Oh my gosh, I have been going a million miles an hour lately. Sometimes life is like that. We have had a trip to San Diego (family wedding), tons and tons of gardening because my farmer husband planted so much this year, and fire season has begun in fall force. So, I am behind on blogging and blog post reading.
This picture was taken at the recent wedding. My parents are standing on either side of the bride and groom. Just to explain; my parents had six kids, who then provided 21 grand children to the group. Following that, those grand children produced (so far) 16 great grands. This picture shows our family less about 15 people who weren’t able to get to the wedding. I love our huge, very noisy family.
When we got home from the wedding there were four quilts waiting for me! It was like Christmas morning!! Let me show them to you.
Just gorgeous and if these colors don’t make you ache for autumn, than nothing will! Cheree blogs over at the Lively Latte and she actually made two quilts during the Positivity QAL one of which we were fortunate to receive!
Here is Janine’s version of the Positivity Quilt. Adding the triangles gives it such a different feel. She blogged the details for this quilt here. She also pieced the backing which I love!
The color sequence she used is so pretty. This is a double sided quilt, if you ask me!
Janine included a second quilt in her box. I remember when she made this one and I just love it. Looking at the quilting design, I suspect it stayed hidden in my brain and was my inspiration when I quilted the Ninja baby quilt I just finished. 🙂 Janine based her design of this quilt on a pattern called Nines in the Middle by Doris Rice for Moda, The blog post with the back story is here. Also, she made sure to tell me that she received the fabric from Louise of My Quilt Odyssey . So actually, this pretty quilt comes from both Janine and Louise!
Looking at the back side, you will see that Janine made another pretty, pieced backing with her leftovers. This side also really shows the quilting pattern off.
This beauty was also made by a participant in the Positivity QAL. Julie K pieced this pretty quilt. The blues on a scrappy neutral background are so soothing. She sent it over to the talented Rebecca Grace to be quilted. Rebecca did a custom quilt motif on it using several different patterns. The effect is really fantastic. I offered to bind this quilt so that Rebecca could send it directly to me as opposed to sending it back to Julie for binding and then sending it to me. Might as well save on some postage!
Isn’t this a cool backing? I love the huge plus or cross, depending on what you want it to be, with the blue fabric. I have enough of the blue fabric to use as binding and hopefully this will be done soon.
Let’s move on to summer gardening! Like I said earlier, Ray put in a lot of plants this year. With just the three of us here, there is no way we can eat all of it. We share it with neighbors, friends and family but there is still too much! I have taken extra fruits and veggies over to our local food ministry twice now.
We have had grapes for at least five or six years now. Usually the raccoons and birds take most of them and the individual berries on the plant are quite small. Not so this year! We have beautiful clusters and, as you can imagine, more than we can possibly eat. So I have been taking those to the food ministry as well.
The peppers are very happy this year as well. I will be roasting these in the next day or too. We love roasted peppers on sandwiches, in omelets and in salsa.
As far as the shop goes, the sale continues and the number of bolts on hand has been steadily decreasing. I appreciate all of your support. Whether by shopping or sharing the word about the close out sale, you are such a help!
The regular price fabric is now 30% off! Patterns and notions are 20% off and ship free. The clearance and remnants are 10% off. Come by and browse the sale; see what might strike your fancy!
OK – this post is getting on the lengthy side. I will close now and hopefully get back into a better blogging schedule. I hope all of you are well and happy!
That is quite a harvest, both in veggies and quilts!
Beautiful Positivity quilts! There are so many great ways to put them together! Mine won’t be done during the timeframe of the QAL, but I know Mercyful Quilts won’t care about that. Your garden produce is amazing! It’s wonderful that you have so much that you can donate some of it.
Love the picture! I can recognize a good number of people but of course not all. So glad you posted that!
Glad you enjoyed the photo – it is wild how the family has grown! The great grands had so much fun playing together at the wedding. Other than the bride and groom’s marriage, that is the part I enjoyed most – just watching them together! Hope all is well with you and Randy.
Goodness, with all you have going on, I’m amazed that you were able to get this post written! I love the family photo! Your garden bounty looks so good (I’m drooling over roasted peppers.- yum!). What fun to receive all the pretty quilts!
It has been (almost too) busy! I am happy to be home for a while – until we take Julia to the university to move in. It will be nice to just have a normal routine for a bit. The quilts are amazing and we are so happy to be replenishing the stock for patients to choose from.
Beautiful family you have!! how fun to see it grow and have as many as possible together!!
The quilts are lovely and will bring lots of comfort!
This is the first time since pre-pandemic to have so many together – like so many families – and it was a blast.
The quilts are amazing and we are so grateful to be receiving them!
Your family picture is amazing! What fun for most of you to see each other at such a joyous occasion. Love seeing the positivity quilts. Should be quilting and mailing mine early next week. My blogging has been pretty slow, intentionally, for July and August. A sick dog may keep it that way for a while, but we are hoping for a turn around soon!
Shoot – I hope the pup is healthy again soon. I am looking forward to receiving your quilt Kathleen! This is such a wonderful time for Mercy to have this new influx of quilts. Thank you so much!!
Beautiful family. You look like both of your parents. At first I thought just your mom, but you are a perfect blend of both of them. Good to hear from you. I had been wondering if I lost touch somehow with all the changes that have been happening with bloglovin notifications. I couldn’t remember how I had been following you!
Hi Kathleen – I have been MIA off and on this summer. Life seems to be settling down though so hoping to get back into the routine again. Thank you for the sweet compliment about me and my parents. 🙂
Looks like such a wonderful wedding, and to get everyone but about 15 family members there is awesome! The quilts are stunning, and I’m impressed with the beautiful backings the makers made. And seeing all that food makes me hungry; must be time for breakfast!
I agree – the backings are so pretty, the quilt is actually two sided! I haven’t pieced many backings – probably due to wanting to be done with the quilt and move on to a new project. However, these are quite inspiring!
Thanks so much Yvonne! Keep in touch. 🙂
Wow, what a family, even missing some! Celebrations must be a blast. It’s fun to see the quilts arrived safely. (I do need to clarify that my extra quilt is not my design but my variation of a pattern called Nines in the Middle by Doris Rice for Moda.) I have a feeling that the next few weeks are going to be a quilt festival for you with all the packages arriving. I love seeing all the different versions and quilting. Yay for Ray for over-planting. Your produce is perfection, and I think it’s wonderful that you can provide the food ministry with such quality and delicious food for the clients. What a blessing for people with food insecurity.
HI Janine: We really love to donate to the food ministry. They love getting produce donations. Veggies and fruit are expensive and very perishable. Ray plants such a huge garden that we have lots of extra.
Thank you for the update on the quilt. I will make an update to the post. Keeping me honest, there!!! 🙂
How fun to come home to some Positivity quilts showing up! Please send me your address. All I have left to do is bind mine so there is hope it can hit the mail next week. Loved seeing your happy family wedding.
Thank you Bonnie! Can’t wait to see your quilt in real life! I will send the mailing info in a separate email. 🙂
After I am done feasting my eyes on all that gorgeous positivity, I will eat the yummy peaches and savor the juicy grapes and pickle those hot peppers to top a pizza or add zing to my sandwich. OK, too much drool on the keyboard now. You look cute in your maxi dress. Love the red sash. I spotted Julia too 🙂
Haha – great comment Preeti. I didn’t get any peppers roasted but I did get to donate tons of produce and also got some peaches into the freezer for pie this winter. Thanks for commenting. 🙂
Ha! I am dealing with peaches, grapes and those peppers as well (along with others). Don’t you just LOVE the smell of roasting peppers!?? Glad those quilts all arrived safely! You are blessed with a great large and fun family–in my mind, those are the best! Even more blessed to have both parents living to share many years with you all! Wonderful!
Yes, definitely love the smell of roasting peppers. We have such an abundance this year. What do you do with grapes? We love having them because the vines are so pretty along this one fence. But other than eating them fresh, there aren’t many things to do with them. We aren’t fans of grape jelly. So we give them to the food ministry, neighbors and eat them but there are soooo many this year!