Sunday Stash Report - February 13, 2011

I purchased fabric on friday for a quicky Warm Wishes quilt that my DH and I are making. A Co-worker's husband is very ill, his favorite thing to do is fish so we went and purchased fish fabric on friday. Yesterday I made the blocks and Ed started sewing them into rows and then I started getting the rows sewn together. Nice we can be a team on this.

Stats for the week are:

Fabric used this week: 8.5 yards (mostly on the warm wishes quilt)
Fabric used YTD: 49.5 yards
Fabric purchased this week: 6
Fabric purchased YTD: 38.5
Net used in 2011: 11 yards

I am thinking about re-thinking my stash reduction goals for this year. My goal last year was to downsize by 100 yards which I did hit, just barely. I am finding that so much of my stash is like 1/2 to 3/4 yard sizes which are hard to use up except in scrap quilts and I am finding I don't have many blenders etc. I might switch my goal to just staying in the black with the amount used/vs. purchased but concentrate more on using up old old fabric and replacing with blenders and nice "go with" fabrics.


My only sewing for the rest of the week was getting this backing completed for my Christmas ribbons quilt.




Another co-work of my DH asked if I would make them a quilted seat cover. I didn't have time so Ed went ahead and made the cover and I quilted it. I was calling the DH a ONE BLOCK WONDER. He can do very accurate piecing if he wants to but is never interested in making more than one block as he says that is boring!! Didn't he do a great job.



Kathie

Thursday Progress

Two more customer quilts done (one yesterday and one today). During breaks I have got my Christmas quilt backing into rows and a couple of the rows sewn together.

I also got border fabrics cut and made up two charity quilt kits with the flower panels I had.

Feel good about the accomplishments of the week.

Still having problems with my thumb so finally broke down and made a doctors appointment for monday. I am afraid it might be dislocated as it is causing pain and sometimes popping when I bend it (not pleasent). Wonder what they do if it is dislocated? Sure can't have a split or anything that would get in the way of my quilting.

Guess maybe i should get a couple extra quilts done this week just in case I have to rest the hand for a few days.

kathie

MidWeek Update - February 09, 2011

Well I don't know if it is because of all the cold weather, January resolutions etc. but it appears that everyone I know has been quilting up a storm during January. From Christmas up through mid January I didn't have any customer quilts and now in the last two weeks they have been coming from all directions.

I have pretty much been working on customer stuff all week so have not had much "me" sewing time.

I had lunch with a friend yesterday. In my push to try and move some of the charity fabric out of my basement and into quilts I took a panel quilt over to her house. Four of these panels have been sitting in the guild charity stash for several years and it is time to get them made into quilts. Carol let me "shop" in her stash to find fabrics to make borders and binding for these.

I put the borders on the first one last night. I don't think I would have pick the stripe or the outer border if I had taken the panel to a fabric store but I like the way it turned out.

I don't know if I am going to border the other three or just cut borders and taken them to the guild as kits for someone else to stitch up.



When I quilt on the longarm I sit down for 5 minutes after each pass or two across the quilt to rest my knees and back and in doing so I am able to quilt longer. This morning during those breaks I would sew a few squares together. Have a few rows done, this will be the backing for my Christmas Ribbons quilt.



Kathie

Design Wall Monday - February 7, 2011

I had some time yesterday afternoon to sew so thought I would start on UFO #10 (six goose in the pond swap blocks). I couldn't remember the formula for putting them on point so found that on Bonnie Hunter's Quiltville site.


Had just enough fabric to cut the alternating blocks and the setting squares. Later in the evening I did get this part of it sewn together. Now looking through my stash to find fabrics for borders. I think I will put a really thin rust border and then a wider striped border if the fabrics I found still look ok in daylight.

Yesterday I heard Sammy growling under his breath in the quilt room and turned around to see that he had company through the sliding glass door. They sat and stared at each other for a good 20 minutes.



The visiting cat had leopard spot markings, very pretty.

Off to get a customer quilt done today if I can get a hurting shoulder blade to cooperate. Don't know what is with all these aches and pains lately. Sure hope it is just the weather and things will improve as the weather warms.

Kathie

Sunday Stash Report - February 6, 2011

I have to admit that this was a stash enhancement week not a stash reduction week. I quilted four customer quilts this week, went to my day time guild meeting and spent some time trying to organize my quilt room (more later) so didn't have much time to work on my projects.

Yesterday I went by our local quilt shop. Yesterday you could draw a number from a basket and get that much of a discount on your entire purchase. I pulled the 45% off coupon!!! So in addition to the quilt magazine I went for I purchased a piece of black fabric I needed (you know how hard it is to find a NICE black fabric) and then saw this cute pastel kitten fabric, too cute. Anyway some of that yardage and panel prints followed me home also.

Stats for the week:

Fabric used: 5 yards (making backings)
Fabric used YTD: 41 yards
Fabric purchased: 8 yards
Fabric purchased YTD: 32.5
Net fabric used in 2011: 8.5 yards

You know how something can kind of bother you for a long time and then you "hit the wall" and can't stand it anymore? Well that was my quilt room the other day.

I had got several customer quilts dropped off all in one day, several quilts done waiting for pick up, my projects everywhere and about 4 bins of charity fabric in the middle of everything.

I received a donation of a whole box of fabric to make charity quilts wednesday that were mostly batiks, beautiful.

I was to the point I couldn't work because there was so much STUFF everywhere.

I spent my time instead of sewing the last couple of days trying to get all the customer stuff put away, my projects more organized (scraps put away etc.) and trying to organize the charity fabric.

I need to get some of the charity fabric and batting out of here so I have more room so am starting to get some kits cut to give out at guild and need to take the time to zig zag some batting together to give out to people that have volunteered to do some of the quilting.

My 10 minutes a day of trying to straighten my sewing room works to a point to keep thread put away, leftover fabric back on the shelf etc. but that doesn't make a dent when you have so many things going at once.

Kathie

Midweek Update - February 2, 2011

I have spent most of the week so far working on customer quilts. I wanted to post a picture of this one that I finished quilting yesterday. With so many people wanting to cut back on their purchasing of fabric and use what they have I thought this would be a great idea. The lady that made this used all sorts of different fabrics but with the cream background and the sashing between it all works. I did notice that she doesn't have many light light blocks or really dark so maybe having everything a more medium tone helped make it all go together.


I think I will have to keep this in mind for a quick donation quilt. I have lots of bits and pieces left that I need to do something with. I think this will have to be my year of the scrap quilt!!!

I did get a little time yesterday afternoon to do some of my sewing so I finished sewing the rows of my Christmas Ribbons quilt together. I was going to put on a black border but didn't have enough fabric so will just stop (it is 60 x 60) and use my remaining black for the binding.





Off to my day time quilt guild in a few, looking forward to our speaker and trunk show.

Kathie

AND THE NUMBER IS?

UFO #10 is the number that was drawn today in Judy L's UFO challenge over at Patchwork Times.



This is my number 10. They are I believe Goose in the Pond blocks from a block swap many years ago. I am thinking somewhere between 7 to 10 years ago we did this swap. I will have to double check but I believe I have 9 blocks. I will have to pull out my cheat sheet for putting these on point and see if I have any fabric to make alternating solid blocks.

Will be interesting to see how this one comes out.

Kathie