I didn’t do much for April fools day, saw a few cute “jokes”, but it’s been an uneventful first week of April. Just stitching away on the mermaid and the Starburst quilt. I also finished the Swedish Postcard look-a-like top. It is similar, but slightly different, as my color choices were influenced by what I had in my stash. I am proud to say that no new fabric was purchased for this quilt top.

The mermaid cross stitch is really starting to come together, there is an actual tail fin depicted now. I am having mixed feelings about the metallic threads. In the upper section I used one strand, and on the tail I used two strands. I like that the color shows a bit more in the two strands, but it looks a bit bulky. It is a bit difficult to stitch with two strands, and get it to lay evenly. I am leaning towards clipping the double threads out and replacing with singles. It still gives a bit of sparkle, but not as textured.

The Starburst quilt is a a lesson in repetitions. Each block has to be measured, and then the design has to be sized to fit. About ten steps for each diamond, there are thirty two, and there are thirty two squares. I will have to turn this quilt to do the borders on the sides. All in all it is considered a semi-custom, the next one will be an E2E – and a simple one at that.

Funny thing, yesterday we got an invitation to another baby shower. Very good friends of ours are going to become grandparents of twin boys in August. The shower is April 20th, in Syracuse NY. My husband jokingly asked if I was going to make them quilts and send them in time. Ha ha, no, not this time. We sent something from the registry, ultimately Amazon. I’ll get started on the twin quilts soon.

I am going away for a few weeks this Saturday. Kinda looking forward to closing the shop for a bit and not being with my machines. Hoping to come back ready to sew. I need to get a few things together to work on while on the planes and in my free time. I have a few small cross stitch patterns that I got recently. If I use Aida cloth, I don’t need my magnifier, and can get by with readers. I should bring the appliqué blocks for the Message in a Bottle quilt. They are prepped and small enough to tuck into a carryon. Just need a spool of thread and a small thread clipper, I can get a few done on the four hour flight. Which reminds me, a need a few good books too.

Be Kind.

This past week has been one of lots of sewing, and lots of ripping. I managed to finish the Starburst top and get it ironed. It is neatly folded and waiting for its turn on the long arm. I received the ordered backing for it too. I had it relaxing on the frame for its pinning on, but had to refold it due to a different quilt that needed quilting asap.

After finishing the Starburst top I really needed a palette cleanser, something with right angles and straight seams. I remembered I had one more Peter rabbit panel that I had bought to finish up all the scraps from the other PR quilts I finished last year. The panel arrived with a slit cut into the side of it. I couldn’t return it or complain because I couldn’t remember who I bought it from, or exactly when. I figured I had to cut it anyway and I could add another border. After carefully measuring and centering the panel I added two off white strips and started sewing the rest of the quilt top together. The blocks are 5 inch squares, and four carrots and six radishes. The veggie blocks were made using the folded corner technique and used solid colored scraps. Flash back to Awesome Ocean quilts. Those blocks took a few hours to make, especially the radish tops. The squares went together easily enough. It came time to put everything together and it didn’t work. My additional borders were too small. After much ripping and remeasuring I adjusted them and found that they were too large. More ripping and resewing ensued, for a total of four times – exasperating. This was supposed to be my easy no brainer project, I actually had to put it down and leave the room for a few hours. I did finish it the next day.

Once again I found I was in need of something simple to make. While sorting through my solids scraps and pieces (for the veggies) I realized I had enough colors to make a Postcards from Sweden quilt. I printed out the pattern and the colors needed and made up some stick on labels. I found each color, or its equivalent, cut the squares and labeled them. There are 36 colors of squares and I have them all ready to go. Also I neatened up my solid stash a bit, it now all fits in the bin. Then the squirrels popped up.

I started thinking about the up coming baby shower I will be attending soon. It’s for my nephew and his wife, their first baby and my first grand nephew. I thought I could give them the newly completed Thomas the Tank Engine scrappy quilt. I foolishly went to see their gift registry to see if I could get a feel for the colors/theme of the nursery. It is a Winnie the Pooh theme. I remembered that I had seen a cute baby quilt kit for the newish Riley Blake WtP fabric line. I found one and ordered it, along with a second panel, a 5″square pack and a few yards of coordinating fabric. I figured I could use the pattern to make another quilt for the shop while I was at it. The fabric arrived on Tuesday (a day early) and I had it all cut and ready to sew for the next day. This top went together with very little trouble, I had it loaded on the frame and quilting by dinner time. I’m going to finish it today, so it’ll be ready for Saturday.

My stitching on the mermaid tail is continuing, I have been stitching in the day a bit more. Possibly to alleviate the stress of the quilt top sewing. The shape of the tail is really starting to look like something and it is getting easier to add too. I use a disappearing marker to highlight stitch symbols to help with the confetti areas.

Be Kind.

Y-seams aren’t for whimps. This quilt is making me, or rather the making of this quilt, has me taking deep breaths and short breaks. I knew after reading through the directions the first time just what was involved. I have made quite a few Y-seam quilts, diamonds and stripes and hexagons, and eight pointed stars. This one really has my patience at an end. I have ripped so many seams and re-sewn them. It is a top now, and today I will put the borders on, all five of them, and it will be finished. I will have to steam and press the whole thing to make sure there aren’t any volcanoes or other wonkiness. The very center is a big conglomeration of points, I think I may use a mallet to flatten them. One of the more nagging issues I had was sewing the black sections together with black thread. I have very good lighting in my sewing room and on my machine, also have a window at my back that gets indirect light. I struggled to see those y intersections, and I am admitting to “making do” here. Fortunately the black fabric pieces will blend once the quilting happens and I think it’ll all work out.

I did find a specific quilting set that was made for this quilt at Wasatch Quilting. I was looking for a diamond or swirling pantograph when I came upon it. I am hoping that it is dense enough, but not too much backtracking. It is similar to the Gravity quilt I quilted a while ago. I am thinking of using a variegated purple and green thread to break up the black fields. The backing is a green leafy print on white, I want to stay with a light color bobbin.

I would really like to get this done today, so I can get it on the frame. I am also getting itchy to start another quilt, maybe one of the kits I have, definitely one with lots of ninety degree angles.

In cross stitch news, I am making progress on the mermaids tail. Lots of counting and color changes. I am getting the “rhythm” of it though, learning the color symbols and shading. This is stitching more like a whole cloth piece, which is a bit different from the motifs of Consider the Lilies. I am waiting until the end to do the bead work, as I am using a smaller hoop and I don’t want to be crushing the beads when I have to move it to another area. I have used a bit of the metallic threads, in the bra area, but I may just leave those to the end also. The colors of my project are the same as in the finished photo. My camera is seeing them not so pretty today.

Be Kind.

Consider the Lilies started 08/23 as part of a SAL with Jo Kramer of Jo’s Country Junction. She has since moved on to other things.

Projects finished in-between:

• Manor House 2025
• Fabulous houses 2025
• Birth Sampler 2025
• Punch needle Halloween 2024
• Halloween cat/moon 2024
• Snowman pillow 2025

I had put this project on the back burner when I started the Fabulous houses in January 2024. Once finished with that house-a-month, I pulled everything out, once again, into my stitching area. I have a chair and light with a Lowery stand set up with a small cart in a corner of my bedroom. All of my stitching supplies are in the sewing room, this little spot stays neat and organized for the one project I am working on.

I have been steadily working on this since restarting it last May. I put it aside for June and July to do a Birth Sampler. Then restarted with the intent to finish by the end of 2025.

Once the Summer was over, I worked at a more steady pace. I put the last stitches in on 3/10/26.

I’m not sure how I want to frame this, it’s large, I will need to go get a foam core board and figure out how much of an outer border of white I want to show. A mat might be nice too, but it would add more size. Stitching this piece reminded me of making a tapestry, like the medieval ones. People spent hours and hours on them, with little light and limited materials. Well, that part isn’t similar, but telling a story with the stitching is. I think that’s why I enjoyed stitching the Long Dog Sampler of Pilgrims Progress, the story of the stitching.

Be Kind.

Sew many pieces together and make a block or two or 32. I have been sewing the blocks for the star bright quilt the past few days. Each diamond log cabin has 17 pieces and 7 colors, all on a paper foundation. I think that trying to make this block without a foundation would be a terrible idea. Maybe if there was a special ruler involved, but the chances for error are great, seam allowances are very important in getting this block to be the right size. I read ahead to the construction phase, and Y seams are employed, imagine trying to get wonky diamonds to play nice. I have an older UFO that suffered from a similar construction mishap. It was (is) the maze pattern called Labyrinth Walk, lots of diamonds and bias edges. I’m still not ready to re-start that one, it might just get culled in next years de-cluttering.

I am hoping to finish these blocks up today. Although I have 5 that I have to wait for more fabric to come for. I mistakenly didn’t order enough of the graphite gray, and was short a few strips. 27 blocks done is a good start, and the complimentary blocks are a bit simpler. Strip piecing and more assembly line cutting.

I am trying to find an appropriate pantograph for the Starry Nights quilt. There are some zodiac themed ones out there, but none that will work for me. I am toying with the idea of making my own, I have the software, and sort of the knowledge. I want to do something like this print, the symbols for the signs in a swirly pattern. How hard could it be? The hardest part is setting up the laptop and remembering how to use the windows program -ew.

I am almost finished with the last page of the Consider the lilies cross stitch. I have five more motifs and five more border flowers. Yesterday I devoted a few hours of time to it, mostly while talking on the phone. I also got notification that the four patterns from Nashville that I “liked” were in stock. I ended up buying two, the Bird in the Berry Patch from Luminous Fiber arts and Hearts Garden from Blue Flower. I got the thread pack for Hearts garden, as I didn’t have any of the Weeks dye works threads called for. I am going to finish the Lilies soon, I was looking at the piece yesterday, to see where I needed to fill in flowers on the top border and saw that the year I put in the personalization space was 2023. I might change it, because it really didn’t take me three years to stitch it, but three years to finish it. A hyphen would look weird, I’ll think on it a bit.

Be Kind.