I have been running all day it seems.  First there was quilting group this morning.  Then met Mike for lunch, then to the fitness center to work off lunch stop at the grocery store and then home.  Here it is the middle of the afternoon and I have been busy all day.

From this morning quilting:

I don’t know if this photo is any better than the ones I took the other day. There weren’t many there today so I didn’t ask anyone to help hold the quilt up.

June’s quilt back from the quilter she uses, now she needs to square and trim up and then the binding.

Janet’s quilt – a mystery quilt that she started last year and finished up, she got this back from her quilter a couple weeks ago and has the binding finished.

I got this Farmer’s Wife block done this morning and started on another.  I haven’t worked on these for awhile and I think I really need to try to stick with working on these on Friday’s.  It is something easy to bring along to group and have something to work on and ready.  If I get some prepped up that is!  I’m not sure but I think I have about 20 of the blocks done and will go ahead and finish the one that I got started on shortly before we ended our morning later today.

We had 3 days of rain for about a total of 4 1/2 inches here and each day was nice and cool.  I could have done without loosing power 2 times in that time period but there you go.  Today is very humid and tonight = maybe more storms – I think our drought and heat wave might be over although we will still be in the 90 degree range – much better than 100+

Our drought and heat wave have broke the last several days.  For the 3rd morning in a row we have waken up to rain and cloudy cool skies.  It is so nice waking up to find it is 68 degrees outside instead of 82.  I think we have gotten a total of close to 3 inches of rain over the last 3 2 and a half days.  Slowly it is soaking into the dry earth and the grass is turning green again and growing of course – the lawn mower will need to come back out this weekend making it maybe only the 4th time or so to cut grass this entire spring/summer!! A record of low cutting for sure.

But with the rain and cooler weather I have not been sitting on the porch too much the last couple of days because of the rain.  I have been getting some sewing done.

First the bed ruffle with the new quilt-slightly out of focus, sorry about that.  I do not have a large room and trying to back up to get the photo – well not my best.

I have been quilting on my nieces quilt – just simple, nothing fancy – this is not a fancy quilt so simple stitch goes with it fine.

More pieces ready for Joseph’s Coat after I get caught up with the sewing today of the pieces already on the design wall.

I got the bottom two rows sewed together yesterday and some of the next color that I had put on the wall  yesterday.  Today I will continue to work on what is on the wall and get those rows sewed together as well and then lay out the color waiting – it is close to the same color but a little darker.

After all the dry weather we have had this summer this wet deck looks just fine to me – we sure do need it and so far we have been getting light slow rain so it is soaking into the ground and not running off.

I have four blocks for the Farmer’s Wife quilt that I have selected fabric for and I want to get those blocks prepped and ready to sew.  I will bring the blocks with me to sewing tomorrow so I can work on it.  I tried taking some of Joseph’s Coat with me last week to work on – but that didn’t work out – I really need to keep it on the design wall and only take a little off the wall at a time to work on or it gets kind of unorganized quickly!!

Hope you all have a good day.

For my design wall Monday I am showing “Going in Circles” finished.  Something else will be worked on later today.  Head on over to Judy’s at Patchwork Times to see what others are working on.

Going In Circles ended up being 90 x 92 after I made the curve cuts to go along the border that I wanted and after the slight shrinkage from washing and drying 100% cotton batting.  It sure does give it that crinkly antique look!!  The quilt is hand quilted and machine pieced, the circles are needle turn applique after having been gathered and pressed using the circle method that I use.

It is so very, very hard to get a photo of a big quilt. I brought it outside and the sun is shining on part of it and shade on another.  I will bring it to quilting on Friday morning and try to get a photo of it in the big room.  Until then these will show it.

I corner turned up to get in the photo.

The back fabric showing quilting and binding.

Looking down from above.

Like I say I will try to get a photo on Friday – maybe someone can help me hold it up and get a photo that way and then I can lay it out on the floor and stand above on the stage where the piano is and get it all in that way too.   I’m glad this one is done and now on to finish more.

Head on over to Judy’s page and see what others are working on

Well after working for what seemed hours yesterday afternoon I got the binding cut, pressed, and sewed onto the quilt.  Now all the hand stitching to do.  I got one of the four sides done this evening – maybe more this weekend and Monday?  We will see I don’t know what we are doing this weekend.

I don’t know how most of you do it but I use about six clips at a time and sew, clip, sew, clip until it is done.  I have seen some people clip the binding ALL the way around the quilt and then start to sew – that seems to be a lot of extra work to me.

I use a tiny whip stitch with thread that matches as close as possible.  I know a lot quilters use a blind stitch – we all do what we like don’t we.  If I was entering a quilt into a show I would take the time to blind stitch, but when using thread as close as possible in color to the fabric this way looks just fine to me.

With my Gutermann Thread Cabinet of 100 different colors I can almost always find a shade that matches really close.

One side done – folded and ready for work on the next side – it is moving smoothly and won’t take more than a couple days at this rate.

How do you all wash your large quilts?  I cram mine into my medium size washing machine.  Normally I wash two or three times just to make sure that if there is any color bleed that it is all out before I put it in the dryer.  I wish I had one of those really new big machine that I am constantly seeing in Lowes when we shop there for home stuff, but it is not in the budget right now.  Maybe in a year or two.

On my queen size quilts I am tempted at times to go to the Laundromat and use a big machine and a big dryer – but after using these places when we travel I am not always pleased with them.   Occasionally a child’s crayon has been left in a pocket (or lipstick? other things) and ends up in the dryer melting to the sides of the machine and not noticeable until you take your clothing out and find marks here and there.

I have heard some say they clean their bathtub out really well to make sure there is no bath oil or bath soap in it and use the tub to wash and then lay it out on a sheet in the yard to dry – has anyone tried that?  I wouldn’t want to completely dry it outside as I like the crinkly antique look the hot air in the dryer gives it, but maybe I will try that and then stick it in the dryer when it is most of the dried.

I did find some Orvis soap to try out on this quilt and will use and color catchers – a lot of patchwork in this quilt and all those circles – I think the Moda Sampler squares that I used for the circles will be just fine but I used a lot of scraps too and some of those pieces were old, I have no idea what the dye is like in some of those — we will just hope for the best

I had been very much leaning towards the darker of the two colors for binding the “Going in Circles” quilt until I read Wanda’s comment to me – she said that the darker green would tend to draw your eye to the vine not to the whole quilt, where as the aqua color is in the inside border and scattered through out the quilt in the patches (as is the darker green but not in the border). Wanda’s blog is Exuberant Color and she does have a good eye for color.  Then I asked Mike my DH and I must say he has a good eye for color as well and has in the past helped me with color decisions and he always seems to pick the right color – he immediately said the aqua.   So yes I am going with the aqua even though I had been leaning towards the darker green.  Thanks for you opinions – it does help!  I will leave to go work out at the fitness center in just a little bit – I think I need to put in a little extra time today to make up for all the cake I have been eating!!

I did get my nieces Signature/Wedding quilt on the frame the other day and last night I sat down and did a little quilting on it to get started.  This fabric on this quilt is all from Connecting Threads and I must say it is soft to work with.  The needle is gliding through.

What I have done so far – I finished this first row of little blocks all the way across the bottom of the quilt.  I’m not sure how much I will do today as I will be doing the binding on the big quilt and also want to get in a little piecing on Joseph’s Coat.

It isn’t near as hot today still in the mid 90’s right now but too hot to do much of anything outside and Mike is working late tonight so I do believe when I get back from exercise I will be machine stitching the binding and then it will be time for hand stitching the binding – piecing Joseph’s Coat, and maybe a little quilting – I think it will be a busy day today.

What better way to celebrate the finishing of a quilting project that took 10 months to do then to make a chocolate cake   the recipe in a moment – quilting done and the edges cut in a wavy pattern – free hand no rhyme or reason to it – just kind of following the rhythm of the vine.  “Going in Circles” is now ready to bind – after I cut the binding that is and get it stitched together, pressed ect.

Now on to the binding – hmm – the aqua blue/green or the same green batik of the vine?  I will decide tomorrow I think, tonight will be break time from quilting.  I’m even skipping the quilt group this evening.  I just don’t feel like running out tonight – although it is much, much cooler today due to cloud cover for most of the day – high is 91 today!!  I think when I am done with the binding I might have to find a Laundromat to do this one and use one of their large machines – mine is a tight squeeze and last time I thought I really needed a little more room for them.

Chocolate Fudgy Cake

4 oz. dark chocolate squares (4 squares)
1 cup butter softened
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/2 cups of flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 can sweetened condensed milk

Melt the chocolate and the butter in a double boiler over water.

Beat the eggs, add the sugar and the condensed milk.  Add the vanilla, beat again.  Add the dry ingredients and the chocolate mixture.  Make sure it is all mixed well together.

Pour into a tube pan, bundt pan or two layer cake pans.  Bake the tube/bundt pan about 50 to 55 minutes at 350 degrees – check for doneness bake a little longer if needed – the layer pans for about 30 minutes and check.

This is a fudgy cake – dense and a little heavy.  Add the frosting of your choice.  Yes I had a piece already – had to celebrate getting the quilting done

Here it is another hot day in central Arkansas.  Here it is 1:34 in the afternoon and it is already 100.4!!!  It actually started out at 82 and it is to be in the 100’s all week – better get used to it huh.  Well I guess I am used to staying in the house with the blinds pulled on the sunny sides of the house.

I quilted on Going In Circles for awhile this morning.  And I finished one of the Rizzoli & Isles books that I had loaded on my Kindle – this one was called “ The Surgeon” it is the first book of the series – (I had actually read the newest in the series last week) I thought I better start from the beginning and so I have 3 of the oldest loaded.  In this first one The Surgeon – Isles is not in it – I guess she starts in the second book. I will soon find out, I will be moving to the couch and reading in a little bit.

This much left to do.

Then I thought it was time to take a break from quilting and from reading and thought I would get my nieces wedding signature quilt loaded on the 3 roller.  I’m happy to say it went on the frame easily – it helps that it is about a twin size – no where near as large as Going in Circles was on the frame.  This one should be done by the end of the year – I hope I haven’t named this quilt yet – Maybe something like “Love in the Fall” “Fall in Love”  maybe something along those lines.

Another angle, you can see from this photo just how much smaller it is than Going In Circles was on the frame.

The thread I am going to use is one that I used on another quilt earlier this year – King Tut #921, a very colorful thread and I have almost 2 full spools of it still –plenty to use on this one and will still have left over thread for another quilt down the road.  I think the photo on the link shows way more blue than is actually in it.  The colors are all very evenly spaced out and you have orange, blue, green, red, purple, yellow – just about all the primary colors I think.

Oh well, time to go read!

Another hot, hot day – heat warnings in effect.  At 12 noon it was already 95 degrees.  I do believe out here on the ridge and in the shade we might get up to 100 for the second time this summer – we have been “lucky” and mainly stay around 95 not much difference once it gets to 95 in my opinion.

I was outside for a couple hours this morning – around 8:30 and I was reading a new book that I had put on my Kindle the other day.  This has been a reading summer for me.  With the heat being so bad there is not much gardening to be done so I have been reading and sewing with a few bouts of housework in between.

The author I am stuck on right now is Tess Gerritsen.  She is the author of “Rizzoli & Isles” which has been made into a tv series on TNT with it just having started two weeks ago I think – unless this is new to me but not new at all?  I like the books (series), I have watched the show two times now and it is ok but not as good as the books – the usual way it seems to be.

I have gotten more quilting done on “Going in Circles” – almost to the half way point on the final border – sorry, that one isn’t real clear is it.

This is how much is left to do, I will keep working on it all week.  I still hope to be done at the end of the week.

I have been hand piecing Joseph’s Coat as well – it is coming along nicely – slow but nice   What I have up there for the bottom row is finished – more to come of course but for what is up there is what I am talking about -

I have a partial round in the living room ready to work on for the second row

I think I had mentioned right after I got the background fabric that I was going to need more of it as I hadn’t ordered enough, I got on line right away and ordered more but they only had a couple yards left and sent me what they had and after several phone calls to them – them letting me know what they had and didn’t have I decided to order another shade from them of the same thing.  I figure with this being a rainbow quilt a rainbow background would go with the design.  But when I got the fabric it was darker than I wanted a lot darker!!  I knew they had nothing else and I had already done some searches so knew I was stuck with what I had and to work with it.  I decided to bleach the new background to get it closer to what I already had – I wish I would have had a before and after photo but I didn’t think of it at the time.

I don’t think you can really see in this photo but the piece on the right is my original piece  – a little shade of light green — the one on the left is bleached and now has a hint of blue in it – it is lighter now that what I had wanted.  I think I might try a green tea dye to see if I can get it a little closer to what I want.  It doesn’t have to be exact and I’m sure I won’t be able to get it exactly – but I just want it a little closer.  I’ll let you all know what I end up with!!  About half of the quilt going on the diagonal – corner to corner will be the first shade that I got and the second half of the quilt will have the newer shade – I think it will work out well even if I can’t get the green tea dye to do it much darker.

Hot summer days bring the Hummingbirds out to the feeders – it took them awhile to come back but several weeks ago we finally had them back.

I will get back to the Farmer’s Wife and the border for the Red & Green Applique quilt one day – but just not right now

Quilting has progressed a little more on Going in Circles.  Maybe by the end of next week I will be finished.  Since I took the quilt off of the frame my elbow pain is nearly gone already.  I think I was pressing up against a nerve with the way I was holding my arm next to the bar while going right to left.  I will continue not to quilt at the 3 roller for the time being though and just finish up this quilt and then stick with piecing for awhile and maybe even wait until fall before I start quilting another quilt and really take a break and see how the elbow is then.

I have all the pieces cut for the quilt that I will be working on when we start to travel in September.  It is an easy quilt and you know I haven’t even figured out how large it will be – I just know I cut the whole layer cake up to use for it and go from there – all the cut pieces are in a take along box waiting for me to throw in the other supplies needed when it comes time to do that.  Plenty of room for thread, threader, scissors, rotary cutter small mat ect.  Everything I can think of that I need will most likely get tossed in there.  Don’t these boxes come in handy   I will need to come up with a name for this quilt.  I didn’t see one on the pattern that was for making a pillow with this pattern.  I still know I saw a photo of the same pattern in a quilt size instead though and don’t know where.

Now on to a recipe – Brown Sugar Sugar Cookies.

I got this recipe out of a book simply called “Cookies” that I have had forever.  I changed it up a little adding chopped dried cherries and a 1/2 cup of brown sugar for something different.

3 cups of flour (I used white wheat)
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder (which I just realized I didn’t put in mine!!  I wonder now what would have been different
1 teaspoon grated orange peel
1/2 cup softened butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg
1/2 cup milk
sugar to sprinkle on tops

Cream the butter and sugar together.  Add the vanilla and continue mixing.  Beat in the egg, then add the dry ingredients and some of the milk.  If you need all of the milk add the rest. Chill for about 30 minutes. Lightly flour a surface and roll the dough out to about 1/8th inch.  Cut with cookie cutters and place on a lightly greased pan (I use Pam Spray).  Sprinkle with sugar.  Bake 10 to 14 minutes until golden brown.

I really did not realize I forgot the baking powder until I was typing in the ingredients.  They tasted fine to me and looked just right too – I will have to take note of this next time I make them and see what the difference is.

And the title of this post tells it all.  That is what I did yesterday -

Cutting – I got my layer cut into 2 1/2 by 10 inch strips.  This is for the project I will take along when we travel this fall.  I need to cut out the half square triangles for it still.  Maybe later today.  I do not think this project took more than 15 minutes – cutting layer cakes and other precuts are so easy!

Quilting – on Going In Circles – making progress, I got done with the corner and on to the wavy edges – I have had some ask do I have any quilting tips and how do I quilt things so fast.  Well I normally only quilt fast on small quilts as we all know by now I have been quilting on this queen size since last October at least.  As you can see I took it off the frame and pin basted this border, I used a hoop in the corners but have found it easier to disregard the hoop for now.  I hold the fabric to keep it smooth in my left hand while I stitch with the right hand.  I use a running stitch which is what most people use for hand quilting.  If you use a hoop don’t keep it stretched tight, do that at first to make sure all the wrinkles are out the back but then loosen it up – your needle goes though faster and easier if it is loosen – my opinion.

Hand Piecing on Joseph’s Coat.   A little progress, I want to get all of these pieces on the wall pieced before I go to the next colors.  The pieces pieced are the ones that have the background color in them.

Other than doing laundry and exercise these are the projects that I will continue to work on today.  The weather just isn’t pleasant this summer and I have done very little outside work, the weather remains the same – the mid to high 90’s with it reaching in the 100’s in town.  I enjoy an hour or so on the porch in the morning and very late evening reading – other than that it is too hot for me to enjoy the summer this year.