Got orange?

 

Orange is the June color of the month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.   When I started digging into my scraps to see what I had, there wasn't much!  There are two fat quarters pulled out of the bundle I won through the Stay at Home Round Robin, but the rest of the pieces are pretty small.

So I stopped by my LQS one day this week, and bought a few fat quarters to add in.

Bright!

That enabled me to sew up eight quarter star blocks in all different shades of orange.

Then it was time to play with all the blocks!  So far, I'm arranging all the warm colors around the center, and the cool colors will go around the outside.  

52 blocks - shooting for 100!

Sharing at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday.

I Like Thursday #438

Something we really enjoyed on our trip to San Diego was visiting the San Diego Zoo.  I'm not sure we'd been there since we were first married and didn't even have kids yet.  It's really an amazing place!

Our dear friend, Cheryl, wife of one of Mike's Navy buddies, who lives in San Diego, volunteers at the Zoo, so she was our tour guide, and knew everything about everything.  We walked our feet off for 5 1/2 hours, but we also took a ride in a gondola that goes from one side of the Zoo to the other.

Cheryl loves all the monkeys and apes 

and is very knowledgeable about them.

We enjoyed seeing the orangutans.  Did you know they like to cover up in blankets?  Their blankets are made from burlap.

And there are giant pandas at the San Diego Zoo!  Two of them.  They were fascinating to watch - we were lucky to come across them when they were active and eating.  The Zoo actually grows the bamboo that they eat.

And the giraffes - for you, Vicki!  Who could resist this face?!

And, of course, the elephants - the Zoo has quite a few of them.  One thing they do very well at this zoo is coming up with ways to keep the animals actively thinking about how to find food.  This elephant is getting food out of a puzzle box.  It was so interesting to watch him using his trunk to grab and twist to get the food out.

I had to check out the gift shop before we left, and this is what I came home with.  It is a penguin bracelet!  🐧🐧🐧 The added fun of it is that you download an app on your phone and you can track your very own penguin, learn about it, and see where they live and where they go.

LeeAnna's question of the week is about the game, Monopoly.  Although we haven't gotten it out for a long time, we do have a Monopoly game and over the years have enjoyed playing it a lot.  I like being the banker, counting the money, and keeping it all in nice, neat piles.  And my favorite game piece has always been... the iron!

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

 

Midweek Update

We so enjoyed our week in San Diego - especially being able to spend time by the ocean - 

After returning home there's always lots to do - laundry, grocery shopping, making sure the bills are paid... back to reality!  When I got back into my sewing room, I had to spend some time remembering where I left off, and what are the priorities to get back to first.

Before we left on the trip, I had started hand stitching the orange peels to the background, so there's that to continue working on. 

And my Glowing Hearts are ready for the border to be added.  I'm planning to use some of the leftover jelly roll strips for that purpose, but I don't have four that match.  I do like these colors, though - so I could use them this way - 

Or this way?  Those dark blue cornerstones match the center cornerstones, but I'm not sure I'll use them.

While I'm thinking about this, I'll work on some orange blocks for a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project.  

Sharing at The Inquiring Quilter for Wednesday Wait Loss.

And at Alycia Quilts for Finished or Not Friday. 

Travel stitching...

I stitched a grand total of one strawberry this week while enjoying our days in San Diego!  The days and evenings were just spent too differently from the usual times at home when I sew.

We did go to the Coronado farmers market and bought some locally grown California strawberries.  Yummy!

And the view for stitching was pretty neat - the Shelter Island marina was right outside our hotel room for these last couple days.  

It's always fun to go, but I am also glad to be home again.  Maybe there will be time for some slow stitching after I get caught up on laundry and groceries today!

Sharing at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching.

A short getaway and a little sewing...

Hello from San Diego!  We celebrated Memorial Day by getting on a plane and flying to one of our favorite cities and are enjoying every minute.  Because we are away from home this week, I decided to merge all of my usual weekly posts into one.  Midweek Update, I Like Thursday, this month's Table Scraps, and ScrapHappy Saturday, Oh Scrap, Sew and Tell Monday - all here!

We're staying on Coronado Island and using the ferry to get around, plus putting many miles on our step counters.  (And sleeping well at night!)

One of the things I love about visiting here is the interesting plants, like these huge succulents - 

All the green reminds of my Table Scraps project for May, which is all about green!  Our challenge this month was to use the color green and the inspiration of "freshly cut grass" to use up a few more scraps.   I do love green, and I even like mowing - this was a few days ago before we left. 

So there was no lack of inspiration at my house, either outside in the yard or inside in the sewing room.   I had a lot of green strips hanging around that looked like they would work well for a quilt-as-you-go placemat, so that is what I did.  And I used all the greens, too - dark, light, and in between, and the last bit of my favorite floral that has green in it.

Even a green selvage was thrown in!

And where is freshly cut grass more important than at the golf course?  I've had this fat quarter for several years and didn't have anywhere to use it, until now - and it made the perfect backing!

And so, ta-da!

Perfect for the table in between our comfy chairs in the TV room.  

Sharing at all my favorite link-ups:

Wednesday Wait Loss 

I Like Thursday

Finished or Not Friday 

The May Table Scraps Challenge

ScrapHappy Saturday 

Oh Scrap

Sew and Tell Monday 

Slow stitching this week...

Since it's the end of the month, it's time to finish another embroidered heart mini.  I finished the June heart for May, so now I'm finishing the May heart for June!  🍓🍓🍓 In my defense, strawberries grow a bit later out here in Colorado, and are often harvested in June, so it will still be appropriate.

Just for fun, I prepped another little strawberry doodle from PinkernPunkin to stitch as a companion piece.  I think I'll work this one all in red.

I did make good progress on the Rose Garden Mini Sampler this week.   I don't often stitch a border like this, and I did get off by one stitch early on, so had to rip back a ways.  But I continued on around and ended up exactly where I needed to be!  Just one green leaf and a few more roses to finish up now!

Sharing at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching.

Working on this and that...

Being all caught up on this year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks gave me a chance to pull out a few other projects this week.  Thanks to a challenge by Gwyned, I really wanted to get some more quilting done on my 2024 Patchwork Hearts quilt, and I finally got it out on Thursday afternoon.  I'm quilting this one row at a time and will join the rows later in quilt-as-you-go style.  This row has all the quilting done in one direction, now marking for and sewing in the other direction.

And a photo after sewing with low lighting to see if I could capture the great texture that the grid quilting gives.

I just happened to be working on the dark green block!

The other project I wanted to get back to was the Orange Peel QAL, hosted by The Crafty Quilter, which I had started on back in April, around the same time as the Glowing Hearts QAL.  Of course, it was too much to keep up with all at the same time (I should have anticipated that!) and now the QAL is over, but I am still working on mine.  

Early on, I made the scrappy neutral background and a few of the orange peels, but was way short of the 24 that were needed.  My orange peels are made from a leftover pile of Kaffe Fassett charm squares, and they have lots of soft green in them, plus pink, purple, and light blue.  

After twelve orange peels were made, I could make this design, and it was tempting to stop there.

But I really wanted the full design that Julie shared at the beginning of the QAL, which is what hooked me in to participating!  So I made twelve more orange peels.  These are made with a template traced onto fusible interfacing, sewn right sides together with the charm square, and then after taking this photo I snipped a hole in the interfacing and flipped the orange peel to right sides out.

And with 24 orange peels, here's the design I really wanted!  These are lightly fused on to the background, and my next decision will have to be about how to applique them down.

Now I'm feeling much more caught up!

Sharing at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday,

And at The Crafty Quilter for the Orange Peel QAL link-up.

Quilting is More Fun than Housework for Oh Scrap! 

Melva Loves Scraps for Sew and Tell Monday.