November's last stash report and a NewFO

It's been a busy week.  Lots of cooking, visiting, driving, and even a bit of stitching went on at various times.  The weather was a little chilly to start off the holiday week, but it has been absolutely gorgeous the last couple of days. We drove out to the family farm on Friday and walked pretty much the whole afternoon since it was so nice.  I'm always surprised by the bright pops of color you can find during the winter if you look for them. 

Wild Rose Hips

Friday was also the start of the new Bonnie Hunter mystery.  I wasn't able to get back into the sewing room until last night and then there was only an hour or so before bed time.  I had to press out the pink fabric before cutting any strips, so only 6 HSTs got finished.

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt 
a sew along by Bonnie Hunter

I'll have time in the sewing room this afternoon to make some more progress on the HSTs.  Hopefully I'll get a few of the 4-patch blocks made before before bed time tonight.  Grand Illusion is my NewFO for November. Nothing like getting a project in just under the wire.  

I haven't started counting the fabric used for Grand Illusion yet, not that it would amount to much.  However, I did manage to finish up a few blocks for my Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects, so there is a bit of stash going out this week.  

Used last week:  0.64 yards
Used in November:  3.67 yards
Used year to date:  32.21 yards

I need to use about 8 yards of fabrics in the next 31 days to make my revised goal of using 40 yards.  I'd better stay on track with my 15 minutes of stitching time each day or I don't have a chance of making it.  

You can see other NewFOs over at Cat Patches and more stash reports over at Patchwork Times.  Happy stitching!   

Rainbow Scrap Challenge - Finishing Up

It's the last Saturday in November!  I'm always surprised at how fast the year goes, the next few weeks will fly by even more quickly if past experience holds true.  I spent my time in the sewing room this week trying to finish up this year's Rainbow Scrap Projects.  I'm not there yet, but I made a lot of progress.  

Scrappy Butterflies is actually my 2013 Rainbow Scrap project, but I only made one block in 2013.  The goal is to get all the blocks done this year.  The next butterfly in the series is black.  

Scrappy Butterflies
Block is available in EQ 7 Block Library

There's not a lot of contrast in this one, but I still like it.  I need two more blocks to finish out my set of 12.  Butterfly number 11 will be gray.  That one is  cut out and partially assembled. That leaves the question of what color to use for the last one?  Since the background fabric is a pale blue, I'm hoping there is enough contrast for me to make the last one out of a white tone on tone and a print with a lot of the white background. Hopefully the scrap stash has something that will work.   

Last month's brown Inverted Star block is finally all stitched together.  

 Inverted Star
by Jessica Boschem of Common Threads
available from Craftsy as a free download

It turned out nicely, I love all those rich chocolate browns.  I need 3 more Inverted Star blocks to have a set of 12.  Black and gray blocks have been started.  But what color to make the last one?  I've come up with two options; either prints with a lot of white background or pale beige.  At the moment I'm leaning towards the pale beige.  Any other color suggestions for block 12? 

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge Sampler needed one more block to complete the 8 x 10 layout.   

Twinkle Star
Tutorial by Angela Feldbush of Soscrappy

The Twinkle Star block caught my fancy.  I like this little block so well that it's on the list as one of the potential scrappy projects for next year's challenge. Now that all the sampler blocks are done, I've started adding the sashing.  

Rainbow Scrap Challenge Sampler
By Angela Feldbush of Soscrappy

I really like the black sashing.  My plan is to work from the top and bottom.  That way I'll be able to meet in the middle and sew the two halves together. 

I've really enjoyed playing with my scraps this week.  To see who else has been playing with scraps, check out Soscrappy.  

Happy Thanksgiving

Wordless Wednesday - Icy Winds of Winter Past

Design Wall Monday - Back off the Wall

The rain held off till almost dark last night.  It was a wet weekend, though it wasn't as cold as last weekend was.  It's still drier than normal so the wet weekend was welcome, well My Guy would have been more welcoming if he hadn't been on his way home from a bike ride.  Thankfully he got home before the sky really let loose. 

So what do I have to show for my weekend?  Just the back of Scrappy Stars.  It's too big to put it up on the design wall, so it's draped over the cutting table. 

I used up a lot of the left over fabric in the back, including a few fabrics that were bought for the project but ended up not being used.  This quilt is all pressed and packaged to ship to Trudy for quilting.  It always amazes me how long it takes to press everything and get all the loose threads off.  That took most of the afternoon, so not a lot of stitching this weekend.  But I'm off all week, so I should get a bit more done than normal.  

Check out all the other design walls over at Patchwork Times.