Friday, March 16, 2012

A little Progress...

Today has been a busy day but I really didn't accomplish anything. Ever have one of those days? Richard was home today and decided to paint everything is a big mess around here. I'll show paint photos later in this post but right now I will talk about quilting...

First off, I've decided that I am not going to post about customer quilts in every post that I do. Trust me, I am working on customer quilts somewhere around 4-5 days a week, sometimes 6 days a week. Anyway, I figure I will post about them every couple of weeks or so and show a bunch of photos of them in one post. I do enjoy machine quilting and showing the quilts that I do for others but this blog was started years ago because I wanted to share my stuff, my family and our farm life, I miss talking about that stuff. As it is right now, I do the machine quilting through the day and take breaks every little bit to let my legs rest and instead of going downstairs I will work on a block or two of my own stuff. Also if you have read my blog for a few years you will know that every once in a while I take a spell of not being able to sleep at night and do alot of sewing then. The past several nights I've had trouble sleeping again and since my sewing room is directly above the master bedroom I can't use my quilting machine during the night because I don't want to wake Richard up. My regular sewing machine is not as loud as my quilting machine so I am able to do a little sewing then. So here it goes...

Here are my log cabin blocks! I counted and I have a total of 140 of them finished and I need 28 more of them to piece the design that I want. I'm getting anxious to get them finished.

And as bad as I hate to say it.....I broke over and bought the Farmer's Wife book!!! I know I really shouldn't have but I did it any way. I am going to try to catch up on Randy's Sow-A-Long. I think they have 9 blocks of it finished right now and tonight I pieced one of them.

Here is my first block. It is Basket Weave. I must say that I love the look of the finished quilt in the book but I absolutely don't like how the book is setup. It shows the blocks, then you have to flip on back through the book to see how it is pieced and then there is a cd with the templates that you can print but there are no cutting sizes in it. The blocks all seem to be common blocks and would be very easy to figure up the sizes for the pieces but just aggravating that you would have to do that and it not in the book with the blocks. Oh well....just my opinion. I'm almost embarrassed to show this but look what I found today all wrinkled up....my Civil War Love Letter quilt top. It will take me hours on end to press this thing. :( All 121 blocks are pieced and sashed, I just need to sew the outer border on it and quilt it. The sad thing is, it has been at this point for a few years now and all it needs is the outer border on it and it is even a solid border. I even have the fabric for it. This will be something that I plan on getting done soon. Here is an upclose shot of one of the blocks. They are all pieced in pinks and browns. I love this quilt.
Now on to Richard's painting....this is the stairway wall. He worked a little more on the stairway post today too. See all of the dust on the stairs? He was sanding on the post and I hadn't swept it up yet. Anyway, he has more of the post done now and hopefully it will be done in a few days and we can start on the railing.
This is upstairs. This wall is a 40 ft wall that goes down the center of the upstairs. You can see it is still dusty up there. The door on the end will open to an upstairs balcony out there....someday. :) If you look close you can see all of the mess that I have stored in the guest room up there too. We still have tons of trim to do but I am pleased with the painting so far. This is the same color that will go in my sewing room too. He has part of it painted but I'll show it after it is finished.
Mom and my sister, Chantal came out for supper this evening. I made a big lasagna! Mom has been sick for a week or so but is starting to get a little better. She has bronchitis. I guess that is all for tonight......
Kristie

4 comments:

lil red hen said...

I've enjoyed seeing your work on customer quilts and I'm glad you take time out of your busy schedule to do some piecing for yourself. And I'm looking forward to seeing how you decide to set the log cabin blocks together.

I got that book for Christmas from one of my daughters. I'm really not committed to making a whole sampler quilt right now as I'm trying to finish up some things that have been put back.

Janet O. said...

Love your log cabin blocks! You will be done with them in no time!
Your frustration with the directions (or the lack thereof) in the FW quilt book are shared by so many. I really like your first block! What fun fabrics!
My goodness, Kristie, your CW Love Letter quilt is wonderful! Where has that been hiding? Get it done, girl!! : )
The painting looks good. Progress, however slow, is exciting!

Deb A said...

Love your log cabins and I did not realize you had the Love letter quilt that far along! I'm going to be starting the quilt along sometime soon too.. hope I can catch up by the end of next month. I love reading about your life, your quilting and your family. Keep up the great work.

Yvette said...

I love that CW Love Letters quilt. Finish it! You will be glad you did. I have several quilts like that, they only need a little finishing to be done.

Your Log Cabin blocks are gorgeous. What size are they? I'm thinking I need to do that with my CW bag of scraps and strings.