Needle and Thread Project

Bonnie Hunter is back from Bali and setting up a new challenges for us.

First, I believe it was before she left for Bali, she challenged us to make Spool Blocks as leader/enders.   I won't be participating that challenge any time soon as I'm still working on last year's Cheddar Challenge.

Her newest challenge is inspired by her desire to finish hand quilting her pink/brown Dear Jane quilt (using just needle and thread) and she has invited us to sew along with her for one hour each day.  She set up her comfy chair with all the necessities so there is no excuse not to work.  Here is her post:   http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2012/09/september-is-national-sewing-month.html

My days are filled with church activities and customer quilts so I will have to do my stitching at night.  That said, I will not be able to stitch every night as I often have my grandson.  He is known to spontaneously jump up into my lap and I don't want that to happen when I have a needle and thread in my hand!  But, I will sew as often as possible.


I have a couple little hand projects I want to finish first so they don't remain in the UFO pile for years.

I am going to work on blanket stitching down the fused flowers on this little wall hanging I started in class on Friday.

I also have some hand stitching to complete on 8 holiday table runners I have made for upcoming shows.... those triangular ends need to be stitched down.

On Fridays league bowling has started again and I will be working on my Cheddar Bow Ties.  They were Bonnie's leader/ender challenge last year, but I chose to do them by hand as I was heading out of town at that time and needed something to work on.  I have 81 bow tie blocks made and am working on sewing row 8 together.  I felt I had to frog and restitch several of the pinkish wavy blocks (see that extra one sticking out on the end of row 8) the waves were turned in all different directions and looked funky to me.  Once all these rows are stitched together, then I make another 81 blocks for the 2nd quarter of the quilt. 

I do have a quilt top I started for me in January 2006 that has never been completed.  The top was pieced and done in 6 months and then just laid there... it was too hot for me to sit and hand quilt with this on my lap.  When the cold weather arrived  I pulled it out again and did a light basting on my quilter.    It is a sampler quilt called Rosewood Cottage.  I did some quilting on it that winter... the first three rows of the center of the quilt... and then I showed it to someone in guild who told me I need to do a lot more quilting in each block.  That kind of discouraged me and I ended up putting it away.  So I have two more rows of the center, the applique'd border and the final border to work on... and I have decided not to listen to the quilt police and just quilt it how I like. If I want to add more quilting later I can.  I think it is definitely time to work on this and get it done!  I just need to find my hand quilting thread.   If you want to see close ups of the stitching I've done so far let me know and I'll do another post later.

What will you be working on?