Rainbow Neighbourhood Quilt Flimsy, Family

My week has gone well and included a visit with older daughter who lives about 30 minutes away. I love her little house so much; while it is ideal for a single person as herself it would also make the perfect retirement home. The back of the house has two huge bay windows and the side windows are extra large so a very bright house inside. 

When I moved here to Ottawa, I had intended to live with her in this house. We had a two bedroom apartment built in the basement for me and that has never been lived in. I met Hubby and the plan completely changed for me. 

In completely different other news, my Rainbow Neighbourhood quilt is a flimsy!

First up, here are blocks I sewed that didn't make it into the final houses for one reason or another.

And I used this fabric below for my cornerstones. I first had the plan to make each cornerstone a different colour since the sashings are all the same neutral and then I came across this. Here is what was left of the sashing fabric too...cut it a little bit close. 

I think the design looks like tall buildings and is called Homeward from Free Spirit. It was a special way to use up a small piece of fabric. 

I took it outside to see if the colours would show better in natural light. Somewhat successful but it's disappointing that the sashings black flecks don't appear at all. I'll get a photo later which hopefully will show the sashings are not completely white!

 And of course a breeze had to appear just as I was trying to take photos. I am happy with the accuracy of 7 of the houses. Right now this is 62 in. x 58 in. so a good lap size for sure. I especially enjoyed sewing the different blocks for the house side. 

 Imperfections abound. I am a scissors cutter and it could have been worse, LOL Lost a point here and I could go back and tease it out I suppose.

Didn't quite match up here. And there are others, sigh.

And for the backing, I'm looking at Diann's Little Penguin Quilts's post HERE where she shows excellent backing suggestions. I would like to use those orphan blocks I made if I can. That's a weekend job for me.

As I stated in another post, Sandra's Rainbow House pattern instructions are in depth and wonderful. Besides variations of houses, they include instructions for many star blocks, trees, and hearts to flesh out your neighbourhood.  I'm very pleased to have taken part in her QAL and would definitely sign up for another! Check out her mmmquilts link to see the wonderful (and precisely sewn!) neighbourhoods folks are posting. 

Below is younger daughter Beth, the cake maker, and younger grandson, Robbie. They live not that far from Lake Mississippi-less than a 5 minute drive and have a boat. They can go fishing after work during these long evenings which they did recently. I really liked this photo of the happy fisherfolk, which I guess is what they are called these days.

They had a fish fry the next night which they shared and we enjoyed the fish very much. So much better tasting than what I buy in the grocery store and am paying an insane price for these days. 

We have more ground hogs again. Three little ones appeared one day scrambling about the front yard. A quick look around and this new hole was found where I dump the weeds and clippings, not near a walkway thankfully.

I'm not that worried about the population increase as ground hogs are solitary and these will be encouraged to move on and find their own territory before too long. Just like the three from last year did.

LeeAnna at Not Afraid of Color's prompt this week was about the fun of ice cream trucks driving around neighbourhoods. This did not happen during my time in my province that I know of but it is iconic in American movies and such a wonderful summertime thing. You can pop over there to read folks' wonderful ice cream truck memories. I do have fond memories of when Dixie Cups appeared with their dainty wooden spoon/spatulas and also when delicious Drumsticks came available. Do you have any such delicious ice cream memories? 

Summer Solstice was this week. Time is precious that's for sure. 

Linking up with Quilting is More Fun Than Housework, Songbird Designs, From Bolt to Beauty and Small Quilts and Doll Quilts.