DWR, squash, and new fabric

I had been thinking about how long have I had the DWR quilt. I searched my blog and found the first time I had posted about it was November 3, 2015. I think I had it a few months already though. Yes, it is time to get it done and returned to the owner.

I met my goal and got one melon done yesterday.

The 16 patch baby quilt is almost sewn together. I got four rows done last night. I plan on finishing the other two tonight.

I found a picture of the quilt that I had on my phone that was my inspiration. Unfortunately I don't have any information about this quilt.

I went ahead and picked my yellow squash. It is about 9 1/2" long and will be cut up tonight, cooked, and go into a stir fry dish with some soft noodles and broccoli. There was another squash on the plant, but it was shriveling up so I cut it off. I sure hope I get more than one squash off this plant! LOL!!

I have been trying not to buy any fabric, but I couldn't resist these cute dotted fabrics. It was only 5 dollars a yard and I didn't pay any tax or shipping so it was a really good deal. They will be added to the group of fabrics I have been gathering for baby quilts.

Update on the DWR quilt and 16 patch blocks

Last Monday I had 37 melons to quilt. I now have 25 left to quilt which makes me 73% done quilting the melons. For the centers, last Monday I had 18 to quilt and now I have 15 left to quilt which means I am 62% done with the melons. I have 43 days until my goal date of getting this quilt finished. With 40 elements, that is a melon or a center, left to quilt I now only have to quilt one element at day and I will meet my goal. I took the safety pins out of the quilt and thread basted what I have left to quilt. I definitely do not follow the standard procedures for quilting a quilt!

I spent Saturday basting and then would take breaks from that to sew together the rest of the 16 patch blocks I had ready. I sewed together 73 blocks. Here they are pressed.

I decided I was going to make a twin sized quilt so here are the blocks laid out on the design wall

I had enough blocks to make a baby quilt

I had three blocks left over which I will put in another baby quilt. I still have the strips that were not the full width of the fabric to sew together into blocks so these will be added to those three blocks.

We had a heck of a storm yesterday late afternoon on Sunday. The wind was blowing the rain so hard it look like a hurricane! I had to pick up the trash bins this morning that got blown over. I am glad they were empty. At least I didn't have to go out and water.

More progress on the DWR quilt

Progress yesterday was getting two more melons quilted. That would make six quilted in the last three days so I think I have 31 more to go.

I took Wanda's advice and fertilized my squash to see if that would help my problem of them not maturing. The fruit would form, but then the blossom end would start to shrivel and the squash would not get any bigger. Here is a picture of one that did that.

There are two more on the plant I am not sure if they are going to grow or not. The plant seems healthy so I have no idea what it's problem is.

I do have one nice size squash that is growing! It was hard to get a picture of it buried under those leaves.

I am taking a day of vacation tomorrow so that means another 3 day weekend - yeah! The forecast is calling for hot and humid weather so I won't be doing much outside. It will probably be another 3 days of working on the DWR quilt and sewing more of the 16 patch blocks together. Less time at work right now is better since we have had our second covid case. Have a great weekend!

DWR progress and garden

I managed to get three melons quilted yesterday.

I thought my posts must be boring knowing that it will be about the DWR quilt. I mean I have another 5 - 6 weeks of posting about it. I do appreciate the comments and the encouragement you all have been giving me as I slowly make progress on this project. Elle you are a no-reply blogger, but I appreciate your supportive words.

I needed to water the plants last night. The coneflowers have taken off and look so pretty.

The marigolds that were from seed are growing nicely

and I even have a few flowers on this daylily plant. The deer came by one night and ate most of the flower buds, but they missed a few which I get to enjoy.

One more done

I got one more melon quilted yesterday. I say that is better than nothing!

36 more to go!

Progess on the DWR quilt, 16-patch blocks, and weeding

It was a busy three days and I spent a lot of time working on the DWR quilt. I now have 22 of the 40 centers done which puts me at 55% complete for the centers, and I have 37 more melons to quilt which puts me at 60% done. I have 50 days left so if I keep up the pace of at least two elements a day, I will make my goal of having this done by the end of August.

I had to give my fingers a break on Saturday so I switched to sewing together the 16 patch blocks. It is funny that they appear brown when they are mostly marron and wine colors. Must be the bad lighting. There are some taupe, navy blue, and tans in these blocks too. I got 54 blocks sewn and pressed. Here they are on the design wall with the other 7 I already had made.

Sunday morning is was cooler, but humid. I braved the humidity and weeded all of the front flower beds. It took almost 2 hours, but the weeds are gone for now. I attempted to dead head the Shasta daisies, but found the job to be futile. There are thousands of flower heads and it would take hours and hours to cut each one. I am going to have to rethink this.

DWR, hemming, and blocks

I was busy yesterday and made progress! I had to stop at JoAnn's on my way home and get a spool of navy thread. I needed it so I could hem this top for one of the guys at work. I had other darker blue thread, but they just weren't dark enough.

I got two melons and one center done. There is another center I got outlined, but I didn't get the four melon shapes quilted so right now it doesn't count. I either miscounted or did the math wrong with the number of melons I had done. As of this morning I have 49 of the 93 melons quilted which is 52% done and I now have 15 of the 40 centers quilted which is 37%. I have given myself a goal to get these done by the end of August which gives me 54 days to get 44 melons and 25 centers done.

I squeezed in a few minutes to get four more 16-patch blocks made.

I am taking Friday as a vacation day. My big plans are to try and finish up my laundry room floor and of course make a dent in the DWR quilt. Hot with possible thunderstorms for the weekend so my time will be limited/short outside. The heat and lack of rain had the Shasta daisy flowers turning brown already! I will deadhead them and if they will bloom again. There are other plants in the yard that are doing ok; it's the ones at the curb that a fading quickly. Have a great weekend!