Sew Happy!

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Thanks for stopping by!

Yesterday, I finally finished the last Heart quilt from last year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  It was sunny in the afternoon and 40 degrees F, so I hung it outside for a photo.

Here's what the backyard looks like this morning!  The snow is coming down thick and fast.  I don't have anywhere I have to go today, so I will stay inside and enjoy how pretty it is.

I made this quilt with the last heart blocks, even though there wasn't a good mix of colors.  There are 7 red hearts and 6 yellow ones out of the 20 total blocks.  I didn't want to make any more blocks and I refused to have any leftovers to put in the orphan pile, so I tried to balance the colors out and left it at that.

The sashings were cut from a polka dot fabric I bought in Oklahoma.  The cornerstones and border are the same fabric, a Thomas the Tank Engine print.  When my youngest grandson (Little Guy) was small he loved Thomas, so I always bought Thomas prints whenever I saw them at sales and flea markets.  Little Guy has moved on (he's into Super Mario now), so I can use these fabrics for my charity quilts.

The backing is another heart print I bought at the museum sale in June, and the binding is a red polka dot.  Simple quilting as usual, thanks to Mrs. Pfaff and her built-in walking foot.

Are you participating in the RSC this year?  I am so used to it now I think I'd be lost without it!  Many, many thanks to Angela for hosting it year after year.  I'm making the Greek Cross pattern, in blue for our January color.  These are the dark blue blocks.  

I also made light blue blocks.  This year, I have a PLAN.  We'll see if I stick to it.  BTW, did you catch the mistake?  I didn't see it until I took the picture.  Top row, far right.  Sigh.  Seam ripper time.

There, that's better.

A quilt in the book Quilts from the Heart inspired me to choose this block to make all year.  It's a good book, by the way.  The author, Karin Renaud, uses bright colors and novelty prints to make donation quilts for kids.  A lady after my own heart!

This is the photo of her Greek Cross quilt.  I love it!  But her blocks are 7.5 in. finished, and I wanted mine to be 9 in.  I also wanted to use some of the squares and rectangles from my parts department.  And simple math is always better for me lol.

Greek Cross is a pattern that has been around for a very long time.  It's listed as #1646b in Barbara Brackman's Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns and as #152 Grecian Designs in the Lady's Art Company Catalog of 1928.  The block itself existed long before it was published in print.

When I started this block, I already had the light rectangles (2 in. x 3.5 in.), the Sesame Street rectangles (also 2 in. x 3.5 in.), and the center square (3.5 in.).  I sewed the rectangles together on the long side, and used my Easy Angle ruler and 3.5 in. strips of the white and the Eric Carle fabric to make the corner hsts, which measure 3.5 in. before being sewn into the block. (You could of course use any other method to make the hsts.  I just hate drawing on fabric.)  Once I had all nine components, it was easy to stitch together.  It's also easy to goof up, see the light blue square above, so I need to keep my wits about me!

A New Year is a good time to do some cleaning and reorganizing.  My sewing room has needed a makeover (or just a facelift?) for a long time.  I started with making my light yardage and scraps more accessible.  This dresser is right next to Mrs. Pfaff, so there are tools/accessories in the tin in front, such as sewing machine oil, a small ruler, and of course a seam ripper.

The big basket on the left holds mostly half yard pieces.  The Sew Happy scissors decoration was a gift from my youngest daughter years ago.  I live up to it almost every day.

Fabrics in the center basket have an off-white background.  Heed the message on the little zipper bag:  Life is short, buy the fabric!

I made this basket more than 30 years ago.  It now holds light fat quarters. 

Having these fabric visible and handy makes it more likely I will use them.  It's a start.

Announcement:  Quilt Nihon is back at the Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts!  My friend Debbie and I went last weekend, and it was amazing!  There are all sorts of quilts, from elaborate traditional ones to knock-your-socks-off modern ones, and everything in between.  We were so dazzled we forgot to take a selfie together!  The show will be there until March.  Click HERE for details.

To put the icing on the cake of a wonderful week, our youngest grandsons were here for a short visit after school.

They love to play Grandpa's drums.  Buddy's sticks were just blurs.

Little Guy's drumsticks were going so fast the camera could hardly capture them.

Oh, and if you have been annoyed by a certain viral trend, you might be glad to know Buddy says that 6-7 thing is "so 2025".  I'm sure something else will come along soon.

Thank you for reading this long post!  I will not be able to post next week since we're going to a funeral, so I put everything in today.

I'm off to see what lovely items other quilters have posted for us.  Have a wonderful week, and Sew Happy!

Cheers,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

 

Pink Hearts and Sisters Choice

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  Happy Holidays!

I'm still on my quest to use up the Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks I made all this year.  This is the next-to-last heart quilt, which I'm calling Pink Valentines.

For somebody whose favorite color is NOT pink, I seem to be making a lot of pink quilts!  This one uses up the last pink hearts.  It's a little one, just 35 in. x 43 in., and will be donated to the Children's Advocacy Center.

My pink stash is tiny (wonder why?).  I had a couple of strips of this heart print that I used for cornerstones to fit the heart theme.

The border is this very subtle heart print.  I also used what was left of it for the binding, along with another pink to make enough.  I'll be on the lookout this year for some bright pink prints and solids.

The backing is this same "cheater" print I've used on the two pink Bowtie quilts.  There's only a scrap of it left now.

Coming soon, one last heart quilt!

Meanwhile, I've moved on to the Sisters Choice blocks.  Even though I didn't expect to have much time to sew this week, a few hours opened up on a couple of days.  It doesn't take long to put a top together if all the blocks are already sewn!  

To set the blocks together, I used sashing strips cut from this paw print, and cornerstones and borders from the mottled blue.  I bought both of these fabrics at Sew & Sews quilt shop in Oklahoma City while I was visiting my mom.

This red block is my favorite.  The dinosaur in the center is waving at us!

The top is 54 in. x 66 in., and will also go to the CAC.

When I'm piecing I need leaders and enders, which can lead to scrambling around in the scraps and getting totally off track.  A better use of the time is participating in block drives, like the current one being run by Cynthia at Oh Scrap.  (Click HERE for the block drive post/directions.)

The blocks this time are 4 patches surrounded by either white-on-black prints or black-on-white prints.  I didn't have any of the black-on-white ones (I think they got used up in a guild challenge?) but I had a few of the white-on-black.  These quilts will be for adults, so I didn't use my usual kid prints.  It gave me a chance to use up some colorful non-kid squares.  

The quilts made from the blocks will be donated through Many Hand and Many Hearts.  Click on the link to learn about their mission.

The holidays are here!  This can be such a busy time for those of us who celebrate.  How are you doing?  Don't forget to stay hydrated!

Hubby and I went to a program this week at our youngest grandson's school.  That's him, with the vest on, next to his friends.  The program was wonderful as always, and really gets me in a holiday mood.  

More holiday merrymaking is on the schedule for today.  My daughters and their kids are coming over, and we're making Christmas cookies.  It's a family tradition that we look forward to every year.  I'm almost ready.  Three different doughs are chilling in the fridge, but I do need to make about a gallon of icing, so I'd better get going.

Merry Christmas to all who celebrate!  And a joyful week to everyone!

Cheers for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

Rainbow Scrap Challenge Heart Quilts, Part Deux

Welcome to Treadlestitches!

More hearts this week!  I'm working on making quilts with the blocks I sewed all year for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  These are the second and third heart quilts.

In the little quilt above, I have alternated the heart blocks with Bright Hopes blocks, which were also an RSC project this year.  I'm calling it Hearts and Bright Hopes (I am nothing if not obvious!).  I arranged them in rainbow rows.  There are fifteen Hearts and fifteen Bright Hopes.

The border is an Eric Carle print.  This one features The Very Lonely Firefly from his book of the same name.  I got several yards at a sale in Madison almost a year ago.  You can expect to see it again!

Here's the backing, red hearts on white.  This yardage came from the museum sale last summer, and was just right for this project.

The quilt is 36 in. x 42 in., and will be donated to the Children's Advocacy Center.

More hearts!  I call this one Hearts and Squares.  It's a lap size/small twin at 54 in. x 62 in.

I was hoping to use up some of these 2.5 in. squares, so the rest would fit better in the drawer.  I bet you know what happened.  This is the "before" photo.

Here's a photo from today.  This quilt top used up 213 of the squares.  And the only reason the drawer looks a little emptier is that I moved the solid squares to a different drawer.  This proves it.  I will never be able to use up all my scraps.  

That's okay with me!

The sashing pieces were handy to use for leaders and enders.  When I finished the top, I realized it was a bit bright.  Even for me.

All these wild fabrics might be a bit much.  I put a calmer border on it, not sure if it helps.

It was definitely fun digging all these squares out of the drawer and adding them together.

The top will also be going to the CAC in Milwaukee.

Christmastime is here for all of us who celebrate.  We got a little help decorating the tree this week from our youngest grandsons.  Buddy was kind enough to pose for me.  He is growing so much lately, getting taller.

So is Little Guy!  He can reach farther up on the tree than ever.  You can see we still have snow on the ground.  It's been here for two weeks now, not melting any time soon.

I hope you're having a good week, in spite of or because of the holiday excitement.  I'm not expecting to get much sewing done this coming week, which is one of the reasons I don't sew gifts.  I am looking forward to all the fun social activities this week.

Merry Christmas to all who celebrate!  And happy quilting to everyone!

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy, home of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Cynthia at Oh Scrap

 

My Heart Belongs to Project Linus

This wasn't the best week for getting quilting done around here.  My 20 month old grandson has not been reliably taking his nap, which is my sewing time.  I think we've got it straightened out now, and he slept like an angel on Friday, but we'll see what happens next week.

I did manage to get the pink and purple Pixel Hearts quilt finished.

Here's the back.  I haven't done a lot of pieced backs, so this was fun. 

The quilting was done using the edge of the presser foot for the most part, and masking tape for the lines through the alternate squares.

Here's one of my favorite blocks.  I just love these goofy farm animals.

Speaking of goofy, how about this Yo Gabba Gabba fabric? Yo Gabba Gabba was literally the weirdest kid show ever, back in the day.

You gotta have cows!  Especially Holsteins.  This is the dairy state, dern it.

When I made the blocks for the pink quilt, I also made blocks for a blue quilt.  Some of them are the same, for instance Yo Gabba Gabba and the cows.  I finished the blue top this morning.  Did you catch my shadow as I'm taking the photo?  I've got such mad photography skills.

The border is a bug print I have used over and over.  It's almost used up now, and I'm sad to see it go.  The robot print block is made from scraps I had left after making my oldest grandson a pillow case.  The robots were the border.

It's a lovely day for January here in Wisconsin.  After I took these pictures the dog and I went for a walk in the sunshine.

I'm wishing sunshine for you too this week.
Cheers,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches
Linking up with Busy Hands Quilts and Crazy Mom Quilts (as usual)
and with Oh Scrap for the first time.  Join the party!