Easy Street Clue 1

Sketti anyone?  No butter or ketchup needed!  20 strip sets

Today I got really busy and made the cute little 4 patches for clue 1 of Easy Street, Bonnie Hunter's new mystery on Quiltville, http://quiltville.blogspot.com/,  Look for the Easy Street tab at the top.  I needed to make 192 of these patches.  I remembered that I had made lots of 4 patches for another quilt and that there was a "nesting" technique that might make it go faster.  After sewing a grey strip to a B/W background strip, I cut these strips into about 21" lengths.  I matched each strip set to another strip set that had a different B/W print.  After smoothing and nesting them carefully, I cut these into the 2" parts to make the 4 patches.  But since I cut the 2 parts together and they were already paired up, it went pretty fast.  I timed how long it took to sew the pairs together and I did about 200(I have some extras.)in 35 minutes.  Then I only needed to twirl the seams and press. 
Here's the link up to more fun with other quilters and their blocks!

easy-street-monday-link-up

Nesting the strips

The 4 patch on the bottom is one I sewed and tested for size.  The stack shows pairs ready to be sewn together.

My 200 4 patches with swirled seams and pressed.

November 
I haven't posted since August!  I've done quite a bit of sewing and quilting and have spent less time on the computer.  I will try to get photos updated soon.
Today I started on Clue 1 on Bonnie Hunter's "Easy Street" mystery. 
Here is her blog and click on the Easy Street tab at the top to see it.
 http://quiltville.blogspot.com/

I have other projects in the works but will save the pictures of those as they might be gifts. :) 

August Sewing

August has been a busy month around here.  My sweet husband has been putting in a more permanent fence for my garden spot in the backyard.  I've gotten things planted for a fall garden and we've had some good rain. 
I finished a quilt top for a friend's daughter and husband.  It's a late wedding present.  Just need to get it quilted and bound. Here is the top - didn't have a quilt "holder" so laid it on a chair on the front porch.

I've sewn a little on an applique quilt I started a few years ago for my daughter and am starting to put the blocks together.

Then something new and sparkly caught my eye and I started a free block of the month....had to go back and copy everything up through August.  It's called "Hello Sun" and is at:
http://aprilmaedesigns.com
The original blocks are applique.  I had been wanting to try the technique of using crayons to color a quilt.  So I adapted her pattern by tracing the designs onto white fabric with a pigma pen.  I then colored them with Crayola brand regular crayons and ironed them face down on white paper towels to remove the extra wax and color.  

 The next step is embroidering on the drawn lines for the details.  I may also add some buttons and rick rack.  The little blocks will finish at 6".  I'll probably put these into a little quilt for my preschool room.  I think I will name it "You Are My Sunshine".  We love to sing that song and another one called "Mr. Sun".

The block on the left is for February - the original didn't have hearts which would have been super tiny to applique.  The one on the left is for March.  Still have some embroidery outlining to do.  The orange outline isn't quite so neon in real life.

This is a baby quilt top that I put together in July.  It's for Emma's first college roommate who had a baby in July.  It just needs quilting and binding.  It's actually a little brighter than the picture.

Our poor dog, Sophie, had to have surgery to remove her dew claws that weren't correctly removed by the breeder when she was a puppy. She's done pretty well until today after  the stitches came out.  One foot has to still be wrapped and she is in quite a bit of pain tonight.  

I'll leave you today with a picture of one of my quilting supervisors.  Cookie has decided  that the batting makes a nice cave. 

4 Quilts

I finished up 4 quilts for my brother, sisters, and myself last Friday. They were made from Mother's clothing. We are all meeting up this week in Colorado for a few days and I wanted to take them as it isn't often that all 4 of us are together at the same time.  There is an earlier post (March) of one of the quilts in the beginning stages.

                                     Here we are with our quilts.

Handprint Quilt

I got several pictures at my friend's retirement party but I was helping her hold the quilt up and forgot to have anyone take a picture with my camera.  Here are two photos taken before gifting.  I need to get a better one of it with her. The colors are actually brighter than they look in these photos too.

Garden Bounty

Wanted to share some pictures of my backyard garden and it's bounty before the weather gets too hot and the garden isn't as pretty as it is now. I'm sorry some are sideways.  I haven't figured out how to turn them as I'm using a different computer now with a different photo program. 

I am going to try to put a link to a quilting site that is hosting a quilt a long.  It is hard for an old girl to learn new tricks.  
The Quilt Along is on Quilting Gallery and will be hosted by Michelle (Mishka) of QG and Pat Sloan.  It says it is for beginners but that more experienced quilters will enjoy it too!  So here we go for the try...http://quiltinggallery.com/2012/05/31/beginners-quilt-along-fabric-requirements-and-reliable-iron-give-away/

The link seems to work - yeah!  Now to figure out how to copy a logo for it.

Well the logo button seems to work too!  Now if I can just remember how to do this again!