Thank you

Thank you all for the supportive comments on my last post. They mean a lot to me.  Many of you gave me advice to keep on sewing for myself.  I've been taking that advice to heart with another batch for the Farmer's Wife quilt.

I don't usually like basket blocks, but this one had enough HST's to work for me.

I used a lot of starch and the templates for this one, but I'm really pleased with the yellow, red and gray combination.

This wild geese block was the most difficult one of the batch.  I sacrificed 2 points on the geese to keep one point for the star, but I think I'll get over it.  (I can't get the color on this photo to turn out at all, so you'll have to trust me that it is better in person.)

Here is yellow, gray and red again.  Plus cute birdies!

And here is another extra block for my quilt.  It is a friendship block on Quilter's Cache.  I changed the sizing to make it a 6.5" block.

Henry is off to bed for the night, and I'm headed to my sewing machine to work on some more.  I'm picking up my sashing fabric on Wednesday after Henry's therapy and I now have less than 20 blocks left to make.   I have to ride the wave of motivation while I can.

Plugging along

Hello friends.

I feel like I should explain why I'm not quick about responding to comments, why sometimes I take a long time in between posts, why I can't keep up with your blogs as much as I'd like to and why I don't often find a lot to say about what I am sewing.

And the answer is this joyous little guy here:

He LOVED the ferris wheel last weekend!

Henry was diagnosed with autism in March.  We started looking for answers back in January.  Since then, so much of my time has been spent researching treatment options, making appointments, fighting with insurance, getting him started in school, adapting to his desire to ride the school bus (he's not even 3!), reading and networking, getting him into therapies, driving and more driving to see the best providers and more that I can't put into words here.  Henry and his needs are in the front of my mind and on the tip of my tongue every single waking minute.

In fact, not sharing about it here has left me tongue-tied.  I stare at the blank blogger post screen or a blank email reply and I can't form a coherent thought.
But, I can still sew.
In fact, I need to sew.
But I can't find many words to talk about it.  I just do, and then I photograph and then I upload.

So please forgive me.  I'm late with bee blocks.  I'm slow with swaps.  I'm obsessed with projects that have no deadline.  And I'm just trying to plug along as we adapt to big changes in our family.

I'm grateful for the community that I have here.  I'm grateful for the chance to talk about something other than autism.  But leaving the words unsaid have been a roadblock.

........

All right.  That said, I need to share the tutorial sources for my blocks from my last post.

This is the Ribbon Star block.  You can find the tutorial at Fresh Lemons Quilts.  I did this block at half size and did the block math and piecing order myself, but Faith really inspired me.

This is the Buzzsaw block.  You can find the tutorial at Quilter's Cache.  That tutorial uses paper piecing, but I pieced the 45˚ strips, sewed them to the solid strips and then centered the angle on my ruler and trimmed the quadrants.  

And now on to my fresh batch of Farmer's Wife blocks.  I made the Cut Glass Dish block months ago, but I was not pleased with the result.

Thankfully another reader gave that block a home and now I've made this one. Much better (in my opinion).

 

This Wedding Ring block strays from my pattern of not including cream fabrics in this quilt.  But, that elementary math fabric is way too cute to not include it.

And, lastly, my Storm Signal block has very little contrast, but I designed it that way.  The Suzuko Koseki fabric on the outside was previously in a different block plan but it just didn't have a chance to shine against the brighter fabric.  Again, this one is much better.

Thank you for giving me a place to chat a little about my blocks. The Farmer's Wife Quilt-along group on flickr has been really quiet lately, but my friend Jennifer is churning out some lovely work on her blocks lately. I want to give a shout out to her and her blog because she is really keeping me motivated lately.  As are the sweet comments from all of you.

Happy sewing to you.

Speechless

 

 Let's chat more soon :)

Distracted

Oh, hi!

I'm still here. 

I'm in the middle of one of the coolest paper piecing block designs, but I'm stalling on the embroidery needed.  So, I decided to cut up an entirely new stack of fabric and start a full quilt top.  Then I was rearranging the furniture in my house and somehow started stripping and sanding some old furniture.  Oh, and I'm starting a new quilt for the quilting retreat this weekend.  Distracted, much?

Well, I'm finally posting some pictures of that new quilt top.




Pictures don't do this justice though.  Have you ever felt how light, soft and silky Anna Maria Horner's voile fabric is?  This is all from her Little Folks line.  I wish you could all reach through the monitor and feel this quilt top.

 


Kelly over at kelbysews started the My Precious QAL (quilt along).  The purpose is to finally gather the courage to cut into fabric that you've been hoarding in a pile and gazing at and petting, but never sewing with.




I meant to make a summer quilt out of this fabric last year.  Thank goodness Kelly knows what is good for me. 




I still have to choose the backing and quilting pattern, but I did make this in three days.  I love it when other quilters push me to go the extra step.