December OMG and Table Scraps Challenge

Bonjour and welcome! 😄 I've managed to get a few things done! Yay!!!! 

December's OMG

I mentioned in my last post that I would be working on my Christmas panel quilt, one of my SAHRR 2025 projects. Well, it turns out that after putting together the Cowboy panel quilt, this second one was a breeze! It came together without any re-stitching which is quite the accomplishment when you're making it up as you go along. 😂

All four borders ready to attach

I found it difficult to decide on the fabrics to use for the borders. At first I wasn't going to have a border and I was just going to use "quiet" fabrics between each block, but it was just too chaotic. I was doubtful as I was doing it, but after looking at the picture, I knew that it was NOT going to happen!

A failed experiment

I was hoping to use blue in the border but none of the blue fabrics were correct. I also didn't have the right green. So, going through my fabrics, I found a checkered fabric that had all of the right colours!

The perfect inner border

I then looked at my friend's finished Christmas panel quilt. We bought these panels last year to make together. She finished her quilt early in 2025, but I made it for the SAHRR and it took a while to make, especially since it was one of two quilts! 

My friend Sylvie's Christmas panel

Isn't the yellow amazing as a border? I was lucky to find a large piece of bright yellow fabric in my stash. After making the pieces around the blocks, I should have enough for the binding.

Borders around the quilt

At this point I've added three of the borders - I just need to add the bottom border. It will then get sandwiched and quilted! 😊 That is a reasonable December One Monthly Goal (OMG).

Table Scraps Challenge

I really wanted to make something for the November Table Scraps Challenge. After all, the colours were ours to choose and the theme was music book or movie. Since I was playing with Christmas fabric scraps, I decided to make a couple of small mats that I will stitch up using colourful running stitches.  I'm not finished stitching them, but that's something that shouldn't be rushed.

As for a song (sorry, it should have been a book or movie!), I'm going to say that the song "River" came up most often as I was working on this. Joni Mitchell wrote and recorded it (1971) and it was later recorded by Sarah McLachlan (2006). 

Two Christmas fabric mats - lot of colours!

First mat - stitching with colourful running stitches

The second mat, ready to stitch

The backs of the mats

What I learned

• After working on the Christmas panel quilt, I'm happy to say that I'm no longer in denial about Christmas coming!
• I was really surprised by how quickly the Christmas panel quilt came together. I'm happy because it shows that I did learn a lot making the first one!
• I'm so grateful that I had the fabric necessary to finish the borders around the quilt.
• I looked in my Christmas fabric stash and found a nice print for the back, so it should be easy enough to piece together and then sandwich. 
• I'll be putting together a post with all of the links to the Christmas panel quilt like I did for the Cowboy quilt. At this time, I'm just including my last post on the Christmas panel. It has all of the related links 
• I'll enjoy slow stitching the Christmas mats.

Related links

• SAHRR Week 6 and Free Motion Mavericks, February 27, 2025

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties, including the December OMG and the November Table Scraps Challenge. Why not check some of these out, after linking up below? Monday Musings, Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, Beauties Pageant, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2025, Oh Scrap!

FM Mavericks

Welcome to week 560 of Free Motion Mavericks! It was a very productive week! Thanks for linking up. Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. 

Kat of Scrapbox Quilts FMQ this fun Go Blue banner. She used a new attachment that was a bit of a disappointment. Kat quilted around all of the elements of the fabric. 

Go Blue banner FMQ by Kat

Donnalee made another lovely placemat for Zoey, her dog. This one is a Christmas mat. As well, she made this storage bag that will be sold at the guild's show.

Zoey's Christmas mat by Donnalee

Storage Bag made by Donnalee

Deb, the Scrappy Quilter, FMQ this lovely mystery quilt that was designed by a friend, for their guild.

Mystery quilt made by Deb

Here is a look at her FMQ. She used a wondering leaf design in different colours of thread.

Multi-coloured thread used by Deb
for the colourful areas

A white leaf FMQ by Deb in the white sections 

It's now your turn!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Cowboy Panel Finish!

Hi and welcome! 😁 I know - two posts in one week. It's been a while since I've done that! I'm thrilled to share with you my Cowboy panel quilt flimsy. Here's the link to this week's FM Mavericks,

4 Borders on the Cowboy quilt

I've been working on this project since January through the SAHRR 2025 (Stay At Home Round Robin). I knew that I wouldn't get this project done by March when they had the parade. However, having a completed flimsy by the end of 2025 is a huge win! 😃

Cowboy panel quilt - a finished flimsy 😀

Here's are some highlights of the project. To make things easier for everyone, I've added the links directly in the post.

Week 1 was the Art block - we had to find a block that started with the fist letter of our name. The corner block and the bottom blocks are Art blocks. 

Week 2 was HST or blocks with half-square triangles. The Lama block on top is a Friendship Star block with a border. The bison block in the middle was an extra block to showcase the fabric. 

Weeks 1 and 2 blocks

Week 3 was a Star block. I made two Nine Patch Star blocks with scraps from two shirts. Here's one of them.

Week 3 - a Nine Patch Star block

Week 4 was blocks with inserts. I made the first block with the horse fabric and the next two blocks have all kinds of inserts. Those are the first two blocks on top as well as the last one on the bottom. I also added a pocket block with a denim border. The pocket is from one of the shirts.

Cowboy panel with blocks from weeks 1 to 3

Another insert block made later

Week 5 was a half or quarter log cabin blocks. I ended up making one regular log cabin block to feature the Canada geese fabric and then a quarter log cabin block.

Full log cabin block wit Canada geese

Quarter log cabin block with Moo!

Week 6 was the Kite block. Other than some math issues, it came out well.

Kite block that I later added coping strips

After week 6, I needed more blocks so I made a few appliqué blocks based on a free pattern that I found.  

Boot and hat

Cacti

Horse shoe with friends

Finally I needed one extra block so I made an improv block.

Last block - improv

This summer, I added an inner dark brown border and completed the two side borders. It went well, especially with the help of coping strips.

Inner and side borders done

Since the side borders went together fairly easily, I thought that the top and bottom borders would be a breeze....not so much 😔 I blame it on my accuracy challenge and poor math skills. Here is the quilt with the top border.

Outside picture of the Cowboy panel quilt with 3 borders

This is where I left the quilt until this week. I knew that the bottom border wouldn't be as much trouble because in theory, all I had to do was to copy the measurements of the top border. I'm thrilled to say that I was only a quarter inch off on both ends, so just cut that off!

Last look at the Cowboy panel quilt flimsy
from SAHRR 2025

This flimsy is my November OMG - Yay! Done with days to spare.

What I learned

• It was really interesting going through all of my SAHRR posts to prepare this one. There were definitely lots of learning while making all of these blocks.
• The quilt is 48" x 55".
• I knew that I was being overly ambitious when I started making 2 panel quilts, but the Cowboy quilt is now a flimsy and I'm hoping to finish the Christmas panel quilt by the end of the year. This is also very ambitious but I know that I can do it after everything I've learned from making the Cowboy quilt (in theory anyway😁). Think coping strips and measure 4 times!!!!
• I've looked at my Christmas panel and blocks - I don't have any fabric picked out for the borders. Oh well, I'll be checking out my stash next. I will also make this my December One Monthly Goal (OMG).
• My plan is to finish both flimsies this year and start the new year with FMQ fun!
• Here's a photo of the panel. After checking out my photos, it looks like I'll be spreading the blocks out or making more. Come back to check up on my progress 😊

Christmas panel quilt is next

Linking parties

I'll be linking to many linking parties, including the November One Monthly Goal Finish link-up. FM Mavericks, Off The Wall Friday, TGIFF, Patchwork & Appliqué, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2025, Oh Scrap!, 

Monday Musings, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Finished (Or Not) Friday, Beauties Pageant,

Bonjour and welcome! 😊 I've been chasing a squirrel this week. Read on to find out more.

Spiral Challenge

One of my favourite embroidery artist and teacher is Mirjam Gielen of Mirjam Textiles. I've been following her on Instagram for years. She has taught a couple of workshops with TextileArtist.org and I'm also a member of her Patreon. She's having a Spiral Challenge for her Patreon members, so I've watched her videos and stitched up a few spirals.

Four embroidered spirals

For my first spiral, I drew a simple shape on the fabric with a FriXion pen. It was a spiral with curves within it, like an ammonite stone or a snail's shell. I wanted to make those marks within the curve and used bullion knots and cast-on stitches. Some of my stitches are better than others but outlining the spiral with a chain stitch makes it look better. 

My first spiral, outlined with chain stitch and the curves in
bullion knots and cast-on stitches

The second spiral was created with two layers of herringbone stitches. I used a variegated perle cotton of green and yellow. I really enjoyed this one, once I got the hang of the stitch.

Herringbone stitch to make another spiral

The third spiral was made using the blanket stitch and outlined with a chain stitch. I love the blanket stitch once I get it started. The problem with a blanket stitch in a curved pattern is that it tends to draw in. That's why adding a contour of chain stitch is great - you can use the chain stitch to tack the blanket stitch in place.

Adding the chain stitch

Blanket stitch

Blanket stitched spiral with chain stitch edging

My final many-spoked spiral was stitched with a back stitch in different colours of #12 perle cotton. I added two rows of French knots to jazz it up.

Back stitched spirals with French knots

What I learned

• I really enjoyed playing with the different stitches to make the spirals. 
• I don't often embroider in a hoop, but I found it necessary to use the hoop to get a good tension.
• My stitches are ok - and I know that if I really wanted to get much better, that I would need to practice these shapes several times. 
• Although I enjoyed making them, I just don't have the patience to keep stitching the spirals over and over because I'm easily bored!
• Lucky for me, I've learned to work to my strengths. When I embroider, it's usually to add texture to a piece - so that the imperfections don't really matter. 

Related links

• Mirjam Textiles, Patreon and Instagram
• Mirjam Gielen: Down to earth embroidery - article in TextileArtist.org
• Hexies and a Mindful Stitching Project, July 17, 2025
• Stitching procrastination, April 17, 2022
• Please let me play, February 19, 2022

Linking parties

I'm linking up to many fun linking parties. Monday Musings, Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, Off The Wall Friday, Patchwork & Appliqué, Slow Sunday Stitching

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 559 of Free Motion Mavericks! It was a very productive week! Thanks for linking up. Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. 

Deb from A Scrappy Quilter got two quilts quilted and finished! The first one was a pieced quilt top made of scrappy triangles. Deb quilted around each of the pyramids to accentuate them.

Deb's finished pyramid quilt

Close-up of the Deb's quilting along the pyramids

Deb's second quilt, 2000 Colors, started off as a green quilt. Deb put it aside - it was too green! Then she got a stash of "near postage stamp blocks" and the second quilt was created!

2000 Colors, created and quilted by Deb

Gwyned Trefethen has started FMQ the background of her Broken Hearts quilt with spirals.

Gwyneth FMQ spirals in the background of Broken Hearts

Donnalee quilted another runner for her guild's upcoming show and sale. It was originally quilted as you go but Donnalee added serpentine quilting to finish it off.

Donated runner gets additional serpentine quilting by Donnalee

Donnalee's quilted doggy placemat for Zoey

Melva, of Melva Loves Scraps, finished quilting two Memory Keeper quilts.  

Memory Keeper quilt by Melva

Another Memory Keeper quilt by Melva

It's now your turn! 😎

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Some Embroidery

Bonjour and welcome 😊 I don't have much to share today except a bit of embroidery. So let's get to it!

Not so daily stitching

This week has been full of appointments and non-textile related tasks. I did get a little bit of embroidery done on my "Almost Daily Stitching 2024" project, which BTW won't be finished in 2025.

Sunset over water

Rain and more rain 

Random stitches

I did finish Desert Landscape but I want to attach it in the hoop and take good pictures. It should be next week's post (as well as some progress on the cowboy quilt....I hope!). I also started my next coiling project. Nothing to show yet. I've mostly been stitching in the evening but this night owl has been going to bed early and waking up way too early. I hope that's going to stop soon. 😁

Here's a photo of the freezing rain that we got - it was minimal, so just pretty but not dangerous!

Freezing rain on the tree

What I learned

• I must be tired because I was not motivated to write this post - sorry for the late post again.
• I'm glad that I've stitched on my "Almost Daily Stitching 2024" project. I tend to forget about it except when I'm inspired. I like how my Sunset over water translated to embroidery. Since I gave the piece away, this will be a great reminder.
• There have been a lot of appointments but I'm happy to say that it's all good. 😊
• I can't believe that it's already almost the end of the month....I'm so not ready for what's coming next!

Related posts

• A Nostalgic Trip and Hand Stitching, August 07, 2025
• Scraps, Embroidery and Free Motion Mavericks, October 31, 2024
• Floral Fusion and hand-stitching on Free Motion Mavericks, September 05, 2024
• Spending Quality Time Slow Stitching, February 06, 2024
• So much slow stitching going on, January 09, 2024

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties. You might want to check some out. Monday Musings, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2025, Slow Sunday Stitching, 

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 558 of Free Motion Mavericks! Thanks for linking up. Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. 

Gail of The Cozy Quilter finished a lovely winter wall hanging that will be donated for auction. She quilted it using her walking foot. 

Winter wall hanging quilted by the Cozy Quilter

Gwyneth Trefethen is learning to use her Bernina 990. It sounds like she used the embroidery function to quilt a spiral motif. 

Gwyned learning more functions on her Bernina

It's now your turn 😊

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter