Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all!!  Of course, my main quilting mission at this time every year is Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt. Annie, Cheryl, Kathy are some of the quilters I know are working on this quilt...are you working on this quilt as well?   I am on track to finish strong! Each bin is a clue.  These are saline syringe cartons from the hospital, which are thrown away each day.  Why not recycle them?  I have yet to finish the fifth clue, but I do have my fabric at the ready.  Just need that ever-elusive thing...time!  Lucky the kitty is helping with inspection. Quality control, you see!

I finished another pink block for Block heads five.  Great fun! 

After all this quilting...we just MUST rest!!!

My iris is blooming in December.  Hmmmm.  why???

I have been playing with plaid log cabin blocks.  Stay tuned!  They are such great fun!!!  I did have a picture but darling kitty helped with the touch screen...and poof!!  Picture deleted!!!  Next time, hopefully, I will have a quilt made of them.  

Hope you have a wonderful day.  I am working a 12-hour shift in hospice today.  Hope all goes really well.

Julie

 

Mystery quilt, clue number three

OH, for the glory of a day off work!!!  About is my starting point, clue three of the mystery quilt.  All the clues are here:

Quiltville's Quips & Snips!!: Indigo Way Mystery!

All of clue three is cut out and ready to go.  Here are my first four sets.  It is great fun and not too late to join in!!

I finished another block for Lisa Bongean of Primitive Gathering's quilt along.  The patterns are only free for a month.  I have it on my calendar to print the pattern out each month.  

This block holds a secret, though.  Under one of those pink flowers is a pin, that held the vine in place.  It is totally sewn in, now!!  I will wiggle it out, one way or another.

 Here is a picture of Lucky, our kitty, who grows about 2 inches in length per day.  Exaggerating?  Maybe a little bit...but wow, is he ever growing fast!!  He was 4 ounces when we found him.  6.5 pounds today, and 4.5 months old.  He is purring in my lap as I type.  He is the softest thing.

Have a great day, each of you!

Julie

Mystery quilt!!!!!

I have had this small quilt out for fall.  I loved making it about 15 years ago.  It is so soft and worn !

I am working on the Quiltville mystery quilt!!!  I am working with yellow fabrics, so of course I save the trimmings and make a scrap heart; these are fun!!  The link is below for the mystery quilt.  Plenty of time to jump right in there...I know Kathy is making it...who else is joining in?  

Kathy's Quilts (kathysquilts.blogspot.com)

Quiltville's Quips & Snips!!: Indigo Way Mystery!

Hope all is well with each of you!

Julie

 

Slow stitching Sunday

 Lucky the kitty enjoys quilting.  A lot!  Here he is just coming out from under the quilt.  Thus the rumple you see.  I finished this binding, which is my slow stitching for the week.  I am linking to Kathy’s blog, here.

Kathy's Quilts (kathysquilts.blogspot.com)

Lucky loves his kitty tower and plays on it a lot,  but will pose for an action shot.

He also enjoys working with hexagons.

This quilt is the summer mystery from Kathy’s blog; from her quilt guild mystery offering.  Unbeknownst to her, Kathy inspired Annie and I to make a quilt like hers! Mine is some different, because I ran out of pink.    It was finished quickly and on the way to the quilters.  The lady I am using to quilt things for me is a childhood friend, Paula.  I am delighted to get closer to her again after 45 years!  We were in 4-h together.  She has a brand new computerized amazing quilting machine, which she acquired when she retired.

Hope each of you is doing fantastic!!

November!

 

Ok, well I am starting another mystery, prior to quiltville’s  mystery!  It is great fun so far!

These are my moda blockheads blocks so far.

A little appliqué never hurt anything…

And I have doubled the number of my autumnal Jacob’s ladder blocks!

Hurrah!  Hope each of you is having a marvelous day!

Progress!

I was arranging projects and found my fall blocks again.  I love them!  Time for more progress on these blocks.
 

Above are my Moda blockheads five blocks, so far.  Pink, pink, pink!!!

These lovely blocks were on the free table at guild.  They are lovely!  I researched a bit and they were a block of the month from 2015, fat quarter shop.  They just need a bit of tweaking… not all exactly the same size.  Gorgeous blocks, though!

 On we go; hope you are finding some sewing time!

Think pink!!

 

I have a lovely helper, assisting me with all things quilting.  Lucky kitty is so darling and precious to me.  I love him dearly!

I added borders to the sampler quilt and I am calling it complete.  

Another view.  I dream of hand quilting this one.

Quilting is hard work…rest is essential!

Sampler quilts are simply so much fun!

 

I greatly enjoyed making each block for this quilt!!  Made with all reproduction fabrics, and a couple of orphan blocks, too...I love it!!  I am showing our lawn, hard pressed in these 100+ days of scorching heat.  

We are blessed now to have some 90 degree days!!  Hurrah!!!

Hope you are doing great, each of you!!  

***************************Nurse's Notes**************************

Our friend Angie made it through her SECOND open heart surgery!!!  I am so, so glad...she is taking time to heal and adjust to her new normal.  What an amazingly tough person!!!  All your prayers did all the good in the world!

Comments no longer go to my inbox again. Sigh...what now?  I changed nothing!!!!!!!!!

Julie

Winners and a new baby to love

 

I am making progress on my scrappy sampler top, based on the 2014 Country Threads mystery sampler.  I adore all these fun and scrappy blocks, made with treasured fabrics.  It is supposed to be done, but I am making it bigger!!!  More blocks equal more fun and more to love, right??

This little morsel above....well, I just got out of the car from work, and heard a SCREAMIMG!!!  Somewhere in the neighborhood.  I went running, total panic mode, trying to find what child was screaming, because I thought it was a little human child.  Instead, I found this tiny kitten.  Maybe 3 weeks old, I am guessing?  It was backed up in the corner by the drainpipe, in my neighbor's driveway, and a hawk was after it.  Hense the screaming!!!  I scared away the hawk (what hawk would not be afraid of a wild banshee hollering and running at it?)  The kitty escaped with no talons through the abdomen, which would have been a death sentence due to peritonitis, but his eye was pecked narrowly escaping actually hitting the eye, and also his left front leg is completely flaccid.  I scooped him and up ran him back to the house, him meowing as hard as he could!

Took him to the vet...the eye will be totally fine.  The leg...maybe not.  It is severely injured from the shoulder, so the vet put him on steroids for pain and for swelling, and the baby is now in our home and?  in our hearts.  We shall see if the baby can heal with that leg...the hawk obviously had it by the leg.   He eats like a trucker and meows for anything he wants, and just wants love and to purr with the loudest little voice, sleeping under my hair on my chest.  No, my chest is not hairy, but I have kind of long hair and that is just the best nest for this baby, according to him.    So that is my drama for the week!!

Remember this leader and ender from Bonnie Hunter about a decade ago? I am finishing it!!!  I recently received gorgeous scraps....my totally favorite thing, and some of the scraps will be used to make more bowties!!!

Hurrah!!!

Any drama for you this week??  Hope everyone is doing fantastic!!

The last post's repro stack was won by Mary Jo Belk, by random drawing.  I do not have your email address, Mary JO...can you please write to me? Thank you!!!

Julie

1/2 square triangles!

I had a chance to work on these 1/2 square triangle blocks.  All solid fabrics.  They were great fun to sew!  More to come, now that I have triangulations and can make them more accurately.  

 

The patterns are all found in this book by Lisa Bongean, of Primitive Gatherings.  It is a lovely book!

Would anyone like some reproduction fabrics?  This bundle was on the free table at guild, and I really would like someone to have it.  Just leave a message, and if more than one person is interested, I will draw for it on Tuesday.

Does everyone know about this but me?  This stuff is great!  It works as a template, like cut out cardboard, but is much thinner and makes a wonderful template to press around for simple shapes.  I love it!!!

**********************Nurse's notes*************************

Our friend Angie made it to Cleveland!!!  A long journey, but she is tough, and she made it there.  A plan is being formulated about what are her next surgical steps for her heart.  Your prayers worked!!!  Thank you so much for them!!!!!!!!

Julie

Prayers for our friend Angie

 Dear everyone, 

I ask you to lift up our friend Angie.  Many of you know her as the Threadcatcher.  She is embarking a perilous land journey over many miles to Cleveland clinic.around 600 miles via emergency ambulance.  Her heart cannot withstand the changes in altitude with care flight by air. I would love a thousand voices lifting her up in thought and prayer!  Please stop what you are doing and do this, please.  I pray for safety and strength for her journey.  She is such a darling person.  Thank you!

Sampler from much loved fabrics

 

I started this sampler, of all reproduction fabrics.  It was a quilt along a lot of years back, and I have always loved it.  It is super fun to work on!!

I am slowing working on these heart blocks, from a Facebook quilt along.  These are labor intensive little things!

TILDA fabrics!!!  Aren't they just so pretty??

I am making progress on the 1/2 square triangle quilt.  Lisa Bongean of Primitive Gatherings has a book with all sorts of different 1/2 triangle patterns.  Great fun!!!

Thank you for your prayers for our Angie.  Hospitals, doctors and surgeons are working out details to get her the care she needs!!

Julie

!!!!!!!!!!!ATTENTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IMMEDIATE PRAYERS NEEDED!!!!!!!!!!!!

 The ThreadCatcher

Angie S. has been a blogger for many, many years.   Above is her blog link.  Angie is an amazing quilter and lovely person, and we have been friends for lots of years...she is so easy to love!!!  She also needs your prayers, and now.  If you are not a praying person, please send some positive energy out into the universe for her!!

Angie had open heart surgery recently, and she did very well through it.  She is tough, and that is no joke. A few weeks out from this, she had another heart attack, and she really did not realize it...and neither did her local doctors. She just knew she felt awful.  One of her bypass grafts shut down, and also...she has developed a hole in-between the left and right ventricles of her heart.  Now this particular problem is almost always fatal, immediately, for the adult person experiencing it, according to her cardiologist.  BUT ANGIE SURVIVED IT!!!!!!!!!!   Now?  She is going to a world class, premier heart surgery center...to have her heart fixed again.  This means probably another open heart surgery for her.  She is a tiny thing...and I am asking for your support and prayers for her, please, please, please.  Angie rocks it...tough as they come...but this is a hard and long road!!!

Thank you!!!!!  I really appreciate you.  Thank you!!  Angie says I have permission to share this...

Tada!!!! Done! almost...

Hello!  I finished the checkerboard border on this quilt.  I am so glad, and now I just need to send it off to be quilted.  It feels great to finish this one.

This quilt is together, also.  I just need my borders, and it will go in the same package as the other one, to be quilted.  The red is the backing.

I have started making hearts for patients, and I will leave them randomly around the hospital.  Maybe actually in the waiting rooms....for the very intensive surgeries??

https://www.facebook.com/IFoundAQuiltedHeart

https://www.ifoundaquiltedheart.com/

Hope you are doing fantastic!!!

Progress on the second red, white and blue quilt

 

Good morning!!!  Hope you are doing well today.  I am off work at the hospital today, and so I am cleaning and sewing.  Above are my blocks for my hubby's red, white and blue quilt.  This is the second one I have made of this pattern.  I am making fast progress now, with all the components made and ready to sew.  Hurrah!  I can sew blocks together!

I found this little floral quilt, wool applique and plaid fabrics for the border.  I love it...makes me happy!!!

What are you working on today???

UFO's I never knew I had!

 

I knew I had this UFO, above.  It was just a pile of blocks, created with much love and joy, by me.  I just had not gotten them put together yet! But now?  I do!  And the quilt has a border!  Yahoo!!!!!!

This quilt, however, is not mine...yet it a UFO.  I was going through my scraps, cutting them to sizes I use most, and I found it crammed into a bag of scraps.  hmmmmm.  Where did this come from?  What to do with it??  It had a 10 inch wide yellow border, just on two sides.  So, I cut much of the border off, left a narrow strip, added the leftover yellow to the top and bottom, and added the lavender border.  Tada!!!  This will be a perfect quilt for chemo!!!

Onward!!!  I am working frantically on the RWB quilt for my hubby, but I have to dust, honestly...it is needed!!!

Julie

Star centers and plaid hearts

 

Hello!!!  Above are the centers of my husband's quilt.  He liked the red, white and blue quilt I recently donated, so I jumped on the chance to make one just like it for him.  I am making such good progress on it!  It is going so much better the second time around. 

I made this block as a practice block.  Ignore the center, please, I just trimmed it to fit when it was too big for the rest of the block. But now?  I know how to make the block!  Hurrah!!

I have finished the applique on all but two of my applique hearts.   These just scream fall time, don't they?  But here, it is over 100 degrees each day.  HOT!!!

Hope each of you is doing fantastic!

Julie

Children's quilt tops are complete.

 

Hello!!  I am off work today!  I finished my children's quilt top today.  I am packaging it up to be longarm quilted, then it will be shipped to Ukraine this fall.  I loved making it!!

My friend Annie M. has made two quilts in the same time frame.  Above is her quilt for a boy, 

and below is her quilt for a girl.  I just love them both!!  Annie is a fast quilter!

I am off work for four whole days!!!  Watch out, world, I am on the loose!!!

Julie

How are you doing?  Working on something today?