A Virtual Sew-Along

Friends for over 40 years - Dee, Sharon, and Jayne. We three go way back to our first years as English teachers at CHS. (To read additional history on our friendship, this post will provide basic details.) Now retirees and free from the constraints of our jobs, we are prohibited from enjoying sewing time together because of this dang pandemic. 

After a couple of calls and texts in recent days, we have devised a plan not too far removed from what most teachers (and just about everyone) have been doing during this pandemic - virtual meetings. We are preparing to sew together - virtually.

 We will officially start our little sew-along on March 1st and finish on June 20th, the summer solstice. I don't think we will in any way stress ourselves over that finish date, but it's something to shoot for. 

Here's a bonus for blog followers - we would love to have you sew along with us. PAR-TAY! As retired teachers, we think it'd be particularly fun if we had other teachers join us, English or math or home ec or elementary - the more the merrier - retired or not. 

Since we start in just two weeks, if you do want to sew along with us, the first order of business is to pull fabrics. The photo above shows what I have selected; it is far more fabric than I will need, but I want variety, so I will be cutting from them all. It's entirely possible that I will even add a couple more. 

Now for the quilt we are going to make. Something simple. Something that requires no advanced skills. Something that will allow us to be social while we sew. I don't think any of us will obsess about too much in this endeavor - we can make our quilt as small as a table topper or as big as a king size quilt.

We have selected this quilt for our sew-along. Made by Helen Philipps and pictured on this blog post (scroll to the bottom), it features easy elements: 2.5-inch squares, 2.5-inch strips, 9-patch blocks. I have not seen where she has a pattern for this quilt; with elements this basic, I suspect she made it up to suit herself. We will be doing likewise.

Good eye if you think this picture looks familiar. I showed it as a possible inspiration quilt for use in a scrap quilt when I shared my 2021 goals. A simple, easy quilt, it offers plenty of versatility. As the picture shows, it lends itself to scrappiness, but would work just as successfully in a planned color scheme. 

Stay tuned for more on our sew along. The three of us have been sharing potential fabrics back and forth through text messages. I have done some initial prepping. I 'm even going to attempt to contact Helen Philipps to share our excitement over her pretty inspiration quilt. 

We promise to share all of our activity here starting March 1.

Happy Quilting, Friends!