Hallelujah!

I finished, Clue 2 in the Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt is finally done! Yahoo!

All 100, all clues done at this point!  I'll have to wait to see what Friday's clue brings,- I am leaving tomorrow to drive the Daughter back up to Birmingham. I am not looking forward to that, I've gotten rather used to having her here again.

I'd like to wish all my readers a healthy, happy and prosperous New Year, and also an abundance of sewing time!

Pesky Clue 2

Hello, everyone! I hope your holidays were nice.  My daughter surprised me by coming home!  Yay!
I haven't been sewing a lot, but did manage to get the Grand Illusion Clue 4 done, and am still working on Clue 2.

I feel like I have been sewing on these units f-o-r-e-v-e-r.  Ugh.  100 done,

100 to go.  Then I have to sew them together in pairs.

I drew diagonal lines on the first 30 or so before I remembered this handy this gadget.  I love this thing! I've resolved to use my speciality rulers and gadgets more in the new year as I have a tendency to forget (lazy, really) them.

And I got a new book for Christmas, too late for the row-along, but appreciated all the same.

Talk to you later!

Holiday Greetings!

                  Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Sweatshop

I really should have been doing a lot of other things but I felt driven today to make a dent in the Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt especially clue#3. I mean it's 8-patches, how long could that take!  I started sewing at eight this morning and didn't stop until four.  Whew!  I was convinced I had overshot the goal but that turned out not to be the case.

I was hoping to get the whole lot made today but fatigue and hunger got the best of me.

Here's the finished unit.  I'm kind of regreting not going with some other colors but it is what it is at this point.  

Linking up with Lee at WIP Wednesday.  Thanks for visiting!

A Grand Illusion

I don't know why, but I did, start a new project.  My first mystery quilt via Quiltville's Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt.  I kept running into fellow bloggers doing this quilt and decided to join in.  I find the directions a bit scattered but after reading through them several times I've figured things out.

I ran across these which I have been carting around every time I've moved.  According to the dated price tag, I got them in 1991. Yup, that sounds right.  They worked great for the 280 HSTs I needed.

Would you believe this was the very first time I've used this method to make HSTs?

Using fabric mostly from my stash, this is clue#1,

I discovered quite the pile of blacks I could have used rather than buying some new ones. Oh well…

My stack of Broken Dishes blocks. Sorry for the poor photo.

Then onto clue#2 and Double Diamond blocks. These are time consuming. I elected to do the stitch-and-flip method of construction as I didn't trust my printer to print the template right.

I just cut out everything, made a few, and plan on taking it up to Alabama for when I visit my daughter next week.

And lastly, started clue#3 which is an 8-patch using neutrals, greens, and black.  I am way behind but I did start the sew along about 10 days after it started.  I also need to squeeze some Christmas shopping in here somewhere! Yikes!
Thanks for visiting!

SMS Winner

First, thank you to everyone who left a comment, I read every one and even took notes! So many wonderful suggestions, and a few books with less enthusiastic  approvals.  Kat is the lucky winner!  I've already sent her an email and hope to hear back soon.  Thanks again for participating!

SMS Giveaway Day

Welcome to the Sew Mama Sew giveaway! If this is your first visit I hope you'll come back, and if you're a regular reader, thank you!

I have four new fat quarters of Laurel Burch fabric by Clothworks and a large spool of cotton thread to giveaway.  I will ship international.  Please, please, please,  make sure I have some way of contacting you ~ no-reply bloggers do not work!

Just leave a comment on this post about a book you'd like to read, or last read, or have heard about that's supposed to be good.  Giveaway with be open until December 12 at 8:00 p.m.  

Be sure to check out the other giveaways at SMS.  Thanks for stopping by!

Comments closed, winner will be notified 12-13-14.  Thanks for participating!

A Seam Ripper Weekend

Sorry about the poor quality photos but it's been nothing but clouds in the Sunshine State for the past several days.  I spent the weekend finishing up on some block-of-the-month programs I joined this year.  This is the last block in the Sugar Block Club with Amy Gibson.  All year I've been waiting for the right block to fussy cut a flower and  December was the month.

Here are all twelve of the blocks.  I haven't decided how I'm going to set them yet, I might just make a few more blocks.  The fabric was a  line I found at Joann's in their better fabrics back in 2005 that I'd been saving for just the right project.  I love how all the blocks turned out!

I joined Block Lotto last month and made four blocks for December.

Then it was on to this block.  It's the December block for the Designer-of-the-Month on the Auribuzz site.  That red Grunge fabric is much prettier in natural light!  I used the no-waste method for the flying geese and must have done something wrong as once they were sewn together they were a good quarter of an inch too long. Ugh.  Ripped things apart, resewed, and eventually decided to just re-make the block after never getting it quite right.  I'm satisfied with it finally!

Here's all the blocks for the year.  I made all of them from my scraps which pleases me greatly!

Thanks for stopping by!

Third Time's the Charm

I finally got to shop at Suzanne's Quilt Shop in Moultrie, Georgia on Tuesday past.  The first two times things just did not work out.  The first was a timing issue having arrived for close of business, my second attempt I decided I'd stay in a nearby hotel and visit in the morning.  Well, just about every farmer in a radius of 500 miles was in Moultrie for the whole week for a big Agricultural Expo so that meant there was not a hotel room to be found anywhere.  At this point, what started out to be a casual trip to a quilt shop I'd never seen, segued into a bit of an obsession for me.  Lots of pictures to share…

I love this! I have the pattern just haven't made it yet.

So many Asian fabrics, the flip-side of the shelves are filled with them also.

A whole section of Batiks.

My favorite quilt on display, simple red, white, and blue but it's wonderful! I want to go on a picnic looking at it!  Here's a closeup...

A huge section of Civil War Reproduction fabrics.

I forgot to take a picture of my purchases, I'll post that tomorrow.

Today, I made a drawstring bag using Jeni's tutorial on In Color Order.  I'd made the size featured in the tutorial but decided I'd enlarge it which is what I did.  It turned out about 13 by 8 by 4 inches. A perfect size for neatly wrapping my niece's Christmas presents.

Thanks for stopping by~

A Lovely Local Outing

Hello everyone!  After much food (yikes) fun, and frivolity I have returned to Florida.  I can't say I enjoyed the chilly weather in Alabama for the first few days, but I loved the scattered changing leaves on the trees.  I hope you all enjoyed your Thanksgiving!

We discovered a sweet yarn/mini-fabric shop nearby, In The Making.

They had such beautiful yarn!  I wish I were a better knitter.  And much to the consternation of my daughter, they 'catered' to knitters to the exclusion of crocheters. Gasp!

I ended up getting a few FQs with nothing specific in mind for their use.  You know how that is!
Talk to you later.