Scrappy Bits and Pieces

If you've been waiting and waiting for a report about the Poppies exhibit, I'm sorry, this isn't that report. But it has been all go lately and instead of waiting any longer to get caught up I thought I'd post a few candid shots... They're taken at night and thus poorly lit but they tell the stories I want to share with you.

 Last weekend I was away from home at a three day quilt retreat. This time I finally wised up and took something fairly easy to sew. With a 20 or so quilters all sitting together with sewing machines, fabric, sharp cutting instruments and good stories it is not always easy to keep your mind on some intricate project. Above is what I worked on. One of my small groups needs to raffle a quilt to raise funds to buy fabrics to make our charity quilts. To save money I said we could make something using fabrics from my stash - which then morphed into my designing the top and doing a lot of the piecing. Over the weekend I got all the blocks put together and now need to come up with some applique to put in the corners before I hand this over to another of our members to quilt. The blocks are 4 1/2" finished - 13 nine patch and 12 assorted pieced blocks. After the applique I think I will add another narrow border of that solid green - or maybe just make a wide binding. Hopefully I will remember to show the finished product in a couple of months before it gets raffled off.

 At this time of year #2 son is often busy sewing his own costume to go to a comic.con (or similar) convention. But a few weeks back he decided he would make a baby quilt for a high school/office friend who is expecting her first baby. Now most people would choose something easy for their first quilt (thinking back, my first quilt was also a baby quilt made in a triple Irish Chain pattern which was simple piecing). In this case the choice was to make paper foundation pieced sheep which will be set in an attic window setting. Since this is a baby quilt it will need frequent laundering so he decided that white sheep would get dirty and that purple would be a much better choice! The pattern is from an older Margaret Rolfe book "A Quilters Ark".

 I think he is making a wonderful effort and it will look great when it is all done. Since I took this photo he has three more blocks done which means only one more to be done for the 3 x 4 setting. The faces are meant to be embroidered but now we are rethinking that and wondering if embroidery floss is (a) color fast and (b) will stand up to frequent laundering. Your input is welcomed.

 Meanwhile I am beavering away on a "secret" project intended as an entry for a juried show so I don't want to show you too much. But here are some of the pieces - these blocks finish at 3". On the weekend people would look at my 4 1/2" blocks and remark how small they are but after working on 28 of these orange and blue blocks the pink and green ones were not nearly as tedious to make.

So that's what is being created here.