It’s a rainy day here in the North GA mountains so I snuck away to the sewing room to piece a Quick Strippie. Now I’ll go up and watch some of the Master’s tournament with Keith and pull out my crochet!

Good grief! These 3 yard quilts are just too fast and I’ll have my work cut out for me getting them all quilted and bound. Yesterday after finishing my Rectangle top, I cut this one out and came down today to piece the top. I pretty much do my borders different on all of these but the pattern is City Lights from the Fast and Fun 3 yard quilt book.

Close-up of the fabrics

After finishing that one, I still had half the afternoon so I cut and started … and finished another one. Using the same pattern but I used 4 fabrics on this one so I could enlarge it a bit with the borders.

And again, here’s a close up view of the fabrics.

The rectangle quilt is assembled. This was from a jelly roll and meets the April Precut Challenge. It’s a bit larger then the others I’ve done – 56 x 72 – so it’s a nice donation size.

And since I couldn’t let those stripset ends go to waste, there’s another doll quilt top. I didn’t see I had those two fabrics too close until after it was pieced and I’m not taking it out!

The Strips and Strings log cabin top is assembled. Counting this one, 9 of my 17 new starts this year have been from my scraps or string bins. With the 3 yard challenge, I’ll have to make sure to keep working in my scraps and strings if I want to end the year with more of them than ones made from yardage and precuts. Scrap quilts are my favorites but it’s just so easy to pull precuts or some yardage and make a quick quilt.

And speaking of precuts, I’ve got a good start on my April precut quilt.

After I finished organizing everything downstairs, I decided I’d sew a little. These little 3 yard quilts are so fast to cut and piece that before I knew it, the top was done! This one is called Brick Street and it’s from the Fast and Fun 3 Yard Quilt book. I left the last 1 inch finished border off and will bind it in a black fabric from stash. Since the design wall has the log cabin blocks on it, I just draped it across the ironing board.

These black and yellow prints are SO pretty!

My part of the packing is done and Keith just has to get it to fit in the car. The pile never seems to get smaller – quilt projects, bins, yarn, finished quilts for donation … there’s a full load every trip to Big Canoe. I did get out for a bike ride to Ballast Point park and along Bayshore. The temperature has dropped from earlier in the week and it’s a lovely 70 degrees.

I also managed to get the Dino Strippie assembled. That’s another “3 yard” top made for our HeartStrings project.

I was sharing my goals for 2021 with my HeartStrings group the other day … they’re responsible for several items on the list with the newest one being make a quilt from my website each month. I’d been looking at some of the quilts and wanting to remake them anyway so why not add it to the list?! I’m thinking keeping the UFOs to 20 or under going into 2022 is going to be the hard one!

• Precut Challenge – piece or quilt a top made from the precut of the month or both!
• UFO goal – finish 12 UFOs (one per month, getting behind and catching up is OK)
• Make more scrap/string quilts – try for 1/2 of all tops made in 2021
• 3 and 5 yard quilt challenge – thru June
• 365 Block Challenge
• MaryQuilts.com challenge – one quilt from the website each month
• Keep UFOs to 20 or lower going into 2022

I mentioned last week that HeartStrings is doing a 3 yard quilt challenge and I’m taking advantage of the opportunity to make some kid quilts for donation. This is the 2nd Town Square quilt from Fabric Cafe that I cut and pieced this morning. Next up will be two Strippies from the leftover fabric from both quilts.

This afternoon I drove to New Port Richey to meet Sandy, a friend of Kathy’s, who is heading back to WI soon and she’s taking 6 finished donation quilts to Kathy for me, saving me the cost of shipping them. I miss attending the sew-ins in WI and I like to send Kathy quilts once or twice a year so I can still be part of the group effort even though I’m participating remotely!

I had a dentist appointment this afternoon and rather than finishing up the challenging quilt on the longarm, I decided to make the rest of the blocks and assemble this little top. My HeartStrings group is doing a 3 and/or 5 yard quilt project and I was anxious to join in the fun. This one is called Town Square and it’s from the Easy Peasy 3 yard quilt book from Fabric Cafe. The pattern had two skinny borders but I like it better without and at 44 x 58 it’s plenty big. I’ll bind it in the green.

I love the little dog print and I’ve got enough left over for a Quick Strippie too.

You know that happy feeling you get when finishing a quilt top … and then that sinking feeling you get when you look at the photo and realize you have a block rotated the wrong way? The Twisted Pinwheel top is assembled and I’m probably going to fix it …

EDIT: I couldn’t face going in there tomorrow to fix it so I did it this afternoon.

After taking Finn for grooming and getting in another 4 mile hike, I finished up this Easy Flock of Geese top. It’s my second finished project for our Precut challenge for February (triangles) and I’ve got one more project in process – my twisted pinwheels – but so far only the pinwheel blocks have been made, they’ll go back to Tampa for twisting.

You’d think that bin of fabric I brought with me would be a little less full after making two quilts from it but nope … not much noticeable difference. There will be others from this bin. This is the 5th top assembled this month – 3 were from blocks made in Tampa, 2 were pieced here, and a set of Pinwheel blocks were pieced and will go back to Tampa to be finished up. The sewing room is shut down for this visit. Tomorrow I’ll clean, do laundry, and pack and if time and the weather allow, sneak in another hike.