September 350 block count

After a few stellar block months, September was a month focused on assembling tops and finishing quilting, so the numbers are small.

I made another row for the row quilt: 13 blocks

And I finished the sampler blocks: 7 blocks

20 blocks, to bring my new total to 540.  Not bad!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Rainbow Scrap Challenge: This and That

Where, o where did the week go?  Not sewing my scraps, I'd say!

There was plenty of canning, almost the end of it, as we are at 16 days to my due date.  I have a last batch of apple jelly to can, and then the canner is getting put away so I stop.

I hoped to make a flimsy of my sampler quilt, but didn't quite make it.  I did baste my Carrie Nation quilt, so it's ready for the walking foot next week.  The bulk of my sewing time was spent finishing the quilting on my sister's long-delayed double wedding ring quilt.  I even have the binding on, waiting for hand finishing, so it's finally within striking distance!

What were you up to this week?  Be sure to check out the last of the orange inspiration that's part of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Rainbow Scrap Challenge: Not So Orange

I'm afraid I'm not doing much work with just orange these days.  Since I have so many block sets ready to put together, I'm trying to get a few flimsies assembled and potentially basted in the next few weeks.

I was dismayed that, in tidying up, to make room for a sewing table for the Assistant, I discovered multiple bags of untamed scraps, left from clothes making, backings, and large prints.  Ugh.  Here I thought I was doing so well keeping up.  I guess a goal for the next few weeks will be so see how many of these bags (5?) I can tackle before the baby comes.  My cutting table is currently the coffee table, so I have to sit on the floor to cut, and I can only do that for a few minutes at a time.

I intended to have a picture of the layout for my 9s and 6s, since it includes orange, but it's rolled up in a sheet to keep it safely in order.

The Assistant chose this layout after arranging the blocks a few times.  It works for me, since this will be for one of her teachers!  I have the blocks sewn into four-patches, and over the next few weeks hope to get it to flimsy stage.

Meanwhile, next week, I want to baste my Carrie Nation top and prep it for quilting, as there's only one quilt left in my "currently quilting" pile (the "dreaded" double wedding ring quilt for my younger sister is nearing completion)!  Maybe if I'm not in too much pain (my hips are not what they were, at 37 weeks), I'll also baste this rainbow sampler.  First, though, I'll need to piece a scrappy batting.  That box that I moved with two years ago still has batting scraps.  It's time for it to go!

JoJo is safely on the mend, with stitches out on Monday and just bruising left.  So far, we've stayed inside a lot to keep him from getting the cut dirty until it heals thoroughly.  Of course, the temperatures have shot up to nearly 100 several days this week, so I'm happy to stay inside.

Be sure to check out more orange projects every Saturday this month as part of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Tell it to the Stars: September/October

This quilt is turning out to be such a nice one!  I'm probably mad for putting so much white on a quilt intended for my bed, particularly since JoJo is going through a "marker phase."  (It is so hard to find and hide all the markers when the older kids use them regularly!)  JoJo aside, I love the colors I chose, and how this quilt is turning out.  Since I have it completely assembled to this point, I won't need to work on it in October.  Miss G is due October 13, so the less sewing I "need" to do, the better!

One note to myself would be that I should have been more careful with my setting triangles.  Some of them are not quite right.

This is a fabulous pattern by Judy Laquidara.

from the room of Zana's Ninis,

katie z.

Back to Square One

Woohoo!  I have one of my two major quilts completed.

This quilt was a mystery designed by Judy Laquidara with fabrics by Vicki Welsh.  The combination, I must tell you, was fabulous.  I love the finished quilt, I loved practicing new blocks I'd never tried before, and I definitely love the colors of the fabric.  I found the hand-dyed fabric a little tricky to coordinate with the appropriate needle, but keeping my machine extra clean seemed to help as much as anything else.

The major reason it took me from December until now to quilt this lovely beast is that I could not decide what to quilt.  I tend to do all-over meanders or some such thing, but with all the borders, this quilt definitely called for something different.  But what did that mean?  Ugh!  I quilted ribbons in all the narrow borders, various motifs in the center, and two borders have prayers quilted into them for my friend.

I pieced the back out of some of my favorite grey/blue star prints.  This way, the quilt is reversible, and since the intended recipient likes blue, she can have her choice!

I'm a little sad to be giving this away, but hope she loves it as much as I do!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Rainbow Scrap Challenge: Orange

Whew!  I'm so ridiculously grateful it's Saturday.  Before we even get to sewing, let me tell you about our week.  You know something happened to JoJo when it's been "one of those weeks."  We'll start with a large section of maple tree collapsing over our deck. Fortunately, not really on the deck, but over it, means it could wait until my overworked DH had time to cut it Friday night.

Wednesday, minutes before it was time to take Bear Cub to preschool, I heard crying from JoJo.  It started as the "something in my life is wrong but I'm not injured" but quickly accelerated into "I might be dying."  By the time I made it to the top of the stairs, JoJo was 2/3 of the way up with blood streaming down his face and all over the carpet.  What happened?  I still don't know.  (It had nothing to do with my sewing table or implements, however, as they were secure.). I do know we made a frantic call to my mom regarding stitches, dropped Bear Cub at preschool, and spent the morning at our lovely doctor's office, where JoJo had to be rolled in a blanket and pinned down by three nurses in order to stitch below his eyebrow.  That might have been more painful to me than labor. Might. The worst part was knowing he was afraid and not being able to explain to him that we were trying to help him.

We've spent a portion of each day trying to keep him from picking on his stitches, and he needs ibuprofen on a regular basis, but otherwise he seems unphased.  I'll spare you a picture, but know he will be okay.

So... I did sew a bit, including finishing up the last eight blocks I need for my sampler quilt.  Yay!

Be sure to check out other lovely orange projects this Saturday!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

p.s. One month to my due date!

Rainbow Scrap Challenge: In Which I Begin the Race Against Time

Orange may very well be the smallest fabric collection in my stash.  I tend to buy yellow for my younger sister, so it has a nice presence, but it's pretty clear I favor cool colors over warm.  Fortunately, slim pickings means cutting a 4" strip from each was a quick task that didn't hurt my wrist.

This week, I have a completed top to present.  These Carrie Nation blocks have been on my mind for over a year.  I had originally planned to make six blocks from each color, but when I laid them out after the first few months, I really wanted to make them in rows rather than scrambled.  That means I needed eight of each, so I did a bit of catch up, and I love the results.

I particularly love the orange and red, which seem to glow.  I must have some pretty awesome scraps!

I've already pieced a brown backing from stash and plan to use simple diagonal quilting to keep it fast and soft.  I have two queen-sized quilts to finish first, but I would love to finish this quilt before Miss G arrives (in approximately five weeks).  What should I do for binding?  I don't have a rainbow stripe or anything fun like that and don't really want to do a complicated pieced binding.  Black?  Cream?

This will be one of the four needed teacher quilts.  It makes me feel better to know one is almost finished since I never know how I can get back to quilting after a baby is born.  JoJo was an excellent napper, so I returned to quilting quickly, but after the Assistant was born, it was a long time before I quilted again.

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

September Goals

First, the August wrap-up.

1.  Tell it to the Stars month 8: This turned out to be a quick step, despite looking challenging and requiring plenty of trimming and ironing.

2.  Finish the commissioned quilt for my SiL.  I might have been a little crazy to push the quilt this hard, but I don't like business hanging over my head when I want to sew for pleasure.  The quilt went in the wash this morning in preparation for delivery this weekend.  I always wait to wash as JoJo likes to touch quilts with Nutella-covered hands.  That's my boy!

3.  Finish the tree skirt.  Also done.  This is for my younger sister, and was started as part of the HSTeria quilt along that Vicki Welsh hosted.  I finished this before #2 to try out a quilting idea.  The idea worked for this quilt, since it was smaller, but I decided it wouldn't turn out as I imagined for the queen-sized quilt.  No worries, though, as they are both done!

4. Scraps in light and bright green:  I already cut all my greens in the previous green month as well as completed an extra lime green row for my row quilt back then, so this month I only needed my sampler blocks and Carrie Nation blocks.  Not only did I complete those blocks, but I also worked up a blue-grey row for the row quilt and completed 42 9s and 6s blocks that were lingering from July's red scraps.  The bonus to finishing the 9s and 6s blocks is that I now have enough completed for a quilt!

5.  If life had been calm, the last goal was to quilt Back to Square One, my Judy Laquidara mystery from last year.  Didn't happen.

September's goals:
1.  Tell it to the Stars step 9.  September and October are assembling the main part of the flimsy.  I think I will try to fully assemble this month, since October is baby month!

2.  Orange scraps.  Sampler blocks, Carrie Nation blocks and top, row for the row quilt, and layout my 9s and 6s blocks, since they include orange.

3.  Finally get back to the DWR quilt, in which the hand quilting stalled out early this summer.

4.  Finish Back to Square One.  It's a Christmas gift, or may turn into a birthday gift for my best friend if I finish by her birthday this month!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Around the World Blog Hop

I'm not great at introductions, but I taking part in a fun blog hop to meet new blogs!  I should have posted this morning, but I have four kids (and one on the way), and today was a little hectic with everyone home!  I am following after Angela at SoScrappy.

The Assistant is 8 and has been sewing with me for years.  We call her Zana, and when she was little, she would sit on my lap while I sewed and sing, "nini nini nini."  Hence the name Zana's Ninis.  Spunky is 6 and, while interested in sewing, doesn't quite have the attention span to sew yet. Soon!  I also have two boys, Bear Cub Q (4) and JoJo (1 1/2).  Since I sew in the play room, JoJo is convinced he should help me sew by threading my machine and dropping pins in it.  He is in a particularly destructively "helpful" stage, so I often write about his disasters, especially his current favorite, eggs.  Our third girl is due October 13, so I'm on a mission to finish at least two quilts before her arrival, unless she surprises me by being the ONLY baby to be born early.  I wouldn't mind!

We also run a small farm business called Paradiso Products, and I can during the summer.  We have chickens (lots!), turkeys, goats, sheep, and a cat and dog.  We had guinea fowl and may try pigs next summer.  It's always an adventure around here.  We're the crazy people in the neighborhood, but everyone loves our craziness.  It's not noisome, and we like to share!

1.  What am I working on?

Probably too many things.  My "short list" on the sidebar lists what SHOULD be my priorities, like the fabulous DWR quilt my younger sister has awaited so patiently for three years (or so!).  I also have several rainbow scrap challenge quilts, several of which will be teacher gifts.  I need four this year, as the Assistant has two teachers and Bear Cub Q started school this year!

I like to have several ongoing projects so that when one is at a difficult stage (quilting, for example!) I can take a break from it but still move something forward.

2. How does my work differ from others?

I don't think it does.  I try lots of techniques (minus applique and paper piecing.  Too difficult to track with JoJo around!), but I don't do anything particularly revolutionary.

3.  Why do I write/create what I do?

Stress relief.  We have a busy life on our little farm and with our fabulous family, but sometimes I need some personal time alone.  I'm an introvert, so I like to tune everyone out for a while and be with my thoughts.  Quilting is a perfect method for me, as I can work at my own pace, set my own goals, and my husband doesn't care how often I finish a quilt.  He's a good man, my husband is.

4.  How does my writing/creating process work?

I usually see a fabric, block design, or quilt that tickles my fancy.  It percolates for a while as I pull fabric or sketch designs on graph paper.  Sometimes a need emerges and a quilt is perfect for the need, so it moves to the front.  Eventually, my plate is clear enough to start something new, and I can pick from previous plans.

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge has been a great way for me to finally use my scraps.  I've saved them for years and even, at one point, gave them all away because I didn't know how to use them.  Now, I have several quilts in the works, known what sizes I use most, and am regularly dreaming up more quilts I can make with scraps!

Since I was lame and didn't get my friendly friends contacted ahead of time, hopefully at least one or two of these lovely ladies will participate in the blog hop by posting next Monday and continue its journey around the globe:

1.  Alzbeta of the Volk's Wagon.  My younger sister.  Photographer extraordinaire.  Her two girls are each six weeks younger than my boys, so we share lots of stories.

2.  Millie of Truckin' for the Lord.  This is my older sister, who loves music, needlework, and English.  She's also an expert on dealing with school matters, so when something comes up for my kids, she's always there to help me.  She's a saint, as she has a husband who experienced kidney failure and a son who's on the Autism spectrum (and she's still patient!).

3.  Lori of Dakota City Quilter.  Lori was the first blogger to encourage me to keep blogging, way back when, and we've been friends ever since.   She even visited me once, and two summers ago, my family vacationed in her neck of the woods.

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

P.S.  I had this post all nicely done earlier this evening, and then it vanished.  It may not be his fault, but since JoJo watched PBS kids on my iPad this evening, I can only wonder if he tapped on something online and ate my post for me.  He's always helpful like that, the poor, cute thing!

Tell It to the Stars: August

I'm in love.  I thought these setting triangles were pretty crazy-looking, but they went together without a hitch and I am thrilled with the "guesstimate" I hung on my design wall.

I saw we will be adding sashing and assembling for the next two months.  This is perfect for me, as I can work ahead and have it done (God willing) before Miss G makes her appearance!  That will leave me borders.  I usually hate borders and skip them whenever possible, but that's partly why I love to follow Judy's mysteries: they have great borders, and I don't have to figure them out!

This quilt will end up on our bed, since I have one queen sized quilt that fits for winter and in the summer, we use a full sized quilt that doesn't quite fit.  Oddly enough, both are Judy Laquidara designs.  We need two quilts, as evidenced by the fact that JoJo smashed an egg on DH Sunday... In our bed...  While poor DH was sleeping... On DH's side so it nailed the quilt and sheets... Oh, JoJo, I do love you!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.