I’ve finished my first UFO of the year. This baby quilt is headed to my manager and her 8th month old. Now to figure out what to work on next. It’s not like I don’t have a ton of quilt tops needing to be quilted, or tops that needed to be completed.
Pam
If my goal is to reduce my stash, I seem to be going backwards. I only used ¼ yard on the sweatshirt. There was another ¼ yard pulled for a narrow border on a baby quilt, and the 1 ½ yards for the backing and binding. The quilt is quilted and the binding is made. I should be able to get it in the mail on Tuesday.
There were two fabric purchases this week. Last Sunday I purchased a few FQs to round out a bundle I got at Thanksgiving. I also picked up some dragon fly fabric that I had been looking for. Then today, I stopped in at Heritage Fine Fabrics and spotted two things. The first is the pattern Sunset by Sunflower Hill Designs the second is Kona Bay Print in the pic.
Needless to say I thought the two would work well together and started pulling Fairy Frost FQs to go with it. I still need the background and will probably use a Moda Marbles for the background.
Fabric Added This Week: 8.5 yards
Fabric Added Year to Date: 10 yards
Fabric Used This Week: 2 yards
Fabric Used to Date: 4 yards
Net Stash: +6
Pam
Finished!
About 11:45 this evening I finished the sweatshirt for my friend C. I’ll give it to her tomorrow night.
Next up, quilting a baby quilt that should have been done months ago.
Pam
Procrastinating
I know I’m in trouble when I start watching the evening news, cook dinner, seriously start thinking about cleaning the house and actually READ a book instead of listening to it on CDs Either the house is a disaster even in my eyes (and it takes a lot to get to that point), or I’m putting off something.
Although I love to read, I’ve taken to listening to books on CDs so I can continue sewing. Lately, I pick up books at the library and then read them in a hurry right before they are due because I’ve been quilting. Not this time. Friday before leaving town I picked up two books: Old Maid’s Puzzle by Terri Thayer. and The Pagan Stone by Nora Roberts. I started on Old Maid’s Puzzle on the trip, finishing up Sunday morning and then read The Pagan Stone Sunday and Monday evenings. I enjoyed both of them.
So what I have been procrastinating about? The Lone Star Sweatshirt. There are two pieces to making this shirt which I’m not overly fond of. One is ripping out the neckline – I hate the thread – but I can do it while I “watch” TV and the other thing is turning the edges under so I can appliqué it to the shirt. My original desired date was January 2nd (of this year), but I missed that. So, I’ve adjusted my ‘due’ date to this Friday. See, I’m improving, in the past, it would go into the UFO pile and I’d work on something else. Since I had previously decided I wanted to finish this before working on anything else (ok, I did cut out charm squares, but there was no sewing), I made a deal with myself this evening. If I got the edges turned under by 9 CST, I could watch Leverage while I ripped out the neckband. I had 3 hours, surely I could do that.
Well, the good news is I was able to get it done, even though I stopped to watch the local news and pet Seven who hopped up on my lap without me calling her. I even ripped out the neckband so I could start sewing it to the shirt before I stopped to watch the show.
However now, I’ve got to rip. I’m not sure what happened, but my sewing machine kept sewing after I took my foot off the pedal. My thread matches so it’s nearly impossible to see. I’ve got to wait until morning to work for better light. I think it’s time to go to bed.
Pam
There was no piecing for me this past weekend. I was quilting – as in stitching to hold 3 layers together. Ok, it was nothing more than two lengths of off white fabric, but I did stitch them together.
Some of my quilting buddies and I I drove down to Southwest Missouri and met Heidi of Two Sisters at Squirrel Hollow. When the day started Heidi was our instructor, but by the end of the day we called her our friend.
Heidi, led us through loading the quilt, basic maintenance of the Tin Lizzie and simple exercises to get us started. As you can see by the pictures, I’m clearly not ready to quilt for real, but now I’m better equipped, when I pop over to my friend S’s to work on her Tin Lizzie. Not bad for a day’s work.
Not a whole lot of quilting was done this week. However I did cut 6″ charms from my music fabric collection to send to Tammy for her son’s graduation quilt. But then this weekend I hit two quilt stores with friends while out of town. Fortunately most of the fabric was bought TODAY so, I have work to do this week.
Fabric Added This Week: 1 1/2 yards
Fabric Added Year to Date: 1 1/2 yards
Fabric Used This Week: 1 1/2 yards
Fabric Used to Date: 2 yards
Pam
Earlier this week I said I know where all my stash is. Most of it is on the shelves in the picture of that post. In addition to those shelves, I have a chest of drawers that houses miscellanous stuff, including two drawers full of music fabric.
Four or five years ago when I started quilting in earnest, I picked up a couple of music themed FQs. My thought was someday I would make a music quilt for my DH who is an instrumental music educator. He suggested that I cut a single repeat from each fabric and sew it together for the top. The quilter in me wanted a piecing challenge and dismissed the idea. Besides, I only had a couple of FQs.
Now I’ve got 2 drawers full. The some of the blue fabric I raided for the Blue Applecore quilt I made for my DH. So there’s less than a FQ, some pieces are 2 yards. Most are FQs or 1/2 yard pieces. But how much fabric do I NEED for a single quilt.
Since I couldn’t fit another piece of fabric into the two drawers, it was time to design a quilt. Now DH’s idea that I dismissed sounded really good, but I had over 150 pieces of fabric, not including repeats bought by mistake. I still wanted to ‘piece’, but didn’t have a clue what I was going to do.
On the Quilt in a Day forum (http://www.quiltinaday.com/) someone posted a picture of a floral quilt. She had used 100+ different floral fabrics (5″ or 6″) and then sashed them with pieced sashing which formed a star with the cornerstones. The quilt design was set. That’s when I discovered I needed another 8 music designs. That was another 2 yards of fabric to the stash.
I’ve got part of the quilt done. — All the charms are cut — but that’s only 3 1/2 yards. The backing will take another 7 or so (yes, I’ll piece it from the music stash when I get that far.) But my guess is I will still have two drawers full of music fabric when I’m done.
I tend to be overly optimistic on how much I can get accomplished in a sewing session. Last week with the New Year’s Day holiday, I thought I could easily get the Lone Star Sweatshirt completed for my friend. Little did I know I wouldn’t have the entire day to sew. And that’s where my time management runs into trouble. I neglect to account for the unexpected.
That in turn turns into UFOs. Either the calendar deadline –birthday, or holiday –or my self imposed deadline passes without me finishing the project and then I’m off to the next project with a deadline. As a result, I have 32 projects in various stages which were started prior to Jan 1st. That doesn’t include the 32 quilt tops that need quilting.
So, in theory, I’m going to work on one project until I get it done — or at least to the next stage — can’t expect miracles.
The lone star is ready for me to turn the edges. Once I get them all turned, I remove the neck band on the store bought sweatshirt, I’ll applique it to the shirt and add a bit of quilting, before putting the neckband back on.
Pam
I have no idea how much stash I have, although I do know where it all is. This picture was taken several months ago. There is a bit more on the shelves now. About all I completed was 2 12″ Flying Dutchmen blocks for a block lotto.
So, this weeks report is as follows
Fabric Added This Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added Year to Date: 0 yards
Fabric Used This Week: 1/2 yard
Fabric Used to Date: 1/2 yard
Pam
Well, this is my first real blogging post. Knowing nothing about blogging, I had previously been searching for a free PDF host site. If found out I can’t host PDFs here. I did find one which was working for my purposes at FreePDFHosting.com.
I love to quilt, although lately it seems it’s been more piecing. At the begining of 2009 I have way to many projects in the works. So I’m going to work on getting them done this year, along with not buying speculation fabric – or even fabric that I’m not ready to use immediately. That doesn’t mean I won’t buy fabric, just that I’ll pay better attention to what and when I buy it.
Eventually, I may get a pretty side bar to list out the top 10 projects I’m working on, or my tops to be quilted, or projects in the works, but for now, here’s a simple accounting of them.
As of 1/1/09:
UFOs/WIP: 33
Tops: 31
PIGS: 16
I guess that’s all for now.
Pam
