Summer-- Finally!

This has been one of the craziest springs I've ever experienced.  We had a huge set of snow storms in mid-April and now it is Memorial Day Weekend and we have record breaking temperatures-- 3 days over 90 degrees!  Wha??!?? Normally we don't hit 90 until July.

Here is the last snowstorm in April:

And now I'm scurrying to get my garden planted.  The beds had a bumper crop of weeds going on. It was rewarding to clean them up and add a new mix of compost/peat moss/vermiculite to top them off.

Saturday I rototilled the area beyond the beds.  This is where I plant corn and sunflowers. Fannie is inspecting the pile of dirt I added.

And new this year-- I'm trying straw bales! We shall see how those turn out!

With all of this gardening, I barely have any time or energy left for quilting. --sad face--

I have just a tiny bit of quilty news to share.

I'm working on my Scrap Happy Sampler and at this month's Late Night Sew Night at Blue Bar Quilts, I got a good start on the applique stitching. Aren't these fun??!??

And lastly-- My On Ringo Lake mystery quilt won a prize at our last Mad City Quilt Guild meeting of the season.  Woot!! We had 'challenge' fabric that we bought in the fall and we showed off completed projects in May. Members voted for our favorites and I got a gift card to a local quilt shop. So cool!!! The fabric was a yellow/orange batik and fit right in with my fruit cocktail of colors! 

xoxo,

Kristin

Linking up with Judy's Design Wall Mondays, Lorna's Let's bee Sewcial and Cynthia's  Oh Scrap!!

On Ringo Lake - Quilted

I made big progress on my On Ringo Lake - Quiltville Mystery Quilt this weekend.  Hooray!  I took it to my parent's house to quilt it and quilt it, I did.  The process was a little bumpy at times.  The longarm can have a mind of it's own and the more you want to finish something, the more it acts up! =(

Here is a picture of part of the top draped over the frame pre-quilting.

I selected a pantograph that is somewhat simple and had a breezy feel that matched the quilt.  Here is a close up of the back and you can see the panto in the background.

And here is a picture of some of my trouble!  Ack!  Apparently the presser foot and its lever have become 'finnicky'.  If the foot isn't completely settled in, the tension goes off.  This happened about 4x while quilting--DOH!!  It was definitely pushing my patience.

We frog stitched way more than I like to-- rip it.  rip it.  =(

BUT IT IS DONE! The weather has been rather frightful lately.  I'm pretty sure I missed summer.  I think it was on a Sunday 2 weeks ago and I was working that day.  Due to wind, rain and cold, I didn't get any nice pictures.  They will have to wait until after the binding is done.

xoxo,
Kristin

Linking up with Lorna's Let's bee Sewcial and Cynthia's  Oh Scrap!!

Finish! Hekla

I'm happy to report that I finally finished my binding on Hekla.  I tend to bind in spurts and I didn't have enough time to finish this up prior to the end of Q1.  So it became my slam dunk finish of Q2.  Here is the listing of my Q2 Finish-A-Long goals

I started this quilt almost exactly one year ago.  Gudrun Erla came to the Madison area and had a trunk show and workshop (sponsored by the Lodi Valley Quilt Guild).  It was a lot of fun and I was very inspired by her designs.  I bought the book Strip Your Stash, a few patterns and her Stripology Ruler.  The ruler is amazing! It exceeds my expectations and I absolutely love how easy and quick it is to cut strips with it.

Hekla is the name of a volcano in Iceland.  I love the design of the Scandinavian Stars.  This will eventually hang in my house (not sure where) and if accepted, I will show this at Quilt Expo this fall.  My friend, Heather, did the quilting and it really makes this quilt shine.

In other sewing news, I'm piecing a back together for my On Ringo Lake.  It needs to be done by next Friday, when I plan to quilt it at my parent's house.  I have my work cut out for me this week!!

xoxo,

Kristin

Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts, Finish-A-Long, Let's bee Sewcial and Oh Scrap!!