The Riley Blake Challenge flimsy

One WIP is a step closer to finished.

The 2025 Riley Blake Design challenge provided 1 block per week for a total of 16 blocks, and this is the third year I've participated I think.  It's an easy sew along to keep up with because the last week of each month is a catch-up week.  This year's layout added one more block to the middle and surrounded it will a checkerboard.  I decided to use the RBD bird block in the center.  That bird block was shared a few years ago.  

My fabric choice for this was to dig into my stash of Tula Pink fat quarters.  So it's scrappy, but a controlled scrappy.  The background is scrappy white.  The top is about 65" square. 

This and that

Happy birthday today to my son-in-law Jamie.  He nearly had to share a birthday with his boy Jack.  We have 1 more June birthday coming up next week.

I've mentioned that we have feral kitties hanging around the past couple of months.   

One had 5 kittens about 6 weeks ago.  We found them once, but then she moved them and we haven't actually seen any of the kittens again - just the mama.  Until Tuesday morning when I went down to sew about 8:30 and heard pitiful meows coming from my 4' deep window well.  This poor scared little baby was shivering in the corner.  Hopefully it hadn't been in there very long.  Dave went out and set a ladder down into the well.  He picked up the kitten and set it on the grass.  It scampered right under the deck.  So maybe the mama has had them under the deck at some point because it certainly knew where to go to feel safe.  Late afternoon when we checked the kitten was gone, so we're hoping mama came and got him.  AND - at 5:00 this morning a little sibling was crying in the window well.  Rescue time!!

The second block pattern in the Moda Blockheads 6 was posted yesterday morning.  Of course I dove right in and cut the pieces for the block.  It's called Crossroads by Lynn Hagmeier (Kansas Troubles).  Neat block, but there was way too much wasted fabric as the pieces for the HSTs and QST could have been much smaller.  Like the first block last week, it was suggested to make 2 of them.

The Riley Blake project is another step closer to being a flimsy.  The 16 blocks plus some sashing make a wide border around that center checkerboard area.  One more purple border will finish it off, and the strips are already cut.  This quilt is square, which isn't my usual preference.  But I liked the layout that was used in the pattern so I'll be OK with square.

Birthdays & Goals

First of all - Happy Birthday YESTERDAY to this handsome young man!!  Jack turned 10 yesterday, so now all the grands are in double digits.  He is the only one still shorter than me.  The oldest one will turn 14 in just a few days.  They are growing up way too quickly.  

Summer has begun, but it doesn't seem like as much of a big deal as it did when I had kids at home and we planned for fun summer activities.  I've been trying to come up with ideas for a vacation this summer, but for now we'll just have STAY-CATION time.  That gives me plenty of sewing time, right?  And hopefully I'll get in at least 1 golf round per week. 

In preparation for some orange sewing I have the parts cut for some Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks.  And I've made the 2 side panels for the Riley Blake project. 

Creative goals for the month . . . 

• #1 Priority - Finish the genealogy project!!

• Saturday Sampler - row for June
• Bind the Saturday Sampler from 2024
• Bind Dinosaur Quick Strippie baby quilt
• Bind Pyramid quilt - if it's ready
• Take Hummingbird quilt to long arm quilter
• Quilt the Sunflower wall hanging myself
• Rainbow Scrap Challenge - ORANGE is June's color
• Buckeye Beauty blocks
• Brighten blocks
• Triple Triangle (string) blocks
• Hollow 9 blocks
• Give It a Whirl blocks
• Gameboard blocks
• Quilt of Valor blocks - Spools
• Riley Blake project - flimsy
• Circle of Friends project - flimsy
• PIG - fall pumpkin door hanger

 The door hangers are only about 20 x 36, so one would think that I would have gotten them made almost immediately when they arrived.  LOL  I subscribed to these from Fat Quarter Shop a couple of years ago - 1 per month.  Like any subscription of this type I kept up for awhile, then there was one I didn't want to make at all, and of course the finishes were hit and miss after that.  I think this is a good one to work on this month, as I really like it plus orange is the color of the month for RSC.  

Riley Blake progress

 

One step closer to a finished quilt top.  I hope to get the blocks all layed out around this center section this morning. 

This looks so washed out in the grey light, but the purple is actually much richer in good light.  The checkerboard is definitely something different than anything I've done before.  

Design Wall Monday - June 2

Like millions of other people, we have an air quality alert here due to that smoke in the air from wild fires in Canada.  I'm not going to whine about however, because I'm just really grateful that we are not directly impacted by those fires.  The smoke has triggered my allergies, but that's better than being in a fire zone.

I did get 9 holes of golf in on Saturday, but spent a lot of the rest of the day indoors working on a genealogy project.  More time on the genealogy happened on Sunday too, but I did get some extended sewing time in.  And laundry, always laundry!

I'm hoping this week to get the Riley Blake Design challenge blocks all set into a finished quilt top.  There is a big checkerboard surrounding a central block.  I switched out the central block in the pattern for the Riley Blake bird block, framed by the purple sashing.  One side of the checkerboard is done, 3 more to go.

The strip sets for the checkerboard were quick to make using 3" strips.  Once the full checkerboard is made and attached there will be another purple frame.  Then the 16 RBD challenge blocks will go around the whole thing.  

One other project this week is to put the Circle of Friends blocks into rows.  There are 2 different dark backgrounds, so those are alternated.  Once this center part is assembled, then I'll figure out borders. This was a paper pieced monthly sew along by Carol Doak, and all on Facebook.  She plans to start a new set of blocks in July, which I may or may not make.  I do feel like making these blocks has improved my skills. 

Of course there will be some scrappy sewing in between these projects - more Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks and most like more Quilt of Valor blocks.  

A list of goals for the month of June is coming, but I needed to remove some things as it was totally unreasonable.  I need to keep working on UFO/WIP projects, and still have time to work on some new things too.  But I have to be somewhat realistic.  LOL

I'll be picking up one granddaughter from swim practice this morning, and then we will shop for a birthday present for her little brother who turns 10 tomorrow.  When I get home this afternoon I may sew or I may dig back into that genealogy stuff.  I'm kind of determined to have the genealogy project done by the end of this week too, but there are still a lot of old pictures to organize and scan.  It began as a secret project, but my husband noticed what I was working on.  I told him this was seriously cutting into my sewing time, but I'm excited to have it done. 

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

https://songbirddesigns.blog  

RSC25 - Week #22

The next RSC project to move forward is Pyramids.  

The blocks were mostly made for RSC 2024, and I finally got the top assembled this year.  I debated with myself over what color to use for backing, until I found that rainbow of big dots.  So it will be circles on the back and triangles on the front!!  This one went to a long armer this week.  This might be a good one for a scrappy binding.  

 

Early in the month I had pulled out various UFO and WIP projects that had a lot of green in them.  This wall hanging was a Lori Holt project from her Prairie Home book that we are dabbling with in the Sew Vintage group.  It's ready to quilt, and I actually have some ideas of how to quilt it myself.  The rest of those UFO/WIP projects had to go back into the closet, because I just didn't get to them. 

There was a partial set of blocks I found hanging in the back of the closet that appear to have been set aside and forgotten.  I'm not sure I even added to them last year.  This is certainly how UFOs are born!!  The pattern is Wisdom, from the Sewcialites sew-along a few years ago.  It's a 9" (finished) Churn Dash with a 4-patch center.  I was making these from a layer cake of Bloomington by Moda.  I know that only because the tag is hanging on the hanger with the pattern, blocks, and remaining parts of the layer cake.  Thirteen blocks had been made, and in the remainder of the layer cake were 2 green pieces.  So now there are 15 of the 20 blocks finished.  These are going on my June "To Do" list because it shouldn't take long to finish the last 5 blocks.  That would move them 1 step closer to the finish line, and at least not leave a partial set of blocks hanging there.  

I did play a bit this week with the pile of scrappy String Triangle blocks that I've been doing.  The original plan was to make long vertical strips of these, but that plan is evolving.  Putting 3 of them together, and then framing with black is different direction to go with these.  There are plenty of black prints in my stash to use as different frames.  I'll need more variety of triangle colors (all scrappy) so this will be an on-going RSC project.  A number of final layout ideas are spinning in my head. 

And I added 1 more blue block to the set of Whirl blocks because I had extra blue squares from that wall hanging above.  These will keep adding up gradually.   

Let's see what color might be next for RSC . . .
https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/ 

Friday check-in

This post is pretty photo heavy . . . but I had so much to share.  LOL
 

Another Quilt of Valor presentation was on my schedule for Wednesday afternoon, in Madison SD.  The family asked to have it at the new Veteran's Park in town - notice those beautiful engraved panels of marble behind the veteran.  Madison is a little over an hour away from here, and our group has awarded quilts there before as there isn't a local QOV group.

After the QOV presentation I drove to Sioux Falls to meet up with my younger daughter at a cooking class.  What fun!!!  She and her husband have attended several of these at Plum's Cooking Company.  She says it's an awesome date night activity.  I think there were 16 seats around a half circle bar style "classroom" area.  The instructor was funny and kept the group involved all through.  Plus we had a full 3 course meal to eat.  I would definitely do this again!

The theme of the cooking class was "Evening With Ina Garten", and all 3 of the dishes were Ina's recipes.  We began with a hot crab dip with fried wontons.  OMG!!  I dug right in and didn't think of taking an photos until my plate was empty.  Laura and I decided this might be a good recipe for a dip to make for our next family gathering.  Then the instructors did a cheese tasting with 2 fabulous European cheeses.  I bought a chunk of one called Alp Blossom - soft and mild. Yum!  The main dish was baked chicken with a mustard/breadcrumb topping and a rice pilaf.  So good, and everyone took home their leftovers.  I had enough for my supper again last night.  And dessert was a cake with cream cheese frosting and coconut.  The shop sells all kinds of cookware, wines, honey, every seasoning you've ever heard of.  What a fun place to go.  

OK, enough talk about food - my drive home had a very dramatic sky.  I know I shouldn't take a photo while driving but I was the only car on the interstate at that spot.

I finished the 2 blocks for this week's Moda Blockheads 6 sew-along. There will usually only be 1 block each week, but occasionally 2.  And I guess not all of the blocks will be the same size, with the different sizes at least being compatible with each other.  Hmmm . . .  Since my plan is to use these as parts for 1 or more Quilts of Valor I guess it will be interesting as we progress to see how they work out.

There are now 17 of these Spool blocks done in patriotic prints, along with 2 more strip sets ready to be cut.  And I've pulled a few more strips and put them into the project box so that these can continue to be a Leader/Ender project as I work on other things.  

The parts are cut for the final Circle of Friends block, and I hope to get it sewn today after playing golf (maybe).  Once this 12th block is done then figuring out how I want to finish the quilt will be next.  Carol Doak, the designer, is actually beginning another BOM via Facebook beginning in July.  I may have to continue to play along because these have been fun and stretched my paper pieing skills.  Besides - one block per month is manageable, right?