Happy New Year!

I forgot to take any photos of my guests for New Year's lunch, but we had a good time and enjoyed a great feast!  Ham, turnip greens, cooked cabbage, black-eyed peas, corn casserole, green beans, cole slaw, mandarin orange salad, coconut cake, chocolate pie and scotcheroos.  Two of our daughters and their families were here along with my Dad and sister, Eva Marie.

I made a chicken pin cushion from 4 1/2" blocks.  The pattern was from the Missouri Star Quilt Co Idea Book called BLOCK, late summer vol 1 issue 4.

Happy Chicks Pincushion

I gifted it to my sister, Eva Marie, who is a relatively new quilter.  She started out hand quilting a top I had made for her a couple years ago.  Then another top I finished we decided to give to our Dad.  Then in April (the 16th, day after tax deadline...she's a CPA tax accountant...) I took my 2 1/2" strip scrap box to her house and got her started piecing strips together.  And the quilting bug bit and the rest is history.

Eva Marie with her new pin cushion.

She's also working on the Bonnie Hunter Grand Illusion Mystery.  We were watching the "Rockin' New Year's Eve program on TV Wednesday night.  Then at 11:00 decided to check Quiltville's blog to see if possibly Bonnie had posted the "reveal".  And YES...she had.  Here's one block pinned to my design wall.  I haven't had time to actually sew the pieces together yet.  Trying to get all the steps completed first but I just had to put one up on the wall to see what it was going to look like.

Grand Illusion Block

All of steps 4 and 5 are complete.  Still working on 1-3 but I'll get there eventually.  I've been working on my Possum Town Quilter's Ultimate Guild Challenge which is due February 14.  When I make a little more progress (where you can actually tell what I'm trying to do) I'll share a post about it.  Until then, Happy Quilting!