What's Up

A week has just flown by. Activities are on again, with extra people at rec centers, and more golf carts and cars on the roads. I'm back to line dancing, stitchery group and Bible study, but have opted to drop out of yoga until April which is when class attendance will return to normal levels. It's just not fun to wait an hour or more to get into a class when I can do at home the yoga I've learned in the past five months.

Last week was Quilting Guild of The Villages garage sale. I came home with a M'liss Rae Hawley book called "Fat Quarter Quilts." Since I saw a quilter in Australia toting a whole quilt in a huge bag made from a pattern in that book, I've wanted one for myself. The bag is made from six fat quarters and needs 2-1/8 yard of fabric for lining! It's not very pretty but easily holds any size quilt I might need to carry around, and a few other things too!

I've resisted jumping on the Scrappy Tripalong that's so pervasive in the blogosphere. However, after we had a steering committee meeting for our Central Florida MQG chapter, and decided that our February meeting would be a demo about how to make Scrappy Tripalong blocks, committee members agreed to each make a block so the demonstrating quilter has blocks with which to show various layouts. These are blocks I sewed. I now understand why making them is so addictive. 

When Marmalade Fabrics had an after-Christmas sale, I jumped on $5 a yard Kona so I could make these king-sized pillowcases. Each case is sewn with an envelope at the end, so the pillow is hidden and doesn't slide out. We're sleeping on Kona Daffodils every night! Pretty amazing how that color matches the wall paint, isn't it?

Free motion quilting on Snowmen A to Zzz is coming along. I'm looking at each block individually to choose quilting designs, using a snowflake shape whenever I need filler. I like this a whole lot better than the all over meander shown on the pattern cover quilt. I've never liked the look of quilting on top of hand embroidery.

I've also spent considerable time FMQing my Madrona Road challenge quilt. Actually, I spent more time quilting than piecing and hand appliquéing! Now I'm adding big stitch hand quilting, using #8 perle cotton, to selected strips in the design.

Though I'm focusing on UFOs this year, only one of the above sewing projects is on my 18-item UFO list. (See tab above called "On the Horizon.") Can't wait to cross out a few of them, but I'm realistic enough to recognize that I'll have "UFOI" - UnFinished Object Interruptions. Already I'm on the lookout for a block(s) that I'll need to make for teaching a selvages workshop in October.

Everything I do these days seems better because of the climate we're in. We've gotten into boccé ball, a game that was new to us until last October. It's a great game, easy to learn and play any time, and play with others.... especially on a gorgeous Saturday, in January! My hubby is the one on court wearing the Panama hat. This is why we moved to Florida!

Linda