End of March

Didn't March fly by? It sure did for me. The good news is that this month begins a new trend I can carry through every month for the rest of 2025. I used-up more fabric than I brought in! Hooray!

The quantity of "out yardage" isn't very high because it reflects only two newly-made items. 

The first item that used-up most of the March total is my paint chip challenge quilt. I made (mostly raw edge appliqué) and sandwiched the top during March.

Fabric colors are Ruby + Bee salvia and night sky, (purples); and Painter's Palette carnation (pink); and lemon ice (yellow).

I have spent most of March hand quilting it with Wonderfil Eleganza perle cotton. 

I'm not quite finished with quilting, but I should see the piece faced and finished by the first week of April. It's due at Big Cypress Quilters on Tuesday, April 15. If you can think of a name for this, I'd appreciate suggestions!

The second use of fabric was to make this caddy cover for a Sterlite five-drawer container. The idea is to make the drawers portable with a zippered cover and webbing handles.

For cover fabric pieces, I sandwiched and quilted part of a improv quilt top that I wasn't happy with - begun during the pandemic as an along with the Boulder MQG.

I will fill the drawers and take it on the May retreat with Central Florida MQG.

The only other fabric use I'm counting in March was hand-piecing more Inner City blocks. I made 26 more blocks this month, so I'm up to 140 blocks made - 218 needed for the quilt top, and that doesn't count the smaller two-patch blocks needed to fill in around the four sides. 

Though it took me a while to put these all on the design wall, it was good to see which colors I have an abundance of - reds - and which colors are lacking - greens and yellows. I know what to cut more of next. 

As happy as I am about having pieced these blocks, and I'm lovin' how they look together - even hubs commented, "That's pretty cool!" - I know what lies ahead. Lots of time spent hand-piecing to join blocks together once they're all completed! 

Incoming this month wasn't fabric, but batting! After having to Frankenbatt the last two quilts I made, I'm happy to have this.

Not only was it on sale, but shipping was free - from Linda's Electric Quilt, in Texas.

The batt is a queen roll (93" X 30 yards) of Quilter's Dream Natural Cotton Request. As I always do, I'm splitting the roll and the cost with a friend. 

Saturday afternoon, I visited a new (to me) activity group called "Boomer Loomers." About 60 women and one man were in attendance. The best aspect of this group is generosity. They're 100 percent into accepting yarn donations, and 100 percent into knitting and crocheting 100 percent of that yarn into useable items to donate to charities - about five charities, by my count. 

I went to learn how to use my round knitting looms, and was given guidance by a very helpful maker from Minnesota, Mary, who showed me how to knit a baby cap. I took home yarn to make more that I will donate.

It's gratifying to learn something new, and know that what I make has a purpose.

As much as I want to learn more round loom knitting techniques, my open Saturday afternoons are few, already taken up each month with a Central Florida MQG meeting, a Central Florida MQG Sew-In, and Sumter County 4-H. 

In spite of busy-ness, or perhaps because of it - I have to keep my ducks in a row! - March was a productive month.

I'll leave you with the pretty view outside the rec center where Boomer Loomers met. We've had beautiful (low humidity) weather lately, and flowers are in glorious bloom.  

Linda