Sorting & Sewing!

I finished the desk work that needed to be done!

Our Open Window PDF release and gift-away is ready for tomorrow - all that is left to do is get things ready to go live in the Quiltville Store and do some edits on the gift-away blog post.

I can do that today - but needing a screen break, I did something that has needed doing for MONTHS!

My effort to use up some of the strings I had emptied into a bin became my String Rings quilt.

This photo is without binding - but be looking for this PDF to release in June.

Did it use up a lot of the colored strings? Yes!  Where there more still hanging around in the same bin looking as if I hadn't used any at all? Also YES!

In came more strings for the border blocks of Hello Gretchen, releasing as a PDF in August. 

And a lot of the smaller scraps were used in the Hello Gretchen blocks themselves, not just the strings.

Were there still more? Abundantly yes.

No binding stitching happened on Gretchen last night - I was too worn out.  Sometimes you just need a night off from hand stitching. 

So yesterday, back to the bin - I dumped the whole thing on the floor and started to sort.

Smallish, yet wide enough hunks and chunks for this year's Leader & Ender challenge coming up in July into this bin. They are all too short to really be strips, and too wide to be strings.  Get the picture?

And all of the strings were sorted by color family - as shown in the photo at the top of this post. I also pulled the neutrals aside into one shoe box to be used...immediately!

I wish I had taken a photo of the now empty bin, but you can just imagine how satisfying it was to have all of this redistributed to the string bins sorted by color family.

This bin, however, is particularly full.

Aqua to turquoise.  What to do?

Hazel has no answer. And zero opinions.

Remember my saying that the Hello Gretchen Border blocks would make a great quilt all on their own?

And my firm belief that when a scrap bin is too full, don't start another scrap bin - make a QUILT!?

I think this is the plan.  And I'm not sure on settings. And I don't know how big I'll go, but if this full aqua string bin has any say - it's going to be my machine project for the next while.

If the blocks are positioned this way, you'll get the aqua to the outside of the quilt. Aqua strings will form squares in between the neutral one as blocks are joined.

If I turn them the other way, then the geese go counter-clockwise and for some reason my eyes don't like that.  LOL!  
At any rate - this is where I am.  We'll see just where this will go.  Maybe it will just be a table runner? Who knows.
And I've got to get that Leader & Ender idea going so that we have something to work with fome July.

On Sunday, a handful of us headed out to hike up along the Appalachian Trail in search of ponies and nature. It was a gorgeous morning - 

I love turning a corner, rounding a bend - and there they are!

Shaggy of coat, and round of belly!

Baby coming soon!

Foraging for anything edible.

Sharing a bench to enjoy the vista.

Who are we kidding/ Our legs are burning from the hike up!

But more memories are being made.

And you just can't beat this view.

Or this one.

Or this one.

Time with quilty friends - Priceless!
Today - Tara and the Quilt District gals will be arriving from Atlanta and beyond this afternoon.
I wonder if I can entice them to go back up to the AT and see if any of these ponies have foaled? Tis the season!
How about you? What will you be up to today?

Quiltville Quote of the Day -
I can find no arguments with this one!

Have a wonderful Wednesday, everyone!