Midnight Mystery Crush

     Somewhere in the craziness that became my life in February I managed to squeeze in the time to sew my Midnight Mystery blocks into a quilt top.

     So I'm crushing on the fact that I got it done and that it turned into a pretty little quilt in the end.  I had some serious reservations about my fabric choices during the construction.  This pattern is so striking that it looks great in a lot of different fabric choices.  The face book page for the quilt along let us see lots of different versions of the quilt.  Thanks Cheryl for this great quilt along and wonderful mystery quilt. I'm pretty sure I'll be quilting along for the next one. I'm linking up with Main Crush Monday.
  

February Update

     Well I have to say that February has been a definite challenge for me.  I started the month by catching a virus (Yup on February 1).  Since lots of other people at my work seemed to have it worse than me I dragged myself to work that week and took off one day the following week.  I was pretty tired out and had little energy left over for quilting or blogging.  I did manage to put together the Polaroid block for Katrin and it's on it's way to Germany now.

  And I managed to get my Stash Bee Block done for Renae but that had it's own challenges, among them a new technique ( applique using interfacing , and a miss cut background piece).  Don't worry I fixed the miss cut!

          I liked both of these blocks and if time permits I just might make my own versions of these quilts some day.
    
      Just as I was recovering from the flu my 87 year old aunt who lives in the big city fell in her apartment.  She was on the floor for several days and is now in the hospital. My sisters family and my family have been doing our best to visit her and support her and look after her affairs.  My sister and I are her closest relatives and neither of us live in the same city as her, so this has been very stressful.   She is recovering quite well however and will eventually make it home again.

      Oh yes, and I was hosting TGIFF for the first time that week.  I'm happy I pulled  that off and I'm grateful to Deanne of Devoted Quilter who mentored me through the experience.

      Somewhere between the flu and the fall I managed to pin baste my daughters quilt.  It's my OMG for February and it's safe to say I won't be completing it, but I just might get that Midnight Mystery quilt top together....should have made that my goal.  I'm linking up to Let's Bee Social over at Lorna's blog and I'm going to check out what everyone else has been up to.

     

Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday

     Hi Everyone!  Welcome to my blog and my first time hosting the link up for TGIFF.  Today I'm happy to share with you my completed Cover for my Quilter's Planner.

       I followed the instructions in the Zippy Cover Tutorial from Amanda at What the Bobbin, but I made a slightly more basic version.  I used Cat Dream by Lizzy House in black for the main fabric in my version.  I love this fabric with it's whimsical cats and plants.

     I picked up some of the colours in the print and added a striped border to the  cover.  I put a pocket on the inside cover with co-ordinating mouse fabric and added a polka dot 
ribbon for a place marker.

     I'm finding my planner to be a useful tool in helping me to organize my quilting and blogging time and I love my new cover.  It's my third finish for quarter one of the 2016 year of lovely finishes.  Here's the original list.  This planner cover is cat approved.

     Now it's your turn.  What  lovely finishes do you have to share today.  Big or small we'd love to see them all.  Link up your blog posts to the link up below...but don't forget the most important part, the visiting.  Visit others in the link up and share the comment love.  Don't forget to share the link to this post on your blog.

An InLinkz Link-up

The Stash Post

     Well it's time to link up my first stash report, and I would like to say I think I did o.k. I'll remind you that I am not totally giving up on purchases, but participating in the year of the stash has got me thinking more about what I purchase.  I seem to be buying less fabric but more books.

      You might recall that my stash manifesto was to use up the weird, the wacky and the wonderful one off's in my stash.  You may not recall that, I had to look it up myself.

     I made four of these, all with different fabrics from the stash.

      I also gave away some a couple of metres of fabric and some quality scraps to friends who I knew would be more likely to use it than me.  There's also several metres of fabric in a bag for the guild stash and the really dreadful stuff went to the reuse store.  Hopefully it finds some love there.
     I backed the pick up sticks quilt with fabric from the stash that I bought years ago, thinking I would make a jacket for myself out of it.  You can just see it peeking out in this picture. 

     These were made from scraps.

     And I made this lovely little assortment for the soon to be born grandchild.  The fronts....

     The backs...

 and this..

     In case you can't tell those are burp pads in the first  and second photo and a burp pad on top of a receiving blanket in the third photo.  This little grouping above represents my second finish of the 2016 finish along first quarter which you can read about here if you are so inclined.

     And speaking of finishes I will be hosting TGIFF this Friday so be sure to come back and link up your finishes. This is my first time hosing TGIFF (Thank Goodness it's Finished Friday) and my first time hosting a linky party.
But right now I'm linking up with Jenn at A Quarter Inch From The Edge where she's holding a linky party to celebrate the Year of the Stash.

Polaroid Blocks for Katrin

     Today I'm crushing on these polaroid blocks.

    My bee mate Katrin is putting together a quilt for a friends ill child and several of us are contributing blocks for it.  Hopefully the quilt will provide some comfort on many trips to the hospital.  You can read more about this project on her blog Puppi lalla.

     The photo part of the polaroid finishes at 3 inches and they  are joined together by bright yellow sashing to make a 
15 1/2 inch block.  I'll have them in the mail by the end of the week.  I'm linking up with Main Crush Monday with Beth of Cooking Up Quilts.

One Main Goal for February

 I'll definitely be finishing up my Mighnight Mystery top this month and working some more on my Graduated Cross quilt but I think I'll chose quilting this  Modern Shoe Fly quilt for my Main Goal for February.

     According to my daughter she's been waiting for me to quilt this for her for three years.  This could be true.  The pattern by Alexandra Ledgerwood is from the Spring 2012 Stitch Magazine.  The original quilt had amazing feathered quilting on it and I was pretty intimidated by the thought of quilting it, so it's been sitting in the WIP pile for a while.

     The ridiculous thing is that my daughter really doesn't care what the quilting is like.  She just wants me to finish it.  So that's what I'm going to do, hopefully by the end of the month.

I'm linking to OMG at Heidi's blog  Red Letter Quilts and to Let's Bee Social at Lorna's blog Sew Fresh Quilts.