A better year......

Yes, I've been a terrible blogger by not posting.  I just haven't done much that I feel like sharing, or am just not in the mood to post......such is life. 2018-2022 were struggles with family illness/death, moving my mother twice to more care within the last 1 1/2 years, several hospital visits for her, but I'm determined 2023 will better. Christmas week we got my mother settled into the memory care building of her retirement community - she likes the smaller community so it will be a good move for her. The last straw in assisted living was her brawling in the dining room - a little dramatic but pushing someone with her wheelchair was her demise. Have to laugh about it now. 

When I had time in the fall I was working on gifts but alas, I forgot to take pictures of them so I could share them here.  Oh well.....some sewing, some knitting, some cross stitch. I'm still working on cross stitch in the evenings - I've been shopping in my own cupboard for small kits, many Shepherd's Bush, that I bought years ago. 

The past 2 years or so I've been collecting small bits of fabric for a quilt for the guest room bed.  It's a trundle bed but I want the quilt to cover the entire bed when the lower bed is brought up.  I started on it 2 days ago. 

Here are strips of fabric cut at varying sizes from 1 14" to 2".   There are 38 different fabrics plus the dark charcoal gray background.  I'm afraid tables in the sewing room will look like this until the project is finished which means I won't be working on any other projects at the machine until it's done - basically the thought of packing it all away to work on something else is overwhelming.  I'm hoping I have plenty of fabric, I've only cut a very small amount of it so far. There were 3 other fabrics I had but they got culled for being too gray. 

Here is the first block.  It actually consists of 4 triangles.  It's around 13".   This is sewn on paper to keep the bias edges from stretching out of shape. I've pulled the paper out from behind the charcoal gray but the rest will wait until it's sewn to squares around it. 

And this is what it looks like when 4 blocks are finished (16 triangles) - it created a spider web of sorts, an octagon. I'm loving the look. I looked at 2 different patterns, one in a magazine, one a free pattern online, to come up with my final design.

I will try to do better posting and I actually may have some fun projects to share since I know 2023 is going to be a better year - I'm determined to have more time to spend being creative.

I wish you all a peaceful and safe new year.