Working on Jamestown Landing

I love back to school time. Even better is Clearance BTS sales!
I bought 10 of these cute little pink pencil boxes.
They fit my 1 1/2" squares as well as these 2 1/2" HST for Bonnie Hunter's Jamestown Landing quilt that was in the Australian magazine.
It only took a few hours of cutting to give me way more than what I needed to begin sewing. I had cut the 2 1/2" strips when that magazine first came out. I slipped them into a big baggies and saved them for the next quilt. I had even done the math to figure how many strips I needed to get the 840 units I needed. I added a few more for mistakes and ended up with this lovely container full of units!

 And then I surprised myself. I was all ready to dig through the swap fabrics from Smith Mountain Morning. When I opened that large container I found my results from the Leader/Ender cutting I had mentioned a few posts back. They were all ready for me! WHOOOHOOOO!

 I am so very lucky that I am detail oriented. It makes scrap sewing so much easier!!!!

 Here I am all ready to sew. The picture for oggling at, full containers of units and a rainy cool day for watching the squirrels and chipmunks fight over the birdfeeder. They are so funny. The cats just watch the birds and squirrels. But when the chipmunks come to the feeder my cats go crazy! Guess they must look tastey!

 Since I am OCD about being an organized quilter, I have a small basket behind the machine to catch the HST. I clip between "like" fabrics. Some of the blues had only 4 cuts. But some also had 10 or more. I want them to be scattered in the quilt, so if I keep track of them now, I can be sure that they stay scattered when I begin the row assembly.
I already have the string blocks made. And the ladies from my guild have donated more phone books to my collection. I remove the spine and cut them down to the best size depending on the original size of the phonebook page. And remember...they are already numbered so you will know how many pages you have! WHOOOHOOOO!!!!!!

And here is my sweet Pearl relaxing in her custom made Michael Miller fabric catbed. She did have her paw stretched out before I went for the camera. Of course she then moved. Her eyes are the palest blue and I swear she has eyelashes. Ole' bedroom eye Pearl. Hubby calls her "Pick on me Pearl". Macy runs her off. Just because...Macy is (at times) a big bully!

FLORIBUNDA quilt is finished!

I have to admit that I did try to do the "blog thingie" when it started on Bonnie Hunter's blog.
(http://www.quiltville.com/)
But...I never made it past her newest creation/idea/quilt design.
Her name for the quilt is Floribunda. She said it was a place for those florals we all have in our stash!
I had been cleaning up my cutting area and came across this Michael Miller fabic with cats in tones of grays, blacks and browns. And I had a black/gray/brown floral that had all the colors in it. They screamed "We belong together"! So I used a precious pale gray fabric as a background for the Floribunda block. The quilt just seemed to sew itself. Honest I was only going to make a tiny one for the kitties to lay on. Then I made more blocks and it kept growing until I knew I needed to stop or I would not be able to quilt it myself. I have way to many quilts waiting to be quilted.

 It finishes to a comfortable 52 X70. Perfect to drape over a chair or to throw over my lap.

 I am a glutton for punishment. I love straight line quilting. So I cross-hatched the entire body of the quilt. I did no marking. I simply went from one corner to the other crossways and then moved one square over and repeated. Then I went the other way diagonally and voila' it is all quilted!

I did not cross-hatch the border. I just did one diagonal line throughout. This picture does not show it as I had not started it yet. I have the binding all on and just need to hand sew it down. My favorite part of quilting. It is also the saddest part of quilting. I get to say goodbye to my quilt.
I dedicated this quilt to my Pain Management doctor. He perished in a plane crash last weekend. I am so sad for his family but also so sad for me. He has kept me going after my back surgery. I do not know what I am going to do..........