Our Christmas Gift From Bonnie

What a great clue for Christmas week - some easy blocks that went together pretty fast so we all had time to do our other holiday activities!

In my case, my "holiday activity" was working on other quilts.

One of the quilts I worked on may have been nice to give as a Christmas gift, but it was kind of nice that I was still working on the quilting when my Granddaughter  Grace,
who will be recieving the quilt was able to watch me doing part of the
process - swirls and hearts make up the quilting design on her
1000 pyramids quilt.

  She had fun watching and she thought I should
be able to get it done while she was there -
no can do, BUT  I was about 3/4's of the way done by Christmas evening, and as of Sunday afternoon - right before Bonnie came on for Quilt Cam, I was done with the quilting! Binding will come tomorrow!

My big trial of working on this quilt was WINSTON my cat - he just has to try out the quilts every chance he gets, even while I'm still working on them at the sewing machine!

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I had a nice surprize Sunday Evening, my son Troy & his girlfriend stopped by with a Christmas gift he made for me. I was pretty surprised by it, it's such a cute papermache snowman, and I'm happy I'll be able to keep it out for a few months since winter is sure to stay around for a while yet - just need to find a place for him that Winston won't bother.

Just for fun here's a little video of my Granddaughter Grace Victoria with one of her Christmas gifts. Grace requested a bird - thankfully, not a live one.  Grace refers to this bird as a cock (giggle), must think it's a Rooster...

Be sure to check out what the other mystery quilters have been working on  on Bonnie's Site.

Working away on Clue 4

Wow, I thought I would be able to complete this step a whole lot faster than I did, but at least they are done!  All blocks for All clues, completed!!!

As I work on  my blocks I keep them organized in flats from my Costco shopping trips, so happy to see the boxes fill with colorful quilt blocks and anxious to see them all come together in a new quilt.

 I like the detail on this black print I've used on some of the blocks, naturally some of the text gets lost in the seams, but it's fun to look for the blocks with fun stuff, especially since it's part of the season this quilt is being made!

This block is a good reminder for me to wish you all a 
Merry Christmas and a Very Happy New Year.


 

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As I've been working on my Mystery Quilt, I've been plodding away on this Hunters Star, I've been pushing myself to get it done for Christmas, but that just won't happen, maybe early January....

Everyone has been working away on Grand Illusion, and are posting links over on the Quiltville site, go on over and take a look!

Grand Illusion Step 3

I've been able to get a start on this weeks clue, but still have quite a way to go (somehow work always gets in the way) - - - tomorrow I plan to spend lots of quality time making more of these beauties!

When I'm quilting I always think of my Grandma Carolyn, she introduced  my siblings and I to sewing when we were very young since it was  her pastime and her way of making a living as a seamstress at a number of upscale stores in the Twin Cities.
I'm working my blocks up on the beautiful "White" sewing machine she gave me as a graduation present way back in the 70's. It was a used machine when she purchased it for me, and still works great, I just oil it up when needed, keep the lint down, and listen to my fav. book or TV series!

In one of my earlier posts I posted that I'm using scraps for the start of a crumb quilt - I don't have any real plans for how it will look in the end, but I've been adding to the group as I work on all my projects.

Stop on over to Bonnie Hunters site Quiltville to see how everyone else is doing!
You can see we're all having lots of fun!

Grand Illusion Step 2

I've been having a great time working on this step, love the colors, 

love how accurate they are turning out following Bonnie's first option for making this block.

I have to admit I was a little concerned about making this one since I hadn't been able to start it right away on Friday, as many of Bonnie's followers on Facebook had, and before I even printed out the instructions and read them myself, I was feeling others concerns and problems with making the blocks, but as it turned out, the first option sounded the easiest for me since I didn't want to be sewing or trimming any extra triangles.

I  still need to do some trimming on my blocks, but little by little I'll be getting them done before the next clue comes out!

 

 

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The whole time I was working on these I was thinking of one of my favorite candies (must be the colors), and IF I left the house today, I was going to buy some - but it was much more fun to work on my blocks.

 

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Be sure to jump on over to  Bonnie Hunters Blog  to keep up with everyone else!

Clue 1 in the works

As soon as I saw the first clue Friday morning I wanted to get started, but work had to come first, so I was only able to do a little bit the last 3 days.

 

 

Luckly I'v got the NEXT 3 DAYS OFF!

 

I still need to square up most of the blocks I've put together, but I'm so happy to say all I've needed to trim off of the ones I've done so far is tiny little slivers, hardly anything at all. I think that must mean I've pretty much mastered the accurate 2  1/2" strip and and scant 1/4 inch seam.

I purchased a new seam guide that was designed by Nova Montgomery primarily for Featherweight machines, but I'm using it on my vintage "WHITE" sewing machine for this quilt. It's a nice long straight edge to the front and back of the pressure foot which really helps keep the fabric from swinging off my intended seam line.

 

Looking forward to the next clues, and really loving Bonnie Hunter for doing all this for us! Take a look at all the others working on this mystery!

Bonnie Hunters new Mystery Quilt 2014

I'll be doing my 4th Bonnie Mystery!      Bonnie Hunters Grand Illusion

So far all I've done is print out the info from Bonnie's site and start pulling out colors I think will work (also I'm cleaning up my sewing room).
As I'm working away I'm thinking of all the others that have done these mysteries in colors that are different from Bonnie's selections, and how beautiful they have been, I wish I had the courage to change up the color way for my quilt, we shall see!
As usual, I'm listening to a book on my IPod, downloaded from the Rochester MN public library, this one has been so very interesting AND educational.

 

The Buddha in the Attic tells a story of many Japanese women that come to the USA to marry American men they have never met - and how life treats them and their families through the years. 

I remember learning of this long ago, but now that I am older and look at life through older eyes, I see the reality of what people endured long ago to come to this great country, and now I've met some wonderful people that endured many hardships to be able to come to the America.

As a high school junior or senior I took part in a contest through the VFW to write an essay "The Voice of Democracy" and my subject was how the United States of America was a melting pot of people from.....

I wish I had a copy of that essay to re-read as I think of it often as I work with so many people that have come from different lands, and the struggle some of them had to get here.  I recall I took 2nd place in that contest, and still feel pride of recognizing how everyone of us can tell a story of our ancestors and their struggles that brought them to this wonderful country.  

God Bless the USA.

Easy Street, another Bonnie Hunter mystery complete

If it weren't for Bonnie Hunters mystery quilt projects, I know I would never have attempted some of the quilts I've made, let alone started a "BLOG" !


One of the things Bonnie likes us to do as part of the

Orca Bay

mysteries is to link images we post to her blog, back to our own blog. Before Orca Bay, I didn't have a blog, and didn't feel a need for one, but did it anyway!

The first Bonnie Mystery I did was "Orca Bay" - so that was when I started this Blog.

The next mystery was "Easy Street" but I didn't finish it right away due to an injury.

Then came Celtic Solstice, which I completed the flimsy and quilting before "Easy Street"

Celtic Solstice

Easy Street & Celtic Solstice flimsy hanging over patio door

Now I have Easy Street Completed!

 This quilt finished at 97"  square, not enough to provide for a pillow wrap ( which I didn't want anyway),on this queen size bed,  but I did want to have a finished look, so I made the pillow cases, first time ever for doing cases, but they were so easy using a Hot Dog Pillow Case tut I found on the internet thanks to the great quilter friends on "The Quilting Board". In true scrappy style - the green prints on the pillow cases do not match, but the color is the same - the 2 border colors are the same are the same as I used in the quilt border.

Easy Street with (semi) matching pillow cases

Quilting Easy Street on my Sunshine 16

Quilting Detail

Time for an update on Celtic Solstice

Here I am again, its been a while since I've posted an update - been working hard, and I've completed my Celtic Solstice and wanted to share the finished product.

I always love working on Bonnie Hunter mysteries, and I'm look forward to the next on already, although it won't be out for quite a while, I wonder if she's been working on it yet????


I just did a meander design for the quilting on this piece, I had it hanging on my wall for so long trying to decide what to do on it, and just had a mental block - couldn't come up with anything else I

wanted to do.

This is a gift for my youngest son, and he's always been somewhat of a wanderer, so I think the meander design is just right for him.











The border I like to use on many of my quilts is a "Flange" border, the way
it works up is so nice since you don't have

any hand sewing to do!












Now that Celtic Solstice is complete, I'll finish off  "Easy Street" - just a tiny bit of hand work to do on that, and it I'll be able to post it too!

Scrappy Trip Aroung the World another Bonnie Hunter freebie

I have to say I love all the Bonnie Hunter quilts I've seen as well as her techniques and use of the many specialty quilt rulers for cutting our precious fabrics!  When I saw the Trip Around the World I knew I had to try it, and up to my scrap pile I went, but these were not all scraps - a couple years ago the group from  QUILTING BOARD  had a "Noodle Swap" . Everyone that wanted to be involved got together a specified number of assorted 2 1/2" WOF strips and submitted them to the address of the quilter in charge that mixed them all up and forwarded them on to other quilters in the swap - cool way to get different fabrics, and a great way to make a Scrappy Trip!
This one hung on my design wall for over a year because of an injury that kept me from my quilting, but also because I wasn't sure how to finish it off - I didn't want just a navy border, so added more of the scraps to a narrow border to continue the "trip".

 The binding is all done on the machine with a gold flange, makes it so much quicker to complete the binding stage of the quilt.

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I had already used many of those 2 1/2" Noodle strips on an earlier quilt,  I've seen this pattern referred to as Log Cabin on Steroids??  I didn't have a pattern to follow, just sort of went with what I thought would work.

Another Bonnie Hunter Completed! Scrappy Spiderweb

I've been trying to complete some of the projects I started over a year ago - before I took a fall on the ice which made it difficult to sit at the sewing machine, get on the floor to make up the quilt sandwich, and get the free motion quilting done - I'm now digging out those projects, and it's time to update the blog with my progress!
I found inspiration for this on Bonnie Hunters site .  I used pages from an old telephone book to sew my scraps to - the paper was very easy to remove once the sections were complete.

         

I do the free motion quilting on my Sunshine 16, I have to admit I'm very rusty at it since it's been so long since I've worked on my quilts, but it sure is fun getting back into the process.
 

I started wrapping the binding around an antique spool I had laying around - I put it between my knees as I sew - goes so nice compared to how I use to just have it rolled up and hope it didn't end up in a knot!

Hand sewing the binding to the back of the quilt - took a few evenings, but It's like a reward after all the other work that went into this project. - as you can see hanging on the wall beyond my feet are my next 2 projects to quilt up - again Bonnie Hunter projects, mystery quilts EASY STREET, and CELTIC SOLSTICE.

Tribute to Spencer

What Is A Cat?
Gentle eyes
that see so much,
paws that have
the quiet touch.

Purrs to signal
"all is well"
and show more love
than words can tell.

Graceful movements
touched with pride,
a calming presence
by our side.

A friendship
that will last and grow,
small wonder
why we love them so.

Author Unknown ***************************************   My Spencer, my pal of the last 7+ years passed away yesterday; it was a shock to come home from work and find he was in his eternal sleep. With a very heavy heart I need to say my final good night baby kitty, and hold him in my memory, no longer in my arms.  

Nearing the Finish Line ~ Flimsy Complete!

I'm feeling pretty good today - I finished the quilt top!

I completed the final border this morning, made me so happy, now I'm mentally planning the border to put on  2 other "Bonnie" quilts that have been in the works for a while, Easy Street and a Scrappy Trip Around the World.

Here's the whole thing, hanging over my patio door, thus the light coming through in some areas.
I don't quite know yet how I'll finish off the back and binding on this one, I think I'll let it hang over the patio door for a while to see what ideas I may come up with.
As always, it's been fun watching the others that follow Bonnie's Mysteries progress through each step and produce their own masterpiece in Bonnie's colors, or by adding their own twist and using their own color pallet.
You can check out other "Quilt Artists" through Bonnie's Site.
I am linking up with other mystery quilters at the Celtic Solstice Finale , check it out!

Working on the final steps of the quilt I enjoyed a couple books on the I-pod. Three Weeks with my Brother is by the author that wrote The Notebook among many other titles, as I listened to the book, I thought of  growing up with my friends and family, and family trips over the course of my life - a very special book. Another was audio book "Juliet" which was very entertaining as well.

Center Complete!

I'm now working away on the boarder blocks now that I have the center section complete, I hoped to be further along than I am, but work just seems to get in the way!

 The colors look a bit washed out in this pic, but I wanted to post it and analyze my layout for mistakes! Sometime I can only spot them in a picture - I've noticed other quilters have found the same thing. If any of you see an oops, please let me know.

 As I've  been working away, I've been listening to a book on my Ipod just as I usually do, and I have to say this one has me a bit riled up at this point -

I'm not done listening yet,  I'm at the part where Huguette is being exploited by everyone she should be able to trust - nurse, doctors, bankers.... making me pretty mad - I'm a nursing assistant, and can't stand the thought of anyone taking advantage of vulnerable folks. THIS IS A TRUE STORY.  Very interesting.

Happy to be this far!

OK, here we go! I got a late start on this mystery, but I'm determined to get the small quilt made.
 I've seen the reveal and LOVE the colors, and the "circular" effect the variety of blocks produces within the quilt.

Although I've only completed 9 of the large  blocks made from the 3.5" sub-units from previous steps to show my work so far, I have completed all the 4-Patch blocks, all the pinwheels, all the blocks from step 5 with the half square triangles, all fabrics are cut and ready to go for the remaining steps.



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As I'm working on CS I'm occasionally  running some scraps through the machine from this quilt and others I've made for a future "crumb project". I don't really know what I'll be doing with these now, but I'll keep building them along with my CS quilt.





Check out the progress of all my quilt friends projects here: Bonnies Link Up site



It's -14 degrees as I write this post this evening, much better than the -24 degrees we woke up to here in Minnesota today - stay warm everyone!

Happy New Year 2014

Bonnie's 2014 Mystery Quilt Revealed

What a great way to start the New Year, checked to see what may be new on Bonnie's site, and there it was! It's a beautiful quilt, and I'm so happy I am working on mine - and really looking forward to seeing some of the other coloration being used by other quilters.

Now it's time for me to get back to the machine and get this beauty finished for me!