Slow Sunday Stitching

We were away for a week’s vacation so there was no post last week. We had a fabulous and restful week camping at the Pinery Provincial Park. In fact, it’s the best week we’ve had away in a long long time. It’s turned into somewhat of a running joke that the weather forecast is always.... the Shepherds are camping..... it’s raining and cold. But not this time. It quite reminded me about why it is that we go to all the work of packing up and setting up to go out into the quiet of the trees. I was beginning to wonder the last few times why we even bothered and whether it really was worth it. But this trip proved that yep..... it’s worth it. The day time temperatures were wonderful for being outside. The night time temperatures were perfect for sleeping under warm comfy quilts.
I managed to find a spot quite near our campsite with a lovely shaded bench where I could sit with my stitching and look out over the river. While there I was treated to the sight of a blue Heron flying by and some Canada geese and some hawks hunting and gliding. 
As you can see by what is on the bench, I’m still working on Friendship’s Chain. Less than 2 rows left now to sew up and then it is finished. I don’t know if I’ll make my goal of the end of this month though. There are some busy days and evenings ahead. I’m doing an afternoon English Paper Piecing class this Wednesday and then a full day English Paper Piecing workshop on Saturday. Then there are a few customer quilts to finish up in time for our guild’s quilt show a month from now. We are vending at that show, so there is stuff to get ready for that as well. All of that is seriously going to cut into my slow stitching time. But, I will continue to work on it as I can and get it done, slowly, one stitch at a time.
I’m linking up to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching before going back to do more stitching of my own.

Slow Sunday Stitching

Squirrel........

I’m in the process of chasing a squirrel. It’s a project that’s been in the back of my head for a while, and a couple of days ago it demanded to be let loose. At first it started as a mostly grey squirrel, but once it was partially assembled, I decided I didn’t like how dark it was turning out. Since there are potentially going to be a lot of these units, I don’t want the over all quilt to be that dark. So then it turned into a brown/beige squirrel and I think I like it much better.  Other than the very weird face in the hexagon. It’s supposed to be a rag doll, but it doesn’t quite come across like one.But they both have their down sides. If I use the greys, I’ll be limited in how many dark colours I can use, but there will be many more places to use lights and I could also use lots of brights. If I use the beige, I’ll be limited to mostly mediums and darks, but few lights. There’s a picture of where I am heading with this quilt here on the Quilter’s Cache. It’s a variation of the Jack’s Chain block. I’m going smaller with it and replacing the nine patches with a smaller square. But the layout will be the same.
So I’m looking for opinions here..... what would you do.... grey squirrel or beige?

I’m linking up to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching

Sapphire Net is Finished

It’s done, finished, finally. Sapphire Net is a finished quilt. The blocks measure 12 inches finished. The entire thing, as shown, measures about 35 inches square.



Not only is the quilt finished, but the pattern is done too. Double added extra bonus for me so I can call it done and done. And the third done is that it’s been added to the website. Printed pattern or pdf pattern and the papers for it too, since it’s English Paper Pieced.  If you are interested, you can find them here Sapphire Net.
Amanda Jean, at Crazy Mom Quilts, took the summer off from her finish it Friday posts and I must say that I’ve missed them. It’s good to have her back. So, saying that, I’m going to link this finished to Finish it Friday.
After that, It’s time to get some work done on the long arm on a customer quilt that was supposed to be done by September...... whoops.......

Slow Sunday Stitching

It’s here again, Slow Sunday Stitching day, but there is always slow stitching happening in our household these days. I seem to be very hooked on the process. My poor old sewing machine hardly ever gets used any more. It must be feeling so sad and neglected. (insert sigh here).
In Kathy’s post today she encouraged us to show our stitching locations. Mine is nothing exciting, but is exceedingly comfortable and close to home. We have a lovely shady patio area right outside our door. I can hear traffic and air conditioners running in the distance, but mostly I hear the breeze in the trees and the sounds of birds and cicadas. No matter how hot it is, it is always at least 10-15 degrees cooler here in our little oasis. We are underneath a canopy of 4 large maple trees, 2 in our yard and 2 in neighbouring yards.

I’m still working on Friendship Chain.  Three more rows to go and it’s finished. So that’s my stitching for today, to continue working on this. I have all the fabrics chosen for the rest of it and I succeeded in my goal - completely from stash and scraps with no fabric repeats making it a true charm quilt.
I'm linking to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching before going back to stitching.

Slow Sunday Stitching

Two Fridays ago at the Chatham quilt show I started a Mariner’s Compass. This past Friday I finished it. Had I to do it again I would have used a solid in the same shade of grey for the large background piece. I’m not 100% happy with the directionality of the white. But the purpose behind this was to choose unusual for me fabrics and to make the piece. So, challenge complete.

Once I finished the compass I got back to working on Friendship Chain. I’m at the point where I am comfortable enough with what I’m doing to be able to break it down into steps for pattern purposes. So I’ve chosen all my fabrics for the remaining rows and have started at the other end so I can take pictures of the beginning row and explain the process. This is obviously slowing things down a bit. But I’m still hoping for my finish date of the end of September. The next few pictures show part of the organizing process: Numbering the fabrics, starting the stitching process with the fabrics numbered. Adding in more colours and more pieces. As I’m doing this I’m also writing myself reminder notes for when I actually sit down to write this up. Now that I have the pictures of the process that I need, I can go ahead and start sewing this row together.
I’m linking up to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching and then I’m going to do some Stitching on this.

Slow Sunday Stitching

We just got back home from 5 days away. It wasn’t a vacation though but a working trip. We were at the Plowing Match quilt show in Chatham as vendors. We took our trailer and went down Wednesday evening and stayed at a conservation area near Chatham so that we wouldn’t have the 1 1/2 hour one way drive to do 3 days in a row. It was a kinda slow day on Friday for activity in our booth, so I decided I needed something new and fun to play with. I grabbed one of our Mariner’s Compass English Paper Piecing kits and went fabric shopping at Michaelanne’s MyStache booth. She has some fun and modern fabrics which are totally outside my usual fabric styles. I started cutting and basting and sewing right away. Here’s how much I have done since Friday. It’s going to be 16 inches across from point to point. I bought 2 fat quarters of the dark grey. One to use for the outside pieces and the other to use as the background square into which I plan to reverse appliqué the finished compass. I haven’t a clue what it will be when it is finished, but that’s ok because I’m having fun. Sometimes it is necessary to put aside the large complex projects and do one that is small and fast. In the slow hand stitching process there is no such thing as instant gratification, but this is coming pretty close.
We still have lots of stuff left that we need to unpack and organize back into the places where it usually lives. But for the rest of today, I am going to relax, slow down after the busy-ness of the last 5 days and stitch more on this compass.
I’m linking up to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching

Slow Sunday Stitching

This past week has been crazy busy. We are vending our English Paper Piecing supplies at a quilt show in Chatham next weekend. Now you would think that because we knew this was coming we’d slowly and gradually build up the stock we want to take, or at least that’s what organized people would do. But no, that’s not what we did, so now this past week we’ve been scrambling to get everything cut. And of course, I keep adding to the list of things I want to take. That means there hasn’t been nearly as much time for slow stitching as I would like. Some days I wasn’t sitting down until after 9 pm. But I’ve still managed to get some progress made on Friendship Chain, but not a lot. I’m hoping to do more today since other than going to church, I have no other plans for doing anything else other than slowing right down, letting my hands keep busy while my brain roams freely dreaming of my next project or 6.

I’m also planning pattern writing for this one while I stitch and I think I have it figured out how to write it up in an organized manner that will make sense. After this row is finished, which is number 6 out of 10,  I’m going to try and pull the fabrics for the rest of the quilt. Then I’ll start the process of taking pictures while I work on it for the pattern. The pictures serve a couple of functions. Obviously they are very helpful in the pattern so that there is a visual representation of what I am trying to explain. But it also serves as a reminder to me of the various steps since there is often a lag time between doing the steps in the quilt and writing it down. But first, row six needs to be finished.
I’m linking to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching