week thirteen

We made our first foray out into the broader world to go visit some friends on their patio while socially distanced this weekend. We did a similar thing with our neighbors yesterday evening, sharing stories over the rosemary hedge between our driveways. We had a couple of calls with family and friends back in the Chicago area, too. It feels good to reconnect with people. 

The rest of the weekend I got a lot of knitting done, but mostly I was chugging away at the sewing machine. I got so much done on this quilt. As of this evening, all of the blocks are done! How very exciting. This second block, the cock’s comb, was a bit more challenging to piece because of all the quarter square triangles with their bias stretchiness. I did manage to get them under control with the help of a good hot iron (no steam!). If I had one major criticism of this pattern I’m following it would be that there is no note of what size the block should be after each “round” of triangles being added to the central four patch on these blocks. I suppose I could have calculated it, but lazy. It would have been nice to trim at each step to make sure the final size was right without any suspense. I think they’ll be close. 

With all of the blocks done, I just had to put some up on the wall to see everything together. It is amazing to me how different they look when they are combined. It’s looking so cool! I have border bits left to piece, but before that I think I will do the trimming and squaring of these. With 63 blocks, it’s gonna be a lot of trimming. I have learned this lesson well this past year, so I’m not skipping it. Especially given all the points I need to try to line up I think a good trim and square is absolutely required. They should be 10 inches finished, so hopefully most of these will find their way to 10.5 inches or close to it. 

At some point I suppose I’m going to have to start quilting all the tops I’m making. Hopefully Dave and I can get my frame set up soon so I can start experimenting!