binding

Star

Flicker

Barn

It has been a busy fall semester and will be a busy spring semester too. Final grading is this coming week.
I have three more quilts ready for binding work. I try to do handwork every Sunday evening.
For the first in a very long time I have nothing at the quilter. Several projects started at LeClaire remain, and a few begun here. I will need to organize myself so that I have sewing ready to go when I can fit it in.

boat

If you have been a squirmy kid it the balcony at St Pauls in the past 30 years you most likely have received a bulletin paper boat. My new best friend Max got three of them this morning, up from two last week.
Davis kids would get enough to reenact the Spanish Armada.

letter box

I have made a quilt before with a more complicated letter box block. I think it is still a top and somewhere in my boxes.
This is a simpler letter box.
At my quilt group my friend Erica showed a lovely one she made all in batiks. It made me think it would work well for the solids on prints series.
Maybe I'll make a batik one too.
Isn't this fox fabric great? I should share some with my quilting DeVos cousins. (DeVos means The Fox in Dutch).

Block finishes 6 by 12 inches.
Solid: one rectangle cut 2 1/2 inches by 8 1/2 inches
Print: two rectangles cut 2 1/2 inches by 8 1/2 inches, two rectangles cut 2 1/2 inches by 6 1/2 inches.

Setting
Can do so randomly
or
Sew into blocks of three, with two side by side and add on one on the end. This larger block comes to 12 inches by 18 inches finished.

Sew together into rows.
Flip rows so every other row starts with the added on block.

WW I remembrance

Andy and  my grandfathers served in the Great War. Here are their photographs and stories.

WW I remembrance My grandfather, Jerry (Jurrien) Dykstra 
Born on a farm near Middleburg, Iowa.
Served in the Army during the Great War. Was put on a troop ship in New York Harbor having never fired a live round in training. They trained with wooden guns as ammunition was scarce. 
The ship never sailed because the armistice was signed.
He told his grandchildren that the Kaiser decided to surrender once he heard Jerry Dykstra was on his way.
Farmed with my grandmother, Cynthia Meerdink north of Hull.
Our son Paul Jurrien is named for my grandfather.

WW I remembrance 
Andy's grandfather, Andrew Cervasio. 
Born in Italy, emigrated to the United States at age seven and settled in New York. 
Served in the Navy during the Great War as a coal tender on troop ships crossing the Atlantic.
Attended the University of Michigan for engineering and became a construction estimator. 
Andy is named for his grandfather.

patience corner set

I really enjoyed this year's 4 inch block sew-a-long by Temecula Quilt Company.
I loosely followed her patterns, adding more of my own. A few are scaled down from the current Moda Blockheads sew-a-long. I have several blocks yet to make to get the quilt to the size I want.

I am using a Patience Corner set. Four little blocks come together to make one 12 inch finished block.
The setting pieces are cut 2 1/2 by 4 1/2 inches and 2 1/2 by 6 1/2 inches.

gathering acorns

Key Hole

Unit Blocks

I have two more quilts ready for binding. These, along with several others at this stage, are squirreled away as handwork projects to pick up during this busy fall semester.

shirting from Italy

I purchased that lovely Italian shirting in Bologna and it is making its way into my 4-inch blocks for the Temecula sew-a-long