The Hodgepodge Quilt, Part 2

I was having so much fun with this quilt, that I finished sewing the top together right after posting about it in the Oh Scrap linky party last Sunday!  When we woke up to a light dusting of snow Thursday morning (on top of the freezing rain from the night before, but that's another story), I just had to take it outside for a beauty shot in the yard.

I ended up piecing in two strips of some navy to make everything fit together correctly, which gives this quilt an asymmetrical design, and I like it!

I was actually really pleased with this picture because it shows off the different blues, greens, and turquoises that are in this quilt.  Plus a teeny, tiny bit of purple!

In keeping with the "Use it Up" theme of this quilt, I decided to piece the backing out of all of the bigger chunks of blues that I could find, so I've been working on that this week.

It's not quite long enough or wide enough yet, so I'll be adding a bit more to it before I can get the layers basted.  I will probably have to piece together some batting as well, but that's okay, too!

I'm thinking of donating this quilt to the nursing home where my MIL is currently spending some time, getting her strength back after multiple health concerns.  It's the perfect size for covering up when someone spends a lot of time sitting in a wheelchair or recliner, about 45 x 55.

Sharing with Oh Scrap today at Quilting is More Fun than Housework!  

A Rainbow Finish

At the beginning of this week, I was determined to Finish Something!  (You know the feeling!) There was only a little bit more hand quilting to be done on my Rainbow Log Cabins, so that was going to be the one.

I started this quilt in May of last year because the blocks were easy to make and my method of making them didn't require a lot of measuring or cutting with my rotary cutter, which was difficult with my broken wrist. After getting the top put together, I decided to experiment with hand quilting it, which I've never done much of.

It turned out to be a very enjoyable experiment!  (It was a good project for football season!)  I did straight stitching through all of the logs, which resulted in a square spiral in each block, and then used a template to mark leaf or orange peel shapes to quilt in the borders.  As I am such an untrained hand quilter, I knew this would be a learning experience, and it definitely was, but I'm very happy with the results.

I raided my leftover binding basket to make the binding, and it makes a fun scrappy addition to the quilt.

While hand stitching down the binding, I'm having fun visiting with these little guys.  There's more binding to be stitched and I'll work on that tonight along with a Longmire episode (or two!) on Netflix.

February's color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is turquoise, and that happens to be one of my favorite blocks of this quilt.  I also love the low volume scraps that I used in each block! 

Sharing at the RSC linky tomorrow over at SoScrappy, and looking forward to seeing what other kinds of scrappy sewing have been going on this week!

I Like Thursday #16 - This and That

It's just about Thursday again, and I'm ready to share a few more things I like, from the past week!  But before I do, I realized that I completely forgot something I wanted to include in last week's Texas post that I liked seeing on our trip down there.

It's an alligator!  (in the wild!)  We, of course, had planned out some places to go for bird watching on this trip, but found this guy (or gal) instead!  We sat and watched as he or she lurked under the water in this pond for quite a while, then headed for the fallen trees, where several turtles were sunning themselves.  We expected to see him grab one of those turtles for lunch, but they weren't all at all worried about him!  For us Colorado folk, this was pretty exciting!

Now for this week's likes - 

I like our National Parks!  They are the protectors of the most beautiful places in this country of ours, and I think should be appreciated and cared for.  I am lucky to live not far from Rocky Mountain National Park, and my hubby and I enjoy going up there as often as we can, even in January!  Here was our view yesterday!

This is Long's Peak, one of our 14,000+ foot peaks in Colorado.

I like being the right age for this - a Senior Pass that enables me to go visit any National Park for free, for ever and ever!  That is a nice perk of being 62 and over!  :)

We also took a little road trip to Boulder, Colorado, the other day.  Boulder is a college town, the home of the University Of Colorado, and a fun place to visit where you can find interesting shops and restaurants.

Boulder is where the Celestial Seasonings Tea Headquarters are, and we needed to stock up on some of our favorite teas, so we stopped off there first.

I like bargains!  All the teas were on sale for just a little more than $1.00 a package, so we got four boxes of our favorite teas for less than $5.00!  Whoo hoo!

One of the reasons we were headed to Boulder was so that I could shop for a new pair of Crocs.  I found out last summer that you shouldn't leave your Crocs out in the sun because they change shape and will no longer be comfortable.  So, it was time for a new pair!

More bargains - the Crocs store we went to was, unfortunately, going out of business and everything was half off!  Whoo hoo #2!

I like wine-tasting.  One of our favorite local wineries, Bookcliff Vineyards, is in Boulder, and since we are members there, we get a free tasting once a month.  Saturday was a good day to visit the tasting room, so we enjoyed some sips of our favorite wines and brought home a bottle - one with my favorite name, "Friday's Folly!"

Fortunately, it tastes good on other days of the week, too!

On the way home, we always go through Lyons, Colorado, a small town on the very edge of the mountains that has one of my favorite quilt shops.  I really like Lyons Quilting!  I almost always have to stop at this quilt shop when we are driving through.  They have a great selection of fabric, and are the only place in my area where I know I can find any color of Kona cotton solids.  

I needed some Navy for a project I'm working on, and then I also picked out 5 fat quarters of other solids that I'm going to save for something... not sure what yet.

Happy Thursday - I hope you are having a great week!  I'm joining in with LeeAnna at Not Afraid of Color in celebrating things we like, love, enjoy, and are thankful for.  Be sure to check out LeeAnna's post today, too!

A Hodgepodge Quilt

My husband walked into my sewing room the other day and asked what I was working on.  I told him I was sewing together a hodgepodge of blocks to make "something."  So that's what I'm calling this quilt!  The Hodgepodge Quilt.

Inspired by Cynthia, and her quest to make orphan blocks into scrappy quilts the last few weeks, I decided to pull out some orphan blocks of my own and see what I could come up with.  Last year, for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, I stitched up a bunch of Double Four Patch blocks using 2 1/2 inch squares and 4 inch squares.

I really struggled with what to do with these blocks, and tried lots of different layouts, but never really found anything I was happy with, and ended up just putting the blocks away again each time.

After reading some of Cynthia's posts about her orphan blocks, I got my pile out and sorted these blocks into warm and cool colors.  I decided to keep working with the cool colors, and set the warm colors aside.

Earlier this week,  I put these blocks up on my design wall.  I also added some 8 1/2 inch squares of light blue Pearl Bracelets, to make the layout 4 x 5.

So far, this measured only about 32 x 40, and I knew that just wouldn't be big enough for anyone to get any use out of.   So then I thought about my big collection of orange peel blocks, and wondered if they could become a border for this set of center blocks.

This was starting to look like something!  What about adding some sashing to that left side and bottom?

Maybe!

Trying not to overthink this whole project, I just started sewing, with the 4 patch blocks first, and then the orange peel borders.

Now it looks like I will just need to add something in that one empty space on the left.  A chunk of navy blue, perhaps?

I'm just going to keep stitching, and I'll show you how it all ends up next week!  Meanwhile, I'm linking up with Oh Scrap! at Cynthia's blog, Quilting is More Fun than Housework.

Purple Sewing for January

Purple has been the color of the month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2017.  While continuing to work on finishing up last year's projects, I've had fun trying some new things for this year.

This week, I had a chance to draw up a design for a string quilt I would like to try making.

It will be helpful to have this plan for the different string blocks I'll need before I go too much farther with making them!  If I continue with this design, I only need four complete blocks out of red (for the center), and all the rest will be half of the color and half low volume neutrals.  The uncolored spaces are string blocks made entirely of my low volume scraps.

This month I've made four purple blocks, and I'm going to need eight.  I guess I'd better get back to work!

I also now have a small collection of Maple Leaves and Nine Patches, including some in purple.

I'm also still playing with monkey blocks this year, and here are my purples.

For more fun scrappy, rainbow projects, check out the Rainbow Scrap Challenge linky at SoScrappy every Saturday.

I Like Thursday #15 - the Texas Edition

This past week, my hubby and I took a trip to Texas!  We are both retired, and thought a mid-January get away sounded like a fun thing to do.  Since Mike's sister and her husband are living the RV life as "Winter Texans," we thought we'd check out what that was like.  

I liked Texas!

I liked visiting a place where flowers are growing, even in mid-January.

We spent a couple of days in San Antonio, where we wandered the Riverwalk, and enjoyed being out doors in 70-ish degrees!

I liked eating yummy Mexican food outdoors, and feeding the ducks.  One of them even came up right next to our table and pecked on my husband's pant leg for more food.  Obviously, this was not the first time some humans had fed him from their table!

We spent some time visiting the Alamo, and I liked learning a little bit about the history of this place.  It's interesting how the city grew up around the old mission, but people had the foresight to save the buildings and preserve them for us to see and hear the story of the famous battle.

The next few days we spent down at the Gulf Coast, near South Padre Island, where my SIL and BIL are camped out for a few months.  We went out on the water for dolphin watching, and saw many other fun creatures as well!

These pelicans know when the fishing boats come in, and they boisterously ask for food from the fishermen.

I liked this collection of carved wood pelicans I saw at a shop, and wished I had a way to bring one home.  I guess a photo will have to do!

We did see some dolphins, and some of the other creatures from the bottom of the ocean.  I even got to hold one!  I'm sure he was scared to death of me.  I was glad when they put him back into his natural habitat.

I liked this view of all the high rises along South Padre Island, and the people enjoying the beach - in January!

I liked putting my feet in the Gulf of Mexico!

And finding treasures...

It was a good trip, a nice get away, and now I'm glad to be home! ☺

Hope you've been having a great week!  Don't forget to check out more things to like on Thursday with LeeAnna over at Not Afraid of Color. 

Oh, the lure of a new project...

I wasn't planning on this...

but one of my scrappy partners in crime, Cathy over at Crazy by Design, shared last week or so that she was going to make a Book Shelf quilt.  When I asked her about it, she sent me this link to a Craftsy tutorial for making a book shelf block.

Well, that did it!  After checking out the tutorial, off I went to my scrap bin to pull out the strips that were needed to make one.

Okay, I made two!

These blocks are fun, and much simpler than I expected. I will definitely be making more of them!  After I got started, I began thinking about the different fun things that I could try - like how to make a book that is leaning, or books that are laying down versus standing up.  It might be fun to add some other items to the books shelves, too.  Maybe a plant or a stuffed animal?  (This could get way out of hand!)  

I know my blocks need more work - like something that actually looks like a shelf for the books to be sitting on?! - but I'm going to keep having fun trying different things!

For more scrappy enabling, I mean, fun, be sure to check out Oh Scrap at Quilting is More Fun than Housework today!

And since these blocks definitely represent a "Drop Everything and Make It" moment for me, I'm linking up with Sandra over at mmmquilts for her new DrEAMi link party on Jan 28th!