Ninjas

Jac and Donovan had their first taekwondo lesson today.

When I first talked to them about it, both were excited because they wanted to be ninja’s!

Before class today, ninjas were out and they want to be karate-powered super heroes instead.

Post-class? Both are fired-up tae-kwan-dooooo master super heroes who can’t wait for their next class. 

And who are going to sleep very well after all that exercise.

Placemats

These are done and should go in the mail this week. 

My favorite 

The first three went great - 

no problems at all with the curvy walking foot quilting or the fold-over binding -

and on the last one I broke a needle, broke the plastic cover to my bobbin case and had some weird thread issue that took forever to figure out. All I wanted was to be finished. Sheesh.

The troublemaker 

Glad these are done and hope someone enjoys them. And with that, we now return you to your regularly scheduled programing quilting. 

The backings. Sizes ranged from 12-13” x 18-19”.

Halfway Orphans

My quilting guild is hosting an orphan block challenge to turn leftover quilt blocks into placemats for Meals On Wheels. 

 My mystery block

And to make it more fun - more challenging? - we did a brown bag swap so everyone got a mystery block. 

Hand stitched flower

Easy peasy, right? I figured I’d spend a couple of hours, make a few placemats, have some fun. 

Two days, 

Orphan from my stash

and several remakes later, 

Coneflower quilt leftovers

I have 4 placemats sewn and ready for quilting tomorrow. 

Crossing my fingers that part goes more easily than the first half.

Prez Week

The grands are out of school this week for President’s Day Week.

We’d planned to go somewhere or do something with them each day 

 Can you spot all 5 monkeys apes?

but a big storm is (allegedly) heading our way, with very low temps (for us) and rain,

Australian Walkabout - the emu got close enough to almost brush against Leanne 

so we headed to the zoo on Tuesday

Ready to run if the emu comes their way

and plan to hang out at home, warm and dry, the rest of the time. 

Grateful we have such a nice little zoo close by 

Didn’t notice when I took this but Donovan’s in the background, laying on the ground

and the grands never (so far) get tired of going,

even if their favorite thing is playing in the sand and sliding down the ant hill. 

Thistle

Had lots of time for flower pics as Jac and I slow-walked to the car, her crying all the way, because she wanted to feed the giraffes and the line was looooooong and sloooooooow so we said no. 🙄

The fact that, every. other. time, she’d get to the front of the line and refuse to participate might have factored in too . . . 

P.S. Every zoo trip, Donovan gets a new snake. So far he has 3.5 -

Donovan put them to bed before dinner

left to right, Lemon, Jac’s Rose, Peanut and Salad. He and Jac share the original snake, Peanut Butter. 

Feeding Lemon a mouse lollipop. 

Early Extra

This is either an early finish for March or an extra block for my flower garden project.

Pattern is “Lotus Flower” by Ingrid at JoeJuneAndMae, a new-to-me designer. 

I was pleased with the directions and how nicely this went together, so I’ll be shopping there again.  

The frog looks huge but is only a 6” square; flowers are 10”

My little garden is growing!

Birthday!

Happy 12th birthday to Leanne!

She’s grown and changed so much in the past year, 

I keep thinking (and saying) she’s 13 already. Oops!

We celebrated with a pizza party where Jac tried to eat her weight in pizza. (She’s growing too, finally. Hooray for the tiny girl!)

Happy, happy birthday, Leo!

Finish #1

This was my first finish of the year but I held off posting, trying to get a pic of it up on the wall.

But the new hanger is still a week out, so . . .

 One of my very favorite backings

Botanical Beauties is done!

I started this block-of-the-month-along in January 2022 (here)

using fabric Wenona gave me for my birthday a couple of years ago. 

 Favorite block. Do you know how hard it is to make a curve using only straight lines??!? Still think it looks like Dancing Groot from Guardians of the Galaxy. 

It quickly became my favorite project, one I looked forward to every month . . . right up until December when I ran out of steam. But I finished it! I learned so much about foundation paper piecing and I’m really, really pleased with how it turned out. 

Finished size: 52x56”. Links: February, Feb2, Feb3, March, April, May, June, July, August, Aug2,  September (my fav), October, November, December, January.

Not Fancy

Finished Is Better Than Fancy is my new quilting mantra.

Diamond Tula isn’t a fancy, complicated design but it is finished, bound and on our bed. That’s so much better than the fabric sitting on a shelf, waiting for the “best” pattern to come along. 

I love all the crazy bright colors and the animals, especially the ‘secret’ ones hidden in some of the designs.

Most of these are from Daybreak and True Colors but there’s also some long hoarded, favorite scraps from other collections.

This is part of The Plan 2023 (here) to use up fabric from my stash. Jac and Leanne helped me get started (here), using a design idea (here) from a tutorial I found on Instagram. 

Final dimensions are 87x95” - bigger than the usual queen-size blanket and the biggest quilt I’ve made so far. With the medium weight 80/20 cotton/poly batting, this thing is heavy and warm, perfect for sleeping under. Can you tell I love it??

Cuts and Kits

Jac’s had a three-fer week - three calls from her school to her mom. One because her stomach hurt; one when she was accidentally hit in the mouth on the playground; and today’s grand finale-

giving herself a new haircut and refashioned pants in class. 

Her teacher, mom and Pop (who bought the pants for her) are seriously not amused. I can’t stop laughing. It’s good to be the grandma.

I moved a box in my craft room and found . . . 

mooooooooore quilt kits. 

I wonder if I’ll ever find them all 

or if they will keep turning up every few months forever and ever???