Actually Getting Some Projects Further Along the Way!

This is a picture of all the rosettes done minus one on the bottom right.  I have since switched the upper right and lower right large rosettes back to the way they should be.  

A close-up of the bottom.

A close-up of the top.

I think I made these hexies a couple of years ago and I have a lot of them -- over a hundred so auditioning how I want to arrange the and how many quilts and what kind of quilts I want to make.    

They could be quilts I keep, Sweet Charity or smaller Neo-natal quilts.  

I decided that definitely I would do one with the vertical arrangement with some fabric in between.  Still have to decide how many rows and how wide to put the in-between fabrics.  I am sure I will have at least a thin strip of white surrounding each column.

I found this fabric when going through my stash this summer and thought I would use it for a 4 patch posie block as there were only 4 repeats and a little extra.  It looked like a good candidate to me.

These were a bunch of the blocks I have completed.  They all look awfully red to me and I know I will surround them with probably a green although I don't want it to look like a Christmas quilt so we shall see.  I am also thinking that maybe some with green, some with white and some with black.  I have done this before and thought it gave a successful look.

These were more of the same and I am amazed that there are really no duplicates or any that are just a little off from being duplicates.  That is very unusual.  The repeat was 13 inches and I cut 3 inch strips and then blocks so the finished block will be 5 1/2 inches square.

I have quite a few tops accumulated now that I will have to start quilting before too long.  I like to do all the quilting at the same time as it helps in the muscle memory with all the free motion quilting.

 

A Day at Huntington Beach State Park!

 Well I had the whole blog almost completed and managed to delete the whole thing with one misstep!  I will try again!!

We headed to a different outlook than we normally do and were greeted with a trio of Roseate Spoonbills.  We hadn't seen one on our last trips.  Two of them were asleep most of the time but this one finally woke up to eat!

I liked this one as it shows his bill so well!

Lisa spotted this dull brown bird off in the distance behind a Great Blue Heron.  I am pretty sure it is a Clapper Rail.  He was darting in and out of the reeds.

This is the aforementioned Great Blue Heron taking off

I saw this Anhinga which surprised me as I have only seen them in fresh water areas.

Spreading his wings!

Just for comparison, this is a not very good picture of two Cormorants.  You can easily see the difference in the beaks here.

We saw lots and lots of both Great Egrets like this one and Snowy Egrets.

There were actually more Snowy Egrets than the Great Egrets which was a change!

There were even a few Ibis foraging on the shore.  They are like pigeons down here after a heavy rain and frequent visitors in the winter.

I believe this is a Semi-palmated Sandpiper.

I believe this is a Western Sandpiper.  He and his friend were very small.

I believe this is a Willet, which are common along the beach down here.

There was a huge flock of Wood Storks way off in the distance.  This is a very cropped picture.

This is still cropped but not as much

All in all, it was a great day at the park!