Tool Tote, Tula Pink's Stacks Quilting and a Baby Mystery Quilt

My holiday break is about over and my reading, listening to books (total was 54 this past year) and sewing is coming to an end.  I will be limited again on my time as teaching and getting well sucks it all!

So I spent several days this break sewing with Barb.  We have had plans to make Penny Stergis' Tool Tote for a long time now.  It has pages and pages of directions and so it is nice to have a friend to sew with.  We spent about twenty minutes just trying to decifier which pattern pieces went to which fabric placement.  She calls the outer pockets the lining and so since I did not realize they were on the outside of the bag I went with my lightest color for the lining.  Barb did too.  We were not happy when we realized that ALL of the fabric placement was not what we expected.  I wanted the black to be the main fabric, the purple an accent and the green inside. UGH.  Barb stopped making her bag and is going to recut things to make hers correctly.  Meanwhile we both worked on mine.  All told, this bag took 8 hours on day one and 3 on day two.  Not sure I will make another one...my only other disappointment is that the pockets do not come up far enough on the bag.  We followed her directions and really the pockets should come up three or more inches on each side (they do on the short side) so IF I were to do it again (or if you are thinking of starting one) I would add three inches onto each of those "lining" pieces.  You can always hack off the bottom when you sew the center seam to the outer bag center--adjust at that time so your pockets are where you want them.

I took a zillion pictures as we went.

 Above is the part where the pockets should be longer....and a different color!

My 

I was so excited that I knew how to use the walking foot to quilt better that I came home and figured it out on my machine.  Barb has a Bernina but not the same model as mine.  I have learned a ton from her showing me little things each time I sew there.  I told her she should give classes.  I first sewed my other mini leaf quilt (didn't upload picture this time) and then I went on to Tula Pink Stacks which has been waiting its turn forever! 

It is hard to see, but I quilted a few inches apart all down the quilt.  I plan to repeat that going in the other direction when I get time.

The very first mystery quilt I made was for my nephew Ben a dozen or so years ago.  I messed up some color placement but it turned out okay anyway.  This year on New Year's Eve I wanted to make a mystery quilt.  This was one of my favorite traditions but this year I did not find one I wanted to do.  So I got out the directions for this one and Kathy and I worked on it together.  I only had printed directions--no pictures other than my messed up one to help us.  There was some unsewing to do as I think there was an error in one of the clues--my guess is I followed the picture to get that right last time!  I read it many times, drew out what she was saying and still it did not match right...so in the end this is what we had.  It has robots on it.  Not sure if I will add a border or not, but another baby flimsy ready to go.

Meanwhile, Bonnie revealed the mystery!  Good Fortune blocks are getting completed today.  I have all the stars done already and half a dozen of the four patch blocks. SEW much fun!