February Mini

 Back in 2016 I made "Memories of Astoria", a special quilt for my husband who spent his early college years in that little town near the mouth of the Columbia River.  You can read more about the inspiration for creating this quilt here.

While making that quilt I made two versions of the "fish through the porthole" block.  The first one ended up being a little too large for the space so rather than ripping and cutting down the background an identical but smaller version was created for the quilt and the first became an orphan block.  While digging through a bin of fabrics last month I unearthed said orphan and decided this was the year it would become a finished mini quilt. 

It was just a matter of adding another round of borders to bring the block to a placemat size.  The circles were hand appliqued, so I decided to hand quilt around each of the fish, then a bit of machine quilted clumps of beach grass and stitch in the ditch for the borders, and it is finally finished.  

Some fresh-fallen snow on a sunny late afternoon provided another view in a different setting and light.

We're bracing for yet another snow-ice-freezing rain storm tomorrow.  It's been a wild-weather February with everything from record low to high temperatures, snowstorms, ice jams and major flooding, with a few sunny days to give us hope that spring will eventually arrive.  The first robins and red-wing blackbirds made an appearance yesterday.  I may go out and look for any sign of daffodils poking through the ground before tomorrow's snow covers them yet again.

Be sure to check out Wendy's (The Constant Quilter) post on the 28th for more February minis.  

Til next time, happy stitching!

A Finish!

Today's snowstorm provided a perfect day to finish this donation quilt for the family who lost their home to a fire in early January.  Since we're not expecting sunny weather for at least a few days, some indoor photos will have to do.

The quilt finished at about 59x74 inches, a good size for a single bed.

Machine quilted - stitch in the ditch and serpentine stitch throughout.  Hopefully you can see the quilting a bit better in the following photos.

Though probably not visible in the photos, there was not enough of the stop border fabric to complete the binding, so I alternated strips of two similar solids to complete the quilt.  

Since the snow is expected to continue through tomorrow, I'm going to allow myself a play date with a pile of orphan blocks, parts and pieces, and see if something develops into a quilt.  In between working on taxes that is.  Maybe February's mini quilt will take precedence, we'll see.

Til next time, wishing you sunny skies and happy quilting!

Time for a Mini

It's nearly the end of January, and for probably the first time ever, my monthly mini has been waiting patiently for a couple weeks to make its debut on the blog.

Following up on Janet O.'s "baggie challenge" from last fall, I found another baggie of mostly red and white tiny flying geese,  mostly finished and ready for pressing.  They made up into this placemat size little quilt.

The narrow blue strips separating the columns of geese are leftover 1" strips from cutting the layer cake pieces for the hatchet blocks shown in my previous post here.  Border and binding are from some miscellaneous less-than-a-fat-quarter pieces in the stash.  It all appears a little bit wonky in the photo, just as it does hanging on the design wall - keeping it humble but happy!  

Here is the back, made with a found piece of an older toile, bordered with another small piece from the stash.  

I've decided that the minis for this year will all be more or less placemat size since there are already more wall size mini/small quilts than we have room to display.  It's always nice to have a new placemat, and some of these may eventually be donated to the local meals-on-wheels office for holiday delivery to their clients, or given as little gifts.   Trying to use up as many scraps and odds and ends as possible this year.

For more mini quilts, check Wendy's blog The Constant Quilter at the end of each month where she posts links to a growing number of mini-makers blog posts.  Thank you Wendy for continuing this Monthly Mini Challenge for yet another year!

January Doings

January has brought fierce winds, a nor'easter that dumped  around16 inches of snow here, and after a one day thaw, we're back in deep frigid bleak mid-winter. The temperature this morning was -19F and as I write this it is -8 degrees.  Our year-old Sammy cat is outside at the moment, worrisome to be sure, but he's become the little terrorist if we try to restrain him from going outdoors.  Hopefully he is in the barn where there is a small heat lamp over his "camping out" bed.  He's quite the adventurer, yesterday we caught him stalking a couple deer who like to visit the bird feeders near the barn.  Quite a sight as they all took off running, Sammy gave up the chase when he saw those long legs a-leaping!

On the quilting front, the year started lazily and I decided to attack the baggies and swiffer boxes of scraps in an attempt to clear some of the excess clutter around here.  Happy to say my January mini was finished early last week, and will be posted closer to the end of the month.  Then I tackled another bag of mostly 2-1/2 inch scrappy pieces most of which were leftovers from the Marrakesh quilt of a few years back.  I ended up with three placemats and two smaller hot dish or mug-rug flimsies, to hopefully all be quilted soon.  I'm planning to raid my orphan block box for backings for all of these, the plan being to use up as many of those oddballs as possible this year.

Another project I'd begun last year at quilt ministry was this one, which I quickly discovered would never work out in that venue due to space limitations and the constant interruptions that happen there. Anyway I'd hoped to make some progress building additional slabs this month, since sidetracked.

In the meantime, we learned last week that a family who had attended our little church lost their home and everything but the clothes they were wearing in a fire.  No insurance, sadly, which is often the case in this area.  The grandparents have two adult grandchildren plus another non-family member living with them.  Our little quilt group which has shrunk drastically in these covid times is busy working on making some quilts.  We had only one to immediately give to the family, but hopefully within the next couple weeks there will be four more.  This is the one I've been working on for the past week and a half, now a completed flimsy.   The blue and gray fabrics are a layer cake that I'd picked up a couple years ago.  A bit disappointing to have so many of the fabrics in the light range, I'd hoped for more dark to better achieve the diagonal gradation of color in the hatchet blocks.  The pinks are all scraps from the stash.  Here's how it looked in the semi-final layout before sewing blocks together.

And the completed top:

I used up all but a couple tiny scraps of the backing fabric from Lady Sings the Blues for the border. The top measures 59x74 inches.

Barring another snowstorm I'd like to get this pin-basted at next Tuesday's quilt ministry meeting, along with another top that was completed last fall, the red and white log cabin quilt.  They will both be simply machine quilted and bound and hopefully out the door to the family in a couple weeks.  

I guess that will more than take us into February!  And I thought I might just ease into the new year ...

But it's all good, quilting a red and white quilt in early February sounds just about right.

A Look Back and a Peek Ahead

2021 seemed like a hugely busy year, quilting-wise, though there were probably less finishes than in most previous years.  Probably a continuing trend as age creeps up on all of us.  I did complete six mini/small quilts, three baby quilts, two throw size and six bed size.  Four ended up being donated and two were gifted.  You can find all of them on the Page entitled "2015 and Later" just under the blog header.

Here are a few of my favorites from last year.

Sing the Blues Mama Lou

Stitched by an Aging Hand, my diamond jubilee quilt

Lady Sings the Blues - gifted

Black Magic

For 2022 I'm not setting a lot of goals but plan to just let the quilts ebb and flow as they dictate.  Of course finishing the oldest UFO - Quilty 365 is a priority, but beyond that, a few minis and donation quilts.  And absolutely no BOMs, sew-alongs, mysteries, or other entanglements that I'll feel guilty about abandoning or otherwise falling behind.  

After the long saga of hand quilting my diamond jubilee quilt I chose this little cutie to put into the hand quilting hoop for evening fun. 

I'm planning to set this one aside for a future great-grandbaby when it's completed.  No hurry with this one, just a few stitches every evening as time allows.

There appears to be no end in sight to the endurance test we've all been living through for the past couple of years.  Rather than choosing a "word" for the year, I'd rather stay with what I call Words for Living and mine has been the phrase Faith Over Fear.  Happy New Year!

Rounding Out the Year with a Mini

 I finally have finished Janet's (Rogue Quilter) fall challenge to take a baggie of saved scraps and turn them into a mini quilt by the end of the year.  I finally located the photo taken of the actual baggie and contents, leftover mini tumbler blocks Janet had sent to me several years ago along with some miscellaneous mini charms that I cut into more tumblers.  

Here is the original mini made with the majority of Janet's tumblers a couple years ago.

And here is the latest mini, just completed last evening:

Janet's "rules" for this baggie challenge included allowing for one additional fabric plus one "neutral" to be added to our baggie's contents.  My "neutral" in this case just happens to be the blue stop border.  This little quilt just wasn't having any of the more traditional neutrals - cream, tan, light gray, etc.   The blue turned out to be perfect, though with less than a fat quarter it was a challenge to create a narrow binding, most of the binding strips were 9-11 inches long - 83 total inches needed.

A piece of blue that has been in the stash for quite a few years was used for the back.

A big thank you to Wendy at The Constant Quilter for rounding up the mini-makers each month, and to Janet for issuing this "baggie challenge."  There are more baggies  and swiffer boxes of scrappy pieces to keep me "challenged" for another year at least!

Wishing you all a new year filled with faith, love, peace, and good health.

Winter Solstice

Today was clear and sunny, and our latest dusting of snow has disappeared.  The five little Christmas table toppers were completed over the weekend, three have already been gifted, the remaining two will be on their way Christmas Day.  A few photos:

All are minimally machine quilted, stitch in the ditch, just enough to hold them together.  So many project, so little time ...

This was a fun little project that used up a lot of 3-1/2 inch scrappy pieces.  

Today is the winter solstice and I've been busy working on my monthly mini, aka Janet's Baggie Challenge.  And I'll leave you with two burning questions:  Is blue a neutral?  and When your quilt screams "NO" do you listen?

The Grand Finale!

So happy to report my Diamond Jubilee Quilt is finished!  Friday evening the final stitches were added to the binding, and that was that!  My hope was to finish this celebration quilt of my 75th year of life before year's end and as it turns out there's time to spare.  And it is aptly named "Stitched by an Aging Hand."  

The weather over the weekend was terrible with high winds and rain, though nowhere near what others in the south were experiencing.  We were fortunate not to suffer any wind damage beyond some branches down, closer to town there were huge old trees down along with power outages.  Anyway, though today is bright and sunny, it's still far too windy and muddy to attempt any outdoor photos, so these will have to do.

The only photo of (nearly) the entire quilt, taken before washing since I needed to use the small available floor space in our living room.  The day was dark and dismal, as reflected in the muted colors.

The next day was brighter, and after washing and a quick spin in the dryer I laid the quilt out on the guest bed to complete drying and more photos.

Three inches in both directions were lost in the quilting and initial washing process.  The final dimensions are 80x80 inches.

The hand quilting was pretty straightforward and simple.  I used a couple stencils in the blocks, some outlining and in the setting triangles and borders a simple 1-1/2 inch cross-hatch, using my favorite Aurifil 12 wt. thread.  

Tried marking the borders with Crayola washable markers though none showed up very well on that dark background, but I'm happy with the outcome.  And really pleased with how that vintage fabric brightened after washing. The next photo shows that fabric the closest to its true color.

The backing fabric is an older Edyta Sitar fabric, I think it is called Indian Summer.  It's been in my stash for several years and there was just barely enough to cover the back.  All the fabrics for this quilt came from stash or the scrap bins, and make-do was the order of the day when several of the block backgrounds required piecing smaller pieces to make the background square large enough.  

So happy to have this one finished!  My first post about making this was in May 2020 here.  I guess as larger quilts go, especially the hand quilted ones, this was finished fairly quickly.  Though it would have taken a week or two longer had I not come down with a cold and spent an entire week sitting in the recliner quilting the setting triangles/borders, since energy to do anything more strenuous was nonexistent.  I guess one can be thankful for a few sick days after all!

So there remains one quilt on my wish-list of finishes for the year - the Quilty 365.  Not going to happen, of course, though I've made considerable progress.  Next year for sure!  Still have the little Christmas table toppers to finish, and I really, REALLY want to have a mini ready this month for Janet's "baggie mini challenge."  

As far as Christmas goes, we pretty much realized a week ago that getting a full size tree this year was out of the question as hubby had a medical procedure coming up (which went well) and a general lethargy set in about any indoor decorating.  Still, while he was in the hospital I did get out a couple boxes and found these old calico Christmas trees.  The fabrics are all from 1982 or earlier, since my mom and I made these together while I was expecting my daughter and mom spent a couple weeks visiting us in Alaska that summer.  We ended up making five of these, and at least four of them are still around.  I have these two, and have used them every year since 1982. They've survived 8 moves, several of them cross country during that time!  

Til next time, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!