Stitching up some mittens...

Not the knitted kind, but with embroidery floss.  Last week, I was finishing up the last Woven Wreath design - 

And then, Melisa posted the December Year of Hearts Doodle, and it has some sweet mittens to stitch, too!  I prepped it yesterday and now it is all ready to get started on today.

Sharing at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching.

Just playing...

It's December, and my creative brain is all over the place.  The best way to deal with that is to just go with it!  Fortunately, the sort-of-secret Christmas gift project is almost done.  I just need to sew on the binding!  Since this one has a deadline, I'm glad to get it finished.

Meanwhile, there are scraps to be played with!  I cut these large triangles out of the red print and then decided not use them.  Could I get a quarter star block out of each one?  The answer was yes!

The white design on the red is doves in flight!

It worked out perfectly to make four of these.

So, how about four more made with the green and white floral from the project?

I started making these quarter star blocks last month with scraps that just happened to be left out on my cutting table from other projects, and I think I'll continue to do that through 2025 for a new Rainbow Scrap Challenge project!

Just a random arrangement! 

Sharing at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday. 

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

I Like Thursday #415

 Happy Holidays!

  It's time for Christmas quilts and favorite mugs and little gingerbread men!  I found the gingerbread cookies at Trader Joe's yesterday, and they are a tasty little treat.  That one guy is already missing a leg - I wonder why?

I always enjoy the after-Thanksgiving changeover from fall decorations to Christmas.  I decorate the little entryway chest seasonally,  and here is my first "attempt," lol!  I think it might need something more - that just means more opportunities to make something for that space, right?! 

I haven't put up the Christmas tree yet, but that will happen tomorrow or Saturday.  LeeAnna's question of the week is real tree or artificial tree?  We had real trees for many years - we even went up in the mountains and cut the tree down ourselves several times.  I love the fresh evergreen scent and have missed that ever since we bought the first artificial tree.  But it got more convenient (and, of course, much cheaper) to have an artificial tree to pull out of storage each year.  I think they look just as pretty once decorated, so I'm happy with it now.

Photo from last year.

Have you seen "Wicked?"  I have never seen the stage version, but I got to go to the movie version with some friends yesterday, and it is amazing!  We all loved it - the music, the storyline, the big musical scenes - all amazing.  I had not been to the movies since before Covid, so this was a big treat, and so much fun!

Hope you're having a great week!

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

 

Midweek Update

After the busy Thanksgiving weekend, with our sons here, and lots of cooking and activity, it has been nice to get back to normal and have some time for sewing.   Before Thanksgiving I had gotten started on a Christmas project that will be a gift for a friend, and now I have the top sewn!  Just a peek here so that if anyone from my quilt group reads my blog, they won't know exactly what I'm making!

This project needs a little more trimming, then quilting and binding.

The blocks I shared in last Wednesday's post (the square-in-a-square blocks) generated quite a few bonus triangles.  That, of course, gets you wondering what could be done with them!  Maybe some HSTs in a block like this?

The other project I'm focusing on right now is the Pieces of My Life QAL hosted by Melva Loves Scraps.  Melva released the final two blocks a few days ago, and I've been working on them as leaders and enders while sewing together the Christmas project.  

A nine patch and a log cabin block.

Once the log cabin block is finished, I'll do a post about them and the journaling questions Melva included.  It's hard to believe we've made all the blocks for the quilt, and now it's time to finish it all up!  I have the top two sections quilted, and will be working on quilting the bottom two sections next.   Finally, there are directions on Melva's most recent post for joining all four sections together into the final quilt.  I'm excited to get to that point!  

Sharing at Quiltfabrication for Midweek Makers.

And at Alycia Quilts for Finished or Not Friday.

Just one left...

There's just one Woven Wreath design left to stitch for the month of December  - we've been working on this project for 12 months!  Today I'll watch the video that Kathy Schmitz always puts out for the monthly designs and then get started working on it.

Then I'll have to decide how to finish this off - I'm thinking it would make a nice pillow cover and is just about the right size for an 18 inch pillow form.

The November heart from PinkernPunkin is almost finished, too.  I could have finished it over Thanksgiving, but older son has been here and it was much more fun (and important!) to hang out visiting and playing games.  The stitching will get done after he has gone home this afternoon!

Harvest Blessings 

Linking up with Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching. 

Melva Loves Scraps for Sew and Tell Monday.

Wonky Woods...

 - a Table Scraps project!  I got started on this project when I was digging around in my crumb box and pulled out both dark and light green blocks that I had made sometime while working with green scraps.  Since this month's challenge is to incorporate trees into your project, but any choice of color, I decided to make flying geese blocks out of the crumbs.

Look - penguins!

After making the trees, I had to laugh when I saw that the penguins ended up upside down!

So this turned into the Wonky Woods!  I added some checkerboard blocks in green and strips of a star print to the trees to get the size I wanted, about 12.5  x 16.5.

It was fun to play a little bit with the quilting in the trees.  I can do some gentle curves from point to point without too much trouble! 

And here is where this latest Table Scraps Challenge fits perfectly!

Thanks, as always, to Joy at the Joyful Quilter for the fun monthly challenges!

Sharing at the November Table Scraps Challenge link-up

as well as at SoScrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday and 

Quilting is More Fun than Housework for Oh Scrap.

Midweek Update and Happy Thanksgiving!

 

I'm just working on little things this week.  Not much time for anything too involved.  I started cutting into the Christmas fat quarter I put together a couple weeks ago to make a gift for a friend.  The first step was to make some square in a square blocks with very specific corners.

My November Table Scraps project is ready to share at the end of the week.  I stitched down the binding on it last night.

And Harvest Blessings has gotten some attention, too.  I enjoyed stitching those stems of wheat the other night, with lots of Lazy Daisy stitches!

LeeAnna's question of the week is "hot chocolate or hot toddy?"  And my answer is - how about champagne?!  Lol!  After enjoying the champagne experience at Korbel Winery on our September trip, we decided we would look for a bottle for Thanksgiving, and we found it.  

Cheers!  And Happy Thanksgiving and Harvest Blessings to you!

Sharing at Quiltfabrication for Midweek Makers 

and at Not Afraid of Color for I Like Thursday.