HAPPY THANKSGIVING

We have much to be thankful for this year, especially our family and friends.

Happy Thanksgiving to all my peeps.

BRAGGING HERE

My Humbug Bag is featured today on Karen Griska's Selvage Blog.

She's the author of Quilts from the Selvage Edge.

QUILT BLOCKS FOR FORT HOOD FAMILIES

Splinters and Threads quilt shop is collecting 6" signature blocks to make quilts for the families who lost loved ones in the Ft. Hood tragedy. They plan to give the completed quilts to the families for Christmas, so they need the blocks asap. I made four of the pictured block and am mailing them off today. If you are interested in joining this effort click on the shop name or the title of this post to connect to the details. They give a sampling of blocks that might be used, or choose your own. Hopefully they will receive so many blocks that they will be able to continue this project in January, to give quilts to those injured as well. It is one small thing we quilters can do to spread a hug and our appreciation for all the military does for us.

CHRISTMAS ORNAMENT SWAP ARRIVES

Today, the mail lady brought my Christmas Ornament Swap. Aren't these sweet??? I just love the batik colors, and the tiny, wonderful workmanship. You only had to make one ornament, but I received a set of three. How lucky is that???

BAH HUMBUG!

Or Humbug Bag I should say!

Here's my little Humbug Bag, all complete. They are called Humbug Bags because they are shaped like the British treat, humbug. Or, humbug also means nonsense, and the tricky shape of the bag is nonsensical. Or the little things you store in it are nonsense. Or, or...........

The inside is a 'quilters' print. And the wrist loop is a repurposed twill from a jelly roll. It had been so long since I put in a zipper that I didn't even recognize my zipper foot! But like riding a bike, it comes right back, and was really pretty easy.

Using normally cast off selvages, it is totally, completely, eco friendly! I think my Humbug Bag will work really well for taking notions to class.

SELVAGE PROJECT

I've been saving selvages for some time, and this weekend decided to get them out and play. This is my first sevage project.

Here's the back side.

I sewed the selvages to the background with a fairly sturdy interfacing in the middle.

You can tell by the ruler on my mat about how big it is. Can anyone guess what I'm making?

VETERAN'S DAY

 

Today in America we are honoring all of our military, past and present. My "USA" things live in this little display in my family room year around. The flag in the photo is from by Dad's casket. He was in the Navy during WWII. My oldest son made the wooden case for it. I didn't make the table topper, but won it at a quilt retreat. Love the patriotic Mickey & Minnie. Doesn't Minnie look great as Betsy Ross? The little angel ornaments are really Christmas, but I leave then out year round. And the framed "America" I made at a Stampin' Up workshop.

I want to say "Thank You" today, and everyday, to all our military men and women.

DJ Christmas Swap

The Dear Jane Alternate group is holding its annual Holiday Swap. We make sets of 5 of DJ blocks in holiday fabrics in gold, red, or green, with white or white-on-white backgrounds. These are the regular tiny 4 1/2" finished size Dear Jane blocks.

My first set is block E-5, Rising Sun.

This one, K-7, Rose of Sharing, is done in Christmas With Aunt Grace fabric, and a white on white background. Don't you love that block name?

Two sets done, four to go.

THE OTHER FIVE

The other five stockings from my Moda Bake Shop Christmas Stocking Ornament set are done. The little squares on the stockings are 1". The stockings are about 3 1/2" by 9", without the hangers.

This project left me with some really neat "crumbs" to play with later!

And the scraps and crumbs fit neatly in the original box.

IT'S HERE!

 

Look what the cute UPS guy in brown shorts brought to my door today! It's Jennifer Chiaverini's newest book, and she is my favorite author. It's a balmy, beautiful, day to go out on the lanai and read in the sunshine and fresh air. I'm a happy camper.

STARS ARRIVE!

There was a squishie in my mail today! Lucky me! Beautiful SBS Christmas Star blocks arrived from Venice (FL). I swapped 10 blocks, and I'm thrilled with the ones I received. I have blocks from Canada, Australia, Ireland, and the USA. Included were blocks from Debbie M. from SBS, Mary Anne, swap hostess, the famous RV Jan, Karen H., from my small swap group, and others. Yippie!!!

CHRISTMAS STOCKING ORNAMENT

Yes, it's Halloween, but I spent this afternoon making a Christmas stocking ornament. It is my first Moda Bakeshop Honeybun project. You get three stockings from one honeybun, and the bakeshop box includes two honeybuns. So, one down, five to go. My kids will be getting homemade ornaments this year!

Now, off to get ready for those scary Trick-or-Treaters, four of whom shall be my grands!

FLIMSY COMPLETE

Today I put the last stitches in my Disappearing Nine Patch, Heart to Heart quilt. All of the hearts (except 2) were swap blocks from women all over the world. So I think I will indeed call this quilt, Heart to Heart.

It is 60 x 83, in the end. Now to find or piece backing fabric. I have left-overs from the top for binding.

HALF-SQUARE TRIANGLE PAPER ON-LINE

There is a great site on the net to print out HST paper in many sizes. It was such a great find, I wanted to share it with you in a post, and have added a link to it on my left gadget bar.

HSTs are used in so many patterns, and this is a super way to create accurate ones.

SPOOLS SWAPPED AND ON DESIGN WALL

These are the lovely spool blocks I received in the swap. The left column, top three are vintage fabrics that I swapped one-on-one. The rest of the column are hostess gifts.

Starting with the second column over, the top row are the ones I made an extra of from each of my sets, so I'd have one to keep.

The 50 blocks below that are from the swap.

I'm planning to make 4 more so I'll have 70 and can set them 7 x 10. I'll likely do an applique border for this quilt.

Another UFO in the pipeline, LOL.

SWAPPING SPOOLS

Today I'm busy swapping out our spool swap. This is only some of the blocks. There were others scattered here and there.

There were 15 participants in the swap, from 3 countries, sending in a total of 96 sets, each with 5 blocks, so that's 480 blocks to swap out.

This was very fun, but I have new found appreciation for gals who hostess the really big swaps! Good for you hostesses!

GIVE AWAY

Pumpkin Patch Primitives is having a Halloween Give Away. Be sure to check it out. It's very generous. You will LOVE the fabrics!

H2H, D9P, CORNER BLOCKS AND BORDERS

Since my quilt is a 'slice-n-dice' type pattern, I decided to use a slice-n-dice heart pattern for the four corners. Here's my corner blocks with the double border fabrics. It's all coming together. Yeah!

HEART-TO-HEART FLIMSY

Today I finished my H2H flimsy, sans borders. Right now it measures 54 1/2" x 72 1/2"

Here's a close up of my intended border fabric. I may make hearts to go in the four corners. Or small heart D9Ps. Or, or...............

HEART TO HEART QUILT

I've decided on this layout for the blocks. This is about half of them.

The more blocks I put on the wall, the more this reminds me of my granddaughters. I won't be giving the quilt to any of them, as these blocks hold precious memories of the makers of the hearts, but perhaps they can sleep under it when they visit.

LAND OF GIANTS

Today I feel like I'm in the Land of the Giants! I'm always making tiny blocks with a million pieces, like DJ and SBS. But today I started my Disappearing Nine Patch Hearts quilt using heart blocks from two swaps I was in last winter. Both the swap on DJ Alternate, called Heart to Heart, or H2H, and the heart swap on my Friendship Swap group had the same guidelines, so the blocks all go together.

You start by making a nine-patch. Since the swaps were 6" squares, the 9-patch was a whopping 18". Huge! The blocks you place in the corners will not be cut, so that's where the hearts go. The center block will end up smallest, so usually you use something darker there.

Here's my first giant 9-patch.

Then you slice it down the center, both vertically and horizontally.

Then you play with the 4 resulting blocks to find an arrangement you like. Here are some of my possibilities, on my design wall.



If your uncut blocks don't have a definite right way up, the possibilities are doubled, or you can start out with two of them (generally diagonally - but there's no rules here) going the opposite direction.
This is really a fun pattern.

ANY WITCH WAY

I just put the last stitches in the binding of my "Any Witch Way" quilt. The pattern calls it a wall quilt, but I'm using it as a table topper.



This is one quilt that I worked on straight from start (Sat. a.m.) to finish, (Mon. p.m.) without it becoming a UFO! Yeah!

SBS, A-10, BACHELOR'S PUZZLE

This week I finished the Sylvia's Bridal Sampler BOW on the first day. I put it off last week and never got to it:-(

FOUR-PATCH POSIE

Have you seen the gorgeous 4-Patch Possie quilts made using only three fabrics! It is like Stack 'n Whack but easier because you are using squares. You can find a complete tutorial to make this quilt on webshots.

Here's a link to a video display of this technique.

I think I definitely need to add this to my to-do list.

CRACKER QUILT

Yesterday I finished this quilt. The blocks are from my Friendship Block Swap group. Each year we have a signed block swap. We made and signed Cracker blocks this year, in scrappy fabrics, so that no one would be left out in hard economic times, for not having the right color or style of fabric.

In lieu of a label I made one additional block and in the signature area, put the label information.

This is the fastest time from receiving blocks to completed quilt in my swap history. I only got them last Sat. -- mine took the long route from St. Pete to Winter Garden, LOL!