Weekend Update

I’m afraid there isn’t much sewing or quilting going on around here. We have our church fall festival coming up on October 18th, and most of my energy is going into that right now. I am chairing the silent auction this year, and it’s turning out to be a whole lot of work! It’s okay, other than so many people being last minute. The last-minute stuff is stressing me out. 

I did a little cutting and sewing in the evenings. I had this pile of sold fabrics that weren’t really motivating me.

These are some of the leftovers from the cutting we do at church for the Lutheran World Relief quilts. Not big enough to use in the quilts, but too big to throw away. Maybe I should say, too big for me to throw away. I have been trying to figure out if I can use them or not, and I ended up getting out some of my Crazy Eight templates. Here’s what I did: 

I also have the Crazier Eight templates, and I was thinking of mixing in some of those blocks. We’ll see how it goes. I feel like these scraps need some red and orange colors, but I really don’t want to buy anything. I might find something here I can use. 

I’m still working on my Irish chain blocks as leaders and enders.

I haven’t worked on the pink ones in a while because I misplaced my pink solid.

As soon as I find it, I will cut more pink squares and make some progress. I hope.

I have been making an effort to get more exercise. It’s good for my stress levels, and I have been a real slacker late. The awful heat is August and September made me skip out on walking and I was also not real faithful with going to the gym. Net result: I had lost 20 pounds and gained 3-4 pounds of it back. I’m trying to be more careful with what I eat, and get back to exercising more regularly. Now that it’s not so hot, I should be able to get more steps. I’m linking this post to Melva’s Sew & Tell.

Mid Week

It’s Wednesday, and I feel like I’ve done nothing but binding. If you remember, I was busy last week cutting and sewing long strips of binding. I got this quilt done with some gray binding.

It’s a panel that I had added a border to and quilted. This one will go in the church auction. We have lots of TAMU fans, so I’m pretty sure it will get bids. It was late in the afternoon when I took the picture and sun was coming through the blinds causing the lighter spots on the fabric.

I got some placemats finished for the craft sale.

There are only two of these, but I think some people don’t need four placemats. We will find out.

I have four of these.

And six of these.

I also did a potholder from the leftovers from this fabric. I am so tired of sewing binding on….i can wait to be finished with all of this. I was telling my friend Janice that I am tired of placemats, and she said she would do some and possibly some table runners. I am grateful for the help!

I think the rain is over, at least for now. I have mushrooms growing in my yard. 

I don’t know what causes them to grow. I need to look it up. 

Finally Finished!

I am so happy to have my church auction quilt finished. It’s quilted and bound and everything.

I’m so glad I cut the striped binding on the bias—I really like the way it looks, and I think it tied everything together. 

I’m not sure if the quilts is 92” x 92” or 93” x 93”. I will re-measure it before I take it to the church. I actually started this quilt for the 2025 Luther Fest auction and got bogged down and didn’t finish. Betty gave me her completed Boys of the Bible top (she didn’t want it), and I quilted it and bound it and put it in the 2025 auction.

It worked out okay, and the quilt did well, but now it’s time to get the blue one donated. 

I spent the rest of the day making more binding. I had some of the blue and yellow stripe left, and I think I can use it on something, so I kept cutting. I also had quite a bit of the light gray left that I had used to bind the baby quilts so I cut up all of that too.

I will get all of this wound ont some cardboard spindles, and it will be ready to go when I have a completed quilt that needs binding. I also cut some brown for the placemats I quilted when? Maybe July or August.

I will try and get these finished this coming week. The sooner the better.

We got another inch of rain yesterday; maybe more counting last night but I haven’t checked yet. It was raining pretty hard when I went to bed. This is the first significant rain we have had since about June. I’m off to church this morning. I had some sun damage spots on my face that the dermatologist froze off Tuesday, and now I have crusty, red spots. I hate to go to church looking like this, but I am trying to talk myself into it. 

 

Scrappy Saturday

Did you see what was chosen for the October color? It was posted on Wednesday—either light neutral or dark neutral. Hmmmm. I don’t know. I liked Angela’s suggestion to think about using the neutrals for sashing. I laid out my star blocks to see if I have enough for a quilt.

Well, I obviously need another block. I think I have another purple cut out—I just need to figure out where I put it. The blocks are 16” so if I add 2” sashing, the top will be 70” x 88” plus whatever I add for the border. A 6” border would make it 82” x 100”. That’s a little large for a quilt to donate to the graduation project. Maybe I can figure out something else to do with it. 

I didn’t bother to lay out my other blocks. I know I don’t have enough of these.

They are 10” blocks and I didn’t make as many of them as I did the stars. I think I will put this on my RSC list for 2027 and see if I can get enough to do a quilt. They are fast to make. I’m also thinking about string blocks and something with solids. Lots of decisions to be made, and I’m too tired right now. It can wait.

We got a little rain….the local news said 2.9”, but my rain gauge said 1.5”. That was for Thursday and Friday. I took a picture of the apple weather app, because I think they lie a lot.

I took the picture on Thursday and the temperatures have been fairly accurate. The rain, not so much. I’m thankful we have gotten what we got. 

Baby Quilts

I have been getting a few things done, but not many are fully completed. I did get a call from my CPA saying my taxes are done, so that’s one thing! Unfortunately, I owe money again. Bummer. It does not make me happy to have to give even more money to the IRS, but there aren’t any other choices other than to pay it. 

Here are three things that are completely finished. Baby quilts for the church fall festival.

I showed these tops before, but now they are quilted and bound. I quilted them all three at the same time on a 108” width piece of white flannel. I pre-washed it first. The quilts aren’t big; 30” x 42”. I think they are pretty cute. It was a little dark when I was taking pictures so not great lighting.

These will go in the craft sale at church. I still have three more to bind, but if it doesn’t happen, I’m okay. Especially since I have these three done and ready to go. In the meantime, I have been working on the silent auction (also for the church fall festival). I am the chairman for the silent auction, and we aren’t doing a live auction this year due to not having a chairman for it. Bottom line, I am hoping to make up the revenue difference with the silent auction. I got my quilt top quilted, and today I made the binding. I hope to have pictures of a completed quilt soon! Once again, I have taken on more than I should have. Pray for me! I don’t want to be the one who messes up! 

Weekend Update

The days are passing so fast I can hardly keep up with what day it is! I got a couple of quilts finished last week that I did not post any pictures of. Both are baby quilts. This one was for a customer. 

I know the pictures don’t show the nice embroidery work very well. Her stitching is beautiful.

Another was one I did.

If it looks familiar, it’s because I did one with half of this layer cake a year ago. This one is what was left of the layer cake. I put a purple binding on it. I wanted to get it finished and add it to our Gabriel Project display for the Quilt Guild open house, which I did, but it’s so pretty I don’t know if I am ready to donate it or not. I have no immediate use for it, so I don’t know why I’m being so silly about it! 

I did a little sewing Saturday and Sunday. I cut up a Kaffe Fasset charm pack and started a bag. I used the free pattern I posted Friday, but of course I modified it to make it bigger. I got the back and the front pieced and quilted both of them. I just did stitch in the ditch on my domestic machine.

I have the perfect fabric for the lining so that will happen soon. I also added another row to the pink Irish chain. 

I will work on the black one this week and see if I can get another row added to it. Then I will have to piece some more blocks.

I went with a friend to a Santana tribute band concert on Sunday night. It was really good. 

 

Very talented band! I thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Saturday evening I was outside taking pictures of the harvest moon. Of course, I don’t have the photography talent or equipment to get good pictures, but I did my best!

Linking to Melva Loves Scraps.

Scrappy Saturday

It was a busy week, so I wasn’t able to do as much sewing as I had hoped. The Quilt Guild Open House was Thursday and Friday, and of course, I spent part of Wednesday getting all my stuff together. More on that at the end of this post. 

I did get a few Rainbow Scrap Challenge block done. I was able to finish another aqua/turquoise one before I moved on to purple.

I could use a few more of these, but it may not happen. 

Once I moved to purple, I made two of the 16-patch star blocks.

Purple is not really my favorite color, but I do like these purple stars—a lot! If I can dig up a few more purple scraps, I will make some more this coming week. I’m not sure what the October color will be; I guess we will find out soon. 

Now for the Quilt Guild Open House. We decided not to do a show this year and just do an open house to try and attract new members. We held it at our regular meeting place which is Christ the Victor Lutheran Church. They let us do an Airing of the Quilts display in their sanctuary.

Our goal was to show the community what we do. We had a table showing our programs and workshops, a display of the collage quilting we taught to the 4H students, a membership table, and a Community Service table. I am the Community Service Coordinator, and this is this the display I set up. 

The plastic sheet holders on the left table show which organizations we support and what we donated last year. There are four community organizations we support.

Anyway, we signed up 11 new members, so I guess it was worth all the effort, and believe me, it was a lot of effort! I came home about 3 yesterday and took a nap!