Put on your thinking caps!! ADVICE needed for a GIVEAWAY

 One thing about me that hardly anyone knows is that I used to play the piano.  In fact, I have had a piano since I was a little girl.  We have a beautiful grand piano in our home in California that I have hardly played. My grandson loves playing it, so that's good!

When we built our cabin here in Central Oregon, I had asked the builder to make sure there was space for my piano.  Fast forward to 7 yrs later and I learned that moving a piano from California to the High Desert in Oregon isn't smart so I needed to find a piano here.  I have been looking periodically but last week I hit pay dirt and found the most beautiful old upright nearby for sale.

It was owned by a young woman looking to drive around the country unencumbered by "things".  Her dad was a concern pianist and bought her this piano!  So I figured I couldn't go wrong. The brand is Tokai, which I hadn't heard of.  No matter--it sounds amazing and hasn't even been tuned yet (after it acclimates to its new home!)

The help I need is for the bench!  It's a bit tattered and is covered with a cheap vinyl.  So I of course checked out the LQS and my stash and found some musical fabric.  I'd like to recover the bench and I am stumped as to what to do!  It measures 13 x 34.  I was thinking some blocks but I'm not sure what to use.  I'll obviously put heavy batting under my "top".  Here is my "pallet!!"

The person who offers the best alternative will win a load of fabric!!  Deadline?  Friday June 24th.  THANKS.

What have I been doing since I've been stuck with this giant boot on my foot?  Well, listening to lots of books!  And sewing.

I unearthed two quilts waiting for bindings.  Don't ask me why I waited so long to get them done.  They are two favorite quilts of mine, really!

This was a Primitive Gatherings kit from a few years ago.  Lots of small flowers done by wool appliqué and put together with the tiniest of half square triangles you can imagine!!  I am trying to figure out if it's washable or not since it has wool.  No idea what I'll do with it.  I do love it, though.

The second quilt was a Bonnie Hunter block design that I really love.  In fact, I was thinking of using that block for my piano bench with musical notes in the center.  Block is called "Diamond Tile".

I had great fun fussy cutting the centers, which you can see by these blocks:

These few centers are from Tula Pink, Di Ford and French General!  Such a fun block and quilt to make.  The border is also fun, with flamingos throughout!  Just a fun quilt!

Hope you have a great week.  it's finally warming up here in Central Oregon and my foot has improved enough (in my eyes, anyway) that I'm going kayaking on Thursday.  CANNOT wait!!  I'll probably change my header photo with lake and snow pictures!

Take care, be kind and be grateful,

xxx

Randy

I'm losing to scraps!

 I'll bet you all feel that scraps seems to multiply overnight!  I am inundated and decided to try to organize some of my scraps here in Sunriver.

I've been cutting 2-1/2" strips forever and had a huge bag filled with them so I decided it was time to organize them.  So I sorted them between lights and darks.  Easy, right?  But then the question became what to do with these sorted strips?

I went to Joann's and Walmart and bought a couple of containers but I can't say that I'm happy with them as a solution.

This is the bag (in back) with the lights in a Tupperware-type container.

The darks:

Here are other ineffective solutions:

So here is my question:  how do you organize your scraps?  I know some people keep colors separated but I'm not thinking that's the best solution for me. I like having strips separated by size but that box with the dark strips seems absolutely useless to me!  

HELP??!!!!!

Still being pretty stuck in the house with my boot, I'm getting lots of sewing done.  I added another border to the red appliqué/stars quilt and laid it on the carpet to decide on a border when my small (HA!!) puppy decided to plop down on it.

I'm still not convinced I want to do a border with purple vines and leaves, thinking that'll take be forever.  Might take it to the LQS to see if there is a border fabric that might work.

Not much else going on around here.  Still pretty cool and rainy, which I'm not minding.  My foot is feeling a little better--I've been icing it every day for at least an hour and I think that's helping the swelling.  I'm thinking next week I might try to kayak...will keep you posted.

Hope you're having a great early summer.

Stay well, be kind and be grateful,

Hugs,

Randy

I got the boot!!

 I'll bet that got your attention!!

I was careless while I was walking last week and wasn't paying attention when I fell.  The road wasn't flat and my foot landed on an uneven portion and I went forward, landing on my knees.  Oh and I broke my foot!  It's a small fracture and I should be good as new quickly.  But what a drag!  I am trying to be positive--could've been so much worse, right?

The good news is that it's given me a lot of time to sew.  I can't go hiking or walking the dog very far.  Definitely not getting into my kayak (fortunately it's still a bit too chilly here in Central Oregon for that).  So I've put together two tops and have been working on more appliqué blocks!

These are some of the blocks from the Splendid Sampler I did during Covid.  It's not even all the blocks; I still have more.  I dropped it off with my long-arm quilter friend this week!

I also pulled this out and put the blocks together.

I had a lot of star blocks to catch up with so I got them done and then decided to add another row.  I am on the last appliqué block and still need two more stars.  I am thinking about the border...I was going to go shop for a border fabric but I'm thinking a simple red border with a purple vine and leaves might add to the overall look.  Of course that's a lot more appliqué but I've really enjoyed working with the red and purple.  I have a lot of red leftover so it'd be a good way to use it up!  It's a fun quilt, don't you think??  What would you do with the border??

My twilight garden center is all ready to finish up.  I pressed the last border into place and it's now just waiting for me to finish the sewing!  Such an amazing quilt, I think!

One might conclude that I'm an appliqué-er but that'd be inaccurate.  I'm not great at it but good enough.  I do enjoy it, in all honesty.  The "A" word is not a bad word, in my world!

Hope you are all healthy and have a great weekend.

Be safe, be kind and be grateful.

xxxx

Randy