New Orleans House Project

Saturday, March 14, 2020

Fabric Therapy When We Really Need It!

It's been a crazy week, for sure! 

I've been relying on sewing, reading, and binge-watching shows from streaming services to keep down the stress levels.  

One of my goals this year is to make lots of quilt-oriented Christmas gifts.  To that end, I pulled out a well-aged jelly roll (Flurry by Kate Spain) and looked for some inspiration.
I'm not a fan of jelly roll pre-cuts - I think they're too limiting - but I really liked this fabric line, and the jelly roll was ON SALE!  Once I settled on a pattern recipe (this type of pattern is all over the internet), it didn't take long to sub-cut the fabric strips and assemble all the parts.  The border fabric also came from the stash - a Moda Grunge called Sugar Cookie.

I love the crisp, colorful look of the fabrics.  They're festive, but don't scream "Christmas".  Not sure who the lucky recipient will be, but I've made a start on my goal.

I've been making Carolina Chain blocks as a leader-ender project this year.  The Flurry quilt needed lots of leader-enders, so...
I chopped up lots of teal and aqua fabrics, as that's the theme for this month's Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  This is just a few of the RSC blocks; I think I'm actually going to end up with enough blocks for two quilts by the end of the year.

I've been working on hand-stitching the binding on this quilt (English Garden by Kaye England).  I decided to get 'er finished this week and dialed up Season 3 of The Crown (Netflix) to keep me entertained while I stitched.  I finished the binding and hanger, just need to appliqué the label and the quilt will be finished.  Pictures soon.

One of my favorite forms of escapist reading is mystery/detective stories.  I think it comes from my childhood love for Nancy Drew.  I've read many different authors over the years and I love finding a new-to-me author with a series of mysteries that capture my imagination.  My latest find is the Tess Monaghan series by Laura Lippman.  Tess is a private investigator in Baltimore, Maryland and I think I enjoy the descriptions of Baltimore (a city much like New Orleans) as much as the detective adventures!

Stay safe out there, everyone!