Some Blocks

It was an easy-going day at home yesterday. I got some embroidery done and I did some housework. Also, I tackled Mt. Laundry...a mountain I climb with a fair amount of regularity. Did you happen to see those guys who climbed El Capitan recently? Why do they get all the credit when women (and men) all around the country climb Mt. Laundry week after week. I'm telling you, we don't get no respect around here. Hmph.

In addition to all of that, I finished the first block of the retirement quilt I'm making for my friend, Lisa. You can read all about it in my post from yesterday.

Here's the original block submitted by Lisa's daughter and four of her granddaughters:

Here it is rendered into fabric.

I neglected to reverse the applique, and so I had to make a mirror image of the block. Also, I'm realizing I need to trim the applique and apply some fray check. Some of those little areas are quite narrow, and so I zigzag stitched all around it. Still, I'm thinking a little fray check will give it a cleaner edge.

So, I didn't really expect to finish that block in one sitting, but it went together faster than I expected.

With that finished, I got to work on the next set of blocks for the Mumm's the Word quilt I've been working on since I was 12 years old. Not really. It only seems that way. I started this project way back in August of 2012. It feels good to be getting some work done on some of the oldest of the old projects. The two blocks I did yesterday were the cat blocks:

This was a six-installment year-long free project from Debbie Mumm in 2012. It was created to celebrate her 25th year in business. Hopefully, I'll finish the quilt before she's been in business for another 25 years, because I don't think I'll live that long. Anyway, here's how the whole quilt will look when its finished:

You can see the cat blocks in the bottom row. With these finished I've completed the blocks from January through June. July's installment contains the four-patches and stars around the border, and that's where I'll pick up next time I work on this project.

Today is a swimming day, and I need to run a few errands. (Don't you hate those errand-running-around days?) I have a couple of small housework chores today, and then I'm hoping I'll have some time left to make two more sets of blocks for the Yard Art quilt...a quilt I've been working almost as long as Debbie Mumm. If I'm to meet my goal for the month, I'll need to make two more sets just like this:

When those are finished, I'll have six out of ten block sets completed. When the quilt is finished, it'll look like this:

I started this project in November of 2012. It's another whose time to be finished up has come.

So that's a tall order for one day, but you know me: Determined. Off I go.