Grandmother's Choice BOW 3

This week was Union Square. Finally a 9-patch, kind of at any rate. I did use Marti Michell template A-3 for the center squares (on point). The corner squares were cut with a regular ruler and the triangles were cut with EQ templates, to make it easy to trim the corners (their HST templates have the same trimmed corners as Marti Michell). Had a hard time picking fabrics this week. Only having a fat eighth makes it tough to fussy cut!

Busy Saturday

After making the BOW, I got back to my Album blocks. There were still a few more signatures I wanted on this quilt, so I made another 6 blocks on Saturday. Still need them signed, but will start stitching this together between bouts of quilting on Cornucopia of Thanks. That got a bit of stitching yesterday, and another block today, so far. Hope to get three more done today, but we will see. Have the next quilt design basted to the top, ready to go.

BOW 2 Amethyst

Grandmother's Choice BOW 2 was Amethyst.

Continued with the "Morris and Company" fabric. I got a packet of the whole line, in eighth yards, and I am hoping that will be enough for all of the blocks! I also got a few bigger pieces, but was not thinking of this quilt when I got them. So we will see. EQ will get put to good use when figuring out the setting and if I have enough fabric to do it.

New BOW - Grandmother's Choice

Barbara Brackman has started a new BOW to celebrate Woman's Suffrage - Grandmother's Choice. I'll be doing it in fabric in the style of William Morris. Here is the first one, appropriately enough "Grandmother's choice". I will say that this time I am converting them to 9" to make nine-patch blocks easier. I have an EQ7 project that will be populated with the blocks that Barbara picks. She very nicely includes the Blockbase number, so I don't even have to draft it!

Quilting Cornucopia of Thanks

Looking at the pile of fabric I had left, and no desire to make another quilt with it, I decided to piece the backing. Originally it was to be 36 squares 16.6" each, but that got modified. The outer border (not shown) is rectangles, to make it 4" bigger all around. The pile of leftover fabric is now very small.

Decided to quilt it myself, the design shown will be on all 16 squares, still deciding on the sashing and border quilting.

Cornucopia of Thanks quilt top done

It is a top. After much angst, I put my big girl panties on and just did it. The borders are all pieced, just didn't have enough fabric (this was from my stash), or the design of the fabric made me piece it, the stripes and directional print. I wanted to do mitered corners, but would have had to piece even more than I did, so I revised the plan. First and third borders are not mitered at all. The middle striped border has corner blocks that were mitered and then pieced onto the stripe. They just were not long enough with two widths of fabric to miter without the corner blocks. Now I can move on to the next thing on my UFO list, not sure what that is yet, there are several contenders. This will probably go to my long-arm quilter since I already have a couple of tops to quilt once I get them basted. Maybe that should be next.

Craft therapy

Therapy, quilting or otherwise, gotta have it. Last night, or yesterday, or sometime, I was looking at my 2012 quilt goals. They are all to continue working on UFOs. Of course, what I have actually finished this year includes four new quilts, and I have just about got another top finished that I started this year. Right now, however, I have no desire to start a new quilt, but would like to finish some of the quilts I have started that have gotten sidetracked. I will be starting a new quilt in September when Barbara Brackman starts her new BOW, but until then will work on some of my favorite unfinished quilts. What I would like to start is a sweater. I started a swatch for a sweater while on vacation. It did not match the gauge required, and I am not sure how to get there. Yes, I could knit on a larger needle, but think then it will be too big, it isn’t that much smaller than it ought to be. Then there is the fear that it won’t fit. And the fact that I think the yarn is really boring (tan). It will go with lots of stuff, but I don’t want to knit it right now. And I really need to learn how to knit short rows for shaping a sweater before I start a sweater. But on Friday I got some beautiful yarn, Mushishi color 9, a luscious red, from Plymouth Yarn, after looking at the sample the store had for months, and got the pattern for the sample from Ravelry for Bono Kimono, which should be relatively straightforward to make. And since I have never knit a sweater, that would be a good thing. First I will get the borders on the Cornucopia of Thanks and get it to a long arm quilter. Unless I weaken to play with yarn…