Sue

On Saturday, I took two classes from Melissa Corry of Happy Quilting at the Thanksgiving Point Garden of Quilts, sponsored by Riley Blake. I wanted some good instruction on curves because I’m only mediocre on that skill, so I took her Nordic Nights class & got one block made, plus a start on another. I feel confident I can finish this quilt….in 2027. I’ve wanted to make it for a long time because it’s a fairly striking pattern.

Her afternoon class was Braided Irish Chain & since I like her & I like Irish Chain quilts, I opted to stick with her. This quilt is pretty straightforward, but she had some good tips to make it easier. I got one 30″ block done & about 1/2 the units for the second. The lap quilt I’m making takes four of these blocks, so it’s a good start.

Monday & Tuesday I cut out half the new group project so it will be available when I can sew again. I also cut & pieced a Christmas table banner so it will be ready for hand quilting when I’m able. I cleaned up the studio so it’s fresh & clean, then Wednesday I had surgery for the arthritis in my thumb. This is what I had done for all you medically-interested people: Left trapeziectomy / resection arthroplasty with suture suspensionplasty / tendon transfer using flexor carpi radialis to abductor pollicis longus. He removed my trapezoid bone & made a sling with the tendon to stabilize my thumb. It’s a long recovery with weeks in various splints & lots of PT; a year to get all my strength back. But the arthritis pain will be gone & I should be able to start sewing in a few weeks. So I will be disappearing & catching you on the flip side. Happy sewing & get those RSC projects together so I can see all the scrappy fun!

I made 9 purple houses for Our Town, so now all my houses & trees are done & the blocks are ready to assemble! I don’t need any purple for Starlets, so my three block projects for this year’s RSC have all their blocks completed. Amazing!

One of those three block projects is Nine Patch & Snowballs, which has now become the first RSC2026 top assembled. Wow! Usually I’m finishing blocks during the assembly months & then putting them together the next year. This is why I still have three 2025 RSC projects to get to the flimsy stage. It feels good to have this together.

No purple here, but seasonal. I sewed & hand-quilted this pumpkin house table banner this week, plus started on a second fall banner.

In other sewing news: I did cutting & sewing prep for the two classes I’m taking next week at Garden of Quilts with Melissa Corry. So nice to have it all tucked away in project boxes. Happy sewing everyone!

I got another table banner made for August. It’s yellow for the monthly color & even though it will be only be out for a short time this year, it’s now done & can be displayed all of August next year! Slowly but surely, I am working my way through these banners.

My RSC goals for this year are to make blocks in the monthly color for 3 projects & get 1 WIP turned into a top each month. So far, I am up to date on all my colored blocks & have done 14 WIPs. So I’m way ahead on those, which is great. For the rest of the month, I’m going to get this assembled. These are Moda Blockheads that I made last year for RSC2025, but never assembled. I have been making over 300 flying geese, cutting sashing, & finally starting some assembly. The top border is on the wall & the first row is together. I’m very pleased with the look of this project, so far.

I got the aqua & yellow blocks made for My Town & the Nine Patch & Snowballs. I finished the rest of the half snowball blocks needed for the borders.

I also made the aqua & yellow blocks for Starlets, so now all the colors are done for this project. I can get it assembled during Nov or Dec.

Now that my 3 monthly projects are done, I can begin my WIP for this month, so I’ve begun cutting the flying geese sashing for my RSC2025 sampler project of Moda Blockheads. I made all the blocks last year & never got them together, so this will be a satisfying finish.

I’ve been AWOL from posting during July since each week would have been the same news: still sewing Hamilton Gardens. I’m still using the wheelchair for the stress fracture in my foot, so I just kept plodding away on sewing this together. I sat & cut the low-volume sashing strips & when I needed more colors, I drew from the box of charm squares on my table. It got harder when I had to put it on the design wall & sew rows, but that was this week & I’m supposed to start walking a few steps a day before my appointment next week, so walking happened in the studio. I finished the flimsy in time to post for this week’s link up. Yay! Since I can sit & cut, I had my hubby pull fabric & got my aqua & yellow houses cut out for RSC, so sewing on those will be my task for next week. I’m also going to try to get my Nine-Patch & Snowballs made in those colors. We will see how the next week moves along! Hope you’ve all been sewing up a storm.