A Quick Finish

     If you ever need a quick and striking baby/toddler quilt to make, this is it.

     It's the Celestial Quilt from Cheryl and Paige's Modern Plus Sign Quilts book, made in baby size.  It works up very quickly and finishes at 48 inches square.  My available sewing time this month was limited so this quilt top was the perfect project to work into small bits of time.  You might say that it's a squirrel because when I came across this photo in my blog archive I decided I should use up the fabric.

     Every fabric in this bundle except the one I didn't use is directional.  It didn't really matter how I put the stripes and the ribbons but I definitely wanted the birds all upright and I was hoping to get the mushrooms upright as well.  When I was cutting out the fabrics though I didn't think about the fact that the blocks all orient in different directions so in the end I made the mushrooms go in all different directions.

     The background fabric looks orange in the photo but it is a bright coral.  I'm pretty pleased with this finished top, so I'm linking it up to Main Crush Monday which is hosted by Beth at Cooking Up Quilts and I'm going to link it up to the Squirrel party at MMMQuilts.

     And oh yes, we got two days of rain on the weekend so I'm happy!

A quarter of a quarter

      Dwight and I had big plans for this weekend.  We had a date to get lots of work done in the garden and I had wanted to really clean up my quilting room after clearing out guild stuff but then bringing new guild stuff home.  Instead we were called upon to babysit the boys on Friday and Saturday.  I'm not complaining.  I love spending time with the boys but the only yard work that got done was at my son's house.  

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     Today, Sunday we took my mother in law out to dinner as it was her birthday on Wednesday and we celebrated Father's Day at the same time.  When we got home we managed to water the transplants with buckets.  Man I hope it rains soon.

     I did make a start on one of the baby quilts.  I got one 24" square block sewn together, which is one quarter of a baby quilt. The baby quilt is one quarter of the Celestial Quilt from Cheryl and Paige's Modern Plus Sign Quilts book.  All my fabrics are directional so I am going to have to think out placement as I put each block together so I am taking my time. 

     I'll be linking up with Main Crush Monday, and with Let's Bee Social....then I think I'll check out more tutorials on the Tips and Tutorial's  link up hosted by Cheryl of Meadowmist Designs and Yvonne of Quilting Jet Girl.  I've already voted on one category and have two left.

A Friday Finish

     I have a finish to share with you.  Here it is nestled into the dark recesses of my backyard.  It's a group effort and the process to make it was a lot of fun.

     Way back in May of last year the Grand River Modern Guild decided to make quilts for the Ronald McDonald House in Hamilton.  One of the guild members, Lisa, noted that all the quilts where very girl themed and she thought we should make some more neutral or boy friendly quilts. So we all brought some fabric to a meeting and we set about making versions of Rainbow Round the Cabin from Krista Hennebury's book Make it Take It.  Krista is an amazing modern quilter who blogs at Poppyprint.
   

     Nine quilters worked at sewing the logs on the quilt, a couple of quilters trimmed and a couple of quilters pressed.

How this works is you start with the centre and sew on a strip.  It get trimmed to size and passed to the next quilter.  So nine quilts where made simultaneously getting passed around the room.  It's a fun group activity and when your quilt gets back to you it's a bit of a surprise!

     

     

        Because Lisa (there are 3 Lisa's in our guild) was collecting donation quilts over the year there was no rush to quilt it, so of course it sat in my pile till the last minute.  Inspiration hit after looking at the Quilt Con calendar of classes and seeing that Christina Camelli will be teaching several classes.  This spurred me to watch my Craftsy classes and practice a bit.

     I decided to further practice my free motion quilting on this quilt, trying out different motifs in the different strips.  I'm sharing lots of pictures to show you the quilting.  I'm most comfortable quilting from the left side of the quilt to the right side and quilting gentle curves, but I bravely practiced quilting from the top of the quilt down and straight lines and boxy shapes.

     I'm pleased with the result.  Quilting on this scale is challenging.  My stitch size is still all over the place but I did find that the coordination of hand and foot improved greatly by the time I got to the end of the quilting.

     This is my third finish for the 2nd quarter of the 2018 Finish Along.  The original list is here.  Now I'm headed over to Lisa's ( a different Lisa) blog Lisa in Port Hope for the TGIFF link up.

     

What's happening so far in June.

     I love this time of year.  It always feels so full of possibility.  The skies are blue, the trees and lawns are a beautiful light shade of green and it's not so hot and humid that you melt into the furniture.  I haven't been on the blog much but I have been sewing quite a bit.

     Here's step one for the Fireburst Mystery.  I got this finished just over a week ago.  I'm loving the pace of Tish's quilt along.  I manage to keep ahead of the game with this one and that is a good feeling.  

     I'm planning to quilt along with Cheryl and Paige as well, for the Modern plus signs Sampler.  This one also goes along at a moderate pace, although some of the blocks will be a bit more of a challenge.   But that's how we grow, isn't it?

     Speaking of challenges what I've been spending most of my quilting time on over the last week is practicing free motion quilting. Here's a sneak peak.

     I've been treating this quilt as a sampler trying different designs in different areas.  I'll be sharing this quilt as a Friday Finish soon.  I really enjoy fmq, but like many things, I don't seem to make enough time in my life for practice.  The sections on this quilt are 6 inches wide which is a challenge for sure in trying to get a consistent look with the motifs in such a big space.  

     One thing I have learned is that even though there are very long spaces of time between working on my quilting  I don't loose the skills I have.  I just don't get any better. 

     I have also started to cut the fabrics for one of the baby quilts.  I located the  bird and mushroom fabrics.  They were fat quarters not the half yards I thought they would be so I had to change my plans about how to use them.  I found this coral fabric at the local fabric store, which plays along very nicely and will take the quilt up a notch to the usual brightness level of my quilts.  Sorry future baby I just don't do subtle very often.

     Well I'm off to sew some quilt backs together for donation quilts before I go to work.  I'll link up with Beth at Cooking Up Quilts, with Tish of Tish's Adventures in Wonderland and with Lorna of Sew Fresh Quilts.

Goal for June

     My sewing machine has had a bit of a rest for the last week or so.  I have a three day weekend and that's usually when I do the bulk of my sewing but last weekend I spent Friday babysitting the boys (yippee) and then our friend Tessa arrived from England and we spent the rest of the weekend with her.  Tessa from England is not to be confused with Tessa my co worker (i.e. Rory's mom). It was wonderful and relaxing, spending time with Tessa.  We haven't been to England in 6 years, but she comes here every second year or so and divides her time amongst her many friends in Ontario and Quebec. 

      I did manage to do some fabric cutting during the week  and I am happy to say that I am all set for the first set of instructions for the Fireburst Mystery QAL hosted by Tish of Tish's Adventures in Wonderland.

     Tish is posting the instructions today.  The red fabric bleeds a little, so I have decided to keep this quilt in our spare bedroom for when the boys are a bit older and stay over at our place. That way I can make sure it gets washed in cold water. I'm excited to get started.  I'm have a sewing with my two buddies tomorrow, and I have decided to bring this project along.

     Getting back to the baby quilts, I did pull some fabric out of the stash that I am going to use for the first of the baby quilts.  I'm keeping the pattern under wraps for now, but some of you might have an idea of what pattern that might be, when you see the fabrics.

   While I was looking for a photo on my blog for my June OMG project I can across this photo which reminded me that I have these fabrics in my stash that really have to be used for a baby quilt.  I won this bundle of fabrics when I sewed along with Ruth and the Modern Quilters Ireland for the Rainbow Rose Quilt Along.  Maybe I'll make the same quilt as the one above and we will see how it looks in the two different fabric groupings.  

      None of these are my OMG for June however.  For that I have decided to make 6 more blocks of the Quilters Planner Quilt Along Quilt.  If I get more than that done it will be a bonus.  Here is where I stand on that project.

     I originally was trying to work on these blocks one a month but it's not working for me so I am going to try to focus my efforts.  If I finish more than 6 it will be a super bonus.  There are a few other things I will be putting my energy into as well.  I'm linking up with OMG linkup for June over at Patti's blog Elm Street Quilts.

     I share the comments problem with all who blog on blogger, so I'll do my best at responding to any comments that get left.