All the pieces for the Noah block are cut out and fused in place. Well, except for two pieces of the ark and I can’t quite tell where exactly they go from the pattern.  I haven’t decided if I’ll worry about them or not.  I wish there was more color variance in the ostriches, but at this point I’m not sure there is anything I can do about it.  I do like my fabric choices for the giraffes.

This week I can’t get to my design wall.  Saturday before we took off for Mississippi, we went to a music sale.  If you were in the door by 11 AM anything you could carry off was yours for the $20 admission fee.  My husband who has taught all grade levels of instrumental music went to the sale by himself.  After he unloaded his car, we went back in my SUV and picked up more method books and a couple of file cabinets.  There are 4 more crates behind the stack of crates on the left.  The file cabinets are out in the garage.   It’s a good thing I cleaned my sewing room or there wouldn’t be a place to stack this stuff.  I hope that we’ll have it all sorted and out of my sewing room by the end of the year.

As for what I’m working on, I’ve focused on the blocks for my Christmas BOM.  I’ve got most of the fabric selected for the Noah block.

Last week I finished the Row Houses,  Pieced Santa, Train, and Stockings.  If I finish Noah and the Snow Family by the end of the month I’ll be caught up on this year’s UFO and will just have the Here Comes Santa Claus block to complete.  Being so close to completion on this quilt is exciting.

Check out others’ design walls by following the links over at Patchwork Times.

Last week my husband and I drove to Mississippi for a quick visit with family.  On our way home I spotted a sign which said “Fabric – left at light left after Pizza Inn”.  Naturally we made the turns – it was an easy decision since I was driving 🙂

I found Thayer Fabrics (Thayer, Missouri) – great selection and great prices.  But I managed to contain myself to two neutrals and two Halloween FQs and got out for less than $10!

The blocks I made barely make a dent in my purchases.

Fabric Added Since Last Report: 2.16 yards
Fabric Added to Date:  165.192 yards

Fabric Used Since Last Report: 0.508 yards
Fabric Used to Date: 85.345 yards

Net Used for the year -79.847 yards

I’m linking up to Judy’s Stash Report over at Patchwork Times.

Judy picked #6 for October’s UFO.  That’s the Train and Stocking blocks from my Christmas BOM.   Today I finished both of them.  There’s a bit of fudging going on.  Let’s just say I’m not fond of ‘weird’ triangles.  But the bigger issue is that I discovered that my train block is too tall for the space it goes in.  I’ll fix this problem by adding spacers across the width of the quilt.

So, now there are three blocks.  Noah’s Ark from August, this month’s Snow Family and Here Comes Santa for December.  I see more fusible applique in my future — and possibly a quilt top!

This evening I worked on the Train block.  All the pieces are fused in place.  I just need to decided exactly how I’m going to stitch it down – invisible thread or narrow satin stitch.  Perhaps a combination of both.

This is Sampler Block # 23 – Pieced Santa which is one of the two blocks for this month’s UFO.  I’m still working on the hand applique on the Snow Family block.  I got a little bit done earlier this week, but it’s slow going.

Tonight I finished Block # 8 of my Christmas BOM – Row Houses.  This is September’s UFO.   Six more blocks to go.

Linda Everhart of Among Quilting Friends spoke at the Sunflower Piecemakers Quilt Guild in Ottawa, Kansas on August 16th 2004.  My mom had seen the guild announcement in the paper and called to see if I wanted to go to the meeting.  This was back before I joined a quilt guild.

Linda was showing her technique for stained glass quilting without using bias strips. I thought the technique was interesting and bought the kit for this wallhanging.

I started the quilt the next day (8/17/04) and had it finished the following (8/18/04).  The wall hanging measures 11 3/4″ x 13 1/2″ and hangs on my sewing room wall by the garage and kitchen doors.

The Christmas quilt is still on the design wall, but is not the only thing I’m working on.  Saturday morning I thought I would piece some more backs.  The quilt top shown above I completed in 2008.  There were 12 blocks from a $1 BOM and I didn’t think they all went together so I split them into two quilts using 5 blocks each.

It had always been my intention to piece the backing using the left over fabric and the extra blocks.  But I started digging in the boxes from mom and found a length of this VIP printed plaid.  I think I’m going to use this for the backing of this quilt.  It’s just wide enough (or the quilt is narrow enough) that one length will be plenty.

To see what others are working on hop over to Patchwork Times.

Believe it or not, I used a little bit of fabric this week – the Evergreen Block I completed on Monday, the coping strips putting the quilt together and the borders on my SBS Swap quilt.  Although I have the backing and binding made, I’m not going to count it until I actually use it.

Fabric Added Since Last Report: 0 yards
Fabric Added to Date:  163.032 yards

Fabric Used Since Last Report: 1.019 yards
Fabric Used to Date: 83.818 yards

Net Used for the year -78.195 yards

Reports from other quilters can be seen through the links at Patchwork Times.