Another UFO Down

and so am I!

I actually finished this up a week or two ago, but I've been down with a stomach bug for a little bit now and haven't gotten around to posting it yet, or for that matter doing much of anything.

Here it is finished.

Due to the sheen in a lot of the fabrics I've had a hard time getting a good photo.  Here's a close up that shows it a little better.

I'm thinking it needs a dark blue border to set it off a little better.  I like the way it looks against the dark blue sofa in the photo above. 

This quilt actually started as a mystery quilt and the teacher wasn't too optimistic it was going to work, since I didn't follow the rules.  I think it worked just fine!  Blue and yellow has always been a color combo I've liked and I'm glad I decided not to listen.

The background fabric is a pale yellow fairy frost and the blues are a pack of eight fat quarters I had picked up at a quilt show.  If you look closely they are actually suppose to represent the four seasons.

Can't wait to see what UFO is next.  It's halfway through the year and it's feeling so nice to get some tops done!  (Well minus the borders anyway.)

July UFO

Remember this quilt?

I think it was one of the very first things I ever posted on my blog.  That was a year and a half ago.

This is what it looks like now.

 

I guess it's time to buckle down and finish it off as it is the lucky UFO number picked for this month.  I'm not sure why I lost motivation on it in the first place, but I did.  Maybe it's the prospect of sewing all the squares together.  I would like to have it done though, so here's to adding it to my monthly to do list.  I think I've started more projects in the last month than I have finished so far this year.  So not helping my UFO count, but making a nice long list for next year!

American Sue

Happy belated Independence Day, for those of you who live in the US and celebrate the 4th of July.  For the rest of you, happy !

We had a busy weekend with 13 people over to BBQ and watch fireworks.  Our new place has the perfect view of the city's fireworks, so it was a lot of fun!

When we decided to have people over for the 4th I realized that I didn't have a single patriotic quilt in my whole collection.  Clearly this had to be rectified, so I pulled out a pattern I had gotten a few years ago and whipped up this little American Sue in a few hours.  It went so fast!

It's only 16" wide, but makes a perfect addition over my front hall table.  I'm thinking I might have to design a few more Sunbonnet Sue patterns for other holidays to grace this spot.  If you are interested in this pattern, it is free online at Sentimental Stitches.

In other news, I found out I won a prise from the shop hop I participated in.  I won $100 gift card to my favorite shop of the group.  I'm so excited to go pick it up next week.  It was very welcome news as I've had a crazy couple of weeks and work is just insane right now.  One of my co-workers actually started yelling at me today after I spent most of yesterday working on a project for him to help him with his work load. 

I was not happy, but thankfully I have an amazing boss who told me to go work out of the office the rest of the day, so it turned out to be a pretty nice day and I got a lot done.  It was also nice to hear that even if I got nothing else done between now and our yearly deadline of next Friday that he would still be more than happy with me.  It's taken a little of the stress off, but I'm hoping to work some more time in this week to quilt.  I sure do need a good stress relief session.

I have been trying to keep up with everyone's blogs the last few weeks, but forgive me if I haven't been commenting much.  I promise to be better after next Friday!

My Next Project

This weekend was our local shop hop.  It covers 13 shops all over the South San Fransisco Bay area.  It's the third year I've gone and somehow every year, despite our plan, we end up pushing ourselves and visiting all the shops in two days.  My husband actually loves the hop, so he's a very good companion.  Last year I picked up these Kaffe Fassett prints for a quilt but didn't buy the background fabric for it.  I got it this year though and this will be my next project, hopefully.

The pattern I plan to use is from the book Open a Can of Worms by Debbie Caffrey.  I love this book and have made several quilts out of it.  One of which for some reason I have never blogged about but almost have the top done for.  More to come on that one soon! 

One of my very first quilts was a table runner made from this pattern.

Is is my only use of oriental prints ever.  I like them, just have never really gotten too into them, despite the fact that I love this runner.

I got loads of other stuff on the shop hop that should keep me busy for quite some time.  I think I am going to need to get busy working on some quits!