December 2020 OMG Complete

I waited until the last minute, why?  I don’t know why!  But I didn’t!  I finished everything on my list.

Borders added.

  Pillowcases made

Blocks made.  50 of them!

That was my goal.  All complete.  Linking up with Patty at Elm Street Quilts.

I hope you had a very Merry Christmas and I wish you the happiest New Year.

Swooze

Retreat Day At Church

Can you have too much fun?  A few friends gathered today at church to sew.  We had a small gift exchange.  This group has so much fun together.  Lots of laughter, teasing and love!  The really fun part was that Karen and I are addicted to The Quilted Cow’s weekly live on Facebook.  Be warned it’s a super long sales pitch and they have awesome stuff!  The one thing I’ve fallen in love with are the shirts.

I’m not sure how I found them but I quickly shared the info with Karen because she loves the quilt shirts too.  We planned that I wear my newest shirt today so that we could stage some funny pics.  The joke is on me because while Karen and I were discussing the staging, Linda started snapping pics.  I think what she captured was even funnier than what we were trying to do.

 This, to me, was the epic shot.  I was telling her what we were going for.  We were talking and that’s my listening face.  If you didn’t know you might think my thought bubble said “What?  You think I’m naughty?”

This was the staged shot.  “What can I say?”  Her thought.  “That’s funny!”

Another staged one.  “What can I say?”.  Her thought “She’s crazy!”

We had fun!  But there was sewing too.  The pillowcases are done and the borders are added to the camper quilt.  Parts are cut for the broken dishes blocks.

More to come!  I’ll show and talk more of the broken dishes blocks soon.

Slow But Forward Movement

In months past I’ve been whipping out quilt tops.  This month I’ve slowed waaaay down.  Can’t really put my finger on anything in particular that might be the cause.  I’m definitely thankful for the OMG because honestly that is what has propelled me forward this month.

I’ve added the borders to this one.

I had about a yard of that large print leftover.  My friend suggested I make a matching pillowcase so I did just that.  Although I still have to French seam it.

Another part of my goal was to make four pillowcases to go with my camper quilt.  All four are needing the final French seam.  I decided to sew down the flange on them which is shown here.  

I’ve always gifted cases in the past but never kept them for myself.  I did just that last year.  One cash convinced me to sew down the flange!

The last part of the goal is to add the final border to the camper quilt.  No new pic but the borders are cut.  They need to be trimmed to size and attached!  No worries!  I also have to make my broken dishes blocks.  They’re not hard just small and fiddly.  I think I said I’d make 50.  I can do it!  

I have two day long retreats at the church with friends this month.  I also have several days off from work in addition to the retreat days.  Watch this space for an update soon!

I hope you’re ready to pass the holidays however you like and that everyone is safe and sound.  Merry Christmas to all!

Swooze

Need Some Focus

I can’t help but think about the many things I want to work on.  “One” of those things is to dig into scraps and use them.  I’ve talked to several people about how they decide to cut up their scraps.  I do follow Bonnie Hunters techniques but really don’t want to cut everything down just yet.  I’ve made her last two mysteries by dipping into my scraps, then stash to make them.  

I haven’t started Grassy Creek yet but I think I will start soon.  I also picked three other quilts I want to make from my scraps and thought about sorting through and pulling for those quilts as I go.  In the process of choosing I realized that Jamestown Landing is a broken dishes pattern so will mishmash my pieces into a Jamestown like setting.

I make these decisions then waste time on lots of other things.  That’s why I’m glad I started doing One Monthly Goal again.  It keeps me moving forward.  I decided to sew the flange down on my pillowcases.  I tested a few designs and chose one last night.  That will go quickly.  

Yesterday I was at church and cut the final border for my split decision quilt.  I decided to continue cutting instead of sewing it on.

I have enough extra to make a pillow case to go along with this one.  Win!

Then I selected and attached the next borders on my camper quilt.  Just have to cut and attach the last border.

Good progress on my OMG goal.  I have 4 sew dates planned before the end of the year so should be able to finish everything!

How are you doing with your sewing goals?  Linking up with Love Laugh Quilt for Monday Making.

December 2020 OMG

Time to set my goal for the month with Patty at Elm Street Quilts.  I try to balance between it being achievable but also a little bit of a challenge.

Adding borders seems to be my thing this year.  So a repeat on that front.  I’ll add borders to these two quilts.

The second picture is my camper quilt.  I’ll also be making the four matching pillowcases.

Finally, I’ve had a broken dishes quilt on my bucket list for a long time.  I’ve started making some units and playing with a layout.  I also have had a Bonnie Hunter design, Jamestown Landing on my list.  In playing with the layout it seems that I was coincidentally trying to create that design.  I think I’m going to modify her design and make my quilt Jamestown Landingesque.  So my goal is to make 50 broken dishes blocks, or more.  More on this in future posts.

This picture represents 4 units.

Are you joining Patty and the rest of us OMGers?  I hope you do!

p.s.  I will confess that I have two kits here burning a hole in my desire to work on them.  Watch this space for those as well!

November 2020 OMG Complete!

I managed to complete my goal.  With the help of a four day stay at home retreat I got lots of sewing done and then some!

My two BOMs that I taught are completed tops.

I also finished the three QOV tops that remained.

Thanks to Patty at Elm Street Quilts for hosting this very motivating event!  Go take a look at everyone else’s accomplishments.

Camper Doings

I did a little sewing this week.  I have the quilt center done on my Split Decision quilt.  I’m looking for a neutral to use as the inner border.  Then the rest is TBD.  I’m planning to give this as a quilt of valor.  I have a fabric I was thinking I would use as the back but now that I plan to make it larger it would have to be enlarged as well.  You’ll be seeing more as I go

I was sewing at the church.  .I had to return to stash to continue so decided to move on to my other project.  I planned to add borders to my camper quilt.  I measured it on the camper bed so knew I was at the right size.  When I looked in the bag the only thing I had was the extra fabric intended for backing.  I was disappointed so visited with my friend.  She is a retired nurse and has been helping me with documentation I need so it was time well spent.

I blame my missing project on the stash shuffle.  I’m still working on that by the way.  I’ve had several items missing and managed over the past week to find quite a few, including the camper quilt.  I’m still missing a backing fabric and a pin keeper.  I’m trying hard not to stuff it away in my stash repository but I’m getting dangerously close to doing just that!

So about that camper the quilt is intended for.  On Tuesday the 10th I got a call from the local police department.  They had found our trailer abandoned on a street in our town.  It was hooked up to a stolen truck.  We keep it at a storage facility in Dallas and had no idea it had been taken.  I had to file a police report in Dallas in order for Mesquite to release it.  It was released and we got it after calling our insurance company.  We moved it to a repair facility after we assessed the damage ourselves.  So we are in the throes of estimates and negotiating with the insurance company.  I’m amazed it was not damaged worse than it was.  We will repair it and beef up the security the best we can.

Sewing is in my forecast this week.  I hope you have a great Thanksgiving.  It will just be my kids, dd’s boyfriend and Ray.  We are trying to keep it simple but the menu always seems to grow before the big day!

Big Accomplishments

I had Veterans Day off From work and decided to take advantage and added a vacation day to Thursday and Friday.  I went to the church and sewed with my friends.  There were just three of us.  Actually, we did have a fourth join us on Thursday.  We started as early as 9 and went until 9 two evenings.  We came and went as needed to take care of appointments.  We went out to get a few meals and brought others in.  All in all we had a very good time.

I got a lot done!  On the first day I finished the last two QOVs which gives me 6 completed tops.

With the completion of my OMG November goal under my belt I launched into new things.  Folks on my Stashbuster io group had been talking about this pattern.  Serendipitously a friend asked me if I wanted a layer cake she had.  BINGO!  Of course I did because I don’t buy them.  Here is the result. 

I love it!  Another added to the to be quilted pile.  It’s flannel and will be super snuggly and warm.  I started cutting it Wednesday and finished sewing it Thursday.

Friday I pulled out a panel I had kitted up myself.  In fact I made two kits and gifted one to a dear friend.  I had already cut all the strips a week or so ago.  The pattern is Fernanda by Villa Rose.  I set to sewing and here is the result.

Do you see my little helper down there holding the corner?  I use the term help loosely.  He was our sewing companion the majority of the time.  He gave us reason to get up and move.  Walking and playing helped us move!

I started cutting on my next kit.  I made up a single block before calling it a night.  I managed to get away for 6 hours Saturday.  I didn’t sew the entire time but made 28 of the 36 blocks needed.  It’s called Split Decision.  I’ll finish it later.  Here’s my progress.

I’m thinking this may be a good QOV.  It will be close to the size I want to achieve and I have extra fabric.

Are you getting a lot done?  What are you working on?

Big Accomplishments

I failed to mention I finally got my sewing machine back!  16 weeks and 2 days.  When I dropped it off they quoted 5 weeks before they’d even be able to look at it.  I was ok with that.  There was a good bit of what I call game playing through the whole process.  Telling me my machine was getting old and parts were hard to find, delays in working on it, trying to sell me a new machine, marking up replacement parts and terrible communication.  When I picked it up it supposedly had been serviced.  The oil wick was completely and the bobbin case was full of lint.  I wrote them a review and was contacted immediately.  I didn’t budge and they responded to my review that they don’t do business as I described.  Believe me when I tell you I encountered many others that were in the same boat with their machines and repairs.  Why am I the only nad review out there??  The Stitch House in Plano.  Beware.

So the good news about my machine is that it works. After my friend cleaned and oiled it I went right to work.  Since my last post I’ve managed to get my two BOMs together to the top stage and got the fourth of six QOV tops done.  Two more to go and they only lack the last border.  On a roll!

I’m taking two two days off in addition to Veterans day this coming week.  I’ll be sewing with my friend at the church.  I plan to finish off the two QOV tops,  sew together the panel that I just cut the coordinating fabric for and was just given a flannel layer cake that I’ll be trying a pattern out with.  These should be quick projects so I’ll be digging in the stash for other projects.  I have a few already cut so thos will be likely candidates!

What are you working on?

November OMG 2020

I’m feeling frisky this month.  Let’s see what I can do.  

Bring the last three QOVs to a completed top, complete the two BOMs, that I taught over the past year, to the top stage.  For the QOVs it’s all border work.  For the BOMs it’s assembling blocks into columns and assembling the columns x 2.  

 

Linking up with Patty at Elm Street Quilts for One Monthly Goal.  Are you participating?

October OMG Complete!

My goal was to fix one of the six tops I had made for my cousins.  When I finished my OMG for last month I felt quite smug.  I completed all the centers!  Then I measured the first one to start adding borders.  My goal size for the completed top was 60x80 and I knew I’d have to add a 6” border (total) to do that.

I excitedly measured and my width was 48” as I expected but the length looked quite long.  I put measuring tape to fabric.  What??  It was already 80”.  How the heck did that happen?  Bad math somewhere obviously.

As my friends and I talked and laughed about it I realized I sometimes have funny math.  It’s not that I can’t do simple math, it’s that I get incorrect facts in my head and run with them.  I write down the wrong info without checking previous steps.  In this case I somehow only counted 5 rows when there are clearly six.  In the end it was an easy enough fix.  Ripped that last star row off, the red, white border, and reattached that border to the fifth star row.  I was back in business.

I knew we were planning to travel so I went easy on myself and pledged to bring 1 top to correct, complete flimsy.  I did it!  I even pushed that goal and completed two more.  I’ve started cutting the borders for the last three.  All six had already been ripped back when I started working on them today.

My friend and I ran out and bought backings for four of the quilts.  There wasn’t enough yardage on the bolt for all six so another shopping trip will happen soon.

What are you working on?

Camp Crafting

This past summer when we went to Tennessee and Michigan I had taken my featherweight with me.  I had a few small projects and my cutting implements.  I never got around to touching any of it except to move it out of the way from time to time.

When I was preparing for the ?Oklahoma trip I thought about what I could take that I would have a higher likelihood to get to.  I had a few balls of cotton crochet yarn and grabbed a crochet hook.  I had been wanting to make more dishcloths and knew I could find a pattern online easily.  I had previously knitted a basket weave cloth and gifted it away.  I really liked that pattern so googled to see if there was a crochet version.

The pattern I used is here.  I didn’t worry about gauge and crocheted until I ran out of the skein.  I love it!

I had another skein of this yarn and am working on this pattern.  Again I am not worrying about gauge and will end up with a rectangle!  It will get the job done.

One other thing I brought was a quilt I had started for the camper.  I stopped at the point of adding borders because I wanted to check it with the camper mattress.  I wasn’t sure if it’s a standard size.  It’s a full.  I’m ready to add borders!

What, if any, projects do you take traveling with you?  The crochet worked for me because I could sit with Ray where ever as long as there was light.  He didn’t think I could crochet and talk at the same time but I managed fine once I got the pattern started!