I finally finished my latest Irish Chain Quilt.  Oh my goodness, it turned out great.

At the bottom of this post will be a slideshow of pictures of the quilt.

I battled with the binding, but I won!  I don't know what it is about binding, but it seems to be the bane of my existence right now.

I also tried to organize the drawers in my sewing desk.

And with that, I'm dreadfully sorry, but I'm going to end early today.

I am wiped out after the organizing, I not only organized those two drawers, but I also went through most of the rest of my supplies in the other room and got that a lot more orderly.  I still have so much more to do there, but at least I've got a good idea of what I have and where everything is, as well as how I want things to look when I'm done.  I also made a small mug rug for the kitchen in the area where we like to make our tea.  If some tea spills, at least it doesn't go all over the counter, we just have to throw the mug rug into the washing machine and wipe down the counter with a wipe.

Have a good week, everybody, I'll be back with a nice project and maybe some tomatoes next time.  I actually have some pretty nice little plants in my Aerogarden.

Take care.

Hello.  I know I usually post on Fridays. 
 
Yesterday, I didn't feel so great.  

Hey There!

I am starting a new hashtag.  Well, I don't know if it's new.  But I've never seen it before.

#tinyquiltlife

I have been obsessed of late with finding out how small I can make an actual quilt. Big projects are difficult for me to accomplish with the sewing setup I have now.  Someday....

​The last quilt I made used 2" squares.  Now, I'm working with 1 1/2" squares.

As usual, I'm hooked on the Single Irish Chain block.  I had some Batik dyed fat quarters languishing in the fabric drawer.  I used the green for a cover for my Missal.  There is some purple/emerald green that I am not sure what to do with.  But, I liked the way these three colors worked together.

Surprisingly, putting this photo in grayscale to check the intensity of the squares results in squares that are pretty much the same.

In color, to my eyes, the blue pops out immediately.

This is not the arrangement I settled on.  

​I am hand sewing the whole thing.  Well, I probably will machine sew the binding to the front of the quilt, but that will probably be about it.   

In some ways, this project is making me anxious.  I really want to get it done!  The blocks are looking so nice already!  However, sewing by hand makes me slow down.  Plus, I am thinking that my OP Juki will tear these little squares right up.

As for being tiny, even though these squares are kind of tiny, the whole quilt will not be tiny per se.  It will probably be about 22" square.

I am planning on using 1" squares next time.  The smaller the square, the more each little mistake is magnified.  I don't know what I am going to use for batting when the quilts start getting truly tiny.

​There will be nine of these blocks in total in the quilt, and sixteen others.  Eight of those will have two orange squares on the top and eight will have two yellow.

​So far I have completed the nine blocks with the two blue squares on the top row of the block and two with orange on the top row.  

I am pleased with how well the corners are matching up.  

After putting aside all the squares for this project, I found that I have quite a few of the blue, yellow and orange squares left!

Some of the squares are a bit wonky.  I am worried because they are so small that even these little errors are prone to ruin the whole project.  I am also using only a 3/16" seam allowance.   This will make things tricky.

I am really enjoying this project.  It is teaching me to slow down and enjoy the process.  If my stitching line seems to be starting to go wrong, I can fix it right there, instead of only finding out after taking it off the machine. Mistakes can be hard to fix, though.  It is more difficult to take out hand stitching than you would think!  The impression is that machine stitching is the more secure stitch, but hand stitches can be quite sturdy.

All in all, I am pleased with the way this project is going. 

Look for more updates on my #tinyquiltlife.

​:)

​Hi There! I was going to do a long post about how to make a needlebook, but there were just too many pictures, some were not that great, and there was just too much information that I was trying to jam into there, I must take some more time to organize my thoughts, possibly take some more pictures and get rid of the ones I don't need, and maybe learn how not to type in these hideously long, run-on sentences.  Good Luck with that last one!
 
So, I think today's post will be relatively short.  But ugly.  Very ugly.  As in, if 2020 had been a quilt, what would it have looked like?
 
I can tell you.
 
It might look like this:

​I saw a pack of pre-cuts at Wally World, these are getting really popular, and I think I will try and do a post about those in the future.  I don't know much about all that.  The only thing I know anything at all about are Fat Quarters.  Yes, I still call them "Fat" Quarters.  That's what I've always called them.  It refers to the generous cutting of the fabric.  It's a good thing.  It has nothing to do with any kind of a person.
 
But, anyway, to get back on track....
 
I saw a pack of Christmas fabric pre-cuts.  Oh, these fabrics, the little that I could see of them while they were still packed up, didn't look great together to me.  I think there would have been a way to use them and make some really pretty Christmas items. 
 
Hahahahahahahahahahaha
 
They don't know ME very well, do they?
 
I opened the pack up and discovered some “gems” in there. I used them all together, along with some weird orange and tan fabric to fill out the little bit more I needed.  Plus the white for the center.
 
I began by thinking about trying to simulate a Christmas ornament in the middle. I didn't do **too** badly, considering the fact this was my very first attempt at such a thing and I just kind of went with whatever I cut out and didn't try to fix anything. Just whatever I did, I went with.

​So, I tried to make it pretty ugly.  It doesn't look as bad as I really wanted.
 
I washed it to remove all the fabric marker marks, fluffed it in the dryer, so I can attest that it is machine washable and dryable.  It is lap quilt size.  I'm not sure anyone would want to sport this around. 
 
One last thing for me to do is make a custom label for the back with my name and the year.
 
Will anybody want this thing?  It's a collector's item?
 
IF 2020 WAS A QUILT.
 
Sorry to say, though, 2021 seems to be telling 2020 to hold its beer.
 
Ciao

UPDATE: I squished the thing into a plastic zippy bag and stuffed it in the closet  Oh, I put that label thing on, too.  I had to throw the first zippy bag away!  Wally World zippy bags are crap, but they are cheap.  There it sits.