ar 28: Just wanted to get out awhile. Decided to browse a local quilt shop. Got enough fabric to make the entire Silly Gilly quilt. Love the positive affirmations. Who doesn't need those? 
Mar 29: Woke up mulling over this fabric. I purchased 2 panels & now know I want to use just one. Went to dinner with my some friends & showed them the fabric. They claimed the project for a 1 year little girl at church who has stolen their hearts. Played with designs all day. Unable to sleep, I came up with many more.
Mar 30: My friends selected a design from the dozens I showed them.
Apr 01: Bought the extra coordinating fabrics that were available: teal, orange & pink. Can't wait to start cutting  & piecing.
Apr 02: I am going to try the impossible. It is 4 PM. The birthday party is Saturday at 6 PM. Let's see how far I get by then. By 8 PM I had a nap, fussy cut 52 3.25" squares & started piecing 5 of the what I am calling the alpha blocks. Worked until I finished alpha blocks.
Apr 03: Did all the cutting. The colored blocks are pieced and squared. 
Apr 04: Finished squaring all the blocks. Joined the rows. Hoping to finish piecing the top in time for the party so my friends can show what their gift will be. After that, I will get back to normal & finish this in queue sequence. Center is done. Adding borders. Quilt top is finished 1 hour before the party. Or so I thought. I called my friend to tell her the top was finished only to learn the party was really at 2 PM. All for nothing. She could have called and told me. So I apologize to everyone for spending so much time on this project this week. I am disheartened to put ti very mildly.
Dec 26: Finally got back to this, pieced the backing & loaded it for quilting. Using Warm & White batting, Bottom Line Silver thread and Lil Hands N Feet panto by Patricia Ritter. Thinking that all the cartoon hands & feet need a bit of balance with reality. Quilted. Kinda neat that the hands & feet show up as fingers & toes.
Jan 05: Made & attached the binding.
Feb 02: This quilt now has a child, namely Lisa's 18 month. old grandson.
​Feb 13: Binding finished. 
​Feb 23: Delivered--kept getting snowed in.

Mar 26: Fabric arrived today. Already had the panto design worked out. Didn't know until I read a note in the package that there is no backing . Also didn't know Diane wants monopoly thread front & back. Hmmm. I was not expecting any piecing in what I received but there are two seams that are horribly drawn up--not something I can work with. Things are not looking promising at the moment. Diane is unavailable for a a couple of weeks.
Apr 09: Diane is back. She has ordered some backing. We have a tentative thread selection. She is sending me a sample of the fabric. Perhaps the answer is to stabilize it before seaming or quilting it. I will redo the seams (I hope) and test the thread(s). Hoping for the best.
Apr 13: Working with a fabric sample. I was able to make a nice seam & quilt a couple of rows. I did not care for how it looked so I sent that sample to Diane for a close-up look.
Apr 23: Got word that Diane wants me to quilt this like my sample & so I will. She has re-ordered the backing from Fabric.com (who graciously allowed her to return the first order earlier when things didn't look promising.)
Apr 29: The backing fabric is here. I removed two lines of stitching with very thick thread & some stitching with nylon/poly thread. Re-seamed & pressed. Ready to load. 
Apr 30: Finished prep ... well, not the bobbins.
May 01: Since I have enough King Tut #951 Brooklet to wind matching bobbins, I have done so. Loaded ready to baste. To say this is not square is an under statement.
May 02: Finally made myself start quilting this. Problems with thread breaks & bobbins & skipped stitches plagued me until I slowed down the machine. I always run it slow but very slow seams to work this project. Quilted -- not perfect but the best I could do. Pressing helped close the holes. Will ship Monday.
May 30: Diane sent photos of her finished project. Posted one above.

Mar 02: First contact.
Mar 26: Quilt arrived along with 4 panto ideas. Been playing with & responding to those ideas.
Mar 27: Settled on Soap Flakes.
Apr 19: Did an EQ7 quilt rendition & overlay. Silver thread & Density 1.25.
Apr 20: Quilting.
Apr 21: Quilted.

Mar 22: First contact. WV logo panto. Learned it is called "the flyijng WV". Using wool batting.
Mar 26: Quilt arrived. Still need to select thread color & density.
Apr 17: Started prepping. Vacuumed trash off the backing. Trimmed threads (lots of them) off the back of the top so the dark threads will not show through the white sections.
Apr 18: Quilting. On point square blocks against the WV makes for some interesting geometries I wasn't expecting. Change "interesting" to unacceptable. At Karen's request, I have removed the stitching while she is considering an alternative pattern. Decided to do a quilt rendition so I could audition lots of patterns and densities. Don't know if it helped ... I asks Karen about her blocks -- ha! turns out she made up her quilt top pattern. As I studied it, I realized all the blocks are the same, just turned differently. Very interesting and very nice effect.
Apr 19: Fast Splash is the chosen pattern. Quilting. More pics in the morning.
Apr 20: Final pics.

Mar 23: Elizabeth Perez (daughter of Eddunio Gomez)  and her family stopped by announcing they wanted a quilt made for her young boys who were nearby playing quietly but energetically. When he spotted my !!!Happy Fourth of July!!! quilt & loved it as much as I do, it was settled. We would make a much smaller one. I would start searching for fabrics & she would come back to make a selection. I told her if I could find a matching jelly roll & layer cake in patriotic colors, that would make the fabric selection easy. Searched all afternoon but didn't have any success finding pre-cuts or similar fabrics. Kept finding duck cloth and seersucker. Aarghh!! 
Mar 24: Elizabeth & I worked together for several hours looking online for fabric. When I noticed some of our selections were Northcott Stonehenge fabrics, I focused on those. When I searched wider, we found precut strips and a fat quarter bundle. We were set. She picked a cute backing fabric featuring pirates & we placed the orders. I had already drawn the quilt in EQ7 some months ago so we just had to pop in some of our fabrics to get an idea of how it might look. The real quilt won't be so repetitive. Now all I need is time. Oh, and I get to use Eagles On High again!
Mar 27: Pre-cuts are here. Includes a beautiful panel.
Mar 30: Pirate backing and inner border fabrics are here.
May 10: And now after a week of planning, we have a final plan for the quilt top.

May 03: Started working on the stars. Need to make a template. First effort not so good but know now what to try next.
May 04: Working on those stars. Nasty little innocent looking little blocks. Cut the templates for the stars.
May 05-07: Continuing work on the stars. Stars & their backgrounds are cut out ready to sew.
May 08-09: Working on stripe blocks &  on the sashing & cornerstones that complete the star blocks. I can't imagine doing this project with the fabric constraints without EQ7 to give me an evolving idea of the total look.
May 10: We have a plan: Q7.
May 11: Piecing the stripe blocks.
May 12: Finished the stripe blocks after planning a 2nd quilt for another day.
May 14: Piecing the star blocks.
May 14: One down, 11 to go. I have to do better than several hours on one star to make everything fit together nicely. 4 more blocks mostly complete.
May 20: After several days, the star blocks are finally done. The blocks are assembled & the inner border is on.
May 21: Quilt top is finished.
May 22: Need 1.5 more yards of backing. Ordered.
May 29: The rest of the backing fabric is here.

Jun 21: Programmed IQ. Loading.
Jun 22: Loaded and quilting. Using Bottom Line Ivory thread. Very hard to show the quilting on such busy fabrics but I'm trying.
Jun 23: Quilted. Made the binding using the pirates fabric. It is all I have left. Ready to attach it & then start the hand work.
Jun 24: Attached binding. Ready for hand work.
Jul 09: Binding is finished.

Mar 03: First Contact.
Mar 11: Quilt arrived. Pattie is thinking wool batting and Magnifico thread.
Mar 12: Thread: Magnifico #2112 Arabesque.
Mar 26: Quilt rendition and overlays. Quilting will be loose to allow the batting room to expand.
Mar 28: Started prepping,
Mar 29: More prepping. And testing--Wool, Magnifico, much larger needle, stiff backing fabric quite different from using Bottom Line with cotton & similar weight front and back fabrics. All set to quilt tomorrow after I finish loading. I won't take long.
Mar 30: Not a productive day but the quilt is loaded and basted. So sorry but Vertigo and no sleep last night has me in slow motion today.
Mar 31: Quilting. After first full row, Pattie & I are trying to see if we need to add anything to fill in the largest open space. Decided to add 1 small flower. Easy to say. Three hours later, I quilted the first row.
Apr 01: Quilted.
Apr 02: It has been awhile since I documented the final roll & basting of a quilt. Posted final pictures. Shipping today.

Feb 22: First contact on this quilt.
Mar 04: Quilt arrived. Using African Samba pattern.
Apr 08: Prepped & ready to load. Quilting.
Apr 09: Quilted.