Hello November! It's been a busy couple of months to the point that the blog went by the wayside. So this will be a partial catch-up as well as a look at what I hope to get done in the coming week (and/or weeks). As always, I am grateful to our host Carole at Quilt Schmilt for providing the opportunity to link up with all of this for "To Do Tuesday".
When I last posted at the start of September, I had this going on:
Quilt Of Valor Donation Quilt
I had reported that I managed to get the top done and the binding prepped for the QOV kit by the end of August. I put it in the mail back to my MIL's quilt guild in North Carolina in preparation for it to be quilted in September by one of the guild's members. I am pleased to say that not only did it get done but it will be presented to a veteran this coming weekend!
More on the details of how all of that transpired will be in a "Finished Or Not Friday" post at the end of this week.
My plans for the week of my last report had been as follows:
1. I now need to get September's "Alaska BOM" blocks cut and ready for leader/ender sewing.
That did get done but it was touch and go for a while there!
This was the third month of my project to make Edyta Sitar's design in "Block of the Month" fashion. Previously I had made notes for some of the blocks I was going to be making in an attempt to try and stay organized about which fabrics and cuts I need to make for them.
For that month's block, I had cut the corner and small triangles just fine but when I first went to cut the diamonds for the block, I cut them too large. I am using Marti Michell's Kaleido-rulers to make all the blocks. This is the first time I've needed to use both the "Large" and "Small" rulers for one block but was intially wrong about which ruler and cutting line to use to cut the diamond units.
So I stepped back through the construction process and made a test block out of scraps to better visualize what I was supposed to be doing.
I had (and still have!) a big box of scraps from old projects sitting in my space. I had hoped to process them as I worked on other things. However they are also helpful to draw from when I need to make a test block for a project. In this case, these are scraps left over from when I made my MIL's husband a quilt for Christmas all the way back in 2017. He was a big fan of Westerns so I made a quilt from a western-themed fabric line that was out at the time.
It was a big help to run through the steps for making the block and clarify just how and what I needed to cut. I was even forced due to fabric limitations to try piecing the diamonds into the block in two ways: as whole diamonds and diamonds pieced as two-triangles. Not only did I get the cutting for that month's block on track but I worked out the specs for two more blocks in the project and reviewed the specs for the blocks I had already mapped out. I made sure to make clearer notes about the cutting and piecing steps so I don't have problems setting up the blocks going forward.
However after all of that set-up work, I did not get the blocks stitched up! Then I also didn't get October's blocks cut out. So it looks like now the "To Do" for this week will be to cut blocks for both October AND November and hopefully get the blocks for all three months sewn up by the end of this month.
2. I will resume stitching on my "New York Skyline" cross stitch project.
By the start of September, I had completed the first two pages of the pattern....
....so the plan for the rest of that month was to continue stitching on it and complete the third page. While I did continue stitching, by the last weekend of that month as we prepared to go on our last camping trip for the season, I was still only halfway through that page:
Then I didn't get to stitch on it any more for October partly because I focused on the next project on September's "To Do" list. Also we were heading down to visit my MIL the following weekend and I had planned to take my "Open Your Heart" project with me to work on during that trip.
It had been my hope to complete that page and the remaining two pages of this design by the end of this month so I will just have to see how far I get with it all but definitely hope to get it stitched and "fully finished before the year ends.
3. Continuing work on a new holiday cross stitch project.
The project that had competed with "Skyline" for attention in September and pre-empted work on it during October was this year's Fat Quarter Shop "Christmas In July" Stitch Along called "Up On the Rooftop". On my last report I was here with it:
By the end of September, I was up to here:
My hope was to finish it so I can display it with "Letters To Santa", last year's FQS CIJ cross stitch design that I finished up back in July. I want to create a display with them that will also incorporate the "Patchwork Bow" using Christmas scraps that I had made for Melva's "CIJ Blog Hop".
Well the good news on that front is that I did get this one finished although it took a lot longer than planned!
When I hadn't finished this by the end of September, I took it with us when we visited my MIL for the first two weeks of October. I thought I would get it finished up quickly while down there but for some reason once I got to the sled part, filling it in proved to be very challenging since it is colored with two different reds that are close in color. Whenever I stitched on it, I really, really had to concentrate to get the patterning correct.
I continued to work on it once we returned home and finished the last of it just as the month ended. No wait, actually when I finished the sleigh, I realized I had incorrectly positioned two of the little white motifs above it on the right side so on Monday quickly "frogged" and re-stitched them so now the stitching on this is totally finished!
4. Make a quilt to raffle at the community garden Art Show.
In my last TDT report, I had talked about plans to make another raffle quilt. I already had a fall themed FQ bundle that I purchased on a Shop Hop and had planned to make another of the "9 Fat Quarter Disappearing Nine Patch" quilts that I have enjoyed making. Well I'm pleased to say I did get that quilt done in September!
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| As I worked on the top and backing on my design wall.... |
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| The finished quilt! |
Details on that quilt (as well as the quilts I made while I was away) will also be in the FONF post at the end of the week. Unfortunately, a date for the show was not announced before we left for NC and on our return, I learned that our garden's President had been hospitalized in our absence and is currently still in recovery. On a positive note: if our garden decides to do another show next year, I already have my plan for a display and the raffle quilt!
The last thing on my previous list was to work on another charity quilt for the guild in NC. I didn't get to that before our trip nor during it so I've put that one on the back burner for the moment. We will be heading back down to NC in February so I will probably try to restart that project at the start of 2026.
So the recap for this week's "To Do" list is:
1. Once again resume stitching on my "New York Skyline" cross stitch project and finish Page 3 of the pattern. I may also work on my "Open Your Heart" project if I feel up to it or am so inclined.
2. Cut out the "Alaska" BOM blocks for October and November. I will try to also start stitching up the September blocks and plan to try to finish the blocks for all three months by the end of this month.
3. Sketch out some plans for "fully finishing" the two Christmas-In-July cross stitch pieces.
4. Something new I'd like to work on this week is that I haven't put out my Fall decorations yet:
I also have a new one I'd love to start working on:
These are the supplies for a wool wallhanging called "Midnight Garden" (available digitally here and in print here). The Ackfeld hanger I want to use with it just came yesterday. I've already printed out the applique templates and gathered a background from my homespuns stash and wools from my wool stash. It's been a while since I've made someting with wools so it'll be fun to try it again!
So that's my catching up and plans for the week. It will also be nice to finally get to check in again to see what everyone else is up to over at Carol's "Quilt Schmilt" for "To Do Tuesday"!
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