I continue to swim with Orca Bay…

I started Bonnie Hunter’s mystery quilt, Orca Bay on Christmas Eve. I know call me crazy, but I had a quiet moment & all was ready for the festivities.

Little did I realize the amount of work and the hours that go in to this quilt.  I have never made anything with such small pieces and so much cutting.  I started off with the string blocks as those I love to make.

Then it was on to HST’s  and 2.5”blocks. At this point I have not bought any fabric but have used only scraps or stash (not sure if that is a good or bad thing, depends which way you look at it I guess). (lots of cutting)

sewing the HST’s and squares together made for beautiful blocks

test run of the layout

See the black wings on the flying geese?  Well I deviated from the pattern here. I just couldn’t bring myself to cut 700 some triangles to make a pieced wing. So I went scrappy black wings instead.  Sorry Bonnie!

I was finally at a point to piece it all together last week. I am so pleased with it. This is a birds eye view of it on my bed. (I am balancing on the foot board).

I have to put the borders on still, but truthfully, I was getting bored playing with black, red, and white and needed a break.  I also know that I won’t be doing exactly as Bonnie’s pattern suggests for the borders. Again I can’t fathom cutting so many triangles. Plus if you know me I never seem to follow a pattern always added my own flair to it.

There is still a little bit of Christmas around here.  My Poinsettias have never been this nice. Figures when I spend $30 on one it dies instantly. These were $5.99 specials from Costco and they are just as lovely as the day I got them, only bigger!!!

A couple of things I ponder about the makings of a mystery quilt. Next time, if there is, will I wait again to see the end result  to start or truly make it a mystery?  Will I actually follow the pattern (ha who am I kidding probably not!)  Will I choose the same colour combination or go with my own choices?  Something to think about. 

Happy Stitching

Lee

Feeling a little dark…..

It all started with this over flowing container of dark strings. If you can believe they were all squished in to this box/container.  Which was starting to drive me crazy…way to messy…..

Soooo…..I turned them into these

Many 10” string blocks

Ok so maybe there are a few medium coloured strings too.

Not only was I using up all the dark strings, but using up all those half filled bobbins too!

Then it was time to audition for layouts:

In the end I went with a more traditional X layout with a black border and a piano key outside border.

Tah dah

Which left me with this….a nearly empty dark string bin.

I have the backing fabric for this, now I just need to get started on the quilting. I am not sure how to quilt this just yet.  Any suggestions? 

Happy Stitching!

Lee

another forgotten project....

I finished this little table topper before Christmas.

This was gifted to our neighbours who dog sit for us now and then. Isn't it a cutie? I sewed on gold stars at the top of each tree!

somehow the this post got lost between my phone and the computer. Also the picture isn't very good, it really is red not pinky.

no sew day!

I was a little bit busy defrosting my freezer.

Its all clean now and ready to be filled again

another forgotten project!

Note pad cover and pen holder. Made for my son's girl friend.