Good Fortune Mystery Clue # 4

     I am linking this post to the Linky party for Bonnie Hunter's mystery. 

      Click here to check out everyone's progress

     Clue # 4 of Bonnie Hunter's Good Fortune Mystery is string piecing!   I love string piecing for many reasons.  

     First, it is like Zen to just pick a string and stitch it to the one already stitched in place.  

    Second,  it's done with thin pieces that would otherwise be unused by most of us.   For me, my strings are generally the narrow strips that I cut to even off a piece of fabric before measuring concise strips.  They may be wonky and  have some frayed edges.  Sometimes, strings are the last amount left on a cut of fabric that is too narrow to be used in block components.  

     Third, the variety and texture found in string blocks can span decades of time and  many genres of fabrics such as novelty prints, tone on tone textures, geometric, floral, solids, reproduction and modern.  

     I sorted my pinkish strings to find the ones that were in the shades of pinks that I had already picked for my color palette.    The basket is full of my choices.   I didn't have as many strings in my string stash that were in this color range,  so  I added by cutting the first cut off of my  pressed pinks that may be used later.    

 I only wish I had needed to make more!    Here are some of my blocks: 

     There is a lot of history in these prints.  Some have been lurking in my stash for 10 years or more.  Others are newer additions,  and some are even one-off strings that have been gifted to me by other quilters.  

     I can't wait to see what clue # 5 has in store for us this week. 

      In other quilty pursuits this last week,  I am nearly finished with clue 3.  I have 30 units left to trim and press and then I'll be done!   Yeah!  I also finished stitching the clue 1 and clue 2 pieces that I had cut to use as leaders and enders.    I need to cut and prep more of each clue, but I am over the 1/2 way on clue 1  and about 75% done with clue 2.  Progress at any pace is progress, right?  

     I've been working on Jamestown Landing as my main project, and have webbed 3 of 5 columns for the center of the top.    Had to stitch more Half-Square triangles into the Broken Dishes blocks before webbing the rest.  Those are now stitched and ready to press.  

    I also took the time to stitch some Oregon Ducks and Oregon State Beavers pillow cases for a gift exchange this week.  They stitch up quickly and I had the fabric prepped and left over from  when I helped my students make pillow cases 2 years ago at school.  That was a really fun project that involved more of my male students than females.  They really enjoyed using the machines. 

    One of my biggest accomplishments this week was hemming a pair of jeans for my hubby!  Somehow, mending is not at the top of my list of things to do for fun,  but occasionally it's necessity. 

I also made 4 little cosmetic size bags from a mini charm square pack that was given to me as a challenge last year at Christmas by a quilting sister.  The snag was that we were each to use the charm pack before this Christmas.   Well,  dinner was last night, so I waited until 3 days before the deadline to get started.    It was serendipity that the charm pack was a shabby chic Paris type of print,  and that I had participated in a rose fabric swap several years ago, and just happened to have batting scraps,  some fabric that would coordinate and  even zippers here at home.  SCORE!