I am a woman possessed. I'm like a dog with a bone. I've had my nose to the grindstone.
All the blocks for the center of the quilt are done. I have 3 of 5 columns assembled. Will I pause there to get the quilting done on my challenge quilt. I'll see what tomorrow brings.
48 birds in the air blocks in that border. I might need a break.
Swooze
I'm trying to spend time on some of my longer term UFOs that require a lot of piecing. I quilt one here and there for my UFO challenge on Stashbuster to keep me from becoming queen.
I need 28 big blocks and 4 half blocks. Then when those are done I have to piece 48 blocks for the pieced border. 7 are done and a dozen are ready for the final assembly step. To finish the last 10 or so I have to cut more black fabric. I'll probably finish those that are ready for final assembly then skip to quilting something else.
Swooze
There are two acronyms that are used regularly on the Yahoo group Stashbuster. WITB stands for what's in the box or bag or basket. It is meant to be a decluttering/organization challenge. One of the ladies on the list has 222 bins that she wants to go through. She is working towards a goal of one a week planning to toss or rehome or use the contents. Quite a few of us picked up on this challenge and are working similarly. Not all my B's are quilt related but I may share a few of the quilt related ones from time to time.
I had these three bins sitting next to the door of my sewing room.
I peeked inside all three. Two are projects I bought fabric for and want to make soon. The third had fabric leftover from a quilt top that is now a flimsy. That fabric was intended for the binding but due to miscuts there is not enough. There were some other bits in there. It's all put away or thrown away and I have an empty project bin. Wish they'd all be this easy!
The other acronym is WAYWO which means what are you working on? I thought I'd show my next little project up on the block. This is made from orphan blocks that I got from Grace and are now a top. I have it laid out here selecting thread for quilting and trying to decide on a quilting pattern for it. I plan to donate this to the Mesquite Quilt guild for their miniature silent auction at the next quilt show in June.
I'm thinking about a 1 inch grid crosshatch at the moment. I'll think about it for just a little bit longer before I begin. My other thoughts were to outline stitch around the churndash but the thought of the crosshatch pleases me.
WAYWO??
Swooze
I managed to finish my second bag today. Each bag uses around 3.25 yards of fabric and a little elastic. This is the Fatt Quarter bag on All Free Sewing.
On this one I used full yardage rather than cutting as the pattern suggests. The red is French General Joyeux Noel. I love the fabric. The inside is a gold snake print. The pairing just made me smile.
Here is the first bag.
This is my first UFO Finish and one of my goals for the first quarter FAL for 2017.
Swooze
I announced to you all that I was going to quickly finish up the second bag. Right after that post I went to bed and started coughing. I got up and searched for the elastic for the second bag while sucking on a cough drop. I tried going back to bed but would just cough. I ended up staying up until 3 am and was able to fall asleep purely from exhaustion. Sadly I have pretty much been in bed with the crud since then.
Friday my son took me to the doc where I received a steroid shot and antibiotics. By that evening I actually felt hungry and sat up for an hour. Today I still have an appetite and have eaten well. I've been awake more today but still in bed. I got up for a few hours to eat and watch tv. I got a crazy idea to go sew on that bag. What I should have completed in 15 minutes took well over an hour. I also broke into a sweat doing this. I'll try again tomorrow but in shorter spurts.
I'm aiming for a shower tomorrow too. If you don't hear from me send out a search party!
Swooze
One of my UFOs is listed as two FQ Bags. It is a free pattern from All Free Sewing and can be found here. I had constructed the body of the bags last year and left all the fussy work. Inserting elastic, top stitching, handle/strap making. Now that this one is done the second will go together much more quickly.
I'm going to stick with the other bag until it's done and not jump to something else.
Watch this space for my first UFO finish!
Swooze
Some years ago, probably 5 or more, I was at Tirane's house. She was working on a quilt and it was too long for the backing she had so she ripped the bottom row off. I asked her what she planned to do with it. I don't recall the ensuing conversation exactly but I am pretty sure I asked for them. I love turquoise!
Fast forward. I had pretty much forgotten these in my orphan bin. When I did bump into them I didn't really think about doing anything with them. Last year a friend mentioned she was decorating her sewing room in turquoise and black. Insert bright lightbulb here...ding!!💡
Last night I started sorting things in my sewing room trying to locate the row of blocks. My daughter moved out so I now also have a stash room. I have moved quite a bit in there and have been grouping and sorting things. This activity has kept me from buying fabric this year. 👀😳 I digress. By moving things out I was able to unearth the blocks.
Last night I unpicked the row and pressed the blocks.
Today I pulled some black out of the stash and cut it up. I joined it with the turquoise blocks. This is what I will be quilting and giving to her.
I hope she likes it. Two UFOs brought to top stage in two days! I'll get back to Wanderlust but needed some variety in my sewing.
Swooze
This is not a quick block to assemble. I have gone through and made all the components that I could make ahead except for maybe a few for the half blocks. This does not include the borders which will require a lot of piecing as well. If you look at the black goose you will see that each wing is a different color. In order to assemble this block I have to lay it all out, make the black geese, and then make the block. I wanted to get further along on this one because I don't want to get caught with an intensive piecing project while I'm in the UFO challenge and not have a finish.
I'm going to start working on other things in between to have a little variety in my life. Here is a little table runner that I am making using the orphan blocks I inherited from Grace. I'm going to use that French General pictured for both the backing and the binding which have both been cut. I need to just quilt and bind to complete it.
Consider this a sneak peek until I finish it.
Swooze
I've been diligently working on my Wanderlust quilt. As of Christmas Day I needed 67 more units. I thought that I would be able to get through them quickly but it looks like it took me three weeks to make them. I wondered why it took so long because I made a good number of them in just the past few days. I had to go back and read through my blog to see what I had been up to.
Happily I found that I had been accomplishing quite a bit. I quilted two quilts. I bound two quilts. I loaded another quilt on my frame and had started working on that as well. There has also been a lot of cleaning and organizing around here that has not been shown on the blog but it definitely accounts for a lot of my time.
With that said I'm now ready to start assembling my blocks for my quilt. I do need 48 more units that look very similar to the birds in the air block that I just completed but those should go pretty quickly.
A lot of this quilt has come from my mothers scrap basket. I'm linking up with Scraptastic Tuesday.
Swooze
Rhonda at Rhonda's Ramblings hosts a Finish Along each quarter. You link to her blog, or one of the other hostesses, with a post about your proposed finishes.
My goal this year is to be a finisher. There are two UFO challenges I participate in. To prepare for those I listed 12 I really wanted to get finished this year. Those will be the main focus of this quarter along with some smaller items.
1 Strip Stacks - purple borders
2 Strip Stacks - red border
3 Hugs and Kisses
4 tumbler
5 4 patch on point - black green pink
6 Avignon Picnic
7 Matchstick Marimba
8 Strip Stacks - green and pink
9 Renee's navy top
10 Nancie's Floral and White Blocks
11 Pieced together contest
12 Pink Poppy BQ
13 FQ bags x2
14 Bandana shirt
15 Grace's Churndash
16 Turquoise blocks
17 Ricci's quilt
18 -? Find and quilt all the charity quilts I have lingering here
The first 12 require quilting. The next five are in the piecing stage. The last ? Require quilting.
Wish me luck!
Swooze
I got a ruler base and some rulers at Christmas for my Avante. I did straight line quilting and some freehand on one of my UFOs.
Now I'm trying to quilt circles. They are so wobbly but by the time I get to the 30th one I should have it down!
I'm operating under the done is better than perfect principle.
Swooze
Elm Street Quilts hosts OMG each month. One Monthly Goal. You show and talk about your goal. You link to Elm Street Quilts in the first 7 days of the month. You have until the end of the month to write about your completion of your goal and then link that to Elm Street Quilts in the last 7 days of the month. And guess what! There are prizes. It doesn't cost anything to join and you get the reward of a finish.
This month I am going to complete a quilt I'm entering in a contest at a LQS in Mesquite. I need to get it quilted , bound and turned in soon. I'm just showing a small peek until the end of the month since there is public voting.
Join us! I'm linking up to Elm Street Quilts.
Swooze
I am starting the year with 43 UFOs. I bought two at an estate sale and I was given two by a friend. So I had lots of help to increase my UFO count.
I have been thinking about my goals for 2017 and the main thing that comes to mind is that I want to be a finisher. That means I'd like to finish UFOs but I'd also like to finish new starts and not have things carryover from year-to-year.
With that said, if I complete one UFO per week then I can finish all of my UFOs this year. I doubt that will happen and I'm sure I would become bored with that plan as well.
There are several things that I would like to try. I would like to make postcards and art quilts. I would like to participate in the RSC too. Then let's add to that all the great sew along's that are hosted all over the internet. Then there are the scraps…Oh the scraps. I have recently been asked to do some commission work as well. Let's face it the universe does not want me to only work on UFOs.
To summarize I want to FINISH, I want to learn, I want to participate, and I want to get a handle on my stash whether it be scraps or yardage.
I will aim for 24 UFO finishes. 0 new starts carrying over into 2018. More fabric going out than coming in.
Here's to 2017!
Swooze
Like many others I'm going through my blog to find out what I accomplished for the year. I was very pleased to see the number of large projects that I brought from the piecing stage to a completed flimsy.
UFOs start of year - 41
UFOs finished - 7
New starts - 12
New starts completed - 5
9 of the UFOs were brought to a flimsy and 2 had major piecing that brought them to a near flimsy. The latter are Bonnie Hunter quilts so you can imagine the work involved.
For the new starts, those not completed were brought to a flimsy except for a tote bag still in the piecing stage.
I repaired an old quilt for a friend. I took it completely apart, quilted and bound it. I got a second quilt from this person and have repaired it. Need to quilt and bi d it now. I even participated in a swap working on three other people's quilts.
i have to admit that I read a blog Karen Quilts. She mainly hand pieces and hand quilts although she has been using the machine a lot more these past two years. I am amazed at what she completes and feel a bit like a slacker because she completes a lot more than I do. Also my yahoogroup stashbuster started a thread called JOT which stands for just one thing. The concept is to do one task no matter how small to move forward on a project everyday. I credit these two things for my forward progress this year.
i hope 2016 was a productive year for you.
Swooze
Along with finishing Raising Cane yesterday I also finished this little 4 patch on point. I bought the squares from the Witchita Falls American Sewing Guild garage sale table while attending their fall retreat in 2015.
I sewed all of them into four patches then made the biggest quilt I could from them. It came out to 38x54. The blue came from my stash. The back is a striped linen that came from my guilds garage sale table probably two years ago.
This quilt is another of my 4Q FAL finishes. I'm linking to4Q FAL.
Swooze
