Back Yard Birds and Starry Sampler

I have been working feverishly to get my blocks made for the 2026 BOM I am in charge of at my Guild.  The Backyard Birds is a Foundation Paper Piecing project while the Starry Sampler is an English Paper Piecing pattern.  We will begin in January and I am just trying to get ahead of the game  to detect any potential areas of concern. I started sign-up at our November meeting and received more sign-ups than I anticipated, so its going to be a fun year in 2026 trying to stay on top of both BOM's. Some guild members signed up for both BOM's, so they are going to be right busy as well :)

 Below is a picture of the blocks I have completed to date.  I have 4 more birds to make and 5 more EPP blocks.

I have decided to hand quilt each of the Starry Sampler blocks as I make them, and so far have only gotten one quilted.  I am using #8 perle cotton thread and big stitch quilting.  I chose a plain unbleached muslin backing so that the black stitching could easily be seen on the back.

I continue to make progress on the Insanity quilt, but it has truly slowed down as most of my effort has gone to the BOM blocks.  I keep my workstation ready to go whenever I sit and watch TV in the evenings.  Must admit though, I neglect it some as I also use that time to respond to Facebook posts and clear out my messages on the phone, as well as my email.    But with that said, I do try to work a little on this every week.

Bloom and Sew - Gail Pan 2025 BOM

 Finished this project on Wednesday. (APIP#2)

Progress as of today

 Well it has been a little over a month since my last update, and it just amazes me how fast these days go by.  I have bought a few Christmas presents now, but just can't seem to get my mind wrapped around the holiday quickly approaching.

APIP#2 - Bloom and Sew; this one is in the final stages.  I am about half way through the hand quilting  and already made the label and have it attached,  My goal is to have ti done by the end of the month, mainly as I have another one ready to start hand quilting.

APIP #17 - Insanity Quilt - Making good progress on this quilt.  I am almost at 50% for the center section.  

APIP #18 - Wrapped in Ribbon table runners.  Two of the three are completed and I am hemming the third one tonight.  I plan to give the two Christmas runners to my daughters at Thanksgiving Dinner and am so glad I was able to get them done in time.  My good friend, Martee, quilted the two for the girls on her long arm machine.  I will show pictures when I give them to the girls.

APIP #20 - Jasine Bag - no progress this past month

APIP #22 - Backyard Birds  - This is a new project I have just started and will be using it as  2026 Block of the Month for my guild (York County Quilters Guild).  I will be in charge of the BOM for next year and am actually planning to have two different BOM's running consecutively.  I have made three of the bird blocks so far and they are made with Foundation Paper Piecing (machine work)  The designer has given me a good price for the guild and will allow me to make 20 copies of the pattern for the guild members who sign up.  Shown below is the pattern picture and the first two blocks I have completed.   I have also finished a cardinal block but for some reason my computer is refusing to let me open my email so that I can get the picture. 

APIP#23 - Starry Sampler - This one is English Paper Pieced and will be the second 2026 BOM that I will be running next year.  It is all hand work and has 16 EPP blocks that are beautiful.  We will only be doing the first 9 in 2026.  Each member participating must go to the webpage for the TJ Designs and down load the pattern in .pdf format.The designer is giving us a guild discount for all participants.  I have made a couple of these blocks trying to stay at least 4 months ahead of group.  Below are pictures of the two blocks I have completed so far and a picture of the pattern.

My computer is simple being aggravating today and I had planned to go into a little more detail on each project, but guess that will have to await a better day.

Bloom and Sew - Gail Pan 2025 BOM

 Top of my list for this post is APIP#2 - Gail Pan 2025 BOM - Bloom and Sew;   So happy to finally have this in my hoop and hand quilting has begun.  I am using the clam shell pattern.  This was one that my Mom used in several of her quilts and I have always liked it.   Each morning I try to get in 2 hours of hand quilting - but sometimes that Insanity Quilt demands my attention.

Speaking of the Insanity Quilt (APIP#17) I continue making steady progress, working on it nearly every day.  I am putting together Row #8 which has 15 diamonds now.  I had to take a couple of days to just cover white and turquoise hexies as I was starting to run out.  I keep a little workstation I can move to my chair in the evenings while watching tv.   This table was made by my brother Michael and is 1 of 3 stacking tables.

I have also made some good progress  on the Wrapped in Ribbons (APIP#18) this week.   I am making three of these table runners ( one for me, one each of my two daughters) and have decided to also make a single star block as a table topper for my kitchen.  This I am doing to use as a sample with my club on how to do the foundation paper piecing.  Getting my supplies together for the meeting Wednesday, Oct 8th, and hopefully will be done with this project by the end of October.

Insanity Quilt

 Well thought I would just start off with my APIP#17 - Insanity by Rhonda Pearce.  I have become obsessed with this quilt and thoroughly enjoying piecing all these little hexies. I have attached my summary progress report as of this morning when I completed Row 7 of 18.  Row 8 will turn the corner for the quilt center and I am sooooooooo anxious to get this row done, but I must put some time in for other projects as well.

APIP#2 - Bloom and Sew; Gail Pan 2025 BOM - I have finally started hand quilting this project.  I am using a clam shell pattern, chosen as this was one of my mother's quilting patterns. This is me at a program yesterday called Patchwork Tales.  It is a community event with story telling and many forms of arts/crafts being demonstrated and displayed.  My guild, York County Quilters, was present for a couple hours in the afternoon displaying various quilts (Crazy Quilts, Art Quilts, Vintage and Traditional) I was demonstrating hand quilting and so enjoyed experience.  Because my quilt was not completed, I was also able to show to all the children the various layers of a quilt and let them feel the soft batting. The children were fascinated by just watching me stitch.  It was a fun afternoon!

APIP#18 - Wrapped Ribbon Table Runner"s" - Quiltworks

I completed one of these table runners in August and reported it finished in my last post.  Well I am teaching this runner to my Stitchin Friends quilt club and have completed a second runner and have a third one cut and ready for a class tomorrow on how to do the cutting.  So I have placed this back on the "in-process" status.

Here is the top I just completed, and yet to quilt.  I am considering machine quilting this one with diagonal lines, with thread color matching the stripes.

That is pretty much all I have accomplished since my last post.  I am enjoying all my projects, and it is good to have some machine work as well as hand work and hand quilting all going at once.  Variety is the spice of life, right?

Wrapped in Ribbon - Quiltworx pattern

 Oh my goodness it has been a month since I last posted and my goal was to post every week. Time is just speeding me by.  

I have started and completed a new project (APIP#18) - Wrapped in Ribbon, a Quiltworx pattern.  I plan to teach this to my Stitchin' Friends quilt club  in September and October meetings.  Making my own I came up with a few "shortcuts" for the pattern, although they do require a little extra preparation.  But hopefully it will be fun for all.  The pattern itself has the paper pieces for two table runners, each with three stars.  The ladies all bought the patterns, but a 4 are sharing it, making one table runner a piece so they needed two patterns and one group of 3 are sharing and making 1 block apiece.  A couple plan to make both table runners and each bought a pattern.

Here is my finished table runner.  All the fabric is from the Stonehenge lines. You can also get a glimpse of my obsession with colored glass bottle.  Once Christmas is over I put out my whole collection of beautiful glass for the winter season.

Other progress since I last posted primarily goes to my Insanity quilt (APIP#17)- which I am enjoying tremendously making. Todate I have completed four rows of the diamonds and almost have the 5th row done - just needs one more diamond.  I have been doing lots of planning, drawing diagrams of how the quilt goes together and designed a progression chart to keep track of how many hexagons I have sewn to the quilt top.  I don't count them until I actually attach them to the top as in the picture shown below 

Finish one start one - so I am starting a new project this morning which will be APIP#20. It is the Jasmine Bag by Katrina Hadjimichael. This is a large bag (14 1/2" x 17 1/2" x 7") and I have had the pattern for awhile now, just kept putting off making the bag.  I will be showing my Underlay Applique technique at the First Friday Guild Sewing day in September and decided to get my applique started on this bag to use as my demo.  This is a picture of the bag I pulled off Katrina's webpage. She does absolutely beautiful patterns that have EPP and Applique and I so love making her designs.  I call the Elegant Whimsy just cause that is what I see in her designs.

I I completed another quilt label (APIP#19).  A fun one to make for the Owl and Hare quilt. I used the image from the pattern sheet for the center embroidery as I though is so cute.

 I am still working a little each week on the Crochet Bright Hope (APIP#14) quilt, crocheting the individual blocks, but the picture of the crochet blocks all look the same so no need to keep showing the same picture.

I also completed my last goody bag Rotary Cutter Bag this month (APIP#16) so that is another completed project off my list.  To date I have 20 projects on my (Active Projects in Process) APIP list, of which 16 have been completed :)  Makes me happy to see completions - some small but still a finish!

July 27 Progress report

 I did not post last Sunday, was just too busy working on stuff and then I forgot to post.  Guess one of those senior moment creeping up on me again.

APIP#1: Meryton Quilt - Its FINISHED!  The quilt is done and I have made the a label,  Have not sewn the label on yet as I an assisting a friend in a quilt label class in October and need to bring samples of labels I have made.  I have a couple more to complete before the class, and will wait and sew these all on after that class so I don't have to lug the big quilts in as well.

APIP#14: Bright Hopes Crochet Quilt - Crocheted the border around four more blocks.  Anxious to sew on Row 2, maybe this week.

APIP#17 - Insanity Quilt.  Accomplished a lot this week.  Cut out more squares for the diamonds (all cut out now) and added the backing and first inner border to the top left corner.  This took a little longer than I expected as I had to keep referring the diagram to figure out how to do it.