"Whirlpool", and Nebraska Breeze - both D O N E

"Whirlpool" - This is a large quilt, MQ'ed on my DSM.  86" x 106".  Due to the difficulties of bulk and a heavy project, I added the last border "QAYG and pre-quilted" with marginal success, due to my own lack of knowledge.  There is no way I could have quilted it while all one piece - waaaay too large.  I will use this technique on my next large quilt now - I think I learned the tricks.  

Kaleidoscopes have always been one of my favorite blocks!

Here is part of a border.  This was all my own design.  Those triangles on the border - another part that was not as difficult as I had guessed, but you need to measure carefully and sew accurately to get them to turn the corner accurately.  

Nebraska Breeze -  I posted this earlier, but now it's ALL DONE.  This is a design by Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville - her instructions are excellent.  She calls hers Texas Tumbleweeds. There are 2 sets of blocks and the settings is straight.

I tried quilting serpentines in this border, fairly easy, not yet uniform but pretty good.

I tried wishbones, or figure "8"s on this side of the quilt.  It's easier than it looks.  Once you sew 10 or so, your hands know what to do.  The curl in the green border is another favorite .   

Texas Tumbleweeds, (Tornadoes and Tumbleweeds)

I am so weary of electronics - (a LOT deleted!!!)

Here are 36, 8 in. ladder blocks, all in the same green, but various light backgrounds.  Also 36 "star" blocks, in various shades of purples, cranberries, bright blues, etc.  ... analogous, with backgrounds of lights.  These are for Quiltville's "Texas Tumbleweeds" by Bonnie Hunter.   Because in western Nebraska we have experienced many spring/summer weather alerts, tornado watches and alerts, storms, hail, heavy rain, flood watches, I am calling it Tornadoes and Tumbleweeds.  I don't mind tumbleweeds.

 I was very pleased how well the units went together.  I didn't pin, and I used the "blue tape line" method on my sewing machine bed instead of drawing the diagonal line on each square that results in  triangles.  I had few errors, but you DO need to concentrate on which way the diagonals are sewn.

I saved and pressed the 1200 or so cut-off triangles. 

My trusty Janome is going back to the shop.  In the meantime, I dragged out an older Viking.  It machine quilts OK, but throat space is limited.  I found the correct "insert" for my sewing desk, and steeled myself to re-learn this machine's idiosyncrasies.  

Long time, no see

 Funny little Log Cabins - just playing.

 Hah, a project all ready to baste.  Even managed to set the garage swept out beforehand!

 Ready to machine quilt.

=

However, my usually trusty Janome MC6500 is still acting up.  I did all the checks, thread, new needles, tensions, cleaned, dusted, and even solved this snarl along the way (how did it DO that...look closely - giganto snarl all over the top!)  OK, I can fix that part, but it's going back to the shop Monday.  I'm disheartened to have my machine uncooperative and been unable to do any machine quilting since it came home from the shop months ago, only straight sewing, so, something is still not right.  Exasperating - can only take a few inches of stitches, the thread skips, breaks, etc.  Groannnnn,

However, I DO have the required 72 blocks made for Bonnie Hunter's "Texas Tumbleweeds" but when I get back to it, I'm going to name it "Tornadoes and Tumbleweeds".  We've had many, many storms, tornado watches and warnings, and rain which is almost always accompanied by hail.   We have tumbleweeds here as well.