I loaded my May Quilt of Valor this morning before work. This is the Take Five block and it is a fun quilt for practicing machine quilting. I can do each square with a different doodle.
I hope to finish it up by Monday but I may not. My wonderful hubby is taking me to Lansing tomorrow for a quilt show. Yayyy!!!
Until next time…
It is May 1st and I think spring has FINALLY come to Michigan! As I was having coffee with Jesus this morning, feeling thankful for this glorious season, I was pondering the difference between how things look and how we see them. Like this. When I look at this:
….what I really see is this:
The first picture really isn’t all that beautiful, but when i see that, my heart swells. I take a deep breath because I don’t see a slight bulge on the end of a stem, I see spring! I see the gloriously beautiful bloom that is soon to be here. I see what it will be and that makes what it is now, simply breathtaking.
When some people look at this:
….they see one big tangled mess. But show this to a quilter and she will see this:
We are good at making lovely things out of scraps! And this comes from seeing what could be, what will be.
In Deuteronomy, God is chiding Israel for her seriously bad behavior. Yet even then, He calls her Jeshurun. This name means upright, straight, the very best. Though she was one hot mess, He loved her and saw her as she could be, would be, one day.
And He sees me that way too.
How awesome is that?
Until next time….
Time to see how things went in April and plan for May! Here is my list of April goals:
1. Quilt and bind one more service quilt. Done!
2. Ship quilts to QBB. Done!
3. April SQT challenge quilt. Done!
4. May SQT challenge quilt. Done!
5. Small quilt for SQT Swap for Judith in Wales! Done and shipped!
6. Border and bind QOV # 12 (for April). Blocks are done and together. Done!
7. QOV #13 (for May). – Not done. Blocks are together, needs a border, quilting, binding, presentation case, and label. In other words, not even close.
8. Finish Yellow socks. I just turned the heel on sock #1. – Not done. Sock #1 is finished and the toe is started for sock #2. Not happy with the first one so it is hard to get motivated to do sock #2.
I also finished another service quilt that was not on the list. I worked on my free motion quilting on Barney. I cut and started piecing hexagons for another Civil War Repro lap quilt. I cut pieces for the DCSMLA. I posted two tutorials.
I don’t have great plans for May and here is why:
So given that, here are my May goals:
1. Get Daughter #1 moved to her apartment.
2. Get Daughter #1 married!
3. Finish May QOV.
4. Survive it all with grace. Lots of grace.
If you don’t see much of me this month, this is why. I am linking up with Judy at Patchwork Times for Get it Done.
Ebony Love is the queen of die cutting! She is hosting the first ever Die Cut Scrap Make Later Along! She has a series of posts with embedded videos demoing various dies and die cutting machines. The idea is that you choose your own die and cut up scraps for a 1000 Pyramids quilt to be made later.
I had planned to cut up some 30s repels for this but when I went looking, I came across some scraps of Dutch wax prints I had purchased in Amsterdam. A small quilt made of these would coordinate beautifully with the original quilt I made from these fabrics. I will show that later but first, here are the details of my cutting spree.
Here is the die I used.
Here are my cut pie
And here is how I am storing them since this is a make later along.
And this is a sneak peak at what this will look like.
Cutting these pieces literally took 20 minutes including pressing time. Have I mentioned lately how much I love my studio cutter?
Thanks to Ebony for hosting this!
ETA: Here is a pic of my inspiration quilt. My triangles are cut from the scraps from this quilt. I made this after visiting Holland with Dutch wax prints purchased there.
Sorry for the bad pic but it is dreary here again today.
I am finally putting the blocks together for my May Quilt of Valor.
I hope to sew the rows together today. It will also need a border to bring it up to size. This pattern is called Take Five as there are 5 pieces in each 12″ block and it can be made with just 5 fabrics. I used a lot more than that for my blocks. This goes together VERY fast. I used the Take Five die for my Studio cutter to cut the pieces.
I am linking up with Judy at Patchwork Times for DWM. Click here to see what others are working on today.
Until next time….
A while back, I posted a picture on the Yahoo Accuquilt group of the woven star block that I made for the Quilt of Valor block swap. Gwen asked how this block was made so I decided to create a tutorial.
Here is one of the blocks I made for the swap:
Here are the dies I used for my studio cutter:
I have used a silver Sharpie Marker to outline the blades of my dies (this idea came from Ebony Love at Lovebug Studios). I used the 3″ finished square, 3″ finished half square triangle, and the chisel die which finishes at 3″ by 6″. The block will finish at 12″.
First I will cut two blue and two red chisels. It is very important that all four pieces lay right side up on the die. We do not want mirror images. This shows the die and pieces with the extra fabric removed.
I will also need two blue HSTs, two red HSTs, 8 white HSTs, and 4 white squares. This pic shows all pieces laid out.
Next I will add the white triangles to the chisel pieces.
I like to start sewing at the tip.
Sew the remaining white triangles to the bye and red HSTs. Press the seams of the chisels towards the chisel piece. Press the HST seams towards the white triangles. Now lay out you pieces.
Anytime you are making a block and get confused, remember this: When in doubt, lay it out! It prevents lots of mistakes. Ask me how I know.
Next sew the white squares to the HSTs like this:
Here are the pieces laid out once more:
Now sew the chisels to the HST bits.
Now just sew the rest together like a 4 patch.
One se left. You are almost there!
All done!
Now that wasn’t so hard!
Hope someone finds this helpful. Now I have another block for my QOV sampler.
Until next time….
The closer we get to Daughter #1’s wedding day, the less sewing I get done! It has been a glorious weekend here weatherwise. Finally, some sunshine has arrived in Michigan! It is supposed to rain a bit today but the sun will come out again tomorrow and the daffodils are blooming.
We went to an estate sale yesterday at an old Saginaw limber baron’s mansion. What an incredible house!
Sadly, the house is crumbling and in a deplorable state of disrepair.
I am glad I got to see it. I wish I had the funds to restore this place.
Back to quilting, I finally appliqued my little hexagon quilt to its new background. I am not in love with it but it is better than the green one.
Now I need to figure out how to quilt it. I also sewed a couple more rows for my larger hexagon quilt.
I hope to sew the rows together today. But that all depends on the weather 🌞.
And that May QOV?
Um, yeah, about that. Might not happen before the wedding.
Until next time, enjoy this beautiful day that God has made!
It’s a busy day with lots to do. First up, a trip to the vet for this guy.
Then choosing a new background/border fabric for this.
Binding this.
Time to make some appointments and then off to work until 9. I hope to get the hand stitching on the little quilt done when I get home tonight.
Until next time….
Welcome to another edition of DWM! You can see what others are working on by checking the Judy’s post at Patchwork Times. Here is my design wall today:
I am machine piecing this quilt. I posted a tutorial to show you how I do this here. I cut my pieces for this quilt using this die:
Sharon asked about the tiny hexagon quilt I have been working on.
In this picture, the he idea on the outer edges appear elongated. This is because the edges still show the seam allowances. Here is a pic of the back side.
And here is a pic showing the piece being appliqués to a background.
On e the seams are turned under, they no longer appear to be elongated. I finished the appliqué and decided I hated it!
I love this green fabric but it isn’t working here. So I pressed the piece and then took at apart. I will audition other fabrics today. At least I won’t have to needle turn the edges as I go this time since the seams are now pressed.
Happy Monday
