Paintbox Quilt Along Blocks - Weeks 3 and 4

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I always sew more when I can because I never know when I'm going to fall behind from one week to the next. Despite all the distractions the last two weeks, I managed to complete 16 blocks, which means with the 4 I was "ahead," I'm now exactly where I should be - 40 blocks down, 40 blocks to go. I'm still happy with the color combinations and with my continued improvement in the relative "squareness" of the squares. Yesterday, I attended my long-awaited machine quilting class where I experimented for the first time with free-motion quilting. Although it was a long day of sewing (6 whole hours), I left with a serious headache, and the samples I worked on were more frustrating than "freeing," I still learned an awful lot and am anxious to spend more time improving my skills. I'm sure it will be awhile before I subject one of my quilts to the madness of my free-motion hands, but I have a good panel to practice on and look forward to building my confidence. Machine Quilting Part II, here I come! Oh, and because I feel the need to spend some of my designated sewing time (which generally must coincide with baby naps), to something other than this project, I'm going to work on a blooming nine patch I started for my hubby way too long ago to remember. Stay-tuned for updates on that project!