Grey Birds

 Time for me to make another block for the BAMQ BOM, so it's back to the Box o' Greys.

This month it's Birds In The Air, and I'm going to use an EQ8 version.

I made two of these blocks, and I really like how they turned out. I almost want to make two reverse blocks to make a big four patch out of them.

So Many Kitty Ears

I buckled down and got started sewing the remaining sets of Kitty Ears units for the Lupine Mystery quilt. 

I love how these "Kitty Ears" units kind of have the look of Flying Geese gone wrong, or maybe just gone wiiiiiide.

Cutting the very last set to size with the Simple Folded Corners ruler.

It took a lot of trimming and sewing and pressing, but they got put together. Check out that pile of teeny tiny hsts™!

 But here they all are.  

Twenty-four sets of four "kitty ears" all done. You may be wondering if I had run out of white on white? No, just thought it'd be fun to put in two of my favorite white with black prints. This layout would actually make a very interesting scrap (or otherwise) quilt. Looks like columns of arrows.

  I am so very very ready to move on to the next clue.

Back to Kitty Ears

 

Today I got back to work in my sewing room, and I finished cutting out all of the pieces to complete the "kitty ears" for the Lupine Mystery quilt. 

They are all ready to get sewn together into the fifteen sets of four I have left to make. It's nice to work with the blue and white combination, I kind of got tired of all the pink and purple. 

Many Hands

 Another thing I worked on at Super Sew Day was putting together the quilt we're making for one of our relatives. This is a non-official Quilt of Valor for a veteran. As you can see, our design wall was the floor. I took a picture of the row I was sewing together with the sashing in between so that I'd get the blocks in the correct order and orientation.

The work went by so quickly with four of us working on it at once. The sashing had been pre-cut which was very helpful. And the majority of the blocks were actually 12.5" which always makes these group quilts go together more easily.

I think these blocks all turned out beautifully, and I love the range of prints and solids that we all chose.

There was some rearranging happening when we did the horizontal white sashing + red solid cornerstones. Unfortunately I neglected to get a final form picture of the finished quilt top. The binding and backing got made as well, so that one of our members can do the long-arming this week. It will be a very quick turnaround which is great news.

More Kitty Ears

 

On the second day of Sew Day, I made more "kitty ears". (sung to the tune of "On The First Day of Christmas") for the Lupine Mystery Quilt. I'm of course, ending up with a whole lot of teeny tiny hsts™

Are my blues arctic blues as they're meant to be? I'd say that some of them get fairly close, but many are way off. I hope it ends up working out. I'm completely using up some of these blues, so this will be the last time they appear in one of my quilts.  

It wasn't all strip cutting, there was some fussy fiddly cutting happening. But at the end, I ended up with nine sets of four (out of the required 24 sets) done. I also cut out the rest of the blue squares that will be needed. Pshew, that was a lot. What a super fun, Super Sew Day(s) it was!

Time for Kitty Ears

Time for a Super Sew Day, so I brought along my stacks of "ice blue" and "white/cream" fabrics and cut out a bunch of the next clue I'm working on for the Lupine Mystery quilt. This block unit is called "Kitty Ears."

Well, at least two sets got done!

Bohemian Wife Quilting

I've finally made a start on getting the Bohemian Wife quilt actually quilted. First I did the vertical lines. A lot of stopping and starting, but it worked out. Used the walking foot, it went very well. 

Then I switched over to quilting the quilt blocks. And it turns out, I really should have switched over the thread color I was using.  

The medium red/purple that I was using blended in pretty well with all those vertical prints and on a lot of the blocks. A lot of the blocks have straight lines, which are tough to do well with free motion quilting. 

So I got out my new ruler quilting foot and the ruler I bought to go with it. Definitely straightened up my lines a lot, (especially for my first time) but still not good enough especially with that dark thread. And a lot of the blocks use lighter colored fabrics as well which makes that situation even more apparent. The quilting ruler is on the quilt there, but it's quite see-through isn't it?

I pinned up the quilt on the design wall to see if it was even visible from a normal viewing distance. Nope, not really. 

But a couple steps away from the quilt and yikes on bikes! Just to me, it will always bug me. I'm not planning on entering this in any shows or competitions, so it truly doesn't matter. Except I'll know it looks bad and takes away from the look of the quilt I've spent so much time making. 

I will have to pick out a whole bunch of quilting and then switch over to a lighter color so every little but and squiggle shows up so plainly.. Sigh, still un-picking and trying not to just give up on this one when I'm so close to finishing.

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