November's blocks

Here are the five blocks I made for November's QBE. I have already received a couple from other members of the group and I am liking my choice of black and white with a splash of bright color. I am looking forward to putting them together one of these days.

There will be no sewing today though as I will be heading out as soon as I take my shower for the other side of the state. I get to spend the evening with my grandkids and tomorrow morning and then I will pick up my son from college and bring him home. Hopefully I will have a picture of my granddaughter in her little dress - whether it fits her or not!

sewing, but not quilting

Since the denim quilt tops got finished I haven't done anymore quilty kind of sewing but I did make this cute little dress for my granddaughter, Clara. She is 16 months old but is a bit shrimpy so I think the dress will be a bit big but it is somewhere to start. I have more fabrics to use for more dresses and the good news is that she might grow into this one before summer comes again! I am holding off on the elastic in the sleeves so I put the right length in when it fits her. I hope to get a picture of her in the dress next week when I am at their house.
I finally got around to taking pictures of these three blocks I received in the Quilt Block Exchange. The first two are from October and the one on the right is my first one for November.I hope to get started on my November blocks tomorrow.

Today I helped out tying quilts for Lutheran World Relief at our church. Several of the usual ladies were out of town so I got a call to help. We got the usual 10 quilts tied this morning so I am glad it worked in my schedule this time. After stopping at the store for ingredients, I spent the rest of the afternoon making lasagna for my husband for his continuing birthday celebration (we went out to dinner last night) and an apple coffee cake for 'bruncheon' tomorrow at church. Now I am pooped and need to get off my feet.

The rain continues...

which means I have no excuse for not getting a lot of sewing done! I have managed to finish two denim quilt tops. The first one was supposed to be for my great niece but...
...I wasn't satisfied with the results for her so I made this one instead.

I have also started ripping some more jeans so I can get more cut up so I can sew more tops.

Last week at Joann's I bought four pieces of fabric to use for little dresses for my granddaughter. Three are corduroy and one is denim. I have them prewashed and ironed so I can get started on the first one as soon as I get her measurements. I plan to have the first one done so I can take it over on the 20th when I go over to pick up our son for Thanksgiving break. Then, if I get time I will get the others done before Thanksgiving when we will be seeing them again.

The Reveal

This past weekend I spent with my sister and her family. On Saturday we had the reveal for our Quilt Block Exchange. Nine of the twelve involved were able to be there. Lots of fun! All the blocks turned out great though we all struggled to remember which ones we made! You can see everyone else's blocks here. We will be starting another round soon.

If you are interested in being a part of a round robin block exchange there will be starting one after the holidays over on flickr.

I haven't gotten too much done in the sewing room recently what with working and traveling. This week is full of appointments: oil change, haircut, helping my husband pick out his first pair of glasses, picking up a friend from a Dr. appointment, etc. On top of that it hasn't been raining so I have gotten some leaves raked, blown, vacuumed, mowed - just in time for a storm to come in tomorrow and knock more leaves down! Maybe I can do a little sewing tomorrow afternoon while the rain falls.

QBEs for October

I decided that my first priority this weekend was to get the 4 blocks for this month's Quilt Block Exchange done. Yesterday evening I was able to get one done and I created the other three today.

Now I need to go outside in the beautiful weather and do some kind of fall clean up before I run out of steam! I think I will be moving some sod first and then I might just do a little raking.

About Time

to give you a report on last weekend. My husband decided we would leave on Wednesday instead of Thursday so I had a little less time to get my act together. I did pretty well except for forgetting my sewing table until we were about half an hour from home. We had to turn around and get it but still made it to our daughter's for dinner. The grandkids were wonderful as always. Nearly 4 year old Layden was showing me pictures of the earth in his mom's college textbook and said "Merf! The planet we live on." What a hoot! Fifteen month old Clara amazed me by eating an adult serving of spaghetti and won her papa over by giving him a huge hug when he finally sat down after unloading his stuff from the car.

I headed out the next morning for the quilt retreat in spite of waking up feeling a cold coming on. I bought these 6 fabrics during a quick stop at the new quilt shop in their town and the next little town. I made good time the rest of the way except for a quick stop for a box of kleenex!

I got my stuff all set up and started in on my scrap bin. Over the course of the weekend I finished another 37 crazy quilt blocks but the bin just didn't seem to get any emptier! It wasn't helped by the fact that others kept giving me their scraps! The only other project I worked on over the weekend were these double 4-patch blocks. At the end of the weekend I had 85 finished blocks, 14 half blocks and 74 4-patch blocks. I will cut more 3.5" blocks to finish of the rest of the blocks and then I will figure out what to do with the rest.

The Prize Patrol came by several times and I won this little bundle of fabrics because I had the oldest sewing machine at the retreat. I had a great time at the retreat despite being a bit sick. I especially enjoyed the chance to spend time with my second daughter who currently is working there at the camp in their Outdoor Ed program.

Planning and Packing

The company is all gone and the guest room is a sewing room again. We had a great time with my brother and his wife this past week - sometimes just sitting around and visiting but also getting some things done. They headed out very early yesterday morning without a sound. Yesterday I got the towels and sheets washed and other laundry folded and also got started thinking about what to bring to the quilt retreat.

I was planning on working with the leftover HSTs from this quilt, turning them into Lady of the Lake blocks but there is still lots of trimming to do. I did some trimming yesterday but determined I have too much to do today and tomorrow to spend all my time at it. I have pulled out some other projects and, so far, I have decided to bring a bin of scraps and work on 6.5" crazy quilt blocks - at least for a start. Other possible projects include a bag of batik scraps from a yard sale, my birthday quilt, this summer's color blocks, and maybe some mini card trick blocks. I will probably find other options further down in the piles too!

I finished the hand quilting on my round robin Christmas quilt last night and got the pom-poms sewn on the santa hats. I started on the little bows on the tree in the middle but got too tired. I still need some kind of cording for the string of lights across the top and then it will be done. I think! That will be one of the quilts I use for the trunk show I will be doing at the retreat. I am just bringing a few bigger quilts and showing more the doll and mini quilts I have received in swaps and round robins.