The other day I was up early for a work call, and then found myself free for the rest of the day. Of course, I decided to sew.

I wasn’t in the mood to work on any of my current projects, and I had an empty project box. I wanted something mindless. Well not mindless… there really is no mindless sewing (not like knitting) – but something simple… and quick.

I had two charm packs squirreled away with plans to use them to make a disappearing nine patch.

It took about an hour to fiddle with combinations, and  I finally ended up with six cheerful nine patches, ready to be chopped up and reassembled.

And that’s when things went off the rails… in the best way.

I decided that I didn’t want to do the usual (chop them in quarters, flip the pieces around, and then sew them back together). I wanted something different… but it DEFINITELY wasn’t mindless.

I did chop them into quarters. But instead of sewing them back together, I created four separate piles. I took those piles to the design bed, and spent the next hour or so moving them around to create the perfect layout. Then sashing and cornerstones were added, a couple of borders, and voila!

A colourful lap quilt (40″x 52″) perfect to chase away the January blahs. And another one for the to-quilt pile

I’ve got this crazy patchwork piece for the back, and some nice sunshiny yellow for the binding. I better get up to Mom’s soon!

Here we are, officially a month from Valentine’s Day…

And these sad little rows of ribbing are all I have to show for the second Hamilton sock.

I generally only knit in the evenings (day time is saved for day job and sewing), and there hasn’t been a lot going on. Work got crazy again, so I’m usually too zonked by the time the sun goes down. When I have had enegery for the needles, I’ve been working on the poncho.

Still… I have a month to finish this poor second sock. It’s more than enough time. If I actually work on it. I may have to put a row minimum on this, just like the poncho.  Gotta get those stitches in!

And now for a post about that second new quilt I told you about last week….

In late 2019 I added a few charm packs to a Missouri Star order, one of which was Moda’s Safari Life

And on my last trip to Lens, I picked up a remnant of aqua fabric what was just perfect to pair with it.

I chopped it up into 5″ squares to pair with the charm pack and set to making HSTs. Now, I love HSTs – they are easy to make and so versatile… but…

Trimming them to size is soooooo tedious. And there were 64 of them! Still, I stuck with it and after what seemed like ages, they were all ready to put into the final layout.

A simple, but effective chevron pattern. It’s one I’ve wanted to try for quite some time. Once it was all sewn together, it was a little smaller than I wanted, so I dug into the stash for something for a simple border. The only thing I had in the right quantity was some marble fabric leftover from Dave’s quilt. It did the job, and brought the final size out to a respectable 39 inches square.

Some time in the near future, I’ll get up to Mom’s and get quilting…

… and it will be finished off with more of the aqua fabric for the binding, and these cute flannel lions on the back.

And if you’re wondering about the title for this post… it’s inspired by a silly song from a silly site. Enjoy!

I have no finished quilts to show this week, because I didn’t make it up to Mom’s this weekend. Instead, I went to visit Sam and her wonderful family for our annual holiday get-together. We were supposed to do it a couple weeks before Christmas, but the weather interfered. As both our schedules were too full after that,  this was the first opportunity we had to see each other.

But I’m soooo glad we waited because…

THEY GOT A NEW PUPPY this weekend!!!!!!! Meet Calibre (Cali for short), the cutest little Beagle ever born. She’s only 10 weeks old and soooooo tiny!

That’s her beside Sam’s hand. And Sam does not have big hands. She’s just a wee little thing.

And so full of energy. It was hard to get a picture of her when she was awake.

And sleeping… well she’ll just melt your heart. You may or may not know, but Sam’s already got a full house – two labs (Dozer and Moose), and three cats (Ezra, Ruby and Marlin), and though Cali has only been there a short time, they are all adjusting very well.

As long as Cali doesn’t get too pushy! And of course, as long as the boys still get plenty of the attention they so deserve.

And as cute as wee Cali is, I don’t envy Sam and her early morning  outside pee sessions…

I’ll definitely stick to cat. At least they potty in a box!

The poncho is progressing. But as a snail’s pace… or at least that’s how it feels.

I don’t have a big enough spot on the floor to lay it out for you (and it’s too darn muddy outside… aren’t we supposed to have snow in January?? It feels like April right now), so here it is folded up on the couch.

That little blue/green line is them middle point (and eventual neckline). As you can see, I’m only a few inches further from where I last showed it to you. And I’ve got lots and lots of inches to go.

She was much neglected over the holiday, but I’m back to trying to put at least four rows on her each night. I’d love to have her done by the end of January, but I think that’s probably too ambitions. Maybe by March… ?

The other day I mentioned a couple new projects on the go. The first is a birthday quilt for my sister-in-law, Jenn.

When I saw Paisley over New Year’s, I asked her for her help picking out fabrics for a quilt for her Mom.

She chose this  collection (Moon Shadow), which I had in 10″ squares

I then went to work finding a pattern, and finally settled on Quatrefoil.

Normally, when I make a quilt, I usually build it one block at a time. But for this quilt, it made more sense to build some units first… ie, all those four patches.

That’s 80 of them… it took me all afternoon, but it was worth it. Now I have to snowball 80 squares to make the “petals” of each block, but that will have  to wait for another afternoon.

Still… I couldn’t resist doing just enough to complete just one block…

This is going to be a fun one!

Make the bed is always a bit of a chore, but making the bed with a cat…

Well now that’s a challenge!