SPRING IS IN THE AIR . . .

From a wonderful d0uble (look carefully) rainbow after a hail storm,

tulips in my sewing room,

and a couple Easter presents for Linus,

to Easter baskets for some special grandchildren,

complete with a knitted wash cloth and egg soaps,

spring most definitely IS in the air!

I will be closing down my blog-o-sphere during Holy Week and the first couple days after Easter.

May you all have a blessed celebration of Passover and the Resurrection of our Lord.

SPRING IS HERE !

At least that's what the calendar says. And I must admit it was a very lovely day here today, and I lolled a bit outside in the chaise lounge this afternoon.

And if the flowers are a little late to bloom, I can just check out my current quilt in progress. After all spring is the time for tulips, right?

A friend shared a tulip block pattern the other day, and I decided to give it a try.

But, oh my, I didn't know I'd be able to have so much fun in the planning stages. My daughter Anna Maria visited over the weekend and brought me some goodies. Her daughters (5 & 8) could hardly wait to give them to me. Seems like such a little thing, but my daughter knows me well enough to know that I would never buy it for myself:

graph paper and a 24 set of nice colored pencils.

To plan quilts of course!

So after she left, I got out the tulip block pattern and went to work.

This is the resulting plan:

And of course I wanted to use Anna Maria's fabric for it, specifically Chocolate Lollipop.

The multicolor (Bohemian) will be the sashing.

And this pink will be the outer sashing.

And with all that planning, I finished my first block today. I'm really likin' it!

And until I see the first tulip around here, I'll just enjoy my fabric ones!

NO LONGER A UFO . . .

. . . or for those of you not familiar with the lingo: UnFinished Object.

And I might just take some sort of a prize for just how long this has been unfinished.

I actually started this needlepoint for my son in 1978! I'll do the math: that's 32 years ago!

I had forgotten about it until last summer when I came across it as I was looking for something else. So now it's not for my son, but for HIS son!

Just in time to take it to him when we visit that NY family for Easter.

And speaking of Easter, I think I'll add these wash cloths with some cute little soaps to the children's Easter Baskets.

Can't wait to see them all.

But in the meantime: HOORAY, today one of my daughters is coming with her 3 youngest children and we are going to spend a lot of time just sittin' and stitchin'!

Can't think of a better way to spend a day!

I THINK IT WORKED !

I think that the hodge-podge of turquoise, teal, and red worked out OK. I had enough of the stash fabric to make a nice size quilt for a young teen. (It turned out to be about 38" x 60".) I backed it with fleece. I have backed with fleece previously without using a batting, but I was always a bit unhappy with the seam bumps that could be felt through the fleece. So this time I pressed the seams opened, then zig-zagged sewed the horizontal seams of the top to sheeting fabric before I sewed on the fleece backing. I'm much happier with it this way than with nothing between the fleece and the seams.

Since there was already the zig zag on the top, though, I didn't want to do a lot more quilting, so I decided to tie this one.

And on to the knitting front:

I have started this sweater for my soon-to-be 15 yo granddaughter.

I was a bit concerned that the pretty ringlet pattern stripe on the front wouldn't show up enough on my varigated yarn, but I think it's going to be OK.

Well, it's been a couple days since I've picked it up, so I guess it's time to get back to work!

ANOTHER SWEATER READY FOR THE MAIL

So, here it is: the next birthday sweater with those buttons I found in my stash. This one is for my soon-to-be 5 year old grandson in New York. Maybe it will help keep him warm while all that snow finishes melting. Well, maybe it's already melted; I'm not sure. At any rate, hope he likes it!

On the quilting front: still trying to use up my old fabrics (some with at least a bit of polyester). I had so much turquoise and so much red, but not enough of either do do much with. But, HOORAY, there was a flannel that had both colors. So it's all going together in one quilt with that flannel "tying" it all together. (Actually I have the top sewn together and just this morning picked up some turquoise fleece for the backing.)

This might not quite count as quilting (Well, I stitched some straight lines in the middle for the book "spine" area, so maybe that does count as quilting.) Anyway, some dear internet friends have been spoiling me with all kinds of little goodies in the mail for my birthday and "just 'cause". Most of the fabrics will be put together in one quilt for me to be reminded of their love. But these three goodies worked out just great for a book cover.

I call it my "green pastures" (as in the 23rd Psalm) book cover and I'll use it for my paper back spiritual books to carry around with me.

These fabrics were sent by two different friends:

Couldn't get a more coordinated look, huh?

And this embroidered goody was sent by yet another.

Great finishing touch, don't you think?

OK, maybe I should go trim up that red/turquoise quilt top, and sew the backing on.

A HA, ANOTHER KIND OF STASH . . .

We're not to the new kind of stash just yet. Wait a minute, I'll get there.

But in the meantime, these are a few of the stash quilts I made and dropped off for Project Linus yesterday:

This is not stash; I purchased this fabric in Nashville a few weeks ago. A gift for a baby to be born, most likely this weekend.

TADA, here is my "other" kind of stash: my button box (well in my case, a basket). I was about to go to the fabric store to buy some buttons for this sweater, but decided to look in my basket first. Lo, and behold: just the kind of button I was planning to purchase, and just the right number too.

Hoping for this sweater to be finished (All that's left to do is this buttonhole band and the side seam stitching.) and in the mail on Monday!