All Tulips, All the Time

Good morning, my friends, and welcome to September. It’s been feeling pretty fall-like here. Gazing out the window this morning, the sky is overcast…or maybe it’s smoke. Skies were smoky yesterday evening from a fire across the valley from us. We’re in no danger where we are, but the smoke was a little eerie when you consider there isn’t a breath of wind.

It was a pretty easy-going day yesterday. There was a quick trip to the grocery store, but I was home by lunchtime. After that, I had the afternoon to sew. The first step was to sandwich Tulip Time for quilting. It’s a small quilt at 26 x 28 inches, and so that was pretty easy.

I might have quilted this on my domestic machine, but the mid-arm was already threaded with the threads I wanted to use, and so the mid-arm was my choice. I quilted some veins into the leaves and just a couple of wavy lines for the stems.

For the flower a little swirl on the sides and a pointy oval with an echo (technical quilting terms) for the center.

And that’s how that looks. All the flowers were done the same way.

For the pinwheels, I did my go-to swirl. Sometimes I make the swirl point in the same direction all around. For this, I had them facing opposite directions to make a little heart shape. In the green borders, I used the motif Lori Kennedy calls “paperclip.” I like this motif, and use it often.

In the outer border, I quilted a ferny leafy feather.

And then, the quilting was finished. It took about two hours.

Here’s a peek at the back.

Now it’s downstairs in the sewing room. I’ve squared it up.

Today I’ll sew on the binding. You can see the binding fabric on the right side of the image below.

It was getting late in the day by then, and so I stopped. I’ll pick it up there this afternoon. This being September, it’s time to choose a project for September’s

We’re going to be traveling this month and part of next month, and so any sewing will be slow-stitching. It seems a good choice to commit to finishing the Plaid Cat in the Garden for September’s goal. There’s a lot of stitching to be done on this piece, but I should be able to finish it before month’s end.

I’m planning to trace the next blocks for the “Snowmen & Reindeer” and for “Home is Where My Flock Is,” and that should keep me busy while we’re traveling. It’s never good when I have a stitching emergency on the road.

Today’s top priority will be to finish the binding on Tulip Time. Possibly, I can finish the hand-sewing too. It’s also time to make September’s purple block for the Inverted Stars project. If I finish September’s block before we go, I won’t fall behind. October’s block can be done after we get back.

When that’s finished, I’m going to finish this table runner for the Santa Quartet. I’ve yet to go pawing through my stash of Christmas fabrics, but I feel fairly certain I can find something appropriate there.

There are a few other things on today’s agenda, but nothing major. It seems a good time to suck up the calm before the storm of packing starts next week. I’m happy to have these smaller projects I can work on for the time being.

Okay, so that’s all I have for you today. I’m looking forward to another easy-going day today. I hope your day is easy-going as well.