A Stitching Week

After quilt camp last weekend, I had several 'sewing' get together's this week.

On Wednesday, Marilyn and I went to Sewing, Etc, to stitch with the owner, Kelly.  First, I stitched the 'missing' sides onto the blocks from Clue #3, in Kevin's mystery.  This is 2 sets of scrappy blocks, finished.

2 finished sets of blocks

When those were done, I pulled out a jelly roll, that I'd won from Henry Glass fabrics, last March.  Wow, I'd forgotten that it was a full year ago when I won these. 

I'd seen a picture of a quilt, ages ago, and had drawn up the pattern to use with these strips.  No clue where I saw the quilt, or what the pattern name was, sorry.  Usually, I try to save the link to where I see something.  Sometimes I'm given a photo of a quilt, with no info included.  I think that was the case with this one. Here is the baby size pattern. 

graph paper pattern I drew up from a photo

A couple in our church had a baby last week, so, it was time to get this quilt made. I cut the strips out, and stitched them up.

all the strip sets, stitched

By the time these strip sets were stitched, it was time to drive to Ottawa, for the Camp Tuckabatchee quilter's group.  Mary was teaching us how to make a tote bag.  My tote bag didn't get finished Wednesday night, due to a stupid mistake on my part.  I was trying to rush (first mistake) and talking too much (second mistake), so, I stitched the lining to the wrong side of the outside of the bag.  Oh well.  I just put the messed up bag away, and 'frog stitched' (rip it, rip it) later in the week.

Saturday, my large quilt guild, Pride of the Prairie had a sew-in.  The first thing I worked on was finishing the tote bag. 

finished tote bag

lots of room in the tote bag

When the tote bag was done, I pulled out the pieces I'd cut for the baby quilt (the box blocks) and stitched them.

all the box blocks stitched

Well, silly me forgot to bring the sewn strip pieces, so, that project got put up.  I'll have to finish sewing all the parts together this week.

Since I couldn't finish the baby quilt top, I pulled out a bag of blocks that I'd bought at a thrift store last year.  The bag had 79 finished 9 inch flannel blocks, a couple of blocks that just need to be stitched, and some extra scraps of the fabrics.  The whole bag cost me a whopping $4. 

I laid out 77 of the blocks, and started stitching the rows together.

77 blocks laid out

My little quilt guild is trying to make 14 quilts for the boys and girls at the Naperville 360 group homes.  We'd made quilts for all the boys back in 2016, but, when the boys leave the home, they take all of their bedding with them, including the quilts.  We started making quilts for the girls this year, then found out that all the boys who we'd made quilts for have moved out, so, none of the new boys have quilts now.  We need twin size quilts for each bed (with lots of  hang over, since they will be the bedspreads for the boys and the girls). 

These blocks will be for one of these boys.  I got all 11 rows stitched, but, I still need to sew the rows together.  I will still need some flannel for the borders, since this isn't large enough yet.  I have enough extra circle blocks to use in the corners.  I hope I can find matching flannel to go with these blocks.

Not a bad stitching week.  I'm still trying to get back in the groove of things, after being out of town for so many weeks.  I'm trying to catch up on housework, and do some deep cleaning, too.  It all takes time.  At least I'm finally feeling better, after being sick for so long. 

I have another craft day next Saturday.  Hopefully I'll be sewing the binding onto that baby quilt by then.