Monday Meanderings 12 - 26 - 2022

The last set of goals for 2022.  I'm trying to get ready mentally for 2023 but I'm not there quite yet. Let's do a quick goals check for last week. 

12/19/22

✅Finish last ornaments — See them here

✅Wrap presents — done early Sat evening

✅Make some more flying geese and string blocks for Talking Turkey — Change of plan to just one row of flying geese. See below

✅Make the last block from Sherri’s 2022 BOM — Done! 

✅Make a cake for Christmas dinner — Finished Sat morning

✅Enjoy family Christmas celebration  — It was a blast! 

And for the last goals list this year -- doesn't look like too much until quilt and bind two quilts hits me. The backing is on for the first one. 

12/26/22

Quilt and bind two of my quilts

Pick a new hand project to work on

Decide on 12 UFOs to work on for the 2023 UFO Challenge

Start sewing border on Talking Turkey 

And, because I forgot to do this earlier here's my November stash busting statistics.  Um, yea, I am still busting some stash but it was less than last month. OOPS.  

2022	Fabric In Month	Fabric In Year	Fabric Out  Month	Fabric Out Year	Total In or Out Year
Nov	14	106	8	122.25	16

Not bad though but I do need to get at least 2 tops quilted and bound as I have added 3 wide backs to my stash this month. The first backing is already loaded.  

Here's the new plan for Talking Turkey.  I might have enough blocks made but if not I only need a few more. (Or so I hope.) You can see the previous plan here.  I'm leaving out the string quilting and the extra border of flying geese.  Once I get the first flying geese border on I will "consider" more but I'm inclined to get this finished and move on to something else. 

When we arrived at our son's house Christmas Day I was tickled to see Rose dressed up in her wedding dress I made a previous Christmas.  And, I was happy to see the dress was in good condition.  I was pretty hard on all the doll clothes my grandma made me.  Good job Ellie. 

I'm linking up with my regular Linky Parties: 

Design Wall Monday

To Do Tuesday  

Oh Scrap on hiatus to next week

I'm looking forward to doing some blog surfing.  I haven't been very good about it for the last couple of weeks. Hopefully this week I'll get to view a lot of blogs. 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

 

 

 

Monday Meanderings 8 - 23 - 2021

I've taken two weeks off -- although I did get a post up yesterday about finishing my Positivity quilt.   I didn't have anything to post for the last two Fridays.  Last week my granddaughter was visiting Sunday through Wednesday evening.  We had so much fun together although I was exhausted each night.  I had her doing a little sewing on my Featherweight, we made some bead bracelets, we played dolls together, went swimming and looked at all the boxes marked "dolls" in my closet.  

I have way too many dolls!  The last box we went through had another box in it marked "Grandma Ruth's dolls."  That would be Ellie's great, great grandmother.  When we opened the box -- ugh -- there were heads rolling. There was a wig, probably made with human hair. There were some bald dolls.  I picked up one and the arms fell off.  Neither of us were very excited about that box!  I will have to figure out if it makes sense to repair any of the dolls. My grandmother loved dolls and made me lots of doll clothes for various dolls she gave me.  It was fun to visit them.  

Dolls from left to right: My Friend Jenny (my daughter Jenny's doll), Rose (Ellie's American Girl doll), and Kit (my AG doll that I won in the late 90s or early 2000s.) Ellie has a great imagination and made up stories about what the dolls were doing.  

Needless to say I got little quilting done last week.  But I did get a dress made for Ellie.  She picked the pattern and the fabric. (Hey, I was excited she picked fabric from my stash for her dress!) I have been very good not buying fabric this month although I would have for Ellie.💙 I should have a good amount of fabric used by the end of the month.

Here's how I did on my goals from 2 weeks ago.  (I may have completed some during the last 2 weeks.) 

8/16/21

Finish knit baby blanket - close but not quite done.

✅Make more Ombre Log Cabin blocks

✅Have fun with Ellie 

Finish quilt on long arm — ugh.  Long Arm problems still 1 more row to do.

8/23/21

Finish Blue basket 

Begin aqua table runner 

Work on Ombre blocks 

Finish knitting baby blanket 

Mail Verdant Serenity to Ca. 

Hopefully I'll finish a couple of projects on my list this week.  And, wow, there isn't much time left in August and I haven't even started this month's table runner. (I think I've picked out the block though!) Where has this month gone? 

I'm linking up with most of my regular linky parties: Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, and To Do Tuesday.  Spend some time surfing to see what everyone is working on.  

Do you know of some upcoming Quilt Alongs or Mystery Quilts?  I've been trying to pass along some web sites for QAL and Mysteries to my guild.  If you know of some starting in Sept or Oct please share the info.  Here are a few I know of: 

All the Trimmings  Mystery Quilt and Stitch Along at the the Fat Quarter Shop starts on September 7.  Link to beginning of All the Trimmings.

Starting later in September is the Snowman Sew Along by Jacquelynne Steves. 

Well bummer -- this one doesn't start until October but sign ups are already full.  It is a Murder Mystery Quilt -- sew the quilt to solve the crime.  I believe there is a cost for this one but it does sound fun.  If this sounds like something you might be interested in you can sign up for the 2022 one beginning on Halloween, 2021. 

As I said above -- if you know of others please share!  Thanks. 

Happy Quilting All.  Bonnie  

Monday Meandering 12 - 21 - 2020

Not much is getting done on the piecing and quilting side but I am making some progress on Christmas preparations.  Here's what I hoped to get done last week. . . 

12/14/2020

Finish Christmas ornaments✔️

Wrap presents✔️ Most that have arrived and those I needed to pass on Sunday were done.

Finish adding coping strips ✔️ - 2 columns are sewn together - 1 to go 

Make scarf to go with doll hat✔️I had to find the right clothes for my Kit doll to do a glamor shot to show off the scarf & hat I made as a Christmas present for one of my grands. In hindsight I would have made the scarf a bit wider and less long. 

Write & Mail Christmas cards✔️

And now, goals for the last full week of 2020 . . . 

12/21/2020

T Shirt Quilt - add the coping strips to the last column, get vertical sashing strips on

Make blocks for FCQ Equilter

Try to finish hand quilting on very old Christmas quilt

Make more blocks for 2019 BOM quilt 

Quilt and bind one of my quilts

Are you having delays receiving mail and packages from all the major delivery services? We are. As most people have this year, we ordered most presents online. Some presents were ordered early, others not so early.  We've got a list and are checking it twice multiple times to make sure everything we ordered comes in.  So far way too many items haven't arrived. 

But enough arrived to allow us a quick meet up with our son to pass along some of the presents for his family.  The ten of us are tentatively planning an outdoor get together after Christmas to swap and open Christmas presents.  Hopefully, later in the week but it will all depend on the weather.  It would be pretty uncomfortable to sit outside at 40 degrees and rain. 

I finished these socks a few weeks ago but didn't get a picture of them until recently.  These were in the group of presents passed off to Kevin.  (I'm not admitting who is getting them...) But I really love the color.  

I'm ready to get my day going.  I have some last minute local shopping to do. And, then on to the items on the goals list.  I'd really like to get the T shirt quilt together (sans borders) so I can put some other blocks up that I'd like to get to top stage soon. 

Linking up to my regular parties: Oh Scrap, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, and To Do Tuesday.  I'll really try to remember to link up on Tuesday -- I noticed I failed to last week.  Sigh! Yea!  I remembered to link up to To Do Tuesday! 

Wishing all who celebrate a Happy Christmas Holiday.  

Happy Quilting! Bonnie 

Monday Meandering 1 - 27 - 2020

After a great sewing weekend with Sharon I made it home safely after the 5 hour drive.  I was home by 2:30 totally exhausted.  I was sound a sleep on the couch by 3:30 -- and didn't wake up until 5! 


I'm still sharing things I made for the grand's Christmas presents.  Here's one of the big presents for Ellie and her doll.  (Her name escapes me at the moment...)  For the last year Ellie has been asking me for a wedding dress for her doll.  EEK! A WEDDING dress??  Yep.  And I made it for her! Here are a few pictures... 

Dress in process.  (My spray bottle made a great dress form!) 

Finished wedding dress in the wardrobe Pat made for Ellie. 

Here's the wardrobe loaded up Christmas afternoon.  I'm sure she's hung a lot more clothes in there now. 

For some reason, this year I made way more than I usually do for the grands.  One of the things I made was a sports bag tag for Sophie and Natalie.  

Front of the baseball tag for Sophie's new sports bag.

Bag Tag Gone Wrong.  Notice where the tag is suppose to be sliced open to put the clip in. The sad thing is it didn't show up on the instructions with the cut area to the side.... it was perfectly lined up for the top.  My guess is the embroidery design was changed after the directions were written. Sigh. Needless to say I made another one.  These are made with marine vinyl.  

I wanted to share more photos from our vacation.  We were on an cruise that stopped at Aruba; Curaçao; Cartagena, Columbia; Panama Canal and Costa Rica.  The only stop we didn't have an excursion was Aruba.  We left the ship and walked around town a bit.  This was what we saw as we were leaving the dock. Looks good to me! 

One thing we saw was this National Archeological Museum of Aruba.  It was interesting to see how people lived on the island through history.  I'm not sure what the blue horse was all about but I had to get a picture.  The museum was housed in the green building.  It was bigger than that building hints at. 

We ended up at a bar that had WiFi.  (Unlike other cruises we've been on this one did not offer free WiFi -- even though we did have a suite. Sigh.)  We enjoyed ourselves just watching the main street.  Unfortunately, I don't like beer so I had soda water, which I do like.  Lots of bubbles but no sugar or caffeine.

I'll continue to share photos of the trip over the next few posts.  Knowing me and the fact I'm trying to get a top quilted before January is gone AND I have a challenge quilt that must be done by Feb 8th I'll probably only post on Mondays.  I'd like to get back in the habit of posting twice or three times a week but don't hold your breath.  

I'm linking with my favorite Monday Linky Parties: Oh Scrap, Monday Making and Design Wall Monday. (Design Wall Monday will be added once it goes live AND I remember to do it!) 

I'm calling it quits tonight.  Happy Quilting All!  Bonnie 

Monday Meandering 12 - 2 - 2019

Busy days this past week and it looks like that busy-ness will continue this week. 

Things that have been on my ironing station this week: 

Doll wedding dress needs some big seams and the back closure.  

And something that was on the embroidery machine Sunday. 

Second Mendhi shirt half embroidered -- it's finished now but I'll get a decent picture when the sun is out. 

Grammy and Theo selfie.

Tuesday I spent in Northern Virginia with Theo.  Luckily he was really good.  No whining, no crying and no fussing at all, including going down for a nap.  Amazing. I, on the other hand, was crying over the traffic on the way home!  Ok, not really but I would have liked to! Evidently the I 95 corridor is the most congested in the nation.  And, boy howdy, it sure was Tuesday evening.  It took an hour to get to Kevin's house and 2 1/2 hours to get home.  (Ok, it might have been 2 1/4 hours as I stopped to buy dinner.)  

Overall I've been able to check off ✔ a few items on my secret list.  Some are partially done.  I expect to be checking off a few more this week.  Of course, I do have an addendum to the list.  But those items won't be worked on until the original list is finished or almost finished.  If you guess that I'll be in my studio every free moment this week you are absolutely right. 

Here are the linky parties I will try to link up with!  Busy times means I don't always think about getting back to link up.  Sigh.  Oh Scrap, Monday Making, and Design Wall Monday should be hosting quilty Linky Parties this week.  Check the links (once they are up of course) and see what new ideas you an find!

Happy Quilting All!  Bonnie   

Monday Meanderings 11 - 18 - 2019

Not much piecing and no quilting was accomplished this week.  Here's what I did get done.  Doll clothes for Ellie for her birthday. 

I was really happy with the end result and most fabric came from my stash except for the netting for the petticoat and the Velcro® for the back closure.  By Thursday afternoon I was pretty well finished with the dress except for needing to buy the Velcro®. I thought, hum, I have a doll sweater in pieces just waiting to be put together.  I'll finish that too.  Except, wait, Ruby, the doll, would need a pair of pants to wear with the sweater.  So on to making a pair a "jeans." 

The sweater got sewn together and the snaps were done on the back.  It's a good thing I have all sorts of odd ball stuff from my previous days of sewing clothes because I had the perfect size of snaps to sew on the back.  

Ellie loved all the clothes and immediately put the pants and sweater on Ruby.  Except evidently she doesn't like the patch pockets on the jeans because she put them on backwards.  Sigh.  

As I said, no piecing but a very productive week.  Between Monday's morning long Veterans Day program in our community and pretty much a full day rehearsal for the Spotsylvanians on Saturday, I've had a really busy week!  

My goals for this week is to make more progress on various Christmas presents which will remain unnamed.  Just know that I have a list of several things to be done and some planned time to work on them.  (Hopefully, I've planned enough time!) I'm also going to sneak in one more top to be quilted this week along with working on QOV at the guild on Wednesday. 

I'm linking up with Oh Scrap!, Monday Making, and Design Wall Monday.  When you have a spare moment, take a look. 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

One Monthly Goal -- November

Success! 

I finished two American Girl doll outfits which was my goal for the month. And,  I made rompers and a shirt for Ellie's babydoll.  YEA! Whoop, Whoop! Here's the link to the dress and jacket I made first.   I was reading over my blog post about setting the goal.  Maybe I should make the little doggy and a back pack that goes with the shorts outfit.  The question is whether I have time to or not. 

Check out those shoes ..dolly Crocs. 

Baby Doll rompers and shirt. Hum, I originally thought that the pale aqua was Kona cotton.  I eventually realized it isn't.  It is lighter weight and probably not the best choice.  Ow well.  It does actually go with the shirt pretty well though. 

After sewing all of these doll clothes,  I'm looking forward to getting back to piecing quilts and getting a few quilts on Ruthie 2.  She runs so smoothly.  And because she is 24" I don't have to scroll forward so often.  Maybe next week I can throw a baby quilt on and quilt it up.  

I'm linking up with Elm Street Quilts for the November finish link and Needle and Thread Thursday.  Take some time to see what folks are working on as we start December.

It's time to get back to the studio. (OK, no, I'm really not going back to the studio -- I'm going to check out some of the blogs from those linky parties above!) 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

Monday Meandering 11 - 13 - 2017

Here are some successes from last week's goals:

I showed the pattern and my fabric here. Here is "Kit" modeling the dress almost done.  I have stitched the lapels back but there are some roses that still need to be put on the dress.  

I've cut out a top and a pair of shorts.  The shorts are done but the top still has a little work to go.  Next up will be another baby doll outfit.  Quilting and piecing have taken a backseat to these doll clothes. 

I won Kit with a trunk, clothes, accessories and quilts from Village Quilters in Catonsville, Md at least 10 years ago. When she came to live at my house I displayed her.  When Jenny was home from college she would often change Kit into one of the many outfits she had.  When the grands came along, Kit retired to her trunk because Jenny's doll and clothes were available.  Needless to say, she was very happy to get out in the world again wearing this fabulous outfit! 

The Country Piecemaker's pillowcase day was so much fun! Sharon came down and we traveled the hour and half to Powhatan, Va together.  The guild made 152 pillowcases Saturday.  All were cut out and in kits before the day began.  Some were already pinned in "burritos."  We had more people stay this year to do the sewing and all the turning, pinning, ironing and etc. that goes into making the pillowcases.  Rumor has it that only 110 were made last year.  

Sewers in the front, pinners in the back.  Standing folks were ferrying cases from one location to another.

Becky, Bonnie and Nancy sewing away. You can see cases ready to sew and ready to turn in front. 

Through the 8 years that Country Piecemakers have been making and giving pillowcases for sick kids we've contributed 2,685 cases.  Amazing!  The funds and/or fabric are all donated -- the guild does not provide any financial assistance. Hats of to Colleen, our intrepid pillowcase leader, and her special elf, Donna, who cut the fabric and put together all the kits.   I will continue to make pillowcases for this -- in fact I think I bought 5 yards of Easter fabric when I was up in Lancaster.  

I was more successful with my goals this week. Here's last weeks:

November 6, 2017

Make first doll outfit√

Retime Ruthie, the longarm√

Attend Pillowcase day in Powhatan√√

Finish one cross stitch ornament √

Catch up on the Rainbow Scrap Challenge √ mostly

November 13, 2017

Finish 2^nd doll outfit

Cut out baby doll outfit

Work on another cross stitch ornament

Continue to work on Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Play on Ruthie 2

Attend Spotsylvanian’s rehearsal and first concert of the season

A lot is going on this week so I may fall short on some of these goals.  

Check out my favorite linky parties:  Oh Scrap!, Monday Making, Main Crush Monday, and Moving It Forward.  I'm going to spend a bit of time today cruising through the Internet to see what folks are working on. 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

November OMG & Stashbusting Efforts

It's time to decide on my November One Monthly Goal.  While I was trying to decide what to work on this month it dawned on me that I really had to have all Christmas presents bought and wrapped by the second weekend of December because I had all sorts of other plans for the rest of the month.  So, knowing that, I decided to make my goal present-oriented.  Natalie has her new American Girl doll so I will be making doll clothes for it.  My goal is to make 2 complete outfits (sans shoes...) during November. 

I bought this great book a couple of months ago at Quilter's Corner in Midlothian, VA.  It has quite a few different style outfits including 2 dresses, several pants, the coat and pjs.  And, notice the little dog.  Hum, do I want to try to make the dog?  

Here's the dress and jacket I've already cut out.  Both the bodice and the jacket are lined.  Unfortunately the shoe pattern isn't included.   I'll be starting on it soon.  So two doll outfits is my goal for the month.  

Next up is my stash busting statistics.  I just realized I didn't post the September results.  So here are the stats for both months.

2017	Fabric In Month	Fabric In Year	Fabric Out Month	Fabric Out Year	Total In or Out Year
Sept.	18.5	85.5	15.625	92.0	6.50
Oct.	7.25	92.75	10	102	9.25

I bought a lot of fabric in September because I was shopping in Lancaster County.  But I added to the stash in October too.  Luckily, I had a couple of  finishes that counter-balanced the additions to the stash. In October I made lots of pillowcases to donate to hurricane relief and to Ryan's Case for Smiles. In October I finished my Christmas Trip Around the World.  That used up a nice amount of fabric.  What tickled me about it is I was able to use up several smaller bits of fabric that I'd had for a long time.  

I suspect I won't have much fabric used during November.  But I will be getting some doll clothes finished! 

Link ups for today include Elm Street Quilts' One Monthly Goal November Goal Setting and Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation. I'm heading over to these two sites to see what sewists are up to today.  Hope you take a look too. 

Happy Quilting All!  Bonnie