Checkerboard Quilt Done!

I finished hand stitching the binding on my checkerboard quilt earlier in the week and then today, my quilt holder did his part for the photoshoot. It was windy outside today, so we picked a sheltered spot on the back patio. Finn watched from the back door--he really wanted to come out to participate in the photo shoot! This quilt was started last year as part of Debbie Brown's Colour Block Challenge on Facebook--I had a lot of black and white scraps to use up and made 25 sixteen patches for this quilt. Yes--I still have more black and white scraps, but this one put a good dent in the scrap bin. Even in the sheltered spot, the wind still made the quilt move around a bit--you will have to take my word for it that the edges are straight!

You can see Finn peeking out the window in this picture.

I spent quite a bit of time this week sorting some of my selvages in to bags by colour. This is no easy task as I have been accumulating this large collection of selvages for a long time. Most of these came from my own fabric but some have been gifted to me over the years.

I'm hoping they will be easier to use in my projects if they are more organized! As you know, one of my Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects this year uses selvages. April's colour is pink and this is not a colour I use a lot in my quilts. I originally started digging in the bin to find more pink selvages so I could make my blocks but one thing led to another, and soon I was sorting great fistfuls of selvages into bags. I even threw some out --mostly because they were too narrow to be useful. I cut my selvages 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 inches wide so that some of the fabric shows along with the selvage. I should be ready now to complete the rest of my selvage blocks each month. I have not sorted all the selvages yet and hope to continue to do this until I get to the bottom of the bin. Here are my pink selvage blocks for the RSC:

I hope to do some more hand appliqué on my house borders of Coming Home this week. The goal is to finish the doors and windows by the end of the month. In May, I might be able to get working on the corner blocks for this border--birds, vines and leaves. I will link up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers on Easter Morning.

My spring flowers are just starting to show some colour this week. I have some crocuses in bloom and my daffodils are going to burst open any day now.