Nothing much has happened here on the quilting front.
It's been a week of working out, school activities, starting the holiday house cleaning (b/c we're having a house sitter over Thanksgiving, then hosting the family Christmas), and getting houseplants indoors for the winter. Lots of rearranging and de-cluttering has been occurring.
About 4 seams were sewn this week to get the Be Merry Christmas top in one piece.
Now to find border fabric and figure out how big the first one needs to be to accomodate the checkerboard border, b/c I'm sure I don't match the measurements given in the pattern.
Although, I have some tops that require some quilting, so this one may have to wait a while.
Two packages arrived this week. The first was a belated birthday gift from Leona!
A cute FQ and a pattern - love this pattern company, Villa Rose Designs, very simple and quick.
The second was from the Scrappy Trip Along Flickr Swap. So, I counted the fabric "out" and now I count it back "in" - all 3 yards of it.
I was so anxious to see the goodies that I sorted them loosely by color and put them in my bins. That's what happens when one is in house-cleaning mode!
I love this swap because you sign up in yard increments. However, the 2.5" strips must be the equivalent of one yard and do not have to be all the same fabric. It's a very nice way to share some duplicate FQs or some leftover scraps that you can't stand to see after using them in 3 or 4 projects!
Another reason I sorted the strips so quickly was to see if there were any colors that might work in Bonnie Hunter's new mystery quilt, Celtic Solstice. She released her color pallet this week.
Bonnie is providing yardage requirements for 2 sizes - WooHoo! After finishing almost 4 queen size quilts this year, I don't think I can look at another large project!
Quilty friend Elise is going to do this one with me - yeah!
I've only given my shelves a cursory look but I know this: when it comes to gathering 2.25 yards of orange/pumpkin scraps from my stash, or that much of any particular shade of color except maybe blue - well, it won't be happening.
See, I only think I have a lot of fabric until I start to do a Bonnie Hunter quilt, then I know I'm way out stashed by so many quilters! And, Elise is one of them!
Still in the black, barely!!!
Used this week: 0
Used YTD: 110.088
Added this week:3
Gifted this week: 0.25
Added YTD: 103.5
Net used YTD: 6.338
Check out some more stash reports at Judy's Patchwork Times.
Have a great week!
It took about two weeks to gather the motivation to get the backing put together for Easy Street and get it to a long-armer from my guild. Since I no longer delay the gratification of counting fabric "out" until the binding is on, these numbers thrill me and put the "used" numbers back in the black - WooHoo!!
Like many quilters I consider patterns as a guideline, my Easy Street easily covered my queen size without the two borders that Bonnie used. So, I put on narrow side borders and wider top/bottom borders to make it rectangular rather than square, measuring 91x95. It took 8.33 yds to back it and 10.41 yds of scraps for the front (8.33x1.25). That's 18.74 yds total - and I double checked my math b/c that is a crazy amount of fabric!
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| 12.5x16.5 unfinished |
Yesterday was our quilty friends sew day. What a great day we had - good food - good conversation - good laughs.
After working on borders and backing, I needed a small project. I had been using the HSTs in this pattern as leader/enders while I worked on Easy Street. Today I put them all together - love it!
At retreat one year ago I put this UFO top into sections. Then, I had holiday projects to finish and never got back to it. (Be Merry by BitsnPieces)
The hang up was the checkerboard border. After doing Easy Street, I've learned to just buck up and stitch! So, that's what I did yesterday. I haven't counted to see how many more I need. Then there's the inner border to figure but maybe I can get the top together by the holidays.
Back in the black!!!
Used this week: 18.74
Used YTD: 110.088
Added this week: 0
Gifted this week: 0
Added YTD: 100.25
Net used YTD: 9.838
Check out some more stash reports at Judy's Patchwork Times.
Have a great week!
Amazingly, I've gotten some sewing done despite being a tad under the weather, sinusitis and such. Today is the first day I've worn jeans in months! I love putting on jeans for the first time in the fall.
A few days ago I decided to sit and pin my BOM blocks. There were two waiting for attention and I didn't want to fall behind.
Stitching 32 curved blocks, 16 squares per block, might make one think that they'd get better with practice. It made me impatient, apparently. For the first time there are actual pleats in my seams. Oh well - they're done!
I finally started putting my second Pineapple Blossom blocks together and decided to use muslin sashing and cornerstones. I had asked for help at our last sew day with the setting but I didn't have any sashing cut then. The more I looked at what I had on the design wall, the more I felt I had to do something else.
The jelly roll fabrics just didn't have enough contrast to make this pattern sing, so all the pretty florals just jumbled together. Splitting them up and adding a solid seemed to help. Plus, it makes it a bit larger. I may have it in one piece for next week's report.
Finally, feeling a bit better, I got the border on Easy Street. I'm just using one border rather than the two that Bonnie put in the pattern. My top is plenty big enough without a border for a queen size bed.
The quilt is square so I added a narrow border on the sides and a wider border on the top and bottom. It's not a huge difference but it helps a bit with the overhang on the bottom. I hope to get the backing together and get it to a long armer from my guild, whose services I've not used before, so that I can check it off this year's UFO list.
This was Bonnie Hunter's 2012 mystery quilt and its pattern will be in her next book. If you are interested, she plans to release the color scheme for this year's mystery this month.
Used this week: 0
Used YTD: 91.348
Added this week: 0
Gifted this week: 0
Added YTD: 100.25
Net used YTD: -8.902
Check out some more stash reports at Judy's Patchwork Times.
Have a great week!
