March Stashbusting (Enhancing?) Statistics

Someone in my community was selling fabrics from her mother's stash.  I really shouldn't have gone but I did.  At $5 a bag for fabric it was too enticing to give up.  Here's the whole collection of fabrics that fit in a plastic grocery bag.  I've been so busy since this sale I really didn't do anything with them until yesterday when I grabbed all the darks out and threw them in the washing machine with the border for the dog quilt.  

I didn't want to take the time to measure all of the fabrics so I decided I would count the darks in for March and the lights in for April.  Hopefully, I'll finish a lot of quilts during April to make up for this deficit!

It wasn't a pretty month!  I brought in over 5 yards more than I used.  Well, what did I expect when I only finished one project!  Sigh. I'm already ahead of that dismal usage as I just finished quilting the boy charity quilt.  I'll trim and bind it by Friday.

2016	Fabric In Month	Fabric in Year	Fabric Out Month	Fabric Out Year	Total In or Out Year
Mar	8.250	16.00	2.875	11.875	-5.375

Ok, time to get busy using fabrics -- a lot of fabrics cause it looks to me there are a lot more light colored fabrics than dark and they need to be confessed during April.  On the other hand, the doggy quilt must be finished before the end of the month too.  Hope springs eternal!  

I'm linking up with Let's Be Social at Sew Fresh Quilts and Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation on Thursday.  

Happy Quilting All! 

Monday Meanderings 4 - 4 - 2016

I cleared off the design wall this weekend so I could layout the next quilt.  It needs to be done by about April 20th.  I had been working on all the little units which I finished on Thursday.  This quilt is being made to donate to Mid-Atlantic English Springer Spaniel Rescue.  We got Raggs through them and I've been volunteering with them for many years.   This quilt will be raffled during the year as a fund raiser. 

Here's how I first laid out the quilt.

It was ok, but something just didn't work for me.  Some of it looked fussy.  I moved some things around and tried again. 

Much better but the first 2 blocks in rows 2 and 3 bothered me as did the three read-as-solids in the bottom row.  I already knew I wanted one springer photo in each row so something else had to move.  

Much better.  I moved the dog square on the black background.  I also swapped the orange and print in row two which meant I needed to do the same in row 4. By doing that I calmed down all the rows and spread the more interesting prints through out the quilt.  As I've been sewing the rows together I've been moving around the "sprockets" to try to keep from having the same fabric next to each other too often.  I still need to find a border and backing for this although I think I am going to actually make the backing from leftover fabric.  I have a panel with lots of dog sayings like the one above.  Time will tell. 

For those interested the pattern is Slide Show by Atkinson Designs.  The photos were transferred to fabric by Fotos on Fabric. I really like the end result with these photos.  The fabric is soft and easy to work with, nothing crunchy or stiff. 

I did really well on my goals last week.  Of course, they were written knowing exactly what I needed to get done. I've really focused on the dog quilt 

March 28, 2016

Finish Applique on OMG√

Make backing for OMG√

Quilt OMG√

Sew top together Boy donation quilt√

Work on Slide Show – put top together √ started

April 4, 2016

Finish sewing the rows together for Slide Show

Figure out borders for Slide Show 

Make or buy backing for Slide Show 

Put borders on Boy donation quilt

Make backing for Boy donation quilt

Finish small zippered pouch

That's enough to keep me constantly busy.  I'll be going to Maryland in a week and a half and I'd really like to have the boy donation quilt done and the zippered pouch done so I can donate it to the $10 and under table. The doggy quilt needs to be passed on right after I come back. Time will tell if everything gets done.   

I'm linking up with Monday Makings,  Main Crush Monday, and Design Board Monday at Bits 'n Bobs.  Grab a cup of tea and browse through what's happening in studios around the globe. 

Happy Quilting All!