Ramblings From Randi, The Wild Rose Quilter
My adventures in quilting, my adventures at Hackberry Spring Ranch, and other tidbits of my life.
Thought I would share pics of the quilt I made for my great-nephew before and after washing. I love the post wash quilty crinkle glow up. What about you? Do you love battings that give that crinkle, or do you prefer the less crinkle. To me, the crinkle is part of what makes a quilt a quilt.
Thanks for stopping by. I’d love to hear from you in the comments. Have a wonderful Wednesday!
This past week, my quilting attention went mostly to this lovely Optical Illusions quilt that I am quilting for a client. She made it for her 16 year old grandson. I felt a little intimidated by it at first, but this has actually turned out to be so much fun to work on. The center part is just straight line quilting through the intersections, in such a way as to enhance the 3D-ness of the piece. It’s just really cool. I’m doing all the black thread parts first, and then I will switch and finish up with the white. All I have left with black is the very outside border, and whatever I end up doing in the inner sashing. The outside borders will be the same as the pattern I put in the inside border corner pieces.
I’ll share pics of the whole quilt once I get it off the frame. I had to take a pause on the mermaid I was quilting because my client ordered little eye and mouth appliqués that she wanted me to stitch onto the face and we are still waiting on them. One of those times zippers on my longarm leaders came in handy. I was able to zip it off and lay it on my guest bed in the meantime, and move on to the next client quilt.
Last week, my Sunday Funday sewing time ended on a down note. I thought I was zipping along, making good progress on the diamond star blocks for my Barn Star Sampler. I was working on assembling the four corner units for each of the two blocks. Well, I don’t know how I goofed up so badly, but I sewed a total of 32 half square triangles into their units backwards or upside down. Good grief! I spent some quality time with my seam ripper, and felt for sure the pieces would then be distorted enough that they wouldn’t go back together nicely. I finished redoing them this afternoon, and I now have all 8 corner units done, and they didn’t turn out badly at all. The next step is to make 16 elongated flying geese units. Hopefully, I will get those sewn together without mishap. 😂
I’m no stranger to the seam ripper, but that was a much bigger mistake than normal. I’m ready to get these two giant blocks behind me. I was supposed to have finished my blocks in February, and then assembled the quilt top last month, according to the QAL schedule. Obviously, I didn’t make it on schedule. This block is month 9, so after it I have blocks to do for months 10 & 11, then the mini filler blocks and top assembly for month 12. I haven’t decided if I’m going to custom quilt it, or do a pretty edge to edge on it. I’m kind of leaning to doing an all over edge to edge. We shall see when I get there, I guess!
I’m curious to see how noticeable the eclipse will be here tomorrow. We are not in the path of totality, and that suits me just fine. Sounds like it’s going to be crazy in those areas with so many flocking in to see it. I find them (eclipses and gigantic crowds) kind of unnerving for some reason, so I’m just fine staying where I am, and going about business as usual.
I did get some exciting news from an area quilt show this weekend, but I’ll share that in an upcoming post! If you’ve made it this far and are still with me, thank you for stopping by!
First, thank you to my readers that recommended the Bloc Loc rulers. It was the nudge I needed to finally orders some. They are fantastic! I finished trimming my 64 half square triangles and it’s so much better with them. What a nifty notion!
The big news of today is that my cow Cookie calved early this morning! I was sipping my cup of coffee when my cousin texted me with pictures, saying he would guess the calf was about an hour old. Cookie runs with his herd, over my small acreage, my bother’s small acreage, and my cousin’s much larger ranch. His ranch connects to my grandparents’ farm and ranch land, of which we all three own portions. It’s her first calf, so he’s been keeping a close watch on her. She did great and we loaded up and made the 1.75 hour drive to see in person. The calf is a little heifer which means I will keep her instead of raising her for beef. The goal is for us to have enough to feed my family. My cousin has been so gracious to do this with and for me. I’m so grateful for him! Cookie did great and is being a good mama right off the bat. She is a good cow! Here she is with her new baby, Sugar. 😍
I went to the ranch to check on Cookie, my very pregnant cow, due any time to have her first calf. She was happily grazing with the rest of the herd, which belongs to my cousin. While there, I got some pics of this finished Strip Mirage quilt I made for my great-nephew. The pattern is free from Sew Yeah Quilting. You can find a video tutorial on YouTube, along with a link to the printable pattern. It’s a fast, fun jelly roll pattern. I chose to buy some coordinating Bella solid fabric and add some size by adding borders. The jelly roll is Stomp Stomp Roar from Stacy Iest Hsu for Moda.
Well, after being down with a bad headache all day yesterday, I felt much better today and made up for lost time. I even had to keep my two youngest grandsons from 3:45 yesterday afternoon until their parents and older brother got home from his track meet last night. I’m usually a pretty fun grandma, playing games, going for walks and pretty much whatever they want, but my husband had to take up the slack for me last night. I hated that I couldn’t play.
Back to today, I stayed on track with starting my day with household chores. Then onto my longarm business time. I started loading my next client quilt while waiting for a drop off and consult with a client. Then I got to stitching. Such a cute mermaid quilt for a little girl’s birthday. I’ll show a little peek of my progress.
I worked on it til time for dinner, stopping for a quick lunch and to swap out and fold some laundry. After dinner, which was a delicious Home Chef meal, I worked on my Barn Star Sampler a a teeny bit and then sewed two more rows of a special t-shirt quilt I’m making for a family.
I ordered a set of Bloc Loc rulers to trim half square triangles, and they have already shipped, but I may have to trim this whole stack before they get here. I only trimmed 8 of the 64 today, and made these little units. I have the next 8 units lines up and ready to trim and sew.
And, that’s about a wrap on today. I’m going to mix up my sourdough before I go to bed so it can rise overnight. I hope that works out. I’m basing it on how long the first batch took to rise. We shall see!
I’m trying to get into a better time management routine between my housework, my quilting business, and my personal quilting time. I used to subscribe to Flylady years ago, and I’m giving that another whirl. After the required morning caffeination, I get myself ready and then tend some household chores before I start my quilting workday.
Today, my workday consisted of taking our tax paperwork to the accountant. I had to fold and package up two quilts for shipping and get them to the post office. Getting quilts neatly packaged takes a significant amount of time. A quick trip to the bank and home for a quick sandwich and then spent almost three hours working on a very special t-shirt quilt commission. I don’t usually make t-shirt quilts as part of my business, but this is a very special case. Finally, this evening I found time for a little personal sewing. I made 64 half square triangles for the Barn Star Sampler. I’m working on the diamond star block and you make two of that block. I ran out of steam after pressing them, so trimming will wait.
Tomorrow afternoon and evening I will have my two youngest grandsons. So, I’ll definitely be busy then. Have a terrific Tuesday tomorrow, y’all!
The first project I worked on today was the machine sewn binding on the quilt I’m making for my great-nephew. Then I pulled out a WIP I started last February. I joined Shelley Cavanna’s Barn Star Sampler quilt along, and should have been assembling my quilt top this month, but I fell behind in December. Today, I cut out all the pieces for my next block. Just as I finished cutting the pieces, we had an unexpected thunderstorm that brought hail, and a tornado that caused some damage on the south side of town. Not fun considering my town was hit by a bad tornado last June, killing three people, injuring many more and leaving many homeless. Businesses were also lost. Anyway, we are fine. And, now it’s supposed to snow tomorrow!
Is anyone else reading doing the Barn Star Sampler?
After everything calmed down, I finished the hand stitched binding on my friend’s commissioned quilt.
Thankful not to have lost anyone or our home today in this tornado. Counting my blessing as I go to sleep.
I am hand finishing the binding on one of the quilts I’m currently working on, so it went along on the trip to the ranch Thursday so I could stitch during the drive. It’s a commission for a dear friend, pieced from her late father’s shirts, and a neutral fabric I purchased for the sashing. They are huge baseball fans, and we found a digital baseball pattern for the quilting. Even though the binding isn’t completely stitched, I went ahead and got some pictures of it while we were there, as it will be shipped off to her this next week. I don’t take on many commissions, as I have a huge bucket list of my own that I want to make, but there are some that I just cannot turn down. I love that I’m able to make something for my friend that will bring her comfort and be a treasure to her. After all, that is one of the best things about being a quilter, isn’t it?
I had this adorable, cheerful client quilt under my needle to brighten the cloudy, cold, wet day we had. 
We were supposed to get 4″ or more of snow overnight and into the afternoon, but we ended up with only a dusting.
I spent the rest of my quilting time today working on more star blocks for the commissioned quilt I’m making. I’m keeping my little grandsons the rest of the week. I didn’t have them today, however I did have lunch with them, my son and hubby. So, I had some “son-shine” in my day, as well. 😍
Today was just a good day. I had my two youngest grandsons and they were a blast today. A client dropped off a quilt for me to longarm quilt for her. And, I got a nice squishy in the mail from Missouri Star Quilt Company. In addition to the two lovely quilt backs I bought, they threw in two extra goodies for free! A sweet little pattern and cute pin set. Gotta love that! Thank you, MSQC!
Yesterday I didn’t have my littles and got quite a bit more work done on the commissioned memorial quilt I’m making for a recently widowed client. I laid a few blocks out on the floor to see how they look mixed together.
There will be 49 blocks altogether. These blocks are made from several of his shirts and even some swimming trunks he wore on their vacation trips to Mexico. I hope it brings her much comfort when it’s finished. I purchased the pattern several years ago from Quiltin’ Tia Quiltworks called Gracie’s Star. I’ve really enjoyed this pattern. This is one of my own quilts and the first one I made using this pattern. I love this quilt. ❤️
And, this is a cute cowboy themed baby quilt I made with it.
Have good night and a fantastic Friday tomorrow! Thanks for visiting me.
Ramblings From Randi, The Wild Rose Quilter 