I Like Thursday #244

Happy Thursday, friends!  Hope you're having a good week!  I braved the DMV yesterday and successfully helped my mom get a Colorado ID card.  I even had all the right paperwork!  She doesn't drive anymore, but needed a photo ID.  That feels like an accomplishment!  

Meanwhile, Mike got some good photos from around our yard this week.  This little bunny was all stretched out on one of those really hot days enjoying the cool grass.

And look at this big bumble bee!  They've been really interested in these tall purple flowers.  (Anyone know what these are called?  I can never remember!)

This bird nest was inside one of our birdhouses.  It doesn't look like it was ever used, which I think isn't unusual.  We've read that birds can make multiple nests that they don't use.  I think this one was made by some chickadees, judging by who we saw going in and out of the little house.

It was fascinating to look at the nest up close and see how it was made.

Coarser grasses at the bottom and softer fluff up at the top.

I've discovered that I can grow green and wax beans!  They are delicious, too!

I wanted to share this little pincushion I made last week.  The front is another one of those little embroidered designs from Crabapple Hill.

And the back is...

And a book I really enjoyed this past week, too:

When a family is fractured after their baby is abducted, they put themselves

back together with the help of nature and the outdoors.

I'm joining in with LeeAnna and friends at Not Afraid of Color for I like Thursday.

To-Do Tuesday #97

Good morning!  I'm checking in with Chris and friends at Chrisknits to share my to-do list for the week. 

Last week I worked a little bit on everything on my list.  More plus blocks were made for the Positivity QAL.  

Dark blue scraps were made into a few blocks for my July Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects.

This week there is more of the same on my to-do list.

• Continue on with the plus blocks.
• I have two Table Scraps projects in process this month and would like to finish them up this week.  I'm planning my Saturday post around those projects.
• Time to get caught up on the June and July rows for Full Stop, the RSC sampler for this year.  I left off here with the semicolons for June.

• July's row is colons, tutorial found HERE.  I need more background fabric, which is Moda Bella Pearl, and I just ordered some from Missouri Star, so hopefully it won't take too long to arrive.

Plenty to work on this week!  

Cool Blues for a Hot July

 It's been really hot here the last couple days...

Fortunately, my sewing room is in the basement, which for us is the coolest part of the house, so it's been a good place to spend part of each afternoon.  Early in the week, I finished up my hand-pieced 4th of July tabletopper with some hand quilting and scrappy dark blue binding.

It fits perfectly on the little square table where I keep all my stitching supplies.  I'm using the little penguin pouch with it for supply storage and even made a tiny new pincushion for the table, too.

I also prepped (and have been sewing) a dark blue scrappy trips block.  The others I made previously were mostly lighter blues, so this will be a good addition to the project.

These are also hand-pieced.

Every month I've been adding two chandelier blocks in the RSC color of the month, so I stitched those up this week, too.  They're really quick!

Here's the whole group - 14 of them.

These are hard to photograph!  The dark blue and purple blocks look black, but I promise they are not!  I do they think they will make a pretty *something* - probably a tablerunner.

And one other thing I worked on - the start of my July Table Scraps project - these little string blocks in dark blues and browns.  They're 3.5 inches square!

More about these next week!

Linking up with my favorite weekend parties at:

SoScrappy 

Quilting is more fun than Housework and

Kathy's Quilts 

 

I Like Thursday #243

Mike and I were in need of a getaway day last Friday, so we plotted out a drive that included a hike, a picnic lunch, a stop at a quilt shop, and a wine tasting at our favorite winery.   There was lots to like!  The only thing we forgot was the camera!  Oops!  So I had to make do with my phone camera, but I did get a few good shots.

Rabbit Mountain Open Space

Boulder County, Colorado

This was a foothills hike, so lots of wide open views (and not much shade!), and uphill all the way!  😉

Beautiful!

Wildflowers, bird sounds, and butterflies.

Tons of these little guys  -  Fritillaries

And these - Spotted Towhees - which we had to identify by their song because they were hidden in the trees.

Image Source

And a strategically placed bench or two!  👍

Ahhh!

From the quilt shop I brought home a couple yards of Kona Aruba, which is going to help me with an idea I have for the crumb hearts and wonky stars project.  Something like this, maybe?

This could be fun, yes?!

I'm joining in with LeeAnna and friends at Not Afraid of Color for I like Thursday,

To-Do Tuesday #96

Good morning!  I'm checking in with Chris and friends at Chrisknits to share my to-do list for the week. 

I had a finish last week!  Read more about Rainbow Strings in my Saturday post if you'd like to know more.

Along the way, I made a few more Positivity blocks, too.

This week I'll continue to work on those plus blocks at my slow-as-molasses pace!

Plus, Angela announced that July is the month for the cool dark blues, so I've been pulling out the dark blue scraps and thinking through what I want to accomplish with them.

The project on the left there is a finished Gail Pan embroidery design that needs to be finished into a small wall-hanging.  Another small gift for a quilty friend.

There might also be a DrEAMi project in those blue scraps shown above.   More about that one in another post.

There's plenty to do!  Wishing you a great week!

4th of July sewing...

In need of a hand stitching project, I dug up some 2.5 inch precut squares in reds, blues, and low volumes.  I started with 4 patches and ended with this hand-pieced 36 patch square.

How about this neat cardinal in the trees print for a backing?

A scrap of batting and some #12 perle cotton in white, and I'm ready to do some hand quilting on this little piece.  This will be my slow Sunday stitching for today!

Joining in with all the Slow Sunday Stitchers at Kathy's Quilts!

 

A Scrappy Rainbow Finish!

The end of one month and the beginning of the next is the perfect time to finish up a scrappy rainbow quilt because no matter what the new month's color is, you worked on it!  And that's what I focused on this week - finishing my Rainbow Strings quilt.

I started this quilt way back in January of 2019 with one of those "How would this work?" ideas that I get.  How would it work to piece string blocks on pages from an old phone book that are rectangular?  The best size I could get out of these pages was a 6.5 x 9.5 block.

Four of those made a 12.5 x 18.5 block and created a neat diamond effect.

So... after sewing each block in the color of the month throughout 2019, and then s l o w l y making the neutral string border blocks during 2020, I finally have a finish!

49 x 66

I haven't always liked this quilt as I was putting it together, but it made a huge difference after I finished the quilting and got the binding on.  Something about containing all that wild color!  The binding is made out of the same fabric as the backing - a neutral paisley wide-back fabric that I ordered from Bernie at Needle and Foot earlier this year.

I really like the kite shapes that form where the border blocks touch the big diamonds!

The front is so busy that you can't really see the quilting, but it shows up really well on the back!

This quilt is going to my sister and her family for their mountain cabin.  Seems like the perfect place for it!

Sharing at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday and at 

Quilting is more fun than Housework for Oh Scrap!