Last night I finished quilting a shop sample. So now I have 3 quilts to bind! On the white bench are the pillowcases I need to finish by 4/6. I would also like to finish the Disappearing Hourglass quilt by then as well. There should be enough time – if I don’t get distracted.
This past Saturday was National Quilting Day. Up early, I started assembling the Disappearing Hourglass blocks. Riviana blocks were built as my leader/ender.
The afternoon found me going with Ruby to pick up an indoor/outdoor rug for her patio. Doesn’t this look like a quilt?
I spent the evening (and the next morning) kitting up the rest of the fabric for Ritzy’s shop hop block. 58. When these are gone that’s it. We don’t have any more fabric.
It’s been a crazy week. If it wasn’t for my camera I’m not sure I would have remembered what I did last week.
Wednesday – Took the cats to the Vet for their shots — but this one had to go back under drugs because she wouldn’t let us get her out of the carrier.
Thursday – Quilted a quilt for a customer 
Friday was the Quilters by Hearts’ Desire retreat. I attended that morning where I stitched this Star-A-Day Block. It’s one of 2 blocks so far which only use a single fabric for the star points.
Friday afternoon I drove down to Collins to pick up a couple of chairs for my living room
Since we were halfway to Wiggins, we drove down to the quilts shop – Ms. Sew-n-Sew. They are one of the shops participating in the state wide quilt shop hop. I found a few things to bring home with me.
Saturday, the plan was to hit 5 shops, but between a late start and car issues requiring us to turn around and switch cars, we only hit 3. At Gardensong Fabrics I picked up the book and butterfly fabric. The stack of Fat Quarters is a bundle I purchased from Pearblossom Quilt Cottage in Bogue Chitto – after the car switch. The floral and dot fabrics and travel it is from The Cotton Patch, also in Bogue Chitto. This was the end of our shop hopping and we headed on to New Orleans.
Sunday started off with Brunch at Antoine’s Restaurant.
Then it was time for Banana Ball! I didn’t realize the music would be non-stop, if I get tickets to another game I’m taking ear plugs. We then drove home.
Monday started with a trip to the Vet for Butterscotch. This picture was after I gave her meds. She was a good girl.
Afterwards I went to Twin Oaks Craft where I purchased this gorgeous orange fabric. I think it’s destined to become a pillowcase cuff for the butterfly fabric I bought on Saturday.
Monday night was the Quilters By Hearts Desire Meeting. Our speaker spoke on embelishments and we tried beading ourselves.
The ongoing Disappearing Block segment is Lazy 8. It starts off as a 9-patch the centers are one fabric and the corners the background. – Add this to my list of quilts to make….
Tuesday I spent the day kitting up MORE blocks for Ritzy Quilting. She ran out of the lavender kits and couldn’t get additional fabric, so we pivoted and went with the pink. The kits were cut with the Accuquilt so just sit down and sew.
It’s no wonder I did nothing Wednesday. So what’s on the agenda this week? I’m just ignoring the stuff that’s in progress – binding on 2 quilts, pillowcases which need to be done by April 6th, the disappearing hourglass quilt in progress. the redwork I need to do and the other 9 stars I want to finish by the end of the month because I pulled fabric for a new pair of shoes which I want to wear in Paducah in April. 
Stay tuned to see if I get any of this done.
My Disappearing Hourglasses are ready to assemble. It turns out I only have 16 squares in the layer cake. Now I’ve cut 2 of them wrong. The first one I made a pinwheel, but didn’t notice until I cut it. That’s OK – I’ll just have one block that is not a star. However the 2nd block I miscut and I won’t be able to use. I guess I’m making a smaller quilt.
Meanwhile, my Riviana blocks continue to accumulate as leader/ender.
and I still need to bind Eclipse and Scrappy Bargello.
Tuesday I attached the long green to blue section to the main top. It was a lot easier to do than I anticipated. I suspect it was because I had it oriented correctly in my hands. For the rest of the month I’ll work on Winter Wonderland and Star-A-Day.
I finished my Scrappy Bargello.
I also tamed my 2 1/2″ wide scraps. Anything over 12″ was sorted by color and rolled up. Those bags on the left fit in top of the box. The zip top bag is to hopefully keeps them contained. I can get the box shut, but only because of the 3 1/2 yards pulled for the quilt. I’ve also sorted by color the 2 1/2″ squares and rectangles. To think that at one point I had them all in a single shoe box (squares and rectangles)!
The post title is Scrappy Bargello is a Top, but I was able to quilt it this afternoon. It has now been added to the binding stack. Neither quilt will take that long to bind, I just need to do it – preferably before the next guild meeting on the 16th.
Scrappy Bargello is going together quickly — when I actually sit down and sew. I think I spent about an hour at my sewing machine last night. I don’t have anything on my plate for this evening, so I hope I can finish the center. There’s one more set of strips to sew together. When that’s done I’ll audition fabric for a border.
It’s late Thursday afternoon. I received a call Wednesday from my LQS asking me to cut more shop hop block kits, so that’s all I did yesterday, but prior to that I was working in my 2 1/2″ scraps. I contained my strips, then started in on my bricks and squares. I really thought I had a “ton” and needed to find a pattern to use them up. (No, I have not finished Scrappy Bargello).
After separating the squares from the rectangles it’s not as overwhelming, but none the less, I’ve found two patterns.
The first the potato chip block. All rectangles. I started pulling the light rectangles. I need 180 light rectangles and I only have 90. I’ve bagged them, putting them and the pattern in the box for later.
I regrouped, and looked at my squares. This is a take on a free Fat Quarter Shop table runner. I’ve pulled yardage for the background and stared sorting the squares by color. As I needed to clear the tables to work on the shop hop blocks, I have no idea if I have enough squares precut. For now, I’ve put the pattern in the box and the yardage back on the shelf.
Which brings me back to Scrappy Bargello. The shop hop blocks are kitted and will be taken to the shop in the morning, so this evening I plan on working on this quilt and continuing Rivianna as my leader/ender. Who knows, I might even get Eclipse bound this weekend.
This Handwork Tuesday I added a few neutral hexies to this section
and prepped the blue hexies for the next row.
I didn’t get more done as I was corralling my 2 1/2 inch strips and bits. The strips are all pressed so they now fit into the bin. I carefully folded the pile and placed it on the bottom of the bin, the topped it off with the bags and bundles of strips. At some point, I’ll return to the box to sort by color and roll them up.
The pile in the lower left corner of the picture are those bits which are less than 10″ long. At some point I’ll trim them into squares and rectangles, but I need to tackle the shoebox of squares and rectangles – pressing them flat and sorting by color. Once that’s done I think I need another quilt using 2 1/2″ squares and 2 1/2″ x 4 1/2″ rectangles. But first I need to finish Scrappy Bargello, Disappearing Hourglass, and get the binding on Eclipse.
Last night at the guild meeting a woman brought in 4 or 5 tubs of fabric her mother no longer wanted. It was my intent to not bring any home. That did not happen. I brought home a length of muslin since my stash is running low and I brought home this 4 yard length of people in “native” costume. It may become the back of my current quilt.
Yesterday I searched Bonnie’s free patterns and found Scrappy Bargello. It uses 2 1/2″ strips. The size I’m making needs 128 strips and I pulled 128 unique fabrics from my strip bin to make this quilt. I started sewing after I got home from the guild meeting and got this first panel assembled.
This morning I woke up about 5 AM and got up to see if I could see the eclipse. Since I was up I started the second panel.
Of course the boxes of strips got stirred and it doesn’t look like I took anything out — although they do close. My intent is to press the strips and sort them by color. Everything fits better when it is neatly folded.
