Work in Progress

It has been a busy summer. Our oldest is building a house in a wilderness spot and photos don't do it justice... so we travel a couple hours one way to see it. I'm almost jealous but more excited for them. We also took a trip to South Carolina to visit our daughter, hubby and all. It was wonderful. Our youngest lives in our city and we spent most of a day with him and his fiancee looking at a show home and eating. Besides those things, the usual visits with friends, our church activities, and now I'm a new member on our local guild board, so that's one big learning curve. A few quilters in our neighborhood have started a Bee Group, so that adds a new dimension. Also, have a work in progress on my table that is where my heart likes to sew, but it is a challenge turning a sketch/photos into fabric and making it work. This is a shot of part of it. 

The sky and background are done, sewn, along with about 6-8" of water. This shot shows the sky pinned to a wall and the rest on a table where I am auditioning and fiddling. There is about 24" or more water to go, then a sandy beach with rocks in the very bottom foreground. I've not a lot of perfect water fabric. Also planning to put a couple islands of trees in the sides. This is fun, but not moving very fast. I keep playing with it until the best ideas show up. I've a sketch to follow (loosely) and am not sticking strictly to it. 

We had a wonderful August, sunny and warm (needed AC most days) with cool nights. By far my favorite month. No signs of fall yet, but some report a bit of yellow here and there.Back too school showed up far too soon!

Three Finishes and many plans...

 Jessica's quilt is finished, was delivered, and well received. I'd asked her a few months ago about colors and favorite things. She said pastels, cats, horses, elephants, beaches, sunsets, wildflowers and her son Cayden. Enlarge the pictures and everything is there. I called it "Jessica's Heart" and it is about 64" square. The colors are truest in the sunset one on the right and below in the upper left one with the horses.

 

Before finishing it, I took all my tiny leftover bits of old florals from the third quilt when it was in the top but not quilted stage, and made a table runner. I'd already pieced the much larger quilt (see below) but wanted to used up ALL of those bits. It is old-fashioned but looks okay on the top of a black bookcase.

 

The floral one was totally a blast. I had lots of these old print, either scraps or fat quarters. On Jessica's quilt I learned that fast and easy way to make eight HSTs at the same time. So I did that with my scraps and wound up with dozens of HSTs that would finish to 2" and 3" and 4" and 6" so they would easily fit together. Also some squares in the same sizes and a few strips. I started in the middle and made it up as I went along. The colors are anything but true in this photo. 

Now this is not a quilt that everyone will love, but so far, everyone does. It is called "It Started Out Sane" and became a little crazy, but there are no bits of old florals left in my stash. How good that feels. It will likely go to a charity but right now I'm still liking to look at it. 

I've many project boxes and as many more plans, but had to purchase the latest fabric from Northcott called Soar, the Moody Blues line. Yikes, this is so beautiful. Click here for my favorite story, but others will carry it.