I quilted and bound these two scrappy baby quilts. These cat fabric scraps have been lying for years and I’m glad to finally use them (there are more, small scraps that I made into leaders and enders kits for more tops.)
These flannel zebra scraps are newer, but I’m still glad to use them. My first low volume piece of the year!
These are headed to Project Linus.
I’m linking up to Oh, Scrap! and Let’s Make Baby Quilts.
(This is a Page on my site, but not everyone saw it.)
Happy New Year! Yuri and I have been hard at work on this year’s goals. Unlike regular resolutions, which can be difficult when all you want to do is stay inside and eat comfort food, January in the northern hemisphere is a good time to renew commitment and focus on quilting. The house is clean (or it will be when our Christmas is all put away), we’ve received new books and tools as gifts, extra family has gone home (or will soon), and I’m certainly not outside gardening or even walking right now!
2018 Goals:
Time on task: Similar to last year, I want to be more disciplined about spending time in my studio. I’m not really going to do much housework anyway, so I may as will quit procrastinating and get to sewing. Especially in these cooler months.
Creativity: Let’s not say “art quilt”. Let’s just say I want to experiment with more techniques and incorporate new things into my quilting. I plan to read/reread some books and magazines and choose some to try.
Color: My color selection tends to be…bold? bright? saturated? I want to make at least a few where I lower the volume and get a bit more subtle. This will be limited by my current stash and scrap collection, but it’s a goal.
Stash: I’m going for another fifty yards of stash reduction. This is pretty modest. It allows me to buy quite a bit of fabric, turn my stash over a bit, and use the scraps. Some of the new fabric will be low volume.
January Goals:
Best of luck to all of us in this fresh, new year!
Happy New Year’s Eve! Time to take stock of my goals for the year.
2017 Goals
1.Sandy’s (Quilting for the Rest of Us) word this year is “Balance”. I have the opposite problem from many of you, in that I have plenty of time to sew and don’t always take advantage of it. My life has definitely gotten in the way of sewing this year. There are lots of reasons, but a lot of it boils down to distraction and/or laziness. I developed bad habits of sitting around while my knees were recuperating and I need to replace them (the habits! Already replaced the knees!).
I’m making an appointment with myself to sew every day from 11 A.M. to 1 P.M. If I start earlier, fine, especially in warm weather. If I go back to it later, fine. If I tweak the time, fine. I just want a target and to know that I can put the housework, etc., aside and go quilt.
-This was partially successful. The times didn’t always work, but I did get into the studio more. As my walking stamina improves, my schedule continues to evolve, but I am sewing more.
2. This year I want to finish my largest UFO, the Slow Quilt. I have some ideas about cutting it down or otherwise changing it to improve it. Finishing it will free up a lot of physical and mental space, and take some fabric out of the stash.
-No, I didn’t finish this. Because of this goal, I did take it out, do a lot of thinking about it, and made a little progress. So, it will go back on the goal list for 2018.
3. Continue to work on the way I store things in my studio. My personal quilts are hard to reach and take up space I could use for other things. The fabric needs to be refolded and organized. And going through it will make sure I see it all again.
Yes! I revisited and refolded a lot of my stash (although some of it is messed up again). I cleaned out a cabinet, hung up some small quilts, and stored others out of the light in that cabinet that is hard to access behind my ironing board.
4. Work on those art quilts again!
No. Nothing happened here. Maybe it was this crazy year, but I just didn’t feel moved to create anything this way. I made three mystery quilts and many donation blocks where others made all the decisions and all I had to do was sew patches together. It seemed to be what I needed this year. Another one to revisit in 2018.
5. I’m going to take another fifty yards out of my stash this year! (Four hundred yards in the past five years!)
Yes! So that’s a net reduction of 450 yards from my stash since I started tracking. And there’s still so much there! No, I am seeing it turn over and contain more fabrics that are to my current taste. To that end, you’ll see me continue to purchase new fabric as I use the old. This year those last eight donation pillowcases put my over the top.
This week: + 0 yards, – 8 yards
This year: + 109.25 yards, – 165.75 yards
Net destashed added in 2017: 56.50 yards
December Goals:
So, a pretty successful year, but room to improve for 2018. I’ll be back soon with my new goals. In the meantime, I’m going to use this quiet day to sew! Hope you can, too!
As best I can tell, this is what I made this year. They’re in no particular order; it was enough just to collage them. Lots of donation blocks, some donation quilts, a few bed quilts for us, some gifts, some things to sell on Etsy. Quite a few projects. Definitely colorful. Some celebrated new babys, a few went to tragic situations.
2017 was quite a year. Thank you for sharing it with me.
Merry Christmas Eve, Happy Holidays, and happy Solstice to all of my friends who read this! I can’t travel the world, but on here we get glimpses of each other’s lives and traditions and wonderful artistry. We share so much and you bring me a lot of smiles. Thank you!
Not much sewing happened this week, but I did sew these eighteen blocks for the Ventura Modern Quilt Guild’s drive for the Thomas fires.
This week: + 0 yards, – 2.5 yards
This year: + 109.25 yards, – 157.75 yards
Net destashed added in 2017: 48.50 yards
So close to the fifty yards I’m trying to destash this year! I always use these days to make donation pillowcases, so that will put me over the top.
Wishing you all peace and kindness in this season!
I forgot to file a report last week, even though I had a finish! That Nautical Baby Quilt used 3.5 yards.
This week I used 1.75 yards to make a dozen blocks for Kat’s Covered in Love block drive.
And I bought 2.5 yards of deep gold Christmas fabric for a scrappy top I’m making.
This week: + 2.5 yards, – 5.25 yards
This year: + 109.25 yards, – 155.25 yards
Net destashed added in 2017: 46.00 yards
Hope you’re enjoying the season and using your stash!
This week I put together this baby quilt that I designed a few months ago. It has it’s roots in quilts I made in 2012 and 2013, but with much larger blocks. The blocks are all real signal flags, but I chose them for their graphic appeal, rather than their meaning.
I had a signal flag print ready for the backing, but as I was looking for some fabric to piece into it, I found a big piece of this great fish batik, and this nautical stripe that I used for the binding. Love those fish!
This sunny picture shows the quilting. I wanted improv wavy lines across it, but was afraid I would have trouble making smooth lines on such a large space.
I used both sides of two rulers to mark a few lines. That left these voids between the wavy lines, so when I echoed the waves, I doubled back to make wave/flame shapes to fill in.
Incidently, I spray basted this using that same can of June Tailor I started back on February 5. It’s getting low, but I think I can do one more quilt in January!
I had fun making this, and I think it came out well. Find it in my Etsy shop soon.
I’m linking up to Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.
I spent a few hours this week making up this baby quilt from fabrics I had on hand. I hadn’t expected to use the turquoise and orange Grunge in this, but there it is. This was cheerful and fun to work on. It’s quilted with a serpentine stitch where the frames meet the center patches, using Superior’s Twist thread in turquoise, and Bottom Line below. (It’s also quilted between all the blocks with Bottom Line.) I would place the stitching differently next time to make the stitches more visible, but, again, there it is. It does drape better than some of the ones that have more quilting. You’ll find this in my Etsy shop.
The numbers are a wash, though, because there was some fabric acquisition over Thanksgiving.
This week: + 3.25 yards, – 3.5 yards
This year: + 106.75 yards, – 150.0 yards
Net destashed added in 2017: 43.25 yards
Good luck on your destashing!
I was very successful completing my goals this month! 100%, A+!
November Goals:
As busy as December always is, these goals may be too ambitious, but we’ll see. Sometimes I get in a lot of sewing late in the month after all the festivities.
December Goals:
Enjoy December, whether you achieve all your goals or not!
Last week I finished the Poinsettia Quilt, and I’m really happy with the result. It’s 60″ square, with a bazillion 4″ curved patches. The design is by Anne at Springleaf Studios, and she did it as a Christmas Quilt-Along in 2015. I love her fabrics, but I used what I had.
This is similar to my Spring Violets quilt from 2014. It’s a Drunkard’s Path variation. A regular Drunkard’s Path is easier to piece because the “legs” aren’t so exacting. “Beach Drunk” is a good example of a regular one.
I used Superior Threads’ Fantastico in red and green to quilt the flowers and leaves, and Bottom Line in light green for the background and bottom thread.
The back is a wonderful green and white leaf print that I though was perfect. So did Yuri.
This is for sale in my Etsy Shop.
And a nice scrappy binding!
Hope you are finishing something.
Evening in the Garden Quilts 