Design Wall Monday 1-9-12

First -- HAPPY BIRTHDAY KEVIN... 29 years ago my son was born.  Hope your year is fantastic. 


On to the design wall... 


Sorry, not much to show you.  I am working on something that can't be shown for awhile.  


But here are the three quilties  I received from the swap last month. First is by Tove in Phoenix, Az.

 Next  by Laura Pringle

 And, last by Sandy Rowe.  Hers was a bit bigger than the rules but it is so darn cute.  All the bells tingled and jingled when I carried it down from the studio.  Love the buttons too. 

Last Week's Goals

Finish the 12 Days of Christmas Mystery √ at least all blocks are done

Put the Chip and Strips top, mystery from Planet Patchwork √ all blocks are done

Baste and quilt Twister Quilt um, no, didn’t happen

Make practice block for secret project √

Cut out the rest of the secret project and begin stitching √ 6 blocks done more cut out

Make 4 more blocks for EFCQuilter’s Komen donation quilt √ I’ve lost count – need 5, maybe 6 more as I duplicated one of the blocks.  Bummer.

Yuck, vacuum the downstairs.  √ and even did a great pre-clean up vacuuming of the studio.  

Week of Jan 9, 2012

Make heart block or two

Make sample blocks of BOM for Guild

Write up and print out instructions for BOM

Make and mail out BOM for Faithful Circle Quilters

Keep making blocks for the secret project… at least 6

Keep making blocks for the Komen donation quilt

Clean off cutting table regularly

Spend 15 minutes a day cutting scraps into usable sizes

Make star blocks from Carolina Christmas as leader/ender project


There you go folks.  Our second design wall of the new year. Go to Patchwork Times to see other design walls.  


Happy Quilting All!  

Clean Up & Organization Day

 A big thank you to my pal, Diana, for spending the day helping me clean up and add a little more organization to my studio.  And, she said she enjoyed herself.  Really?  

I had already done a bit of clean up of the cutting table yesterday.  We're actually dealing with my ridiculous collection of plastic bags... I moved a bunch to the downstairs, trashed some and put others neatly in the basket and changed where the basket lived on the shelves.  Hum the E Quilter's Komen donation quilt on the design wall is making progress.  I changed the corners on the two blocks on the top right.  I added some white to lighten them up.  I want to make at least one more block with a pale pink background and use some more of the light green that I used in the green and yellow star.  6 more to go on those. 

Argh -- look at all the junk in the top right corner.  What a waste of space.  This was taken in process so it looks like I have open shelf space because we were working with the basket of plastic bags. 

Here's the other side of the stash collection before the clean up. You can't really appreciate my cute little duck collection above, they're all mixed together.  But, trust me, below they are spread out!

And, here's one after picture.  I bet you didn't even realize I had boxes and baskets of fat quarters on the top of my shelving.  I need to take pictures that are exactly what I had taken in the before pictures so you can really see what's been done.

My sewing machine is to the left of this L shaped space.  Honestly, you could not see the blue counter here before.  Didn't get a picture of it though.   We didn't start in on the shelf so I'm booking her again in a few weeks!  My "homework" is to cut up and put away a bunch of scraps.  I keep 2.5", 2" and 1.5" strips in the plastic drawer unit on the left.  The boxes and tins have half square triangles in them and different sizes of squares.  The white basket on top has triangles that I can sew into half square triangles... I finally got to the point today that I threw away some of my scraps... I just couldn't take it any more! I did get most of the 80+ yards of fabric I bought at the guild auction folded and put away before today. 

Tomorrow I need to work on getting some of my goals done for this week.  I have a sneaky feeling I'm not going to be checking off a whole bunch of stuff this week!  

Happy Quilting All!  

The First Design Wall Monday of 2012

Here's what I've been working on. I started Planet Patchwork's New Years Day mystery yesterday.  Oops -- I started a new quilt, didn't I?  Here's what I got done in one day.  This is one clue.  I spent the whole day working on this.  It called for 2.5" strips which I was happy to use from my collection of strips.  Except a lot of mine were short pieces 3" to 5".  It would have gone much faster if I had used 22" long strips.  This is what took me nearly the whole day.  I'll sew the next clue this morning since I pinned them together last night.  And then I'm watching the Tournament of Roses parade and the Rose Bowl game. 

 

Goals for Week of 12/26/11

Finish Christmas cards and mail√

Make 4 blocks for FCQ Equilters Komen donation quilts√

Make more log cabin blocks√

Work on Carolina Christmas (finish clue 4) Almost done with all of these

Cut fabric for Planet Patchwork’s New Year’s Day Mystery√

Start the Temecula Quilt Store 12 Days of Christmas Mystery√

Begin working on another secret project. Shoot, what was this secret project??? Oh yes, fabric is selected…. 

I did pretty well on getting things done this past week.  So what's coming up this first week of 2012. 

Week of Jan 2, 2012

Finish the 12 Days of Christmas Mystery

Put the Chip and Strips top, mystery from Planet Patchwork

Baste and quilt Twister Quilt

Make practice block for secret project

Cut out the rest of the secret project and begin stitching

Make 4 more blocks for EFCQuilter’s Komen donation quilt

Yuck, vacuum the downstairs. 

Don't forget to visit Patchwork Times to see what is new on design walls across the internet. 

Happy Quilting All! 

December Stash Report and the Beginning of the New Year

Month of December and the end of the year report

Fabric used:  7.5 yards

Fabric purchased (acquired):  6 7/8 yards  

Net fabric used:5/8 yards    

YEAR To Date 

Year to date fabric used: 72 yards

Year to date fabric purchased: 186.5 yards

Net Year to Date Acquired : 114.5 yards

Just to put this into perspective let's look at the last few years of fabric in and out. 

Year       Fabric In          Fabric Out          + / - 
2009      91.75              91.                    +.75      great year! 
2010      65                   70.25                - 5.25    super year! More used than acquired. 
2011      186.5              72                     +114.5  ARGH -- Too much fabric in and not enough going out.  However I was pretty consistent in amount of fabric used these last two years. But I need to up the number of quilts finished so I can use some of this stash! Or give it away.  


Now on to an exciting addition to my quilting life in 2012.  I have been selected to be a member of Quiltmaker magazine's 2012 Scrap Squad.  Yippee.  I'm looking forward to working on 6 quilts for the magazine during the year.  If you don't know what the Scrap Squad does each member makes the same quilt from an issue of the magazine before it is published.  I've got the directions for the first quilt and have pulled the fabric.  So look for more secret projects in my goals each week.  


Here's a peak at the 12 Days of Christmas Mystery.  I've got 8 blocks to show you now. Although Temecula Quilt Co. sold kits to make this little gem, I'm super pleased with my red and whites.  

After seeing another blogger show all the empty thread spools she had to show for a year's worth of quilting, I decided to do the same thing.  So, here's the thread I've used up this year.  Hum, doesn't look like all that much considering this is both piecing and quilting on Ruthie.  But take a look at this next picture.

Last year, Pat bought me two cones of thread from Connecting Threads.  One was silver grey and the other was black.  So, yes, I have been using a lot of thread but it was only the silver on my big cone.  I unwrapped the black today to show how much I've actually used of the silver this year.  Yep, quite a bit.  I figure I'll finish the silver by about May or so.  Then I think I'll use some of the beige cotton thread I have hanging around before I buy more.  And, the poor black?  I have two additional large spools that I haven't made it through yet so I don't think this cone will be seeing any use for a while! And, I seldom use black unless the quilt is mostly dark.  Grey is my preferred piecing thread. 


Happy Quilting Everyone! 

Winding Down 2011 with Quilting

A few more days left to finish some things, make progress on others and, yes, start something new... 

First a look at a finish from earlier that had to remain a secret until opened. 


I love this quilt ... I may have to duplicate it but I probably never will.  The design elements were from primitive bom kits I got many years ago.  I didn't even realize what I'd signed up for until I started getting them.  After about 4 months and never making them I quit.  I just don't really do primitives.  One of the kits I donated to a silent auction at Faithful Circle Quilters in Md.  The gal who won the bid made it into a wonderful quilt for her husband.  Sorry I don't have pictures to share.  The rooster and the flower were from two different months.  I used some of my fabrics and some from the kits.  I used wonder under or the like to attach the elements except the fence.  I hand buttonholed around every thing but the fence.  There is a little bit of embroidery on the rooster... rats, his eye isn't big enough...should have redone it.  The fence was ripped fabric stitched down the center on the machine.  I used pearl cotton and big stitches to hand quilt it.  It was so much fun to do.  And I hope Patti likes it half as much as I do!  I tried the technique of cutting out the inside of the wonder under on the rooster.  It makes the whole piece feel softer.  I may start doing that on a regular basis. 


On to what I've been working on the past two days... 


More blocks for the FCQ Equilter's donation quilt to Komen.  I've decided I need to keep the outside of the blocks light and not use too much of the darker fabrics.  Hopefully I'll get 8 more blocks done over the weekend. 

Have you checked out Temecula Quilt Company's 12 Days of Christmas Mystery? It is a lot of fun and you would only have 4 blocks to catch up.  Oh, did I forget to tell you they are 3" finished blocks?  One a day for the 12 days of Christmas. there were fabric kits available but are all sold out.  So, I'm using reds and creams.  Here's a picture of the 4 blocks revealed so far. Um, notice one piece block, two pieces block, three pieces block, and four pieces block.  Yep, there is definitely a pattern going on.  They've said not to worry about 12 pieces in a 3" finished block.  Are they crazy?  Well, we'll see.  In the meantime I'm having a lot of fun and keeping up with no problem. The blocks are available on their blog which is the site listed above.  Come join me.  

Are any of you planning on doing mystery quilts this weekend? I had the choice between two.  One is Ann Smith's New Year's Eve mystery.  I've done Ann's mysteries for years over at Fabricholics Annonymous on Yahoo Groups.  (It's also available on beginners_and_beyond@yahoogroups.com , misfit_quilters@yahoogroups.com , PickleRoadStudio@yahoogroups.com ,   qtmysteryquilts@yahoogroups.com , quilt-talk@yahoogroups.com , quiltingtofriendship@yahoogroups.com , and thequiltingpost@yahoogroups.com. ) FA closes membership two weeks before the mystery.  I don't know if any of the other groups do or not. But you might want to check it out.  Ann writes a great mystery.  I'll be saving the steps and might do it later.  Of course, I will be looking before I make it... I'm not good at not peeking! 

The other is Planet Patchwork's New Year's Day mystery. But this year the Merry Mayhem Chips and Strips mystery tickled my interest.  It uses 2.5" strips -- either use a jelly roll or use strips from your stash... I'm using my stash strips.  I've picked the go-with fabric but need to go through the strip drawer to gather the rest of the requirements.  This will be presented on New Year's Day.  Normally I would be watching the Rose Parade and Rose Bowl Game but it's Sunday so all of those festivities will be postponed until Monday.  So, I'm making Chips and Strips.  It will start at 10 am and go until 2 pm.  Six clues posted hourly... except it seems to me that 6 clues hourly would go until 3 pm.  There are prizes and places to post your finished project or top.  So, join me and thousands of others doing Chips and Strips. 

As long time readers may realize, I'm forever taking self portraits of Sophia and me.  Here's the latest -- taken with an older iPhone on Christmas day.  At least I got a "good" part of Sophi!  But, my chin?  Yuck!


Time for me to hit the Y and then on to sewing.  I've got stuff to sew and other stuff to get ready for the mystery.  I'm shopping a bit tomorrow. 


Happy quilting!  beginners_and_beyond@yahoogroups.commisfit_quilters@yahoogroups.com

Design Wall Monday

Nothing to show on the design wall but I can show you a finished Christmas present. 


No, not the tree, the tree skirt.  This was a gift for Kevin and Aimee.  The green print was fabric that Kevin and Aimee got during their honeymoon in India.  I purchased the go-with fabrics on the trip to Mary Jo's.  The backing came directly from the stash.  They were thrilled to receive it especially with the fabric from their honeymoon. 


Here are a couple of photos taken on Christmas day.  We all gathered at Kevin and Aimee's house for their first Christmas. This year Sophia understood Christmas a bit more than she did last year.


She was fascinated with the curling ribbon. And, wow, her first bike according to Uncle Kevin.    

The two turkey cooks! Or perhaps cookers of the turkey. 

And this last picture -- Four Dogs and a Toddler.  Kona, Homer, Cassie, Raggs and Sophia.  

Goals for Week of 12/19/11 Yikes less than a week ‘til Christmas!

Finish secret Christmas present. √

Find pattern, start and finish another secret project √

Bind a third secret project and mail it out √

Send off FCQ Equilters blocks for Joan√

Finish Christmas cards and mail Partly done and mailed, 12 or so to go √

Wrap presents √

Last minute shopping? √

Work on Carolina Christmas √

Work on black and white √

Work on FCQ Equilters Komen donation quilt  didn’t do anything on this one

Goals for Week of 12/26/11

Finish Christmas cards and mail

Make 4 blocks for FCQ Equilters Komen donation quilts

Make more log cabin blocks

Work on Carolina Christmas (finish clue 4)

Cut fabric for Planet Patchwork’s New Year’s Day Mystery

Start the Temecula Quilt Store 12 Days of Christmas Mystery

Begin working on another secret project. 


Don't forget to visit Patchwork Times to visit Design Walls across the internet.  I'm hoping to spend a lot of time in the studio -- some sewing going on and some neatening of the space. 

3 Sleeps 'til Christmas

 

I think I'd better start out with a nice cuppa... cranberry tea.  I usually drink just one or two cups a day if the tea is caffeinated.  I'm super sensitive to caffeine.  


Here's what I've been doing lately --


Log cabins as enders

Hearts for the new Quiltville Heart group 

And secret project that is almost done. Yeah! 

The other good news is I found the pattern and directions for the other secret project.  The third secret project is ready to be boxed up and shipped out.  2/3rds of the Christmas cards are done and ready to take to the post office.  Even if folks don't get them before Christmas, at least they will be post marked before Christmas. 


And, now, with no further to do, I'm out of here --- 


                zip------------off to the studio.  Oops, got to get my clothes on first. And finish breakfast and... Sigh. Eventually I'll be off to the studio. 


Happy Quilting All!