Wow.  I did very little marking on the block that I completed today so it was nearly all free hand but it still took a lot longer than I remembered.  I started the morning off by watching Patrick Lose look aghast that the guest on Love of Quilting this morning didn’t technically sew down all her applique – she tacked it in the corners and let the long armer finish sewing it on.  Honestly the look on his face was priceless!

Once that was done, I finished sewing the 8th block for the machine quilting block party so at least I’m caught up on that now which is a step in the right direction.

I don’t know if anyone heard me, but I practically yelled out “I love this 12″ Qube from AccuQuilt!” when I was able to cut out the 25 pieces above using 3 different dies in the same Qube – the 4 3/4″ for the center square on point (and they also have a 3.5″ and 6.5″ square in the same set) and then the 3.5″ x 6.5″ for the 4 flying geese, and then the 3.5″ half square triangles.  It’s a little pricey but it has sure worth its weight in gold to me.

I basted 3 of the 4 blocks that I had finished piecing since yesterday and then I was ready to quilt.  Now I remember why I have such a hard time with these.  Unless I’m just missing something in the downloaded PDF, there’s not a finished picture of the quilting from the top so that I can see what it looks like. I had started by just printing out 1 page of the quilting pattern, thinking I would just shift it around as I moved through each quadrant, but my mind couldn’t visualize the finished product.

I finally printed out all 4 pages and taped them together, then put some dots as needed on the block.  I’ll have to put an iron to that orange-blue-green block after I print out 4 pages for it.

I should actually group these just 3 across since the finished quilt will be 3 across and 4 down but this picture makes for a more even picture.

It’s 4:30 and really what I got done today was sewing the block for August, basted 3 and quilted 1.  Oh and I went swimming in the middle of all of that and other non-house cleaning tasks!  I don’t know what on earth made me think I’d get through quilting 3 of those today.

I’m doing my best to resist the urge to cut out the Christmas quilt I have in mind and get through the rest of this quilting first!