Criss Cross Stars and Yellow Blocks

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

In spite of getting distracted by my Kid Stuff quilt, I did finally finish the Criss Cross Stars top!  Must be because we stayed home all week.  I had to hang it sideways on the clothesline so it wouldn't drag on the ground.

Criss Cross Stars is a pattern by Lori Holt.  I started watching her YouTube videos last winter/spring and really loved them.  (Click HERE for Criss Cross Stars.)  Ms. Holt uses fabric she designs herself, but of course I used my bright kid-friendly prints.  For the centers, I chose either multicolored prints or multicolors on black.  This one is a Laurel Burch print of horses.

This is one of the black ones.  My backgrounds are scrappy.  With as much fabric as I have, I wasn't going to buy any more just to have enough for all the squares to be the same! (I probably will at some point, of course lol.)  The star points are made from 2.5 in. squares from my parts department.

I love this center square!  I bought a small scrap bundle at a quilt shop in Edinburgh last September and a tiny bit of this fabric was in it.  Happy, colorful elephants!  What's not to love?

 

Here's the border.   It looks blue in the photos, but it's actually a bluish purple.

The quilt measures 52 in. x 70 in., and will be donated to the Children's Advocacy Center to be quilted and given to a child in foster care.

It's yellow month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge!  I love yellow.  It adds so much spark to a quilt, and goes with almost anything.  First up are my Greek Cross blocks.

I have all sorts of yellow scraps.  Some a bright as day, like the ones in this block.

Others are quieter.  Don't wake the sleepy little bear!

I didn't get any yellow blocks done for the first yellow Saturday, so I'm doing double time this week to catch up with these Whirligig blocks.  They are probably the quickest to cut and sew of any of my RSC blocks.

This soft print has characters from the Little Golden books.  I remember my Mom reading them to my brother and sister and me, especially the Poky Little Puppy and the Saggy Baggy Elephant.

In Progress

Now that I'm all caught up I can get to work on a UFO.  Back in 2024 I made STACKS of cat blocks.  After finishing several small quilts, I still had 21 blocks left over.  This project will use up 20 of those blocks in a small quilt, which I will quilt and donate to the GSAFE auction at the end of October.  I'm adding frames to bring them up to 9 in. finished.  All the frames were cut yesterday, so I'm ready to go.

For leaders and enders I'm sewing 2.5 in. squares into "twosies" and will then sew the twosies into four patches.  I need 96 four patches so it will be a while before they're done.  This basket had over 200 squares in it when I started.  Looks like I need to load it up again from the parts department.

No pictures of the grandkids this week.  Their dad was off work so they went fishing, etc., and I didn't babysit much.  (Could that be another reason I got some things done?)

Both boys would like to recommend this book that we borrowed from the library.  It is tough to find anything a 6 year old and a 10 year agree on, so I thought I'd pass it on.  Steve (the rubber ducky) and his friend Hank (a plastic dinosaur) are hiding in the puzzles on the pages.  Hank is VERY easy to find.  Steve just gets harder and harder to spot as the book goes along.  More of a puzzle book than a reading book, but challenging (even for adults!) and fun.

No blog next week!  I will be out of town, but I'm NOT going to another funeral (thank goodness!), just a big family reunion.  I may even visit a quilt shop.

Have a great week!  Or two!  Happy quilting!

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with these kind ladies:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy, Home of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Stack It Up!

Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

Happy U.S. Independence Day!

The Stack It Up top doesn't really qualify as a 4th of July quilt.  It's red white and blue, and also orange and green and yellow and purple and aqua, etc.  I always think I'll do some red white and blue sewing on July 4, but end up not prepping anything ahead.

Many thanks to the people who commented recommending not including the heart appliques from Lori Holt's original pattern.  My white strips are wild enough on their own!  

All of these scraps come from my "Parts Department", mostly the 2 in. strips drawer.  I also raided the 2 in. squares box and the "little bricks" (2 x 3.5 in. rectangles) box. 

There's a solid red inner border, then this blue alphabet print border with illustrations that remind me of books from the 1950s, like Dick and Jane.  I got the blue fabric second hand from the museum sale.

Lizzy the cat walked over the top to test the seams but declined to stay and pose.  I think she gets fluffier every day.

I haven't decided if I'm quilting it myself or donating it as a top to be quilted by a volunteer.  It's not huge (45 in. x 57 in.) but I'm not going to have a lot of time to quilt this summer.

New color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge:  Aqua!  I'm making five of these Half Log Cabin blocks in each color.  I had already made the one above when I tested the pattern, so I had only four more to sew.

Two are a greenish aqua and two are more bluish.  Lots of my aqua prints have a nautical/ocean life theme.  Except for the cow (not a sea cow) and elephants (not elephant seals).  Also some butterflies.

In Progress

Summer is my busiest time of year, mostly because school is out for my youngest grandsons.  I can make time for piecing in the mornings and at odd moments, but having time to actually do the quilting is hard to come by.  I'll catch up in the fall when the boys go back to school.

In the meantime I'll get ahead on some piecing projects.  This is another Lori Holt pattern called Criss Cross Star.   I first saw it on her You Tube channel.  It's #10 in her Sew Your Stash Series.  (Click HERE.)  The block she made on the video was 9 in. finished, and that's what I'm making.  It appears in her book Scrappiness is Happiness as a 15 in. finished block.  One of the coolest things about it is the cutting:  it's all squares!  Also the points float, so you can't accidentally cut off the points.  Works for me!

More beautiful aqua!  My friend Debbie gave me this lovely shawl she knit with beautiful shades of blues and greens.  It's light as a feather and so soft.  I can't wait to find a dress to wear with it.  (Thanks again, Debbie, you are amazing!)

It's July 4th, and we've already been to a parade!  That's because a neighboring town has its Independence Day parade on July 3rd.  That's Hubby and our youngest daughter above.  My hilarious husband is wearing Little Guy's hat.  The parade was amazing, and we had a great time.

I hope you all have a great time this week, doing things you love to do.

Happy Independence Day, America!

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

 

 

Visiting

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

Last Saturday was a wonderful day!  My friend Debbie C. and I spent the day in Cedarburg, Wisconsin.  First we had a lovely lunch at the Anvil Pub and Grill.  The weather was a little cool but sunny, and it was great to be outside.

Then we went to the Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts to see the current exhibit and hear a talk given by four of the featured artists about their work.

The exhibit is called Slow Light.  According to the museum's description, "Slow Light is part of the museum's ongoing commitment to expanding the definition of fiber art."  We really enjoyed hearing the artists describing their media, their inspirations, and their techniques.  My favorite pieces were digitally woven from paper yarn, which I had never heard of before.  Click HERE for an article from Knit Magazine about Japanese paper yarn.

The exhibit runs through August 16th.

Seeing the exhibit and especially visiting with Debbie was the highlight of the week.  

I did get a little sewing done.  I started putting the small Stack It Up blocks together in blocks of four, with the light pieces in the center.  Lori Holt, the designer, appliqued hearts in the centers of her blocks.  I'm trying to decide if I want to do that with mine.  What would you do?

Last week I mentioned that I had resized Ms. Holt's small blocks to be 6 in. finished instead of 4 in., but I never gave you the dimensions in case you'd like to do that too.

Here they are, in cut (not finished) sizes.

Cut 1 dark square 2 in. x 2 in. and 1 light squares 2 in. x 2 in.

Cut 1 dark rectangle 2 in. x 3.5 in. and 1 light rectangle 2 in. x 3.5 in.

Cut 1 dark rectangle 2 in. x 5 in. and 1 light rectangle 2 in. x 5 in.

Cut 1 dark rectangle 2 in. x 6.5 in.

The small blocks are 6 in. x 6 in. finished.  Four of these sewn together measure 12 in. x 12 in.

Unfortunately, I had to go out of town for a family funeral on Wednesday, so I didn't get much sewing done.  It was important to us to be there for our family members, and my Mom and I enjoyed catching up with relatives we don't see often.  I do wish we could have more family reunions and fewer funerals.

The last four blocks for the pastel baby quilt are sewn, so it's time to set them together and finish it up!  I'm hoping to get some time this weekend to catch up.  I guess maybe I'm a little bit ahead (?) since these are aqua and aqua is our Rainbow Scrap Challenge color for July.

Early in the week the boys and I went to the playground.  Buddy asked me to take this photo of his head encircled by the apparatus.  

I asked our Little Guy to pose for me to show off his missing teeth.  I think he turned into the dinosaur on his shirt.  He's a wild one!

Have a great week, everyone, with lots of time for the things you love to do.  Like quilting!

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Color Block Stars and Stack It Up

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

Good morning and happy Saturday!  The Color Block Star top is done and hanging on the clothesline.  I added the border on Wednesday and the weather cooperated for a sunny photo yesterday.

It was really too big for the clothesline at 54 in. x 68 in.  Twelve inch blocks really add up!

 In addition to two of each of the "regular" colors I made two black blocks and two multicolor ones.  I forgot how many fun prints I had in black and multicolor.

I bought this colorful alphabet on the border at the museum sale.  I guess blue is my favorite border color.  I use other colors but I always go back to blue.  Do you have a favorite border color?

Every block has 15 print squares plus one white one.  That makes 300 squares, right?  So why do I still have a full box of 3.5 in. squares?  (Magic?)

The top will be donated to the Children's Advocacy Center in Milwaukee.

The Color Block Stars pattern is available for free HERE.  It was part of a block drive last year for Many Hands Many Hearts on the Oh Scrap blog.  (Thanks, Cynthia!)

  

Working on the top reminded me to get started on some blocks for the current MHMH block drive.  We're making these easy "potato chip-ish" blocks in complimentary colors.  I'm a little short on red and green prints (except for novelties of course!) but I had some orange/blue and yellow/purple to get started on.

Now for some pastels!  Well, mostly.  This time they're green, and they'll be part of the pastel baby quilt I hope to finish before the end of the month.

In Progress

As you can see, I'm treadling again!  My treadle is now in the dining room right under the window.  It's a good place to sew, especially when I'm waiting on supper to cook.  The jungle outside the window is a tangle of black raspberry vines, now with baby green raspberries ripening in the sun.

Once I finished the Color Block Stars top I went digging in the kits, block sets, etc. for the next project.  I chose a partial kit I cut a few weeks ago to make Stack It Up, a Lori Holt pattern.  

Last winter I really got into watching Lori Holt's videos on YouTube.  She has so many fun ideas for scrappy quilts.  Click HERE for the video for her 4 in. finished Stack It Up.  I wanted slightly bigger blocks, so I scaled mine up to 6 in. finished by cutting all the pieces from 2 in. strips.

So that's all the sewing news from our house.   But there is something even better than happened.

Our eldest daughter finished her Master's degree!  That's quite an accomplishment while working full time as a first grade teacher and looking after her husband and two teenagers.  We're very proud of her!

Have a good week, everyone, and thanks for reading this!

Cheers,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

A Scrappy Star, and Lots of Red

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

Twinkle Twinkle Scrappy Star is a top!  I hung it in our maple tree on a sunny day last week.

The blocks were easy and fun to make.  The points even came out right, most of the time!  All thanks to quilt designer Lori Holt.

I discovered the tutorial for this quilt on Lori Holt's Youtube channel.  I had two of her books, but hadn't really done anything with them.  After I watched a ton of her videos I ordered two more books.  My favorite is the one on top in the photo, Scrappiness is Happiness.  The directions on Youtube are very clear, and you wouldn't need the book to make the quilt, but I wanted to see all the other great designs.  Plus, as you'd expect from a retired librarian, I like hard copies!

The directions and photos in the book are great too.  You can see that Lori set her blocks side by side. I went for sashing and cornerstones for a slightly different look, which helps separate the wide variety of background fabrics I used.

All of the star points came from my box of 2.5 in. x 4.5 in. rectangles, so all I had to cut were the background pieces.  Did you notice the Peanuts Easter fabric in the block above?  I'm using holiday fabrics even in non-holiday quilts if the color is right.

My quilt is 56 in. x 66 in., and will be donated as a top to the Children's Advocacy Center.  A volunteer will quilt it.

Here's an adorable snuggly flannel baby quilt, also going to the CAC.  I didn't make this one, my friend Tammy M. did.

Tammy had a really good idea, which I will be shamelessly stealing.  This quilt is made of leftover border strips.  Tammy sewed them together (see the seam in the middle?) and quilted them.  People often donate this kind of thing to our group, or these borders end up in second hand sales, and I never knew what to do with them.  Now I know!  Thanks, Tammy!

It's the last week of red month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, and I had two sets of blocks to work on if I was going to get done on time.  First is the Half Log Cabin.  The block above is one I made to test my pattern.

It was fun digging through the red scraps to find fun prints.

Isn't red a great color?

Lastly, the crumb blocks!  I made all of these yesterday.  Still not sure what I'm doing with them at the end of the year.  My favorite block is the one with the south end of a north bound cow.  (It's the second block from the top, on the right.)

In Progress

I'm still working on the Cabin Steps quilt blocks as leaders and enders.  This one is going to take a while.

Meanwhile, this little quilt will be getting an orange binding.  The backing fabric is from 2012, and I bought it second hand in an antique shop.  All those colorful words are names of towns in Wisconsin. I'll show the front of the quilt next week.

Farewell to red month for the RSC, it's been fun!  I'm sure our next color will great, too.

Have a lovely week, everyone.  Happy Quilting!

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap