AHIQ- share your improv #27

I'm hoping others have improv to share because, as you may have noticed, there hasn't been much going on around here (I'm still working flat out in real life but the end is not yet in sight).  However, spurred on by the desire to have something to share today I paused for a couple of hours yesterday and did a wee bit of sewing, before heading back to the computer.

  

I knew that the text part of this project wasn't photographing well, but a couple of comments last time made me realise that is isn't showing up at all - trick of the light - so here's a close up to prove that it's there. 

It occurs to me that this is one of those projects that doesn't look very different from one progress picture to the next, and that is even more obvious because progress at the moment is so painfully slow but that's the way it goes sometimes. I have to keep working, and it is in my nature to want to push and push until the job is down,  but I know I ought to take more little breaks, if only for the sake of my poor eyes, which are not enjoying staring at a screen for hours on end.

Yellow Birds - all that's happening here

There is still literally no piecing happening here, though I am determined to make time for a bit tomorrow, if only so that I have something to share on AHIQ on Tuesday.  Trying to look on the bright side, I am telling myself that at least my hand quilting hasn't ground to a halt and Yellow Birds is coming along nicely - maybe half done.  

A couple of progress pics...

 and I am linking up with Kathy for Slow Sunday Stitching.

And onwards...

A bit more progress.  I've just started a piece of work (yes, actual proper real-life work) that is much bigger than I was expecting and threatens to eat up all my time for the next several weeks, but I am going to try and keep carving out an hour here or there.  Non-stop intense concentration can only be maintained for limited periods without a break, so I spent some time today prepping more squares to be sewn for triangles, so that I can use my breaks productively.  It should keep this project moving, I hope.  

My ruler is on the top left-hand corner because I know the first piece I sewed was wider at the top than the bottom.  I haven't trimmed it yet but needed to estimate how wide the chunk I'm making now needed to be.  This is my low-tech way of guesstimating.   

I have been wondering as I went along how much of the text would fit on the front, and think my reluctance to finish printing is possibly connected to the feeling that masses of it would end up on the back (also, the conservatory is really cold now and that's where the printing is set up).  Now I am thinking maybe more than I thought will end up on front, which would be a good thing.

A pause to give thanks

The pictures that follow are today's progress, but are pretty self-explanatory, so I'm going to veer off topic for a moment.  

It has occurred to me that this is a quilt that would never have been made were it not for the internet and for the world of quilt blogging.

If I hadn't found Julie's blog, I would never have tried free piecing... 

without the AHIQ challenge from Ann The Shipping Forecast might never have been more than a vague notion... 

without instagram I wouldn't have seen Tonya Ricucci's Shark and realised she had found the perfect way to piece water.  

So I would like to give my heartfelt thanks for all quilters, quilt bloggers and instagrammers, for everyone who takes the time to comment on quilt blogs, for the sharing of ideas, techniques, inspiration and support, for communication and creativity.  Thank you!

And, in the spirit of sharing, I am linking up with Linda and Julie for sew stitch snap SHARE.

Virtue rewarded

Well, that may be overstating the case rather, but I felt very virtuous piling up my HSTs at the end of last week and today that labour paid off, as I had plenty of options when I started putting things together again.  In fact, though I probably won't have enough to finish the quilt, I definitely have enough to get a fair way through it, so no more chain piecing for me for a while.  Hooray.  

Even better, this starts to feel like it's going somewhere now.  The first thing I did today was to rip out a little strip of plaid and replace it with tiny triangles (just to the right at the top of the lighthouse).  Fiddly and time-consuming but it serves me right for thinking I could get away with a short-cut in the first place.  I like it much better now.

This is in two pieces still, but joining them will be my first move next time, then on to the next chunk, and the next lighthouse.  

I realise that the width of this piece was not decided upon, but just dictated by the length of the first strip of lettering.  Probably I need to go wider - I could do this before I add further chunks, or make the whole thing this wider and then add something all the way round.  This has only just occurred to me, so I've no idea yet which way I'll go.  

And just in case I get too smug, having made some progress, I should own up that my 'to do' list for this quilt still includes two items 'finish printing' and 'make third lighthouse' which have been there for the better part of a month.  I'll have to cave in and do them in the end!

Finally, a quick note for Liz and Linda, both of whom have left lovely comments recently.   I can't reply directly as you are no-reply commenters, but thank you, and do let me have an email address if you'd like direct responses.

Squares, triangles, squares, triangles

I searched high and low earlier in the week for white shirts and only managed to find two, one completely plain,and one a dress shirt with lots of tiny pleats in a panel on the front.  So yesterday, while I was waiting for another boiler man to come and finish off the job the first boiler man couldn't do,  I used my time cutting them up.  By the time he was done I had a nice little pile of blue squares and matching white squares, ready to be turned into triangles.

A bit of application this morning and I now have an equally pleasing, but rather more useful, pile of triangles.

Onward and upward.