Unidentified Bag in the Closet

I was looking for something in my UFO closet today and found this in the far back corner.

 

A really small bag with some fabric in it.  Huh?!  When did I put that in there.  I don't remember any of it LOL!

 

I opened up the bag and found some all blue 16-patches.  I vaguely remember these . . . . and some other squares and a piece of paper.

 

There is a patter from the 2008-2009 guild year for snowballs along with squares to cut them out using the stitch and flip method.  Hmmm.  Starting to remember this more now.  I sort of remember thinking to match the 16-patches up with some snow-ball blocks to make a scrap quilt.  It must have seemed like a good idea at the time because I packaged it all up for another day.

But, I must have had this idea before I understood quilting math very well LOL!  You see, those white squares are 2.5" and they will not match up with the 2" cut squares in the 16-patches.  I will end up with the HST not aligning with the squares.  This wouldn't bother some people, and I don't think it would have bothered me 5-6 years ago when i put this leaders and enders project away; but, this would really bother me now - silly I know but it would!

 

I remembered the snowball die that Accuquilt sent me and pulled it out.  This is a cool die that cuts all the shapes so that you have no trimming to do after you piece.  I like that!  Maybe I will play with the large blue squares and this die and make a snowball project.

I like the concept I had for a 16-patch, snowball quilt but I really don't like the values I chose here.  I think this would be MUCH better if the snowballs were white and the tips were blues, and, the right size for me ;-)  I think that would make a cool secondary pattern with nice contrast.

So, I think what I found was in fact not one but two little projects in my UFO closet.  Sigh!  How can one little bag hold so much stuff!?

New Years Day Quilting

Happy New Year everyone!

I hope that you all had a great and safe New Years celebration and that, if you're in this area, kept warm!  It was -35 C today and that is COLD!

I spent New Years day as I did a couple of years ago making the Merry Mayhem's New Years Day Mystery quilt.  They gave us the first clue well ahead of time to do the prep work, and, when I saw that it was scrappy I JUMPED in with both feet to get rid of some scraps.  So, I spent New Years Day piecing this.

It used up so many small scraps out of my 2.5" strip bin and that made me very, very happy.  Between that and my other 2.5" strip project the bin is almost empty!! :-o  I know shocking.  Since I, frankly, had no need or place for this quilt I thought that it might be nice to donate it; so, now that the quilt is completely finished: it is quilted and bound and off to Victoria's Quilts to go to someone in need of comfort.  I know that the borders are uneven but I added them to bring the quilt up to the size that they like which, for this chapter is 50" x 70"

 

Here is a close-up of the quilting.  I used my Loricles Baptist Fan board again and I love the effect it gives - it makes the quilt look so vintage!  I backed it in a plaid homespun flannel out of my stash - yey!  It is quilted in 40 weight YLI cotton thread top and bobbin.  It went very smoothly and I think that the quilting really adds to the quilt.

So, what do you think?  Will this quilt make someone happy?

Do you plan on any charity quilting this year?