What I'm Up To

Last weekend I spent a day sewing with some of my quilting friends.  I didn't want to arrive empty handed, so I made pincushions for each of them using some of my scraps.  I was inspired by Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts.  I adore her blog.  Go check it out!  The top center pincushion below was made using one of her tutorials.  I was inspired by some of her other pincushion pictures to make a few of the others.  I used some previously made HST on a few and tried improv piecing (or as close as I ever care to get) on another.

Hopefully you can tell this is supposed to be a spool of Aurifil.  I should have quilted diagonal lines on it to make it look more realistic though.
This one is all made from Lori Holt fabric.  The HST finished at 1/2".  I may be crazy.  Ha ha!  It didn't seem so bad when they were 1" squares before sewing.  These HST were all trimmings from previous blocks.  Any time I trim off triangles, I sew the extra seam in to make new HST.  I'm happy to have used some of them.
Last week I mentioned I'd pulled out a project from 2005 (designed by Kimberly Einmo).    I think every block was a different size!  Since my piecing wasn't the best, I decided not to worry overmuch if things didn't line up just so, and just went for it.  So now the bulk of the top is assembled.  I have the first row of the borders assembled and partially sewn on.  Then there are three more borders after that.  

I also have been spending a lot of time this week trimming the blocks I sewed over the weekend.  I'm quite thankful for the rotating cutting mat and the Bloc-Loc ruler on these!  It felt like the never ending cutting job.  In reality there are around 240 of them.  Next up on this project is deciding on a layout.
I'm more than halfway done with the binding on the S'mores quilt, so I decided I needed a new handwork project.  I'm planning to work on this cross stitch kit.  I think I previously put in about 30 stitches before setting it aside a good number of years ago.

I'd also mentioned that we bought a bunch of magnets from Harbor Freight to assist me in putting quilts onto the longarm frame.  We purchased three of the magnetic tool holders (free this week with coupons!  Boo, missed that one!  Those things are like $12 a piece) and also some rectangular magnets.  We found a 3D printed magnet holder pattern on Thingiverse, and I wanted pink, so we ordered some filament from Monoprice.  It finally came last Friday and it took a good day to print four handles.  Here they are, mostly ready, but probably needing another coat of clear over the magnets since they were giving off black smears and I don't want that on my fabric.  By the way, these puppies are STRONG!!!  I was trying to set them near each other and they snapped together like this.  So if you choose to go this route, please exercise caution!


Oh, and I signed up for round 4 of the BC Barn Quilt Swap and should receive my partner assignment soon.  This is my favorite swap, and the only one I seem to sign up for at all anymore, with the exception of my guild swap.  I'd be open to a private swap of mini minis as well.  Follow my Instagram feed (over at the right---->) to see my progress on the barn quilt swap.  

Enjoy your long weekend!  Our school summer starts this weekend and right now it's looking like it will be a whirlwind of activities, appointments, and, unfortunately, jury duty for me. :(

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