WIP Wednesday

First, thank you for all your nice comments and encouragement from my last post about our upcoming move! I haven't had time yet to respond to all of your comments, but I've read them all and shared them with my husband. Y'all are so sweet!!

I've been doing way more cleaning than is typical around here, but that's almost done and I've squeezed in a little sewing time here and there. I've got a couple of WIPs that have been sitting around and thought maybe I should get going on those.

I finished up the blocks I had started on retreat last month and sewed them together into a top this week. The pattern is "Sparklettes" from Fat Quarter Style. I thought I'd change the setting a bit and simply added background strips to square up each block, then alternated their direction.

Next up is my Glam Clam quilt. I bought some Cotton + Steel lawn for the backing and am ready to get this pin basted. I'm at a loss on how to quilt it. Any suggestions??

So that's what's going on here! Linking up with Lee at Freshly Pieced!

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Changes...

Maybe you've noticed that my sewing/quilting/blogging have slowed down a bit in the past few weeks. Yup! They have! I've been a tiny bit preoccupied because my husband and I have decided to make a major change in our lives. He is retiring from work {I'll never retire from quilting!} and we are moving south. We've lived in the St Louis, Missouri area for the past 30 years. A big stretch for a couple of New Yorkers - but it's been a wonderful place to live and raise our children.

Now that those children are grown and have left town, and without a job to hold us here, we've decided to embrace a new adventure. A warmer climate and a new culture of "things to do". This Summer we'll be moving to Greenville, South Carolina. Why Greenville? We did lots of research online looking for a nice place to relocate and kept coming back to Greenville. It's a small city with a beautiful reimagined downtown, and when we visited a couple of months ago, we fell in love. There's a great article about the "hippest little city in South Carolina" here.

We've got a house going up and are super excited! And you know what I'm most thankful for? That I'm a quilter and I'll meet other quilters and quilters are super nice.

So yesterday instead of sewing, I did some "dequiltifying" in my sewing room to make it a bit more appealing to potential buyers. I love my room and thought I should take a few pictures before removing the design wall, mini quits and lots of special, personal items.

My pile of minis going into storage...

My "to-do" list will come back out in the new space...

The exciting thing is that the new house will have a nice big sewing room. So the future is looking super bright!

In the mean time, I'm trying to work on some smaller projects. Just for fun, I joined my first online swap/bee. It's called #iheartbandc {for Bonnie and Camille} and I found it on Instagram. We're making one swap package for one member of the group. I've started that and it will be ready to go next month...

We're also making a 12" block for two members of the bee each month and will have 16 blocks when we're finished.

I'm sure I'll see you here intermittently over the next few months and Greenville Modern Quilt Guild - can't wait to meet you!

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Back to a bit of sewing...

I've been a bit absent from here, which means I've been a bit absent from the sewing room. A couple of fun trips and lots going on here!

But I did manage to finish up a binding between trips and have been able to squeeze in a little bit of sewing this week!

Quilting is done on this one and am I happy about that! The zig zag quilting was the perfect choice, but it is a slow and tedious way to quilt. Jeez...

My straight lines are far from perfect and I did learn a little lesson on this one. The slower you go, the straighter the lines. 

I made 3 big blocks to stretch out a piece that I wanted to use for the backing. I think they turned out pretty cool!

And this gray fabric with the arrows turned out to be a great binding choice!

While I was taking photos, I had to stop and smell the roses  Korean Spice Viburnum. This lovely shrub has the most beautiful scent that fills the whole yard. How I wish it would last all Summer!

Ahhh... Spring - there's nothing like it!

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