My finished row (Harvest Home)

These are my last three blocks.  I finished them last night.  From left to right they are: Rail Fence, fall leaf, and Road to Oklahoma.  Obviously I decided against including an applique square.  I felt like the fall leaf was detailed enough to give a similar look as an appliqued piece.

Here are all the rows for this quilt so far.  My completed row is the row on the bottom.  This is just the order that I happened to have them on my design wall.  The rows will ultimately be sewn together in the order that the owner likes.  If it were up to me, I'd probably move my row up and place it above the row with the squirrel.

Last Week's Blocks

These are the rows for the row swap quilt I have to work on this month.  The theme for this one is "Harvest Home".  The black harvest print fabric is the focus fabric, and she asked that we include a house block as well.  She says that when she finishes it she plans to donate it to the veteran's hospital in Tuskegee, so she wants us to keep the blocks/row masculine.  I worked on the quilt last week, but I guess I forgot to post any pictures.  So here they are, better late than never.

These are the ones I've made so far.  I figured I would start the prerequisites.  I've got my house block, a block that uses the focus fabric (the Old Maid's Puzzle block), and of course, a pumpkin block.  As you can see, the pumpkin block uses the same pattern as one from my pumpkin patch quilt, but with a few different fabrics thrown in.  Now I have to decide which other blocks I'm going to make.  So far, no two blocks in the quilt use the same pattern, so I'm planning to maintain that pattern (or should I say non-pattern).  I'm thinking I will do a leaf block, and at least one more traditional patchwork block.  All the other rows have an applique block, so I sort of feel like I should do one, but I don't really enjoy doing applique that much, so I'm not sure yet about that.

I'm planning to working on more blocks today, so hopefully I'll have some more pictures up soon. 

Making a List

I did something yesterday that I'm not sure a quilter should ever do.  I made a UFO (UnFinished Objects) list.  I didn't actually look through everything and drag everything out, but I sat down and made a list of all the quilting projects I have in progress that aren't yet finished.  I knew I had several, but there were several more than I thought there were going to be.  As it turns out, I have 11 quilting project "in progress" at the moment (possibly more if I pulled everything out), six of which are completed quilt tops (obviously I've gotten a little lax on actually quilting).  This doesn't even include the things that I have bought fabric for, but haven't yet started work on.

I also made a list of 'quilting ideas'.  These are the things that I either have some or all of the fabric for, or things that I'm pretty sure I want to try making at some point.  That list is almost twice as long as my UFO list.  This list has 17 projects on it, and it doesn't include everything that I've at least made a sketch of in my graph paper notebook.  It's somewhat overwhelming. 

My reason for doing it was to try to help me get organized and have a better idea of what to be working on.  Also, I had been having several new quilting ideas lately and I didn't want to forget any of them.  So now I know that I need to buy some quilt batting and get something into my new quilting frame, but I'm still not sure what.  I've got so many choices that I still don't know what to do.  LOL!

More Little Pumpkins

Yesterday I finished my last two pumpkins for my little pumpkin patch quilt that I started back before Halloween.  The one on the left is a log cabin block with rounded sides added and a stem across the top.  It was inspired by a block I saw online at The Confused Quilter.  The one on the right is paper pieced from a pattern I saw online at Preserving Home Basics.  Again, I didn't order a pattern, I just sketched it out on graph paper while looking at the block on the computer.

This is the layout I had in mind for the pumpkin blocks.  I'm planning to put traditional pieced blocks in the currently blank spaces of the nine patch.  I was originally thinking I would do orange, black, and green (background fabric) blocks in either a Churn Dash or an Ohio Star, but now I'm not so sure.  Currently the only black in the quilt is the kitty in the center pumpkin, and I'm afraid using black in the alternate blocks might be a little too much.  But then again, if I don't do orange and black, I'm not sure which colors to use:  two different oranges, orange and green?  I'm just not sure yet.  I already have one orphan block from this quilt.  I hate to make another if I don't like what I choose.  Oh, decisions, decisions. . .

Also, I'm not sure yet if I'm going to put any sashing strips to divide the blocks or not.  Once I get the alternate blocks made and put into place, I will decide if I think I need them or not.

Completed Sandy Quilt

My Sandy Quilt team leader emailed me last night with pictures of the completed quilt.  I'm so happy with how it turned out.  I like scrappy quilts and this one is so bright and cheerful.  I hope it will lift the spirits of whoever gets it.

I have six blocks in the quilt.  One of them is right there on the corner facing the camera in the picture above.  My thanks go out to my team leader, Nancy, for putting the quilt together, quilting and binding it, and to Michele for organizing the drive.  I love being able to put my hobby to such a worthwhile cause.

If you are interested in helping out too, click on the link to your left.  The one with the cute little doggie that says "Sandy Quilt Block Drive".

Block Contest Block...so far

Here is a picture of my challenge quilt block for the Sisters Quilt Show.  I'm not 100% sure that I'm done with it at this point.  Actually, I know that it still needs to be trimmed to 9 1/2 inches.

The body of the fish is sequins and the splash is made from beads.  The head, eye, tail, and fins are appliqued, and the "water" at the bottom is just seamed to the background fabric.  There is a lot of embellishment with all those little sequins, but it still looks a little plain beyond the fish itself.  I'm gonna leave it up on the wall for a while and see if any other ideas for embellishments strike me.