Pie (Basketballs)

Something finally moved me to finish stitching the last three circles down to their backgrounds for Pie in the Sky. Probably it was my desire to avoid banishment to the freezing basement to baste the Sawtooth quilt in favor of doing some hand sewing on the couch in front of the TV. The painter's tape I used to tape Sawtooth to the floor has probably gone gooey or turned to yogurt by now. I'll get to it next, I promise!!!

The blocks are all trimmed and ready to go now. I have learned the lesson of cutting the backgrounds too big to start with for applique blocks (after making that mistake on a dresden plate quilt). I didn't forget to account for shrinkiness this time. Next lesson: use starch for weird and skinny shapes. I won a bottle of Best Press at November's MMQG meeting. Too bad I didn't have it 2 or 3 years ago when I started this quilt. There are lots of wrinkles and puckery bits on these, but I'm hoping the quilting and washing will hide it. I am excited to put the blocks together and get this top done. It's so fun!

I came across the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild and Adrienne's blog too late, and missed out on The Library Project led by Chezzetcook Modern Quilts. But I can definitely relate to the idea behind TLP, so just for fun, here's my little library. I haven't made anything yet from Modern Log Cabin Quilting, or Block Party. Maybe in 2015. And that's as close as you'll come to catching me making any kind of to-do list for quilting. Maternity leave ends in about 4 months!

Let's focus on an actual finish instead :) Here's a boxy pouch I made as a Christmas gift. Wish you could see the great Denyse Schmidt fabric I used on the inside. I'm only half happy with how it turned out. I wish I had done a practice one first, but I didn't have time. There were a few hints I could have used that weren't in the directions, but every mess up is a learning opportunity, so now I have a bit more experience for next time. The pouch will work as a cosmetics bag or whatever, but the lining came out too big so it's all baggy inside. And I shambled the fusible interfacing. Can I blame the iron and the ironing board? I might do a do-over... maybe this one.

Happy New Year!