It’s been two weeks since we cleaned the house.  OK. 1 1/2 weeks.  It was in decent shape by Christmas, but definitely company ready (beyond my standards) by the 28th.  We’ve kept it clean.

The quilt rack from my sewing room is stored in the basement.  All of the Christmas decorations have been collected, boxed and stored under the basement stairs. The dining table, coffee table and wing back chair are back in their usual positions.

The bed was made this morning, the laundry, although not caught up, what is washed is put away, it’s 7 PM, we’ve eaten and the dishes are washed.

So why can’t I quilt?

I think it’s because it’s too clean.  Back when we lived in Texas I had my house this clean and I couldn’t sew or do counted cross stitch.  I was antsy.  Couldn’t sit still.  At the time I wrote it off to being afraid of messing things up.  Not wanting to get up to do something else and leaving anything out.  But tonight I had a revelation.

Quilting is my escape.

If the house is clean I have nothing to escape from.

Clearly I’m going to have open that box and throw bits and pieces around. It’s too clean and I have a quilt to make.

Today I have a finish.  This is the 2006 Retreat Mystery Quilt. Well, not really.  I think after step #4 said cut 306 HST I threw my hands up and said the weekend simply wasn’t long enough.

This is what I did with some of the parts and pieces — that is the outer blocks.  The center medallion and tiny squares I made about the same time as the fabric is the same.

I’m calling this quilt “It’s A Mystery!”.  It measures approximately 41″ square.  I quilted it on a Nolting at  Quilted Memories.  The top thread is King Tut “Sands of Time”.  The bobbin thread is Bottom Line in a dark red/maroon.   I used Warm and Natural batting.

Here’s a bit of a close up of the quilting. Click on the picture for a larger image.

I’m linking up today for Design Wall Monday over at Patchwork Times.

This week I worked on my Twas the Night Before Christmas blocks, but I’m going to count that fabric when I finish the quilt.  I managed to stay out of the fabric shops this week.  But it’s a good thing I don’t count my Home Depot visits.  I think we’ve finally got all of our Christmas stuff organized — now to find a spot in the basement…

So here’s my goose egg report:
Fabric Added to Date:  0 yards

Fabric Used to Date: 0 yards

Net Used for the year 0 yards

I’d like to use more fabric this year than I buy.  Which normally wouldn’t be a big deal, but… I’ve found the address of the Goodwill Outlet, so there may be shirts in my future.

Check out the links over at Patchwork Times to see how others did this first week of 2013.

Shelly over at Prairie Moon Quilts hosted the 4th annual Final Countdown to get us prepared for the new year.  Here’s how I did on my three count down challenges.

Locate your UFO that’s closest to being done, and do something about it.

The UFO closest to being done is the 2006 Retreat Mystery quilt – or my version of it.  I quilted it in mid-December and with the hustle and bustle leading up toward Christmas and the new year, it was still in the bag I brought it home in.  Today, it’s closer to being finished.

I’ve trimmed the excess batting and backing and made the binding.  But it’s not the width I normally use and I’ve decided to scrap what I’ve done and go back to my 2 1/2″ wide binding.  I don’t know if I’ll get to it today or  not.  I really would like to get the Christmas stuff put away today.

Clean a pile.

The pile I chose for this was the quilt show I had in my house.  I’m happy to report the quilts have been taken down and the quilt rack contained.

I’ve even put my design wall back up.  I already miss the quilt that was on the fireplace wall, but I suspect I’ll get over it after I start using my design wall.  We still need to haul the quilt rack out, but stuff has to shift around in other parts of the house, basement and garage before we can find a spot for the poles.

Pick a project to work on that is just for you.

For this project I picked the first block of Twas the Night Before Christmas.  It’s a quilt-a-long I’m hosting this year (click on the gingerbread man in my sidebar for more information).  One could argue that it’s not just for me if it’s a quilt-a-long, but I’m doing the quilt-a-long so I can be part of a group project.  I haven’t done one of those for a while.  I actually made two blocks, so the 2nd one definitely counts.

All in all, I’m pretty happy with how my sewing area/office looks (just don’t look at my desk!) After I took down the quilt tops from my main shelves, I put away most of the stuff on top of the boxes.  My box of floss is even in order.

The next order of business (after putting up the Christmas stuff in the rest of the house) is to pull out Eeyore.  I want to have at least the center of the quilt top finished by the end of the month.

Christmas Hearts is the 2nd or 3rd quilt I made.  This was a shop sample for Northwest Fabrics & Crafts which means I made it sometime in between August and December of 1990.

Yes, those hearts are appliquéd and I didn’t like appliqué any better then than I do now.

The wall hanging is 27″ square plus the “hanging” bow.  There is a narrow sleeve to accommodate a cafe rod for hanging.  The quilting consists of stitch in the ditch around the hearts, large blocks and corner squares and channel stitching using red thread through the background and border.

Melissa of Sew BitterSweet Designs and Shanna of Fiber of All Sorts have come up with a neat process to have us FINISHING stuff, whether it’s something already in process or something new.  I’m planning on joining because I didn’t quite make it to 12 finishes last year (although the three pillowcases were only counted as one…)  I really would like to see that number hit a solid 12 or even go higher like they did in 2011 and 2010.

So, to that end, the January Goal is my 2006 Retreat Mystery quilt.

This should be an easy finish.  I quilted it last month and then it got set aside in the hustle and bustle leading up to Christmas and the new year.  It just needs binding, a label and washing to be completed.

I hope to finish it by this weekend as it is one of my tasks for Prairie Moon Quilt’s Final Countdown Challenge. It’s also listed as one of my four Getting It Done tasks I’ve listed as part of the new challenge at Patchwork Times.

Sometimes only listing something 3 or 4 places is the only way I’ll get something done.  Of course that’s doesn’t always help. 😉

There a linky box at Sew BitterSweet Designs and Fiber of All Sorts if you want to join up or see what others are planning on finishing this month.

Last week my husband built a PVC quilt rack for me to display some of my quilts.  It is pretty simple and more importantly modular so a single section can be setup or if the need arises more sections added to it with the purchase of a few more PVC pipes and fittings.

My rack has three sections.  Music Lessons (left) which was 82″ x 96″ before washing fit nicely across the width of a section and hung 6 or 7 inches onto the floor.

Parts

• 10 – 10 foot lengths of 1 1/4 inch PVC pipe
• 4 – elbows
• 16 – T-fittings
• 8 – caps
• 2 – couplers optional
• PVC pipe cutter, or other means of cutting the pipe

Cut

• 4 pipes to measure 66″ for uprights
• 6 pipes to measure 78″ for cross pieces
• 10 – 12″ long (2 are optional) sections
• 12 – 4″ long sections

Assembly

For each upright you’ll need an elbow, 3 – 4″ sections, 2 – 12″ sections, 4 T-fittings, two caps and an 66″ section.

The foot of the upright consists of two  12″ sections with caps joined to a T-fitting.  The caps are necessary to keep the foot from rocking on the T-fitting.

To the center of the T-fitting insert a 4″ section and another T-fitting. The top of the upright is an elbow, 4″ section and T-fitting.  The 66″ piece goes in the middle.

Assemble all four of the uprights. Cat supervision is optional.

The next step is to put in the horizontal supports.  Start with the lower supports.  Since none of the fittings are glued, they can be turned as needed.  We used an extra length of leftover pipe as a “wrench” to turn fittings.

Finally slide the last of the long pipes into the sleeve of your quilt and insert into the elbows or upper T-fittings.

Here’s a picture of my rack with no quilts on it.

The legs can be turned to get them out-of-the-way (to a certain extent).

Now for some miscellaneous information and pictures.

Originally we thought Music Lessons was going to need a wider cross-piece.  That’s why we had two extra 12″ sections with the couplers to use as extenders.  However, we neglected to take into consideration the length of the fittings.  This is also why the uprights are shorter than the cross pieces.  We had to cut a foot off the uprights to clear the ceiling fans. The uprights are 7 foot 3 1/2 inches fully assembled.

The feet and the smaller parts fit into a softball/baseball bat bag we bought at Target.

Here’s a picture of the end of the rack.

Here’s a “middle” upright.

The middle quilt hangs lower than the quilts on the end.

The backside with quilts hanging.

We opted to make all the uprights the same, so it would be easy to assemble and additional sections could be added if required.

I hope between the pictures and my narrative this makes sense.  If not feel free to ask questions.  If I can’t answer them, I’ll get my husband to answer them.

Since Judy announced this year’s challenge of Getting It Done, I’ve been thinking how I wanted to use it.  Picking one quilt to focus on last year worked pretty well, so should I do that with my Just Takes Two or Sylvia’s Bridal Sampler? I think if I focused on either of them I would have a top by the end of the year.

But, what about that lengthy list of UFOs? There are 34 quilts on that list — not to mention another 36 tops which need to be quilted!

Since neither the JTS or SBS quilts are priorities (i.e. have destinations  identified yet), I’m going to simply go with the flow.

• Bind the 2006 Retreat Mystery quilt
• Make TNBC block using Faux Applique technique
• Complete the center of the Eyeore quilt
• Work on the Double Wedding Ring Quilt

I’m sure I’ll do other things this month as well, but I really want to get these four things done.  To see what others are planning on doing this month check out the links over at Patchwork Times.

Ah — the good news.  I have until Saturday to get the three tasks completed in Shelly’s 4th annual Final Countdown over at Prairie Moon Quilts.  This is good as my UFO from Day 1 still needs binding and the Day 2 “pile” of quilts are still hanging.  Today’s task is to:

Pick a project to work on that is just for you.

Well, it may not look like it’s just for me, but I’ve started on the first block of Twas the Night Before Christmas.  I fell in love with Kaaren’s  quilt, but knew I would put it off if I didn’t know others were working alongside me, so I’m doing it as a Quilt-a-Long.

The design has been traced and it’s in my hoop.  The only reason there are only a few stitches done is I finally realized I was using the wrong type of needle.  So, tonight I’ll dig through my supplies to find an embroidery needle and see how much I can get stitched.