Here we go again!

Before I get to the part that explains the title, I want to show you something fun. Do you recall when Kathie posted about her cheddar/red/green quilt with the blocks set on point? She was just trimming off the points on the edges of the quilt and was through with them. When she offered to send them my way, I was thrilled for the chance to play with them.
They were in my mailbox when we returned home from my Aunt's funeral. It was nice to have something fun to finish an emotional day. I told myself I could only add muslin to create whatever I could with them. I love a "make do" challenge.
This is the little quilt I created with the cuttings. It is still in the design stage.

The green triangles will be sewn to muslin triangles (right now the design wall is providing the neutral color) after I get them cut to a uniform size. I have all of the other pieces sewn into strips, but the strips are not sewn to each other yet. When I get those sawtooth strips made I will get it all sewn up.

This is how it all began.

I have enough trimmings left for a mug rug or two. How did I do, Kathie?
Now for the "here we go again". I am posting my SewCalGal FMQ challenge for the month just minutes before the deadline. It remains to be seen if I am the very last one to post this month, but I have been for the past three months in a row. I'm not too proud of what that says about me.
This month's expert was Leah Day, whose blog I read regularly. Our challenge was to do a couple of 8" squares using two similar, yet different, foundational designs--Double Stippling, and Railroad Tracks.
When I began learning FMQ the flowing, rounded designs were the most difficult for me and straight line designs (like stars) were much easier. I found the reverse true on this challenge.
Double Stippling was much easier to me this time than the angled Railroad Tracks.

I have strategically placed the double stippled sample to overlap the worst corner of the railroad tracks sample. : )

I have been working on the machine quilting of Chris' tablerunner. I have been doing all of the "stitch in the ditch" a la Karen McTavish whenever I've had a minute the last couple of days. Tonight I did the first block with a stenciled design. I practiced it 4 times before actually stitching on the runner. I think I have found the very slow speed setting that allows me to stay within a reasonable distance of the stenciled line.

It may take me forever to quilt 7 more of these blocks and then do the border, but at least I will be happy with it when I am finished. You can see the blue lines where I planned on adding more quilting to the block, but now that I have outlined the churn dash and quilted the center, I don't know if I want to add that outer design.

Last year at this time I was a new blogger. In one of my early posts I shared photos of the snowmen we built on family graves on Memorial Day. This year the snow behaved itself. It stayed in the tops of the mountains and we were able to enjoy a beautiful holiday visiting family graves without freezing.

Well, I'd better get this linked up to SewCalGal's post. The minutes left until midnight on the west coast are ticking away! : )

Until next time, 

Janet O.