For those of you following along in my quilters journey, last week I deemed I was not sure which project I would work next. I really refrained from starting a new project. Good thing the table was cluttered with mount scrapmore!
Let’s talk about my table full of fabric. I had done a large fabric pull for the placemats I made and had not put that fabric up. That just needed to be put back in the chest of drawers. Then there were left over pieces of the 60 degree stars quilt top I just finished. There were enough of those pieces I will be able to make a baby quilt with the left overs/orphans. So into a project bin it went. That cleared off the majority of my mess.
What did that leave? I am rather ashamed of the answer. I found two bills (paid those), some change, a zipper pull, and SNOW. I know right? Snow on my fabric table!!!! I forgot I had this.

One summer day, this will be fun, a snowball fight. I have been hanging onto this for about 8 years.
I also found some hexis that needed to be glue basted. That may have taken 10 full minutes, but they are now done.

Here are the remnants I chose NOT to keep.

Some of these pieces would have been great strings, but they were about 2 inches. I tossed them. But I did retrieve several strings for that bucket project (which seems to keep growning).
And here is what I got out of the mountain…..

In the lower right corner I have some left over pieces from a project which are some 4 patches and some unsewn four patches. They are in the keep pile for now. I ended up with a nice stack of 2 1/2, 2, and 1 1/2 inch squares for another scrappy project on another day. Into their bins they went.
And at the upper portion of this picture is a bundle of fabrics that were too small or oddly shapped to put anywhere, so they are randomly tied up for whenever I need to grab some smaller pieces. Usually I do this in a particular colorway, but all of those are already put up and I did not go back and unbundle to rebundle. It will be with all the other bundles and easily seen when the time strikes I need a specific size/color.
And I did have a finish this week. I recently purchased the Moda Matchbox project (which is dated and old but new to me). This sewed up really quick. I took a stab at hand quilting. The perfect project for non-busy hands.
For Christmas our household got a knock off Addi Express knitter. These knitted up in about 15 minutes.

At work the area I work in stays between 67 and 69 degrees, which for someone who has hot flashes, ITS GREAT most of the time. But on cold days, when laying wrists over cold objects all day long, you can get chilled. These are now wrist warmers and basically clothe my arms between my elbows and wrists. I find if you are extremely hot and hold an ice cube to the wrist, you tend to cool off quickly. It is a thin part of the body and I suppose can act as a heat sink. Or the opposite, a cold sink!
This was made with this little knitter. I know I have had my eye on the Addi Express knitting in the round machine. But they are just too stinkin expensive! This was around $25 according to my Mom at Walmart.


And for the last couple of weeks we have heard a woodpecker pecking in the neighborhood. Could never see him but heard him several times. Finally he was in a tree close enough to see. Turns out this is a red bellied woodpecker. I will enjoy his knocks whenever he visits, it is quite charming!
And, on the design wall, Jacks Chain is in all its glory. I am not ashamed, but surprised how little I needed to sew to bring my blocks to a state that will be a quilt top. I needed to sew 4 whole blocks, and 6 half blocks. All of my 9 patches were already made. All of my pieces were already cut.
Those few blocks are sewn and installed into the pattern of how I will be sewing it together.

And just like that, I have set in the missing triangles and have two whole rows sewn together. I should have forced this together long ago, I was so close. And I am so glad it lacked so little. I will have another major finish sometime this year! Glad I did not attempt a new project. Very little effort went a long way. Gosh, this design wall kicks butt! It has more than paid for itself! It streamlines everything!

Whadyathink? I am a bit disappointed that I used part of the fabric line in the fat quarter bundle of the creams. It does make the circles somewhat translucent and interesting, but boy, I sure do like seeing the circles in the dark fabrics. It really pops. My Y seam woes from so long ago, are a very distant memory. And these are going together beautifully (I think in the back of my mind I was terrified to get to this point if I had done the sewing wrong on the blocks. In my mind I thought it would not come together so easily, but it is).
It seems like I have gotten a bunch done, but most of my progress was something in the past. I think this project is about 6-7 years old. Tsk Tsk! I can’t wait to quilt this one!
Goals from my previous week were:
- Tackle mount scrapmore….completed
- Make progress on a UFO…progress!
- Determine next scrappy project…..incomplete
- Trace Quilting lines onto clean newsprint….incomplete
Goals for the upcoming week:
- Make progress on the Jack’s Chain quilt
- Start thinking about next project UFO vs new project
- Start sewing some EPP
- Tat some on the Jan Stawasz doily
- Look into Fed/Ex Kinkos copying my quilting image to 365 pieces of clean newsprint.
My bins and shelves are becoming bare. I have had major large projects move into the completed state, so now my to be quilted bag runneth over. With this being winter, as soon as some nice weather hits, I could be in the garage for days and days and never run out of work. And that reminds me, I have a saddle chair to move into the quilting studio to try out while at the longarm.
Stay tunned for more quilting news, and thanks for reading my blog!