He found a HUGE double berry...and of course had to eat it. It's a good thing they don't weigh little ones on the way out! He ate his share:)

When we got home, I made freezer strawberry jam (our favorite) and pumpkin cookies. The cookies are for my brothers that are stopping by on their way to the Upper Peninsula...heading to their summer cottage. They love these cookies that I usually only make in the fall. 

Cherry Festival is being set up downtown and traffic is getting bad. I'm just going to hide out at home and get ready for the biggest week of the year!

Charlevoix UFO...continued

Well I ended up with 21 blocks....I had to squeeze out one extra for the design I decided on.

I BARELY had enough.

So this is the design I settled on. I needed a larger quilt than 4'x5'. An extra 21 blocks will give me 6'x7'. 

I had plenty of the background fabric and a good sized piece of the light blue. The orange had to be pieced to get enough for the centers.

So the light blue squares had to be a very specific size...3-5/16"!! And I had to cut 84 of them. I cut a paper template that size first then used double stick tape to temporarily attach it to my 3-1/2" template. It gives me a good visual for lining up and cutting blocks. 

It's all cut now and I'm starting to stitch blocks ....I think the layout will work. 

Sewing up a UFO

I'm working on an old UFO today. This is from 2011 or so.  The fabric is "Charlevoix" from Moda designed by Minick and Simpson. 

There was enough fabric to make 20 blocks.

If I stitched scraps together like quilters of old did, I might be able to squeeze out one more block.

There's a few yards of the background fabric and plenty of backing. I also have a piece for binding. My problem is I want to make this quilt larger. A large border of the background fabric would be nice and maybe a sawtooth border of background and the orange/ rose fabric. 

I'm searching the internet and local quilt shops first to see if I can find any more fabric. 

Just another day in my sewing room.....

Scrappy Saturday sewing

Today was a true SCRAPPY SATURDAY... Finished up all my yellow blocks for the June #rainbowscrapchallenge 

The scrappy spools quilt is now halfway... It'll be 20 blocks when done. 

The Scrap Jar Stars blocks are also halfway. This quilt will be 12 blocks. I think it would look good with nine patches as cornerstones. I'm going to stitch up a few and see if I like it.

Here's this months yellows. My supply of scrap yellow was very limited so I was lucky to get as many as I did. 

And after finishing up the yellows I tackled the Scrappy HST quilt. The top is now done. Tomorrow I'll find a backing and get that pieced. It finished up at 64"x80". Not a bad size for picnics and the beach.

Look what popped up in my backyard...we didn't plant these. Such a nice surprise!

June is YELLOW

The scrappy color for June is yellow so I'm digging those out. This is one of three quilts I'm making in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge...see the button on the left sidebar of this page. Here's two of the four blocks I did for this quilt,

 It's surprising how much yellow I DONT have. But there's enough for these blocks with leftovers for my spool blocks, which I haven't cut yet and my scrap jar stars.

 As I stitch the yellow blocks, I'm using HST scraps as leaders and enders.

I have quite a pile of those! I cut my scraps into strips then cut strips into squares or triangles. These are 4" finished half square triangles. 

 Here's where the HSTs end up:

As I get enough for a row, I add it on....need at least five more rows for a 64" square quilt. It will probably be much larger than that ...I have SOOO many scraps!