Indecision

All forty-two blocks for my batik version of Schnibbles' "Little Red" pattern are complete, and I have made 168 half square triangles from the cut off corners. These will be assembled into 42 pinwheel blocks to go in the border somehow. I've played on EQ for a while but can't decide.

There aren't enough pinwheels to complete the entire inner border so I thought of combining them with the blue batik of the outer border. I'm leaning toward this arrangement: But I am always so symmetrical in my thinking I even bore myself, so I tried this uneven arrangement. Then my old ways reasserted themselves and I tried this also: I just can't decide! What do you think?

What's for dinner?

Can't stop for long to chat. There's a pan of lasagna in the kitchen as big as me and as soon as the Italian bread is toasted, I've got to dive into it. Husband has perfected the art of making homemade lasagna. It's excellent.

A gardener of extremes

From this: To this:

How's this for a tomato? After a plethora of golf ball size tomatoes from the "Early Girl" variety, my "Mr. Stripey" plant started producing these monsters. I included the drinking glass to illustrate scale. That tomato's almost 6" in diameter. One thing about heirloom tomatoes, they may not be pretty but they are delicious.

What I've been up to

Well, I haven't been blogging or doing much on the computer recently. I've had two doctor appointments. My husband has had two appointments too, and a dentist appointment for an abscessed tooth (ouch). That's not out of the woods yet, but he's better.

Mostly, I've been sewing. All five of the quilt tops for my nephew's family are now complete. One is at the longarm quilter, but here are pictures of the other four, and some other pictures, too. Please excuse if the pictures look wonky, but I have to photograph large quilts hung across two closet doors in the bedroom and that makes them hang funny.

First is the one for my nephew. It's so different from what I normally make that I had to warm up to it during the sewing, but now I think it's kind of neat. This quilt is going to be called "It's All Right There In Black and White". It's about 75" x 87". The proper way to make this would have been to match all four white pieces as well as matching the four black pieces in each "windmill", but that would have entailed laying out the whole top somewhere and assembling the blocks as you go, row by row, to keep all the matching pieces together. That was just impossible because the only space large enough to lay it out would be our bed in the opposite end of the house from the sewing machine and I refused to run back and forth for every single block. So, I picked one black print and one white print for each block. I don't think the design suffers much. And I love the punch of lime green. The backing is supposed to be a stylized black and white spider chrysanthemum print, but I may hunt a lime green and white print instead. What do you think?

This one is for my 4 year old great nephew. It's 68" x 80". I didn't want to make a kid's quilt but instead something he could use for years. I thought a red white and blue color scheme would work well for a boy. It's big enough to use all the way through his teen years (unless he gets very tall - both his parents are tall, we'll have to see). I like to think of him taking it off to college with him. This one is for my nephew's wife, 75" square. It's all stash, I'm proud to say, and it made a nice dent in the stash closet. I like the colors. It's the "Little Red" pattern from the "Schnibbles Times Two" book. There's a batik version in the future for myself.

Then, I fell in love with the Moda "Fresh Cottons" line and used layer cakes to make my oldest great-niece's quilt, that's 78" square. It's from "Schnibbles Times Two" also. I've fallen in love with that book! This is very girly. She's turning 14 in a few weeks. Gee, I hope she's not gone Goth or something.

I'll have to post the picture of the other great-niece's quilt when it comes back from the quilter.

Now for a few I very selfishly made myself (like I need another bed-sized quilt!). This one came from the Schnibbles book too. I may not stop until I've made every quilt in the book. Love the colors and the feather quilting. I have the greatest longarm quilter. Go, Sherry!

This one I showed before it was quilted. I want a bedroom in these colors someday.

Those two need to be bound soon. Another mega-binding party is in the future, like I did last October, I guess.

And finally a little thing I just finished piecing. It's the same pattern as the blue quilt above, but just 36" inches square.

I have a blue and yellow basket quilt that just needs borders waiting on the design wall, but that stack of batiks is calling my name. Given the fact that I have no self-restraint, I'll probably start my version of "Little Red" this weekend.

Five, count 'em, five, part 2

By the way, here's the EQ image of what I am making for my great-niece, which is at the quilter's right now: Did I say how much I love EQ? LOL

Five, count 'em, five

Never to do anything in a small way, I have embarked on a major project. During the past two years, I have made a quilt for my brother-in-law, my brother, my mother, my brother-in-law and his new wife, my brother and sister-in-law at their anniversary, my nephew and my niece. Whew! The one part of the family that's been left out of this gift-y barrage is my other nephew and his family who live in Germany. He last received a quilt from me 20 years ago, and his kids got baby quilts, but nothing for quite some time. That is about to change.

He has three children, two girls and a boy. The oldest is, oh my heavens, going to be 14 this fall, the middle girl is 10 and the youngest, the boy, is 4. I want to make a quilt for each of them, including my nephew and his wife. This idea started out as making a quilt for the family and then grew. My first idea was a black and white "propeller blade" block (what is it really called?) quilt like this:

They have more modern taste than I do, and it seemed like something they would enjoy. Plus, I have been seeing a lot of black and white quilts on blogs and chat groups lately and had never made one. So, I started collecting fat quarters of black and white prints. I also found a great lime green and black/white/lime print for the border. So far, so good.

Then I got to thinking while I was making a star quilt out of a layer cake of Moda's Frolic collection that it looked like a great pattern and fabric for a kid, and the younger great-niece might like it. But if I made her one too. . .

You see where this is going. Now I'm making five quilt. The star quilt is at the longarmer, the second one for my nephew's wife is completed and in the drawer waiting to be quilted, and the third for the oldest girl is in process. I'm using patterns from the book "Schnibbles Times Two" because they are attractive, the right size (around 75" x 75", good for a second cover on the bed or TV snuggling) and showcase great fabrics with larger patches. It was the source for two of my last projects.

There isn't a rush to finish these because they live in Germany and I can't give them the quilts until their next visit, which may be later this year or next, not sure when. Or, I can send them over with my brother when he goes to visit the grandkids (I'll pay the extra baggage charge). No way will I ship them. Not after having a quilt lost in the mail once. It just about killed me! I sent a wedding gift quilt to Atlanta last week, FedEx next day delivers, sign for the package, and I was a nervous wreck until I heard back that it had been delivered safely. So mailing them to Europe? No way.

However, I'm one of those people that jumps into new projects with both feet, so even if there's no hurry I want to do them NOW. I have no patience!