Amish Puzzle Ball

Obviously, I have been very busy lately. I did not realize exactly how busy being a temporary employee would make you. A few things have changed. We moved, I have switched temp assignments a few times and am currently at a long term assignment. I have been sewing. There is some progress on the Sweet Pea-like quilt, but not much else.

One of my coworkers had a baby shower, so I made her an Amish Puzzle Ball.

I found a tutorial at Sweater Doll, she does a very good job of explaining how to create the ball and how the puzzle works. If you are not familiar with the ball, please visit her site, I only took a few quick pictures before wrapping, as I had a tight deadline. This ball is made with scraps from the last baby quilt I made and the ellipses work really well with smaller scraps. The center of the ball is not as scrappy, as I needed 6 1/2" circles. You have to stuff these really tight, so I used a lot of scraps to fill the ball, all 100% cotton. Fiberfill, besides being polyester, just doesn't pack tight enough.

Kitty Quilt Update

School.... takes up so much of your time. Wow. Will enjoy not having homework. Soon, very soon. In the mean time my life revolves around courses and homework. Right before classes started for the spring I was working on a project for my SIL.

When I last posted this was my layout and everything was ready to be sewn together.

I started by attaching the kitties to the corners. *cough* I mean the corners on the cat blocks.

Then I chain pieced the 9 patches and tried to keep the rows together.

(Obvs. my ironing board is my place to take pictures right now)

I ironed my seams open to avoid bulky seams, since this one is going to be hand quilted.

Trimmed all the corners on the cat blocks and pressed them out and open.

Now I have 4 lovely cat blocks all ready for the 9 patches.

Oops. Apparently I forgot to take a picture of the completed 9 patches before the quilt top was completed.

So this top is another WIP while I work on homework. Fortunately(?), this semester I have several hours between courses and nothing to do except club meetings and homework. I plan on packing small projects like this one and working on them when I find time.