Six Block Quilt ?

Only one more block to make this morning, but I decided I would blog it now anyway. Never would I imagine I could make a big quilt from only six blocks, but here is the proof. When all are made it will measure 72" square, but I do intend to do a small edge border on the opposite side of the smaller blocks. Yes it is an offset design, big time.
The weather was so nice that it was difficult to stay inside and sew, when instead I could be basking pondside learning how to relax from the goldfish. They know how.

A Great Big Block

For the new quilt, I began by pulling fabrics to coordinate with the Kaffe Fasset Serape stripe. I had just about everything but that grey/brown color. I got close tho, even had the white.
Then I cut a center square 16 1/2" and built the block from there. It got really big.
Then I cut it in half and inserted a panel made from the stripe + some more strips to balance it out..
Then cut again and insert a panel with an inset white bit crossing the stripes. The final size of this big big block is 48x46"



 But wait, there's more to come. Surrounding the main block will be more blocks, 24"ish square.
I will probably unsew the main block to quilt it in parts, but you get the idea.















The pond is full to the brim and overflowing in great gushing glugs. All new rain water filled the basin and the fish are ever so visible.

When the sun returns everything will shoot up, so stand back!

Rain Day

Rain day, same as a snow day, but no shoveling. The pond is filling up fast and the new plants I bought are getting really really watered.
I'll be having a lazy day methinks. Maybe wander into the studio, maybe read or nap. La Dee Dah.
The Dawgs are snoring away as we speak.
I came home with the plants I planned to buy: begonias, supertunias, geraniums in glow in the dark pink,
And some I didn't plan to buy: four great varieties of hosta that I just had to have, such as Dream Queen

three new Hercules Heuchera,  that I didn't actually need, but loved the variegated leaf and pink flowers. They might end up in pots this year.
Lots of sweet potato vines came home with me too, in black and limey greens. Not to mention seeds! Cilantro, lettuce, parsely and lots of nasturtiums in three varieties, including the trailing Gleam which drives Dave crazy. Speaking of the Wonder-Husband... he weeded and tilled my veggies beds without request! What a man!

New Knits

I needed a day off and decided it was time to finish this short sleeved cardigan that I have been dawdling over for months. It is my own design, with a high neck and shorter sleeves and is made from Malabrigo Rastita, a deliciously soft merino single. If I could, everything I knit would be in this yarn.
To make the neck fit right and not pull back, I did a bunch of short rows before I began the raglan shaping. It looked funny, bulging out, until it was blocked, and now, phew! it looks just right. Better yet, it fits just like I wanted it to do.



This pullover will be my go-to summer top. Made from Berrocco Weekend yarn, a cotton/acrylic blend, it is cuddly and airy. Gotta love raglan knitting!
I enjoyed my day off, and had a nice snooze, along with many garden walks. No digging!

Today is knitting group, and first I will be visiting Lowe's and Walmart in search of more annuals. I need alyssum, pink begonias, nasturtium and hyacinth bean seeds, and whatever is on sale!

How to snooze:

A Better Plan

I've been taking things OUT of the garden, and finding holding pots like this one. I wanted to add more soil to the beds, and remove any perennial weeds/seeds before adding that soil. Of course transplanting things to better spots was also one of my goals, and providing more room between each plant, finally learning this important gardening lesson. Everything gets lots bigger as the season moves forward. Duh.
But it dawned on me that these holding pots are going to become the way to add color to the beds without getting on my knees, and then later having to weed around the added plants.


I've put pavers in the beds so I can walk around without stepping in the soft planting areas, and later I will put the flowering pots on these pavers. Simple idea, but it will make a big difference in the structure and height of the design. I can plant the pots while standing and have Dave lift them into the beds. Ha! I can hoe the weeds around the pavers which I hopefully have prevented with Preen, but you never know. In the Spring the garden looks so controllable, but it won't stay that way. Eeek
For the sake of recording my efforts, here is the left side front garden with lots of space around the hosta, after removing and transplanting lilies, peonies and heuchera to other parts and gardens. It looks bare comparatively, but I know it is the right thing to do for optimum spacing. The heuchera (a dozen plants) look small in April but by June have a zillion stalks of teeny flowers all over the place, and some of the smaller tiarellas got overwhelmed by the giant hostas, so they were moved to a safer spot.
I tend to go a little overboard plant wise, doncha know. This is from last June, and all those pots drove Dave crazy, so now I will put many of them in the beds, controlling the overflow.


Speaking of overflow...I got these flowers at Walmart last season. They were Better Homes and Gardens Proven Winners and I think they really were. I've never had a prettier flower box. The spillers are bacopa and the rest are calibrachoa or Superbells.
Can't have a garden without started from seed Nasturtiums.
But this will all have to wait. Freeze warnings are out for tonight and for once I haven't got anything to worry about. I brought my annuals inside today and am quite smug.
We live and learn.

Hangin' Out

The finished quilt, Boxed Stripes #3, hanging from the plant hooks on my porch. Chumley gets in the photo too.
By popular vote, I decided against the border and went with pieced, piped binding.(Don't try this at home). It was not easy. All those seams! I used this tute from Color Me Quilty, and it looked simple enough. I may try this again without the pieced parts.

I am still in love with the straight line quilting. The rod pocket below is merely pinned in place. I was in a hurry to photograph this before the sun changed position.


I rarely, if ever, show the back, but this fabric makes me think of men's pajamas, and I have to laugh. In this photo I have an invisible white glove lady showing off the back. (Hate that. The art is on the front.)

In conclusion, I managed to force mitered corners too. Ugh.
BTW, what clinched my decision on eschewing the borders was this comment from Ann from MD:
I think it is finished. Wouldn't it look great hanging on the wall of a sunny beach house?

I couldn't agree more!

 

Boxed Stripes 3

It's quilted and assembled and now I have to decide if it is big enough, or needs a border? At this point it measures 53x58.5".
If I piece a border, I am thinking ten inches all around making it 73x78". Still not big enough to cover a bed, but big enough to cover a body for a nap. But if I think of it as an art quilt for the wall, then this size is definitely big enough. What do you think?
Here's a detail of the quilting and the narrow connector strips. Click twice for a really close look.
I quilted it in four pieces, with a walking foot, and then trimmed and connected the panels with QAYG narrow connector strips. Each panel took about an hour, with breaks to pet the dawgs, and feed the fish. I fooled around most of the weekend, so the majority of the quilting was done today. It seemed like a good workday.

Appreciating Spring

While I am busy quilting, the world is changing into a flowering wonderland. The iris cristata is reliably blooming again, with a bit of poison ivy mixed in. I am always 'going to' divide and transplant some of these to make room, since they are so tightly packed. Of course I still haven't done it.
A really good shot of the poison ivy mixed with the white blooms of candy tuft. These are growing in what we call the pond garden, which sounds lush, but has the hardest rocky clay. Nonetheless, some plants seem happy enough here, so I leave them alone.
Heuchera Bressingham white is almost white with hints of pink and green in the leaves. I keep hoping that this is the year it will really get big, like my other heuchera.



Celandine Poppy, a plant I would like to see in more gardens. I bought two plants and now I have nine. Self seeding in the nearly dark parts of my front bed. And then the big blooms of pink dogwood. This year we have only about 20 blooms, whereas last year there were hundreds on this tree. Our big white dogwood has NONE this year, while a wild one near the road is loaded. Never bloomed in the six years we've been here. Go figure.
Wild woodland anemones. Small white and delicate, they are scattered in the sunnier parts of the woods. Near them grow yellow and purple violets.
Dave takes advantage of the warm Spring sun to have a nap on the back deck. We lost our umbrella in a bad storm so I got a new one, which matches our lounge chairs.
The redbuds continue to amaze.