I Didn't Mean To

Look who is sporting triple borders! 

It's Stubborn Jacob! 

It was a lot of work to straighten this quilt out but I succeeded because I'm stubborn (as per my mother). (Cathy said that my middle name should be Persistence. I like that! ♥)

Anywho! 

Yes, I almost called it Stubborn Jacob and then ... second thoughts, it's too pretty for such an awful name so how about Jacob's Summer? Blue sky, green grass, blue lake. I like Jacob's Summer. 

I believe I do have enough of the dark fabric left to do the binding, whenever JS is ready to be bind. Yay! Thanks for all the encouragements. :^D 

June is Pink month so ... 

I got my bag (scrap basket not made yet) of pink and purple out. It's bursting! Okay, so some chop, chop later and ...

... I still had to separate them as there was still too much scraps for one bag. Oh well! 

I did manage to get two buttons and a spool out of the bag. 

For the crumb blocks, I had to pay a little visit to my stash as variety was absent. 

What's that? Are you asking about the split 9-patch block beside the crumb blocks? Yes, well, let me tell you something. 

Sometimes things just happen. It creeps up on you so slowly that you are barely aware of what is going on until it's too late. That's what happened! 

It went like this.  

Remember the big bags of scraps I received recently? Well, of course I had fun and lots of Ahs and Ohs were heard but I like to put away the scraps and I am running out of room. 

Since there were a lot of triangles in the gifted bags and the container of 2.5" squares scraps is full, I decided to do something with those two. Something simple like placemats which I do need by the way. 

Split 9-Patch is very easy to make and could be my leader-ender as I take care of another UFO, right?  Right! (insert chuckles here)

Sew triangles together, trimmed them down, dig some 2.5" squares out, got some 3" squares out to make more 2.5" HSTs.  Everything was going so well. 

Somehow, one container got empty. Whoop Whoop! So was my cup of coffee. Got more coffee, came back down to the basement and ... 

"Any other container with fabric that I could use in the placemats?" 

How about that small one beside the sewing machine? what's in there? 

All kind of pieces from different projects and they can all go back into the scraps bins. 

There were also lots of 2.5" squares (which I need) sewn together in a 4-Patch design. Hmmm! Maybe I can make one placemat with 4-Patch blocks? 

You can see on the right hand side, the previous empty container got a new job; it's now holding scraps sewn together to make crumb blocks. This will be kept close at hand and be a second leader-ender thingy. 

Oh! Did I got to the bottom of this container too? 

Look at the space beside my sewing machine! Am I really cleaning up my sewing room? 

GOSH! I better sit down and wait for this feeling to pass! Lol.

You know what? I can really work on a big UFO now. I got space and plenty of HSTs and squares to make 6, 8, 25 placemats! On the top right side corner of the last photo is a big pile of triangles still waiting to become HSTs!!

So...

It is time for these flannel crumb blocks to become a top. Yay! It's the third and last crumb block quilt I need to make for the boys. 

Now the real sewing fun can begin ... have a great weekend! 

;^)

Joining: 

Wendy at Wendy's Quilt 

Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Denise at For the Love of Geese

Angela at So Scrappy

Cynthia at Quilting is More Fun than Housework

Frédérique at Patchwork and Quilts

336

I need 336 inches of fabric for the last border around Jacob's Ladder. Then I need another one 340 something long for the binding.  o_o

I love this fabric and I think it suits JL beautifully. 

But do I have enough? You see, it has been used before and it's not a meter anymore. 

I really hope my math are accurate otherwise ... I have a lot of dark blue strings, haha! 

I got a surprise this morning. A friend dropped two big bags on my porch. 

Guess what's in the bags? 

Of course, scraps!! What else would make me so giddy? Gift bags full of not-so-small scraps. My evening will be fabric therapy with a glass of wine. :^D 

And now for a real Ta-Dah! moment, here is 

Amid Joy all finished. 

It was a little sew-along hosted by Temecula last December. Nope, it was December 2018. Whaaaat! That long ago? Time flies but I ain't anymore, lol. 

I called it Amid Joy because I recall the fun I had making this one ... and how easy life was back then. 

Not the best machine quilting, but it was a good practice run. I've repeated those little leaves in the green border.  

A simple cream on red floral for the backing. It finishes at 30.5 inches. 

Another one off the UFO list. Only 30 more to do.  

Neeexxxt!  (hehe) 

Have a great weekend. 

;^)

Joining my friends at 

Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Angela at So Scrappy 

Frédérique at Patchwork & Quilts

Fixed It and Would You?

This week, I managed to fix the spools blocks. (It was an easy one or three.) They all sport a new "thread" to be tall enough to fit in the quilt. (see last post to know more about this adventure)

Before and ...

after.

Now to fix the bigger problem.

Jacob's! 

If you don't know about my latest migraine, trial, challenge, you can read it here.

This quilt, which had more than one sewing machine making the blocks way back when is totally crooked.

It measures 86 inches long. Every column!
The rows are something else.
The bottom ones are 60 1/4".
The middle ones are 60".
The top ones are 60 3/4". Yeah! I had so much fun. At one point, I considered taking it all apart as I did with Field of Poppies (a.k.a. Good Fortune). But I restrained myself.

I spent 4 hours, measure, unstitch, measure, sew, measure, unst....(Good enough!) and calculate how large the blue border had to be in order to fit the pieced border.

I sew the blue border, added the pieced border and

ended up short. What! Went over the calculations again until I realized that I hadn't cut the corner of the blue border at the beginning and it was 1/4 longer than what it should have been. Unstitch the pieced border, cut the blue one properly, sew back the pieced border. Thank goodness for Super Seams Ripper. I distanced some blocks to reach my goal. Phew. My calculations were right. Yes. Finally got it working!! Whoop Whoop! On to the next side.

On a very windy Friday, I tried to take a few pictures. Most of them look like that. I hung it sideways because it is too long.

For a fraction of a second, it behaved and I was able to snap this picture. I love this quilt. The blue border looks very weird to me but it is what it is.


Now, would you add another border to frame the pieced one?

Or would you just leave it to the binding to frame it?

I think I'll go play with pink. It's less stressful, lol.

Enjoy!
And thanks for all your suggestions. You know I appreciate them all.

;^)


Joining
Sarah at Confession of a Fabric Addict
Angela at So Scrappy
Denise at For the Love of Geese
Cynthia at Quilting is More Fun than Housework
Frédérique at Quilting Patchwork Appliqué

In a Fine Pickle!

Yep! That's where I'm at.

Jacob's Ladder is my problem child at the moment because I made an assumption.

Let's go back.
- I saw a Jacob's Ladder quilt on Pinterest
- It had a lovely border
- My Jacob's Ladder top is waiting for a border since 2013
- Can't find Jacob's top
- Started to make blocks for the border lest I forget what it was like
- Found the top
- Continued to make blocks because I like it

- Counted the blocks made - missing 14
- Made 14 more blocks
- Assembled blocks together in a long border
- Assembled more blocks into another border
- Set borders beside quilts
- Borders don't fit
- Wait! what??

There's the pickle!!
I assume that the pieces in Jacob's block were 3 inches finished and made the border blocks accordingly.

It would look nice right?

It's way too long, even if I remove a block or two; the measurements aren't even.

So! 

Options are 

- Undo all the Economy blocks, cut them down to size, and resew (106 blocks)

- Don't add any borders and finish the quilt as is

- Make the stop border wider and hope no one will notice the different sizes 

- Throw the quilt back into the drawer it came out of
- or any other suggestion you have is welcome :^)

See, this was the (very quickly drawn) layout of the quilt I saw on Pinterest. It had a stop border of dark fabric, then the pieced border is added. Now, because of the pickle, what if I make the border wider to reach the length of the border? Will it look silly because the pieces in the block and the pieces in the border aren't the same sizes? 

Let me know what you think please. Thank you. ;^)

On a much happier note, on Tuesday I had a lovely surprise in the mail. 

She told me she would send me the puzzle she has just finished. When I got the box, I was all excited. I got a new puzzle to do. Little did I know! 

Inside the box was. 

a bag! A GORGEOUS bag! 

A BIG gorgeous bag! Beautifully made too. 

The puzzle! Oh, this will be fun! 

And look! There's more!!!

Two pot holders! Such lovely fabrics. I am spoiled. So spoiled. 

Now when I say the bag is big, it's huge!

The bag is 17.5" by 26" deep! It will be used to carry my projects to the Artisanat's reunions because it is big enough and I want to show it off.  

In her lovely card, Karin says she hopes that I will use the gifts. You bet I will! The potholders are so refreshing and Spring-like that they bring a smile to my face every single time I look at them. (Especially since we're still getting snowflakes.) 

Thank you so much, Karin. Bless your generous heart. ♥ 

(You can see how busy this girl is at the end of the dirt road, handling a huge farm with her husband (and sometimes a crew) AND sewing too.) 

So that's all I have for now. 

Thank goodness I have other projects (and a puzzle too) to work on while I ponder about Jacob.  Lol.

;^)

Joining
Sarah at Confession of a Fabric Addict
Angela at So Scrappy

May. Finally!

So happy to see May. I hope it will bring some warmth with it as the trees are still bare. They are now starting to show buds but usually they sport some tiny little bright green leaves at this time of year. Oh well. I'll enjoy whatever I get whenever I can.

This was last Saturday afternoon. It's was cold-ish but warm enough to play outside. I did lots of Economy blocks then. 

The total for Jacob Ladder's border is now 50 Economy blocks. I believe I have 40 more to do. Lots of blues in here.

Played with more blue crumb blocks

which wasn't easy because I have a whole lot more dark blue than lights and brights.

This poor bag is so full. I need to do something about this ... maybe this weekend.

Hey! Look who I found!

It's Jacob! Gosh! I love this quilt! All in blue and green with whatever neutral I had.  It's a pre-blog flimsy.  I will recount how many blocks I need for the border. I also have to find a fabric for the inner border that will play nicely with all the blocks.

It's nice to revisit these fabrics as some I don't have anymore, like these.

You won't believe what I found while looking for Jacob.

Yep! Another bag of blue fabric. Oh! but there's a lot of lights in this one. Okay, so I'll definitively be sewing more blue this weekend, and finish the crumb blocks properly.


Angela announced the new color for May and ...

I have a head start. Dark green is very present in the Economy blocks since Jacob has a lot of those too.

The hand sewing is coming along too. It is very slow sewing as the hexies don't have their paper backing anymore.

Still, half of the row is done, so I see it as good progress for the little bit of attention I gave it.

The other end has its paper still attached. Hopefully, it will go faster.

So, that's all I have for now.
You take care, stay home no matter what they are saying. I love how this post on Facebook explained it.

Only 3% chances of catching Corona-virus. If I give you a bowl of 100 candies and I tell you three candies are poison and you might die if you eat one. Would you still gamble and eat a handful? Because you know you will meet more than just one person out there. 


Please, stay safe as I love you all.
;^)

Joining
Angela at So Scrappy
Cynthia at Quilting is More Fun than Housework
Kathy at Kathy's Quilts
Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict