And February is almost gone!

Well ladies I finally got the quilt done that I have been telling you about and showing you some of the pictures.  It turned out so very well, in my opinion, I just hope the lady that I finished this for thinks the same thing.  I really love applique but sometimes it just seems that I have a very hard time deciding what to do in the background.  Can't wait to take my class in a couple of more weeks and see all the new things I get to learn!  Super excited about that even though it is still a couple of weeks away.

So here are the pictures of the finished quilt.

As I have told you before I did a very little detail work on the applique pieces but I did do the stems up through the tulip leaves.  I also did a line of stitching that runs beside the black applique blanket stitch that defines the area where the two leaves are together and also on the tulip petal.  This picture actually shows the meandering that I did as the background and it is fairly small, but not a micro thank goodness.  As it was this took an enormous amount of time.  In additon it shows the areas I picked out for some division between the blocks and the half feathers that I used in those areas as well as the channel outlining those.  I can tell you this is so much harder for me than you would think when you look at it!  Ruler work is definately not one of my best items.

This picture was taken while the quilt was still on my machine at it shows the chanels better and shows all of my bobbles much better!

 

This is not the best picture in the world, but it sort of shows the border.  All around the border I did triangles and then in the triangle that pointed in toward the quilt I did lines and in the triangle pointing away from the quilt I did an Egyptian Feather.  This is the first time I have used this technique also, but it turned out well and actually was much easier to do than I expected.  If you want to do something like this remember you have to measure your borders and divide so your triangles will be consistent!  I was fortunate that I thought of that before I started this!

 

This picture was taken after the quilt was removed from the machine and it is spread out over my bed.  Of course the light streaks are because the sun was coming in through the blinds.  I really do love this quilt.  The finished product is one I would be happy to have any time!

 

 

After this quilt was completed I did get another pinned on my machine.  I have to say here I can hardly wait to get my staple gun so that I can start using it.  It is on order.  That should speed up my process some and will be very welcome.  Anything that helps me quilt better and quilt faster is always welcome, as are new ideals.  Many of my ideals come from looking at things others have completed and belonging to a network of awesome quilters who are all much more talented than I.  This really makes me strive to make each quilt better than the last one.

 

In addtion to the above I have started taking a class at the local Senior Center with my bud Peggy.  Peggy teaches the class and it is free.  She shows people techniques and they make a quilt top which they can either sew while they are there, or take the things home to sew and bring them back to show everyone what they are doing.  People in the class also will bring in quilt tops that are completed and everyone will help them to pin baste the quilt if they are going to be quilting it themselves on their home machines.  People working together and helping one another achieving things they never thought they would be able to do!  Isn't that what it is really all about.  Yes there are always those in a class that would detract from the goals, but they can be tolerated and loved as we continue to help one another!  I hope you all have a wonderful quilty week!



Goodness it's February already!

Well not only is it February, but February will be gone before we know it!  It's been another eventful week here and not just with quilting, even though there was some of that also.  I've been working on a quilt that I am doing for a lady in Rome.  Actually I thought I would be finished with it by now, but alas, it hasn't happened.  I decided to try something new, as in a new pattern, or maybe I need to rephrase that.  I purchased a video from a lady who does absolutely beautiful quilting, Lisa Calle.  This particular video is about how to decide what you are going to quilt on a quilt and how to design your quilting layout.  I really have felt that I was getting into a rut and wanted to do some new things.  I really don't want to do the same thing over and over on everyones quilts.  Quilts are so individual that I think they each need something that sets them apart from the crowd.  I've actually even signed up for a class coming up in March to learn some new techniques.

Well I digress..........Anyway I got this wonderful video and the instructor is showing how she comes up with some of her ideals and some of the things she uses and I was getting ready to put a new quilt on the machine so I though, well I'm going to try this.  Now that is when the problems started.  I have like never taken this long to get a quilt done (when I was working on it like I have this one).  But first I wanted to follow her directions and divide the quilt.  She says that your quilting will not show up as well unless there are dividing lines.  Well I had this really great ideal to do arcs on this quilt,  I got my design all ready and got my quilt on the machine and I was ready to start this.......Well, not quite, I soon discovered out of all the rulers I have I did not have the one I need to do the arcs because the blocks in this quilt are 18" blocks.  My arc rulers are 12" at the largest.  So then I decided to do straight lines.  Well this is much more difficult than arcs because they will all need to rise the same amount in the center or this will not look good.  I then had a lot of measuring to do.  Now I didn't have to make a lot of long marks, just dots, but the dots had to be in the right place or else I would not have a consistent pattern.  I really don't think that would have looked well at all!  So I had to measure and make marks.

She said to be sure and start in the center of the quilt, so I did. This really involves a lot of moving the quilt back and forth on the rollers. It's not at all like you just pin the quilt on and start on one side and work your way to the other. A lot more time consuming. In addition to that, I know that if I don't keep my work area fairly close to me then I wind up with a bad back ache and I hate to do that to myself, which means even more frequent rolling!

This is a picture of some of the marks that I had to make.

 

As you can see in the picture the marks are very small.  There are 30 blocks in this quilt and I had to measure to the center of each block and then I wanted the channel to travel from the corner up to  1 1/2" at the peak and then back down to the corner.  I wanted the channel to be about 1/4" wide which involved a real learning curve and I had to start marking the other 1/4" mark on the quilt to so the channels would be partially straight!  Wow, who knew this would wind up being this much work!

I wanted to put feathers in the blank space between the channels and between the border and the channel, I think this turned our really well.  Of course you can see in the first picture the feathers where they cross the block seams between the blocks.  This quilt has no sashing.  Still I'm liking the way this looks.

 

 

Now I'm really happy with the way this part is turning out.  I think the lady will be pleased when I get this finished, but as I said, a lot of work and a lot of measuring!  Now I started at the center and worked out to one side.  The video also said to go ahead and either pin baste your quilt if you had large areas between the channels.  Well I did have large spaces between the channels but instead of pin basting which I really am not a fan of doing anyway, I decided to go ahead and sew around the applique in the blocks.  The next step was suppose to be go around applique and specific blocks so I just decided to go ahead with that as my next step.

 

I decided that I wanted to go ahead and do the detail work on the appliqued pieces at the same time I was doing the outline work.

 

I really do like the way this is turning out also.  But another problem.  This is applique, and even though I spent extra time when I was putting the quilt on the machine to make sure all of the embroidery thread had the tails tucked under the applique, some of them sneaked out!  Drat and Darn!!, Double Darn even!!  I have to take a pin and work my way under the applique and pick the thread back down so it will be in under the appliqued piece or else the quilt looks like it has vericose veins!  There are some places that can not be done, since she just skipped over from one piece to the next and did not cut and tie the thread.  Oh well, nothing I can do about that.

 

Well yes I know I should have posted this first.  This is just a picture of the quilt before I started my quilting.

 

 

 

I have decided that I will do a small meandering pattern around the inside of the tulip blocks and I have an ideal for the border that I think will be nice and fairly easy to do.  First I need to finish the center of the quilt though and I'm just about half way through with that portion.  Next week is another week.

 

In addition to working on this quilt I've also managed to get the borders sewn on a quilt for the guild that is in line to be quilted.  Sorry I know it will not be ready for the next guild meeting.  No hope for that I don't think!  I've also been working on a t-shirt quilt being made out of a young lady's cheerleading uniforms, t-shirts, lots of bows and a couple of pictures and some ensignias from her high school.  Got the shirts all cut out and fused to the interfacing and trimmed to size.

 

I have two quilts that need to be repaired that are waiting for me in addition to another quilt waiting to go on the machine for a customer (it goes on next).  On top of all that I just picked up the t-shirts for another quilt for a customer.  So far I've done quilts for all of her boys as they graduated and got ready to go to college and she told me when the last boy graduated that she had some neices and nephews that she wanted to get quilts for so she brought the tees for one last week.

 

In addition to all of that I started taking a class at the senior center and we are going to be making a mystery quilt.  I really will have to work hard to keep up with this.  Sometimes I have a tendency to let those projects fall by the wayside and that is why I have so very many UFO's which is something I want to try to finish some of this year.

 

I hope everyone has had a wonderful week.  Happy quilting!





Hey Baby it's cold outside!

Thank the Lord, I have a nice warm house.  It is so unfortunate that not everyone is able to say that and so sad to think that many of the ones who don't have a nice warm house are children.  Wish I could give them a nice warm quilt to snuggle up in and a nice hot meal to warm their tummies.  It is a great comfort to me to know that my kids and grandkids are taken care of, and my great-grandson also.  They all have nice warm quilts that I have made for them to snuggle in if they like.  Each year at Christmas I start going through the quilts that I have on hand and pick out what I want to cycle out of the house this year and I always have a wonderful time doing that.  I'm sure that many of you have made so many quilts that you really don't need or even want to keep them all, so Christmas is a wonderful time to start a new cycle, and it gives us an excuse to purchase more fabric in the new year and start all over. 

I have promised that I will try to be better about posting on my blog so I am attempting to do that and I want to go ahead and show you some more pictures of what I was up to the weeks before Christmas when I was running around here like a chicken with her head cut off!  So here are some more pics.

This quilt was comissioned by one of the physicians I work with.  She wanted blue and some yellow.  It had to be masculine, meaning to her that there could not be any fabric with a flower print.  Then she picked out this pattern and wanted it to be very scrappy.  Well believe me it was.  I dug through my stash and pulled out every piece of fabric I had that was any shade of blue all the way to teal!  I had well over 100 different fabrics in this quilt and none of them with a flower mofit!  Hard to believe huh.

Another specification was that she wanted it to have a little bling.  Well the bling was achieved by using Fairy Frost fabric in the yellow with the gold metalic print and the white with the silver metalic print and then I picked a grey fabric with just a hint of a shimmer.  The Fairy Frost and the gray were used as the background fabrics.

After the quilt was started then she said she really had wanted to do some purple in it but she had so much purple in the room she was afraid to do a purple quilt.  Hence the purple border and binding, which when all was said and done, she really, really liked and the backing is the same purple.

Rather than put a label on the quilt, she wanted me to do what I call quilt writing on the borders of the quilt.  This particular quilt I decided that I would only do a top and bottom border and no border on the sides.  I guess I could have decreased the time I spent on the quilt if I had done side borders rather than all that extra stripping, but then again I really like the finished project.  The top border has her husbands favorite scripture.  I just used contrasting thread in my quilting machine and it turned out quite well.

This is just a closer look at one of the stars so you can see the scrappiness of this quilt.  I made the strata and then cut out the pieces.  When I was laying the quilt out I really wished that I had kept my pieces together better because it became a huge headache to find the pieces that matched and it looked so much better when the entire star was made out of the same strata pieces.  Problem was that the strata was very different and I would not have enough of one kind to do the entire star.  If I ever do this pattern again I will have a much better ideal of how I want to do the strata and how much of each strata I need. 

 

I really love the scrappy quilts and there will be more.  I have some pieces left over from this project and I have plans for those "one of these days".  Oh me, another UFO!

 

I also finished up a batch of my Quilts for Kids and those have all been mailed now which made me feel really good!

 

Well I can hardly wait until my next post because I want to tell you what I am up to next!  Ya'll have a quilty month with lots of love and laughter!

 



2013, Yeah.

Okay folks, I am so very sorry, but I did this last week and I though I got it posted but apparently I had that old brain thingie and it did not get posted.  So here I am posting this weeks first and last weeks behind it.  Sorry.

Well this new year has started.  I have to say I finished out the last year in a blaze as I completed a lot of quilts between my semi-retirement on Nov. 1, 2012 and the end of Dec. 2012.  Many of those I did not get to make pictures of since my camera died and I had to get a new camera, which I got my husband for Christmas.  Now I'm back to taking pictures and really have been doing quite a bit of quilting.

I'm going to go ahead an post some of the many pictures that I have taken so you will get to see some of what I have been working on so you will know I really have been busy.  Many new projects going also, which I think will be fun.  Also I need to finish some of those older projects that I have started but not yet completed.  I have some that I have been working on for a couple of years and they just sort of get put back when I hit a snag or something to wait for a later date.  I'm sure none of you ever do that, start working on a project and something interrupts like life, or you hit a snag that you just don't really know where to go from here so you have to put it down for a while and wait for inspiration to dawn!  Sometimes it takes a long time for that dawn to come!

So here go my photos in review!

A young lady I know had a baby this year and I decided to make something for the newborn, precious little Olivia.  Now the colors in this are the colors her parents had chosen and I made a cute little round pad to lay her down on to change diapers, or for her to play on when out and about.  It being round, I had these pieces of fabric that had the holes in the center, so what to do.  Well I decided to make a patchwork and cut it to fit into the hole, so that is what I did here.  The top is finished, now just got to get her quilted.  This is a she!  Pretty in pink!

Now this is one of Kay's quilts that she brought me.  The border has this wonderful print that ran diagonially so I just decided to do some wavey lines up through the lines and I really think this turned out quite well.  Of course, I also had to add some leaves in the gold border.  I love doing leaves.

I wanted to do something a little different so I did just some close straight lines where the four corners came together and made the lines in different directions.  I liked the effect as did Kay.  Whew!

Another of Kay's Quilts that I completed for her.  We were going to Florida for a conference and we stopped by The Scarlet Thread down below Atlanta and picked out these fabrics for a pattern that Kay found that she really liked.  They turned out really well together.  Kay has a knack for how to arrange lights and darks.

This top was so pretty but it had some challenges in that each time they added another border the edges were longer than the center portion of the quilt.  The colors were beautiful, but........There wound up being about 4-6" extra fabric sewn into outside border.  I had to whip this one into shape!

As you can see I did a lot of whipping.  The outer border had the closest quilting and the amount of quilting decreased as I moved toward the center of the quilt, until the center was an all over mofit.  Loved the lace and tatting used in this top, but once again that can produce challenges to the longarm quilter.

Wanted you to see a picture of the whole quilt.

Wow, sorry folks but this internet is moving so very slow today, it has taken me more than 5 minutes each to add these photos so I'm going to stop for today.

 

I will be posting next week and putting up some more of what I have been doing.  Just a couple of hints that I will pass along.  On the quilt top I made the circle in a square quilt, that is flannel and boy does that stuff stretch.  You really have to be careful when piecing flannel and take care so you don't stretch the pieces completely out of shape.  I'm sure I will have lots of practice at fixing problems by the time I get through quilting that one.

 

Second hint is to be sure and measure your quilt before adding each border.  If the length of your outside edges and the measurement across the middle of the quilt are not the same you need to make some adjustments so your last border means all three measurements are the same.  If you bring the measurements closer to the center measurement with each added border you will not have wavey edges.  If your measurements are 74", 68", and 76" then you will have wavey borders with the one with the longest measurement being the waviest.  If the issue is not addressed early and consistently by the quilter you will have pleats in your borders which no one wants.  Even with very experienced longarm quilters it is very, very difficult to fix a border that is over 6" longer than it should be according to the rest of the quilt. 

 

My pledge is, I will do my best to make each quilt I quilt the best that I can make it.  I really try to do that but being an imperfect person, in an imperfect world sometimes the results are not perfect.  I hope you all have a wonderful day quilting and piecing.  Practice makes perfect!  I'm still practicing!



 





What do you mean Christmas?

Well folks, Halloween is gone, Thanksgiving will be here in just a few more days and then comes that wonderful Holiday Christmas!  While we never want to forget the reason for the season, this is a time when crafting abounds as we crafters search for ways to provide presents for all on our list!  This is the time that I am making lots of lap quilts as you have seen in previous blogs, pillows, aprons, napkins, potholders and this year I'm making some pillowcases also!  This past week has been my pillowcase week and the cases I have made have been made from stash, so dig through that stash for your larger pieces of fabric  and even your 3" strips.  There are so many pretty fabrics available with kid themes that you also have a wonderful selection at the fabric stores.  One thing I really strive to do is get 100% cotton material so it is all very much washable and easy to get stains out of if necessary!

 

 

Well on to how to make these wonderful little gifts....

 

What you will need:  Fabric for the body of the case 27" x wof (width of fabric)  Now we all know that fabric comes in different widths but this is talking about your standard width of approximately 42 to 45 inches.

 

Fabric for the cuff: 9" x wof

Accent piece of fabric:  3" x wof

 

How much simpler can we get.  3 pieces of coordinating fabric.  Now if you go to the fabric store to purchase the fabric and you know you are going to make more than one pillowcase and you want to stretch those dollars, if you purchase 1 yard of fabric, you can get a body and a cuff from that fabric so you can make coordinating pillow cases by getting 1 yard for the main fabric on one pillow case and have the cuff for the coordinating pillowcase from that 1 yard of fabric without waste!  If you purchase the same accent piece of fabric you will need only 6" x wof for both pillowcases, but switch it up any way you want and you can even use the same accent piece for 4 pillowcases and just purchase 1/3 of a yard of accent fabric.  (Just be sure that your fabric store is cutting the fabric straight)  Sorry but I have gotten home after purchasing 1/3 yard of fabric and found it was 12 inches on one side of the cut and 9 inches on the other!  Did not make my day I can tell you.  Actually took some back to the fabric store because of it, and that was a major hassle!

 

So cut your fabric....

 

1.  The body of the pillowcase

 

2.  The cuff of the pillowcase

 

3.  The accent piece for the pillowcase

4.  Fold the accent piece in 1/2 so it is 1 1/2" wide and press with wrong sides together.

5.  Layout the cuff of the pillowcase, right side up.

6.  Lay the accent piece with the raw edges aligning with the raw edge of the cuff on the top edge.

7.  Align the body of the pillowcase fabric wrong side up with the raw edge also along the top edge.

8. Fold the excess length of the body of the pillowcase up so it is smaller than the cuff piece.

9.  Fold the bottom part of the cuff up matching the raw edges forming a tube and pin the raw edges together catching both edges of the cuff, both edges of the accent piece and only 1 edge of the body of the pillowcase.

10.  Sew a straight seam down the length of the tube you have created.

11.  Turn the tube right side out.

12 Press being sure to turn the accent piece toward the cuff.

Don't worry that all of your fabric has not been the same width.  Just try to keep it as straight as possible on 1 side.

13.  Trim the edge of the case to remove uneven edges and selvedges.

Now you have a nice straight edge to sew.

16.  Fold the case in half , right sides together matching the cuff and accent pieces.

15.  Making sure to pin your edges at the accent piece so they will stay straight then sew a seam around the two raw edges of the pillowcase.

16.  Those pesky corners need to be trimmed so you get a nice corner. 

(TIP:  When getting ready to turn a corner stop a couple of stiches early and turn you material half way around the corner, take 2 stitches and then lift the pressure foot and turn the rest of the way around the corner.  You will have a sharper corner that is more easily turned after trimming.)

17.  Turn the pillowcase right side out and press.

18.  Now to make a nice finished seam once again sew around the two edges where you made the previous seam and all raw edges will be encased so there is no raveling when it is being washed.

 

As you can see I have made several of these pillowcases for gifts for family.  Kids seem to really love them because this labels the pillow as their special pillow.  Parents love for kids to get them because they don't require batteries and they do not make noise!

 

 

Now if you really want to share the Christmas spirit you can make up a few extra of these and donate them and particularly now with the hurricane Sandy victims items like this are needed as well as making them for your local childrens hospitals (check with them first) or you can give them to any of your shelters, because they can always use bedding items, or some of your other organizations like the Salvation Army or Red Cross.  Just call and check with them and see what they tell you before making up a large number.  You make even want to talk with your local guild and see about a community project.  I wish you all a wonderful day and hope you enjoy the preparations for the holiday season.



 

 



Whats happening around my house?

Well it has been a lovely day so far and looks to be a restful evening.  I'm thinking about some different things I could do for Christmas and gifts for friends and co-workers. 

Well you will  never believe that I started this post and got 2 sentences and then had to stop for some reason or another.  I really don't remember what it was now..........Yes I am that age! hahaha  At any rate I'm going to finish this post because what I wanted to talk about today is Christmas gifts.  Now I love homemade, but sadly not everyone does.  The reasons given for not liking homemade as given by people who I have asked are varied and I'm going to list a few.

Most often mentioned was they were not useful.  They were house decorations and they didn't even match their houses.  Another is they don't fit if they were a personal gift.  Another biggie that people seem to complain about is that they are Christmas related and so they can't even use the gift until the next year!  Another thing that people have said in the past is that they were cheap!  Well I know they don't make homemade or they would realize that many homemade gifts are actually more expensive than the person could have bought in the store if they wanted to get something that was made in China from Wally World or a similar place.  Me, I like homemade.  Me, I make homemade.  Usually I make homemade and I use those products that I am making for others in my own home so I know how they stand up to normal everyday wear and tear.

With everyone on television wanting to talk about going green and saving energy I have decided that one of the things that I will do this year is napkins.  Now I am doing Christmas napkins, but you can actually use these napkins at any time of the year so you can use any print or solid or stripe that you want for everyday use.  You can make special occassion napkins using particular seasonal prints etc.  Be aware you can go to Walmart and purchase cloth napkins rather inexpensively.  If you make them here are the supplies you will need for 6-8 napkins.  The reason I say 6-8 is you need to watch the width of the fabric.  If you can find fabric that is less than 45" at a cheaper price, then go for it!  There is significant waste in 45" wide fabric.  The particular pattern that I used is a half-circle that is 18" in diameter.  Now you can make your own pattern with paper and use a string and pencil to draw the arc.  If you are fortunate like I am and had purchases in the past a ruler to cut circles then you are way ahead of the game.

I purposely made this picture specifically so you could see where this particular ruler came from and it even has the telephone number and website in case you want to order this ruler.  I am very glad that I had it on hand.  As you can see it will cut circles up to 19" in diameter and as small as 6" in diameter.  So very great when you want to do a drunkards path quilt!  But that is for another post at a later date, if you want that be sure and let me know and I'll be happy to post.

Now I particularly wanted my napkins to be different colors on the back and the front so I purchased 1 yard of 2 different fabrics.  One is more of a Christmas fabric and the other is a winter print that is not particularly Christmas themed.

Of course the first part is getting everything ready.  Since I purchased 1 yard of fabric I cut the fabric into 2 18" x width of fabric pieces and then I used the ruler to cut the individual pieces.  2 pieces of fabric for each napkin.  A little hint with the cutting.  Since I did not want any more seams than necessary when I cut the pieces I placed the inner line on the fold of fabric and the cut edge on the seam allowance line and that worked perfectly.  Yes it looked a little strange to be cutting it in that way but it worked perfectly.

Now the next step is very simple, just put the right sides of the fabric together and sew them together leaving an opening on the straight edge of the fabric that is 3-4" in width so you can turn the fabric easily.  See that isn't hard at all, just straight sewing.  Next trim the excess fabric from the two corners where the straight line turns and begins the arc.  Just snip off an little triangle from both of these corners and turn the napkin so the right sides are out. 

Press your project making sure that the opening you have left on the straight edge is pressed with the seam allowance turned in.  This will benefit you so much when you start to do your trim around the edge! 

This is a picture of how the napkin will look, and the last step will be putting the finishing around the edges.  I used a very simple stitch on my sewing machine but a straight stitch is what I used on the first napkins I made and is great for everyday napkins.  Oh I do need to say that I used 100" cotton fabric on these napkins because of it's durability and washablity, but I have used linen on some and they also turned out lovely and are washable also.  They have more of the nice texture for the good everyday napkins, you know the ones for regular Sunday dinners or birthday parties if you don't want to be forever purchasing paper napkins.

My fuzzy picture of the tiny bells stitch that I used on my Christmas napkins.  I just looked at the stitches on my machine and that looked Christmas to me that that is what I went with.  You can use metalic thread for this to make it a very special napkin, or if you are adept at embrodery and have a machine you could just use some fabric and put an embrodery mofit on these napkins.  One of the great things about homemade is you can add whatever extras you want and have the ability or equipment to master.

For these particular napkins you can just fold them or you can fold them to form a tree pattern and they will look like this!

Sorry but I think this is adorable!  Here are some pictures of how this is folded.

Begin the fold by measuring over 10 " on the straight edge and that is where you will make your first fold!

Then it is just a matter of folding back and forth!

Try to keep the outside edge fairly even so you will have a good tree effect!  Now on to the last fold!

This will be a wonderful addition to your holiday table and a greener option for holidays and everyday living.

Now with fabric, even the cheap stuff, costing minimum 4.99 yard usually, and you have purchased 2 yards of fabric you can make between 6-8 napkins for $10.00 plus your time and effort.  Oh, sorry I didn't add in the cost of the thread and if you purchase special thread then that is an additional cost that can be anywhere from 1.99 to 12.99 for your project.  My ideal is to use what I already had purchased for other projects and use up some of that!  If you have fabric that has been left from other projects you could even make this from your stash.  These napkins will be paired with coasters that are made from the scraps and I will also have some potholders and trivets for gifts.

Since I have now retired from my full time job, or at least semi-retired since I will work a couple of days each week on some special projects, I plan to use what I have an give several homemade Christmas items this year.  What about you?  If you are making for Christmas I hope you have already started! 

Have a great day and happy quilting and sewing!

The WEEK END!!!! YEA!!

Well I was off on Friday and I wanted to get some sewing done, but with the hundred and one other things that were on the agenda I didn't get a lot of sewing completed.  What I did get done was some work on my block of the month that has been kind of laying around waiting for me to complete the blocks.  Well it is almost the end of the year and the last of the blocks so I figured I better get busy.  The fact of the matter is, I have more than one BOM that I have started and completed 2 or 3 of the blocks and while I continued to go and pick up the patterns and I picked up sashing and borders and binding and even backing and they are all waiting for me to retire and get busy!  Now I have to say that I did complete one of my BOM that was from several years ago when I was traveling to Knoxville every month and doing a lot of quilting up there.  I did finish that quilt and my DIL has that one on her bed at home.  It was Thimbleberries and was a wonderful quilt.  I have to say that some of the blocks I really didn't like the fabric so I sort of substituted some of the fabric and some of the blocks just did not do anything for me so I sort of did my own thing a time or two.  There were also a couple of blocks that I didn't sew exactly like they said because I made mistakes but they were very interesting so I just went ahead and put the stuff I wanted in the quilt and I'm not alone in thinking it was a good quilt.  The problem is.........that is the only BOM I have ever completed.  I guess you could say I'm a starter but not necessarily a finisher.  Oh well, that's me!  But I am determined that this quilt will be finished!  So on to the blocks.

I've completed 6 of the blocks.  It seems I have misplaced one of my patterns so I will have to check with my bud, Peggy, to see if she still has her copy of that particular block.  Then I will pick up the November and December blocks and will be ready to go to finish the quilt.  I think I will go ahead and try to do some of the putting the blocks together since I do have the finishing pattern so I will have that done also.  The more I get done the more likely I am to be able to just pick it up one weekend and finish it.  I love it when I can go through and pick up several different items and sew them together and put the borders on and just finish several quickly.  Do you like to do that also?

How funny that these two pictures go together and almost look like one picture.  This is four of the blocks.  The peach with gray stripe is not part of the quilt blocks just in case you were wondering.  Each block is pinned to it's patter and the plastic bag the pattern and fabric was packaged in.

 

 

Okay here are the other two blocks I have completed. 

 

 

I am really very happy with the way the blocks are turning out.  Maybe this is something else that will inspire me to finish this BOM. 

 

I have been saving up things for several years and saying this is for when I retire.  Well now that I am almost to retirement I keep digging through my things and finding things that I actually forgot that I even had!  I found another BOM that came totally packaged and I really don't remember if I got it in Knoxville or if I got it from the Gypsy Quilter when she came to visit and teach at our guild.  She stayed here at my house and we talked quiting 24-7!  It was so much fun.  Poor Kenneth got to cook for her the entire time because we were so busy doing things that I just didn't even have time to cook! lol.  My friends that would come by the house and I benefited greatly from her staying here because she was a wealth of information!

 

At any rate I have either 3 or 4 or 5 more BOM that I can think of right now that have not been sarted or not been completed.  One of my quilt shop owner friends used to get all the stuff together for the entire BOM for me and just let me buy everything at one time and that was wonderful so that is one of the reasons I have so many.  I think it would be awesome for quilt shop owners to make up a few kits to have for sale as a whole and people not need to come every month for their block and sales pitch.  They could increase the price accordingly and I bet they would have a lot of people that would want to do those things.  One shop owner in Missouri let me take pictures of the BOM they were working on that was in 30's fabric so I could have the pattern since she had not completed the entire pattern when I was there.  She did not purchase a BOM by the manufacturer, but made up her own and wrote her own patterns.  It was a wonderful shop!  Gosh I miss that one!

 

I have also been over to FrogPond to see what Sandi is working on and I'm jealous.  I want to do a quilt like her's.  And I love Quiltworks and their site on FaceBook.   There are so many things I just keep putting pictures in and printing off patterns.  I told Kenneth today that I needed to pick up a couple of binders to put stuff in so I don't lose it or let it get messed up!  I really don't think I will ever run out of projects.

 

Well this is a short post but this is what I have been working on as well as working some more on the T-shirt quilt that I don't have the borders on yet.  I hope to do that this weekend also and I have the blocks from the guild that need to be put together and the tops for the Quilts for Kids that I need to quilt and get the binding sewed on before the next guild meeting which will be next week!  "Yikes, time flies when you're having fun!"  I hope you all have a lovely week of quilting.  Let me see what you are working on this week!