Friday finishes!

This morning I put the final stitches in the binding of my Quilty365, or as I am calling it, A Year in My Life.

This is such a special quilt to me. 

It was started as a sewalong with Audrey at Quilty Folk, with the idea of appliquing a circle per day for a year with the intention that the fabric chosen would reflect that particular day in some way. Most of mine were, but I have to admit that some days I just picked a fabric to get the block done! Although, I somehow think that subconsciously the fabric chosen probably did have meaning on any particular day!

My quilt spans November 12, 2015 to November 11, 2016. For those of you doing the math...a few of the blocks are not on the quilt....they will be incorporated into the label on the back.

I started with a circle, but right away remembered years ago wanting to do a quilt with appliqued hearts, so I switched it up.

Lots of memories in this quilt.

Birthdays...

...puppies born last Summer...

The day we found out that our twin grandbabies would be a boy and a girl!...

....and near the beginning of the quilt, quite a few purple blocks to represent pain I was experiencing at that time....

On a side note....

In the Fall of 2015 I was in a lot of pain....so much so that I considered asking my doctor for a handicapped parking pass. I now know that sugar is the culprit for me. I try now to avoid sugar and on the times I choose to indulge I'll get what I call my "sugar pain". 

The other day I had a visitor bring me a beautiful butter tart (a Canadian treat which is mostly sugar, and delicious!). I chose to go ahead and enjoy....and like clock-work 45 minutes later the sugar-pain shot down my legs. (It was worth it!)

My life has changed so much since this quilt was started almost two years ago now. The biggest being taking up running and really enjoying taking part in races! 

Here I am last weekend after the Disco Dash 5k....I had to ask this stranger to pose for a picture since he was probably the most authentically dressed!....

What I'd like to know is how on earth did this happen, and with probably a million stitches in the quilt, however did I even notice it??!!....

I marked this block with a pin so I would remember to go back and fix it. I don't know if you can quite see it, but one of the stitches is a big loop! I've tried to ease it in, but, nope, it wouldn't co-operate, so I'll go back and un-quilt a tiny bit of the quilt and fix it.

I will cherish this quilt! Among other things, it will represent a transition from pain to good health :)

I'm also happy to say that I have actually finished my OMG - One Monthly Goal!!!

My goal for August was to complete my Freefall quilt....and I did it...

This quilt measures about 39" square, so I think it will be a wall-hanging for the guest room.

I am linking up with Elm Street Quilts for One Monthly Goal-Finishes.

I am also linking with Busy Hands Quilts for Finished or Not Friday and with Mama Sparks World for Friday is Finish Day, and with Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Can I Get a WhoopWhoop!.

To end this post, I'll choose a bit of cuteness...

Our pups are doing well, they are now trying to use their spindly legs to hold up their chubby selves and walk around!

Have a lovely day!

August OMG....One Monthly Goal

I haven't been very successful the last couple of months with my Monthly Goal. 

August will be a very busy time for me at the longarm, so I'm giving myself a break. My goal this month will be finishing the top of my Freefall quilt....

As you can see, not many blocks to go. If I can squeeze it in to get quilted, I will count that as a bonus. It's not very big....maybe 39" square. 

I am linking up with Elm Street Quilts for OMG - One Monthly Goal. Have you decided to join in monthly with a goal???

Have a lovely Summer's day!

A successful Retreat!

Back to the real world after a few lovely days on a quilting retreat hosted by Quilt Junction, held at the beautiful Elmhurst Inn in Ingersoll, Ontario.

The decision to go was definitely meant to be a one-time treat to myself....to go and relax, meet new quilting friends, be pampered in the Spa at the Inn and enjoy excellent cuisine. Well, I think this is now going to be a yearly thing! 

There were thirty of us set up in the Grand Ballroom, a beautiful large, bright room that was perfect for getting some sewing done....

Lana, our lovely hostess, had a booth set up just in case any of us had forgotten any essentials....or just needed a bit of retail therapy!

I was happy to start my Retreat with having lunch with my sister...of the four sisters she is the youngest and I am the oldest. We don't see each other very often so it was so special to get to spend an hour or so together...

I can't say enough about the food our group experienced during our stay....here is just a sample of our meals....

I wish I had taken a picture of this dish on the menu so I could remember what was in it and maybe try to replicate it. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to go back sometime!


I did manage to get some sewing done! I paced myself, since last time I spent too much time in a chair sewing resulted in being laid up with back problems for a couple of weeks. So...many breaks walking around looking at everyone else's inspiring work!

My main project was to complete my Happy Days quilt. After a rocky start things started to fall in place...

.....and.....it's done!!!!!......

My goal for April was to have this quilt top done. I am linking up with Elm Street Quilts for OMG-One Monthly Goal, April Finish!

I'll set aside some time this Summer to get it quilted up in time for the Fall Fair season. I had thought to do an edge-to-edge quilting design on it, but after seeing it laid out in full I now think a light custom job is in order. I love it!

Day 2....I wanted to get the next step complete in my version of Sandra Walker's sew-along, Freefall Spring Quilt-Along.  I had the prep-work done ahead of time and was happy to get them sewn together....all ready for the next step. It was fun, also, to learn a couple of slick techniques for these blocks....thanks, Sandra Walker! 

I want to keep on track with this sew-along since I think this may be a good entrant into this year's Fall Fair category that is celebrating Canada's Sesquicentennial! I am linking this post to Sandra's linky party at Musings of a Menopausal Melon. Check it out to see other quilters' take on Freefall!

My final project for the Retreat was to assemble my Nature's Neutrals. 

This was a quilt made of blocks from a group exchange. The blocks are 5" unfinished and we were to make 2 sets of eight blocks per month for two years. Each month we submitted our blocks and came away with sixteen different blocks. 

I did not want this quilt to wait years to be done, so it was on the list for this week.

Here it is...

I have kept a few blocks aside so I could make a decision at this point to see if the quilt needed to be wider or longer, etc. So, an hour of work sometime in the near future will see this one truly done! 

During our Retreat, Lana did a couple of demos and also showed us how to construct a little fabric "box" meant to put our odd bits of thread and snippets of fabric into...

Thanks, Lana....this will be put into my applique bag for the times I get together for stitching with friends!

All in all, a very successful Retreat....not to mention making new quilty friends. Can't wait 'til next year!

Today I am linking up with Busy Hands Quilts for Finished or Not Fridays, Koka Quilts for sew, stitch, snap, SHARE, and with Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Can I Get a Whoop-Whoop!.

Sunday Stitches

I'm feeling a bit lazy this morning....which is sometimes a good thing, right?

As usual, I've started my day with a bit of stitching. I've started sewing some of the circle flowers for my Down the Rabbit Hole. The difficult part is making sure the centres are off-centre....usually I'm trying to get them centred perfectly....

....and here they are posing on the medallion...

Yesterday I continued getting my projects organised for my Retreat this week (yay!). One of them is the Freefall Mystery offered by Sandra at Musings of a Menopausal Melon. There is a step this week that I wanted to try at home first which made me a little nervous. 

The step involves Paperless Paper-Piecing, which you can see on Sandra's blog, here. We all know how much paper-piecing gives me a headache! 

Well, it worked!....and no ripping papers out afterward! 

...So these bits can be packed away for Retreat to be sewn into maple leaves for the quilt.


Last evening my son and his little ones came for a visit. He has a two-year old and the eight-week old twins. Poor guy....looked so tired! 

I am linking up with Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching. 

A beginning and almost an ending...

I am taking part in the Freefall Spring Quilt Along hosted by Sandra over at Musings of a Menopausal Melon. 

You can find her here or click on the Freefall button over to the right of the screen.

This week we are to report on our progress on the cutting stage of the quilt. So....we are still near the start of this if any of you are wanting to join in!

Here are the fabrics I bought....one is the background and the other the "shadow" fabric needed...

and here is a picture of the fabrics I decided on for the leaves, my newly purchased Shweshwe fabric from a couple of months ago.....

On Wednesday I was feeling a bit under the weather, so I just poked around a bit and also got the cutting stage done....so, all up-too-date on this one....so far!!!

I have to thank Sandra....everytime I do anything with this quilt  I have Free Fallin' by Tom Petty stuck in my head for the rest of the day! Oh well, could be worse, for sure!

I can't seem to resist sew-alongs/quilt-alongs!

Here is one that's three weeks in so far....Long Time Gone by Jen Kingwell....

I haven't got Week 2 sewn yet....so, already a bit behind on this one!

One of the hosts for this sew-along is Nicole from Snips Snippets. You can check her out here.


Well, I came close to finishing my March goal....my Happy Days quilt. Soooo close.

So, this will hangover into April as my OMG - One Monthly Goal.

Here is how it looks today...

I couldn't quite fit it all in this picture, but the inner border is all attached. It's a perfect fabric, as it picks up many of the colours used in the quilt....plus, it's a stripe, which I do like for an inner border!

The final border involves applique and piecing. Luckily, the applique is all done...I just need to piece the remaining bits.

Next time you see this quilt it will be a completed top, woohoo!!!

It became clear this month that this quilt will be for my granddaughter, Mina's, bed. It'll be a big quilt for a little girl, but I think she'll enjoy all the images in the fabrics and applique. And, besides, it definitely reads as a girly quilt!

I am linking up with Elm Street Quilts for OMG- One Monthly Goal and with Sandra at Musings of a Menopausal Melon for the Freefall linky party.

I am also linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Can I Get A Whoop Whoop!, with Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish It Up Fridays. Also, with Busy Hands Quilts for Finished or Not Fridays.

Have a wonderful day as we say goodbye to March and welcome in April!

Feeling side-tracked

Today will be a long day at the longarm working on a beautiful Dresden Plate...hopefully I will complete the rest of the stitch-in-the-ditch today and get to play at the background fill tomorrow.

It would be nice to fit in a bit of prep-work for my Freefall Spring quilt-along. The cutting directions have been released this week.

I purchased the background fabric and focal fabric last Friday but still needed to poke through my stash for the leaf fabrics.

Didn't my eye rest on a stack of bright Shweshwe fat quarters stacked on a shelf and right away knew they would be so much fun to work into this quilt....

This quilt won't make too much of a dent in this group of fabrics, but if so I'll be able to replenish at Quilt Canada in June, as I'm pretty sure Celeste from Meerkat Shweshwe will have a booth there.

I'm moving right along, slowly, on the twenty orange peel blocks needed for the next border of my Midnight at the Oasis...

A friend of mine is doing the same quilt and she has quite a bit more of the quilt completed and it's looking fantastic. I wish now I'd taken a picture of hers the other day and asked her if I could share it here. I'll be sure to do that next time we see each other!

I am linking up today with Silly Mama Quilts for WIPs - Works in Progress and with Lorna for Let's Bee Social.

A couple of my friends traveled to Norwich on Monday to see Lorna's trunk show. I couldn't make it but that's ok as she is speaking at one of my guilds in June! I wish we were doing a workshop, too....I already know which of her patterns I want to purchase....I think!!

I am also linking up for the first time with Susan at Quilt Fabrication for Mid-week Makers!

Have a lovely quilty day!

Anyone ready for a Spring Sew-along???

Sandra Walker is a fellow Ontarian who writes a quilting blog called Musings of a Menopausal Melon.

Sandra is venturing into her first sew-along featuring one of her own patterns and I'm going to join in and invite you to do the same!

The fun starts next week, but she has released the fabric requirements and tips this past week and you can see them here, or by clicking on the button to the right entitled "Freefall Spring Quilt Along". 

The quilt is only 38" square, so would make a great wallhanging, tablecloth, etc. 

I've just been out and about and on the way home we decided to swing by my local quilt shop to get some background fabric and the main focus fabric needed for this project....

Hmm, the green fabric is so much more fresh and cheerful in real life.

I did well, as I was entitled to a free metre of fabric thru' the shop's loyalty programme....and because it's St. Patrick's Day the green fabric was 20% off....nice!

I'm determined that the rest of the fabrics will be pulled from my stash!!!


This week also starts an Instagram sew-along for Jen Kingwell's pattern, Long Time Gone. 

I'm starting to see a definite pattern here....I find it so hard to resist when something is called a sew-along or quilt-along!!!!

Hopefully that's it for this year (she typed while crossing her fingers).


On a non-quilty note:

For the last few weeks we've been trying to have two meat-less days per week, and we've been quite successful. 

What has been most surprising to me is, by following some really nice recipes, there are so many flavours and ingredients that we haven't even missed the meat at all. Mind blown!....lol

Today, before the side-track to the quilt shop, we tried an Indian restaurant in Brantford called The Everest Grill. Everything was so fresh and tasty, I had to mention it here and recommend it! There were many "regular" dishes on the menu, as well as extensive vegetarian and vegan choices. Also, great service and prices!


I am linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Can I Get A Whoop Whoop!.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!