I'm Back!

 Wow, I really can't believe it's been a whole month since I managed to write a blog post!  It's been a very busy month, I spent a week in Colorado helping my mom finish packing up her house, done quite a bit of sewing for weddings, and have just generally been extra busy.  This is the first weekend in about 6 weeks that I haven't had some kind of major commitment keeping me from being able to relax and do some fun sewing. 

While most of my trip was spent cleaning, organizing, and boxing up things, we did take a morning and visit Garden of the Gods.  The scenery was amazing, even though the day was cold and overcast.

I played with the panorama mode on my phone!  This will come in handy later this summer, for sure!

I did manage to finish my April UFO challenge - this is Patterns by Jen's 2020 color challenge!  I love the pixilated border she designed!  This vibrant lap quilt is available for sale in my Etsy shop, along with several other lap quilts that I've recently added.  

My 2022 temperature quilt is still looking very blue!  And May hasn't been a huge improvement, but I am starting to see a shift to warmer temperatures.  It's definitely been a wet month here, we've had much more rain than normal for this time of year.  Just a couple more days and I can add the May row!  I've been thinking about what to do for the trip we are planning at the end of summer, and I think I will split my geese - make one half the temperature here and use the other half to document the temperatures as we travel.  Seems like a fun idea!

Last Saturday I taught a class for beginning free motion quilting.  It was fun!  The one take away I got from teaching was that thread really matters!  I know I was hesitant as a beginner to spend a lot of money on thread, but now I know that it really does make a difference - Aurifil is my preferred thread and I use both 40 and 50 weight for quilting and find that the results are worth it, plus when you take into account the amount of thread on one of their spools, it really does not cost that much more, especially because you don't need to purchase several spools for each quilt.  If you are not happy with your results when free motion quilting, I really suggest trying out different thread!

Working on my May UFO challenge.  These are some old blocks from a free Craftsy Block of the Month.  I only had 13 blocks done, but decided that was enough, and it's perfect for setting on point.  I have now added sashing and setting triangles, and have it basted!  Will I finish before the end of the month?  Maybe!  We'll see how the next couple of days go...

May Island Batik challenge!  Reveal coming up shortly :)  I don't think triangles are tricky, I love them!

June Island Batik Ambassador Challenge in progress!  You are going to love this one - have you noticed other Island Batik Ambassodors teasing their blocks, yet?  We have a specific block theme for June - New York Beauty.  They are going to be spectacular!  There will be a blog hop, prizes and lots of fun, so you'll want to keep your eyes out for this one!

So, now I'm pretty much up to date, I'm looking forward to the next few weeks, and sharing the fun things I'm getting ready to work on!  I've missed sharing my projects, and looking forward to getting back into the habit of blogging more frequently.  What have you been working on this month?  Something fun, I hope!