Looking Back & Looking Forward #9: A Train Wreck

Looking back is definitely not a good thing this week. I got thru lots (as in I don't know the number) of blocks on the quilt for my grandson's High School graduation. At that point I was half excited, half worried about what it would look on the design wall.

 This is what it looked like.

I put the blocks on the design wall but stopped because it didn't look so good. My husband's much better at color than I am and helps me out a lot on designing my quilts. The next day when he got home from work I asked him to come take a look at it. He walked in the room, glanced at it and said, "It's awful."
"That's what I thought," I said glumly.
It's true. I looked at the original pattern and it worked because it was all shades of one color. Mine had three main colors.
Doomed! Doomed I was! Right from the beginning!

 After I went to my bedroom and cried a little, and stared out the window a little, I decided to get on with my life.

The dreadful story is here, here and here.

I've switched to a pattern that I've made twice before. I know it's easy to cut out and easy to make, and quick too. This is a good thing since I've already wasted over a month on the other quilt. The good news is that I can combine the "little" bird pieces from the other one and arrange them into a large hexie. I figure I'll just applique them on some fabric and voila!

The new quilt is this:

The pattern is Gumballs by Debbie Luttrell, who owns Stitcin' Heaven. It calls for 10 different batiks in 1-5/8 yd cuts. The secret to this is to get them all in one color family. I made this one for my TGS. I loved it so much I made one for me too!

Firstest's favorite color is orange, and has been since he was knee high to a grasshopper. So, orange it is!

Okay, doke:

Looking Forward

Firstest's Graduation Quilt:
I had a heck of a time finding 10 different orange batik fabrics. I went to every quilt store in the county, except for Joanns. I ended up with six cuts. I found large orange batik scraps and some yardage and added it in. When it came time to assemble blocks, there just wasn't enough variety. I went ahead and bought some from Etsy and some from Ebay. Now the fabric may not be here until next week, so I don't know when I can work on the quilt.

1. My conservative goal is to get the yardage package(s) out of the mailbox, open them up and iron the fabric.

Chip's One-Year Birthday Quilt
2.  I have the fabric ready and already have the pattern. Since I'll be free most of the next week, my goal will be to cut out the pieces.

That's it for me. I'm a little relieved because I have made the patterns for both Chip and his older brother, Firstest. I think it will be fun from here on out!

Nyd din dag! (Danish for "See You Later!")

Hurry on over and see all the fun going on in the linky parties. Find them in the right sidebar!

Picture of train wreck attribution: http://imlsdcc.grainger.uiuc.edu/

LB&LF#7 Wherein We Celebrate Meeting A Goal!

March has flown in with many winds here in Northern California. It definitely came in like a lion...the end of March will tell whether it goes out like a lamb. We had lots of wind and rain this past four days, which we definitely needed. Rain, that is. We don't need wind, in my opinion. I had enough of that in Maryland to last me for a year.

Without anymore preamble, here's the progress from last week. And, prepared to be awed!

Looking Back

I had one single goal this past week and it was to make 45 more blocks for my grandson's High School graduation quilt. Drumroll! I made more than 45 blocks!

Here is the assortment of blocks that I've made so far. I got carried away and driven by my own enthusiasm. I cut too many strip of one color combination and came up with 40 blocks. Eeeerrr.😕

40 blocks in one color combination is too many.

By doing modern math, I found that I only needed 12 blocks of each color combination. Just a little bit overboard!

I'm back on track again. And let's not forget that I met my goal of making 45 usable blocks. So this is definitely a winner!

Looking Forward

I hate to be redundant, but I want to make 45 blocks next week. One more week of that will bring me to 135 blocks, just ten shy of the needed 145. I think I'm making good progress on getting this quilt done by end-of-May graduation!

A Bit of Scrappy News

I am a friend of a very popular quilter who does trunk shows, et al. She knows I love to make scrap quilts and gives me the scraps after each quilt she finishes. I got a big cloth bag full of her latest scraps. They are gorgeous and they are in my favorite color!

I can't wait to start using these gorgeous blues!

I am hooking up with the bloggers listed on the left column. They are great bloggers, one and all. It's worth it to go and explore there blogs once you get to their linky site.

Nyd din dag. (It Danish for "See you later." I'm Danish! (partly), (like one third), (just to be honest). 

Looking Back and Looking Forward #6

beware!

This is a fair warning! If you are squeamish or prone to screaming, Do.Not.Read!!

BEWARE of Google!
Not Google Search, but Google change your password! It is not for the faint-hearted! Truly!

There I was yesterday sweetly sitting at a computer in our Church Family History Center. I needed to get into a second site, but the password I knew was not working. I know everyone will raise their hand if I ask if this has ever happened to you. Ah yes, 100%.

So, I thought, I'll just change the password. That's SOP (standard operating procedure) for when you forget your password at home or afar. La la la la... Click on Forgot Password on Google Sign In.
     1.  It asks me to copy wonky letters to prove I'm not a robot. No, last time I checked I was human.
     2.  Next screen, what is my secret password? Now I feel like Nancy Drew. I enter that!
     3.  Fill out a form the full size of the screen: Name, Address, Phone Number, Email, Alternate Email, M/D/Y you signed up for Google. Just kidding on that last one! But, on and on.
     4.  It sends an email to my Alternate Email, which is my husband's.
     5.  They send me a code. I type it in the box.
     6.  Finally, in the coup d' gras. (Here is the eerie meaning of coup d' gras: A deathblow delivered to end the misery of a mortally wounded victim.) Well hey. Google now wants to deliver me a death blow. Arrrrrrrrr
     7.  Google says I'm on an unfamiliar computer and wants me to designate (and probably verify my credentials again!) this computer as one I use.
     8.  I don't want my name showing up every time someone else comes to the library and they go to google to find their email.
     9.  After a half hour they've got me.  Arghh! Splutter! No! No!
     10.  I think the deathblow is about to come...I surrender...and exit out of Google.

I was lucky to get out of there alive! I'm warning all you fair gentlemen and ladies so you won't be killed trying to get a new password from Google.

Looking Back

beware!

 What? Not Again? Sad, but true. It was a disastrous week.

My only goal was to make 45 blocks for Firstest's High School graduation quilt. A hefty blow, but nonetheless, I soldiered on. I cut the strips for the blocks, sewed them and cut them into 60' diamonds. Thursday is my day to quilt together with a couple of friends. I keep my Featherweight at my friend's house so I don't have to carry a machine back and forth.

Something in the back of my head said, This machine has to sew the same size seam as the one on your Janome at home. Hmm, I said, well both of them sew a scant 1/4". It'll be alright.

Now you can guess what happened. No, they didn't sew the same 1/4". My task was to rip the seams out of all the strips and the diamonds too.

The first thing at my friend's house, I put all my blocks up on her design wall. Once I stepped back--Disaster! The lightest gray strip showed up as white when put together! I had to tear all the diamonds with the light gray on them. See the pictures in the top row down below; the grey looks white.

Top Left: Blocks with Seams Picked Apart.  Top Right: Close up of blocks sewn apart with curled seams, proof that I ripped them out! Bottom:  The strips to pick apart! Lesson learned!

And that is my progress for this week.

Looking Forward

Make 45 blocks. Same goal as last week and I WILL sew them on my home machine!

Announcement:

There's a whole lot of fun happening on Thursdays in my blog! It's a new feature on my blog! It's Throwback Thursday, a chance to re-visit a blog from my posts from years ago! It's new! Lots of fun! Fun for days! Give it a try! Here's the link for last week's post, jump on over to there!   Throwback Thursday will be published once a month on the first Thursday.

Nyd din dag  (It's Danish!)