Last night I was innocently reading through some blogs and somehow I ended up at this post.  I just LOVED the quilt pictured there (a modern scrappy baby quilt) and remembered that I had a mini charm pack of High Street that I bought during the summer. 

I quickly pieced these 21 blocks, fun-fun.  But then what to do? I have yardage of a couple of the High Street line but not enough. (of course)

So this morning I pulled out some leftover batik jelly roll strips that coordinated and cut a bunch (168) squares and the grey background squares  and had a fun time chain piecing.  

See all those little triangles below the blocks?  Yep, they're the cut offs that I couldn't throw away--I'm going to sew them together for what... I don't know yet.

 With the batik ones, I sewed a 2nd line 1/2 inch from the 1st one so when I trimmed the triangle off it was already sewn together.
 It took only a little more time

  and now these are all done and pressed too.
I'm going to trim off all the little dog ears while watching the Pens game tonight.

In between chain piecing, I pressed the Metro Ring units I had 90+ to press and it seemed to take forever.
They are finally all done and now to trim them all to size.

I took a little break and gave Mr Otis a bath.  He was not too pleased with that but I'm happy to have a clean pupper doodle again.  He was exhausted and took a nice long nap by the fire.

I'm going to need my design wall to lay out the new baby quilt blocks, so I was forced (heh-heh) to start the sashing on the bl-a-days. I'm pretty sure these will be 2 lap size quilts instead of one twin.  I don't have enough of the green fabric I'm using for all the blocks anyway.  I spent about 20 minutes messing around with a scrappy sashing but just couldn't get into it and didn't want to spend more time than necessary to get these done.  

I've done another row of SID on Jonquils & Stars but it's languishing.  

I'm hoping for at least another pass or two tomorrow.

******

OK so here was the design wall on Saturday.

About 5 minutes after taking this picture, the Twister Jack was taken down.   Something had to give and he was it!  I think having him up there and knowing it would require a huge chunk of time to do the "twister-ing up" was really bogging my mind down.  I'd come downstairs to work and see him and mentally feel a twinge "OH Man it's almost Halloween--gotta get that done"   :(

 Here's what's on the design walls now:

3 anvil blocks

I got the pattern here.

I "made" another slab of blue yesterday too.

 The two Urban Runner's are together and waiting for quilting.

I mentioned in my last post that I got Amanda's latest pattern.
While I was working on the Urban runner's I kept seeing the pattern sitting there begging me to stop everything and make it.
I didn't go that far but I did sew the panels for the front and back together.  I thought I'd just 'get started' on them but it was fun and once started how can you stop?  It did take me a couple hours and that's when I also pieced the blue slab.
So two things done at once, even though neither was what I started with;
sorta works-right?? 

I was on a sewing roll and spied the leftover curved pieces from this quilt.

And just sewed them together in a crazy rainbow-ish stack-no idea what will become of this- I'll stick it in a backing if nothing else.

But I feel better that it's sewn and not just sitting there.

I finally cut out the pieces for the Urban Pods bag I've been wanting to make for 3 months at least--going to try to get them sewn together today.

And I am still working on learning to use  rulers on my HQ.

It was frustrating and slow going at first.
AND that is an understatement!!

All thumbs I was.

Yes, see that bobble, I think my thumb was in the way...very difficult for me to keep my big fat thumb out of the way at first.
Now if it happens I get mad---I know better!

 I am gradually noticing I'm able to manipulate the ruler with more ease. I'm s-l-o-w-l-y figuring it out and just realized this morning that I can start/stop the machine without having to think about it or hit the wrong button on the handle.
I know that sounds funny, but having to concentrate on holding the ruler correctly--level, straight, just the right amount of pressure, make sure my thumb is out of the way-- AND start the machine and THEN start moving the machine was a lot for my brain to do.

I guess I'm starting to have a 'flow' going.  So progress on that front as well!

I started quilting the X's quilt thinking I would SID along all the pieced seams and do any design -with different rulers- in each of the blue areas.   

That  kind of worked for the first row.

But this is what happened.
I was doing too many new things at once and stinking at them all.
Not a good way to learn and feel like I was ever going to get it.

So I changed the plan to SID along all the seams to stabilize the quilt.
It's now off the machine and I can go back to it when I have some more free time and work on one design or with one ruler at a time.

just wanted to show the DW real quick.  Happy Jack is waiting patiently to be sewn into rows.

The guild BOM is still being scrutinized.  I did find a leftover Bl-a-Day block that worked so I stuck it in (12 inch star block bottom left).  The layout will definitely change...

I did start sewing the leftover blocks, yardage and FQ chunks from Curve It Up for the backing.  

I am itching to start on either of these.  

But so far I'm showing great restraint.

Tonight I sewed on the final curved borders on my quilt top.

I'm hoping tomorrow to start piecing the backing from all the leftover chunks of fabric I have and a couple blocks that didn't make it into the front.

After taking this down, I started organizing all the fabrics I got on the Shop Hop last week.  There was stuff piled everywhere. Once I got things under control, I pulled out my Christmas BOM blocks from the guild.  Our show is the end of Oct. and the ladies who organized the BOM are hoping we get our tops done and entered in the show as a separate display.  I sorta got tired of working on them so this is all I have.

first layout

second layout

3rd

I had to dig through my scraps and found a couple 3.5 inch strips that I pieced to get the last  few plain blocks with the background! whew.

This is going to sit for a day or two.

One of the patterns I bought on Shop Hop was Happy Jack.

I started cutting out 3.5 inch squares for it.

too cute.

  

Design Wall Monday

This is a sample block of MetroRings 

I purchased the pattern and one for Metro Hoops so I could take the patterns with me on Shop Hop this week and get the fabrics for it.

This is Jenny's curved interpretation of the classic Double Wedding ring block.  I've never been a big fan of DWR probably because most that I've seen are done in 30's feed sack colors, which I am not fond of, and also those pieced arcs--yikes!

After downloading the pattern and reading it over, I thought perhaps I better sew a sample before spending a lot of $.  

~~wisdom comes with age~~

The  pieced arcs are sewn first using 2.5 inch strips-I used a partial jelly roll I had.

Of course I don't have enough of the jelly roll left to make the entire quilt.

But that's OK. This block is going to be a pillow gift.  Pillows are happening a lot here lately!

I did have enough of the jelly roll and some random 2.5 inch strips in the bin for the Metro Rings quilt.  woo-hoo 

*****

Today I am going to try to get the signature quilt as together as I can.

I still need two signature blocks returned to me but I can get most of it together.

scattered...

just like these photos. 

Thought I should pop in and document what's going on in the sewing room.

Lots.

Too much.

This is the back of Swirled Christmas Trees 

all leftover stash pieces.

***********

The start of a long project I fear.  

Meghan loved the purple yo-yo quilt I quilted for a customer.

She wanted one. I said 'oh we could do it together if you like--I'll show you, it's more of a craft thing than a quilt thing....'

I bought the yo-yo maker.  I made one.  

Meghan came down a few days later while I was working on something else and started fiddling with the yo-yo's  (be still my heart).  I tried to ignore her--ie: not pounce and scare her away ya know.

Finally, she asked how this works.  I calmly got up and went through the steps, trying to keep ALL signs of over EXCITEMENT out of my voice.

I showed her how to line up the front and back. I picked up the already threaded needle and said 'and then you just sew through the holes' like this.

She blanched (not an exaggerated word for effect)

Her: WHAT? you have to sew this?  YOU TRICKED me!!

(yep, she actually said 'you tricked me')

Me, laughing:  What are you talking about this is how you make them?

Her:  I didn't know we had to SEW them!

Me: well, yah, that's how you make them, how did you think it worked?

Her:  I thought you just popped them in and out of this thing and it was done somehow.

Oh my shattered dreams.......

This picture shows the first Three yo-yo's.

409 (yes, four hundred and nine) are all that is needed.

sigh......

*******

My guild's Christmas BOM blocks.  I will be taking out the applique globe one and just making the pieced ones.  (they give us both pieced and applique patterns every month) I thought it was required that we make both. I was going to give up the project.

  It's not required.  

So I'm not.

I love it when I get all rebel-y.

******

Thread catchers.  I started making these while I was pulling stash for the back of the Christmas swirls quilt (see above).  I had some nice pieces and had been thinking of making some of these for either the guild's silent auction at the end of the year and/or the guild's show gift boutique.  I ran out of the strapping to finish them. Hubby is going to bring some home next time he gets a delivery.  I use the stuff that they put around boxes.  It's perfect and free. And another example of how/why things don't get finished around here.

******

Christmas Swirls quilted with swirls

am I an original or what????  

:)

I do love this and have the binding made-same aged muslin as the background.

I'm thinking of sewing it on and then taking it to retreat so I can hand sew it to the back when I get tired of piecing.  

Right!  Like that's going to happen-stop piecing to hand sew binding....

I probably won't work on it but I might and I do so like dragging everything with me when I go on retreat so take it I will.

Unless, of course, I finish it before retreat.

buwhahhahahahaaha.

*********

 My design wall.

starting at the left.  

My urban candy blocks:  no work on them for weeks.  I have all the pieces cut and they will be going on retreat with me.

The lime green and blue * asterisk* block-ain't it cute.  I saw it in a book I was looking through at JoAnn's last week and just wanted to see if I could make one when I got home...uh-huh so now what to do.

The 2 blocks with blue background are another block I saw in a book and thought would be cool to use for the strings I have.  It looks like the bottom left of the first block has a chunk cut out, but that is a little note with how I made it pinned to it so I don't forget.  Four blocks sewn together forms an "X".
These are going on retreat with me too.

Dresdens: The fifth and final row with sashing sewn on is last, if I ever get off this computer and get dressed I'd like to take the 10 minutes to sew it on to the bottom of the quilt, for pity's sake why do I put this kind of easy thing off.

  ********

My sewing table-and hence this posts' title 

SCATTERED

holy mackerel!

and yes that is a Christmas wreath above the fire place.
It's seen better days and I had it sitting by the door to get rid of it (before Christmas) and then I didn't so I stuck it up there on an empty nail and forgot about it
until now.
*******

fun times, fun times.

Life is good.

The mailman brought

more than bills and junk mail today!

I've been lurking, snooping looking at wool related blogs lately, and I found Three Sheep Studio . Rose was having a little giveaway and I thought what the heck!

Well I won!  How awesome.

And today the little package arrived.

It's a Beaded Berries Kit with lovely wool too!  I will be making a blueberry strawberry-how fun.

Thanks so much Rose!

*****

In other news, I had the day off today! woo-hoo.  My to do list was so long and in my head (I should have written it down) that I woke up at 4:30am and couldn't go back to sleep.  It's 6:15 pm as I write this and I'm still going strong.  

I started sewing at about 6am and am so happy that I got my block a day blocks together, one more flimsy.

It needs a name. I'll work on that at some point.  I really should get a label made while I'm on the computer and thinking about it. It measures 68 x 90.

I think it's pretty cool.

I've been sewing my Dresden sashing together as my Leader/ender I have a bunch of twosies of 2.5" squares and thought I better sew a few together and audition them to be sure I like it.

I do like it. I cut some of the background fabric for the setting squares and I like that too.

The other side of my design wall has all the other projects I have going on right now-I think that's all of them.

Oh I don't have my guild's block a month up there but that's not anything I can work on until I get the next months pattern.  The piece on the bottom left is some more block a day's that I put together at the beginning of the year, never really decided what to do with it. I'm thinking now of just adding a border and calling it a table topper and just get on with it.

I do have to get going on this.

 

  I want it done for Christmas. I got the pattern sometime this year, early too. Oops, may have just jinxed myself.

Oh and today I mentioned Thanksgiving 

(we have it here) just casually but still, it's been spoken about

time is sure flying by.

Dresden plates

I made a new "list of things to do". It's taped to the side of my sewing machine.  The last one worked really well.  I don't put anything like 

TO BE DONE THIS WEEK!! on it.

I just list some things and leave it open ended.  

It's keeping me on task without making me stressed.  

The Dresden's are on the list.  You may recall how I posted about wanting to set these on point.  Well, I'm over that.  

*smile*

The setting is going to be 4 x 5 plus sashing and borders.  I will aim for a nice queen size for my bed.  

The above picture was taken yesterday morning after the rearrangement. I now have all the plates made and only 5 more to blanket stitch to their foundations, woo-hoo.

You can see I still only have 4 NY Beauty blocks made.  I do need to make at least one soon here so I don't forget the technique!

And a way down at the end of the wall are 8 random block-a-days.  I want to put them together with a solid fabric--saw an inspiration  quilt for it on Pinterest; forgot to pin it or pinned to wrong board (done that before)-- but that's OK as I saw another inspiration quilt today. 

***

Last Saturday Paul-michael called.  

He was in the 'burgh and wanted to know if he could stop for a little visit before having to head back to Emmitsburg on Sunday morning.

"HECK YAH, come on over!"  I said calmly.  ;)

After lunch he and Meg went out on the deck.

I was cleaning up and spied them out the kitchen window.

One of those moments, 

                  nothing special really 

but it made my heart swell.

You know what I mean.  

 Sometimes life is so good it wells up and leaks out my eyes.