Quilty 365 May Update

I have continued to work on my Quilty 365 circles, though I must admit I have not completed as many as I should have. Slowing down is usually a bad sign for me. lol But I don't think I'm over them quite yet.  Mostly I was exhausted from trying to finish out the school year...but that's done! So I'm back to circles and other projects, too!

I have 33 blocks to add to the ones I made earlier and wrote about in March.  I can't believe that I forgot to give an update in April, but there you have it.  If my math is correct--and it's entirely possible that my math is way off--I have a total of 120 blocks. 

I counted them last week as I was packing them up to take with me should we ever go on vacation--it's entirely possible that we may not even though we should have left already! That's a story for another day though. And I don't remember the number anyway. 

Of course, a la Mary, I couldn't wait and used a few of those blocks for this project.

But it's all good! That project was meant to represent a window, and one of our boys has a home improvement business that sells and installs windows, among other home improvement jobs.

Because I decided in my last update that I had way too many plaids, I decided to stitch up some solid/neutral circles. I'm still using up some of the plaid circles and squares that were already cut, but as I add to the pile, I'm cutting only from my collection of Kona solids and anything in neutral. I'm hoping that mixing these in with the plaids will calm them down a bit.

And because I figured out how to do this some time ago, I thought I'd show you the same circles in black and white. A b/w cicle quilt would be pretty awesome, don't ya think?

Happy Quilting,

Sunday Quilt Inspiration: O R A N G E

I'm going through an orange spell. I picked up a few orange pieces on a recent shopping spree and have found myself gravitating toward a very pretty stack of orange fabrics recently. So on that note, I thought it appropriate that we look at a little orange inspiration. Maybe even make an orange quilt...though a quilt totally in orange might be a bit much to take in.

As always, first a bit of inspiration....

And next, quilts!

I don't know about you, but I was not expecting to find many quilts in a mostly orange color scheme! There are many more than these ten or so, if you're willing to search for orange and another color. Orange combined with black, teal, and blue seem to be the most popular after orange and white.  One place to look for inspiring quilts is my Pinterest board "heart, quilts."

Building the Stash?

I know! Mother's Day was just a few weeks ago (already?) and to my surprise (shocked, I know) the kids gave me a gift certificate. 

To Hancock Fabrics, purchased before the closure announcement. The kids were terribly concerned that the store would not honor the certificate, but I assured them that I'd spend it quickly. And that is just what I did. Without problems, I should add.

I also got 40-50% off of the regular price because of the closing. It didn't take long to figure out that, since I had to purchase two yards anyway, I could choose bolts carefully and get the extra 10% off, even if there were fewer than two yards.

I picked up some Kona solids and, in the case of the Kona black, bought almost an entire bolt.  I also found a few modern prints that I especially liked, so those went into the pile and, before I was ready, I'd spent the entire gift certificate. Richard found a pack of rotary blades and tossed those in. "They won't go bad," he said. I think he was just trying to finish the shopping and get out of there!

Do I need it all? Definitely not, but I am not one to "look a gift horse in the mouth" (as my mom loved to say), and I also didn't need anything else. My studio is well stocked! 

 I'm still kind of shocked that I was able to get all of this at almost half price. Surprise, I've already cut into some of it! And the rest? Well, in some cases there's enough yardage to make tops or shorts for the grands, and I can always make another quilt, right?

The real problem: I'm not sure how to account for these at the end of the month since they shouldn't count as purchases--technically they are gifts-- but they are definitely additions. I'm open to suggestions...how do you handle gifted additions in your stash report?

Friday Finish -- one for the dogs!

No, really, this one is for the dogs! Our Maltese puppies sometimes have to stay in a kennel, which they don't like very much--laps are so much more comfy--so they scratch and fuss the whole time. That means that they put some wear and tear on the kennel pads.

Since the mats are in horrible shape, I checked on the cost of replacing the smaller one. Wow! The cheapest one is $15 on Amazon Prime. No way! I did some quick math and decided that we could not afford to buy kennel mats for the three puppies, especially since I have everything to make mats right here at home.

So I made mats. I was able to finish two mats this morning, but we have only two kennels, so that was about perfect. One kennel is small. We keep it in the camper to put Cotton in on those days when we go places where he is not welcome. We enjoy museums and such so, when we travel, we need to keep Cotton safe inside the camper. 

The larger kennel is big enough for both of the girl puppies. We rarely bring Candy anywhere because she gets car sick...not a pleasant situation for anyone. But there are times when she needs to get in a vehicle and I want her to be comfortable and safe. 

Little, on the other hand, needs to be held down. She has energy...lots of energy and a cage is necessary so that she doesn't jump out of a window.  

This bright yellow mat goes in Cotton's kennel. It's made from fabric I bought to make Dusti a little dress when she was about four. She is 17 now. It has a soft, silky hand. 

I plan to keep the old mat and just put this one on top. The old one is not torn, just worn, but it has a thick outside edge that Cotton likes to rest his head on.

The blue one is much larger and will go in the girls' kennel. I plan to put a cotton rug, folded in half, for extra thickness with this mat on top. To give the puppies a softer edge, I put in a thick cotton piping insert that I bought many years ago. (I intended to make a casual, comfy seat cover, but the thickness of the piping insert was more work than I bargained for so it never happened.) 

The original mat is gone. We used it without the kennel, and puppies are hard on everything. This one will make a nice replacement, so regardless of when or why we use the kennels, the puppies will be more comfortable and safer.

Linking up with

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation

Thank Goodness Its Finished Friday at Crazy Dutch Bird Quilts

Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Crazy Mom Quilts

Pin It Weekly #155

What have you been pinning? That's getting to be a regular question from me. I guess that would be because it relevant and I don't have any other questions for these posts.

Other than the rainbows from Sunday's inspiration post, I've been posting a crazy mix of things...with no rhyme or reason.  A couple of baby quilts because they are cute quilts, so I really like having them on my baby, quilts board. 

And some "barn, quilts" to that board because, you know, 480 pins could not be enough. Plus, I just love old barns!

And then there were all those baskets from last week's Pin It post, but I couldn't seem to stop after the post was finished. 

And then there's this pin about batting, which I found really interesting and want to be able to review again, so I dropped it into the "quilt, tools" board. That board needs some attention--I have fewer than 50 pins in it, but for some reason I just haven't seen many sewing tools. Maybe I need to try looking again.