A finish!

This quilt was started last November. It was Bonnie Hunter's Celtic Solstice mystery quilt. I stayed right on track until the last couple of clues. Finished up the top in the spring, and it's been languishing since then in my "to be quilted" pile.  Finally pulled it out last week, got it on the longarm during a lull, and even finished the binding. Now it sits in a new stack, waiting to be dropped off for donation :)

Productive week

I had a really productive week this week.  I got 3 of my quilts on (and off) the long arm.

First, a quilt for my son.  I want to try to get this one bound before he leaves for university next week.  That may be pushing my luck, but I'm hopeful.  This is made from Kaffe Fassett shot cottons, and is my second quilt of this pattern. Quilted with the same panto, too. I think I see a pattern here :)

This is Bonnie Hunter's Celtic Solstice, her mystery from last November.  It's actually looking like it might get done before the next one starts.

And finally this one. I picked up the blocks from the exchange table at guild in the spring. Added the pink setting triangles, and finished it off with a bias border and the darker pink border.  It will get bound with more of the stripe - hopefully cut on the bias again, if I have enough of it.

Donation Time!

Last week I said I wanted to finish a number of quilties, to take to my guild meeting this week.  I wasn't sure how realistic my list was, but I was going to give it my best shot.   Apparently I had more time to quilt than I thought, because I finished all but one of my projects.

yellow celtic hearts - Done
red celtic hearts - Done
blue celtic hearts - Done
tic-tac-toe - Done
sleight of hand - not done

I chose not to try to quilt Sleight of Hand this week, because I wanted some more time to admire it :) and to decide how I was going to quilt it.

So, in the pile above are my 4 finishes from this week, plus 2 earlier ones (that poor little Hawaiian quilt that waited so long, and a quiltie from last year, made from some surplus blocks from my sister's quilt).   All of these will go to guild with me tonight, to be donated to the children's hospital.

And just because I haven't shown it yet, here's the blue celtic square, all complete and ready to go.


Check out Baris's blog for this week's Accountability reports.

2 More Finishes

I've been busy today.   Got to go out for lunch and some quilt-shop browsing with a friend.   I managed to leave without buying anything new (except for some new needles), so nothing added to my stash this week.

But around the outing, I managed to get a lot of quilting done.   Two quilties finished, ready to send to the children's hospital at the guild meeting on Wednesday.

Hearts and Nines is the first one.   My red celtic square, surround by hearts and nine-patches.  The quilting on this one is a meander with hearts interleaved.   In the middle, I echo-quilted around the celtic knot.

The second one is my tic-tac-toe quilt, made from blocks I won in the block lotto.  I posted about the set of blocks here - there are 48 in total, and I pulled 9 of them for this quilt.  The rest will make a few more quilts over the next few months.

These are really fun, bright blocks, so I wanted a fun setting for them.  I think this will make a nice quilt for a child.


For this quilt, I echo-quilted in each of the small blocks, following the lines of the bright tic-tac-toe.  The photo on the right shows the back of one of the blocks (click on the photos to enlarage).

The blocks in this quilt came from 8 different quilters, so I included each of their first names and locations on the label.

Both of these quilts will be donated to the local children's hospital.


And since it's Sunday, here's my stash report for this week.  Nothing in, and nothing out (all the bindings for the above quilts were already counted).

Total in this year - 42 yards
Total out this year - 46 1/2 yards

Net this year: 4 1/2 yards out

Check out Judy's blog for other stash reports today.

One Down ...

Several to go.  But, the first of my quilties is finished.  My goal is to get as many of these done before my guild meeting Wednesday night as a I can.   This one - my yellow celtic square - still needs a name and a label, but other than that it is complete.  I'll label it tomorrow.

Here's a close up of some of the quilting. Outline stitching around the celtic knot, and then a meander over the rest of the quilt.


I've also finished the quilting on one other quilt, so I'll start the binding on that tomorrow, and hopefully start quilting the red celtic heart.

Design Wall Monday - Mar 1

My design wall is busy today.  Unexpectedly, I started a new project on the weekend.  I was inspired to make some "card trick" blocks (a non-triangle version - I posted about those here).  Having done that, of course I had to figure out how I was going to set them, so the card tricks and setting blocks are on the upper right of my design wall.

For some reason, I made 8 card tricks.  That was a silly number, because what size quilt can you make from 8 blocks?  Too long and skinny if it's 2x4.  So, I need to make 1 more block to round out this baby quilt.  Then I'll make the setting triangles.

Top left is my block lotto for February.  I'll be packing that up today and sending it off to the lucky winner.  And on the lower left is a bit more progress on my celtic hearts quilt.  Just the final border to add and the top is done.

Check out Judy's blog to see what other quilters have on their design walls today.

Design Wall Monday - Feb 22

This is my plan for bordering the blue celtic square.  Pinwheels in a variety of blues, which will be separated by a dark blue sashing strip.

Hopefully, when I sew all these bits together, the seam allowances will take up enough to allow some sashing.  I calcuated it, but my track record these days is not so great with those calculations.  Looking at the picture, I may have a problem.  But at least pinwheels are something I can cut down if they come out oversized.

You can still see the edges of some of my tic-tac-toe blocks peaking out on the right.  Still waiting for a  few more to arrive, so they're hanging out waiting for inspiration.

Check out Judy's blog for more design walls.

Hearts and Nines

My celtic hearts quilt is coming along.  The 2 sides are done and attached to the center.   I just need to cut the sashing for the top & bottom and set those blocks.  Then I'm planning a narrow border in red around the outside and bind it in red.

This quilt has been good for my stash.  All the hearts and 9-patches were made from some 5" squares that I gathered from swaps this past year.  I had no idea what I was going to do with them, so when this occurred to me I was very happy.

The 9 patch settings are not quite what I had intended.  They came out a bit smaller than the heart blocks.  I had planned to make the setting triangles a bit oversized, so I could cut them to match the hearts - but I got distracted and set them too small.  So, they got an extra red border to bring them up to size.

February Quiltathon Day 2

I did get some work done on my Celtic square yesterday.  Most importantly (to me) - I finished appliqueing the hearts.  And yes, I do still dislike applique.  Must remember that.

I also made a few 9-patch blocks to go with the hearts.  Because I did decide that I was NOT doing 16 applique blocks for this quilt.

This is where I'm going with this one. Some red sashing between the border blocks, and I think it'll be a cute little quilty for the children's hospital.

That's about all I did, 'cause there was way too much other stuff to do - like watching the Olympics :)

It's stash report day at Patchwork Times, so here's where I stand:  1 1/2 yards out  and nothing in this week.
Total in this year - 37 yards
Total out this year - 39 1/4 yards

Net this year: 2 1/4 yards OUT

Celtic Hearts

I have a plan.   Well, part of one anyway.   Remember my red celtic square?  I've decided I'm going to surround it with some hearts.  I think this will reflect the heart shape that is formed by the 2 loops at the top and bottom. Or maybe not, but that's my theory  :)

Pretty good choice to work on, for Valentine's weekend, don't you think?

However, those 2 hearts at the top are appliqued.  Do you remember how much I dislike applique?  I think I mentioned it here. And the plan for this quilt requires 16 hearts.  I thought it was 12.  But then I put these 2 up and realized that I forgot to count the corners. Oops.  So, 16 appliqued hearts.  That might be a bit much, so maybe this plan needs re-thinking.

This weekend is another Quiltathon, courtesy of Judy over at Patchwork Times.  I want to join in - but I have so much to do this weekend.  So, I may get a little done, but probably not nearly so much as last month.   I don't really want to set goals for this weekend since I'll have so little time, but I'll see what I can get done on the red - and the blue- celtic quilts.