Nine Patch One Patch Borders

Here are the borders for my Nine Patch One Patch. I think this will work. These are just laying on the design wall, but I overlapped them so that I could see how the finished product would look. With just the first cream, it seemed too large for the center, but now I think this looks fine.

I hope to finish my laundry and sew these on tonight.

~Joan

Fall Decorations

My fall decorations this year are not so grand. But I like them. The following picture is my mantel. I got the picture in the middle from my mom when she moved. I've always liked it. I can see that it should be hanging higher. I'll fix that later.


Here is a close-up of the right side. On the mantel are a few of my favorite things. The ceramic pumpkin and flower arrangement was a secret sister gift to me in 2006. I yearn to put it out each year. It is sitting on top of my newly-finished wool candle mat. I loved making this. Some time I'll put it on our island in the kitchen or on the table. For now it lives on the mantel.

The plate says..."Thank you for the food before us, Thank you for the friends beside us, Thank you for the love between us". To my horror, it got chipped while it was stored in the attic. I touched it up with a little acrylic paint. No one has noticed so far!!

On this side is a little autumn greenery, some fabric pumpkins, an old-fashioned-looking pumpkin candle, and my scarecrow shelf sitter. My son (thanks, Luke) made it possible for the scarecrow to sit securely on the mantel. I appreciate his help so much!


This is the view as soon as you enter our home. I have fond memories of making the "Fall Frolic" quilt on the wall. It's one of my favorites, and oh, so scrappy.

This mirror is to the right when you enter our home. Just an orange berry and tiny pumpkin bedecked swag.

This is the shelf to the left. Just a few additions to our normal look.

That's about it, with the exception of a fall table runner (my favorite table runner we have) and three fall quilts in the living room. Long gone are the days when I'm envious of those show houses where there are touches of holiday decorations everywhere. We have what we have, and I'm grateful!!

I took a box of decorations to church for the ladies to look through and take home. That is a big step for me in uncluttering!!

~Joan

Latest, But Not New

This is from last week some time. I did not post the picture at that time, and I can't remember why. It might have had something to do with sleeping all day Friday and Saturday, under the influence of seasonal allergy gunk. I also have put on the first inner border. But that is not in the picture.

After I finished all my 9-patches, I realized that the header of the quilt needed to be 10 inches wider. I am adding a set of border strips that will add up to 12 inches on the other three sides, so I guess I could have just added them to that side as well. I wanted the top of the quilt (where the pillows would go) to be different than the other 3 sides. The way this is, the top of the quilt LOOKS different, so that differentiates it from the foot. Clever, huh?

~Joan

NPOP Progress

Here is a close-up of the side of my NPOP quilt. I am so close to having the center of the top put together. I still feel quite horrid, but if I can't talk or swallow w/o pain, I can still piece, right?

Most of the fabrics for this are from the load I bought from my sister. She had a box of scraps from which I gleaned most of these lovelies. The purple setting fabric is also from her.

Here is the whole top so far. I did two more rows since the picture was taken...so close to being finished. I love it when I really like a quilt even if it wasn't totally planned from the beginning.

As I was piecing this, more scraps came to my notice. I have a sudden desire to make a two-color quilt (I'm thinking cream and red, blue, brown, or green). If you have a favorite two-color quilt, please send me a picture of it. It will be scrappy (duh), and I favor traditional patterns and fairly small pieces. Thanks in advance!

Off to put in a few more stitches...

~Joan

NPOP Starting Down The Final Stretch

I am pretty sure it's the seasonal stuff, but I don't feel well. Sore throat, body aches, and a low-grade fever. Yuck. Oddly enough, my daughter that is acting as live-in help for another family has the exact same symptoms. She texted me this AM to let me know she wasn't feeling well. I took her over some cough drops, tissues, cold medicine, and chicken soup. Maybe I got it from her??

I had to wait for two loads of laundry to process, so even though I didn't want to do anything but sleep, I started putting the rows of my Nine-Patch One-Patch together. (for those of you who are new to my blog, you can click on anything underlined in a different color, and it will take you to all the past posts or links on that subject). I decided on a light-ish purple Thimbleberries for the setting triangles and one of the borders and the binding. Refer to the original picture to see the pattern. I chose purple because the room where this will be used is painted purple. I picked out the color myself :)

Here is a picture with one row missing...I happened to have that one in the sewing machine when the picture was taken. This looks like an optical illusion. I had to put some of the blocks slightly on top of their neighbors to make room for all the blocks on my design wall.


Here's a close-up of the purple. I think I'm gonna like it!!

Here's how much I have finished. I didn't do any more because I. am. finished. I need to go sleep, or at least recline in bed.

Just counting the 9-patch blocks with the colors in the corners and center, this is 8 blocks x 10 blocks, on point naturally.

Good night!

~Joan

Cooking Ahead

Tomorrow I will be responsible for preparing a meal for 60. I decided on Sue's Stew (a beef/veggie stew), chicken rice soup, and chicken noodle soup. I made 5 gallons of sweet tea and have Saltine crackers to serve with the meal. There are also 5 pans of dessert, 9" x 13" each.

Thursday I cooked a lot of chicken (boneless skinless breasts and skin and bones on thighs). I cut up all the usable meat and froze it in 2-cup portions. I ended up with 20 cups of cooked meat. I think 4 cups per batch of soup will be plenty, if not too much. I saved the broth to reheat tomorrow, add carrots and celery, and then the meat. Divide in half, noodles in one batch, rice in the other. We have a girl in our church who can't eat any wheat products, so I am making rice for her.

Thursday evening I also cooked up 4 pounds of stew meat (after cutting it into playing-dice-sized pieces) to get a jump start on the beef stew. I cooked that overnight in the slow cooker and added potatoes and carrots to cook a couple hours today. Tomorrow I will reheat it, adding green beans and corn.

Cooking larger batches only takes a few more minutes of preparation and you get so much more out of it.

We had 3 bananas that were nearly bad (perfect for banana bread). Instead of just making a batch of banana bread, I also made a batch of pumpkin bread and 12 muffin tops since it would only take about 10 more minutes. What is left by morning will go into the freezer. I have updated my freezer inventory, so I know exactly what is in there.

Doing all this big batch cooking has renewed my desire to have good and fast meals on hand. I don't use my freezer as much as I should. I want to start doing that again. Many times when all my children were very young, I would cook 18-20 meals at one time and put them in the freezer. That's how I kept my sanity at meal times.

Do you cook ahead? What do you make that freezes well? I have found http://www.lifeasmom.com/ to be a handy resource and inspiration for cooking ahead.

As I was doing all this cooking ahead, it made me wish I had this much ambition every day. I think my lack of ambition is really a combination of poor planning and lack of an attitude of service. I used to love to cook...now it is a chore. I need to find my love of cooking again!!

~Joan

New Bed Skirt

My old bed skirt was one of those things that bothered me...daily. Unfortunately, there are too many of those things in my house. Fortunately, I sewed a new skirt today. I didn't think of taking a pic of the old one. It was cream, stained, and ripped on this side (the side everyone sees when they come in the room). It was perpetually crooked also. It was gathered onto a piece of fabric that was between the mattress and box springs, so it was crooked from the second the mattress was put back on.

I saw this tutorial and decided right then and there that this was the skirt for me. It was incredibly easy to sew and put on. I used the self-adhesive Velcro. I thought it might not be sturdy, but it is on those box springs like white on rice. Very secure. The only hard part was decided which fabric to use. Since I recently bought over 500 yards, that should have been easy...but it wasn't. I think the fabric brings out the stars in the corners of the log cabin blocks on my quilt.

The middle picture shows the faux pleat on the center of the side.

I am about to sew the last side. In this pic this side and the foot of the bed are finished. I've been cleaning/decluttering my bathroom and bedroom yesterday and today. I'm beat. How does all that junk get crammed everywhere?? Don't answer...

~Joan