Saturday, March 16, 2024

Villa Rosa Designs Blog Hop

Welcome to my stop on the hop! I am Sandra of mmmquilts, which came about from the original name of my blog which I started in 2013, Musings of a Menopausal Melon. It was started when I quit teaching because my husband took early retirement, and I was certainly not going to work if he wasn't. Along with that major decision we made a major move across Canada, and the blog (I love to write) became my way of keeping in touch with family and friends afar as I mused about our new direction in life, life in general, and quilting, which led to a whole new journey in and of itself! When quilting became the predominant subject of the blog, I shortened the name to mmmquilts, all one word, lower case. I also design patterns, which have appeared in several publications, and you can also find them in my Etsy shop, SandraJaneQuilts. On April 3, my eighth annual Quilt Along begins, running through June 15 at a nice relaxed pace. This year it is once again free to participants, with some great prizes to be won.

I was thrilled to be invited to participate for the second year of this hop which showcases five fast and fun quilts to make. The one I chose came together from start to finish within a few hours!

Rufus, my quilt model

This design is named Gypsy Rose, but I’ve named my quilt Around the Block for a couple of reasons. Read on for that explanation, as well as to enter for your chance to win some truly fantastic prizes, many of which are open to quilters around the globe this year.

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Project Quilting 15.5 Wearables

I actually was excited about this prompt because I felt it would be the impetus to get me doing a little garment sewing again. I still have kept a few pieces of yardage in the thought (hope) I’d sew some clothes again one day. 
Here is the top I made!


A couple of years ago I made myself a pair of pajama shorts using the same pattern as we’d used when Brady was here visiting to make his. I originally had a dress in mind for this fabric but, since I had scads of yardage and I really liked the print, I decided to make the shorts. They turned out great and I thought why not make a top to go with them? A top would be a faster make since I only had from Thursday on to get something together before the deadline.

Wednesday, February 28, 2024

SAHRR Round 6 Letters and Numbers

And just like that, another Stay at Home Round Robin is done. This was my second time participating, and once again, I really enjoyed the work for my math and creative brain, and really enjoyed where the quilt ended up, as much a surprise for me as those watching!

Many thanks to Gail of QuiltingGail for dreaming this up and being the main host. 

Friday, February 23, 2024

SAHRR Round 5 “Four”

This round’s directive was given to us by Gail at QuiltingGail. She said the theme this week is ‘4’. We could do whatever we want but it has to have an element of four in it. I decided to make 4-patches, and my first plan was to put them in the four corners. Here is how my quilt ended up:


Read on to find out how it got there.

Monday, February 19, 2024

Project Quilting 15.4 Hourglass

I had told myself to make a little less involved of a project this round of Project Quilting at Persimon Dreams. When I saw the final graphic that Trish had posted, the idea to make a placemat, and thus have a rectangular based hourglass was born.


I have tons of green and tons of blue strips so I at first figured I’d do the side triangles in blue strips. It didn’t take long to realize that that would be a whole lot of seams regardless of whether they met or not, and on the bias. Not such a great plan. A little thinking ensued.

Sunday, February 18, 2024

SAHRR Round 4 Square in a Square

I had intended to add more fish in a subsequent round, and this round was perfect for it! Brenda of Songbird Designs is this week’s host who gave us the directive: add Square in a Square blocks in this round. 


Along with the fish which are the SiaS block, I made three more plain SiaS blocks, pulling in two fabrics from previous rounds as well as introducing the bubbles shimmery water-like fabric.

Wednesday, February 14, 2024

Special Makeup Bags

It seems I am constantly making makeup bags, but I do love making them so it’s never a problem. I have two to show you today, one which has been half done for a couple of months, just waiting for me to finish it up, and the other was a DrEAMi (Drop Everything And Make it!)


You may recognize the fabrics in the one on the left; they are the same ones I used to make my big tote bag for Project Quilting 15.3 this past week.