Yippee

Last year, 2020, was an unusual year to say the least. My summer in Maine was delayed because I could not cross the border until the end of June unless I quarantined. I had to buy groceries so I delayed my summer. Gardens were overgrown and beyond hope. It was discouraging. Then I decided to sell and one of my daughters bought the property. It was a quick move and I was back in N. H. on August 31st. Combining two houses into one was interesting. Some of my “stuff” is still in Maine in the garage to be sold at a yard sale next summer.

After I settled in, I decided to work on Dear Jane. Row A and row B had been completed and I thought that I would sew them into the main body of the quilt. But, they were missing. Did I leave them in Maine or are they in the N. H. house?

Since September I have been checking and organizing every cupboard and bin. My fabric is neatly organized and I know where most thing are now. The rows were still missing. I have just three places to look.

The pile of batting. I had found another missing piece in the batting pile before.

The bins of wall hangings, and the dreaded attic. If they were up there, they would never be found. It’s to cold to go up there now for a search.

I took two bins of wall hangings down. As I was checking them, I decided to divide the wall hangings into two piles, hand quilted and machine quilted. The last wall hanging in one of the bins was a green piece that I made last year for March – St. Patrick’s day. As I started to pull it out to put it into the machine quilted pile, I noticed another piece inside with circles. What joy!!! It was the missing Dear Jane rows.

Now, another puzzle. How did they get there? Why were those two pieces together in that bin? The answer was simple when I looked back into the pictures on my iPhone. I took pictures of the two pieces the same day in May. I must have folded both up and put them away in the wall hanging bin not noticing that Dear Jane was in the middle of the wall hanging. Dear Jane never did go to Maine with me last summer like I thought.

I’m attaching the rows to the main body of the quilt so that I won’t loose them again. I’m working on the blocks that are missing in the upper right. When they are finished, there will be just three more rows to make. Of course, there are the triangles that go all around the outside. This is a long, long, term project.

I’ve finished the second row of the pandemic round robin quilts. This row had to have a cross.

The gold is darker on this row. This fabric was dyed in an Ombre dyeing class. As I go out, the gold will be darker in each row. It’s a happy, unintended, design element.

I have to pay attention to value with the black and white.

One of my UFOs. It was a sample for my mile a minute class. The mile a minute blocks were cut into quarters and an inch sashing was inserted. The block is the same size as it was when I started. The inch insertion is fun to do. I’m quilting the UFOs using the chapters in Angela Walter’s book, Background fillers. This was the second chapter. Loopy meander. I finally figured out how to do it by the time I finished. It’s not my favorite background filler, but I might use it in another piece.

I think that I’ve figured out how to finish all my UFOs. Have fun, learn something new when finishing them, and just get them done.

Have a great day and happy quilting.