Another Donation Made

Shoots and Ladders block (designed by me!)

 I got a chance to run some kennel blankets out to my friend Cheryl at Avoca Veterinary Clinic in Avoca Iowa yesterday!  12 little flannel beauties to keep the kitties cozy!  Final donation for them this season too.  

I'm wrapping up my donations  to be made here in Omaha, as our departure to TX is looming on the horizon.  I want some down time to "create" during these last few weeks here.

I'm working on the above blocks and calling them Shoots and Ladders!  Im not sure how the quilt top will play out yet, but it's fun to work with these little pieces most people would throw away.  Shoots, becasue the crumb side of the block includes scraps and pieces of blocks that didnt work, were wrong size, didnt like etc (shoot!) and ladders because what's between the black line resembles a ladder...Chutes and Ladders after the game....Cleaver?

I found another fun idea on Pinterest using larger solid square with a flip and sew scrap square in the corners.  It also looks so fun and modern.  I may have to play with that at the same time as working on Shoots!

Did I mention I want to make a modern scrap house quilt too..???...I more ideas than time.  Stay tuned!

Final Donation to Project Linus for this Season

Here is my Lucy, "helping" me sew one of the flannel baby quilts

Again, Sweet Lucy, keeping my flannel blanket project warm while I went to lunch!

These little blocks and extra fabric was found among some scraps given to me.  I just finished it up!

 My sister Kris and I took a trip to the Country Sampler yesterday to deliver a load of baby quilts to Project Linus.   I took 4 flannel and one pieced quilt as my final donation for this season.  Although I forgot to take pictures of all the finished quilts, I do have a couple of in progress and a picture of the finished pieced one.   

This donation has about depleted my flannel stash so now what???    It's just a bit humorous when I think that I want to use up my stash, but when the stash gets low, I begin to get a little nervous and a bit sweaty....and go on lookout for a good bargain!  

It's fun to have a project my sister and I can work on together.   This scrap infatuation we both have is so enjoyable and creative.  We don't agree on much socially, politically or spiritually, so having this connection is great glue to hold our relationship together.   I need her in my life.  She is about the only family I have left and she is just too important.

Where to Start Now?

 

I've spent this morning reading thru some of the old posts and I was drawn into the memories of days past.  I want to read them all!  There are pictures here that have been lost on old computers and now I've found them again.  There are stories near forgotten of holidays, children and grandchildren and a tall son gone and back again...of blizzards and fires and cats and friends.   I deleted many posts that dealt with my old Etsy business and my working with Cheryl True in her shops, as they were mostly marketing and those days are over for me.

This blog has been buried among  my pile of "man I'm burned out" things, like my quilting was for so long.      So, now where to begin with a new blog??? All that went on in between I will never be able to document...but maybe as we go along some things will sneak in beside the new. 

 I think I have been using Facebook for all my pictures etc., but FB so public that now I very seldom post anything personal there.  So reviving this blog should be fun for me.  I don't even care if no one ever reads it.

So I guess I begin where I am...which is in my basement sewing room in Omaha where I seem to be stockpiling scraps to make quilts for charity. 

 My Omaha Charities are The Least of my Brethren and Project Linus.  I am trying to NOT buy new fabric but rely on what is given, what I have amassed and what I can find at the thrift store.   My charity in Texas is The Rainbow Rooms of the TX department of Family Services and perhaps the city of Mercedes if that can be set up in a trusted and organized way.

 I also will be making a stack of fun quilts for myself, creating a stash of quilts from which anyone asking for a quilt can choose.  Gone are the days I make one for someone and have them not appreciate or even care about it.  Thanks to my friend Pam, for the idea of just making what I like and making them available to those that ASK  instead of trying to figure out what someone might like.

I have gotten to the point that I no longer purchase patterns, but try to figure out a pattern on my own.  The creative juices are flowing.  I have a pattern " Fireworks and Pinwheels" that I totally created myself and am in the process of writing and publishing a pattern for.   I will be teaching it both in TX and Omaha (next spring).  

The small quilt pictured here  is an example of mixing a few ideas together for a quilt.  No written pattern, just ideas.  A mixture of "crumb" blocks and a square in a square type block,  I was going to give it to Project Linus, but I am now planning to keep it at least for a while as I want to recreate it and may need an example.   This one is a great way to use crumb blocks!