Old and New and Blue

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Happy 2023!

The Christmas quilts are washed up and ready to put away for another year.  It took me all week in fits and starts, but I got the decorations down and packed up, with a little help from my Little Guy.

Isn't it fun to start new quilts?  Every year, I enjoy doing projects following The Rainbow Scrap Challenge (Click HERE for information).  Sometimes I choose my projects based on something I just really want to make.  A few weeks ago I showed an antique quilt made with concentric rounds of 4 patches.  I loved that idea.  Since the RSC color for January is dark or bright blue, I started with these.  (Click HERE for the post with the antique quilt.)  

Sometimes my RSC projects are based on scraps I need to use up.  Two of my projects this year come from this:

The two large bins on the bottom are filled with 5 in. wide strips of bright fabrics.  The shoe box sized bin on top holds 5 in. squares.  These pieces need a home.  (Maybe several homes?)

The boxes are absolutely stuffed full.

First, I cut a simple baby quilt, just out of the squares.

Here they are, spread out.  This will be a Trip Around the World, and will measure 40.5 in. square before borders.  Having it already cut will make it easy to use for leaders and enders around other projects.  Most pieces came from the bin, but I did have to cut some squares from larger scraps.

Here's a quilt I had my eye on.  It's called Row Houses, by Judy Gauthier.  I'm going to make all my houses the same size.

The pattern is from this book, and you won't believe how easy it is!

Just one seam turns a square into a house.

The house are sewn side by side, and then machine appliqued onto a background.  These are my test blocks.

My houses will be made mostly from novelty prints.  These are what I got done--dinosaurs, cats, baseballs, a singing chicken, an alligator, a toy boat, Clifford, and Marvin the Martian.  If the strips are relatively short after I cut the square, I cut up the rest of the strip into useful pieces.  Maybe the bins will be less full?

That's the new stuff.  What about the old?  Here's my last RSC project for 2022. (We won't talk about earlier years!)  I call it Rainbow Streak of Lightning.   It's spray basted and ready to quilt.  I should get some time with it this weekend.

Want to play with pretend clay?  Littlest grandson and I had fun this week.  He made a clay birthday cake for his dinosaur, complete with candles.  The dino couldn't eat the cake until we sang happy birthday and he blew out the candles, which of course were not really lit.

Our Little Guy and Snicklefritz the kitten love each other, but they do need a referee.  Cats don't want to be hugged around the neck.

The tiny rescue kitten we brought home last month has really grown!  He alternates between running around the house like a maniac, and passing out asleep on laps and chairs.  It's fun having a kitten again.

The new year always feels like a fresh new start.  Have fun this year.  And every year!

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Cynthia at Oh Scrap