Pitty Party

Good morning, my friends. Hopefully, nobody lost any fingers in yesterday's Fourth of July festivities. True story:  My brother once tried to put out a Roman candle by sticking it into the sand. Just one problem: He had the burning end in his hand and stuck the unlit end in the sand. Meanwhile, the thing shot a fireball right into the palm of his hand. It was a serious injury that had his hand out of commission for quite some time. So...hopefully, none of you did anything like that yesterday. 

We had a quiet day. No plans, and leftovers for dinner. I started the day weighing out the cherries we'd picked the day before. As it turned out, I needed four cups more for the cherry crisp I wanted to bake, and so we spent a short time collecting more cherries. And then...pitting. This is the most time-consuming part of working with cherries.

So, I started out by baking the Cast Iron Skillet Cherry Crisp. We had that with a scoop of vanilla ice cream last night. Tasty.

While that was baking, I pitted 8 lbs. of cherries and turned them into Sweet Cherry Pie Filling. My yield was 9 pints. Sadly a tenth jar broke in the canner…one assumes from thermal shock. The jars were warm when I put them into the boiling water bath, but apparently not warm enough. It didn’t make too much of a mess, and so it was more a disappointment than anything else. 

It was after lunch time by then. I had some lunch and a short nap, and then I went to work quilting the border for Ruth’s Legacy.

And now, the quilting is finished. It’s ready for binding.

Here’s a peek at the back.

And then there was plenty of time left to sew together the final block for the Stair Steps quilt. Hallelujah!

Then I sewed all five blocks into a row.

Smitty helped me lay the rest of the quilt out flat…

And I could sew the final row to the bottom of the quilt. Yay! It’s a huge quilt at 81 x 97 inches. Now that it’s all sewn together, it’s easier to see the diagonal strips of color.

It still needs a back. I haven’t looked through my stash, but I’m reasonably certain I’ll need to go shopping for this. Probably, I’ll wait until the last Saturday of the month. There’s a quilt shop about an hour south of me that will give 25% off backing fabric if you bring in a finished quilt top. It’s been a while since I’ve visited a quilt shop. Looking for a backing fabric seems like a good reason to go.

Having the Stair Steps quilt top finished means a slot has opened up on my WIPs dance card. The quilt pictured below will be added to the list. I mentioned this in an earlier post. Somewhere I saw this image. I don’t know where or when. I don’t even know the name of the pattern.

It inspired me to dig out the two fabrics on either side of the image below. These are such pretty fabrics, but I’ve struggled to find a way to use them. They are large scale fabrics, and so they need a pattern that will show off the design. The green was purchased a month or two ago with this quilt in mind. All I have is a picture…no pattern…and I’ve come up with my own measurements for sewing the blocks together. 

Next, I’ll need to look at how much fabric I have to be certain I have enough. I have in mind to use the butterfly fabric (on the left) where the large square is framed in light blue and black. I’ll use the green where the light blue appears. In the blocks with four squares and the black +, I’ll use the leaf fabric where the mottled blue appears. Possibly I’ll have to make some adjustments if my fabrics won’t stretch far enough, but I’m still working that part out. This project will be called “Butterfly Garden.” I’m still deciding whether to make the blocks one or two rows at a time. It’ll depend on how long it takes.

So, I haven’t decided whether to start on the new project now, or whether to wait until my list of WIPs comes around again. By rights, I should be making another row of blocks for the Jawbreakers quilt below. Possibly I’ll let the new project take cuts ahead of it. High drama…I know.

Okay so yesterday’s comings and goings took care of the hardest parts of things. Finishing off the final block for Stair Steps was the hardest part of that project. When I could sew the blocks into a row and finish the quilt top, it felt like I was getting a new lease on life. Also, I’ve pitted most of the cherries. Yesterday’s batch probably worked out to about ten pounds. Today I’ll make some Cherries in Simple Syrup. It’s the main ingredient in my favorite cherry cobbler. There are only six pounds to pit today, and the recipe is an easy one. Probably I’ll hoe the garden, and that should still leave plenty of time for sewing.

So that’s it from this end. Enjoy the rest of your holiday weekend, Everybody.