A Few Finishes and I am a Blockhead!

It's A Grand Old Flag is an official finish.

As I was putting on the binding, I noticed the machine quilter had missed one of the leaves.  Then I noticed she was not the only one...

I had not blanket stitched around 4 of the red stars!

I had a good laugh and will try to correct my error...some day.

Anna, over at The Woolie Mammoth, came up with a great motivational idea...Blockheads.

I don't know all the details, but I decided to use her idea to help me finish up some WIPs. 

If I understand the approach correctly, once a month I will work on just one block each from the projects I want to complete. So my projects are Le Jardin, my red and white quilt and the hexie quilt.

Here is my progress.

Block #7

I am doing them in a strange order, AND I made a mistake on this one too.  After I had the house appliqued down, I figured out I had cut the background the wrong size.  No way was I going to start over, so I cut the side strip a little wider.  Hopefully, I will not notice it too much.

Wish I had drafted this one as a full size quilt.  I will finish it off with a wide solid border of either the red or the white and applique some birds and berries on it.  Like Le Jardin, it is definitely a long term project.  Working in just two colors and repeating the same block over and over again is not my favorite type of piecing!

Unfortunately, I did not get a hexie block made today.  Ah, but the month is young!

The Secret for Me...

...in getting multitudes of HSTs made is to have a tennis tournament to watch! 

 And that would be Wimbledon, especially with the return of Venus and Serena Williams,

although Venus's attire is atrocious!

I am challenged with the use of the high contrast solid fabrics, so it is slow going. 

I've already started to plan a border.  Thinking maybe some red on white applique, but not floral. 

We'll see if I have any enthusiasm left once the center is finished! 

The tennis was rained out the other day, so we fit in a hike to the very sedate Coal Creek...which is more like a babbling brook.  Tall ferns and giant flowering plants surrounded the creek and made for some great photo opportunities. 

These flower stalks were on plants that were chest high and had fernlike leaves.  My best guess is it is a subalpine Larkspur of some sort. Our hike was cut short when I saw an animal print in the mud around the creek and asked my DH what it might be.

  "Probably a large cat," he said. 

 Suddenly realizing the effect that would have on me, he tried to change his opinion.

"No, probably someone's dog," was his second answer, even though we had seen no other prints besides sign of free range cattle on the entire walk.  Needless to say, I decided I had had enough for the day.  Still managed to get a fair amount of uphill cardio before my downhill retreat.

Back to HSTs and tennis!

A Weekend's Work

I decided to get at least one of the samples for TOWQS done to take back with me. 

This is Winter #577 by Country Threads.

It is fusible applique, so the next step is to decide how to anchor the shapes...

buttonhole stitch around them all or

stitch them down as I quilt.

The second choice will be faster, but I will let the girls at the shoppe decide which finish they want.

I also managed to catch up with my Civil War BOWs.

Ladies Aid Album

Calico Puzzle

I have been talking about a red and white quilt for some time now, so I finally started it.

I am fascinated by the illusion created by these two color HSTs.

Half the block looks like white triangles on red and the other half looks like red triangles on white.

I'll be using this illusion in my setting design.

I only have 540 HSTs to make and 57 more of these 3" finished blocks!

Better get busy!