APRIL WRAP UP

Whew!!!!  April has been a busy month. I continually set up goals for myself and I continually miss reaching lots of them.

So here is what I have accomplished.

I finally finished all of the components for the Bonnie Hunter Easy Street Mystery Quilt.  This is one of the corner blocks and one of each of the two blocks that make up the quilt design.  Not too sure how long it will take me to get all of these blocks made and assembled....

Second block completed of Starry, Starry Night.  These blocks are about 18 inches square.

Made a few clamshells using my friend's die cutter.  Might turn into a pillow.

These are tiny (3/4 inch) leftover HSTs from the Bonnie Hunter Easy Street Mystery Quilt.  Thinking something modern will come out of these.

Of course, April would never be complete without the Frogpond Quilters Retreat at Grand Oak Retreat Center in Scottsboro, AL.  What a super bunch of gals to hang out with for four days!!!

Cute little make it/take it project that Jackie brought for us.  Still need to quilt it.

I did manage to get one project completed at the retreat - well, the top that is.  No, Carol is not being punished by standing in the corner.  She says it is some kind of exercise???

 

 

Having lots of fun in my paper piecing group making these seasonal mug rugs.

 

Still quilting this strip pieced quilt on my DSM.  Almost there...

Have another block of my QAYG on the design wall.  Not too happy with that large blob of yellow dots in the center there.

 

Of course, I have a carry along project making more hexies....

In my SLKS bee group we are starting a round robin with the four of us.  I have the first Round of Sharon's quilt and here is a little sketch of what I might could do, but then again, maybe not.  Her block is the colored star that she wants used for the center.

I did completely finish one small project.  This is a quilted mat for Lady Dog.  She belongs to a friend of my hubby.  We wanted to say thank you to her master for some kindnesses he has shown us.
The HSTs are made from the Pampered Pooch Charm Pack from Moda.  I still have enough to make another mat, maybe for LilBit.

This piece is about 32 inches square and I love the low contrast of the blocks to the light blue background.

Looks to me like I have a lot of things in progress. . .   Maybe next month we will see some completions ???


                                      -sandi









 

NO JOKE

What a fun day I had on April Fool's Day!!!  It was no joke!

I set up my sewing machine for a fun day of sewing with my friends.  We gather about once a month and have a sew-day.
As you can see on my sewing machine, I have two sets of batik blocks and some clam shell blocks to work on.

Another project I had to work on was the Twister quilt pattern.

I had put these Layer Cake blocks together and was waiting to get my borders on.  Today, I did get the borders cut, but, alas, I did not get them sewn on.  LilBit is guarding my project for me in case some quilty gremlin should come by!

I did get all of Step 5 of the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt, Easy Street, completed.  This is taking me a long time to complete because I am using it for Leaders/Enders for other projects.

All of those little triangles will go into my scrap bin for upcoming Improv Blocks.

The other Batik project is called "Starry, Starry Night' and is a BOM from a neat quilt shop called Quilting Dreams..
We have been collecting the blocks this year but today is the first time I have had a chance to start working on mine.
Here is block one all ready to sew.

I did get a few more clam shells sewn, but I did not get a picture yet. 

As you can see, I still cannot force myself to work on only one project at a time.  All of a sudden, I will have several projects completed at the same time.  That is just how I roll!!

What a great kick off for April!!  I expect there to be some completions this month of projects that I have mentioned in previous blogs.

Go enjoy some beautiful weather and sunshine!!!

                                             -sandi



 

MARCH MADNESS

March has been a really crazy month and I am happy to be saying goodbye and welcoming April.

I certainly did not get all on my list completed, but I have made some progress. 

I will keep trying to get it done!!

This week I will be working on my Easy Street components.  This was a Bonnie Hunter Mystery last year, I think.

 

I finished all of the blocks for my version of an "Auburn Quilt" for my grandson to take to college this fall.

I am taking them to Retreat to assemble the top.

 

Nothing else is finished.  I am still adding sleeves to the quilts for the exhibit that my guild is doing during AQS Quiltweek in Chattanooga in September 10-13.

 

I did go to A Mountain Quiltfest in Pigeon Forge this month. 

Had a fun chat with Bonnie Hunter!!

 

Please enter April!!  You will be most welcomed this year!

 

-sandi

 

CHILLING OUT ON A LILY PAD!

Over here at the Frogpond Studio we do this frequently.  I will spend my weekend getting last minute details taken care of to head to Grand Oak Retreat for four glorious days of eating, sleeping, and stitching with fifteen wonderful gals next week.

I am taking a few of my WIPs with me.

Easy Street designed by Bonnie Hunter.

My ticker tape project.  Love these colors.

STILL working on Farmer's Market.  Maybe this will be the week it gets finished.

I have another project or two I will toss in "just in case" I run out of something to do.


                                    -sandi





 

WIPs TO FOCUS ON

 

ALL OF MY UFOs AND WIPs ARE FINISHED!!

 

Gotcha!  April Fool's!?!?!

 

Now for the truth of the matter.

 

 

Every year I take time to re-assess my WIPs list.  It is quite a long list.  I simply re-arrange the order of the list and continue to do new projects.  Since I will be going away on four retreats this year, I have chosen to focus on some of my specific
WIPs with the idea that they will get finished.  I do not know which is the better way to approach this:  Do I start with the most current and work my way back to the oldest one?  OR Should I go back to the oldest one and work my way forward?

 

After looking at the list of the seven projects that I chose to focus on, I have decided to start with the most recent and work in that direction.

 

In November/December 2012 I started Bonnie Hunter's latest Mystery Quilt called "Easy Street".  This year I knew that I would not have much time to devote to it as it was happening so I decided to do some of each step.  For me that was not the best idea.  It has taken me more time to sort out what number of components are lacking.  In the future I will know that is not a good style for me.

Here is a sample of some of the units I have done.

 

 

 

 

Another Bonnie Hunter project that is still sitting in its little box is "Virginia Bound".  This one was started at a Workshop I attended in Pelham, Alabama when Bonnie came 2 years ago.  In reading her blog and checking her calendar I discovered that she would be coming to a "town near me" and I contacted the sponsoring guild and was able to get the last slot.  That was a really fun day.  It was great to meet Bonnie and to see her style of teaching a Workshop.

I have about half of the blocks done for this quilt that uses strings.

 

 

 

 

 

My landscape quilt and my kaleidoscope quilt are both small pieces and only need to be quilted and bound.  This should not take very much time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A third Bonnie Hunter pattern that I have going is the Lady of  Lake Erie pattern that appeared in Quiltmaker Magazine.  A few years ago I made a picture of the produce section at my local grocery store because it inspired me to think of a quilt pattern to use these colors. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I have chosen to use the Lady of  Lake Erie pattern and am naming this project "Farmer's Market".  I have about a third of the blocks completed and the rest are cut and waiting.

 

 

 

The topic for our projects for this month in my Art Quilt Guild is collage.  I have a fish collage that I started over five years ago.  It needs to have the thread embellishing done and it will be complete.

The first retreat is early in April and my guild meeting is at the end of the month.  This really could get finished.  Of course, that means I will be changing the order again of when to do these WIPs.  But isn't that what life is about?  Being flexible and willing to make changes?

 

 

 

 

 

And, of course, I don't want to forget about my Ticker Tape quilt. 

 

Now I am motivated to get started.  I wonder how many of these I will get finished at the first retreat in April????

 



 

 

-sandi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EASY STREET PROGRESS

My last post about the Easy Street Mystery Quilt Project by Bonnie Hunter was without pictures.  I now have the capability to add some pictures.

Here are my fabrics and a few of my Step One Four-Patch blocks.

I exchanged my oranges for the Teal/Turquoise Blues and included some periwinkle in my purples.

I will be doing some blocks of each step in the beginning because of time restraints.  I will finish this after the first of the year.

Step Two was making Flying Geese with the Purples and Black/White background fabrics.

I used the EZ Angle Ruler and the Companion Ruler that Bonnie suggested.  I was very happy with my results.  There was minimum sliver trimming.

I think this is going to be another fun adventure.


                                      -sandi

EASY STREET MYSTERY

This will be my third Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt.  This year I was going to pass on it and just collect the clues.  I thought it would be better to do this project in January.  That has all changed.

After the Introduction came out with the fabric requirements, I was still convinced I wasn't going to do it because I did not have enough fabric in the color families and I did not want to start working on substitutions.  I am trying very hard to work out of stash.

I could not get it off my mind, so I started looking for fabric in my stash and found a few pieces.  Looked some more and found some more.

Ultimately I found enough fabric to do the quilt.  So here goes.
This is where I would normally post a picture of the fabrics, but I am, once again, having difficulty with Picasa Albums about posting my pics.  I posted the pics directly to Facebook.  The colors I chose were the same colors that Bonnie used.

Sorry this is all words and no pictures.  Maybe soon I will be back to posting pictures with my words.


                                              -sandi