a fusion of textiles & smiles
10 years later I have finished the quilt top for the English Paper Piecing quilt (EPP) that I mist recently discussed in the posts Update: 1/3rd Sewn Together (and more) and ScrapHappy September 2026: Happy Dance Time! .
Here is the fabric I have selected for the backing:
Here is a follow up to my September 15th post ScrapHappy September 2026: Happy Dance Time!
I now have 1/3 of the quilt (33 blocks), that I’ve been working on for 10 years on and off, sewn together – yay!
Here is the section I recently put together:
And with the rest of the blocks up on the design wall:
It’s so funny how it “shrinks” when you sew the blocks together!
I decided to take on piecing the blocks together by breaking them up into a group of 9; and two groups of 12 (= 33). Then I sewed those three groups together.
Hopefully I will by the weekend be able to hand it into my longarm quilter (fingers crossed). I have a fantasy…depending on her turnaround time…that I can feature the quilted quilt for my October 15th monthly ScrapHappy post!
Here is the “and more” part of this post – just some random additional info….
A follow up to the post What’s On The Design Carpet: First 20 Squares; I’ve been experimenting with the additional 3 yarn colors and once I finish all the sample blocks incorporating the new yarn colors I will do another post. For now, here is a photo of my “Granny Square Laboratory”!
A friend bought a new Rowenta Steam Station and gave me her old professional steam station iron! I was a little intimidated by it at first but now I really like it! It was very hand to press down the seams on the denim quilt I am working on.
I love stickers and I decided – what the heck, I have no plans to sell my Bernina – why don’t I just brighten it up with some stickers. So for the first time ever, I put fun stickers on a sewing machine!
The stickers add a little smile to my face while sewing!
Here is an update to the post Update on Latest Granny Square Blanket and an update to my progress on my latest granny square blanket, this time made with Lion Brand Re-Spun – yarn made from recycled polyester.
I’ve completed the first 20 granny squares from the in various stages blocks I started with 100 centers:
I’ve run into an issue: I realized the three skeins I’ve been using is likely not enough to finish 100 granny square blocks:
Here are the other granny square blocks in progress – the remaining 80 are either just centers, or a center and the next row (there are 4 rows in total to the block):
This yarn is hard to find unless I order it online; and I do have it in other colorways (I found a bunch for $2.99 a skein compared to $8 – $10 a skein retail, while thrifting one day).
So I looked through my stash of Re-Spun and found some sort of similar colors that might work to add to the existing blocks in progress:
I am going to make some test granny square blocks adding the new yarns to see how I like them.
I might need to make more centers as I am not sure 100 blocks will be a big enough blanket, and I can use the new yarns (if I ended up liking them for this project) for centers.
I am determined not to buy more yarn and use what is in my stash!
Here is the YouTube video again if you want to see the pattern. I taught myself to crochet this pattern from the video and I refer back to it whenever my mind has disconnected when I am skipping around on completing rows 🙂
It’s the 15th of the month and I am part of the monthly ScrapHappy posting group currently hosted by Kjerstin of Quimper Hitty.
Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants:
Kate, Eva, Sue, Lynda, Birthe, Turid, Tracy, Jan, Moira, Chris, Alys, Claire, Jean, Dawn, Gwen, Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol, Preeti,Viv, Alissa, Tierney, Hannah,
Maggie and Wizzy
This post is an update to the August 10th post Very Good Progress on the EPP Quilt on the English Paper Piecing (EPP) hexagon quilt I begin in 2016 and am still working on finishing in 2026 (I mere 10 years…perhaps not the speediest quilt completion…). The quilt is composed of 99 blocks and was inspired by the cover for the first issue of Quiltfolk Magazine (Issue 1: Oregon):
SO HERE IS THE BIG NEWS: I FINISHED ALL 99 BLOCKS!!!!
HAPPY DANCE!!!
Did you get up from your seated positions and dance along with me?!?!
Here are all 99 blocks – the scrappy hexagon rosettes appliqued on to scrap denim:
I had 98 blocks done and I remembered I had to one from scratch to make 99, because I’d lost one while traveling (I learned they did not make a good traveling project), So in the “eleventh hour” I had to pull out my EPP paper and paper piece six little hexagons (lucky I had one spare random hexagon and didn’t have to piece 7!) and sew them into a rosette (ugh).
But now all the blocks a done and I can start sewing the quilt blocks together and get them off the longarn quilter!!!
Okay, back to dancing…
Here is an update on the English Paper Piecing (EPP) quilt I’ve been working on and off on since 2016.
My late husband, who was also a quilter, helped me make many of the the EPP hexagons for the “rosette” blocks in this quilt and there was a bit of an “emotional curve” to overcome to finish up this quilt.
In my previous update 21 Ready to Applique!, like the title reads, I had 21 more blocks ready to be machine appliquéd (I just couldn’t bring myself to hand applique the blocks as it would have been finished in 2036) to the recycled denim I am using as the background for the 99 blocks (9 by 11 layout) quilt.
I ended up preparing 25 blocks for applique and getting them machine appliqued:
I was quite pleased with myself after quite the bout of procrastination on this quilt (um…started in 2016…)
I trimmed the blocks once appliqued to 6.5 inches x 6.5 inches square and then added them to the other blocks up on the design wall to now have – 90 blocks completed!!!!
Yes I finished up to the 10th row – one more row (the 11th) of 9 blocks to go and then I can start putting the quilt together.
9 more blocks, 9 more blocks, 9 more blocks to go – yay!
Getting so close to this feeling…
It’s the 15th of the month and I am part of the monthly ScrapHappy posting group hosted by Kate of Tall Tales From Chiconia. Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants: Kate, Eva, Sue, Lynda, Birthe, Turid, Tracy, Jan, Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys, Claire, Jean, Dawn, Gwen,
Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol, Preeti,Viv, Karrin, Alissa, Tierney, Hannah,
Maggie and Wizzy
For my ScrapHappy post this month I am skipping an update on the scrappy English Paper Piecing (EPP) hexagon flower quilt I am working on since I recently posted about it in the post 21 Ready to Applique!. I am currently working on machine appliquéing 21 blocks. I will post an update when I am done with those blocks.
So instead I am going to share a scrappy experiment I began working on a couple months ago that is on my design wall. Using recycled decorator fabric samples/scraps and recycled denim scraps, I started playing with some improvisational design and created three blocks:
I don’t know where I am going with it and for now it will continue to sit on my design wall until I finish my EPP quilt.
Once that EPP quilt is off my design wall, I am looking forward to playing in this basket of denim and corduroy scraps; and decorator samples again!
Greetings from someone who has been away from the blogosphere for a little bit.
It’s the 15th of the month and I am part of the monthly ScrapHappy posting group hosted by Kate of Tall Tales From Chiconia.
Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants:
Kate, Eva, Sue, Lynda, Birthe, Turid, Tracy, Jan, Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys, Claire, Jean, Dawn, Gwen,
Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol, Preeti,Viv, Karrin, Alissa, Tierney, Hannah,
Maggie and Wizzy
This month I have little to report as I’ve been hosting out of town visitors; and traveling (3 trips in the past month) including a big emotional return to Bend, Oregon for my birthday in May. It was my for first time in 7 years since I moved to Denver after my husband suddenly died in 2019. I’ll blog about that return sometime in the future.
Following up on my May 2026 ScrapHappy post ScrapHappy May 2026 – Moving Along on the EPP Quilt , I did over the past month complete sewing together 6 more English Paper Piecing (EPP) rosettes.
Yes, that’s it for the past month since the May 15th post!
But I do have a couple random curious things to share to conclude this post.
Granny Square Shoes?
If you’ve followed my blog for a while you might note my obsession for crocheting granny square blankets like this one I completed in 2025:
During my recent travels I came across a pair of granny square shoes!!!! They weren’t in my shoe size and they actually did not look that well made but they were fun to look at!
Everybody Needs a Pair of Quilted Shorts…
I am a quilter and during my recent travels I came across a pair of quilted shorts that gave me a giggle too!
I think an old quilt was turned into clothing. I would suggest this a curious fashion choice, but no judgement if you need a pair of vintage quilt shorts to wear!
I bet the original quilt is “scrap happy” and was made from someone’s fabric scrap basket so these shorts might also count for ScrapHappy June 🙂
An Amazing Thought/Concept
I came across this sign in my travels and I think it is an amazing thought/concept to close this post.
Well hello, it’s the 15th of the month and I’ve rejoined the monthly ScrapHappyposting group hosted by Kate ofTall Tales From Chiconia.
Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants:
Kate,Eva,Sue,Lynda,Birthe,Turid,Tracy,Jan,
Moira,Sandra,Chris,Alys,Claire,Jean,Dawn,Gwen,
Sunny,Kjerstin,Sue L,Vera,Ann,Dawn 2,Carol,Preeti,
Viv,Karrin,Alissa,Tierney,HannahandMaggie
So here is my update on the scrappy English Paper Piecing (EPP) hexie rosette project I’ve been working on since 2016 that I previously posted about in this post – ScrapHappy April 2026: Update on the EPP Quilt
I made a bit of progress from April’s update and completed 16 more blocks.
Here is what the quilt in progress looked like in April 2026 with 49 blocks completed:
And here is what the quilt looks like in May 2026 with 65 blocks completed (yay!):
The quilt will be 9 by 11 for a total of 99 blocks. So I have 34 more blocks to go!
As I mentioned in a previous post, I have to finish sewing all the little paper pieced hexagons to each other for each rosette (and remove the EPP foundation paper) before I can applique the rosette to the recycled denim background. That is why I only got 16 blocks completed in the past month. Very tedious work!
Oh, you might notice that on the left side of the quilt arrangement on my design wall I have all dark background blocks:
That is because I am cutting scrap denim as I need it and I cut too much dark so now I have to make a bunch of lighter background blocks to mix in. But progress is progress and I bet before I know it I will have all 99 blocks done and sewn together!
In closing this post I thought I would share that these types of blocks, like the image below, make me smile because they remind me of just how “scrappy” this project is!
I ran out of some of the scrap fabrics and couldn’t make 6 hexagons in the same fabric to surround the center hexagon so I had to mix similar colors (I am using the word “similar” very loosely, ha!):
April? It’s already April?!??!
Well hello, it’s the 15th of the month and I’ve rejoined the monthly ScrapHappy posting group hosted by Kate of Tall Tales From Chiconia.
Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants:
Kate, Eva, Sue, Lynda, Birthe, Turid, Tracy, Jan,
Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys, Claire, Jean, Dawn, Gwen,
Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol, Preeti,
Viv, Karrin, Alissa, Tierney, Hannah and Maggie
So here is my update on the scrappy English Paper Piecing (EPP) hexie rosette project I’ve been working on since 2016 that I previously posted about in this post – ScrapHappy February 2026.
If you are just joining us, it was inspired by this quilt on the cover of the premiere issue of Quiltfolk Magazine, Issue 1: Oregon:
Image credit: quiltfolk.com
This was my progress back in February 2026 when I had 37 EPP flowers machine appliquéd to scrap denim:
I’ve machine appliquéd 12 more blocks since then:
I’ve would have done more but there was this little thing going on in my life called moving house…
Here are the 49 blocks now completed:
I have 50 more blocks to make for a 9 by 11 (99 blocks) setting.
My little challenge is the remaining 50 blocks need my completion of sewing all the hexies in the rosette together! They are just a center hexie with 6 hexies sewn to the center but not sewn to each other…
So I need to settle in for some serious hand sewing to be able to report progress in May’s ScrapHappy post 🙂
Hello, it’s the 15th of the month and I’ve rejoined the monthly ScrapHappy posting group hosted by Kate of Tall Tales From Chiconia.
Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants:
Kate, Eva, Sue, Lynda, Birthe, Turid, Tracy, Jan,
Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys, Claire, Jean, Dawn, Gwen,
Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol, Preeti,
Viv, Karrin, Alissa, Tierney, Hannah and Maggie
Life is currently crazy and filled with lots of boxes (see post How Did We Get Here? ) but I do have an update on the scrappy English Paper Piecing (EPP) hexie rosette project I’ve been working on since 2016 that I previously posted about in this post – ScrapHappy January 2026: Moving Forward on the Hexie Project .
In the January 15th 2026 ScrapyHappy post I shared this progress – 9 scrappy EPP flowers machine appliquéd to 6.5 inch by 6.5 inch scrap denim backgrounds:
I made some great progress since then and I now have 37 EPP flowers machine appliquéd to scrap denim:
I’ve developed a rhythm to my machine appliqué of the flowers onto the denim and it’s now so cumbersome now to do it.
I stitch them on a slightly larger than 6.5 inch by 6.5 inch square and then trim to size after I stitch them onto the scrap denim.
Only 62 more blocks to make of the 99 EPP flowers I’ve created.
Just a little follow up to my previous post – How Did We Get Here?
The house is currently in such chaos I needed a calm place in which I could blog and sew if I wanted until we get closer to our move date in early March. John came up with the idea of moving a table into our bedroom in front of the window and setting up my laptop and my sewing machine.
We also set up an area in our bedroom where I could sit and stitch on the quilt I am hand quilting (Hand Quilting “Go Boldly”) or read a book…or just enjoy an escape from boxes…
So now I have a place to escape the madness in the rest of house and write or create (even if most of my stuff is packed up now).
Hello, it’s the 15th of the month and I’ve rejoined the monthly ScrapHappy posting group hosted by Kate of Tall Tales From Chiconia.
Here are links to the blogs of the ScrapHappy participants:
Kate, Eva, Sue, Lynda, Birthe, Turid, Tracy, Jan,
Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys, Claire, Jean, Dawn, Gwen,
Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol, Preeti,
Viv, Karrin, Alissa, Tierney, Hannah and Maggie
Over the next couple of months I’ll be saving updates on my long time English Paper Piecing hexie rosette project to share on the 15th of each month for ScrapHappy.
In my most recent post on this project, Revisiting the EPP Quilt, I shared that I’ve been working on this project since 2016 when I fell in love with the quilt on the cover of Issue 1: Oregon of Quiltfolk Magazine.
I paper pieced 99 rosettes from my fabric scrap collection, attempting to coordinate the colors:
And finally I’ve begun setting the rosettes into blocks using my collection of scrap denim with plans to trim each block to 6.5 inches by 6.5 inches.
But I had to find the most efficient want to attach 99 rosettes to the denim scraps without having to hand appliqué them to the blocks. I was afraid if I committed to hand appliqué all 99 blocks, it would be another 9+ years until I finished this quilt!
So I decided to find a way to use my sewing machine to do it.
I researched my Bernina sewing machine books on the Bernina sewing machine feet and sewing machine stitches, and discovered I could use the #20C foot to sew a blanket stitch around each rosette to attach it (I decided to use a little Stitch Witchery Tape to anchor the rosette onto the denim before machine stitching).
After practicing on scrap denim I was able to figure it out and attach my first rosette and from there I put together my first 9 blocks:
Here they are squished together to sort of give you an idea of how the quilt might look:
I have a long way to go but it is a start!
I did discover that in addition to removing the paper from the hexies in each rosette, I still have to stitch some of the rosettes fully together! So there is a lot of work to get this project done and we’ll see how much progress I will have to report next month 🙂
Oh and yes it will be a heavy quilt using scrap denim as the setting squares but it is going to be a wall hanging in my upstairs guest room, not a utility quilt for snuggling under.
Hello, here is a quick update to my post Easing Back into Quiltmaking with a T-Shirt Quilt 🙂
I got John’s T-Shirt Quilt assembled and I am shipping it off to the long-arm quilter. Not sure if I’ll have it back for Christmas as she is of course backlogged this time of year!
Just a reminder from my previous post on this quilt – I will have red binding to it to frame it and pull in the scrap red flannel I used in the center to make the center T-Shirt fit with the others.
Oh and here is a photo of the basketball themed flannel (John loves basketball and was even playing in an intramural league where he was the oldest guy and the referee nicknamed him “Old School” – ha!) that will be on the back:
It feels like I floated far away from a regular quiltmaking practice and I’d like to return to it.
I’d like to always have some quilt, whether traditional or art, in progress on my design wall.
So I am easing back in by making a simple T-shirt quilt for John for Christmas (it’s not a surprise as I wanted him of course to have a say in what T-shirts he gave up for the project!);
I took 17 of his old T-shirts and backed them with interfacing and trimmed them to 12.5 inches by 12.5 inches.
The one in the middle, “Beards Turn Laziness Into Awesomeness” is not actually one of his old T-shirts but a joke T-shirt my friend S found for John while she and I were thrifting.
I am setting the interfaced T-shirt squares with a tartan looking flannel I found a couple years ago at a thrift shop.
I will bind the quilt once it is quilted with red flannel binding to “frame” it/coordinated with the scrappy red flannel I put around the center T-shirt to make it large enough to fit into the design.
Happy to have a quilt in progress up on the design wall!
It should come together quickly so I hope to soon have an update on this quilt!
This post is a quick follow up to the “Toward 2050” – Volunteering to Make A Quilt Top .
After seeing the Toward 2050 exhibit and walking the labyrinth at the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix, Arizona in February, I knew I wanted to contribute to the project in someway and ended up volunteering to sew one of the “blankets” (what they were calling the quilts, ouch) to be made from 30 of the flags that people around the world created inspired by their feelings on Climate Change.
So I turned this pile of 30 – 9 1/2″ by 9 1/2″ flags:
Into this quilt top per the detailed instructions provided:
It was challenging as the flags were really more individual art pieces and likely not originally created to be incorporated together into one piece*.
I ran into issues of trying to sew through very thick materials; and dealing with flag original construction and design issues such as sections within a flag not fully stitched together.
*I am not sure if the original participants knew their flags would become “quilt blocks”:
But I got it done (and so appreciated sharing my challenges with my friend W who was also working on piecing a different set of 30 flags) and will mail to the Toward 2050 project team tomorrow for them to send it on to their volunteer longarm machine quilters to finish.
During my Summer of Travel I’ve been working on my Sunflower Granny Square blanket as crocheting the individual granny squares is a perfect portable project:
Passenger in the car with my crochet project bag on my lap, crocheting through the road miles…
The last update on the Sunflower Granny Square Blanket I am working on was in January 2025 (see What’s on the “Design Carpet”: Progress on Sunflower GS Blanket).
In that January post I reported 39 granny square blocks done. I now have 91 blocks done as of this photo which I took before heading out on another recent road trip (to Santa Fe and Taos, New Mexico):
PLUS 10 more I finished on the recent New Mexico roadtrip (more in a future post on that roadtrip):
So in total I have 101 blocks done.
Here are a couple close up images of the different yarn combinations I used for the blocks (because I only wanted to use yarn from my stash); the ones with the green yarns represent sunflowers that are not fully open:
And I still need to make some more to make the blanket a little bigger. I might make 20 more, we’ll see. I am going to finish up all the remaining sections I’ve started which I think total 20.
Here’s my basket in the living room where I store my completed blocks (oh my will there be a lot of block ends to weave in someday!):
I’m going to do a different granny square block join than I did on the other three granny square blankets I’ve made. This time I am going to do a Single Crochet Join this time instead of the Join As You Go Method I’ve used in the past.
Single Crochet Join Example:
Image credit: Repeat Crafter Me
Join As You Go Example:
Image credit: Crochet 365 Knit Too
Oh something really cool I discovered – for the outside border of each sunflower granny square I used Lion Brand Wool Ease (an acrylic and wool blend) yarn in Wheat.
Image credit: Michael’s
Well when I was taking photos of the laid out granny squares on the “Design Carpet”, I was barefoot and ended up having to step on the laid out squares. I discovered THEY WERE SO SOFT under my feet and I think it is due to the border yarn I used for each square.
I think it will be a really cozy and snuggly blanket and now I really want to get it completed for the winter season!
Here is a follow up to the post The Expansion of “Go Boldly” , and an update on my progress on this quilt which I expanded from it’s original size of 56 inches by 56 inches (142 x 142 cm) to 82.5 by 82.5 inches (2.1 x 2.1 meters) by adding additional blocks:
I figured since this was the quilt in the background of my photoshoot for the October 2023 Issue 28: Colorado of Quiltfolk Magazine I should go ahead and finish it.
(A little background on this quilt: my friend D started this quilt four years ago and didn’t want to finish it so she offered me the initial pieced blocks, the templates, and the fabric she bought for the project. I’ve pieced about 50% of the blocks for the quilt and the rest were pieced by D.)
So I got all the blocks sewn together and discovered it was nearly Queen bed size when I laid it out on the guest bed:
I had a bit of remaining fabric and some blocks leftover, but I didn’t want to expand the quilt further.
I decided I didn’t need it to be a real Queen sized quilt as I didn’t plan to use it as a bed quilt as the colors do not go with my decor.
I did however want it to be a colorful large lap quilt to have at say the foot of a bed. So I pieced the remaining blocks into circles as the center part of the back of the quilt:
From there I used remaining fabric to build out the quilt back to be a little bit larger than the quilt top:
Yes it is a messy wrinkly mess as I didn’t iron it before I took the photo. This is the back in progress, I added one more row of fabric to each side to make it bigger than the quilt top.
It will basically be a reversible quilt with the pieced back.
I’ve decided to tie the quilt instead of sending it out for professional long arm quilting. I have some cool heavy weight colorful threads I plan to use to tie it. They are close to thickness of embroidery floss.
I mentioned in my previous post What’s Going on in the Studio, that I was planning on enlarging the small lap quilt/wall hanging size quilt I made Go Boldly (quilt pattern by Elisa’s Back Porch Designs) which was 56 inches by 56 inches (142 x 142 cm), since I had a lot of extra blocks:
Well, here is the expanded quilt after I laid out additional blocks on my design wall (I still need to sew them together to the existing quilt):
As part of what’s up on the design wall is a sewn together quilt and the other part are individual blocks, I can’t tell you exactly how big the expanded version will be (without doing a lot of pesky math subtracting seam allowances, etc.). However what is currently up on the design wall measures approximately 86 inches x 86 inches (218.5 cm x 218.5 cm).
Believe or not I still have 48 sections leftover and I plan to make them into 12 blocks (each block has 4 sections) that I will piece together as part of the back of the quilt.
I’ll sew it all together after I finish machine quilting Strings Attached:
This is sort of a follow up to this post – Update on Some W.I.P.s.
I thought I’d do a quick share of what is currently going on in my studio…
1) Sewing Machine Cleaning – it was time for a deep clean after I finished quilting SuperSymmetry Table Runner (see post SuperSymmetry Table Runner is Finished! ):
2) Expanding Go Boldly – I decided to make Go Boldly bigger as I had more pieced blocks. Originally I was going to make two quilts with the block but now I think I will make one big one and then use any left over blocks for a pieced quilt back. I now have it up on the design wall to work on enlarging it:
Right now the quilt is 56 inches by 56 inches (142 x 142 cm) which is wallhanging or small lap size, but I should be able to bring it to large lap size or perhaps a bed size (perhaps…) with the expansion.
3) Strings Attached – I decided to go ahead and get it ready for machine quilting. I made the quilt sandwich with batting and backing fabric and I plan to just go ahead and machine quilt it with coordinating red thread and just get it done!
4) What Direction Do I Go – just waiting to start hand quilting in the evening in front of the TV. First I have to finish the gray granny square blanket I am working on in the evenings in front of the TV (see posts Guest Blog Post: Progress on “My Blanket” and Update on Some W.I.P.s on the crochet project). I received some awesome hand quilting advice from one of my blogging buddies and I cannot wait to start on it, I even put together my little hand quilting bag of supplies which is lying on top of the quilt in the image below:
I feel like I am really moving forward on my projects (because there are new ones I want to start but not allowing myself to until I finish these!) 🙂
Well after Monday’s guest post by Mike the Miniature Schnauzer’s on the update of one of the WIPs (Guest Blog Post: Progress on “My Blanket”), the gray granny square blanket, that I shared in this post 2023 Recap: A Year in “Makes” and WIPs Going Forward, I guess I should actually do a post providing an update on another WIP I mentioned in the “2023 Recap” post: the table runner for our new table made from orphan blocks from my friend Wendy’s quilt SuperSymmetry (the quilt and the pattern she wrote appeared in the October 2010 edition of The Quilt Life):
I have all the blocks that Wendy gave me sewn together; and now it seems I have quite a few to make to bring the piece the full length of the table.
I am floating the table runner in progress on the taupe-brownish fabric that I will use as the borders. It is the same fabric I used as the setting fabric in this quilt which is in the dining room/library:
Yes that is Mike napping at my feet while I read a book in the library (before it was the dining room/library).
Here’s a couple more photos of the table runner in progress laid out on the dining table, this time with the bowl and candles that will sit on top of it when it is done:
You can see my breakfast in the background, it is a nice place to sit, read and eat breakfast.
I really like how the table runner is looking in the room and it coordinates well with my color scheme. I have one of those Ruggable washable rugs on order for under the table the in a muted brown color. Hopefully the rug will tie the room even more together (as well as protect the carpet from food spills when the dining table it being used).
You might have noticed in the first image in this post a stack of library books on the chair in the corner. A while back I decided to end my series of posts on the stack of library books I borrow from the library (last post in the series was Revenge of The Library Stack). But I thought I would share a special library book borrowing bonanza event.
The Saturday before New Year Eve (12/30), John and I decided to have a unique adventure – we decided on one day to visit all the libraries in our local library system that were within a reasonable drive. We drove to four different library branches, three of which I’ve never visited. Since my library card worked at all the libraries, I had an “incident” and came home with a LOT of books.
It was fun raiding the NEW NONFICTION sections of each library as well as browsing their 700s sections where all the yumminess for me awaits! It was such a delight to visit all those libraries in one day and what a wonderful sense of anticipation I had as our car parked in front of a library I’d never been to before!
Remember the post I did on the literary and popular culture inspired Christmas Trees my local library had on display (see post O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Trees…) as part of the Forest of Trees? Well the other libraries we visited in the library system also had trees on display as part of this library system wide program.
I took a ridiculous amount of pictures of the different trees at each library branch we visited. Here are some of my favorites (sorry the lighting wasn’t the best for photography) listed in order of the photos:
Such amazing creativity on the part of the library staff who came up with the concepts and decorated the trees!
There were 7 of us for Christmas Eve and we were going to make do with our 6 person seating kitchen table, with one person (#7) either crammed in or sitting at the kitchen counter.
We don’t have a formal dining room, just an open room when you first enter the front door which we turned into the library (previously it was a “sitting room”).
Well I came up with the semi “hare-brained” idea on December 23 that we should go buy an actual dining room table and put it into the library. It would serve as both a library table (it’s always been my dream to have one) and a dining table when needed.
So off we went to IKEA on 12/23, which was surprisingly empty so close to the Christmas holiday, and bought a table which seats 8 (but you could fit 10 at the table).
Yes John could have built a table in his woodshop but we figured it would cost the same or more to build from scratch a 92 1/2″ x 39 3/8 ” table (234 cm x 100 cm approximately) and he wouldn’t have it ready for December 24th!
We got the table home and before you know it we had it set up and made up for Christmas Eve (including Christmas Crackers):
And the table worked perfectly for our Christmas Eve dinner of 7 people (we used the loveseat in the library as seating for 2 of the 7 people; and the chairs are the existing kitchen table chairs):
In addition to candles on the table, I set up tea lights on the bookshelves in the library for a nice atmosphere during our festive dining.
And the two dogs that attended (Mike and Ajax) enjoyed foraging under the table and begging for food:
Christmas morning I was having some quiet time sitting at the new table in the library having tea and looking at library books with Mike the Miniature Schnauzer…
…and I thought: this table needs a table runner! (And a new larger rug under it…I am looking into one of those Ruggable rugs that remove from their pad and are machine washable).
Luckily I had in my stash a group of blocks my friend Wendy gave me (see post Quilter Distractions: Good Mail filled with “Taupe”) from a quilt she made for a magazine article/pattern she wrote for October 2010 edition of The Quilt Life called SuperSymmetry.
It is not enough blocks to make a quilt but it was enough to start a table runner!
I used up all the blocks Wendy sent and I am only at about a 6 foot table runner. The table is over 7 1/2 feet long so I am going to have to piece more blocks. Luckily Wendy sent me a bunch of coordinating fabric scraps!
I plan to add some type of thin border to the pieced blocks to float them. I don’t plan to make the table runner very wide as I just want to run the center of the table.
I’ll update you on the progress.
Oh and I’ll close this post with something sweet I saw this morning on my walk.
We have a lot of deer in the area so there are a lot of “deer crossing” warning signs as crossing deer (who like to randomly cross the street when you least expect it) are a dangerous traffic hazard.
Well someone decorated one of the “deer crossing” signs with a red nose (like Rudolph the Red Noses Reindeer!) to make it festive!
This bit of whimsy gave me a huge smile on my walk!
Hello there, hope you all are doing well 🙂
I finished the quilt top for the quilt “What Direction Do I Go?“ which I most recently posted about in this post – Update on Various Projects.
The quilt top measures 55 inches by 55 inches (140 cm by 140 cm). I am still thinking through my plan on how to quilt it but I did decide what fabric to put on the back of it:
I have this awesome vintage Kas Richloom light weight upholstery fabric in my stash that I found at a charity thrift store shop a couple years ago. I think it will add a bright and happy touch to the back of the quilt.
The quilt is meant to be a wallhanging/art quilt so it is okay if the quilt ends up being a little stiff with the recycled denim and home decor fabric on the front and the upholstery fabric on the back.
I have some handmade items I am making as Christmas gifts so I need to set the quilt top aside for now and get to crafting gifts, but I’ll pick it up again after the new year (can you believe it is nearly 2024?!?!?)
Thanks to one of the quilters I met at the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum Reception for quilters in the October 2023 issue of Quiltfolk Magazine, we discovered an awesome brewery near our house that seems to be custom made for me!
Fiction Beer Company! Two of some of my favorite things combined: craft beer and reading! This brewery was already in Denver and it opened a second location in Parker, Colorado in May.
The brewery is DOG FRIENDLY (we were able to sit inside on a sofa with Mike the Miniature Schnauzer), has a free lending library (take a book or donate a book), delicious craft beer, free bookmarks, and a friendly bartender who came and visited with us and Mike for a while when the bar service slowed up!
This brewery is Miniature Schnauzer approved (no worries we did not give Mike beer, but the bartender did bring Mike over a bowl of water and some dog biscuits!)
DENIM QUILT
Finally I’m sewing together the blocks on my recycled denim and home decor fabric quilt “What Direction Do I Go?“
I am trying something new to sew the 81 blocks together by working on 9 blocks at a time, numbering them and then semi-chain-piecing them into a square:
So far I have three squares, which is 27 blocks total, sewn together:
I really like the look of the individual blocks sewn together:
In the post Blocks Completed for “What Direction Do I Go?” , I mentioned I was trying to figure out the layout for the blocks on this quilt. Well I decided to make it look as if light was coming from the center and radiating out…sort of…well as best I could with the blocks I made. I put the blocks with the lighter or more faded denim in the center and the darker ones on the outer areas:
GRANNY SQUARE BLANKET
As I mentioned in the post What’s on the Design Wall, Design Carpet, and the wall…, I finished crocheting 80 granny square blocks. I’ve started crocheting the blocks together and here is my progress:
It is a fun project to work on while watching TV and hopefully soon it will cover more of my lap (photo above) than it does right now (because it’s cold now in Colorado – 28 degrees!)
PANTRY UPDATE
A couple years ago John redid the pantry and built in shelves. Recently he repainted the pantry to a white with gray undertones and added a new butcher block shelf. He also added a motion sensor light that will turn out when you enter the pantry and turn off after a while when there is no motion; and 4 outlets so we could keep a couple appliances in the pantry and use them in there.
A quick follow up to these posts:
ScrapHappy October 2023 – Recycled Jeans and Home Decor Fabric Scraps
What’s on the Design Wall, Design Carpet, and the wall…
As I mentioned in the first post on this quilt (ScrapHappy October 2023), I’ve tentatively named this piece What Direction Do I Go? and it is made from recycled denim jeans and recycled home decorating fabric scraps.
Saturday night I finished up the 81 blocks for this 9 by 9 block piece and I just thought I’d share with you what my design wall looks like with all the blocks completed:
Now it’s time to figure out the final layout and then get the blocks sewn together.
But first I seriously need to clean my sewing machine it was a LOT of lint from piecing denim and home decorating fabric scraps (many of which are synthetic type of fabrics).
I’ve been taking a break from blogging after my push to do a daily blog post for the 31 days of October, my 10th anniversary month of blogging. Additionally recently I had a wonderful visit with out of town family that of course kept me from sitting down and blogging.
Here are some updates on my current adventures in creativity.
THE DESIGN WALL
Here is a follow up to the post ScrapHappy October 2023 – Recycled Jeans and Home Decor Fabric Scraps.
I now have 66 blocks completed and 15 more to go to make 81 blocks for a 9 by 9 layout:
This is not even close to the final layout, just blocks put up on the design wall to track my progress. I have a lot of cleaning to do on my sewing machine after all that lint from sewing denim and home decor fabrics!
THE DESIGN CARPET
This is a follow up to the post What’s on the “Design Carpet”.
I’ve completed the 80 crocheted granny square blocks for the next granny square blanket I am making. I am doing a 8 by 10 layout of the blocks and will set them in dark gray yarn as the lattice.
Mike the Miniature Schnauzer couldn’t wait to lay on the laid out blocks as soon as I moved away from them!
This also is not the final layout, just a general layout to show all the blocks (and a Miniature Schnauzer, ha!).
THE WALL
This is a follow up to the posts Quiltfolk Issue #28 Colorado Released (and I am in it!), Magazine in Hand, and Magazine in Hand, Addendum…. One of the other quilters featured in Issue 28: Colorado of Quiltfolk Magazine, reached out to me and shared pages from an extra copy of the magazine she had purchased in order to take it apart and put the pages featuring her in her portfolio.
I used the pages she sent me to make a display in my studio of the article I am in using these cool 11 inch by 17 inch frames I found. John did a great job helping me hang them.
I’ll close this post with a cute meme my sister sent me the other day as we all struggle with Daylight Savings Time (setting the clocks back 1 hour in the Fall and 1 hour forward in the Spring); that is US states that agree to play along with it (Hawaii and Arizona do not participate).
I am continuing on my challenge to post to my blog every day in celebration of October 2023 being my 10th anniversary of blogging month. And if you all can’t keep up no worries, this is WAY too much posting – ha! I think once October is over I will go to a once a week posting schedule (or perhaps a little more frequent than that…we’ll see…).
For today’s post, here is an update on this post from July 2023 – What’s On the “Design Carpet” – Road Trip Granny Squares.
I continue to crochet granny squares for a distraction while traveling as a passenger in a car or while traveling in general. I am currently working on an 80 square blanket (8 by 10) and I’ve progressed from this in July 2023:
To this (only 7 more granny squares to complete to make 80):
I don’t have them in their final order before they are joined together, I just semi randomly put them together for this update photo.
I store them in this bucket bag I made a couple years ago, as I complete them:
I have mixed feelings of getting near the end as it will be 1) time to work on joining them (a sort of pain in the booty) and 2) I’ll have to start work on a new one (and I am sort of attached to this one, ha) when I am a passenger in a car/traveling.
Luckily I have a couple blocks of this one already started (see post Plastic Yarn?) so this will be my next “road trip blanket” to work on!
