Summer Garden Bounty

Day 3 pf the 31 day blogging challenge.  

I was going through my phone and came across these photos from the summer.  I love having a garden right in my backyard.  It isn't large by any means, but just right to get some great veggies.  We grow all kinds of tomatoes, including my favorite yummy yellow ones.  When I don't use them up I tend to freeze them until I can can them, or until I use them. When they thaw just a little the skin peels right off.  

My cucumber plants did very well this summer, too.  They seemed to start late, but once they did it was nonstop through the entire summer.  I made two batches of pickles, one made 9 pints and the other was 8 pints and 3 half pints.  

I use a recipe from my "Make Your Own Groceries" cookbook by Daphne Hartwig to make them.  I also use a recipe from that book for my pickled green tomatoes.  One thing I add to my cucumbers and tomatoes is a hot pepper, love the spicy kick it gives.  Oh and a bit of celery is super yummy pickled.  

Just tonight I opened a jar of pickles, so yummy!  I am happy to have my garden grown veggies available all year long in my home.  

Simple Purple Baby Quilt

Day 2 of the 31 day blog challenge. Today I have decided to share a baby quilt that I was asked to create by my sister. She always comes to me when she needs a baby gift for a friend or coworker. Because of her work travels, my baby quilts are all over the world and that makes me smile.

This baby quilt I decided to keep simple. Sometimes, simplicity works best for these little quilts. I pulled from my stash of purples and cut them into 3.5" squares. I alternated the purples with a creamy print. 

I also decided to do nice straight line quilting to emphasize the blocks.  The backing is a simple print with little birds   

This baby quilt was very happily received by the family. Hope their little one enjoys it. 

While I was photographing the quilt my helper puppy was playing in the leaves. 

The 31 Day Blog Writing Challenge

So I have decided to join in on the 31 day blog writing challenge this month hosted by Cheryl Sleboda at muppin.com (link to blog challenge).  Lately I have been kinda neglecting my blog since my computer took a dump back in August.  I did buy a mini tablet, but that was still not as nice as having a laptop to type on.

Since I have awesome family, my parents actually gave me my Christmas gift early and I am typing on it now.  Yay for my new HP laptop.  

So in this challenge I figure it will give me a chance to catch up on posting a lot of the quilts that I created in the time that I was minus a computer.  

Anyone can join in, too.  :)  

Target Practice Mini Quilt

This is the final month of the Project Quilting Cherrywood off season Focus Through the Prism challenge. I'm sad to see it end, but super excited for another season of Project Quilting starting in January.

This month the challenge block was the snowball block. My first thought was, uh oh... I left orange for last and couldn't think of anything at first. The reason I left orange last was to support RSD/CRPS awareness month. Color the World Orange was Monday November 2. 

I randomly started making different size snowballs and tossing them at my design  wall. When I posted on our Facebook group joking about throwing a ball at the snowballs the name Target Pracrice was suggested by Jo and I loved it so I ran with it. I created some more small snowballs and tossed them on the board. From there I started piecing the quilt around where the blocks landed. They only moved if I had to make piecing easier. 

Once it was all together I kept my theme and quilted circles into it using the perfect color orange of Aurifil. It matched the circles in my background fabric perfectly! 

I chose to do the binding on the background fabric to make it seem like it kept going. 

This was a fun quilt to finish the challenge  with. Thanks Kim for all the fun you provided in the off season! 

Target Practice 

20"x 20"

Machine pieced

Machine quilted

Hand bound

And of course an obligatory Maggie pic... or two. 

Maggie and Matt smiled so nicely for the camera.

And here Maggie and CJ are both smiling. She had a lot of attention on Thanksgiving.

Strawberry Patch Mini Quilt

Another month of Project Quilting is over, only one more left. These have been some fun challenges and it is awesome to have at least one finished quilt each month. 

This months challenge was the nine patch. For some reason I was really stumped with this block.  I pulled out my  cherrywood   fabrics and chose the red this month.it sat for weeks until I decided to just cut it and start playing to figure out a design. I paired the cherrywood with a great moda print of pink and red squares. 

In the disappearing none patch blocks I did reverse appliqué circles to mimic the circles on the print. 

The tiny nine patches are only 1.5" square. Sometimes it's fun to go small. The red strips are just a quarter inch wide. I liked the little pops of red it gave. 

The quilting is just simple straight lines to enhance my strawberry patch mini. 

Sad there is only one more month of these cherrywood Project Quilting off season focus through the prisom  challenges. But i am excited to find out what our final block will be! 

And as usual, a quick pic of miss Maggie with my quilt. She is such a great model. 

I interrupted her playing with her own quilt to model mine. 

Geese on the Beach Mini Quilt.

It's the end of the month again and I'm just squeezing in my Project Quilting Focus Through the Prism mini quilt. This month was so awesome, it was flying geese!  My absolute favorite quilt block!  Of course I was going to have fun and do a mix of paper piecing and regular piecing. 

Since I just finished up a top using batik fabrics I decided to keep with the batik trend. All the fabrics, besides the Cherrywood fabrics, are batiks. I love the creamy background batiks.  You might be able to see I even pieced some geese with just the background batiks, which gave me one of my ideas for a name as Hide and Goose Seek. But Geese on the Beach works well, too. The colors give me a beachy feel. 

I wanted something different for the quilting and I struggled with what to do. I thought hand work, but the quilt told me no. Then I thought pebbling and echoing, but both weren't right either. Then I saw a feathery loopy thing and said yes that's it!  In just over an hour I had my mini totally quilted. The quilting really shows on the back. 

I decided to use the Cheerywood to bind my mini quilt. I feel it frames it nicely. 

I can't believe we already have 5 mini quilts already done for this challenge. I love seeing this collection grow. Thanks Kim (at Persimmon Dreams) for this awesome challenge!  

And of course I have to share a Maggie picture.  She was helping carry my top after I took some pictures the other day. 

(Mc) Swirly Twirly Pinwheel

This month seemed to get away from me but I finished my Project Quilting off season Focus Through the Prism challenge just in time. This months block, pinwheels, through me for a loop. And I used a color for them that is not a normal  one for me, green. But in the ending love it!  And thanks to Trisha for helping with the name.  

I used a 3d pinwheel pattern and made them in 2 sizes. For some reason I really like tiny blocks. There are lots of different polka dots in this mini, too. I really wanted to bind with more Cheerywood green, but only had a tiny piece left so I went with a batik polka dot. 

The quilting is swirly like the pinwheels are blowing in the wind. Overall this was a fun quilt to make, once I decided on what I was doing that is. And I was able to piece some of my pinwheels on my new to my 1948 featherweight. She sewed right through the bulky centers. 

I'm so ready for next month!