Summer has arrived in Virginia. We're hitting temperatures around 90. That's not unusual. It's just summer and that means it's a good time to stay inside. I got my two veterans quilts quilted and they are ready for binding. I might get them finished this coming weekend after I get the string quilt top done and the stringy mess cleaned up. The next 2 quilts are basted and ready to start quilting. That will also probably not happened until the weekend. I've got some appointments today, I work the voting precinct tomorrow and the we have quilt club sewing days Wednesday and Thursday. I made some progress on the string quilt. Only 3 more sets of diamonds and I can put this one together. I also got the rest of the Farm quilt cut out! It was nice to clear that off the cutting table. Now this is packed up and ready to take to Maine. But the big project of the weekend was cleaning the basement. We use a wood stove in the winter for heat so after the season the basement needs a deep clean. Plus, it was perfect timing to clean and reorganize the dye space for post-business use. It's a true deep clean that includes mopping a cement floor. I hate doing it but it feels good to be done. I proposed to Chris that we eat dinner on this floor last night. He didn't accept the offer.
Tomorrow I'll be at the voting precinct from 5am until 8pm. For the last lot of years I've used Saturday for sharing some of the great work of my customers. Well, there won't be any more of that! In fact, the Customer Gallery page will be taken down in the next few weeks because I don't think it's right for me to keep that page now that I'm shutting down the business. So, now would be a good time to take a look at a lot of inspiring projects! Going forward, I'm going to use Saturday for my crochet updates and my first project is this baby blanket. I've finished 1 skein of 4. The interesting thing about this one is that in the first skein the green turned brighter about halfway through the panel. This is a new project that I started. It's going to be about 40" wide and maybe 60" long and will be a donation blanket. It's going to be stripes in dark blue, medium blue and white. I've made this pattern a couple of times before. Here's one of them. It's a fast one!
Yesterday I continued with my recent daily habits of a little longarm quilting, a little piecing and a little cutting. But mostly I got sidetracked making some new postcards with the batik scraps that I received. I needed some new birthday cards for the dudes. I got so involved in making them that I didn't take any progress photos. But you can see that they were really simple. I hindsight, I think I would have benefitted from a more rocky shore and maybe a narrower lake. I still like them but, who knows, I might try some more! I made 6 of them so I'm covered for a few birthdays!
This weekend it's going to be really hot so I'll start my annual deep clean of the basement and continue with quilting veterans quilts, making string blocks and cutting out the farm quilt. Since I've give up my regular dyeing schedule I've discovered that I have a ton more time. I don't think I realized just how much of each day was spent dyeing, washing, ironing, photographing and listing fabric. I've been able to catch up on a lot of house-related things and I have a lot more creative time. Yesterday I got to work on a few things. First I got two more veterans quilts loaded and ready to quilt. These are both my quilts and I should have them quilted by Sunday. I have 3 more sets to do before the July meeting and that should be a problem either. Then I made another set of string blocks for the batik quilt. I think I'll try to get a set done each day and that means this will be together in 6 days. I finished the day by cutting out the chicken blocks for the farm quilt. I have pigs, sheep, strawberries and bees left to do and then this will be ready to pack up for Maine.
Today.....more of the same! Yesterday there wasn't a ton of sewing. Instead there was a lot of vacation planning. You may remember that we went to Tucson this past winter and we enjoyed it so much that we immediately made plans to go back in 2025. All was great until late May. In the middle of Chris' medical crisis at the beach I got notice that our Tucson reservation had been canceled because the condo was sold. Finding places to stay is a little difficult for me because I always have to ask about fragrance used in washing the linens. I can't stay in places where they use detergents like Tide and Gain. Those fragrances are permanent and I'm highly allergic to them. So I've spent hours on various websites trying to find a condo to rent in one specific neighborhood. Finally, yesterday, I found it! Unless I also plan a girls beach trip in the fall, I'm all done with vacation planning until 2026. After all the computer work I was in need of some sewing time and I made 4 more blocks for the batik string quilt. These blocks are so much fun to sew. For those who are interested, here's the tutorial that I wrote for my quilt club. I also got the farm quilt back out and started cutting out the chickens.
Last night we had quilt club and I brought home 11 more finished veterans quilts ready for delivery, and 11 more quilt tops ready for quilting! Today I may try to load 2 of my veterans quilts for quilting, sew a few more string blocks and cut out the rest of the pieces for the chicken blocks. I love making these rectangle block string quilts for veterans quilts. The veterans quilts are 48" x 60" and if I make blocks that are 8" x 10" then the setting is 6 blocks by 6 blocks and it makes a wonderful symmetrical pattern. We have our quilt club meeting in our new meeting space tonight and I volunteered to do the program. Since I just finished one of these quilts I decided that I'd do the program on how I make them. To prepare for that I started 3 more of them! I already had kits made for these 2 quilts so I sewed together 4 blocks of each to show how they would look. Both are hand dyed fabrics but they look really different. Then I acquired a great collection of batik strings and decided to start another. This one doesn't have a center strip. Instead I and doing half the block in green and half in multi-color. I think I'm going to keep working on this one in my sewing room since I already have the fabrics spread all over my sewing table. I'm also making a few postcards with them and I'll have those finished to share tomorrow.
We had a friend visiting last night so I stayed out of the sewing room and was social for the evening. We had great weather this weekend. It was a good hot summer weekend and we both got outside every day for some sun and even got in an evening of kayaking. We checked on the baby bluebirds and I expect they will leave at the end of this week. I also did something new for me and I'll tell you about that at the end. On the quilting front, I got 2 more veterans quilts done and that's all I need to quilt before the club meeting Tuesday. Both of these quilts were made by Peg. I felt like this one needed a quilted motif to give it more personality, as opposed to something abstract. This leaf pantograph fit the bill nicely and it worked on both quilts. I've also been gradually cutting out the farm quilt. I have 4 elements cut out and 5 more to go. Some of you may remember that I took clay shooting lessons for a couple of years. It was a lot of fun but I stopped because I just didn't have anyone to shoot with. I've never shot a handgun but always thought it would be nice to at least have a handgun safety class. The opportunity came up when I was looking for something to bid on in a local charity auction. Up for bid was a beginner handgun lesson. I have never shot, or even touched, a handgun. I decided to bid and got it for $70! Yesterday was the day and the lesson was outstanding. Tracie gave me a thorough safety lesson and then I got to shoot 3 different guns. I was pleased that all of my shots hit the target. Chris was impressed. These were my first 8 shots! Not bad!
It was a fun few hours and I learned a lot. It's not something I want to pursue but if I ever had to use one I'd be comfortable doing it, so mission accomplished. I've overcome one fear. I'll not be taking snake of height classes to overcome those fears. I finally made some progress and finished quilting both veterans quilts and I got this one bound. I think this is the 4th quilt like this that I've made and I have two more kits cut out. I love making them. it's a great use of scraps and they look great. Well, at least they look great in my opinion. I like to do this diagonal quilting on these blocks. If you look close you can see that the quilting lines are pretty crooked. But I have a mantra that "messy quilting done consistently, looks great" and when you step back from this you don't see the wonkiness. This happy quilt was made by Karen. She's a master of scrap quilts. I quilted this one with free-motion ferns or banana peels, whatever you want to call it. It's fun and fast.
This weekend I have to get my little quilt club program ready, make a quilt label for Becky's quilt and, hopefully, get 2 more veterans quilts quilted. I had a big trip to the post office yesterday and then we had an appointment but I got to do some quilting in the afternoon. I hope today to get the other quilt done and maybe get another loaded. Since we got the downstairs AC fixed I could finally turn on the oven and bake some bread. I have to eat gluten free but this recipe is about as good as it gets. YOu aren't supposed to touch gluten free bread until it cools down but I couldn't help it and I was able to get a photo with the bread still steamy.
Today's plan is to get some sun and do some quilting and research our January vacation. Honestly, the only thing I did yesterday was pack orders. Thank you to all of you for that! The night before I did have time to load and baste the next 2 veterans quilts. I hope I can start quilting these today but we do have an appointment this afternoon and I have a few more orders to pack. But good news! The electrician came yesterday and fixed the breaker for our AC and now the house is nice and cool again! We also have more bluebirds!
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I'm Vicki Welsh and I've been making things as long as I can remember. I used to be a garment maker but transitioned to quilts about 20 years ago. Currently I'm into fabric dyeing, quilting, Zentangle, fabric postcards, fused glass and mosaic. I document my adventures here. Categories
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February 2025
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