A little organization, please.....

One of the biggest down sides to having UFO's has to be not knowing exactly where they were left off. I've been working on my July UFO, sewing along quite nicely, until I came to a dead stop because I needed to cut more 60 degree triangles and diamonds. Yuck, I really didn't want to go through all the work of taking the 30's style fabrics out of their drawer, ironing them, cutting a strip or 2 off each, and then putting them back. And then I had one of those "Aha" light bulb moments. I have a leaders and enders project that I have been working on, but it's been languishing, since my selection of 2 inch dark squares was losing its variety. So I thought to myself, why don't I cut some 2 inch squares while I'm at it. And then I had another "Aha" moment, and realized that there are a couple of other projects I want to do, and wondered if they used the same sized strips in each. I went and dug out the books with the patterns in them and sure enough, they each use 2 1/2 inch strips. So, after spending 1 1/2 hours yesterday, and another half hour today,  that messy pile of 30's fabrics in that drawer, turned into the 60 degree triangles and diamonds that I needed, plus a whole pile of 2 inch squares for my leader and ender, and a large number of 2 1/2 inch strips. And with an added extra bonus of enough left to have a few
1 1/2 strips to add to that particular drawer, as well. That feels so much better!!
 
Now, all I have to do is get back to my UFO, and maybe even get it finished before the end of the month. I have an hour before I have to get ready for work, so I think that's what I'm going to do.

Scrappy goodness quilt went home.

Way back in April, Charlene brought me 3 quilts to do, and then said she was not in any hurry for them. I took her literally, and have been doing other quilts that people were in a hurry for. But, it has been long enough, and I've decided it is time to get them done before they grow roots and become permanent fixtures in my sewing room. And I'm starting to feel guilty that I've had them this long, even though she did say not to hurry.This quilt is full of wonderful scrappy goodness. It makes me happy just looking at it. I really had no clear idea of what I was going to do on it. Charlene's guidelines were "something simple, like a meander, or something". I'm not a big fan of doing the basic puzzle meander. It is too over worked and done way too often. Once I had this quilt loaded, it told me what it wanted. It said it wanted to have loops going into each individual square, so that's what I did.
Fast, simple, easy and fun. And best of all, she liked it. Now, to come up with an idea for the next one. Hmmmmmm.......

Tuesday was such a fun day

Jannette came over to play on Tuesday afternoon. We had such a great time chatting and visiting, and sewing. It has been so very long since I have had company to sew with. At least a couple of years, if not longer. I am hoping we can do it again, soon.
I pulled out my UFO for July, which happened to be another Judy Martin pattern. It is from her book The Creative Pattern Book and is called Grandmother's Diamond Ring. It is quite a challenge.
 
I already had all the coloured diamonds and triangle units pieced, so I am now adding them to the background shapes. I have found, however, that I wasn't to terribly accurate in my piecing when I was sewing them together, so some of them are going to be a bit wonky. Hopefully, once it is all sewn together, it won't end up too distorted. But I must confess that there is a lot of fudging going on. It is actually going fairly quickly, even with the fudge factor, so I'm hoping to have most of it pieced together by the time I go back to work on the weekend.
And our new front door came today, and was installed by a couple of really nice young men, who were quite good at what they were doing. As far as I can tell, that is. Now we won't need to hang a quilt over the door to keep out the wind next winter and  we don't have to hold the screen part of the screen door in place with duct tape. The quilter in me really likes the way the curves on the top of the screen door pick up the curve of the little window in the door. All in all, a couple of really good days.

Design Wall Monday July 16, 2012

I finally have a change to what is on my wall. My Heartland Star, designed by Judy Martin is a finished top. When I first got her new book, Patchwork Among Friends, this was the quilt that caught my eye the most.
This one measures 86x86 and I could barely get all of it into the picture. I already know how I'm going to quilt this one, and have it already scheduled in to be done.

Here's a pic of the quilt straight on. I love the circle of small stars a around the big center star.

And here's a close up of the center lone star variation.  I simply LOVE this quilt. And it is fun to look at it and remember that I bought the fabric on my first meeting with Jannette, a fellow blogger. We had a great time that day, and got on quite well. So well, in fact, that she's coming over tomorrow afternoon for a sew in. Hmmmmm, I guess that means I'd better do something about clearing off some of the table surfaces up in my sewing room, or she'll not have anywhere to set up. LOL!!
I'm linking up, as usual, to Judy Laquidara's Patchwork Times  for her design wall Monday get together.

Sunday Stash Week 29, 2012 and Stitchery report

I'm joining in with a fairly new linky party hosted by Kathy. This is the 4th week, and it shows what different hand projects we are working on. So I thought this would be a good opportunity to show the progress week by week on the Christmas stockings I'm doing for our adult children. While we were away in Algonquin a week ago, I finished up Rebecca's manger scene stocking.

And then there was still time to get a start on Noel's Santa's Workshop stocking. This one is going to be really challenging. It has a lot of 3 dimensional toys on it, which should be a lot of fun to do. I love the way the window looks. Having the linky party each week will give me incentive to work on them, beyond the fact that I want to get all 4 of them done by Christmas. However, when I get to Laurie's, I won't be able to show pictures of it, because she reads my blog, and I don't want to ruin the surprise of it.

I have some good stash numbers this week. I finished up a quilt top on my Friday afternoon and night sew-in, so I can count those numbers now. I usually count as I cut, but I forgot to write the numbers down as I was cutting this time, so it is a finished quilt to report this week. I'll put up pictures of it tomorrow.


Used this week:                               6.3 yards
Used this year:                              57.7 yards
Purchased this week:                         0 yards
Purchased this year:                  109.25 yards
Balance:                                   51.55 more  yards in than out.

I'm happy that the used numbers are starting to go up. It gives a good feeling of getting something accomplished. I'm linking up to Judy's Stash report at Patchwork Times.

On a sadder note, Scott's brother is back in hospital with a pretty severe case of pneumonia, and he doesn't have a lot of strength left with which to fight it. So, we are waiting to see what happens there, knowing that it is all in God's hands.

A bit about our vacation

When we were up in Algonquin last week, we did one of the many hikes that are mapped out there. They are rated according to difficulty, one dot being the easiest, and three the most difficult. When we were camping in this same area six years ago, we did the hike around Peck Lake, and it was a truly gorgeous area. I'd just purchased my first digital camera, and really didn't know what I was doing with it. There were some gorgeous pictures from that hike, but the were all on the smallest setting. I had really wanted to have some of them printed to be able to hang on our walls. So, when we were up there last week, we did the same hike, with the intent of getting more pictures, this time on a setting which could be printed.  These two definitely fit the category of being printable.

Remember the bit about the difficulty level? This one in rated as two dots, moderate difficulty, taking 1 1/2 hours. When we did it six years ago, it wasn't bad at all, so we thought we knew what we were getting into. Well, all I can say is, what a difference 6 years makes. We came out of this one huffing and puffing, and feeling and looking like we'd been hit by a Mac truck. Of course, it didn't help that the temperature was in the 30's, with a humidex in the 40's. So it wasn't maybe the smartest thing we've ever done. I think we were both in the beginning stages of heat stroke, with faces bright red, slightly dizzy, legs slightly wobbly,  and with the beginnings of headaches. We fell into the car, gabbed something cold to drink and turned the air conditioning on full blast. But now, looking at the pictures, I'm glad we did it. But after this one, we decided that we wouldn't attempt any of the others, since it was way too hot and there was a real danger of heat stroke. So we spent almost all the rest of the time relaxing in our campsite, me with a book or with hand stitching, Scott with a book or some games on his computer. Lovely and quiet and relaxing, which, after all, was the purpose of the week in the first place.

Having a wonderful time........

We are having a wonderful and relaxing time on our vacation. There is a Wi-fi center at the visitor's center. Otherwise, I wouldn't be posting. The wireless internet service in non-existent in the park, and very sketchy out on the main highway. But, in a way, it is nice to get away from even that.

This was the sign that greeted us when we got to the park on Tuesday afternoon.

And this is our soft sided home for the week. So we are being very careful and are keeping all the food in the car. The last thing we want is a black and furry visitor, looking for food.

And this is the view from the beach in our campground at almost sunset last night.

We'll be home Monday evening, sometime before dark, and I'll be back in touch then.