Time to Sew

Bella, our dog, says hi.  She's worn out today, but she has had an amazing week.  She loves Christmas, for several reasons.  There are children's faces to lick, food scraps to snarf up off the floor, more kind hands to pet her, a present or two, and maybe even some Christmas ham in her bowl.  She even loves the mailman who brings packages to the door.  January might seem kind of flat to her.

But not to me!  It's all done--the shopping, wrapping, cleaning, baking, hugs and laughter and merrymaking.  Time to reveal the secret sewing, and to get back to making the needles fly.

Here's the little wall hanging I made for the Brown Bag Challenge at our quilt group.  Each participant puts a fat quarter and a slip of paper with their name on it in a brown bag, and we exchange bags.  We make something (pretty much anything goes) using the fat quarter for the person who brought it, which we give as a gift at Christmas.

The fat quarter in the brown bag I got was the white-on-white fabric I used for the background.  On the slip of paper with the person's name was a request for a Christmas table runner or a wall hanging, with cardinals if possible.  I delivered the cardinals, courtesy of Connecting Threads.com, seen here in the border.  I also made a matching pot holder, but didn't get a photo of that.

I added these corners on the back, to assist in hanging.  Have you done this?  Was it useful, or not very?  I've never done this before, and I'm not sure.

I don't make a lot of sewing projects for Christmas gifts.  It increases the stress, which I can do without.  I did make each grandchild a new pillowcase.  It was fun choosing the fabrics for them.  My granddaughter got vintage kittens, Little Buddy's has tractors (of course), my second-oldest grandson got a Minecraft print, a video game he loves, but I was stumped on the oldest grandson, Big Buddy.  My husband reminded me that Big Buddy will be in high school next year (!!!), so we chose a manly plaid.

I love my family, and I feel like I'm the luckiest person on earth, but I don't mind that the holidays are just about over and I have some time off babysitting.  I have so many UFOs to finish, and I'm hoping to make a dent in them during this long weekend.
The top above was inspired by a lady in my quilt group (the amazing Laverne) who brought a similar top to show and tell some months ago.

It's very simple, just charm squares with 1.5 in. rectangles sewn to two adjacent sides.  Mine is a lot smaller than Laverne's was, because I ran out of the fabric I was using for the narrow pieces.
Everything for this charity quilt comes from the stash.
I'm not sure if I'm going to quilt it myself, or give it to the long armers in the group so they can do a more professional job.

My Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilts from this year are STILL in progress.  I'm adding brown print borders to the Wagon Trail quilt sections.  This is the big "half".  Once the borders are done, it's on to the quilting!

I hope to get this one done soon, but we'll see.   My 2017 RSC quilts are still waiting to be finished.

But that's not stopping me from thinking about RSC quilts for 2019!  This is my current idea--8 pointed stars made from two fabrics in the designated color, plus a white background.  I love all the rainbow star quilts Angela and others have made for the RSC.

This was the view out our back door on Christmas morning.  It's a White Christmas!  Never mind that it all melted by the next day.
Little Buddy is really hoping for more snow so he can build another snowman.  Eventually I'm sure he's going to get his wish.  This is a Wisconsin winter, after all.

With snow, or without, may your days be merry and bright.  Happy New Year!
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches
Linking up with
Angela at soscrappy
Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Myra at Busy Hands Quilts
Cynthia at Oh Scrap