Crackers and Customer Quilts....

Yesterday I spent most of the day piddling instead of sewing.  I did get a customer quilt loaded on the longarm.  It's a small one with a few issues but I will get it quilted sometime today.  

I did piece 5 more Cracker blocks.  Nothing major but just added a few more to the stack.  I did a little cleaning and organizing up in my sewing room too.  

Here is another random customer quilt that I quilted recently.  Just to add another pic to this blog post.  LOL!  A classic looking quilt that I really enjoyed quilting.  If I remember correctly it was for her great niece. 

Richard just went out the door for work and Hunter is in the shower for school.  Hunter almost missed the bus yesterday as it ran early and he wasn't completely ready to go.  I have a doctor's appointment later today.  I dread it like a toothache.  LOL!  Just a routine appointment to try to get things back on track.  You guys know that I am so bad for that.  

While in town today I will be picking up a few customer quilts.  I have to run by the bank and pick up a quilt top from my friend Rita.  It's a queen size.  Then on to a different doctor's office to pick up an EPP beauty from my friend Christy.  It is a queen size as well.   Then I need to run by my friend Nora's house to pick up quilts from her.  I'm not sure how many that I will be picking up there.  Nora takes care of he disabled mother that also quilts.  So these will be both of their quilt tops I'm sure.  I will be doing the binding on all of these quilts too.  I have a lot of people that bring me their quilt tops but if I'm already in town then I will stop by and pick them up or meet them somewhere.  I also have some customer quilts here that need to be done.  So expect upcoming photos of them soon.

I will close this post for now.  I'm going to finish my coffee and as soon as Hunter gets on the bus, I'm getting in the shower to get my day started.  It's going to be a long one as I also need to grocery shop....it's payday.  LOL!  Tomorrow will be a long one as well as Hunter has an orthodontist appointment and that is a 3.5 hour round trip drive.  :(  

Crackers

 I'm a little late posting this morning but I will tell you all about that after I show you some quilty stuff.  :)

I was digging around yesterday and ran on to a plastic shoebox of come Cracker blocks that I had started several years back.  I know that I had a few pieced but they were not in the box.  I played around and pieced a few of them. 

 These little 4" blocks are paper pieced.  Not sure if this is a project that I will continue to work on or if I will just play around with them for a bit. 

 These are fun little blocks.  I'm not even sure where I got the pattern.  I keep thinking that they were in a book that I have but I will have to look for it when I get a chance.  These will work great with scraps since the blocks are so small. 

 I also loaded a scrap piece of fabric on the longarm and played around with some free-motion designs.  It was nice to do it even though it was just a small scrap piece.  I'm thinking that I will do this on a quilt of mine when I get a chance.  It seems like most of the customer quilts that I do end up being stippling or edge-to-edge panto designs. 

 Now on to family things...  I'm late posting this morning because this was Hunter's first day back to school after break and it was just hard to get back into the swing of things.  :)  Richard was getting ready for work and Hunter for school.  I felt like I was running behind in the kitchen and such.  Anyway...it's all good.  Everyone get to where they needed to be on time.  :)  

Yesterday was New Years Day and Richard went to work.  Well let me back up a bit....  We never do anything to really celebrate New Years.  We don't go out, we don't drink or anything so we just usually have a quiet evening at home.  Richard was in bed by 9:20pm the night before and I was sewing when it turned midnight.  I get Richard up at 4:30am, he goes to work only to call me when he gets there and tells me that he wasn't even on the schedule for that day!!!  LOL!  First time he has ever done that!  LOL!  It would have been his regular scheduled day but they had changed a few things around through the holidays.  He bounces around usually from Behavioral Health Unit to the ER to the Med-Surg floor and just hadn't double checked his schedule.  So that was a 90 minute round trip drive for nothing.  LOL!  Well not really for nothing I guess...he did deliver a customer quilt for me.  :)

Crackers!!!

 Today while working on my bow ties I was trying to figure out what my next "small block project" would be and I think I found it! CRACKERS! 

 This morning I was piecing some of my bow ties blocks into larger blocks like these...

 As you can see I have a bunch more to sew into larger blocks and I also need to cut out 200 more blocks.  :)  I know that sounds like a lot but I am close to being finished.  I am loving this quilt so far. 

 Anyway, years ago I saw an old antique quilt made from small cracker blocks.  I fell in love with it and knew that someday I wanted to make one and I think now is the time.  :)  I'm not in a hurry and will work on it like I did my bow ties, just a little at a time. 

 I got my pattern from EQ and just made it to finish at 4" not as small as my 3" bow ties but still small.  I think I'm going to like this one too.  :)  If anyone is interested in making some of these blocks too, Quilter's Cache has the pattern for a 6" block.  :)

 I only did the six blocks to see if I was going to like the process of making them and I do so I will get back to my bow ties and get those finished so that I can move on to the CRACKERS!!!
Kristie