Four-Patch on the Diagonal Top Done

I finished the Four-Patch on the Diagonal quilt top last week, and I really like how it turned out!  The pattern is by MaryQuilts.com and can be found HERE.

There is something very cozy feeling about it.  Maybe all those pinky-browns and earth tones.

It measures around 59 x 71 inches, which is a nice throw size.  

I'm not sure whether I will donate or gift it, but, ultimately, it may be a bit harder to part with than I thought it would be.  I guess that's a good thing!

Lost and Found!

We had a look around the garage a couple weeks ago to see if there was anything we needed to get rid of during our city's bulk waste pickup that happens annually in the spring.

One thing we unearthed that I had totally forgotten about was a 29-inch floor standing quilting hoop that had belonged to my late mother.  It was packed away in its original box and stored on a shelf in the garage.

I am not much of a hand quilter and don't foresee using this hoop, so I brought it in the house to take photos of it and post it for sale on Craigslist.

There was a large envelope inside the box with assembly instructions and other information for the quilting hoop—AND, surprisingly, a recipe booklet from my Aunt Inez that she must have given my mom in the mid-1990s!

How that ended up in the envelope inside the quilting hoop box is anyone's guess.  But my parents did move from Wisconsin to Arkansas in 1995, so I can imagine that in the chaos of packing, my mother stashed the recipe booklet in a "safe place" at the last minute.

I don't think my mom ever used the quilting hoop after their move.  She made a few quilt tops during the next couple years, but then she had a stroke that paralyzed her left arm.  She had all of her quilt tops longarm quilted a few years later and gave them to her granddaughters.

It was such a pleasant surprise to find my aunt's recipes some 28 years later!  Here are a couple pages from the booklet.  Having grown up and lived most of her life in Louisiana, it was fun to see a recipe for Crawfish Etoufee.

And recipes for some of my grandmother's cakes and pies.

This 1-2-3-4 cake sounds like something that would be good served with fresh strawberries and ice cream.  Strawberry season here is right around the corner.

There are so many other great family recipes in this little booklet, flavored throughout with my aunt's helpful tips, remarks, and admonishments.  It makes me smile!

I'm going to put this in its own three-ring binder and then on my recipe book shelf so I know where to find it from now on.

~Paulette

Sunday Sundry 5-21-23

It's been awhile since I did a Sunday Sundry post, a smorgasbord of this and that.  I have been sewing, too, so let's start with what I'm currently working on.

This four-patch quilt is coming along nicely.  It started with a pull of some fat quarter remnants and similar scraps I've accumulated over time.  These muted colors don't typically resonate with me when I'm fabric shopping, but somehow, by gift or thrift, I've ended up with enough of them such that they can all now live their best life together in a quilt.  I'm happy to do the honors.

When I saw this pattern on Mary Quilts, I decided it would work well for this project.  It's called Four Patches on the Diagonal. 

I actually have the top mostly together now except for the outer border, so you'll see it soon.  The more I work on it, the more I like it!

Happy Mail!

A few weeks ago, I got a happy mail package from The Joyful Quilter!  She sent me some nice John Deere themed fabric, as well as a couple bags chock full of blue and green scraps.  I was oohing and aahing over the green ones here.

I may be putting these to good use soon, as Jo's Country Junction is doing a YouTube tutorial series on a scrappy star block quilt she is calling Picadilly Circus.  It looks like fun!

Joyful also included a fun mug rug.  The happy colors make me smile! :)

Like Another Hole in the Head

I had my ears re-pierced a few weeks ago.  Yay!  Since I quit in-office work a dozen or so years ago and thus didn't wear earrings regularly, one of them had completely closed and the other needed way too much effort to shove a post through.  So I met my daughter at the tattoo and piercing salon and we made an afternoon of it, shopping and having lunch after the deed was done.

We even stopped at the thrift store and made a pretty good clothing haul.  Dear daughter spotted this colorful shirt on the rack and waved it as I was getting ready to check out, and I gave it an enthusiastic nod (under $4, I think it was).  It's a Lands End rash guard with UPF 50. 

I tried it on at home and it fit perfectly (always an iffy proposition with my long arms).  Having had my first skin check in February this year (and the scars to prove it; nothing cancerous, thankfully), I probably need to get serious about protecting my skin.

Suddenly Spring!

It took forever for spring to arrive—or feel like it was sticking around, anyway—but it finally seems to have made up its mind.  I planted flowers this past week, mostly in pots scattered here and there around the house.  

Lily of the Valley always reminds me of my grandma.  She had a patch of it in one of her gardens, but she also had some kind of scented powder that smelled like it.  

I did battle with it in the flower bed on the north side of my house, but it persists in finding a way through the cracks.  Ah, well.  I pinch off a sprig and inhale and am transported back to Grandma's house on Hubbard Street all those years ago.

Today was also my first bike ride of the season.  We did a respectable 15 miles with a couple rests stops along the way to give my knees a break.  The idea of an e-bike is looking better every year, but I'd like to keep pedaling under my own power as long as I can.  We tend to bike fairly flat trails so it's still doable for now. 

It was about as perfect a day for biking as there could be!

It's rhubarb season, and I picked a fresh batch a couple days ago.  Earlier this month, I used up the last of the frozen rhubarb and some mulberries from last summer in a rhubarb-berry crisp.  Delicious!

~Paulette

Hands2Help Check-In

I finished this little baby quilt over the weekend.  It's from a few crumb block pinwheels I made sometime last year.

They were just right for a quick little baby quilt when sashed and bordered.  It measures 38 inches square.

The backing is pieced, as is the binding.  There were a lot of smaller strips pieced together for that binding, which I was happy to use up.  Incredibly, none of the seams fell exactly in the corners, so that was a plus. :)

This will be sent to Little Lambs as part of the Hands2Help Comfort Quilt Challenge.

And in case you missed the previous post, this Trip Around the World quilt top was sent to MCC last week.

I'll leave you with a glimpse of my African Violet, which is going blooming crazy...

...and some fresh new additions to the flock!

Linking to Confessions of a Fabric Addict for the Week 8 H2H Check-In.

~Paulette

Blue Sampler and H2H Quilt Tops Done

I finished a couple donation quilt tops and mailed them out this week.

You may recall from my last post that I was making a blue sampler quilt with the intention of donating it as part of the Hands2Help Comfort Quilt Challenge.  There were a few hitches in the pattern, but I worked them out.  

Around the time I was finishing that top, I read a blog post on Jo's Country Junction where one of her charity quilt finishers, Ray in Florida, mentioned a Veterans Day church dinner this coming fall that he was involved in.  He requested if anyone had any patriotic quilt tops they wanted to donate for the event, to send them his way.

It just so happened that I had been thinking the blue sampler would make a nice quilt for a veteran as I was working on it.  So I decided to send it to Ray and then make a different quilt for Hands2Help.

Ray also noted in the comments section of Jo's post, "I could also use some red/white/blue UFO blocks that will finish at 12 inches. I can put some blocks together and make a sampler quilt out of the blocks." 

It sounded like a great use for some of the scraps left over from the blue quilt, so I made a few RWB blocks to send along with the quilt top.

I mailed out the top and blocks to Ray earlier this week, along with some red strips for the binding.  Ray intends to quilt it in red thread.  I think that's going to look great!

If you have any patriotic quilt tops or red/white/blue blocks that will finish at 12 inches, you might consider sending them to Ray.  His contact information can be found on this page of Jo's Country Junction blog, where he is number 18 in the list.

Having decided to pivot and send the blue sampler quilt elsewhere, I then did a fabric pull for a Trip Around the World top for the Hands2Help Challenge.  

All of these were either thrifted or gifted, not that I intended it that way, but it's the way it worked out.  It felt good to be finally giving these fabrics the opportunity to realize their full potential. Check out this selvage!

As it came together, I was digging the old-timey vibe the muted color combination was giving me.  There is a softness to it that I hope someone will find comforting. 

The top has now been sent off to MCC, one of the H2H 2023 partners, where it will be tied and sent to either Turkey or Ukraine, where the need is greatest right now.

That's the update from my sewing room.  What are you working on?

Linking to:  Can I Get a Whoop Whoop and Finished or Not Friday

~Paulette