Midweek Update

Sorting through the junk drawers...

I have one of these plastic 3 drawer units in my sewing room - it's probably something many of you have.  It's a convenient place to stash lots of things, and in my case, it had gotten a bit out of control!  I've sorted through and cleaned it out before, but it just got full again.  

After pulling everything out - one drawer at a time - and doing a bunch of sorting, here is what I found.

Lots of solid scraps:

Skinny strips up to fat quarter size.  

And some small pieces of Grunge.

Lots of orphan blocks in multiple sizes:

  

There is a big pile of leftover charm squares - all different colors, styles, and prints:

And Christmas scraps, all shapes and sizes:

So, the question is what to do with these scraps?

• I need some Christmas scraps for the last house I'm making for a Year in the Neighborhood - there are definitely possibilities for that in this bunch.
• At first the solid scraps didn't inspire me at all, but I realized later that they would be perfect to make a bunch of the little plus blocks that Nancy at Grace and Peace quilting introduced us to a few weeks ago. 
• I'm not sure what to do with most of the orphan blocks, but I did have a little fun this week making a snack mat out of the small red and white block.  It was made many years ago, and I think it was meant to be a "Polaroid" block.  Remember those?  The different widths of white sashing around the center square are the clue.  I think in this photo, it's upside down.

I added a red and white HST border to frame the cardinals, and then extended the block to 10.5 inches wide with the floral.  The binding isn't sewn yet, but you get the idea!

There are still plenty of scraps to find their way into projects, but my drawers look a lot better than they did when I started!

Sharing at The Inquiring Quilter for Wednesday Wait Loss.

Slow stitching this week...

I have just about stitched the whole month of October!  There is one space left which I will fill in tonight (Saturday) - Halloween, Oct. 31st!

My favorite section for this week was yesterday's - I decided to see if I could stitch myself going for a walk on a beautiful fall day!  Do you see my curly gray hair?  

Along with my daily stitching, I did start a new project, but it's not very far along yet - just the border so far.

Someday this will be PinkernPunkin's "O' Christmas Tree."

Sharing at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching.

A pumpkin house...

 Happy Halloween!

It has been all pumpkins all the time in my sewing room this month, with three placemats (here and here) and a tablerunner completed all having pumpkins in them.  So of course, when there was just enough of the pumpkin print left to make a house block for a Year in the Neighborhood, I had to do it!

This...

translated into this!

And of course we needed an autumn tree with falling leaves for the Neighborhood, too!

The Neighborhood is just about fully built now, one more house is planned, and then whatever is needed to even out the number of blocks.  Maybe the Neighborhood needs a park? 

Lots to think about!

Sharing at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday and at

Quilting Learning Combo for the October Quilters Cove link-up.

Melva Loves Scraps for Sew and Tell Monday

I Like Thursday #507

Good morning!  It's that time of year when we get pretty sunrises right out our living room windows.  I loved the golden glow of this one!

This very persistent squirrel figured out how to get on our suet feeder by climbing up the trees and following the branches over to the roof of the house, and then sliding down the rope that is holding the feeder.  At first he made us laugh!  But then...

we couldn't get him to stop, no matter what we did,

so after five days of shooing him off, Mike had to finally

 take the suet out and put it away.

The sad thing about that is that now the birds can't visit either!

Has anyone read this book?  It's my current read, and I can't decide what to think about it.  It's equally fascinating and frustrating!

Image Source

LeeAnna's question of the week is about our favorite Halloween candy when we were kids.  I had to reach way far back into the deep dark recesses of my memory for this one!  What was that called, lol?!   I loved Baby Ruth candy bars - that was one - because my middle name is Ruth.  But then I remembered these - Sugar Babies!  And there were Sugar Daddies, too, but these little bite sized ones were the best.

Have a wonderful Thursday, friends!

Joining in with Not Afraid of Color for I Like Thursday.

Midweek Update

It's been a nice relaxed few days in my sewing room where I decided to stick with the tablerunner I started last week and now it's finished!

There was quilting...

and binding was sewn...

and it is now finished!

This has been a fun and quick project, and

I think I will give it to my sister as a gift for her Thanksgiving table,

since she is hosting is this year!

You might think I would be done with the pumpkin fabric, but not quite.  Next,  it's time to make the October house block for my Year in the Neighborhood, and here's the start of it.

Sharing at The Inquiring Quilter for Wednesday Wait Loss.

And at Quilting Learning Combo for I Quilted This!

Also Alycia Quilts for Finished or Not Friday.

All four seasons...

That's not a reference to our October weather here in Colorado, although it could be.  We often have heat, wind, rain, and snow all within a day or two.  But this time it refers to an embroidery project.  I've finished the Autumn design for Gail Pan's Changing Seasons.

So... all four seasons are stitched!  For some reason I cut the fabric for Autumn quite a bit smaller than the other three seasons - but they can be trimmed to match.

I'm working on an idea to fully finish these into a small quilt, but it will be a 2027 project. 

Meanwhile, I did continue on my daily stitching this week.  Last Sunday's design was lots of little bird feet, because we are so entertained by all the birds at our feeders.  On Thursday this past week, we drove by some pretty sunflowers in someone's yard - still blooming!

Other days were just "doodle" stitching!

There's only one week left in October - that's hard to believe!  I'm ready to start something new in addition to my daily embroidery, but haven't decided what it is yet.  Maybe I'll have something new to share next Sunday!

Linking up with all the slow stitchers at Kathy's Quilts!

Stuck!

October in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is for working with neutrals or figuring out what your block sets need and finishing them up.  So my goal this week has been to get out the Gameboard Blocks and work out what is needed.  But I seem to be stuck!

Here are the 28 blocks I've made, laid out in color groups.  There are three of every color except blue (4 of those), plus two light neutral blocks, and a black one.

Having four blue blocks and then 

those three neutrals/black has me thrown a bit.

How to use them in a layout?

Inspired by a layout I saw on someone's blog, I tried this one next.  What it's supposed to be is cool colors flowing to warm colors flowing back to cool colors.  That helped me work in the black block and the extra blue one.

But what is needed for those two empty spaces?

Then I just switched the yellow and orange blocks - and I think I'm finally getting somewhere!

So... two more orange blocks?

Or should they be red? Pink? One each?

Opinions welcomed!

Then my brain was tired so I decided to go back to working on my October squirrel project - the fall tablerunner!  Using more of the pieces from the fat quarter bundle, I pieced a backing.

That center section is these adorable owls! 

And quilting is underway.  

Sharing at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday.

And at Quilting is More Fun than Housework for Oh Scrap!

Melva Loves Scraps for Sew and Tell Monday.