This is Labour Day weekend here in Canada so that means a three day weekend!  What better way to spend it than sewing?

I have been trying to catch up on some of the UFO’s that have been languishing on the shelves of my studio.  First up, I added borders to my Hawksbill Honu Sashiko piece.  The turtle is a Sylvia Pippen Design.  In April 2013, our quilt guild brought Val Wojutla to our monthly meeting for a trunk show of her work.  The following day, Val stayed to teach a Sashiko class to our membership.

Val Wojutla Trunk Show – April 2013 – Val is holding the class sample for the workshop she taught the following day.

Unfortunately, that class was on a weekday during the busiest month of the year at work for me so I was unable to take the class.  I bought the Honu piece as a kit at one of the vendor booths at a subsequent quilt show.  I also purchased the pattern for the snowflake that Val taught during her workshop.  I haven’t started stitching that snowflake yet.

The fabrics on the borders of my Honu piece were not part of the kit.  The blue outer border print is a Kaffee Fassett fabric.

Hawksbill Honu Sashiko – Flimsy – 24.5 inches square

The second flimsy that I finished today was my Redwork Sunbonnet Sue.  I am not so sure I am totally sold on the outer border.  Next time, I may just forego the borders altogether.  However, the borders have brought it up to 56″ x 69″ which would be a nice size for some little girl’s bed.

The pattern is by Mary Ellen Von Holt of Little Quilts.  The original pattern makes a quilt that finishes 22″ x 28″.   I don’t do “that small” so I enlarged the designs so that they fit nicely within a 9″ finished square.

Unfortunately, I did not record when I started stitching these blocks.  I received the patterns for the blocks in November 2010.  I don’t remember if I started stitching on the blocks right away, but it would have been soon after that time.  I stitched my blocks using DMC pearl cotton number 8, colour 498.  (I just realized that DMC pearl cotton has dye lot numbers.  I have two skeins of colour 498 and they are DEFINITELY not the same red!)  My mother started a similar set of blocks in January 2014 using many different colours of floss.  It will be interesting to see how her blocks turn out.

Sunbonnet Sue Redwork Flimsy – 56″ x 69″

So that makes two more flimsies for the “to be quilted” pile.