Half-a-Dozen Projects After Irma

Though Irma came through our area as a category 1 hurricane, and by the time she reached us the eye was breaking up, we still felt the 70-80 mph winds of the eye wall. Lots of palms were "trimmed" in the process. We've been seeing lots of this - downed palm fronds.

It will be several weeks until the piles of debris have been picked up. 

In my sewing room, it's business as usual. During the past six days I've had my hands on a half-dozen different projects.

This is everything receiving attention lately.

I've completed the first and second rounds of the Bernina Zen Chic Triangle Quilt Along. It's a good along because I can work from my stash and the pace is very slow. Triangles are all 60-degrees.

Bernina Zen Chic QAL - first set of triangles

Bernina Zen Chic QAL - second set of triangles

I've been playing with a couple of new-to-me rulers. This one is the four-inch Triangle in Square ruler by Bloc Loc. 

The other is the Classic Curves ruler by Color Girl Quilts. 

Combining the shapes each ruler creates into a cohesive quilt design is going slowly. Right now, it's a mishmash of solids in all colors. It will be a work in progress for a while.

LindaNova is coming along slowly... more and more slowly as it's now 30" in diameter. 

I've been choosing and prepping fabrics for the next rounds that I'll continue to make in a combination of prints and solids.

I've cut out a baby quilt that's a freebie pattern from the Moda Bake Shop.

Urban Trek, a quilt top finished in May has been pin-basted. I'm looking forward to quilting it, as after watching season two of Fresh Quilting TV, I've been inspired (episodes 6 and 7)! Now I know exactly what I want to quilt - a combination of grid-based FMQ, and big stitch hand quilting with perle cotton. 

I've also cut out fabrics to make four Dog Gone Cute blocks. You see, my long-time blogger-friend Karen (KaHolly) has asked for these blocks for her birthday this Wednesday, September 20. She'll accept blocks into November, but wants to make them into quilts to give to Second Chance Farms, a pet animal rescue facility in Granbury, Texas that stepped up to accept pets during Hurricane Harvey.

If you're interested in helping out, read more here on Karen's blog post. 

All this sewing room time has been to prepare for an upcoming quilt retreat. If you've been on a retreat, you know how that goes. It takes planning ahead to have the fabrics, supplies, and tools ready for several days of non-stop sewing. And in this case, retreat is a whole week! Yep, seven days and seven nights! I'm pilin' on the projects so as not to waste a single moment of uninterrupted sewing days that lie ahead. Me and five friends are gonna get to know each other really well! 

And surprise of surprises, I've been in the kitchen too. It's Dan who's cooking the meals, but I've begun contributing by baking bread. We both like sourdough, so I made and nurtured a starter. This is the second pair of twin loaves I've baked. 

The texture is perfect, but the sourdough flavor hasn't fully developed. The starter needs more aging. I'll keep working on it.

I don't think there's any need to explain this cartoon, but her name is Maria.

During my morning prayer time, it came to my awareness that the names of our recent hurricanes spell something special - H.I.M. Think He's trying to point us to someone? Linda