Welsh Beauty

Progress has been made with Welsh Beauty, another swath across the quilt has been hand quilted.

The photos are from left to right then back again. They are the large size. Hopefully you can click on them to enlarge. I was afraid they would take too long to pull up on the post if I made them extra large.

It's rather exciting to see more and more of the center motif as I roll. There is more cross hatching between the sides and center but I didn't want to show photos of just cross hatching.

Here is a link to the first post I wrote about Welsh Beauty if you want more details.

The Amaryllis I showed you last week is now blooming and it's a white one! It stalk got a little floppy so it's staked with a dowel rod.

Two other bulbs are also blooming. The variegated one I purchased several years ago, the soft orange one is an oldie. I so enjoy the flowers.

The pictures aren't cooperating as I try to place them correctly, Blogger! 

Someone asked last week how to care for the plants when they're not blooming. Keep on watering them until it's warm enough to plant them outside in a flowerbed or your garden. I just pull them out of the pot, cut the leaves to about 6" then plant them. Crumble the soil a little so the roots spread out from the clump. 

Water them well and mulch them. If it gets very dry in the summer, you should water them if it's more than 3 weeks without rain. Make sure the soil is well drained though, you don't want them standing in water.

Let them grow until fall when the temperature starts cooling off at night. That's going to be different for where you live. I live in northern Indiana, just south of the Michigan state line. I pulled them the middle of October, washed the soil of the roots then let them dry in the garage. I have a mesh garden wagon so I left them in there.

The first of November I trimmed the roots then potted them in the cellar. Make sure to add a small rock to the bottom of the pot to help with tipping. I watered them well then just left them there in the dark until the first of December. They don't need light right away because it's the roots that are developing. I brought them up to the main house level. My plants are in full sun. Be careful not to over water them but as leaves and buds develop, they do need to be watered more often. 

After the flowers are finished, take a knife and cut off the flower stalk. I do keep track of some of the bulbs as to what color the flowers are. I had marked the white bulb because that's the only white one I have. It does have a couple 'baby' bulbs this year. Depending on how big those babies are, I may remove them next fall when I pot the bulbs. 

If you look at the picture of the three plants, you may notice behind them there is a pot full of baby plants. There are 7 babies in there, eventually they'll mature and have flowers. The variegated bulb also has a baby. 

My siblings and I take turns hosting a family Christmas reunion. This year was my year (I was actually supposed to host last year but postponed a year). I had a box with 10 potted Amaryllis plants to give away which were raised from babies.

My Christmas cactus was in full bloom when I returned from Phoenix.  She's still blooming! Love those pink flowers.

Linking to Kathys Slow Stitching Sunday, Stitching Stuff, Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Handmade Monday, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away

Star Dance to be Finished in 2022!

My goal for 2022 is to finish up RSC projects already started.

Back in 2018 I finished piecing a flimsy called Star Dance. Here is a link to the last post I wrote about Star Dance. She has been waiting to be quilted for several years.

Every time I decided she was next on the hand quilting frame, she said No!, she wants to be made larger. In 2022, I am going to finally add size to this flimsy and make her into bed quilt. Of course she'll be hand quilted.

She measures 60" by 70" right now.

Here is a link to the Star Dance pattern.

I'm envisioning a border of sawtooth stars. I took the time to sketch out my plan and made measurements. I need forty 6" stars but that works out to only 4 stars a month for 10 months. I want to move faster than that. 

Pink is related to red and since the pink fabrics are stored in the same box as the red fabrics, I made both colors this month. 

Linking to Scrap Happy Saturday, Patchwork & Quilts, Oh Scrap

Flower Patch Sewalong, Blocks 8 & 9

Blocks 8 and 9 are both flower blocks. 

Here is a photo with all the blocks displayed together. This quilt is looking so pretty. I'm really glad I added the red to these blocks.

Linking to Flower Patch SAL, Put Your Foot Down, Peacock Party, TGIFF!, Finished Or Not Friday, Off the Wall Friday, Brag About Your Beauties, Patchwork & Quilts

OMIGOSH! Crib Quilt

This is the last of the crib quilts I've been quilting. This little quilt used the leftover blocks from my OMIGOSH! quilt. I thought the aqua in the border fabric looked good with the blocks.

I marked lines and curvy quilted one way with those. I did think about quilting horizontal lines in the top and bottom borders but I decidedthere was enough quilting. Besides, I was tired of quilting all these little quilts and just wanted to be done! This quilt measures 35" by 46"

All 7 of these quilts used pieced batting but this last quilt was a real mishmash of pieces. The pile of batting pieces that had been stacked in the closet is gone, at least for now.

Most of the quilts have pieced backings but I didn't take pictures. It was freezing outside when I took these photos, 12*!

It feels good to have these quilts finished and ready to be passed along to a charity. Now I can start working on a quilt from my list!

Linking to To Do Tuesday, Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss, Put Your Foot Down, Stitch Sew & Show,  Needle & Thread Thursday 

Hearts & Wreaths, Block 10

I started appliqueing the blocks for Hearts & Wreaths last August. I've just completed block 10 so I am making progress.

The original pattern calls for 20 blocks which will make a quilt that finishes 80" by 96". I'm thinking of making 25 blocks and ending up with a square quilt, I'll make a final decision after I've finished 20 blocks. If I can keep finishing 2 blocks a month, the decision will be made in June or July.

I arranged the finished blocks on the display floor. They look very nice except the yellow background fabric never photographs the true color. It really isn't that washed out yellow!

As usual, here is a link to my first post about the Hearts & Wreaths quilt.

All of you who have followed my blog for awhile know that I grow Amaryllis bulbs in the winter so I can have some colorful flowers during the dreary gray days of winter.

Amaryllis are kind of weird. Last summer all of my bulbs grew outside in the same flowerbed. They were all lifted from the soil the same time last fall, rinsed of soil then laid in my garden wagon to dry. They were all carried down to the cellar the same day and then all potted the same day.

Here are two of my Amaryllis plants. The tall one is going to be blooming in two weeks, the other one? Maybe in April or May?

Linking to Kathys Slow Stitching Sunday, Stitching Stuff, Oh Scrap, Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Handmade Monday, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away

Jumbo Granny Squares & Circle of Squares

Jumbo granny squares was one of my RSC blocks in 2021. I had pieced 4 lavender/purple blocks with the intention of making a crib quilt.

This was one of the crib quilts I quilted this month. My favorite block is the one I fussy cut the butterflies, they're so cute!

This quilt measures 41.4" square. The pattern for jumbo granny squares is here.

Another one of my 2021 RSC blocks was circle of squares. I thought I had counted exactly so I wouldn't have blocks left after I pieced the comforter tops. There were 4 blocks left so I made a baby quilt. I know I posted about sewing this little crib quilt together but I couldn't find the post. This quilt measures 40" square.

The pattern for circle of squares is here.

Linking to Scrap Happy Saturday, Patchwork & Quilts, Oh Scrap, Free Motion Mavericks

More 9 Patch Crib Quilts

I actually used a pattern for the next group of 9 patch crib quilts, at least 2 out of the 3. The pattern is County Fair and is from Lissa Alexander's book, Scrap School.

This first quilt I made a smaller version of Country Fair. But when I sewed it together, the triangle pieces didn't fit! I had glanced over the pattern and thought I knew what I was doing. The sashing was a different size than I thought.  I did NOT take it apart, just cut new triangles and sewed it together. 

I just straight line quilted 1/2" from the seam lines. After I attached the binding, I realized I missed a line of quilting. I'm just leaving it like it is. This little quilt measures 35.5" by 46".

I made sure I followed the pattern for the next quilt but then I forgot what I was doing and sewed sashing onto the corner 9 patches. That correction was easily made. This little cutie measures 43" by 53".

For the 3rd quilt, I decided to just make it simple and used a straight set. I used curvy line quilting stitching all the seams vertically but just quilted the horizontal sashing seams. This quilt measures 44" by 52"

Here are all three of them hanging on the clothes line.

Here are more details about piecing these quilts. 

Linking to Peacock Party, TGIFF!, Finished Or Not Friday, Off the Wall Friday, Brag About Your Beauties, Patchwork & Quilts, Free Motion Mavericks

Finally Some Finishes!

At the end of December I wrote a very detailed post about the challenges I have planned for 2022. Guess which project I started working on first? None of them!

Cathy from Sane, Crazy Crumby Quilting often mentions how she focuses on a project a month at a time. That's what I decided to do.

I pieced several crib quilts in 2021 and decided I was going to spend January machine quilting them. Machine quilting is not my favorite quilting activity but if they're quilted, I'll have some finishes to show you. Also the sense of accomplishment would feel pretty good too.

The first crib quilted was the orange 9 patch quilt. My sewing machine has a curvy stitch setting which I can elongate. I stitched al the seams with the curvy stitch. The binding fabric has been hanging around the sewing room for years. It was perfect for the binding which was machine stitched on both sides.

After quilting the finished measurement is 42" by 49".

All my posts this week will be about the crib quilts. 

Linking to To Do Tuesday, Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss, Put Your Foot Down, Stitch Sew & Show,  Needle & Thread Thursday , Free Motion Mavericks

Binding

A large part of my hand sewing last week was finishing the binding on blue split 9 patch.  I don't always finish the binding by hand sewing but I did for this quilt.

I had purchased this stripe to use as binding for another project but then changed my mind. I thought it was perfect for this scrappy quilt.

The binding strips were cut at 3" so there would be a 1/2" of stripe on each side of the edge.

I posted more information about the quilt on Friday's post.

I won't be keeping this quilt for myself, it's a present for a May wedding.

I appreciate all the concern and suggestions about my cracked fingers last Sunday. I've tried various products over the years. Superglue is the only product that stops the cracks from getting larger and actually makes them heal faster.

I have dry skin which is manageable most of the time. But when we have an arctic front come through, we need to turn on the gas heater to supplement our furnace. Our home really is dry then and the dry air just makes cracks in my fingers.

They're healed now and quilting has started again.

Linking to Kathys Slow Stitching Sunday, Stitching Stuff, Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Handmade Monday, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away

Blue Split 9 Patch Finish

Before I left for Phoenix in December, I pulled blue split 9 patch from the closet and corrected the blocks turned the wrong direction. 

Several people mentioned they couldn't see the mistake. Click on the link above. The light fabrics are supposed to zig zag in a somewhat rectangular path. If you look at the top, the path shoots out to the sides instead of staying inside on the path. Compare that picture to the finished quilt below.

I added a plain blue border. I had thought about piecing a border but this quilt is busy enough, the simple border gave my eyes a place to rest.

I dropped the quilt off to be long arm quilted before I left and it was finished by the time I returned home. It's so nice to have a finish the first month of the new year, I haven't had a complete finish since August 2021!

I ordered a simple overall stippling design. 

A view of the back side of the quilt. That dark spot is some dampness from the snow on the porch.

Here's a close up of the stippling on the backside. 

A view of the quilt on our bed.

My quilt roll is looking pretty good!

The quilt was quilted by Three Sisters Fabrics in New Paris, Ind and measures 91.5" by 102" after quilting.

I wrote several posts about blue split 9 patch: first post, another post , the final post before quilting was the post above. 

The split 9 patch block was Bonnie Hunter's leader/ender project which started in 2013. I did make a change to the block, instead of 3 HST's, I used a square in the center. I think the center square adds more interest to the design.

Linking to Put Your Foot Down, Needle & Thread Thursday, Peacock Party, TGIFF!, Finished Or Not Friday, Off the Wall Friday, Brag About Your Beauties, Patchwork & Quilts, Oh Scrap

Hearts & Wreaths

I've completed another applique block for Hearts & Wreaths!

I work on these blocks in groups of four. I embroider all the circles then hand applique the hearts. The leaves applique pretty fast which makes for a relaxing evening of handwork.

I haven't done any hand quilting since my post a week ago. We're finally having true winter here in northern Indiana, not a lot of snow but the low temperatures are in single digits at night with wind chill factor below zero.

People might not understand wind chill factor but everyone from northern states certainly does. Here is a link explaining wind chill of you're interested.

You  might wonder what wind chill has to do with me not quilting. As soon as it gets that cold out, I get cracks in my fingers, cracks in fingers mean no hand quilting. I've super glued the cracks, hopefully they'll clear up soon and I can hand quilt again.

Here is an informative link to my first post about Hearts & Wreaths.

Linking to Kathys Slow Stitching Sunday, Oh Scrap, Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Handmade Monday, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away

Indian Hatchet

I sewed cut off triangles onto 2.5" white squares at the Jane Stickel retreat in November then trimmed them to size after I returned home from the retreat.

I took the squares along to Phoenix and pieced 16 blocks.

Now I have 46 blocks, I need 34 more.

Here is a link to the first post about these blocks. This is going to be a very colorful quilt! There were a lot of blue triangles in this bunch but I sew a lot of blue quilts.

I have plenty more triangles to sew onto the squares. This has become my leader/ender project for now.

The last time I posted about this project, several people commented they sew triangles together, trim them to size and use them in another quilt. That is too much work for me. This quilt is as improv as I get.

Linking to Stitch Sew & Show, Needle & Thread Thursday, Put Your Foot Down, Peacock Party, Whoop Whoop Party, TGIFF!, Finished Or Not Friday, Off the Wall Friday, Brag About Your Beauties, Patchwork & Quilts,  Oh Scrap

Phoenix Vacation!

I had a wonderful time in Phoenix and thought I'd share a few photos with you. I could have taken so many more pictures but I restrained myself.

One evening we went to the Desert Botanical Gardens, the paths were edged with luminaries. They were so pretty! I didn't think to get a picture of the path edged with them. They didn't use paper sacks, they were in these plastic containers.

There was a glass sculpture display by renowned artist Dale Chihuly, these glass sculptures are displayed all over the world.

They also had a display inside a building. There were informational photos showing the artist blowing the glass and creating these sculptures.

This was my favorite of all of them, these red points just glowed! We went back to the garden later in the week but during the daytime, the sculptures are definitely at their finest  during dark.

I'm always intrigued by the sidewalks. This sidewalk is older than I am! You never see sidewalks this age in any of the northern states due to moisture, freezing and heaving. 

I wore sandals every day, of course the first thing we did was to get pedicures.

The Bougainvillea was in full bloom, aren't these flowers beautiful? I don't know if these bushes are available in any other colors, I have only ever seen them in red.

I tried to go for a long walk every day. Usually I walked down 3rd Avenue then walked along the canal. The houses along the canal have privacy fences, most of the fences have been painted. This parrot and butterfly were my favorites of all the paintings.

I didn't see the usual conifer Christmas trees on displays in public venues. They normally had a tree made of poinsettias. They were very elegant!

This is how they decorated the desert trees at the Botanical Garden. Blogger decided this picture needed to go at the end of my post even the photo was taken at the same time as the other pictures from the garden.

The Sunday I was in Phoenix, we attended a Christmas program at Paradise Valley United Methodist Church.  Later in the week we attended a Christmas Eve Service, there is a lot of talent in this church.

We also enjoyed a presentation of A Christmas Carol at a playhouse in Gilbert.

My two weeks in Arizona were fun, enjoyable and warm!

Linking to To Do Tuesday, Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss, Put Your Foot Down, Stitch Sew & Show, Needle & Thread Thursday