A Finish! (Almost)

I am thrilled to introduce you to Prairie Vine, complete with her sashing, cornerstones and borders. I have plenty of pictures of her in a variety of settings and angles.

I call her complete (almost) because on top of those green borders I am supposed to applique an undulating vine with leaves all the way around the quilt. *ahem* Yes, applique. And probably you haven't seen much applique featured here on my blog over the years because -- I don't applique.

Well, we are just gonna' see about that! At this time, I do intend to applique that vine and all those leaves onto this quilt. I plan to use a fusible of some sort and machine-applique to make it go faster.

For now, she is finished, though, as I have to prepare said vine and leaves. Until then, let's just look at her in all her scrappy and reproduction-inspired beauty.

I am happy to have this completed to this point. And, to be honest, I do not really dread all that applique. In fact, while I do find myself intimidated by it, I know I can do it and I am eager to prove myself in this area.

Now, before I go, I have to share one more picture. DH interrupted my little photo shoot with Prairie Vine, and the result you see below. Don't husbands just crack us up sometimes?! Every time I look at this, I have a little giggle.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Switching Gears

After a week of building my little Village houses, I switched it up yesterday. I was feeling the burden of having too many projects started and not enough of them being finished!!

I needed to get that Prairie Vine quilt together. Above are the 16 blocks I finished earlier in the  month; they have been hanging out on the design wall ever since. Holding me back was making 25 9-patch blocks out of 1.5-inch squares. Ugh; so tiny! Well, I figured out a quicker way to accomplish the task that didn't involve cutting 225 tiny squares. I sewed short lengths of 1.5-inch strips together, using scraps from the Prairie Vine blocks, and mix-and-matched for a scrappy result. It went really well.

Above are my scrappy units ready to be stitched in very random fashion. I did the job in five groups of five, and that made it quite simple. I had them together in no time at all.

Next on the agenda was to cut the sashing strips, and I already had the fabric pulled - this very vintage Judy Rothermel piece from a line called Civil War which had been aging in the stash for far too long. And now I am in the midst of putting all these pieces together. Hope you will come back later in the week to see the results of this labor. I will go ahead and put on the border, too, but then I have the applique stuff to do. This step might take me awhile...

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Prairie Vine Blocks Completed

On Monday when Sharon was here, I made 4 blocks for Prairie Vine, and on Wednesday, I made the remaining 3. Now all 16 blocks are finished and hanging on my design wall. They make me very happy in all their old-fashioned scrappiness.

I have my sashing print set aside as well as border fabric. The sashing will be about 3" wide, with cornerstones of 9-patch blocks. I will need 25, so I suppose that will be my next bit to work on. See the magazine cover below for a picture. My border and sashing fabrics are very similar to those in the photo.

On the border, a vine and a ga-zillion leaves need to be appliqued. I have taken the pattern to be copied onto card-stock paper.  Those now need to be cut out and leaf-prepping will have to begin. This could be a long, drawn-out process, but I am not minding a bit. The quilt is so pretty that it will be worth the time (and tedium?) of doing applique - a branch of quilting that intimidates me.

Wish me well in my endeavor! Are you challenging yourself this year?

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Let's Try To Catch Up

Hello Everyone! I have been way out of touch with you all lately, and I have plenty to catch up on! Don't worry, I won't try to cover everything in one long, text-laden post; instead, I will break things up into separate related tidbits.

Being sick for a big chunk of February seriously interfered with my sewing and quilting, therefore I just didn't have much to blog about for several weeks. Then, because I was in the midst of the most challenging assignment in my comp classes, I felt obligated to provide my students with adequate feedback on their drafts; anytime I was fit for clear thinking at the computer, I was reading and grading essays. Took about all the energy I had.

It's March here in Ohio! Very blustery day!

That is the big-picture take on my lack of writing and posting on the blog in recent weeks. Now, let's get into the news from Jayne's Quilting Room!

Sharon P. and I have tried to continue our Monday sewing dates. A few have had to be cancelled, but these past two weeks we have kept to our schedule - hooray!

The biggest news is that Sharon has finished her Snow Shoo quilt top! Because I want to provide lots of details, I think that will be the topic of tomorrow's post. Today, I will share what we worked on this week.

Early in the year, before we began Snow Shoo, Sharon started this Triple Irish Chain quilt in blue and white. Snow Shoo pushed this to the back burner, and she pulled it out Monday to continue construction. I shared a bit about this quilt here. Next time we sew together, she will be ready to tackle the alternate blocks.

I was busy constructing blocks for Prairie Vine. I had partial cuts prepared for several blocks, so I finished enough cutting for four blocks and tried some semblance of chain piecing.

I seem to gravitate toward scrappy quilts, and this conglomeration of fabrics and colors is quite attractive to me! Prairie Vine requires just 16 blocks, and when these 4 are finished I will have completed 13 - very much a home stretch on those. Then I will need 25 tiny 9-patch blocks to serve as cornerstones. And then...

Applique - leaves and vines. Oh my. Not my most skilled area. However, I intend to do it - teach this old dog some new tricks. Scroll back to the last post for a picture of the finished quilt.

Tomorrow, I will bring you Sharon's Snow Shoo along with cutting and construction details. Several people asked about those after seeing my finish a few weeks back. Come on back for the big reveal!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Prairie Vine Project

Starting a new year (2018) always brings a new list of goals and plans for productivity in the sewing room. It took me most of January to get around to posting my goals for this year, but I did eventually do it. At that time, I was heavily into the production of Snow Shoo, the very first item on my list. Felt good, too, to be doing something that I really wanted to do and was actually in my plans.

Now, here we are looking at the last week of February and I am tackling a second quilt on my goals list -- Prairie Vine. I made the first block on the last day of 2017, loved how complicated it looked, yet came together quite easily, so added it to the 2018 plans. That first block is also pictured in the link provided above, and this weekend I  have made 4 more, shown below.

I pulled and set aside an assortment of fabrics from the stash that I thought would be suitable for these blocks, and I'm making just one block at a time. This is a slow way to go, but I don't really mind so much, as I love seeing how different fabric options make a block come together in a pleasing way.

In other words, I am enjoying the process. Isn't that why we quilt?

The quilt is featured on the cover of a 2007 issue of Quilt Sampler magazine. I don't know how I happened to come across it in 2017/18, but here I am a decade after publication, making that quilt.

Slow Sunday Stitching is today over at Kathy's quilts. I plan to take a few stitches today on Lake Effect. This tub sits by my chair in the family room, and I can reach for it while watching television. With March Madness right around the corner, I expect a good deal of stitching is in my future.

Rows are taking shape, as you can see. The work is satisfying, and I do get on a roll quickly each time I reach for it. When I began the Lake Effect journey last April, I determined then that I would treat this quilt as a 10-year project. I am in no rush, so working at leisure is quite a pleasure.

Not long ago, I found this pack of Thimble Pads in my sewing room; I forget buying them, but the price sticker is telling - our trip last year to Indiana. This project demands a thimble, for sure!

Have a great Sunday, and a great week!
Happy Quilting, Friends!

Finally...My 2018 Goals

Gracious! This month is nearly over (already!), and I have yet to post the sewing and quilting goals I want to accomplish this year. Talk about being remiss. I am reminded of that old phrase "the hurrier I go, the behinder I get." That suits me better than I care to admit.

Early blocks made for Snow Shoo - Item #1 on the list.

A block for item #12 on my list.

A couple of weeks ago, I did sit down to formalize the goals I want to work toward this calendar year. Having a defined list always seems to help me stay on track; I could get so distracted by all the pretty patterns and all the pretty fabrics and all the pretty sew-alongs and all the...well, you get the idea - I am too easily distracted. The list is definitely necessary to help  me maintain my focus.

My current focus is Snow Shoo (shown at the top) - item #1 on the list - and I have not done too much on it this week. Not enough hours in a day, I suppose. With the new semester of school now in full swing, and a book to read for book club, I had distractions that I could not ignore. My little stacks of Shoo Flies and Snowballs are waiting ever so patiently over on the cutting table. I hope to sew on Monday with Sharon, so they won't be ignored too much longer.

Thimbleberries/Retreat Quilt - Item #9

My list contains no UFOs; 2017 had enough of those, so I am backing way, way off. One might think that item #9 is a UFO (cover of book above), but I prefer to reference it as a WIP (work in progress); this is a fine distinction, I know, but it makes sense in my brain. *grin*

Item #10 is also a WIP - I never have 'fessed up about the idiotic mistakes made trying to finish that jelly roll quilt back in September. It's embarrassing...just wait; it's on the list, so it will get done, and I will tell all.

Above is a sample Great Granny Square (item #13) block that I made several years ago. I had come to possess a small amount of vintage feedsack fabrics, and decided this is how I wanted to use them. I have collected a few more vintage pieces and I now have enough to get a quilt top finished. The solids are taken from the collection in my grandmother's items, which seems fitting since we are talking vintage and granny squares (although she detested being referred to as Granny!).

I am gradually getting back on track with things around here! Slow and steady, right?

Happy Quilting, Friends!