October block lotto!

I know, I barely posted for ages, then, several posts in a row.  It's been either feast or famine lately. 

Last night was my tiny quilt guilds monthly meeting (I'm in 2 guilds).  We had an October block lotto.  The squares had to be 12.5" unfinished, They had to have a neutral background, and they had to have a pumpkin somewhere in the block.  They could have anything else, fall related in the block.  Here are the blocks that were made.

Viki's block

Kay's block

Jennie's block

Marilyn's block

Thelma's block

Myriam's block

Gwen's block

my block

I love how everyone's blocks turned out so differently, but, they all are so cute together.  Viki won all the blocks.  She is a new quilter, and now she gets to put all these blocks into a quilt or projects.  Fun!

Shop hop on Thursday!  Maybe I'll post some pictures of some of the yummy things I find.  7 quilt stores in one day!  Woohoo!

Have a great week!

Lyon's Farm Fun Weekend

I spent the weekend at the Kendall County Lyon's Farm Fall Festival in Yorkville, Illinois.  I took one treadle and 3 hand crank machines, along with one of my quilt frames, to show hand quilting. 

my booth space, as much room as I wanted, woohoo!

some hand quilting on my Hinterberg frame

1896 Singer 15 treadle

more of my booth area

New Home converted to a hand crank and some toy machines

1921 Singer 66 HC & 1959 Singer Spartan HC

some of my quilts displayed

I got lots of sewing done this weekend while showing off my machines.  It was so much fun chatting with people.  On Friday afternoon, after hubby and I set up the booth, I stopped at a few yard sales in the area.  I found a cute doily that was stained on one end.  I had fun turning that doily into a mug rug on Saturday.  Marcia at Crafty Sewing & Quilting showed how she turned an old hankie into a mug rug last week.  Well, I took her idea, and totally changed it up.  Marcia cut the edge of her hankie off, but, I really wanted the cute, crocheted edge left on my doily, so, I made my mug rug differently.

sewing strips to the hankie on my Spartan  hand crank

machine quilting my mug rug on my hand crank

I sewed my mug rug on my Spartan hand crank, including the machine quilting.  I only quilted in straight lines, so, it was easy to machine quilt.  I've never done well at free motion quilting on a machine, even though I've taken several classes.  Oh well, I know how to hand quilt very well, even if I'm REALLY SLOW at completing projects.  On Sunday morning, I attached the binding to the mug rug, and hand stitched it to the back.  Here is the finished mug rug.

completed mug rug

back of mug rug

Since I didn't know I was going to make this until late Friday night, I didn't take the correct thread to quilt it with on Saturday.  I had to quilt it with cream colored thread instead of orange or gold thread.  I think it turned out quite well.  I've never made a mug rug before this one.  This was a really quick finish for me, especially since I was chatting with people all day on Saturday about quilting and my machines instead of sewing on this. 

I also finished my block for the Wego Quiltin' October block lotto for Monday night.  We had to make a block with a neutral background, in fall colors with a pumpkin somewhere on the block.  and the block had to be 12.5" square, unfinished.  I think I did it all.  This block was paper pieced.  I'm having fun with paper piecing.

Wego Quiltin' October lotto block

The fabrics for both the mug rug and the block are leftovers from a quilt I made for my niece several years ago.  I've also used the same fabric for a table runner.  I tend to purchase WAY MORE fabric than I'll need for a project, just in case. 

I'll try to take pictures of everyone else's blocks for the block lotto and post them next week.  I doubt I'll win the blocks, but, at least I'll get the pictures.

We're going on a shop hop on Thursday.  There are 7 shops on this hop.  I'll try to remember to take some pictures.

Hope your weekend was as much fun as mine was.  Let me know what you did this weekend.