Using It Up

Like so many of us,

I am trying to use up the fabrics I have.

When I saw the J/F 2019 issue of Quilty magazine

while going through the checkout at the grocery store,

I was enamored with the cover photo.

I had a basket full of assorted strings

and I love sewing these curved blocks,

so, of course, this issue had to follow me home.

It took very little thought and was lots of fun to make.

Sometimes, it's nice to take an easy route.

(As always, you can click on my pictures to enlarge them.)

"That's No Moon"

designed by Megan Collins

While Megan's quilt is 4 blocks by 4 blocks,

I made mine 3 x 4.  With each block finishing at 18" square,

it was plenty big enough

to snuggle under on the couch

on a cold winter's evening.

Last summer, I had placed an order for batting 

from Connecting Threads,

and, as a last minute thought, 

had added some yardage from their clearance pages.

Why not?  At that point, shipping to Canada was free.

It was absolutely perfect for backing this quilt

and...I had ordered exactly enough.

I don't usually get so lucky!

After the many hours I put into FMQing my last quilt,

I was more than happy to straight line quilt this one,

in one inch increments,

just like the original.

~

Before Dorian devastated our coast,

stripping all the foliage off every plant on the property,

I was enjoying the many visitors to my garden-of-sorts.

Atlantis Fritillary

Sharing the 'table' with a Monarch.

I planted Swamp Milkweeds

to encourage the Monarchs to lay their eggs,

but sadly, the storm stripped the leaves from the plants

before the Monarch instars (baby caterpillars) 

were able to mature.

Maybe next year!

Enjoy your day!

Looks like a quilty day to me!

Tomorrow, I will be traveling to the city of Halifax

to spend a few days with Linda,The Scrapmaster.

Color me excited!

XO,

Karen

Forever and a Day

When Cheryl of Meadow Mist Designs

announced her plans to have another mystery quilt along

I attempted a fabric pull,

but I didn't have enough background fabric on hand.

I did, however, have the fabric ready for her
State of Being
quilt,
so I decided I'd work on that instead.

It was lots of fun to make.

Orientation of the half square triangles

kept me on my toes 

as I was sewing the diagonal rows together.

I couldn't wait to start free motion quilting it.

I used dot-to-dot quilting 

in all the gray and green triangles and squares.

Then I filled in the white background with concentric swirls,

pebbles, and straight lines.

My island quilty friend had a whole bolt of a gray print,

so we struck a deal,

(more about that in a future post)

and she gave me enough to back the quilt.

(As always, if you click the picture, you'll get an enlargement.)

I love this quilt.

It's the perfect size, 54" x 60".

I used Kona solids

(I prefer Free Spirit, but they're hard to find)

and Auriful thread.

Now, it's time to make a label.

I'm seriously considering renaming the quilt

to Forever and a Day

because that's how long it took

for me to FMQ it.

*

We had our first frost the night before last.

While this isn't my favorite time of year

(I'm a summertime gal)

I was pretty excited because it means

I can harvest the cranberries

from up in the meadow.

Enjoy your day!

Thanks for popping in.

~Karen