June OMG Finish

 

This was my omg-one-monthly-goal for June for my Serendipity Quilt. 

Well it is done but I might redo it or replace it. I was so sure it was going to finish at 15 inches.

 And it does but only the corners. I started it 5 years ago and got stalled.

Now I remember why it did not get done back then.

Definitely not one of my favourite blocks.
 I still have one of these in 4 1/2 inch size to make for my Bright Jane quilt.
Colour wise it is a dark tone on tone green with a crisp white background.

Maybe it is a good thing I did this now because

 there is one in the Morrell with several more layers of diamonds.

 

I have decided I need to take a bogging / quilting break for the rest of the summer. I know. It will be hard to not spend time here every day reading what others are doing and sharing what I am doing. I love reading your comments and try to respond to everyone.  I even took time last week to write up no less than 7 blog posts, mostly for 17 ufos for 2017. But now instead of sharing what I have done and what I hope to do, I will come back at the end of summer and share what I actually did do. Not sure how much of any quilting I will do but rest assured, I will be doing something. I wonder what the RSC colour will be for July. I hope it is black or brown or neutrals because none of those are in my Bright Jane plan so I will not miss much there.

And why do I need to take a break? I am going to Rwanda in Africa in August for a short term mission trip. We will be modeling how to do a vacation Bible school program and I have lots to do to prepare. I just downloaded the 25 page training manual. Yikes! And we have been doing training meetings every other week for 2 months now.  Some times I drove the 3 hours to Lindsay and other times I skyped in. We have a fundraising concert there Sat night and I am speaking. Well, I am speaking for 2 minutes. So is every one else on the team. This Sunday we have some serious training with the missionaries who just sent out the manual that we have to read before then.

Also we are doing taxes tomorrow. A week late to file, but the accountant could not make it sooner and I did pay them back in April so we are good. And my old high school that closed some 30 years ago is having a reunion this weekend  and I am having dinner with some of my classmates tomorrow night. Should be great. I haven't seen some of them in decades. I graduated in 1970. Yup. That's a long time ago. When I get home, my daughter and her family will be here for a week then the little girls will be here the following week. You get the picture.  Also, I am now starting to work with my publisher to set up a website and a promotion plan for my book. Lots of reading there in the next 2 weeks. Good thing I like to read.

Have a fabulous summer everyone.
Blessings,
Chris
 

The Quilt of Belonging

Quilt of Belonging

will be on display in Hamilton ON Canada July 11- Aug 16

I first saw this quilt in Brantford 10 years ago then again at the AQS in Grand Rapids Michigan 3 years ago.  I think I will celebrate my landmark 65th birthday by taking my granddaughter Ava to see it.

Beyond the Cherry Trees for 17 ufos in 2017

Although I have been working on these blocks off and on this year, I don't think I have blogged about it for my 17 ufos in 2017.  I first learned about it when I discovered Sentimental Stitches and Dear Jane doing the justtakes2 mystery quilt-a-long on Dec 30 2011. The last block had been posted and I wondered what it was all about. I started seeing completed blocks then completed tops then quilted quilts and I fell in love. I finally purchased it on one of Gay's insane sales as a digital download Feb 2014. Printed off all the patterns and started dreaming about it. In April of that year my Sweet Farmer and I went to Bedford Pennsylvania for a cattle auction and I bought the 11 yards of Kona Snow in anticipation of starting it some day. Well that day came in June 2014.

I started this quilt exactly 3 years ago
when I was waiting for the birth of our daughter's first baby.

I packed my project box and flew out to New Brunswick.

Started off in good form by not placing those first corner leaves correctly.

  

So started again in the middle this time.



Took these blocks on a business trip to Lacrosse Wisconsin.

Watched the Mighty Mississippi River rise an inch a day

and flew through thunderstorms in 2 very small planes. 

Finished this one.

Making and stitching on those 1/8th inch red  bias strips was interesting.



I had these 4 blocks done in 2 months.

Stitched a lot of leaves babysitting the girls.
Lots and lots of leaves.



England and Poland Oct 2014

 

This brings me to the grapes. 

Lots of grapes. About 120 give or take in this block.



 Australia April 2015 



What else to do on a 6 hour layover in Hong Kong but stitch.



Oct 2015 Bennington Vermont to see the original Jane Stickle Quilt. 

This block came along.

More grapes and now some vines and leaves.

Lots of bias stems.

More grapes and now some cherries.



India October 2016



Stitched the first 8 leaves in the backseat of the van on our way to

the Shipshewana Quilt Retreat  2016.



Came along on another  business trip to Bedford Pennsylvania



where we bought another 11 yards of Kona Snow for the backing.

I plan to hand quilt this one block at a time

as soon as I complete this block.

Blessings,

Chris

Morrell for 17 ufos in 2017

I started the Sarah Morrell Sampler Nov 2015.

Then I started a new blog  called Quilting Morrell at the Farm
to record my journey.

A few months later I started a facebook group. 

I was off to a great start on a great quilt along

but I forgot to take into account that life happens

and there are lots of tempting things going on in blog land.

I bit off more than I could chew.

This 17 ufos in 2017  challenge

has me revisiting 17 unfinished quilt projects this year 
I could easily pull out 18 different ufos for next year.

I pulled the Morrell boxes out of the cupboard to see what I have done so far.

It looks like I have 12 blocks almost made.

Two of them are simply fabric panels.

There will be lots of broderie perse.

I am doing this by machine.
Not in love with that center block so far.

I drafted up the saw tooth borders for some of the blocks on EQ7.

This way I would not have to cut out a gzillion triangles
and hand piece them.

This is the first block I started.

Looks like I forgot to print out 2 of the foundation strips.

  I took time to choose fabrics for many of the foundation patterns.

I wonder if using all French General fabrics will be a bit boring later on? 

I won't have to worry about that for now since

I will not get the rest of the 60 blocks made this month.

However

I am working on another (Antique Wedding Sampler)

AWS block

because I need to have some handwork.

Blessings,
Chris

Discovering new things about blogger

I have been blogging for nearly 4 years now and loving it. I have been in contact with countless quilters around the world. I have tried to respond to as many of the comments I get on my posts. However, I am a bit slow figuring out some of the options that are available. For instance, I have just discovered how to email no-reply bloggers through my gmail account.
At the top of my gmail homepage are tabs called primary, social and promotions.
Primary is where I get notification of a comment on a blog post from a blogger who I can reply to easily.
Under Promotions is where I get notification from some commercial blogs like elm street and next step,
and recently I fould that under Social, are the no-reply bloggers with their email addresses so I can contact them also.
I am so clever sometimes. But not always. My son gave me my first cell phone last month and I had to get my 9 year old granddaughter to show me how to use it. For the life of me, I cannot swipe the green button to answer a call on the first or 15th try. A bit of practice I suppose.

I have a lot of things to do in the next 2 months before going on a short term mission trip to Rwanda, including team training, fund raising, babysitting and our daughter and her family vacationing here for a couple of weeks. I want to file the 5 doctoral courses I have had on my desk for the past year or so. I want to get a few more pages written for my next book.  And I want to lose at least 40 pounds. But then, I just bought some new clothes so that would be a waste.

My omg-one-monthly-goal will be to complete this radiant star block for Serendipity. I started it about 4 years ago and got stuck so it ended up in a box and I turned my focus on completing my Dear Jane quilt. Which I did complete but not quilted yet.

The RSC colour for June is

I have 6 yellow Bright Jane foundation blocks ready to go since I printed off most of the foundation patterns and there are still a few applique to do so we shall see how the month goes.

Blessings,
Chris