Welcome 2015 - The year of UFOs!

Happy New Year, fellow quilters! My wish for all of you is a peaceful year filled with love, happiness and no drama - the same one I am hoping for. 

 

Last year was a difficult one, but it's now in the past. Today is a new year and in just a little bit, I'll be spending part of the day with my favourite little ones!

 

The only resolution I am making this year is to finish what I start. I need to do this with everything in my life, from housework to my job to my hobbies. Funny, I chose "Finish" as my word of the year last year, but didn't really do what I intended.  This year, I guess I'm repeating myself, but I will also add my other "words", Joy, Focus, Change. I feel like that dog in the movie "Up", Squirrel could be my nickname!

 

 

I'm going to update my UFO page later, but in the meantime I am picking 12 projects to focus on.  The first 12 are all completed flimsies, so it means I have to quit procrastinating and become more comfortable with doing my own quilting. Once they are done, I will pick 12 more and so on, until they are done! (yes, I have that many!)

 

In no particular order (click on the title for more info about the project:

 

1. Table Topper for D.

 

 

This one is already sandwiched ready for quilting.

 

2. Pastel and Lace

 

I have actually already started quilting this one, it will probably only take me a weekend to finish it.

 



3. Thangles IV

 

 

This was a Thangles BOM project, unfortunately there wasn't enough contrast in the blocks so the patterns don't show up really well.  This one still needs a backing. 

4. Just Takes 2 Table Topper

 

 

I have finished the applique, sandwiched it, and have outlined the blocks.  Now I have to decide how I'm going to quilt it.

 

5. Strawberry Table Topper

 

 

This top has been finished for some time now, it's time it got done.  I sandwiched it with a green cotton that has a "quilted" pattern on it that I plan to follow for the border.  I would do it all over except for that flange inner border - not sure how I will figure that out.

 

6. Celtic Solstice

 

 

This is my latest Bonnie Hunter finish, I have a backing for it.  This one is destined for my grandson's bedroom. 

 

7. Gramma Quilt

 

 

I've sandwiched this one twice, but stole the backing for another project once so had to redo it.  This one will be here at my house for the grandkids to cuddle up under. 

 

8. Christmas Tree Skirt

 

 

After 4 or 5 Christmases under the tree unquilted, I am determined this one will get done this year.  I have sandwiched once, but stole the backing and batting for another quilt.  Time to redo it.

 

9. Pansy Rail Fence

 

 

Made 15 years ago when I first started back to quilting, it's about time to get this done.  My daughter wants it, so it will go to her (maybe in time for her birthday in March.

 

10. Charmed

 

 

My first Leader and Ender project, this is made from 2" scraps dating back to the 70s (some of my mom's scraps.  This will be a play/picnic quilt at my house.

 

11. Starburst Pillow Top

 

 

Sandwiched and ready to go - I even have the pillow form.

 

12. 6-Hour Quilt-as-you-go

Somewhere buried in this bucket of flimsies! Somehow I have never managed to take a picture of one of my oldest UFOs. About 15 years ago, when I started quilting again, I took a couple of classes.  I learned how to use rotary cutters (the best invention ever!), pieced the Pansy Rail Fence and then started a quilt-as-you-go. My machine did not like FMQ, so it got put aside and I've just never had the inclination to finish it. Since I have so many quilting projects that need to be finished, this will probably be a good one to start with, just to get the feel back. 

 

 Now that I have made my list, it's time to get sewing!  I plan to update my progress every two weeks.



Weekend Plans

It's going to be a dark, stormy night tonight (and most of the weekend), so I think I'm going to hunker down in my Quilt Cave and work on finishing some projects.  (I didn't tell you my Word of the Year is "Finish", did I?)

 

I'm going to pull out a few flimsies and get them ready for quilting:

 

Like this one - yes, the applique melons are finished - I'm really bad at not showing my finishes. I'm going to back it with this toile I got in Rome, Italy.  That was during the same time period I was piecing these blocks from the Just Takes 2 challenge, so it will become a wonderful memory piece (and a nice table topper just in time for Valentine's Day).

 

 

Now that the tree is down, I am finally going to baste this tree skirt and see if I can actually get it quilted in time for Christmas this year (I have used it for the last three years as a flimsy - I'm amazed no one has noticed).

 

I'll warm up my quilting bones with a few smaller pieces, like this:

 

 

And this:

 

And try to blast through my pile of flimsies!

 

Have a quilty weekend!

 

Terri in BC

 

Project UFO #2 - Just Takes Two

My assessment of this UFO is that I am close to being done! I'm going to be perfectly honest - once the first quarter of the quilt assembly was revealed, I wasn't crazy about it.

I did continue making blocks slowly, when I needed something mindless to work on.

After all, I had strips of fabric pre-cut. (Here I will admit that I am very spoiled by Bonnie Hunter's easy instructions and use of the Easy Angle and Companion angle - in fact, I cut most of my blocks using those same tools.)

As I'm trying to prioritize my UFO projects for this year, I took a hard look at this and decided that I've had fun while it lasted so I played with some layouts, and came up with this:

It still needs a bit of work, but I love it so much better!  

I'm going to move two of those 9" blocks to the bottom row, decide which blocks I want to do to fill the gaps, add a solid red inner border and the checkboard as an outer border and call it done!  It will make a beautiful wall hanging or table topper and measure about 36" square.  As Phil Robertson would say, I'm happy, happy, happy!

This block needs some peels appliqued to the corners:

I think I'll keep the melon block in the centre of the top row, keep the middle row as is, and after moving things around, I probably only have to make a couple of 3" (finished size) blocks, maybe a bit more of the flying geese, and some checkerboard.

I'm putting this on the February UFO list and hope to have it done in time for Valentine's Day! I wish I could go work on it right now, but I have a weekend of scrapbooking planned!

2013: The Year of the Finished Project

 

 

Lynne over at Never Too Hot to Stitch! is hosting a monthly linky party on the first Thursday of every month.  The purpose is to outline what you want to focus on that month, and share what you completed the previous month, in the hopes that 2013 will reduce the number of UFOs floating around the house.  Considering that my UFOs and WIPs are growing exponentially, I feel the need to join in!

 

This month, I am only choosing 5 projects to focus on. 

 

1. Complete Easy Street quilt top

 

 

I have all the parts made for the Bonnie-size version, but my daughter likes it so I am upsizing it to King Size, with a slight modification to the colour order.  Where you see her lime green, I am going to be using a medium purple.  The other colour orders are changed as well, and there won't be any aqua after all, but she is thrilled with the sample block I made. 

 

So far, I have done all the calculations to increase the quilt to king-size.  I'm waiting for tomorrow or Saturday for Hamel's Super Stitcher Weekend (first weekend of every month) so I can get the medium purples at a 20% discount.  It should be finished by the end of the month.

 

Due to the size, this one will get sent out to be long-arm quilted.  Hopefully, I'll be able to do that in March.

 

2. Finish my Pure Happy Quilting Quilt-a-long Quilt

 

 

 

This was the first quilt-a-long I participated in (and Melissa's first one that she hosted!).  This is a lap quilt just for me. 

 

It is partly quilted with a chocolate minkee backing.  I put it aside to concentrate on Christmas presents.  I should be able to finish this in just a weekend, including binding.

 

3. Sarah's Dragonfly Table Runner



 

All that needs to be done on this one is finish the binding.  I was short about 12" so after a quick trip I was able to find the right batik on the third bolt I pulled!  That was a month ago, so today I finished off the strip, attached the binding and it is ready for handsewing.  This will be done by tomorrow night and taken to my daughter's.  We bought the fabric together almost a year and a half ago as a project to teach her how to quilt.  Needless to say, the baby kept her too busy and I did most of the work.  We`ll find another project to do this spring.

 

4. Gramma quilt

 

 

I bought this kit about 3 years ago, and I have no idea why I put it aside.  I finally cut it out this summer, but now it is time to finish it as I am changing the beds in the grandkids` room and need a twin size quilt.  I want the top finished this month, and will quilt it in February.

 

5. Just Takes Two Pillow Cover

 

 

When I started doing my Just Takes Two quilt blocks, I thought I might use aqua and white instead of red.  I found it very bland and assembled the first six blocks to make a pillow cover. I have done the basic stitch-in-the-ditch quilting, but want to fill in the white space with some FMQ, which I want to practice this year. It will coordinate with my lap quilt really nice, which will also match my sofa!

 

So that is the plan for January!  I really want to take control of my projects, and this may be a great way to do it.  In addition to outlining my plan on the first Thursday of each month, I`m also going to participate in Leah Day`s UFO Sundays and dedicate Sunday afternoons to catching up!

 

Thanks, Lynne for coming up with The Year of the Finished Project.

 

 

My new toy!

I saw an iron being demonstrated in Costco the other day, and thought $119 was a bit much to spend, when I had one that worked perfectly fine.  Then I read this post by Melissa of Happy Quilting!  It's not the same iron, it's one step down but after reading her review, and going back to ask a bunch of questions, I came home with this:

Of course, it only comes in orange, which clashes a bit with my blue, hot pink and lime green accessories, but maybe I'll make a little wall hanging to pull it all together!

It weighs more and is bigger than my old iron, but as soon as you let go of the handle it has this little feet that pop out and lift it off the ironing board (see the gap under it).  This keeps it from scorching your fabric and your board, and you never have to lift it more than a millimetre to slide it over your seams.  Of course, a new iron meant I had to test it out (but not until my 3 things were done) so I tried my hand at some flying geese.

These are for my Just Takes 2 Red & White quilt.  I'm trying different methods as I've never really been successful at making FG's.  This is the foundation-pieced method (supplied with the pattern) but I'm not married to it.  I prefer Judy Niemeyer's foundation-piecing method with precut pieces of fabric, and I can't figure out what size to cut them for these blocks.  And then I would get everything turned the wrong way, so I was frogging (you know: rip it, rip it with the seam ripper) a lot. I got frustrated and put them aside to work on the solution this weekend.  I already have some ideas - as I was piecing this, I realized I could probably use my companion angle and EZ angle to make these, and use chain-piecing to speed up the process.  

I wasn't ready to stop playing with my new iron, so I pulled out some ancient Christmas fabric inherited from my mother and ironed the wrinkles out. That iron literally got the wrinkles out with one pass!  Then I made some snowballs for Katie Mae's snowball fight.  Mine are 6 1/2" unfinished, with 2" squares in the corner.  I'll make more as I dig through the stash to add to this:

This quilt is going to be a tribute to my Mom, who has been gone for 11 long years.  Her favourite holiday was Christmas, but because she had a wicked sense of humour, she loved to portray herself as a Grinch. She also loved the classic Christmas shows, and couldn't resist this shirt with her favourite Sesame Street character, either. She used to wear this T-shirt when her workplace tried to make them wear some t-shirts emblazoned with the latest catalog cover (she worked in customer service at Sears), much to the customers' delight.  I came across it when we were cleaning out her closet and after all these years, decided it was time to do something with it. 

 I bought some Grinch fabric (Robert Kaufman line), and I've pulled some of her old Christmas fabric scraps (some date back to the early 80's) out of the box.  I'll use mostly moderns and solids, but I want some of her scraps in it. I have an idea in my head, and have drafted an initial design and I'm going to work on it slowly, and let it percolate.  I'll make blocks in some basic finished sizes (i.e. 3", 6", 9", 12", etc) and wait until I have a good size collection before I actually put together the final design. 

What I've done so far: I cut the T-shirt apart preserving all the design.  I then backed the T-shirt with a very lightweight fusible interfacing to eliminate the stretchiness.   Because the T-shirt was a smaller size, the words on the bottom extended beyond the area where the armholes were.  I solved that by piecing some strips of wonky flying geese and inseting them, making a final block of 18 1/2" square.  This will be the centerpiece of the quilt. 

One of Grinch fabrics I bought was the book panel, and I'm going to make wonky log cabins from some of them, and maverick stars from some others.  I'd love to add some of the Peanuts characters fabric, but they have a lot of blue in them, while the Grinch fabrics don't. I may still find a way to incorporate at least a little bit.  This quilt doesn't have a time frame, so I can be patient!

What's on my design wall - June 18, 2012

I need to spend more time in my sewing room, and less time on the couch, so I'm joining Judy Laquidera's Monday design wall posts in the hopes that I will get something done over the summer.

On the left is my Thangles 3 project, which has been a leaders & enders project, but now is moving to the front of the line.  There will be a total of 24 blocks with 2" wide sashing.  I call it Thangles 3 because I have a total of 3 Thangles Block-of-the-month projects that I've done religiously for about the first 3 months, then put aside.  1 & 2 still have to be done!

On the right are the blocks I've done so far on my Just Takes 2 quilt.  I randomly do the blocks depending on my mood, sometimes I want more of a challenge, and sometimes I just want fast.  I'm not sure how many of the blocks I'll actually do, as I'm not married to the design layout that has been presented for the first quarter.  As long as I'm enjoying making blocks, I'll continue - once I get tired of it, I'll start playing with my own layout.

I had first started my Just Takes 2 quilt in aqua and white, but the overall effect was kind of blah (lack of contrast).  I had made the first six blocks in aqua so tonight I put them together and started quilting a pillow for my sofa.

But after a full day of work, a meeting with a client this evening and an hour in my sewing room, I know when it's time to quit and go to bed!

Sunday Stash Report Week 19

Just when I thought things were going to slow down, things heated up again!  But it's been a good week - we finally got the new software at work doing what we want it to do, I've gotten a handle on the paperwork at home, my 2-day scrapbooking crop was successful and I only have 6 sleeps until my big trip to Italy!

Not much sewing this week, only 3 more Red and White blocks:

I thought I didn't add any fabric this week, but when I was tidying up my sewing room, I came across this kit I bought my birthday weekend and forgot all about.

It's called Word Play Made Easy and makes a 48" x 54" quilt, just perfect for a wallhanging or the kidlets.

I may make it a bit larger with some fat quarters I have on hand from the same line:

So, no finishes this week but I have to add some.  When I get back from my trip, I see some power sewing in my future - I want to stay out the red!

Used this Week:  0 metres
Used year to Date: 45 metres

Added this Week: 2.5 metres

Added Year to Date: 43.9 metres
Net Used for 2012: 1.1 metres

I doubt I'll have any time for sewing this week, but I'm going to post about my trip here so it will make it easier to scrapbook when I get home.  I've only been to Europe once before, Scotland specifically, so I'm looking forward to soaking up some history and sun!

I've starting packing:

I'm taking 1/2 as many clothes and twice as much money ;o)

But I'm already dreading leaving these sweeties!

Zoey - almost 11 months - pic taken today

And Alex, 3 1/2 - he is growing so fast.  Here he is playing soccer with his 5-year-old-today second cousin and other 5's today at the birthday party!

He is going to be a tall boy, and is already very coordinated for his age. He was kicking that ball over the heads of the others with no trouble!  And fast too, he could outrun them all!

To see how others are doing managing their stash, check out the links at Judy Laquidara's blog at http://www.patchworktimes.com/2012/05/06/stash-report-week-19-2012/

Just Takes 2 and a UFO

I'm making some progress on my Just Takes 2 blocks.  I have them all printed out, but reading on their website, it appears there may some issues with sizing on the foundation blocks.  I thought I noticed that last night when I was looking at one of the blocks and trying to figure out how to rotary-cut it instead.

Because I'm doing these blocks during my "stress-relief" time, so far I've been focusing on the easiest ones that can be assembled using pre-cut strips and rotary cutting techniques.  So far, this is what I've accomplished this week.

There is one thing I'm not crazy about the instructions - it's hard to figure out the finished size of some of the smaller HST and QST pieces so I can adapt them to rotary cutting using the Easy Angle and Companion Angle.  For the most part, they are there but buried in the instructions.

I'm not a big fan of the "Cut it Big and Whack it Off" club.  The best thing I've ever done for my piecing skills was participating in Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt-along this past year.  I have gained so much confidence using the right tools and speed-piecing techniques. 

Here's my finished Pinwheel block -

(The block is straight - it's just the camera angle.) On the top, you can see my UFO leaders and enders.  I've even manage to start assembling a few blocks for that quilt as well.

Here's how I'm working with the Just Takes 2 blocks so far.  First, I cut a WOF strip from each colour (Kona Ruby and Bella White) in each of the following sizes:

1.5", 2", 2.5", 3", 3.5", 4", 4.5"

I had actually started out making little kits for each block, but quickly realized that I was using alot of the same size strips.  If I need an odd-size, such as 3 3/4", I just trim up a piece of a 4" strip.  There aren't many odd sizes, so I'm not worried about waste.

I'm also making a spreadsheet to track which blocks I've done, the name of the block and the inspiration quilt from the Infinite Variety show.  I plan on buying the catalog when it comes out and it will be great to have my references organized. Did you know you can download an app for your iPhone to view the show?

So far, I have bought 3 yards of the white (from fabric.com) and 2 metres of the red (from Hamels, my local quilt shop).  I didn't want to order the red online as I am very picky about what shade of red I like.  I prefer blue-reds, not orange-reds, and Ruby fit the bill!

All organized in my project box, all ready for the next blocks - which I'm off to do a couple more!