Garden tour............

The Redbud trees are pinking up.  They should be in full bloom in about a week and a half.

My Bleeding Heart has gotten huge with the little bit of rain we got.

The Brunnera is in full bloom.

Those black lumps are future lilacs.  Mine are a late blooming Korean variety.  

This is a Hosta my sister-in-law gave to me.  I had to laugh at the mud splatter since the rain was so gentle and quiet I didn't even hear it.

The Lungwort/Pulomonaria plants are getting big and are spreading all over as usual.

This whole area at the corner of mine and my neighbor's yard is full of them.  They make nice groundcover in an area where neither of has any grass or other gardening.  This is at the base of a Redbud tree so they are in shade after 11 a.m.

Play day.........

 I was working in the basement and the Kaffe orphan block box was sitting on one of my tables.  I just had to play with the left over blocks and see how many are the same size.  Five of the blocks are 14" square.  The sixth would be made of the 3 small 7" Bear Paw blocks and the H block needs to be trimmed 1/2" to fill in the last spot.

This was pure play.  This could be the start of an orphan block quilt, or......I could make some more 14" Bear Paws and more of the alternate block and make a small throw quilt.  Just fun, relaxing play for a Sunday.

I got 3 of the Friendship Star blocks sewn while watching some remodeling on HGTV.

This is a selection of Kathy Doughty (Australia) fabric.  I have most of her books and have made several quilts with her directions.  Her fabric hasn't been widely available here in the US so when I found some on sale in the last 3 years I bought it.  I found some of her new line at equilter and I had a gift certificate so I got some half yards.  It all goes pretty well together even though it is from several different lines of her fabric.  The purple in the center is the only one I might pull out.  Then I would add a few other fabrics for a nice group to work from.  I think some of Kaffe's Aboriginal Dots would work well with it.

Sewn and pressed.................

I finished the sewing and then spent an hour pulling stray threads out of the seams and pressing the top.  It is 48" x 64" made with all 4" finished triangles.  

The dark pink with white daisies is from the mid 1990s.  It came in this pink and lime green and I made a quilt for the quilt shop owner's granddaughter out of it.  I am so happy to finally find a place to use my piece of it.

We finally got about an inch of rain over several days and the plants are really popping up.  This is the earliest peonies.  The rest are about 3-4" tall.

Four days ago I couldn't even see the tips of these Hostas.  I took this photo from the kitchen window while it was raining yesterday.

The last 2 light pink buds opened at the same time. 

There are 2 more buds on this orange Cacti and the one in the photo will bloom, not sure about the other one.  I'm pretty sure this will be the end of blooms for the season.

 

8 more seams to sew.............

Last night was a 3 hour TV night so I got all of the seams sewn in one direction and half of the seams sewn in the other direction.  If you look close the top half is sewn and the bottom half is hanging from it by threads.  I started teaching this method of sewing quilt tops together (called webbing) back in 1985 when I created classes for adult education at our local community college.

Then I put the pieces for one Friendship star on my table to see how it will look.  The blocks will be 12" finished and I have pieces for 20 blocks sewn.  I'll be sewing them together in TV watching time next week.

This furry creature was pretending to be a bird and stealing bird seed.

More pink...............

This is the latest batch of pink triangles that I sewed yesterday.  I think I might have enough sewn for the layout I have chosen.

I started the layout last night and then it got too late to finish so I'll work on it again today.

I got the center squares for the Friendship Star blocks cut also.  
 

Looking for a fabric.............

For a couple months I have been sewing triangle squares for a friendship star quilt.  On the last one I made I used the same fabric for all of the center squares of the blocks.  

I looked through the box that has a lot of the 1990s and very early 2000s fabric in it and chose this one for the center squares in these blocks.  It is a fabric that I have never been able to figure out how to use so it will just get chopped into 4.5" squares. 

Playing with pink..............

I'm still sewing pink triangle squares and finding a few more fabrics every day to add.  I decided to try a few layouts.  

First all marching the same way.

 Next I tried one of my favorite layouts, a zig zag.

Then I tried alternating diamonds which is interesting.  I have more to cut and sew so I have time to think about the layout.

It got up to 80 yesterday but I didn't do anything outside.  I was waiting for the UPS pickup of my return equipment to the cable company.  By the time they came I decided I would rather cut fabric than go outside.