All of my quilt projects are packed away and I have no place now to work on the few projects I kept out for this summer during the move.  I did uncover my bin of hexagons and I’ve been working on those each week at our quilt group.

I started this project around 2008.  Our local quilt shop got a die cut machine that would cut the template pieces and the fabric.  I cut enough pieces to last me until kingdom come.  Many in my quilt group also cut hexagons and stitched them.  We traded pieces with each other.  We worked on them and got sick of them.

I remember wrapping and stitching (English Paper Piecing) while on a pioneer trek in 2008 with the kids.  I stitched all the way to Wyoming and back on the bus,  I stitched as we walked across the prairies, keeping my pieces in a bag hung over my pioneer dress.  I filled a large bin with pieces to assemble into a quilt, and I started sewing them together.  When I got sick of it, I put them away.

It’s been almost 20 years since I started this project.  I have been ignoring it.  But I needed some handwork while I have no place to sew, so I got the bin out and have been working on stitching these hexagons together each week this month at my quilt group.  I worked on them during General Conference this week.

Each paper is wrapped, then stitched to the one next to it.  The stitches do not go through the cardstock templates.  Those papers will be popped out after the quilt is assembled.  The paper stabilizes each block while you stitch it to the next one.

I sewed the hexagons into sets of 3 in a row.  I never counted how many I wanted or needed.  I just cut and stitched.  It’s my FTC problem manifesting itself (failure to count).  It gets me into trouble.  Then I stitched these 3-piece rows into blocks of 12 hexis.  After I had a big pile of those, I started sewing them into rows.

I have way too many of these 3-piece strip sets.  Under the basket are so many more pieces cut and waiting.  Ugh.

I carried this little basket around with me to ball games and music lessons for years.

This month I worked on making the 9 rows.  I worked on this during Conference at the cabin.

Once all the rows were assembled, the girlies helped me lay them out to make sure none of the same colors touched before sewing the rows together.  I’m working on that now.

Here’s what the actual stitching looks like.

There are millions of stitches in this quilt.  Soon it will be finished.

But then, there are more.  Here are some other pieces I put together years ago.  And then there’s that bin full of more pieces.  Oh dear.  This project may never go away.