Little Brick Ladders Finished, and Aqua Sisters Choice

Welcome to Treadlestitches!

Do you remember this little quilt?  I posted the top almost a month ago.  It's quilted at last, and ready to be donated.

Lizzy and Snicky are posing for me here.  Just after I took this photo, they were wildly attacking each other under the quilt.

I call this pattern Little Brick Ladders, because I call the small rectangles in the blocks (2.5 in. x 3.5 in.) Little Bricks.  Most of them are leftover pieces from 2.5 in. or 3.5 in. strips.

It was fun choosing which pieces to use.  There are 42 blocks of 3 bricks each, so if my math is correct that's 126 pieces.  I don't think I repeated any prints, so it's an absolute chaos of novelties.  The aqua Dr. Seuss print in the border is a nod to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge color of the month.

For the backing, I used the same jelly bean print from the front.  The quilting is my usual serpentine stitch done by Mrs. Pfaff, still going strong after coming home from the repair shop.  For a binding, I chose a darker aqua polka dot from the big scraps basket.

I discovered an embarrassing amount of larger batting scraps in the basement, which is leading to more Franken-batts.  This quilt and the last one I finished both were made with them.  I find I like to piece them by hand at the kitchen table while the grandkids are playing or supper is cooking.

My aqua blocks this week are Sisters Choice.  I divided the scraps roughly into greenish and bluish aqua.

One more greenish one.

Now the bluish ones.

and

Question for you quilters:  If you had a quilting assistant, what would you have them do?  This week I was vaguely remembering a magazine article from a long time ago.  The lady in the article was an art quilter who had received a grant to hire an assistant.  She was wondering what she should have her/him do.  It made me think about what I would choose.

I have lots of small piles of scraps lying around.  The squares and rectangles in the background were cut from some 2.5 in. x 5 in. rectangles I was saving with no real purpose.  Now that they're cut into either 2.5 in. x 4.5 in. or 2.5 in. squares, they need to be sorted by color and filed.  An assistant could do that!

The pile in the front came from the big sale at the museum.  I bought a plastic shoebox of 3.5 in. strips.  Some of the strips were really short, so I set them aside to be trimmed into 3.5 in. squares, etc.  An assistant could do that!

While rummaging through my multicolor fabric drawer, I noticed how messy it was.  An assistant could sort this.  But--I don't have an assistant.  So I sorted it myself, and I am now more familiar with what's here.

I'm also going to sort the small pieces in the previous photo, and cut those 3.5 in. chunks down too.  Maybe I'm my own assistant?  I need to take time to do the non-sewing jobs that make the sewing go smoothly.

Guess what I was doing this morning instead of writing this post?  You're right, I went to the West Bend Farmers Market, and here's the loot I brought back:  12 ears of corn, 2 large green peppers, 10 small to medium cucumbers, a bag of Crimini mushrooms, a bag of fresh green beans, and a bundle of rhubarb.  We are so lucky to have all of this produce near us.  This whole pile cost $31.00.

The cucumbers and peppers will go into my annual pickle relish canning.  The rhubarb will make a sweet/tart pie.

So I guess I bought myself some more work!  Well, it's worth it. 

We're all safe here from last week's flood, although some roads were closed and lots of basements were flooded.  It kept raining on Monday, which meant the kids were indoors too long and we all got cranky.  Thank goodness the sun finally came out, and life is mostly back to normal.

Take care this week!  I hope things are even better than normal for you.  Happy quilting!

Cheers for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap