Off to Texas on a sad mission

 My Dad didn't make it to his 100th birthday party. He died peacefully in his sleep last night at 99 years 11 months of age. We'll be leaving for Texas in the morning plan his memorial service and help get what he left behind donated to charity or given to family. In the back of my mind I knew he couldn't live forever, but he sure gave it a heroic try.

Before this happened, I was sewing and quilting as usual, finishing quilts and feeling happy. Here are the fruits of my labor for you to enjoy. Now, I'm off to bed. It has been a long day of preparation for the trip and tomorrow morning is getting closer. Take care of your family and love them with your whole heart. You never know when you will lose them forever.

I finished the appliqué repair. Isn't it a beauty?!

Everything is sewn and secured for the next 90 years.

All these components were loose. The maker used a weird stitch for her work, but I hid my tiny stitches!

I also finished the Sparrow quilt. Oh my, did I pick out a gob of stitching on this one.

Then, my friend looks at it and asks why some of the bird eyes are higher than others.

GAAAAAAAAAH!!! Mistakes everywhere!

Panto: Argus. It is a vine with leaves.

This cute backing is soft but has a 'slippery' feel to it. I had a booger of a time getting the quilting tension right.

Label on. I need to sew labels down when I get home.

National Jelly Roll Day was last Saturday and the shop in Dahlonega had them on sale for 25% off! I grabbed this one and made the quilt on Funday-Sunday. Not bad.

Panto: Funky Fans

The backing is four leftover strips of backing from other quilts.

This one has a label, too!

Now, I have to choose which picture goes in the papers...

Here is one picture of Dad taken at his and Mom's 65th wedding anniversary.

We had a family reunion and had all our photos taken. It was a wonderful day.

I changed this one  to black and white to see how it would look.

The last time I visited Texas and spent time with Dad was in May. He moved to assisted living to have more supervision and avoid falls. Still spry and getting around with a cane, he enjoyed reading the daily paper and talking about the past. In July, he got Covid and I think that was when he began to struggle to eat enough and get up and about. My Dad was a tough nut and did the best he could with his frail body. 

He went to sleep. To paraphrase poet John Magee; "...he slipped the surly bonds of Earth, and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings'...

I love you, Dad.

My goodness! How time flies.

 Did you know that Saturday was National Jelly Roll Day? It seemed like a great excuse to whip up a jelly roll quilt, so I bought one and made this on Funday-Sunday!

One of my go-to patterns, Boxed Squares, from the website Mary Quilts. It is a free pdf.pattern 

I love this because it makes a nice lap sized quilt from one jelly roll!

I loaded it up, and had it quilted and bound yesterday!

I also finished the quilt top with the bright birds. I decided on the green border to match the leaves in the blocks. I got the backing fabric at the same shop in Dahlonga where I got the jelly roll.

Almost done on Thursday...

Top sewn on Friday

Auditioning the green border

The quirky birds backing

It will be a while before I get this one  quilted because I have things to do this week. I will be in Franklin tomorrow judging the County Fair quilts, and back there again on Thursday for my longarm club meeting. I guess the quilting will have to wait until Friday or Saturday. We'll see how it goes.

Meanwhile, I'll enjoy the view out my studio window while I sew...

Penny watched in silence while these two deer ate acorns in the yard.

If you live in the woods, you get to see loads of these, too!

Color in the studio!

 The binding ia finished on the big neutral, so it was time to start my colorful palate cleanser. It's called Sparrow. I'm not making the traditional sparrow, rather some more colorful birds! I have unfortunately done gobs of picking out because of getting confused with the opposite facing blocks. I finally got in the groove and made these!

!0 pretty birds!

I also finished the binding on the giant customer quilt. I didn't bother to take a picture...we've all see binding.

Today, I took in an interesting repair job. This appliqué quilt was made by the owner's mother and was from a kit. The blue markings are visible and we commiserated about not being able to remove them. I have a baby quilt my mom started in 1944 the I finished, and can't get the blue dots out. Oh well, it is a beautiful quilt, worthy of fixing.

Pretty applique

The quilt is a stylized tree of life. It has a Jacobean feel to the design.

The yellow thread has given up the ghost and left the yellow flowers hanging.

It should be fairly easy to re-applique these .

Another one...

This is the worst of the batch. The hand quilting is lovely and the quilt's binding is totally intact. 

I shouldn't struggle with this one!

Life in the studio, my happy place!

I've been working on the big neutral quilt, determined to get it finished so I can move to something more exciting. Yesterday, that happened! Six hours of quilting was all it took to finally see the finish line on this one. I had to quit at 6:00, but took the photos anyway. I will trim it and apply the binding today. Yippee!!

I started a week ago, making these blocks on Sunday and Monday

                                           

                                This block took a full day to finish while quilting other projects                                         

                                                                             

                                                                    Thursday and Friday's progress

Three sections were completed by Saturday night

Yesterday, I finished the last blocks and assembled the quilt sections.

All finished and quilted.

Panto: Amethyst

I bought the wide backing in Cumming.

Meanwhile, I quilted and bound these charity quilts for the day guild.

Number one

Panto: Paisley swirl

I like the contrast with the backing

Number two

Panto: Frisky Feathers

Pink and green; so pretty

Number three, plaid hearts

Panto: PS I Love you

More pink backing

Number four; Pretty Chinese coins

Panto: Basketweave

Oops! Sideways pink backing

Number five; some floral stars

Panto: Rows of feathers

Oh shoot! Sideways again. Creamy white with a blush of pink

I am so happy to get onto something colorful for the next quilt. It took all afternoon just to cut out the pieces for the background of the blocks. I imagine it will be slow going as there are 24 blocks, and I intend to use 12 color combinations for them. I'll cut two and sew those before moving on. I'm excited to see how they look. It's always a surprise and a bit of a mystery when beginning a new project. Let's get started!!

Backing cut and bits labeled, colors stacked up and ready to sew

A couple of unrelated pictures for you to enjoy. The last of the Summer blooms on the back porch, Penny finally using her bed for its real purpose, and a tidbit I found on-line. Happy sewing!