Bits of Sunshine

It's been cloudy and cooler for the past few days and like my post title we did have bits of sunshine which allowed me to take a photo of my latest quilt finish.

I am naming this quilt Bits of Sunshine for several reasons:

• the fabric and pattern of this quilt came from the August Fat Quarter Shop Sew Sampler Box which included a Jolly Bar of Corey Yoder's Sundrop fabric and a Jolly Bar pattern book.  I chose the Razzle Dazzle pattern.
• In order to make this quilt, I needed yardage of a solid fabric which I so happened to have in my stash forever, a Moda Marble of this wonderful shade of butter yellow which went perfectly with the fabrics and reminded me of sunshine.
• I purchased some yardage of the Sundrop fabrics for the backing and binding and on the selvedge is printed "she used bits of sunshine to make beautiful things 

Five-inch squares were used for the corners of the Jolly Bar blocks and instead of drawing lines on the back of the squares and then trimming to create the corners, I used the Folded Corner Clipper ruler. I find that I make cleaner corners using this because sometimes my lines aren't drawn perfectly or I don't sew right on the line.  After you place your corner square and block together (RST), you use this ruler to trim your corners prior to sewing and it allows you to sew a clean 1/4".  Another benefit is that the excess fabric is ready to sew for HST.  Since I'm sort of angle challenged it's hard for me sometimes to figure how to place the ruler  on the blocks so I have to remind myself before I trim, I check to see if the cutting line extends clear across the corner, if it doesn't then the ruler is not placed correctly.  Since I don't use this ruler very often, this method made take a little more time than drawing the line but I think it's worth the extra effort.  

The quilt measures 36" x 45" approximately and went together rather quickly and loved that I quilted just simple angle lines with the help of the hera marker.  (Machine quilting is my biggest challenge and pain in my quilting life, you can expect to read about future gripes).

And speaking of Bits of Sunshine, I have a story and announcement.  Many years ago when my mother was still alive and my boys were still in school, I was sitting at lunch at work with a group of friends and one of them was a quilter.  They were laughing because my boys, being Star War fans, called my mother, their grandmother, "Yoda" which wasn't being disrespectful because she was short with gray hair and sort of had the same facial expression but thank goodness wasn't green.  So my quilting friend asked me what I thought my future grandchildren would call me and without missing a beat, I replied "Moda".  Well it's been a very long time since I said that, but I am happy that I can finally say that soon I'm going to hear a little voice calling me "Moda".  My son, Mike and his wife, Christina finally officially announced her pregnancy and little Baby Mikulski, my first grandchild, will be arriving March, 2017.  So I'm saving my Bits of Sunshine quilt for my new grandchild and I have to admit I have several other quilts suitable for the new baby and, mine as well confess,  I've been making quilts for future grandchildren since I started quilting and already have twin size quilts for their youth bed.  Maybe I should start sewing their Wedding Quilt, oh that's too way ahead, okay their college quilt.  Prayers for the pending arrival will be appreciated.