Sewing the Day Away

Good morning, my friends. It was a very good Sewturday yesterday. I got a lot done in the sewing room. You might recall that when I left the sewing room Friday afternoon, I was in the process of making two "Rosebud" blocks for the Girls' Getaway quilt.

I'd never made this block before. It looked complicated, but it actually went together pretty easily. When I had them all sewn together, they looked like this.

The pieced blocks for this quilt will be placed around the outer edge of the quilt. Some require a "spacer" to make them fit. The only thing I needed for these two was to add the spacer, and they were finished.

There are just two more blocks needed to finish all the sections of the Girls' Getaway quilt. Next time I work on this, I'll make two of these blocks, called "Double-X." This is the picture from the pattern cover.

Next up, I went to work making two more blocks for the Shop Hop 4.0 quilt. This time around I made a block for The Kentucky Quilt Company in Bowling Green, Kentucky. We were in Bowling Green to see a lot of different things. The quilt shop was just a bonus. Having visited a horse ranch while we were in Georgetown, I selected this fabric.

Also, I made a block for Be Sew Creative in Las Cruces, New Mexico. This was one of the friendliest shops I've visited. I spent some time chatting with the women who worked there, and described my project. They suggested this fabric. Apparently Dia de los Muertos is cause for a big celebration in Las Cruces, and I really liked this fabric.

These are the eight blocks I have for this quilt so far.

In yesterday's post, I wondered if I had any more fabrics to add to this quilt. As it turns out, there are still two more. This one, from Never Enough Stitches in Moab, Utah. I had occasion to visit this brand new shop in Moab when I ran out of embroidery floss. They didn't have the floss, but I still enjoyed their shop.

And this one from Licensed to Sew in Hamilton Missouri. I ended up buying a full yard of this one. I've had good luck fussy-cutting quilt blocks from fabrics like this to use as cornerstones in some of my quilts. This was one of the shops I visited the day I spent at Missouri Star Quilt Company in Hamilton, Missouri.

The finished quilt will have 16 blocks, and so far I've accumulated just 10 fabrics. I know I'll find more when we make our trip to Alaska. In the meantime, a new shop is opening near my home. Their grand opening is next weekend, and so I'm sure I'll pick up one more while I'm there. 

That will mean I need to visit at least five more shops while we're traveling in Canada and Alaska. Boo hoo. Too bad. So sad. I'm sure you're all crying in your coffee at this bit of bad news. 

Tracing the names and places for those blocks was my last gasp of the sewing day, but finishing two more blocks for the Shop Hop quilt was the last item on my list of WIP's. Now I've moved to the "Quilter's Choice" section of my white board. This is where I choose a short project as a little vacation from my "meat and potatoes" projects.

I've already done one photo quilt when I completed the "Circus" piece. No peeking until May 1st.

Also included on my white board is a list of patterns I might choose as a "fun finish." Fun finishes are small quilts that can be completed in less than a week or so. Part of the reason I added this "Quilter's Choice" section to my white board was so that I could enjoy making seasonal quilts when some holiday approached, and so when I saw the "Easter Egg Table Runner" on this list, it seemed like a viable candidate.

It took me a little searching to find the pattern, and I have absolutely no idea when I printed this off. Probably, it's been years. It was a four-part series to make this runner.

Paging through the printed papers, I realized I'd missed some sections, and so I printed a fresh pattern, and I'll start there today.

Heading upstairs, I found Smitty enjoying the catwalk on his catio. They can sit on the catwalk without getting rained on.

And since I am an annoying cat mom, I can't resist tapping on the window to get him to look in my direction. Does he look annoyed to you?

Okay, so this morning, I'll start on the Basil block for the Kitchen Herbs project.

I spent a little extra time on this yesterday, and finished the Chives block.

This being Sunday, I'll link up to

It's back to the old grind for me today. Sewturday is over. It's a day for a Bowflex workout, and I have one of my larger housekeeping chores on the to-do list. There should still be plenty of time for sewing when all of that is done. Right now...Sunday morning blueberry oatmeal pancakes. It's a good way to start the week.