Mike & Gabby: Happy 4th of July!!!

I wish all of you a happy 4th of July! It's getting a little late and the festivities are winding down, but there are probably a few more still fireworks going on. We stayed home and had a nice evening with my brother as company. I'm always a little nervous on occasions when fireworks will go off. Those of you with neurotic dogs can understand. They sound like thunder to them and generally scare them. With Michael's hearing loss, she did very well. She barely noticed them. Gabriel on the other hand was a little anxious, but has calmed down now.

I woke up this morning feeling kind of rough and hurting all over. I tried to take things a bit on the easy side. I wanted to work on quilting a quilt I had started several years ago. It's a hexagon quilt that's 1/2 quilted and is another on my ufo list. I managed to stitch in the ditch on one row before deciding that was just too tough to do in my current state. So I switched gears and started working on my Scraps to Treasures challenge quilt. For this challenge, each participant had to send in a light/dark pair of 6" squares for each challenger. We ended up with 62 participants I think and so have 124 6" squares to work with. We have to use at least a 2" square from every fabric we received and the deadline is September 11th. I've cut out Part 1 of my plan and started sewing the rows together. All I'll add about my plan right now is that is combines piecing and applique.

Yesterday I managed to finish the pillows for our living room. No trim on them, so they didn't take that long to make. Dennis is pleased with them, so I think I'm done with this project. The sofa they're on in the picture is not the sofa they've ended up on...

I stopped at my LQS, Quilts Like Crazy, yesterday. They're transitioning their punch cards to a new one and have a deal this month where all of your purchases are worth double punches so as to fill them up more quickly. Also yesterday they would punch an additional $10 for coming in. I actually did need an older fabric I thought they still carried to use as the binding on my hexagon quilt. Luckily it was indeed there. Adding the binding to this quilt will be the first time I've added binding to an inside corner, so we'll see how that ends up.

I also found a great fabric to use for the Vance Quilts 'R Us Crayon Challenge that is also due in September. The challenge was to pick an envelope that contains 3 crayons. Then you must make a quilt (of any size) using only those 3 colors. You can use any value of that color, but you can't add another color. My colors are Gray, Sky Blue, and Atomic Tangerine. The colors are just like their names suggest. I have the pattern I want to use in my head. I just need to get started on it. However, I found this great gray fabric at the store with a wide range of values and thought it would be a perfect addition. It reminds me a bit of a marble countertop.

And finally, I found a new book called Folded Fabric Elegance by Rami Kim. I was blown away by the techniques in this book. I have another book with a similar theme that I used to make the following quilt that now hangs in my bathroom.