All the HSTs for the Leader & Ender quilt have been made. After it all, I ended up with 256, which will give me a quilt that 64 inches before borders. That’s not to shabby if I do say so myself.

That also means that it’s now gone from L&E quilt into the regular rotation.

And that I needed a new L&E project. I had just the thing. It involved cutting up some leftover white-on-white pieces into five inch squares. And gathering a pile of 2.5 scraps.

But that’s done, and now I’m ready to rock. Or snowball…

That’s right… simply snowball opposite corners. Then place those two blocks together like so…

And repeat many, many times… and you get a quilt top that looks something like this:

Mom shared that pic with me the other week after if popped up in her facebook feed. I immediately knew it was going to be my next L&E quilt. I only have enough of the white fabric for a baby blanket. But that’s ok. It will keep me going for a while anyway.

Here’s where my other projects are at:

• Cluckin’ Eh! – Sewing those adorable chicks
• Spinwheels – Sewing pinwheels still
• Around the World in 256 Days – getting ready to sew all those HSTs together.
• Shave and a Haircut – Blocks done, ready for sashing
• Homecoming quilt – Waiting for round 6!
• L&E quilt – As you see above

One thing I’ve been trying to do the last few years is knit from the stash, and only the stash (with the exception of socks, because sometimes you just NEED self-striping sock yarn).

I’ve never been much for knitting with lace-weight. While I love the feel of the finished object, I just don’t enjoy the feeling of the knitting. As such, I don’t have a lot of lace-weight yarn in the stash. But there is some. Including a few ball of these

The Kidsilk Haze (colour is Meadow) was bought for a particular shawl. But once I started knitting it – I HATED the pattern. I ended up wasting a whole ball of it (because mohair doesn’t frog well) and the rest go relegated to the dark recesses of the stash. The Crystal Palace Kid Merino was bought on a whim – it was on sale, and I liked the colours. I think my intention was to mix it with a fingering weight something… but then I remembered I hate knitting with two yarns at once. Into the back of the stash it went.

But the other day, I was rooting around in there for something (I don’t even remember what now), and they came to my hand. And I thought… I’ve always wanted a fuzzy lace-weight wrap. Why not now?

So I cast on.

Nothing fancy… just a whole lot stitches and some feather and fan, alternating yarns every two rows. I’m not loving the knitting (It’s like knitting with fuzzy sewing thread)… but the fabric is creates really is quite nice.

That said, this is definitely going to be a long-term project. I’m making the commitment to knit a minimum of four rows on it each day. Slow but steady… and one day…one day I will finally have a lace-weight wrap.

That is…

… if Burton doesn’t claim it first.

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I’m starting to think Rupert is part hibernating bear.

Of course – I can’t say I blame him. We got hit with about 10 inches of snow over the weekend. Then another 15, Monday night into Tuesday. Then another inch or so yesterday. With more expected today. And possibly more on the weekend. I guess that’s what I get for saying January was pretty mild…

Hey Rupert… is there room in there for me too?

This week’s prompt is wonky stars… and while I’m very excited to finally be making stars for this quilt (as you know, stars are my FAVOURITE!), I’m in a bit of a conundrum.

This is where we last saw the quilt…

It’s 54″ wide (and tall) right now. So here’s my conundrum. Do I keep going around and make it wider and taller, or do I only add to the top and bottom? Or just the top, and save the bottom for next week!

So… I’ve decided to not decide. As least until next week.

I’m going to wait to see what next week’s prompt is, and decide if I’ll work the two together, or apart.

In the meantime, I thought I’d share Mom’s Round Robin quilt so far. She’s been sewing along too, she just doesn’t blog any more so it’s up to me to show it off!

So different from mine! I love all her scrappy colours. And those “migrating geese“! I’m going to have to try some of those. And lets not forget those sweet hearts in the corners.

I haven’t done much applique… but maybe I should start!

And then she added her wonky stars…

Fabulous!

As mentioned on Monday, with Dave’s socks done, I cast on for a new pair. My Sister-in-Law’s birthday is mid-March, so I wanted to get something done and ready to be mailed by the first week of March.

You may recall, I bought a pile of Knit Picks Felici last year, intending to make socks for my brother’s whole family for Christmas. That didn’t happen (I ended up making lots of other things, so it was all good). But I figured I might as well use the yarn to make their Birthday Presents THIS year.

This colourway is called Hamburger. And I don’t know why… as soon as I saw it, it made me think of my SIL. I think these will give her a real giggle. The red/brown at the top is Alley Cat, whichI’m going to use for heels and toes… it seemed to work well with the tone of the other colours, so I’m running with it.

Although there’s nothing wrong with a plain striped sock, I wanted something that would keep my interest more, so I’m knitting my The Socks are Lava pattern. I like the way they make the stripe dip.

I’m actually further along than the picture shows. That’s just what I knit up in the first night. The pattern, combined with the stripes make this pair so much fun. And the yarn feels great too… Every time I knit with Felici, I want to go out and buy a pile more!

But, I shall resist!….

Maybe.

After we sold that pile of quilts last year, I invested some of the profits back into more fabric – specially stuff for baby/kids blankets. One of those purchases was a cute little fat quarter pack of some adorable zebras.

I also bought a bolt of solid black fabric, so I knew just what to do. It involved making A LOT of HSTs…

With chain piecing, and my handy-dandy HST trimming tool, they went pretty quick. Then it was just a matter of laying them out,and sewing them up. And that took no time at all!

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What a fun little quilt this turned out to be! And of course, I’ve got the perfect backing for it too…

It’s not flannel, but it’s too perfect to pass up.

Oh, Burton want you to know, he’s black and white like a zebra too! Just fluffier… so that makes him EXTRA special!

Happy Monday following Valentine’s! It also happens to be a holiday here (Family Day), so it’s a nice, lazy way to cap off a cold, snowy weekend. I’ll probably do some sewing today, but in the meantime, I figured I better show off Dave’s finished socks.

The pattern is Walking with Emma, and it’s a great unisex sock with multiple options. The yarn is Alley Cat BFL I dyed up in “man colours” just for Dave. It’s a nice denim blue with a whole range of shades.

It does obscure the cables a touch, but they do show up better once stretched out on a foot.

And now that these are off the needles, I’ve cast on again…. for ANOTHER pair of socks. But I promise, these ones are more fun and will just fly off the needles. Details in a couple of days.

Happy Valentine’s! It’s cold and snowy here (we got a good dumping on Friday and Saturday), so we’re staying warm and cuddled up inside. And really, can you think of a better way to spend Valentine’s day?

Relic… I said INSIDE!!! The snow is not going to go away just because you wanted Spring for Valentine’s day! And it’s not going to go away no matter how many times you go back outside just to check.

Sigh…

You’ll be happy to know that I did find my knitting mojo and finished Dave’s socks in plenty of time.

That and a pile of candy made up his gift. We’ve never gone crazy for Valentines, much preferring small gestures. We generally don’t even go out for dinner (too busy, too expensive). But we decided this year, we’ll splurge and order in.

We hope your day is sweet too!

I was feeling like the barbershop quilt had been a little neglected, so I sat down and put together some more blocks.

They are really neat blocks, done with strip sets. And once those sets are sewn together the blocks go really fast. As a reminder, here’s the tutorial I used.

They went together so fast, that I got all but four blocks together before calling it quits for the day. And those last four will be whipped up in no time. Since I’m close to having them all done, I have to make some decisions about layout.

Right now, I’m really leaning towards a plain navy sashing between each block. They are so busy, I think it will help to break things up a bit, so they eye can focus better. It will also help to make the quilt bigger. Each block is about 10.5 inches, so with sashing and borders, this will be a good lap-sized quilt when finished.

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Burton’s Murder Mitts get progressively more murder-y