To Do List for the Week of 5/12/2026

My back has been slowly getting better. Bending is still problematic, but otherwise I'm mostly pain free.  My therapy has included cycling, walking and sewing.  Movement is the best thing for the back and with all the walking between rooms I did working on Chilowie, I moved a lot!  It's a blessing that the sewing room was one of the places I could go and not hurt. That was really good for last week's to do list. 

To Do List for 5/5/2026

1.  Old Town: Work on borders ✔

2.  Chilhowie: Sandwich quilt and start marking ✔

3.  Lupine and Laughter: Work on A blocks ✔

4.  Wild and Goosey: Finish blue blocks, start sashing ✔

It was a good week, 4 for 4 on the to do list. Fingers crossed I can do as well with this week's list. 

To Do List for 5/12/2026

1. 2025 Guild BOM: Make backing

My Girl has asked me to finish this quilt for one of her college buddies.  This one is a bit big for me to quilt on my sewing machine. Plus, having some professionally quilted will help me make a dent in the number of to be quilted projects.  I found a reasonable backing fabric in the stash.  So I need to get some measurements and get started on sewing the back up.  It also needs a different name. My Girl is usually pretty good at coming up with good names for the quilts that go to her friends.  

2. Chilhowie (Bonnie Hunter): Continue quilting 

I'm using painters tape to mark my lines. The first two lines were not perfect. I may or may not go back to fix them. I'll see how noticeable the wobbles are once all the quilting is done.  At least I got started. It's slow going at the moment. I'm hoping it gets faster with more practice.  

3. Lupine and Laughter (Bonnie Hunter): Work on A blocks

I was reading the pattern last night to get started on what I thought was block B.  My block IDs are switched from Bonnie's.  That's OK, as long as I know which is which.  I've started on the "framing blocks" for the first block.  That purple may be way to dark for the rest of the quilt, but it's what I've cut, so we'll see how it develops as the blocks come together. 

4. Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter): Continue sashing blue blocks

Only 1 block sashed so far, 63 left.  This makes a great leader and ender project.  

Another short list.  But it is in line with my strategy was for the year.  I wanted to keep the list to 4 to 5 to dos during second and third quarter.  The focus will be on getting quilts to finished over the next few months.  

Linking up with the Quilt Schmilt for To Do Tuesday.  

Tackling the Bonnie Hunter Unfinished Mystery Quilts

If you've followed me for any length of time you probably know I have a week spot for Cheryl Brickey's Meadow Mist Designs mystery quilts and Bonnie Hunter's annual mystery quilt alongs. I've been sewing with Bonnie's mysteries since 2013. That year was her Celtic Solstice mystery. It's still in pieces with a few blocks made. It's on my 2026 project list. Not sure I'm going to get that far. 

I've started 15 of Bonnie's mysteries and finished 7 of them.  Her 2024 mystery was Old Town.  It's one step closer to being finished. 

The borders were added over the weekend and it's now a finished quilt top. When I bought that teal fabric, I wasn't sure how to use it. It worked really well as the accent color in this quilt.  Rather than pink, I switched to gold, which was one of the accent colors in the teal print. Not my normal color palette, but I do really like how this one turned out. 

Old Town now joins the 14 other quilt tops waiting to be quilted in the spare closet.  

I do have a plan to tackle getting at least some of these tops to finished quilts this year. I'm working on quilting Chilhowie (the 2022 Bonnie Hunter mystery) with my walking foot. I've started but it's going to take a few weeks to finish.  Some of the quilts I am going to get professionally quilted.  Hopefully between the two efforts I can whittle down the to be quilted list a bit.  

Linking up with the usual Monday linky parties: Patchwork & Quilts and Sew & Tell Monday.   

Stitching Stuff: Week 19 of 2026

Happy Mother's Day.  My kiddo didn't know what to get me, so I told her she could take me out to lunch during my next visit.  We had planned to spend the holiday with my mother, but she's not feeling great, so we are targeting Memorial weekend to get the family together.  My plans are to spend the day in the sewing room, one of my favorite gifts of all time.

It's been an up and down week.  My back is slowly getting better. Bending is still a problem, but it's gotten less painful.  We decided that maybe our 14 year old mattress was one of my problems, so we replaced that. That didn't go quite as planned. However, adding a pillow between my knees (I'm a side sleeper) has made a world of difference.  

Thankfully the back problems haven't kept me from the sewing room.  My stats look pretty good considering how miserable I was last weekend.  

• 15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
• 15 minute days/May = 9/9 days
• 15 minute days/2026 = 128/129 days
• Success rate = 99.22%

I've already made good progress on my to do list for the week. Just need to finish the borders on Old Town. That's the plan for this weekend.  

How are you stitching plans working out?  

 

Week 154 Photo Challenge: Crowds

The new photo challenge cards have been a bit more involved then the previous two packs.  It's been taking all of us a bit longer to come up with photos. My Guy and I spend most of our time in a small town, which can limit our photo opportunities. My Girl lives in the big city, but she now has a full time job, with a commute. So she doesn't have as much time as when she was a college student. Consequently, we seemed to have shifted to a monthly schedule on our photographs. We're just going to roll with that.  

That last photo challenge was:

Living in a small town, crowds are a relative thing.  The only crowds around here are things like the high school sports, graduation, and the art festival.  We don't have a kid in school anymore, so we aren't tied into those activities anymore.  The art festival isn't till June. So I went with the only place we routinely see more than 10 people.  

Kate: The Church Crowd

 
We usually attend the vigil Mass on Saturday night, that church crowd is mostly the more senior members of the parish. Our church is a bit plain for a Catholic Church, but that's because the founders of this parish were more focused on works then on the building.  When we started here more than 30 years ago, it had the reputation for being the rebel parish in the diocese. They've since combined our parish with the more conversative parish downtown, not so much because the parish is troublesome, more so because of the dwindling numbers of priests.  

My Guy went a completely different route, literally. He spends most of his time out on long walks or long bike rides these days, so he sees a completely different type of crowd.  

My Guy: The Wind Sweeping Down the Plains Crowd

He's more likely to find cows or horses out on the back roads he rides on. I'm not sure where exactly he took this photo, but it really shows just how flat it is here and how much sky you can see.  Our spring weather this year has been stormy, which does make for some dramatic skies. Those clouds do wonderful things to the light this time of year.  

My Girl took advantage of her big city location to find her photo. 

My Girl: This Picture Cost Me $100

She was able to find last minute, discounted tickets for a Raye concert last weekend.  The advantage of living in Houston is there are lots of concerts. If not in Houston, Dallas is only 4 hours away. Still concert tickets have gotten expensive. She is selective about which ones she attends.  

Of the three, it's a toss up between My Guy's and My Girl's photos for my favorite. Both are very different, but both are interesting photos.  

My Guy and I probably have an advantage with the new photo challenge. 

The summer wildflowers are just getting going here.  So we should have a good opportunity to get some new photos. Since My Girl lives in town, it may be harder for her to get a shot.  

To Do List for the Week of 5/5/2026

Hard to believe it is already May. I completely missed that yesterday was "May the 4th Be With You" day.  Today is Cinco de Mayo, so happy holiday if you are of Mexican heritage. Mother's Day is this weekend (I have no idea what to get my mother).  

The end of April, beginning of May were pretty productive as my to do list shows for last week shows. 

To Do List for 4/28/2026

1. Guild BOM: Finish July block ✔

2. Magnificent Mystery: Finish borders ✔

3. Chilhowie: Prep top and back for quilting ✔

4. Lupine and Laughter: Work on A blocks

5. Wild and Goosey: Continue making blue blocks ✔

Definitely a lot of progress on the to do list last week. Now that Magnificent Mystery is a finished top and the Guild BOM is caught up for a few months, I can add something back to the list and it will still be shorter then last week's list. 

To Do List for 5/5/2026

1. Old Town (Bonnie Hunter): Work on borders

I finished assembling the quilt top back in December of last year. It got put away to concentrate on all the new projects that started in December and January.  All it needs is the borders.  I spent some time in Electric Quilt yesterday and finally decided on fabrics and layout.  I'm excited to get this one to finished quilt top.  

2. Chilhowie (Bonnie Hunter): Sandwich quilt and start marking

The top, batting and backing are all prepped.  With my back, I can't crawl around on the ground, so I'm going to have to take the sandwich to the quilt shop and assemble it there.  There is a big table in the back that should make that a lot easier.  If all I do is get the sandwich made this week, I'm good with that.  

3.  Lupine and Laughter (Bonnie Hunter): Work on A blocks

 

In the project bag were 5 finished block A's and this partially assembled one. My plan was to make 3/4 of the blocks, I think.  I need to pull out my notes and confirm that. The plan is to work on this one till it's finished quilt top.  

4. Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter): Finish blue blocks, start sashing

 

Just one blue block left to finish. Then I'll need to lay out all the blocks in groups of four and decide which block goes where.  Sashing goes fast so I'm hoping to have these all made into 7.5" blocks by the end of the month.  

This week, my to do list is all Bonnie Hunter quilts, three mysteries (2024, 2022, and 2025) plus one Rainbow Scrap Challenge project (2019).  I've started 14 mysteries, finished 7 of those, and 3 are quilt tops.  So 4 are still in the block making stage (well 3, Old Town just needs borders). 

That's my to do list for this week. Linking up with The Quilt Schmilt for To Do Tuesday.