March Mini and other things

 

It seems like I just wrote a blog post, but that was a month ago. Good grief. Where does the time go? I have been sewing, apparently too much because I'm suddenly experiencing flair-ups of extreme pain in my right hand. My guess is tendonitis. As for cause? Most likely, rotary cutter. 

Its torture to not be able to sew. I'll have to find other activities. Walking/hiking works. But most everything else I do involves my hands. Ugh. 

Anyway, lucky for me, I have lots of scraps that can be sewn into little quilts with little to no cutting. I have little bins of these things everywhere. One is full of "waste" triangle squares, which I rename "bonus” triangle squares. I grabbed a handful of them and made this.

I had to cut the border strips and stitch on the binding, but that was before the worst flair-up. I hand quilted some simple lines down the centers of the rows and the borders, and though you can barely see the quilting, ts a sweet little quilt and feels heavenly to the touch. It will probably be a gif. 

Good news! My friend has offered for me to come over and use her electric Go-cutter, which I have been taking her up on. But I still have to pre-cut the fabric, so even that will have to wait for a bit.

Meanwhile, I was really itching to do something fun, and so I grabbed my little bin of 1 1/2 x 2 1/2" bricks. I was inspired by the darling little brick quilt Janet O gave me, and taking her idea as a starting point,  I made this:

The only thing I had to cut were the binding strips, which is actually a fake binding. I sew it on like a border, then sew the quilt together like a pillow. I had only a four inch opening to close at the end. As of now its un-quilted. I did machine quilt in the ditch between the “binding” and the body of the quilt, which gives it definition. The "binding" is a little wonky, and slightly wider than I had planned, but that's because apparently I can't do even the simplest math, and I cut the strips 1/4" too wide. The method needs a little fine tuning, but is potentially a brilliant way to fake a binding onto a tiny quilt or a mug rug. 

 

 

Here they are, relaxing on a bed of dry maple leaves. (See the little tree starts coming up?)

 

 Here's the link to Wendy's blog for more Monthly Mini's

 

 

I also made a throw for a friend, before the hand issue got out of hand (no pun intended).

I saw this on Pinterest:

 I thought it would be a good way to use up some of myy reds (or any other color, for that matter, but I have an overabundance of reds). So I started in and got this far ...

 

... then I thought I'm not so sure I want stars, so I played around with it. 

This is what I ended up with. 

 

I'm calling it Exploding Star. You can see how simple the blocks are, and there are no doubt many design possibilities.

I have an appointment with the hand doctor coming up, hopefully some PT. I have a big first-time four-day quilt retreat coming up at the end of next month. Hopefully I'll be in shape to do some sewing!

(editing seems to be on the fritz tonight. Oh well ... )

love, Sandy