THE WEEK OF THIS AND THAT

This past week has been full of family events.  We enjoyed a week's  visit with our oldest daughter, a grandson's birthday and husband's and my 60th wedding anniversary.  My daughter and I did get into my sewing room and I was able to send her off home with a great load of scrap fabrics, some patterns and quilt books I was no longer using or interested in.  

My quilt guild has a Warm Wrapping charity unit that makes about 350 quilts a year that are given to 5 different local agencies.  About 20 of us make the quilt tops with kits that are made up by us with donated fabric, others quilt them and bind them and yet another take them home and sew the finishing of the binding down.  I am in the group that makes up kits, sews quilt tops together, and does the finishing binding.  I just finished 3 quilts with hand binding them this past month.  This particular quilt I fell in love with.  Very difficult not to keep it and exchange it for a couple of finished quilts I have made and willing to give up for this one.

I just love this quilt.

I had a goal of 60 table runners for our upcoming guild's January 26 quilt show's boutique.  I wrapped that project up this past couple weeks.  Yes, 61 table runners all at 13" by 28".  

I ended up with a good deal of leftover fabrics and happened to have a stash of zippers and decided that these little zipper pouches might be a good addition to the boutique.  They measure about 10" by 10" or 10" by 11" depending on the scrap leftovers.

Simple quilting fronts and backs.  I  will fiddle with these for a few months and see what I come up with.  I find these little projects like the runners and these pouches as good relief sewing from more complicated appliqué projects I am working on for myself.

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QUILTS TIMES FOUR

Well Thanksgiving is over and we have Christmas coming fast.  Time to get out some Christmas runners and wall hanging over the next week or so.  My daughter has come for a week from Colorado for a brief visit bringing 4 wonderful quilts that she has made for 4 mens in her family.  So thought I would share them.  She is a new quilter with just about 2 years now under her belt.  But she has really taken off with it and loves it.  

These first two quilts were made as gifts for her brother in laws that live here locally.  They were made with batiks and are just beautiful. 

Lovely quilting done on those two.  

This one was made for her godson.

The quilting is really outstanding.  Her quilter is just fabulous.  

This one is for her step son, the kid's tall so it is pictured sideways.  I love the unusual pattern on this one.

Again some really great quilting.  I think I need to talk to my quilters and see what I am missing.  

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ATLAS ZIPPER CASE

I took a break for a few days this past week and got involved with Kristina Brinkerhoff's Center Street Quilts, Atlas Zipper Case pattern.  Just needed a break from table runners, and my appliqué project.

Have to admit the pattern took a good deal of reading and study.  Kristina did provide 5 mini lessons on her blog site which were somewhat helpful too.

I chose to use mesh rather than vinyl for the pockets.

I had a minimal supply for matching fabrics to work on with the floral print I selected as well.  I had a stash of zippers in various colors so worked with what I had.

I did get it done.  I did not put the zipper on that closure of the case.  It required a 30 inch zipper, and I was not interested in running out and buying one.  Lots of storage as the areas behind the zipper pouches are open and one can slip a pattern under them or fabric and the blue pouch extends under the floral one and the floral one is just a small pouch.

All finished just folds in half like a book at 8 by 10 inches and open at 16 by 10.   I think if I were to make it again I would do the zipper closure.  Especially now that I have the directions all figured out.

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CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS AND A LITTLE BIT OF OTHER STUFF

 I don't think I have managed to get a great deal done this past week in the sewing room.  Harvesting pecans has taken up a good deal of my sewing time.  Plus some out of town company, birthday shopping for a grandson and early Christmas shopping.

We have some good friends that we have coffee with every Tuesday.  Stan and Barbara invited us along with 2 other couples that we meet with each week to their home for coffee last Thursday.  Barbara decorates her home for Christmas.  Oh yes, at least 30 trees and as you can see lots of other decorations.  She starts in September.  Unbelievable!

Barbara's husband Stan is not to be under done by his wife with his beautiful garden.

 

I am hoping to finish up the last Garden Patch Cats pattern this coming week for my daughter's Cat Network fundraiser.  I have had such fun making these.

I did manage to get another William Morris block done on Enchanted Garden.  Still needs to be stitched down, but making good progress to getting the piece finished.  

I think I will be moving it down from its center top to the bottom center, right now placement is a bit up in the air.  Besides I have to make 2 more large blocks.  I am waiting until those are done to finalize their placement.  

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WISTERIA AND PECANS

Feeling somewhat in a rut these last few weeks.  Thinking about doing something different for a bit of a change.  Maybe time to pull out a couple quilt books and do something different. 

I have another Enchanted Garden block in the works.  Not going to deal with the butterfly. 

It is time to finish this project.  I have been working on it for years.  The goal is to finish by the January 2026 quilt show.

The hang up has been the quilting on the blossoms.  I am not a free motion quilter. Never have been able to get the hang of it  This is done by twisting and turning the piece under the machine to get the nice curved quilting done. So doing this quilting on the project is a monumental chore for me.

I have four more of them to accomplish and it is finally time to get myself together and do it.  

I have kept all the thread colors together so best to just grit my teeth and get busy.

I have been a bit busy on this project with husband.  We have two large pecan trees on our side yard and it is harvest time.  He is busy knocking the hulls out of the trees, then once hulled they go in the oven for a couple hours, then shelled, then dried again and into the freezer.  I think we are on gallon bag number 7 about 4 or 5 pounds of shelled nuts a bag.  My contribution is picking the hulls off the ground and putting them into the buckets and vacuuming up the shells off the dining room floor after he finishes shelling them.  And oh yes, the Christmas baklava!    




 

  

EGGPLANT CAT

This past week has me back to working on Enchanted Garden.  I had a bit of time out with it over the last couple weeks.  I changed out the layout and  I am back to working on it.  In between I have been able to work on some table runners for the January 2026 quilt show's boutique and getting Eggplant Cat started.  

I have Eggplant Cat all quilted.  Eyes on and binding ready to go on.  It will be part of a fundraiser for a group in our area.  One of our daughters volunteers with the group that feed, trap, spa and neuter feral cats and return them to their feral colonies.  The funds raised goes to pay local vet clinics that offer their services at greatly reduced costs.  

It needs whiskers sewn on, can't forget that.

I took a bit of time off from my Enchanted Garden project but have gotten back to that this week and finished the second small block and  the top right hand block is done as well.  All the appliqué pieces are cut out and ready to start getting on to their backing for another large block.  So things are moving along with this project too.  

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WILLIAM MORRIS ENCHANTED GARDEN

With the bedspread project off to the quilters this past week I have been able to clear up the sewing room of that and also get all the 5" squares cut for the hospital project and the remaining donated fabric scraps boxed up and off to another gal that makes wheelchair lap quilts for Hospice.  I am still working on getting table runners done for my guild's upcoming January 2026 quilt show.  Sounds like it is a long way off, but time flies and we sold a good 400 of them at our last show.  I usually try to get 50 or 60 done for them.  I get plenty of donated fabric and I enjoy making them. But now it is time to get back to my own William Morris appliqué project.  

I am using this pattern for my William Morris fabric appliqué project but I have decided to modify the size and lay out of it a good deal.

I only plan on three rows and the center of the second row will have two of the small blocks used between large blocks above and below them.  The third row will be two more large blocks like the first row.  It should be around 38 by 42.  It is a fun project but I think I have somewhat lost interest in it for some reason.  But, who knows what will happen as I move forward on it.  

We have been working in our backyard garden this week.  We have one of our cactus plants flowering again.  It does this about every 6 months or so.  

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AVOCADO AND EGGPLANT CATS

I have spent most of last week finishing up my bedspread, shams, and deco pillows for our king size bed.  Sewing those last two sections of 100" by 40" together to finish the spread at 100" by 120" was grueling.  It is off to the quilters tomorrow.  

Last week I finished my Avocado Cat table topper and handed it off to my daughter, but realized I forgot the button eyes and whiskers on it.  She brought it back and I got them sewn on.  It looks so much better than last week's picture.

Avocado Cat turned out so cute I have decided to make Eggplant Cat.

I have all the fabric scraps pulled to put it together.  My daughter thought that it would be a great auction piece for Stanislaus Cat Network that she volunteers with.  They feed, trap, spa and neuter feral cats in local colonies in our area.

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AVOCADO CAT AND CHEMOTHERAPY QUILTS

 I have taken a couple days off this week from working on my bedspread project.  I had a couple things that I wanted to get finished up and also helping a friend with her charity project.

I finished Avocado Cat.  He still needs two black buttons on his eyes but other than that he is done. 

I did get the fronts of the pillow shams and decorative pillows done for the bedspread project.  Just 2 more rows and the spread will be done and I can get all off to the quilter.

 

I have been helping a friend with some cutting of 5" squares.  Liz hurt her arm and is unable to do much fabric cutting so I volunteered to help out. She received two huge bins of donated fabric.  She makes lap quilts for patients that are receiving cancer treatment at the hospital.  Hospitals are cold they need a quilt to snuggle in when they come for their daily or weekly chemotherapy sessions.  

Thus far I have a pretty good stack of them going for her.  But lots of fabric still waiting to get cut.  She says they are 36" by 60" when done and the blocks take 4 of each color.  So I stack them in fours of each color.  I believe she said she has 30 backs so just needs the 5" squares to start getting those 30 quilts together.

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THE KING SIZE PROJECT

 I spent this past week working on my bedspread project.  For the most part things are going well.  I did have one snag.  I found the perfect back for this project but somehow miscalculated the amount of 108" backing fabric I needed.  Yes I bought 3.5 yards instead of 4.5 yards.  Well, as most quilters I have a pretty good stash, so it is not too much of an issue.  Just pack it away for a future quilt's backing.  Must go back out now and hope I can still find that yards or something similar.

This is a picture of our old bedspread.  Ten inch squares with nine different fabrics. 

This is the pillow sham.

The new bedspread fabrics.  Ten different fabric selections based on the rugs on each side of the bed and also some metal artwork on two walls.  I have these four rows of 10" squares completed and an additional three as well.  I will need 12 rows.  The finished project will be 100" long by 120" wide.  

I have both the centers of the pillow shams pieced as well.  So thus far everything seems to be going very well.  I have over half way finished with the piecing of the bedspread.

I have my little helper laying on one of the rugs that I used as part of my color selections for the bedspread.  She is much more concerned about working on her suntan with the sun coming in from the bedroom sliding door than supervising the project.  

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