Orange Orphan

Happy Leap Day, everyone!  And welcome to Treadlestitches.  It's the last day of February, of course, and it's also the end of orange month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, so it was a good time for me to finish up this little orphan block quilt.

Last year, our guild had a block of the month mystery quilt, presented by our own Pam W.  The theme was friendship, and each month, Pam would give us a block pattern variation on Friendship Star.

I started out making my blocks with vintage, feedsack, and reproduction fabrics, mostly in reds and blues.  Because this particular block pattern was handed out in October, I went nuts and made it in orange and green Halloween prints.  It did not play well with the others, so I set it aside and made another block in red and blue.  (I'm quilting that quilt now, and hope to have it done next month.)

To finish off this orange orphan block, I added a double row of 2.5 in. (cut) squares, again using vintage, feedsacks, and repro fabrics.  Some of these had come out to play recently in my house blocks.  I bound it with a solid orange from my basement "collection".

Isn't this back wild?  It's a vintage fabric, and was made into a curtain when I found it at a flea market.  I'm guessing 1930s to 1940s for when it was originally printed.

Here's the curtain.  It was sewn nicely at the top, but not hemmed, and had little or no wear.  I wonder if it was ever used.  I also wonder what it would have looked like as a curtain.  It would certainly add some color to a room.

I have this little wooden quilt hanger in my dining room, and I would like to have more quilts to hang here so I can change them out with the seasons and holidays.  When I got this quilt finished, I just couldn't wait til October to hang it up and see what it looks like.  So this is a preview.  I'll put it away now and put up some spring quilts.
Hurray, one less orphan block.
In other news:

My Little Buddy asked me to take his picture.  He's sitting in the toy dinosaurs bin, and holding one of his favorite T. Rex dinosaurs.  I want to give him lots of attention now.  He's getting a baby brother no later than next Saturday.

We were finger painting this week.  At first he would just put two blobs of paint on a page and say he was done.  We progressed to making this masterpiece together.

What do you think of this paper towel?  I really love the "quilting"!
The joy of quilting is everywhere.

I'm going to a quilt show today, the first of the season here, so I had better get going.  I'm wishing the joys of quilting for you this week--viewing, touching (only NOT at the quilt show!), and creating.
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:
Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop
Angela at So Scrappy (Home of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge)
Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday
Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Cut, Sew, Quilt!

Good morning, and welcome to Treadlestitches!  I thought I'd take a picture of our snow this morning, since we might get up above freezing today.  Let the melting begin!  Really, it's not too bad for this time of year.  The driveway is clear, and the snow piles along the driveway are only about 2 feet high.

I got some feedsacks cut for the quilt show booth next Saturday--4 charm packs (with 20 squares each) and 10 fat quarters.  That handy dandy gadget in the photo is a pinker, and works like pinking shears, only with a crank.  I have used it for fabric, but I used it here just for the price labels.  My little buddy and I had some fun with it cutting up paper.

Cutting done--on to the sewing!  My Text Me A Quilt blocks are done for February.  I can't believe how much I love orange.

I'm testing out different layouts as I make the blocks.  (I'll bet you do that, too!)

I seemed to have two kinds of orange in my scraps--bright orange and a more "pumpkin-y" orange.  The print with the triangles came from a scrap I picked up on the free table at a guild meeting.

When my Little Buddy saw this block, he said, "You've got minions!"  It prompted me to imagine a roomful of these little guys waiting for my instructions to take over the world.  No thank you, not interested in world domination, but it would be great to have them for a cleaning crew.  I could pay them in bananas.

And now for a little quilting.  I've had these tractor scraps for a long time, trying to figure out what to do with them.  I finally put two kinds of farming/tractor scraps together for this little quilt.

The green strips frame squares cut from a fabric I found in an antique mall.  The red frames surround squares cut from a farm print.  The green tractors are John Deere, the red ones are Case.

I'm not sure this was the best use of color.  The red is so strong.  While each frame goes with its own block, I don't think the two colors work well together.  Oh, well.  It is what it is.

I love the tractor fabric on the border.  Good news, I have lots of it left!

The green print is from the 2018 Wisconsin Quilt Shop Hop, and is just the names of Wisconsin towns and cities with quilt shops in the hop.  My local shop is in Richfield.

I think I like the back better than the front!  This John Deere fabric was sent to me by Beth, a generous blog reader.  Thanks, Beth!
This little tractor quilt measures 36 in. x 36 in., and so would be suitable for Jack's Basket.  I'm going to think about it a little while.  With all the Wisconsin connections here, it might need to be donated to someone local.
I hope you're having a lovely day today.  And every day!
Thanks for reading.

Linking up with:
Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday
Angela at So Scrappy
Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop
Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Old Fabrics and A New Book

 What's better than new books about old fabric?  For me, not much!

This is the book I got this week:  Feedsacks:  A Colourful History of a Frugal Fabric" by Linzee Kull McCray.  I've been collecting feedsacks and the books about them for a long time, so it was great to see something new and fun.
Articles on the history of feedsacks are interspersed in the book with more than 800 color photos of sacks. I was able to find several of my feedsacks pictured.

In the foreground of this photo is the book.  The background is the back of my Buckeye Beauty quilt, an RSC quilt from a couple of years ago.  Blue raspberries!  What a weird and cool idea.

This lovely fabric got its own full page (on the left).  The colors are very true, almost exact.

Sack manufacturers often made the same print in different colorways.  My sack, in the foreground, is mostly purple.  The one in the book is mostly green.

I've been thinking of feedsacks lately because of one particular project I'm making for this year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  My house blocks are made from 1930s reproduction fabrics, vintage fabrics, and feedsacks. 

Here's orange house #1.  The light fabric with the orange fish is a feedsack scrap.

The main fabric, orange plaid with daisies, was an unfinished skirt when I found it at a flea market.

House #2 is entirely reproduction fabric.

The window fabric is a cat print.  I think lots of people in this "town" like cats.

For the third block, I went Halloween.  The leaf print on the outside is a feedsack scrap.

More cats!  This time black cats and pumpkins are in the windows.

Obviously, there are WAY more feedsacks in that pile above than I would need for several quilts.  I pulled these out because I have a project in mind.
Every year, my quilt guild has a booth at the local quilt show, where we sell items.  I am not good at making items for sale (that is an understatement).  But I do know how to cut fabric.  So sometimes I cut up feedsacks to sell in packets.
I have a question for you.  If you were interested in buying feedsack scraps, what size would you want?  Do you think quilters would like charm squares, or bigger pieces?  I don't want to sell full sacks, because they tend to cost more than most people would like to pay.  Also, when I cut them up I can cut pieces for my own use too.  Any ideas would be very helpful.

Still on the sack theme, I made a new grocery bag from fabric I bought at a flea market.  The red handles on the bag were on the free table at our last guild meeting, and came in very handy.

I just love these giraffes!  I'm a sucker for novelty prints.

No quilts finished this week, but my Little Buddy posed on a pile of them.

He wanted me to include this photo he took of his favorite T. Rex.  Roar!

I hope you had a nice Valentine's Day, or Gal-entines Day, or just a nice Friday.  We have been eating too many cupcakes and too much candy.  Dieting is coming.

Good luck with all your projects this week, quilting and otherwise.
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:
Angela at So Scrappy
Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday
Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Ups and Downs and Zigzags

It's almost a miracle!  Zigzag quilt #1 got finished this week.

This is one of last year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilts.  (Click HERE for more details on my zigzag quilts.)  It's not a very big quilt, just 64 in. x 78 in., and it was half quilted last Saturday, so why would it be a miracle to finish it this week?  One word--flu.
My little buddy got it last week, and after a doctor visit and Tamiflu, he bounced right back.  On Tuesday, it was my turn.  (Why didn't I get a flu shot?  From now on, I will.)

This was me, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.  I admit to feeling sorry for myself some of the time, but I had lots of comforts--hot tea, warm quilts, and a sweet dog.  Oh, and word games on my phone.  (Photo credits--Little Buddy took this picture.)

Hubby helped take care of Little Buddy, who was feeling fine.  They built a huge train and car layout in Hubby's office/den.

Monday, before I got really sick, I had finished the quilting on Zigzag #1.  By Friday, I was finally feeling human again (hurray!), so after Little Buddy went home I made a rainbow binding and stitched it on.  I don't think I've ever made a rainbow binding before.  Although I have often made scrappy bindings, they are usually in just one color. 

The quilting is simple, just up and down the zigzags with the built-in walking foot.

With that done, I could work on my blocks for this year's RSC quilts.  Reproduction orange fabric, which I'm using for these shoofly blocks, looks sort of like the burnt orange crayon color we used to have in grade school.  I always wondered why anybody would want to burn an orange.

It's been snowing lightly this morning, just when the snow cover had been finally melting.  We're not supposed to get a big storm, but I want to get out and get my errands done.  I need valentines for the grandchildren as well as groceries.  After that, I'm going to take it slow, and do a little sewing.

Stay well, if you can, and take care of yourself.  Have a lovely weekend.
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:
Angela at So Scrappy
Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday
Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop
Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Dear Diary

Welcome to Treadlestitches, and to a new month!  I can't believe January is already over.

I stopped keeping a diary in junior high because it was the surest way to be ridiculed endlessly by my brothers and sisters, who always managed to find it and read it out loud. (AAK!)  Now, I really have no embarrassing secrets, and my only crush is my Dear Hubby, so diaries are okay again.  I'm making this one out of fabric.

Above are my diary quilt blocks for January.  Each separate block represents a week (mostly), and each strip is a day.  For each day, I choose something to represent that day.

I won't bore you with everything that happened all month long.  I will say that most Sundays are yellow, partly because it's sun-day (Dad joke), and partly because that's the day I talk to my mom on the phone for at least an hour, which is a bright spot in the week.  If I finish a quilt, I include a piece of it for that day (like the dark blue in the center of the block above).  I'm also using lots of my books/library fabrics for Tuesdays, when my Little Buddy and I go to the library.

As I say, each small block is meant to represent a week, with 7 strips, one for each day.  I intended 4 small blocks for each month. The biggest question about this was what to do when the month has more than 28 days.  In that case, I split the last strips into two days each.  Above, the last 3 strips are made up of 2 rectangles, for Sunday/Monday, Tuesday/Wednesday, and Thursday/Friday.

I still have no idea how I'm going to set the blocks.

You might have noticed all the children's prints and novelty fabrics in my diary quilt.  That's because I get to spend my days with this guy, my Little Buddy, seen here helping make his favorite blueberry pancakes.

We make snowman faces in them sometimes.

He also "helped" me pack up some quilts our local group is donating to Jack's Basket.  Here he is pointing out polar bears in the print on this cute quilt.  Bella the dog is nearby, in case we need to have our faces licked.  (Yuck!)  Thank goodness they're going to wash the quilts before sending them out to the babies.

These are the quilts I was packing up.  Aren't they amazing?  There are 12 of them in this batch.  That brings us up to a grand total of 34 quilts sent to Jack's Basket since last summer from our small group of around 50 active members.  I go into more detail on our group's blog, if you're interested click HERE.

Quilting is happening!  Zigzag #1 is about half done.  Mrs. Pfaff will be whirring away later today.

Orange is the new color for February for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, and I couldn't be happier.  The pile of 1930s repros and vintage prints above will eventually be house blocks.

For some reason, I've been in the mood to cut scraps this week.

This little stack (really orange, not yellow, bad lighting) is six blocks worth of Text Me A Quilt.

The shoofly blocks are cut too, ready to sew.

And I finally decided on a layout for the Roscoe Star blocks, so the last blocks are cut to sew as leaders and enders.
You could say I've got my work cut out for me.
(I can just about hear my Dad saying that.  Gotta love Dad jokes.)
Have a wonderful week, and a great start to February.  If it includes sewing, so much the better!
Cheers,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:
Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop
Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday
Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap