Chookshed Challenge

 

My Chookshed Challenge for Sept is Machine Applique. This is timely. I have about 100 hexie flowers to assemble for Stonefields. I am doing them by maxhine. I have many hexies prepped and ready to sew together for the border. I am starting at the other end of this quilt. Not sure why other than I can. I actually have a lot done so far. I am impressed with my productivity. Now to keep the momentum going. 

There are only 46 more flying geese to make for this border. I think I have most of the coloured bars cut out just need to cut more background squares. This will be my OMG goal for Sept. I am doing the sew and flip method. I like it. I will have a lot of 3/4 inch HST eventually for something mini. 

Devan and I are using them for leader enders. She is progressing with her Jelly Roll quilt. I will show pictures when her flimsy is ready. I am looking forward to that since she is using the big design wall and I want to put up all the Stonefields blocks and borders as I complete them. 

I am working on prepared edge applique. The one using starch and a brush and a hot iron. Not sure if I like it, but I will have lots of practice now that I have started. No hand applique for me for now. 

Check out on how Gretchen and Rebecca are doing. We are all making this quilt at the same time. I love that about this project. I am so inspired by their progress. 

Blessings,

Chris 

linking with alyciaquilts-finished-or-not.

Hexie Flowers

So what's with blogger these days? Suddenly I have hundreds of page views and many going back several months. Got 400 on the 20th then another 1000 just yesterday. 

My plan for Stonefields is to make a 9 x 9 setting of 6 inch blocks, I am thinking about putting a larger medallion block in the center. I had this idea 8 years ago when I did several workshops with Di Ford-Hall at one of the Shipshewana quilt retreats. These are some of the blocks I have done so far. I put them up on the small design wall to see how a 12 inch border will look with all those hexie flowers. I plan to space them further apart than the pattern. Not sure yet how many will be needed.

I have been prepping a lot of the blocks and of course, a lot of hexies. Just need to cut a few more larger scale florals after I get the block prepping done. Devan has been working on her Jelly Roll Race quilt. It is suposed to take about an hour if you know what you are doing. We do not. So she has been at it for a couple of days and has almost half the strips sewn together. One delay was stitching her finger right through from top to bottom. A lot of noise happened and we found the broken needle tip, and bandaged the finger. My goodness! She has such skinny little fingers. She is taller than my Sweetie now. So about 5'6"? Ellyse is over 5'10". When did all this happen?

Another delay was the machine jamming every few flying geese I was chain piecing together. So, today Devan and I took the machine back to get it looked at. And of course, it ran perfectly. So, I brought it home, set it up and sewed a few geese together and it jammed again. Twice. Sigh. I think I am lifting the presser foot up too quickly and my left foot is hovering over the foot pedal and possibly adding just enough tiny pressure to bring the needle up and it jams. So, I started doing everything slower. No more jamming. 

The girls start back to school next week and I plan to turn my focus and time on writing. This past week I have been reading back over the Morning Pages I hade been writing for the past 4 1/2 years. I have focused on the books through 2022. A lot happened that year. I turned 70 and had many unexpected, age related health issues. No wonder I did not make much progress on writing and sewing.

blessings,

Chris 

Stonefields Update

I have been home all alone for a few days without any other humans around. People will show up tomorrow. In the meantime, I have been a busy girl. I can eat what I want when I want where I want. But I still have to do dishes. But not many. I did some laundry and, get this, I even ran the machine through a clean cycle since there were no other humans standing in line to do their own wash. I did stay out of the hot tub since I do not go in there when I am home alone. 

I am starting with the borders for Stonefields. And why not? I am loving doing the flying geese units. Partly because that is all I am doing with them. Earlier, I made flying geese for the star blocks and that is that. I am doing the method that gives me a gzillion bonus triangles. I am planning to make something very tiny with them. Not sure what just yet. I have another 50 to make.

And you would think that with all the many different hexies I have prepped so far, how did I manage to make these first 2 flowers, that are not going into the border, the same sprigged floral? 

I tried hand stitching the yellow one together. That took me nearly an hour while watching Miss Marple. The pink one was a lot faster. I machined stitched it. First I stitched 2 hexies together from the back. One using a tiny zigzag then another seam using a blanket stitch. Both show from the front. Then I machine appliqued them both onto the background square using a tiny narrow zig-zag. I did leave the papers in. Oops. Well, maybe not. I cut away the back and pulled out the papers. I am using a neutral colour bottom line thread that I was hoping would disappear. Almost and that is good enough. Only 168 more flowers to go.

Check out what Gretchen is doing here , here , here and here. Rebecca here and here. I am so inspired! 

Blessings,

Chris

lonking with: ninamariesayre. at off-wall-friday. 

quiltery put-your-foot-down-300/ 

inquiringquilter.wednesday-wait-loss-445

quiltingpatch.blogspot

smallquiltsanddollquilts.design-wall-monday- 

melvalovesscraps.

Stonefields & August Challenges

My OMG goal last month was to make 7 more of these star blocks for Stonefields. 

My OMG for August will be to make several more of the 6 inch blocks. There are 3 or 4 with hexies. I will start there.

I am really enjoying this journey so far. Four of these stars still need some tiny circles appliqued on but I will wait until I am doing more circle blocks. I took time to look through the pattern pages and listed blocks with circles. If I have the circle making stuff out, I might as well make a lot. That was my thinking with the hexies and the flying geese. 

There are 121 six inch blocks in the middle of the quilt then a flying geese border then a wider hexagon border. I am still of the mind to make only 72 blocks.  

For this project, I am working on the outside borders right at the beginning. Here is the logic. As I sorted through all the soft floral prints for the first star blocks, I took the time to cut a multitude of strips of the same fabrics to cut and prep the flying geese and the hexagon units. There will be a lot of each. Why wait until the end?  I layed out several layers of the fabrics and cut, cut cut. Devan helped me cut out hexies with the Go Baby. I will now cut a few more strips for her. She is at camp again this week loving it. I really like the colours so far that I have used. I think I will keep to this pallet. No reds or orange or really dark fabrics. 

The Chookshed Challenge number is 7. I again tweaked my original list and will assemble a flimsy. I have several almost ready to sew up. You will have to wait until the end of the month to see which one(s) I get done. 

Our summer Houseguests have all returned to their respective homes. I see a few weeks of empty spaces on my calendar. My plan for now is to sew, sew, sew and write, write, write. 

The summer days here continue to be nice and hot but the evenings have cooled down to a nice 15C or 60F. Perfect for sleeping. 

Blessings,

Chris

Linking with smallquiltsanddollquilts.design-wall-monday- 

Quilty Goals for July

The Chookshed Challenge number for July is 9 and that for me is to do some hand applique. I added a few stitches to this Ella block that has been languishing for several years awaiting completion. My goal will be to simply complete it. That should take about 15 minutes if I hurry.

There are a few other half done blocks nearby that I can progress also. The right hand is beginning to hurt a bit again. Wonder how long the cortisone will last this time? Last year, it lasted about 2 months.

One sister is visiting for the month on her school vacation time. Another sister will be coming over to visit and work on one of her projects. She lives in a tiny 2 room apartment and does not have the luxury of space like I do. 

Twelve year old Devan will be starting her Jelly Roll Race quilt this week. And all that means that I have to clear away my Stonefields bits and peices.

I did complete my June OMG and now for July, I want to complete the next 7 star blocks for Stonefields. I have a good start on them so far. But we also have houseguests for the entire month.

Blessings,

Chris

Linking with wednesday-wait-loss-439

finished or not friday 

Gone Stitchin' FNWF

quiltingpatch.

Slow Sunday Sitching 

Progress on Stonefields

My Chookshed Challenge project for June was permission to start a new project. I started Stonefields. 

My OMG goal was to complete 1 block. So I did. That is not all I did. I pulled out lots of fabrics. Checked out what I had in the project box. Much of the fabric was already prewashed. Some was not so I pre washed those.  I cut out lots and lots of bars and squares in preparation for making a lot of flying geese units for one of the borders. 

There are 8 of these star blocks in the quilt. Four are made in month 1 and another 4 in month 8. These also have circles appliqued on. That can be my goal for July. 

I was reading Angela from Soscrappy the other day and she mentioned cutting hexies with her Go cutter. Duh! I have a GO cutter and I have a hexie die. Wonder what size it is? My thoughts for the Stonefields hexies was fussy cutting some of them and random for others. It turns out that I do have the right size  so Devan helped me cut out a whole bunch. I am glue basting them.

The plan for now, is to machine applique them in place but that will not be till closer to the end when I have the outside borders figured out and prepped. I want to make the whole thing smaller than the original, so do not have the final count. 

Blessings,

Chris

And Sew it Begins - Stonefields

Today I made the first cut on Stonefields. I have a huge pile of fabric set aside for this project. Maybe too much. Do I want it to be matchy-matchy or all out scrappy? No. Definetly not scrappy. I over think things and end up hesitating for years before beginning. I trimmed the pattern sheets to fit into our north american letter sized binder and punched holes. 

I read through the directions again. Did that back in early May when Rebecca said she was planning to start. This pattern is not for beginners as a lot of the techniques are assumed. Just the way I like it. This way I can figure things out for myself. 

My palette is soft florals and perhaps some solids. I have several in the bin of endless options. I decided to start by cutting out a lot of 3/4 inch hexies for the rosettes that frame the quilt with an incredible border. I figure that I can make some every month so not to have them all to do at the end. And there will be an end. I am planning to work on this for a year. At least that is what I am telling myself this month. 

I have a whole week with just me and my Sweetie before grand children and houseguest start arriving for the summer. I wonder what mischeif I can get into? Linking with Finished or Not Friday and Off the Wall Friday and Quilting Patchwork Applique and Design Wall Monday 

Blessings,

Chris

Blessings in Slowing Down

I was greatly blessed by reading Jenny of Elefanz's post this week. 

She wrote about slowing down as the seasons of our life progress and we no longer have to do everything. We can stop doing things that are no longer necessary and begin to enjoy the calm and peace in rest. 

Two of the girl grandchildren are at the farm today. It is a PA day with no school. Their older sister graduated from high school yesterday. I did not go to the ceremony. I had been out several times through the day and got home tired, cold and feverish. I know. Devan took my temperature and told me I sounded hoarse and had a temperatue of 38C or 100.4F. I was in bed very early. Like 5:30 on a Thursday afternoon. Among other things like getting blood work and seeing the nurses for the final time and being discharged after my surgery. Yesterday I bought a couple of rose bushes and new clothes which is what we do when we lose a few pounds and have our breasts reduced so smaller clothes fit better. Just saying. And why was I so tired? After all that, I had to pick the girls up from school. That was a lot of driving for this gramma.  

Today, Friday, I took 13 year old Ellyse to the Dollar Store to pick up some craft supplies for a project at school. We spent $101. We also got milk and bananas. Staples in our house. Then when we got home I took 12 year old Devan to help buy some plants for our summer gardens and went out for lunch. We brought home left overs so may have been caught visiting someone else's secret lunch spot. I won't say how much we spent. I cannot count those kind of numbers in my head so quickly anymore.

I can do all this because my Sweetie is visiting the boy grandchildren for a few days. We also bought a new shelving unit to organize my sewing stuff in the Blue Room. I managed to get the thing off-loaded and up to the room before any other adult humans around saw what I was doing and questioned my sanity. We were asked before we left earlier if we had a list and to stick to the list. How much fun is that I ask? The list was in my head. I had been planning this maneuver for a few weeks. Then forgot to get the unit earlier so we got it later as well as some poppies, begonias, sunflowers, and a bunch of other plants. A couple of window boxes. They are already on the windows. Now to remember to water them before it rains tomorrow. 

Much earlier today, I pulled weeds and added water to the water feature. There were a lot of weeds. If I go out there for just 10 minutes a day and putter, it will look really nice. I lasted 8 minutes. I know. I had the timer set on the kitchen stove for running the water. I do not want to forget to shut it off. 

Tomorrow is Sat and I have another Writing Workshop here to help others to start getting ready to start writing their life stories. I have Stonefield's spread all over all the long tables in the SonRoom. I still have a couple of hours to get that all set up before the girls head off to the final night of youth group before the summer holidays. It is an all-nighter. Remember those? I went to one when I was finishing grade 8. Got home after breakfast and had to go out to work on the farm for the rest of the day. No rest for the weary. Well, not in those days. 

So back to Jenny's comments today. I have learned to slow down. A lot. I cannot do all that I used to do. I do not have many of those responsibilities any more. But I can still do things. This summer will again bring family for several weeks and I will be leading my writing group. I plan to write along with them. If I manage to spend at least one day each week doing some deep writing (2-3 hours without interruption or distraction) I can have at least 12 stories written. And if I do one blog post a week, that adds up to a lot of words written. My hands are working very nicely for now since the cortisone shot a month ago. Here's trusting that it will last for a couple months more. 

And what about stitching? I have plans to do some but will not commit to too much. At least for now. Stonefield's awaits some dedicated attention. My OMG goal for that is to start and complete at least one block. Totally doable. And I am rambling. I like to ramble. Oh. And I cut some scrap 1 inch strips to start on Omisgosh as a leader-ender project from now until possibly eternity.

Blessings,

Chris

linking with frederique 

Chookshed Challenge June 2025

The Chookshed Challenge number for June is 5. That is start a new quilt. And I just happened to have the perfect project ready and waiting to start. It has been ready for nearly 9 years. Rebecca at Cheeky Cognosenti has inspired me to get started on Stonefields. I bought the pattern way back in 2015 when I first went to Australia. I plan to make mine smaller than the original. I will not do at least of the 40 blocks and maybe fewer of the hexies surrounding the outside. No promises. 

I was reminded to punch holes in the pages and put them into a binder. I used to do that years ago.  Now to find a binder. I may have donated all the binders during a declutter phase. But I can always buy a new one. I do need to purchase ink for my printer. And why do we need yellow in order to print black? 

I found a solution to getting photos to my blog. My Sweetie recently figured out how to take and send photos on his phone through email. Duh. I could do that now that I know it is possible and I can now do it. 

Last month I put in a few stitches on an Ella block. Now to put in a few more. Also, I have not posted in One Monthly Challenge for a long time. My plan is to get started on Stonefields and make some blocks. How many? I will start with one.

Blessings,

Chris

linking with: off-wall-friday. alyciaquilts.finish-or-not-froday 

Cruisin'

My daughter Melanie and I went on a Norwegian Cruise. We were brainstorming ideas back in November and when we realized that the MSC Poesia cruise ship docked in Oslo, we quickly decided that this was the one and I contacted Hanne to see if she was available mid May to get together. She was. So we did. It was more than great. 

Hanne's husband offered to be our chauffeur and took the day off work. He is easing into retirement. 

We did some touristy things then went back to their home to get the grand tour of Hanne's quilt room. I am so inspired! She does her little stitches with her morning coffee. What a great idea. Doing the stitching to start the day instead of trying to work in the 15 minutes later. 

Hanne has 68 completed Stonefields blocks. We know. Melanie counted them. She wants to finish it so will be joining Rebecca and Gretchen and me as we begin work on ours. Gretchen and I talked about making it together 9 years ago but did not begin then. I came home and pulled out the project box I had put together 10 years ago when I got my pattern. I must have added to the box, because it is quite full of promising soft prints and pastels. Lots of Mary Koval reproduction filler fabrics. Did I say lots? And I finally found the stash of reprodution shirting fabrics I bought lots of years ago. One yard cuts no less.

Since I have most of the fabrics in the box pre washed, I shall whack off a few peices of the shirtings and pre wash them also. I had precut "about" forty 6 1/2 inch squares of other shirtings and some solid creamy fabrics. I am ready to start. More than 20 years ago I bought most of a collection for a cause by Ro Gregg called Heaven Can Wait. There are fussy cutting options of cherubs and flowers. I do like flowers. I have 4 yards of the border fabric. And it is already pre washed. Yes. I do pre wash my fabrics. I like to get the sizing out and have a softer fabric for hand work. Will I be doing hand work? Not sure yet. I got a shot of cortesone in my right hand last month and it feels pretty good. Well, until it got caught between the hand rail and the bus door in Copenhagen. The bruise is almot gone. 

Blessings,

Chris

 

April Goals

How do we choose which project to start next? I have been busy this past month completing several quilts and thoughts of starting at least five new quilts  have been dancing through my head. I could not give in to them because I was on a mission to complete quilts.  I had to use the Bernina since the Brother machine messed up  and then I broke the acrylic darning foot from the Bernina. Fortunately, I had a metal one that I used to finish the free motion quilting for my 17-ufosin-2017 challenge. This month I will be working on beyond-the-cherry-trees-album-quilt. I am packing my bags to go to Poland to visit my family for Easter. She is not well. At 91 that is no surprise. I am taking 9 year old Ava with me. I plan to take some hand applique with me and at least one text book.

I have the entire pattern packet for the Caswell quilt from sentimental stitches in a box with fabrics and shirting  backgrounds waiting.

I also have all ten months of Susan Smith's stonefields-quilt-block-of-the-month that I bought when I was in Australia two years ago.  I have an old collection of fabrics and various backgrounds ready in a project box waiting until I get back from Poland. These have been pre-washed because they were so wrinkly from sitting in a few boxes for years.

After I get home I am going to babysit the little boy grand children for four days and doubt I will get much stitching done. But who knows, I won't get any done if I do not prep some blocks and take them along,  

I see so many interesting patterns and projects  in blogland and am tempted by many of them. I have at least 80 blogs on my blog list. Most post weekly, some monthly. And some days when I am avoiding doing any real work I will wander off on rabbit trails and see what else is out there to see. I follow lots of blogs that are doing some of the same projects I am doing so I can get encouraged. But right now it seems that they are over whelming me with so many options.

I started talking about how we choose which quilt to make next. I am drooling over  the  150+Canadian+Women weekly quilt-a-long.

And I have  been collecting the patterns while they are free to make this tribute to Canadian women as we celebrate our 150 birthday as a nation. I have fabric. I bought some of the Northcott collection at Lens Mill Store when everything with red in it was 25% off. I like sales. I spend more than $200 on fabric that day. And I already had some in my cupboard with the Canadian national anthem and some with maple leaves. It is going to be a spectacular quilt. I am only 57 blocks behind. But I have a plan. I will pull out the GO cutter and some dies with one inch and one and a half inch options and blitz them.  They are all pieced with none appliqued. I like applique, but have enough of that in project boxes.

How do I choose which quilt to make next? I usually jump in impulsively and blitz it for a while. Starting quilts is so much fun, but I have tasted what it is like to complete not one but 4 quilts this past month. I could put off starting anything new for a whole month and complete another one or two. Maybe. But I have a plane to catch  Friday and  . . .  the power just went off . . .

It was off for a couple of hours so we went to bed really early since it was dark and very quiet. Eventually we heard the furnace come on so knew the power was back on. I have a family wedding to go to today and it is overcast and gloomy this morning, but the sun is supposed to come out this afternoon.

I do not have to worry about what I will start next since I do not have time this week which will be filled with appointments like dentist, massage, chiropractor and the little boy grandchildren are coming for a sleepover just before we leave. But I do have to decide what my omg-one-monthly-goal  will be for April. I will try to complete one, just one BTCT block. 

The RSC colour this month is multicolour. Since I am doing this challenge with my Bright Jane  and there are no multi colour fabrics I plan to make more aqua blocks since I prepped a whole bunch that did not get made in Feb. 

Come back at the end of the month to see how I did.

(I just received news that my 91 year old aunt passed away last  night so we go in sadness)

Blessings, 

Chris

 linking up with needle and thread network  
 http://estheraliu.blogspot.ca/  

17-ufosin-2017 

omg-one-monthly-goal 

needle and thread thursday

confessions of a fabric addict

let's bee social 

sew fresh quilts  

rainbow scrap challenge

sunday slow stitching

 midweek-makers

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31 Day Blogging Challenge Day 2

It 's Day 2 of the 31 day blogging challenge and I might already have writer's block. Seriously. Last night  I had a hundred ideas floating through my brain and this morning, after sleeping in until a normal 8.30, I have no idea what to write. But that has never stopped me before. I have a couple of keys sticking in my laptop. Makes it a challenge to log in with a password that has an "a" and no semi colons or colons are to be use for now. Mary of Quilting through rose colored tri focals   used an expression called at 6's and 7's. Her post got me thinking.

I posted this picture of my quilt room/office last winter. Some readers are interested in how you organize your stuff, but I will share what I am doing with some of my stuff. 

Here are some of the things I am working on this week. I had to check some cow information on line for my Farmer who does very little on the computer, except to check for  emails and facebook postings when I am away. This is the five year old net book I take with me when I travel so I can keep in touch and do some work. I had to get a new battery when I was in India.  Last night I was backing up five years of files so I could transfer India pictures to my lap top where I am trying to put together a power point presentation I will be doing in January at our son-in-law's church.

 Next to that is my journal, daytimer, Bible and pen. I try to do a bit of journaling often but it seems that I write more to-do lists than reflecting on my Bible reading. Beside that is the project box I took on our weekend away. I stitched for about twenty minutes total.  

 Behind me is one of my craft tables. The Bernina is in for servicing so I put the Featherweight in 

and have everything ready to do one more Bright Jane block. This was all sitting on another table 

since I got home from Shipshewana three weeks ago. The intent is to make one block. 

I will not be using that yellow thread on that fabric.

 Beside that is the other craft table with the Brother. I am working on a Simple Simon reproduction quilt from the retreat. I have quite a few very expensive mugs that I was unwilling to throw out when they got cracked or lost a handle so I use them to hold pens, pencils, pencil crayons, markers, etc.

If I do not see things, they do not exist.

 On the table in front of the design wall, I have the first blocks up. Lots of four patch units made and sewn to back ground squares waiting to be sewn into the next blocks. There is also some of the clutter I dumped out after the retreat. I put away most everything when I have the Quilting at the Farm girls come over but that will be mid January sometime. I usually put something different up on the wall then.

 Beside that, I have some project boxes for my grand daughters. They each have their own pair of razor sharp Dear Jane scissors that are too small for my large fingers but perfect for theirs. The two younger ones are still cutting thread and scraps but the older one is using the real machine. I had to eat a lot of cookies over the years to get those empty containers. They are about eight inches square. Again, I have to see things or they do not exist. I later discovered that those cookies are what had been poisoning  my body.

 One of my quilting friends loves to do laundry so she took home three fat quarter bundles of Moda French General fabrics to pre-wash 120 fat quarters for me. What a Blessing! I will be using some of these for a new GORF quilt this winter. The fabric has to be pre-washed before the heat-n-bond lite is ironed on.

 I want it to stay on forever.

 These fabrics have been pre-washed in preparation for Stonefields. I bought the entire pattern when I was in Australia last year and have been waiting for a good time to start. They are available over at Sentimental Stitches.   There is a facebook group and the first month patterns are going out this month.

 At the retreat, I got a tutorial on big stitch quilting without a hoop. It took me a couple of weeks, but I tracked down some creamy coloured Valdani pearl cotton 12 and some size 24 chenille needles. I plan to do a small sample piece of my Dear Jane fabrics with the wool batting I bought last summer to see if my hands can handle this. If they do, I was thinking that I could quilt one block a day (so not to overdo it) and have it done in 225 days. No wait - there are 56 border triangles, so 281 days. Maybe.

In the meantime, I have these to keep my busy. I had each course in its own box, but wanted the boxes for other projects. 

 My self paced online doctoral course with no deadlines is sitting on the desk in front of the desk top computer waiting for me to stay home for a few days. I have filed three out of twelve courses and these five are each half done. They are not hard. I just need to spend more time there than here.

Blessings,
Chris