Dutchman's Puzzle

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow! The northeast corridor got snow on Friday-- about 6" for us--and we're in the midst of another big storm today. I think we got at least 6" last night and today, and it's still snowing. 

The last few weeks have been quite busy with the usual day to day stuff, soap making, puzzle building, and a weekend visit from my granddaughter, who will be seven this year. She likes to work on her little puzzles while Grammie works on the big ones. 

More than anything else, I've been preoccupied with learning all about freeze drying food. The image of empty store shelves during the pandemic has stayed in my head, so hubby and I talked it up and bought a freeze dryer from Harvest Right several weeks ago. Haha, had I known that eggs were going to hit $6+ a dozen, I'd have bought a freeze dryer six months ago.

Since then I've been reading everything I could find and watching YouTube videos on the subject. So far, we've only done one load of bananas and apples; but when the storm is over, we're throwing in a load of mac and cheese and maybe a tray of mushrooms if there's room. My plan is to focus mostly on meals this winter, then fresh produce in the spring and summer. 

I have done some sewing for the Scrappy Rainbow Challenge. The color this month is dark and bright blues. Rather than a rainbow project, my focus was to use up as many of the blues in Barbara's Scrap Bag as I could.

I realized early on that the mix of her prints is so varied that I wasn't going to fit them all into one or two projects, so I worked on a few different blocks. There was quite a lot of that dark navy with the little vine, and I pieced most of that together and am using it as the backing on a small top that used the same fabric as the border.

There are these rectangle bar blocks (I got bored with these pretty quickly); the Eastern Sunrise string blocks; a Scrappy Rectangles block (I got bored with those too); Bonnie Hunter's 2022 Leaders and Enders Triple Treat Challenge; and if I could get a 1-1/2" strip out of a smaller piece of fabric before it went into the string pile, some Bitcoin strips, also a Bonnie Hunter pattern. 

And because I can't make up my mind about much of anything these days, I don't know where any of these projects are going. Except the Triple Treat--that one I'm actively working on. I did come across a pattern called Scrap Happy Rainbow Connection from Amy Smart, which seems to be popular, so I might actually do a rainbow project after all.

Either way, I've whittled Barbara's blues down to this small pile, and I'm working on using up the rest of them, hopefully in one of the above projects.

 

Over the weekend I dug out these Dutchman's Puzzle blocks and assembled them into a small top because I needed some focus. The edges still need to be trimmed up and borders applied. 

This project is another pretty old UFO, and it's one of my 2023 UFO challenges. With just a few exceptions, I used reds, golds, blues, and greens in the blocks and sashings. I like it so much that I may use some of the left over blocks and make a double sized quilt for my guest room. Still signing it off on the challenge list when I get this one finished though!

Some of that dark blue with the little vine from Barbara's scraps went into the sashing on this quilt too.   

Linking to Oh Scrap!

Ringing in the New Year

New Year's is not a big holiday for us, so it came and went without event. Sister-in-law and I spent a few days building two 1000-piece puzzles gifted to me by my daughter-in-law's mother. 

Because there was not a lot of variety in the color, I anticipated they would be more difficult than they actually were. With two of us working at them, we finished each puzzle in just a couple days. 

This past Wednesday at our chapter quilt meeting, someone gifted me a bag of six more puzzles, lol. So I have plenty to keep me busy. 

In the meantime I've been working on this 1000-piece Norman Rockwell puzzle. I failed to notice that the back of the box said "random cut", so there are a lot of very strangely shaped pieces. More challenging for me, but it's going along.

It's fashionable these days for bloggers to review the year prior. In particular, many quilters are assessing what they accomplished the previous year and what they'd like to accomplish in the new year. I can get onboard with that. I listed 9 big quilts and a grouping of 3 minis on my UFO Challenge 2022 tab and managed to complete 4 big quilts and 1 mini. Even though I didn't get them all finished, three of them were years old UFOs, and I felt good about that. 

I do plan to make myself a UFO Challenge list for 2023, and I suppose what didn't get finished in 2022 should be added to this year's list. The problem is there are so many projects I'd like to finish this year that it's hard to choose just 10 or 12. 

One of the things I'd like to do this year is to participate in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2023 hosted on the ScrapHappy blog. I did this a few years ago, and it took me another year or more to finish the quilt. In her write up about this year's challenge, Angela (I think that's her name) mentioned that, instead of a rainbow quilt, you can make some other scrappy or stash busting project, so long as you're trying to focus on the color of the month. That is an approach that appeals to me. The color for this month is bright or dark blue, and I have several blue or blue and white projects I started a while back. I would like to make some headway on those.

Wrapping Up 2022

Hubby, my sister-in-law, and I celebrated our Christmas on Christmas day; and my kids and their kids were here to celebrate with us on the 26th. It was hectic, but we did have a good time. The four-year old who received the Construction Zone quilt was not impressed, lol, and I rather expected that. A four-year old is much more interested in Toys. He might appreciate it later though when the house is cold and he needs a snuggle. His sister did like her Wiggle Time quilt, so I was happy about that. 

I did finish all eight of the bowl cozies for my son and his wife, and those were a hit. Plus I made two for my sister-in-law to take home with her. My other son, who initially declined an offer for bowl cozies, changed his mind and decided maybe he needed some too, lol. So eight for me, eight for him, sixteen more to make. It'll be a little while though, as I am bowl cozie'd out for now.

I hate to leave things unfinished, so to wrap up the Advent Calendar from Missouri Star, there were a few more notions and doodads, if you will. There was also this pattern for another small quilt, which I like and will make at some point. That day's giftie also included a package of laser cut letters and sewing machine for the quilt; and they're fusible too, which will make sewing the quilt a little faster. The Kona rainbow pack from earlier is also meant to be used for this little quilt. 

The other notion I liked towards the end of the month was these acrylic bolts. These are meant for fabric storage, like a mini bolt. Now I would need about 5000 of these to accommodate my stash, so these are not practical for me. 

They are, however, perfect to wrap binding around until I get ready to sew it onto a quilt. There were three in the package, which is plenty; and they come with labels and clips to hold the fabric in place. 

After the holidays, we took a ride up to camp to check on things. It was colder and a little snowier an hour and a half north, and the house was very cold. There was still open water on the lake, but closer to shore the waves crested and froze. 

We haven't had much snow this year at all, so the skiers, snow mobilers, and snowboarders are not happy about that.

On the way home from camp, we swung by Big G's in Winslow for a late lunch. Big G's has more different kinds of sandwiches than any place I've ever seen, and their claim to fame is "generous portions". And they're not kidding. This sandwich was nearly as big as a dinner plate. My sister-in-law and I each ate a quarter of it, and it was plenty for us. Hubby ate the other half. 

On the way out of the deli, I noticed a metal cart with a sign advertising "bread ends", so I asked about it. Big G's bakes all their own breads and pastries on site, and I suppose they don't want to serve a sandwich with a bread end or a slice of bread that isn't consistent in size, so they bag those and sell them. Which is way better than throwing them out.

They were selling bags of actual bread ends (or heels as we call them), but we found one bag that was full of slices close to the end of the loaf that were not uniform in size. Once we got home, we split up the big bag into smaller bags to freeze. Then I weighed all the bags. For $4.25, I got 9 pounds of bread. Yes, pounds. Such a deal. I had half a slice toasted for breakfast this morning, and it was fabulous.

 

 

Christmas Week

Okay, the weatherman was right after all about the snow totals for Saturday's storm. It snowed here all day Saturday, and we wound up with about 9 inches. 

 

I took advantage of a shut-in day to finish the quilting on the Ribbon Candy quilt. Haven't had a chance to trim it up yet, and I surely will not have time to do the binding this week because I still have bowl cozies to finish up before Christmas. But I would love to get this done the week after Christmas and get one more finish in before the end of the year.

I also have some baking I'd like to do. Sunday we drove down to the southern part of the state to drop off some Christmas gifts to my granddaughter's mother's house. My (ex)daughter-in-law loves the stuff called Christmas Crack, which is basically like one of those Chex mixes, with the cereals, pretzel sticks, M&Ms, plus whatever else you want to add, all coated in melted white chocolate. It's pretty addictive once you start eating it. If I can get it made this week, I'll send a tin full down to her when my granddaughter comes for family Christmas on Monday. 

Day 18 of the Advent Calendar was a leatherette cutout of a chick that you stitch together to make a little coin purse. Very cute. The company mascot is a yellow chick, not a duck--I had that wrong. 

Day 19 was a very nice coffee cup with some good weight to it. I have a collection of probably 25 quilt related coffee mugs. Don't ask me why I started collecting them, I just did; so this one will go into the collection. 

Today is Day 20, and there was a rainbow pack of charm squares in the box. There is a project coming up that uses these squares, and I can't wait to see what it is!

December Finish

The weatherman predicted 6-10" of snow for us today, beginning about 10:00 this morning. It finally started snowing at 8:30 this evening. 6-10" ? I don't think so. 

I finished Wiggle Time Oceana yesterday and gave it a good washing so it would be soft and cuddly. 

 

The quilting looks like swirling water to me, and I love it. The Riptide pantograph was perfect. 

I also finished the four small bowl cozies for my kids. The base of these is about 5 inches. I have cut out four of the larger size and will be working on those over the next week.
 

Ribbon Candy, a pattern by Doug Leko of Antler Quilt Designs, is the next one being moved into my five-project quilt rotation. And I'm quilting it with a pantograph called Ribbon Candy, haha. I finished this top earlier this year, but I don't think I ever blogged about it. 

These were all scraps left over from my Holiday Solstice quilt that I made in 2020. I used up a bunch of different white-on-white scraps for the background too. I used the wrong side of quite a few of them to make the print less noticeable.

 

This Debbie Mumm print is what I'm using for the backing. 

The last several days of the Advent Calendar have consisted of a bunch of interesting notions--a threaded needle case, which I've never seen before; a little redwork kit, which will be given to my daughter-in-law; a spool of beeswax, which I will definitely use....

..... a zippered hard case, very nice; fingernail art stickers, which my granddaughter will love....

.... and this thread cutter that uses an old rotary cutter blade, which I've also never seen before. 

Fun, fun, fun!

Bowl Cozy Day

Brrrrr, it was a very cold 16 degrees when I got up this morning, but still no snow in the forecast. Which isn't a bad thing. 

The last several days of the Advent Calendar gifties have consisted of a good mix of notions and project ideas. Along with the Parking sign, there was a small embroidery project. Neither one is really my thing, but my daugher-in-law suggested that a little duck in a charm for a necklace for my granddaughter would probably be well received. A great idea, and I'll wait til next year to make that up. the charm is tiny, about an inch in diameter. 

There was a button jar, to include a little yellow duck button (the company mascot) with directions to make a pincushion top for the jar. Using one of the unused squares from the charm pack from Day 3. 

The next day featured some blue fabric and a pattern for this snowflake pillow, using the buttons in the button jar. 

Yesterday's giftie was a needle threader and needles. Haha, they should have got someone to make a needle threader with a duck. 

Today's giftie is a stashbuilding yard of white on white fabric and a couple spools of cotton thread. 

Personally speaking, I may not use everything in the Missouri Star Advent Calendar box, but whoever put this together put a lot of thought into choosing useful items and fun projects. I have already decided to do this again next year. 

I haven't made quite as much progress as I had hoped on my current projects, but I am moving forward. Wiggle Time Oceana is on the frame, and I've made several passes. The Riptide pantograph seemed like a good choice for a quilt that reminds me of ocean waves and uses some ocean-themed fabrics. 

 

The Cozy Cup mini top plus one mug rug is complete. I still have to add the side borders to the other two mug rugs. 

Whoever designed this quilt did an odd thing with the sashing between the rows. The directions had you add a narrow 1/2" strip to the top and bottom of each cup and snowflake. After I had the top together, I realized it would have been easier, faster and less wasteful to omit the strips on the top and bottom of the cups and just use a wider piece for the sashing. No idea what they were thinking. This would make a great giftie for someone, so it's likely I'll make another; and I'll make the adjustment for the sashing. 

Before I can get these items quilted up, I need to finish the quilt on the frame and get some bowl cozies made. 

Anything that is not quilting is what I call utility sewing, and mostly I don't like to do it. Only occasionally will I make household items like curtains, a tote bag, or anything like that. I did, however, offer to make 4 small and 4 large bowl cozies for my kids, to use up a LOT of yardage of vegetable fabric I acquired at a very cheap price. Why so much? Because I thought I might use it for adult cover ups (bibs), only my quilt chapter never worked on that again as a group project.

So naturally I'm going to use every shortcut I can come up with to make this kind of sewing as painless as possible, so I bought precut bowl cozy batting from Gypsy Quilter. Turns out Creative Grids got together with Gypsy Quilter and made a set of 2 bowl cozy templates which are the same size as Gypsy Quilters batting, which will make it faster to cut out the fabric and more batting. Brilliant!

I made a set of two bowl cozies long enough ago that I forgot some of the little improvements I made to the method, which I remembered after I had most of the first one together last night. 

As I was getting ready to topstitch the outside of it, I realized I had no idea whether my thread was all cotton or a cotton/poly blend, which could be flammable in the microwave. I still have some of the Coats & Clark blends that I am using up, so it very well could have been one of those. So I wound up taking it all back apart, ripping the thread out of the one half, and today I'll put it all back together with the proper thread. I can also include some of those method improvements too.

One side of my bowl cozies is yellow onions, and the other side is red bell peppers. Once I get the first one together, I figure I can put three more together assembly line fashion, to limit how many times I have to change the thread colors. 

Advent Calendar Days 4 and 5

Not much got done in the sewing room yesterday, or today either for that matter. I prefer a block of time to assemble a quilt back and get it loaded, and yesterday was not the day. Instead I contented myself working on the cup handles for my Cozy Cup mini. More about that in a minute.

Day 4's giftie was a two-ring binder with three dividers and some plastic sleeves for pattern storage. This pattern for a Disapparing Hourglass quilt was included, which begs the question, is there a layer cake somewhere else in the box? I hope!
 

For Day 5, there was a container of Quilting and Crafting Spray, which is like Best Press. Who can't use that? I can. And also some Iron Cleaner. Most people would probably use this, but maybe not me, I'll have to try it. Faultless Iron Cleaner works fine; but it got to be too expensive, and it's messy to use. Instead, I've been using Bounce fabric softener sheets They work splendidly, and there's no mess. If I get fusible on my iron, I run my iron over a Bounce sheet, placed on a paper towel, until it's clean, then iron onto a clean paper towel. I can use one Bounce sheet numerous times, which makes it cost effective.

Yesterday I put together the handles for all six cups in the mini quilt and two mug rugs, but only got one attached to a cup. 

There are tons of blocks nowadays that use the folded corner technique, from snowball blocks to picture blocks like Elizabeth Hartman's, where you place a square on the corner of one of your pieces, draw a diagonal line, sew on the line, and then trim the excess. My little cup blocks use this method as well. 

Even with the drawn line, my accuracy is still hit or miss. And truthfully, I don't want or need any more bonus triangles. And to me, this method is wasteful and more time consuming. And I hate drawing those lines. 

Enter the Folded Corners ruler from Doug Leko of Antler Quilt Design. Wish somebody had invented this 30 years ago. It's available in two sizes, but the mini seems to meet most of my needs.

In the photo above, I was supposed to cut a white one-inch square. So I placed my ruler on the fabric with the top edge of the ruler aligned with the top of my fabric, and the 1" line on the ruler aligned with the right edge of the fabric, and cut off that triangle. 

Next, I cut one 2" white square, cut in half diagonally. Oversizing it gives me the ability to square it up after I sew it on. It also gives me a little more fabric to start sewing on so the edge of my main piece doesn't get chewed up in the sewing machine. And I have another white triangle to use for another corner. Brilliant! Less waste and less time!

Doug Leko founded his business when he was just 14 years old. He's had designs published in several quilt magazines; written a number of booklets and patterns; and he must have gotten on the teaching circuit in his teens. He came to Maine Quilt for a presentation several years ago, and he might have been about 18.

And he came up with this fabulous ruler! A remarkable young man.