Not My Favorite Thing

 I've been assembling quilts, which is not my favorite quilting activity, especially in the summer. Ironing big stuff is always cumbersome, and having long rows of quilt blocks in my lap to assemble the quilt is always a chore, but worse in the summer. 

Since I live where summer is REALLY hot, if I'm making blocks, I just use my small travel iron which doesn't heat up the space like a full sized iron. If I'm assembling a quilt I need the big iron, which absolutely makes the air conditioning work harder. I don't mind doing those chores so much during the winter, because I normally keep my house pretty cool in winter, so some extra fabric on my lap can be welcome, and warming up the room I'm in with an iron makes it more pleasant. 

At any rate, I do have some new quilt tops complete.

The border is on the quilt for my great-nephew. I'll be basting this as soon as I'm finished with this blog post. That baby is already six months old, almost seven, and I really need to get this finished and mailed. 

DH is really loving this quilt. It's my version of Bonnie Hunter's Rhododendron Trail. It's big enough for our queen sized bed, but I'm debating switching to a king sized bed, in which case it wouldn't be large enough. The quilt I am purposely making for our bed could go on a king. 

The other blocks I made from the RT mystery quilt border units I am using for a different quilt. I really love this border fabric with that color scheme, and I have enough of that fabric left for another border. I decided I'd start making the alternate blocks I had planned to use for that quilt, so I can assemble it soon, and use the same border fabric before I forget and use the fabric for something else. The alternate blocks I need are just 16 patches, which are easily made as leader/enders, so they'll get made while other things are my main project. 

 I just sewed the last seam on this baby quilt. I am going to trim the sides straight, but I haven't even pressed this yet. Now that this quilt is together, I need to put the scooter quilt up the design wall. It's equilateral triangles and hexies just like this one, but it will be larger. The outdoor scenes in the baby quilt were cut from a National Parks pillow panel. I really do enjoy using panels in unexpected ways. I do enjoy assembling equilateral triangle quilts more than most. they are just pretty fun to see come together, and my Studio cutter dies cut them perfectly! 

Aside from working on quilts, my next big project is cutting out Christmas gifts. There are some health issues going on with family members (DH and I are fine) that could completely hijack things for a while, but if the projects are cut out, I might have a chance. People are always more important than quilting or gifts, so if I can't get it done but end up helping people through a crisis, that's ok. If I can do both, that's fantastic.