Stash Busting - 4/5/2009

I haven't been doing much stash busting this week as the majority of it was spent in Maine for a business trip. However, I did get two quilts finished up this week. First, we have the baby quilt that I've been working on. I finished it up last Saturday morning actually and the baby was born Saturday afternoon. Talk about good timing!

I also finished up the binding on the Irish Rails quilt yesterday. Since I had counted both bindings already in the "stash used" bucket, there's no change in my stash reports. Here's the finished quilt (its not floating in the air...my husband is behind it and didn't want his picture included, so he held the quilt so it completely covered him).

Fabric Added this Week: 10.25 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 100.50 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0.25 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 13.2 yards

Net Fabric: <87.3> yards

Binding, No Blogging, Travel

I know I didn't post a stash busting report on Sunday, but that's mainly because I was trying to do all the normal chores and pack for traveling this week. For work, I'm spending 4 days in Bangor, Maine. There was a small group of us that drove up on Monday (left Albany, NY around 7am) and arrived in Bangor around 3pm. We're spending a few days up here visiting our manufacturing shop to visit with the engineers up here and also to run some workouts with the manufacturing team. Hopefully it will be a good trip overall.

So back to quilting.....

I was able to finish the binding on the baby quilt on Saturday. Yay! I also found out that the baby was actually born on Saturday afternoon, so I finished it up JUST in time. :-) I also got a bunch more of the binding sewn on the Irish Rails quilt. At this point I have less than one side left to do, so I'm pretty close to being done. I thought about bringing the quilt with me and sewing binding in the vehicle and here in the hotel, but decided that I didn't want to pack the quilt and I didn't think I would actually have time to sew. At least progress was being made and I'm hoping that I might actually finish it up this weekend.

So here's the list of things to do over the next few weeks:

• Finish sewing binding on Irish Rails
• Finish sewing binding on Garden Pleasures
• Thread baste and quilt the Rainbow Patch quilt
• Start sewing binding on 54-40 or Fight

Its a little ambitious considering that the weather is getting nicer and I will be doing gardening soon and work is busy, but we'll see how far I get.

Stash Busting - 3/22/2009

Over the next few weeks, there won't be much stash bustin' happening as I'll be sewing binding, binding, and you guess it.... more binding. Here's the main stack of quilts that are quilted with the binding machine sewn, with the exception of the quilt with the brown border sticking out. That one is a top that needs to be quilted, but it was in the middle of the pile and I didn't feel like pulling it out. ;-) The quilt on the bottom I haven't even started the hand sewing yet, but the other two are both about 50% done.

So here's the little baby quilt that I've worked on the past week or so. I got the whole thing quilted in about 2 hours with a new pattern that I was trying out.

Here it is with the binding machine sewn and one edge of it hand-sewn. This is for a baby due at the end of March, so its now on the top of the pile of things to get hand-sewn.

Here's the Irish Rails quilt with the quilting done and the binding halfway sewn. This one is moving right along, too, but its going to have to sit for a little while until I finish the baby quilt.

And the stash report...

I saw the picture on Jill's blog for the Memories of Monet quilt. It was so gorgeous that I just "had" to have it. ;-) I've never actually made a quilt from a pre-made kit, so we'll see how it goes. The fabrics are absolutely gorgeous though. The only problem... 10 more yards bought this year. I'm definitely in the hole stash-wise, but I will eventually get out of it!

Fabric Added this Week: 10.25 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 100.50 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0.25 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 13.2 yards

Net Fabric: <87.3> yards

So WHAT have I been doing???

Over the past few weeks, my quilting progress has been limited by having to help Rich with projects around the house. Earlier this winter, we ordered a media bookcase from an online store in order to store some of Rich's books from when he was a kid. He's been collecting books from the Landmark series for quite a while now. The books are actually pretty good at teaching kids about history without being just a boring textbook that you would read in school.

We've also been working on the foyer that we painted more than a year ago. A while ago we bought crown molding to put up, but we picked out a pretty intricate pattern which took FOREVER to paint. We only have it tacked in place right now, but it looks pretty good!

I've also been growing a few plants in the kitchen to get some of the ready for putting outside. Soon the kitchen will be its own minor jungle!

Progress...

I've been poor at blogging lately, but I think its mainly because I spend all day at the computer so I don't really want to spend time at night on the computer, too. I have been making progress on the quilts that I'm working on though.

• #7 - "Fifty-Four Forty or Fight" - hand sewing of binding not started yet
• #9 - "Garden Pleasures" - hand sewing of binding ~50% complete
• #10 - "Irish Rails" - hand sewing of binding ~45% complete
• #11 - "Rainbow 9-Patch" - top pieced, needs to be basted
• #12 - "Charmed Baby" - quilting complete, needs to have binding added
• #13 - Rainbow Quilt - fabric washed
• #14 - "Heat Wave" - fabric washed
• #15 - "Shine on Bayou Cane" - fabric washed
• #16 - "Memories of Monet" - fabric arrived from quilt shop (shipped)

Phew... that's a lot of quilts in progress! I've been having to re-prioritize things based on my progress and the due dates. The receivers of quilts 9 and 10 don't know that thye are coming, so there really isn't any date except what's in my head. I had tried to get #10 done by St. Patrick's day...but you can see how well that worked out. ;-) I do need to get Quilt #12 done close to the end of the month since the baby is due on the 29th. However, this is the couple's first baby so I'm hoping it will come a little bit late.

Once I get the binding sewn onto the baby quilt, my machine is definitely headed into the quilt shop to get serviced. The shop I bought it from offers free servicing for 5 years, so I definitely need to take advantage of that! Plus, since I've made about 6 or 7 quilts in the past year, it makes sense to get it cleaned up and make sure everything is working well. I'm sure it probably needs a good cleaning in the areas where I can't get to.

Happy Quilting!

Stash Busting - 3/15/2009

Its been fairly quiet here on the quilting front. Work has been busy and I haven't had much time for getting quilting things accomplished. I did however finish quilting the Irish Rails quilt. I have about 40% of the binding hand sewn now and I'm hoping to get the majority of it finished this week. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures. :-(

The good news is that I've used a little bit of stash this past week to get the binding done on the Irish Rails quilt. The bad news is that I saw a post on Jill's blog about a beautiful quilt kit that her LQS put together. I loved it so much (and the fact that I got a promotion at work ;-) ) that I ordered it yesterday. I won't be counting it as stash until its actually here, but it will make my numbers look worse. I definitely need to get some more sewing done!

Here are the numbers for this year:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.50 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0.53 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 12.95 yards

Net Fabric: <72.55> yards

My goal is to get to 0 Net Fabric by the end of the year. Since the majority of the fabric I bought is actually for planned quilts, I should be able to do it.

Happy Quilting!

Honest... I haven't disappeared!

The past few weeks have been incredibly hectic and nothing really blog-worthy. Work has been extremely busy the past week or so with a lot of things happening and projects having deadlines. Whenever I have a really busy day at work, sometimes the last thing I want to do is come home and do more stuff.... even if it is quilting.

However, I have managed to get some quilting done although no pictures right now. I finished up the quilting on Irish Rails (I showed a picture of the top pinned here). I also got the binding sewn on to Irish Rails and I've started the hand sewing. The hand sewing on the Garden Pleasures top is about half done at this point. Hopefully I'll get more done this week!

Stash Busting - 3/1/2009

I haven't gotten a whole lot of sewing done lately...at least nothing picture worthy. I spent most nights this week hand sewing binding, so there's not a lot of progress there. I did get a few rows quilted on the Irish Rails quilt, but I haven't been able to take any pictures of it yet. Today I got about 6 rows of quilting done in between doing loads of laundry and other general chores. I also got the backing material cut and basted for the baby quilt that I posted about here.

Here's the stash report for this week...nothing in and a little bit used.

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.50 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0.75 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 12.42 yards

Net Fabric: <73.07> yards

Quiltathon 2009 - Sunday Update

I was able to get a little bit more sewing done tonight and got this little baby quilt put together. Its just a top for the time being, but I'll figure out some borders to add to it and then get it quilted. I have a co-worker who's wife is having a baby sometime in March, so this quilt will be going to them. I love the Pooh fabrics that I have and I'm definitely going to have to get some more since I'm just about out.

February Quiltathon

Judy, over at Patchwork Times, is having a quiltathon this weekend. While I wasn't able to participate yesterday (Rich and I spent most of the day running errands, doing some shopping at a store that's going out of business, and then watching some movies), I have been doing quilty stuff this morning.

Rich got up early and met one his friends and they both went skiing/snowboarding (we're expected to get about 6 inches of snow today - so prime weather for skiing), so I've had the entire house to myself! :-) First thing this morning, I browned some meat and put all the fixings for some chili in the slow cooker. Now I don't have to cook the rest of the day. Yay! Then I started pinning the Irish Rails quilt.

However, since I haven't marked the quilt yet, I have to baste it with thread so that I can take the big, fat pins out and not have to worry about stitching over them. So I've gotten the entire backing pressed today, everything laid out, pinned and I have about a quarter of it thread basted at this point. Since its almost 1pm, I figured its time to give an update and have something for lunch. I should also probably shower at some point. ;-)

I hope everyone else is enjoying their quilty weekend!

Stash Busting - 2/22/2009

I was able to make a little more progress on the stash busting front. I cut, washed, and pressed the backing for the Irish Rails quilt that I've been working on for a while. Lately, I've gotten stuck on the quilting part of the whole process and its been tending to slow me down a bit. Plus, I've told myself that I'm not allowed to cut into my new fabric that I bought a few weeks ago until I get the 4 quilts currently in process finished. Two of them are almost done and only need binding added, but the other two still need to be quilted. Hopefully I'll be able to make some progress now that I'm no longer sick!

Here's some pictures of the quilts that have binding on them:

And the stash report:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.50 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 3.0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 11.7 yards

Net Fabric: <73.8> yards

Yicky!

Yes, I did spell the title correctly. I am definitely still feeling yicky! I decided after more than a week of dealing with a sore throat that I should go see the doctor. Somehow I managed to pick up Strep throat somewhere which explains why I have been feeling so crummy. Now I'm on a 2 week course of antibiotics to try to clear it up. Hopefully I'll start feeling better soon so I can get some quilting done. ;-) Not to mention that the house is starting to look like a tornado went through it.

Stash Busting - 2/15/2009

I wasn't able to do much sewing this week as the cold I had last week is still kicking around. The only reason I can function right now is due to taking DayQuil. I've been taking a combination of allergy medicine and cold medicine to make sure I cover all my bases. My mom has had some troubles with allergies already despite it still being February in Upstate NY and nothing is growing yet. We've had a few days of warmer weather, so everything is wet and the mold is starting to grow. I'm hoping that my allergies haven't progressed to being allergic to mold. All I can say is that this cold better go away soon because I'm tired of it!

This week is going to be a lonely week since DH is traveling. He'll be in sunny San Francisco for a few days at a conference for work. Hopefully things will go smoothly for him and he won't get sick while he's there. In the meantime though, I'll have plenty of hours in the evenings to do sewing if this cold ever goes away.

So here's is a picture of the Garden Pleasures quilt with the binding attached. I still have to hand sew the back, but I'm not too concerned about that. I'm usually pretty good about sitting down and getting binding done. I decided to use a nice, dark purple color for the binding to anchor the white border. If you zoom in on the picture, you can probably see the quilting on the lighter fabrics. I used a burgundy-ish color that blends into the redish and purple fabrics pretty well, but when you have the quilt in front of you, you can easily see the quilting in the lighter fabrics and on the blues.

And for what we're all waiting for.... the stash report! I did get some stash used on the binding above and I also made the binding for our large quilt, I just haven't sewn it on yet. I'm still counting it as stashed used though. ;-)

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.42 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 1.50 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 8.70 yards

Net Fabric: <76.72> yards

How did everyone else do this week?

Kitty Approved!

A few weeks ago, I was able to pick up our large quilt from the longarm quilter. I haven't put binding on it yet, but we decided to put it on the bed anyway. Its very warm and comfy underneath the quilt and it looks good on the bed. Most importantly....

Its kitty approved!

Every morning this week, we've woken up to find our cat, Ellie, curled up on the blanket. The picture I took above was actually when I came home from work one night. I was looking around for Ellie in her usual spots and when I couldn't find her, I called her name and up popped her head from the quilt. She was very content and didn't want to move. :-)

That's my only picture to share at this point, but I have been doing some quilting... honest! I finished up quilting Garden Pleasures (I'll post a picture later this week) and I've started making binding for it and the big quilt. Right now, I have about 700 linear inches of binding to sew! Yikes! However, binding counts as using stash! :-)

Stash Busting - 2/8/2009

Man, this was a bad week for stash busting. Work and a cold kicked my butt this week and I haven't gotten much done on the quilting front. The good part is that since I was sick... I didn't ADD to the stash. ;-) Hopefully next week will be better.

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.42 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 9.40 yards

Net Fabric: <76.02> yards

**** UPDATE ****

Somehow I had something mis-calculated on my original post. I've actually only used 7.2 yards so far this year vs 9.4. :-( I think I somehow was counting some of the backing material twice! oops! Here's the updated numbers:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.42 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 7.20 yards

Net Fabric: <78.2> yards

Exactly 1 Year Ago....

Exactly one year ago (almost to the hour right now - its 11:39 EST) I was getting home from having surgery on my foot to remove a piece of bone that wasn't healing and to re-attach a tendon. Its very hard to believe it was a year ago already. The first few months after surgery were awful, which I guess can be expected. The only good part was that I got lots of binding sewn onto quilts! ;-)

So its been a year and I'm pretty much pain free. The foot bothers me once in a while when we have really drastic weather changes, but its pretty much OK. I still haven't been able to wear "normal" shoes yet. Granted... I haven't tried in a while, but a few months ago when I tried to wear some low heels (about 1") I was limping after just wearing them for 5 minutes in the house. I'm hoping that eventually I'll be able to wear shoes again versus sneakers all the time. I know the sneakers are probably better for me, but I like my shoes. :-)

Now I just need to figure out how to get more quilting time in!

Stash Busting - 2/1/2009

This was not a good week for using fabric, but it was a good week for buying fabric. ;-)

A local quilt shop had a Super Bowl Sale going on from Friday until today and there was up to 60% off all their fabric. The least amount off was 20%, which is still pretty good. Anytime you can get fabric on sale is a good time. My purchase was even "husband sanctioned" this time so he knew what I was going to come home with. Its a good thing I only came out of the store with the fabric I intended to buy though. The store had the new Bernina 830 on display and let me tell you... even though its ungodly expensive at about $12,000, it definitely is pretty amazing. However, for $12k I think the machine should be able to cut all my fabric by me just giving it the pattern that I want to make.

I have a few pictures that I want to share before I get to the stash report. Here's an updated photo of the bear my mother-in-law made with his quilted blanket. The picture I had posted earlier this week was a little dark since I took it at night. This one is better though.



And here's some pictures of the fabric that I bought. Doesn't it look yummy?? This is for the Rainbow quilt that I posted about on Friday. It took a while to pick out all the fabrics, but I think its going to look awesome when its finished.



Here's a picture of the fabrics I intend to use in Judy's Shine on Bayou Cane quilt. It didn't take too long to pick out these ones, but I think that's only because I had 5 colors instead of 15.

Finally, here are the fabrics for Judy's Heat Wave quilt from her book Nine-Patch Extravaganza. I wanted to use very similar colors to what she choose since I really liked the look fo the quilt.

And now.... the stash report:

Fabric Added this Week: 30.75 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 85.42 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 9.40 yards

Net Fabric: <76.02> yards

I really need to start cracking and using that stash!

Happy Quilting!

Quilt Ideas

I know I've been bad about posting lately. A class that I'm taking at my work has me spending too much of my own time doing the homework. I love it when its a "work" class that takes 3 hours and about 4 hours of homework and you can only charge 1.5 hours of time to it. The rest is on your own. Yuck!

Enough of my ranting though. I thought I'd post some sketches of the quilts that I plan on making over the next few months (otherwise read as probably the next year). One of the quilts is from Judy Laquidara's Nine-Patch Extravaganza. Its called "Heat Wave". I don't have a sketch of this one since I have the book and the pattern at home. Its looks like a very cool quilt though.

The second quilt I'm doing is actually a color variation of Judy's "Shine on Bayou Cane" that she did as a Quilt-for-an-Hour project last year. I saved the instructions since I didn't have time to do it right then, but now I want to make it. I did sketch it up in EQ on my own because I wanted to test out some other colors. I don't have a stash of lots of different colors (yet), so I couldn't just do the stars in it as scrappy colors like she did. Here's my sketch from EQ. I like the reds/pinks and the greens in it. When I pick out the fabrics I just need to make sure the reds and greens aren't too close to being Christmas colors!



The last quilt that I'm doing is actually my own design that I did in EQ. I plan on making it for my husband's grandmother. Its a variation on the Trip Around the World pattern and I thought the rainbow colors would look really happy on the quilt.

It may be a while before you see any actual pictures of the quilts because I have three quilt tops that need to be quilted and bound, our large quilt needs to be bound, and I have a baby quilt to make for a co-worker (baby is due in March so I better hurry up!).

Happy Quilting!
~Sarah

Quilty Pictures

I actually got some things accomplished tonight despite it being an EXTREMELY long day at work. Not only did I go to class (a work training class that meets 3 hours every Monday and has homework - yuck!), but I made dinner, finished adding some borders to a quilt, and took some photos. I also managed to break a needle in my sewing machine (a first for me).

I'm usually ultra careful about putting things close to the needle while its moving. Unfortunately, my little stylus that I use to keep seams together right up to the needle got a little close. A HUGE pop and twang and the needle was in pieces. Thankfully it didn't damage the quilt (or more importantly the machine) and I just needed to put a new needle in after finding all the pieces of the last one. I also got some binding strips sewn together for the Rainbow quilt. I decided to use strips of all the colors that I used in the 9-patches for the binding and it works out pretty much perfectly. Now I just need to find time to quilt it!

So here's the quilt that I picked up this past weekend from the longarm quilter, Karen. She did a fabulous job. I didn't have time to really spread it out, so its just a few pictures of some of the squares. I used the traditional Fifty-Four Forty or Fight pattern with just a slight modification to the middle square (solid instead of a 4-patch). I still haven't figured out what I want to call it though. No matter.... it will be weeks before I can get the binding on it. ;-)


I tried to get some photos of the music notes in it, but its hard to see on the white fabric. Karen didn't want to make the quilting stand out too much, which was perfect for this quilt. I'll definitely go back to her when I have a few more large ones.


I also made a quick little "blanket" for the bear my mother-in-law made for us. It was really just some testing of methods, but it seemed to fit right with him. Sorry about the quality of the photo... the flash on the camera wasn't that great since the battery was low.




Finally, here's the picture of the Rainbow quilt. Its not quite rainbow colors, but it seems cheerful. Now its JUST a matter of quilting it! :-) It will be a while before I get to this one as I have two others in line before it.

Quilter's Block

It seems like over the past week or two I’ve had major quilter’s block. For whatever reason, I haven’t been able to get much done quilting related although I’m sure it has to do with work. For those of you who don’t know me very well, I work 40+ hours outside of the home as a mechanical engineer. I work at a company where I design components for steam turbines that are sold to customers for generating electrical power for all of us to use.

Work has been crazy busy since the beginning of the year. Late last year, it was like pulling teeth to find work whereas now, I have more to do than I can think about. It seems like its either feast or famine around here when it comes to how much work you have. I’ve been pretty stressed out about work and having so much to do and not having time to do it. By the time I get home in the evening, I’m so exhausted from work that I almost have to force myself to sit down at the sewing machine, which makes it no fun. Last week I was able to get a fair amount accomplished at work, so I don’t feel quite so harried anymore and hopefully I’ll be able to devote more time to quilting.

This week my real goal is to choose a couple of patterns that I would like to make over the next few months. As I said in my stash busting post, a local quilt shop is having a fabric sale this coming weekend, so its time to pick out the patterns and get the fabric! My plan for tonight is to get some borders sewn onto the Rainbow Quilt and take some photos of the few things I’ve accomplished over the past week or so. I also want to take a picture of our big quilt now that its been quilted.

To help myself feel like I’m getting things done at home along with at work, I’ve actually started making a list of 5 things that I want to get done each evening. One item is always going to get done because its making dinner. ;-) But it is something that has to be done and then I know I can at least cross off one thing on the list. I used to make the lists really long and I would never get even close to finishing the list, so I’m now limiting it to 5 reasonable things. That way I don’t feel too discouraged if I don’t get everything done. If I get more done than what’s on the list…. BONUS!

Stash Busting - 1/25/2009

Definitely fell off the quilting wagon over the past week or so. I haven't gotten a lot accomplished quilting-wise, but I've been doing a fair amount of "testing". I have two lap-sized quilts that I need to quilt and I've been experimenting with different methods of marking them so that I can actually remove the marks!

I also picked up the BIG quilt this weekend and its fully quilted. It looks amazing and the longarm quilter did a fantastic job. Now I just need to bind it! That's going to take a while since its close to a King sized quilt. All together, its about to be about 450 inches of binding. Ooof! I guess it will keep my hands busy for a while.

I'm also trying to pick out a few quilt patterns that I want to make over the next few months. A local quilt shop is having a sale next weekend on all the fabric (60% off everything) so I definitely want to pick out some stuff to work on and get the fabric at a reduced cost. Expect to see some yardages added next week. ;-) I figure I'm just doing my part to help the economy. haha!

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 45.4 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 7.20 yards

Net Fabric: 38.2 yards

Stash Busting - 1/18/2009

I did get some sewing done this week (see here), but since I hadn't counted that material in the stash reports... it can't be counted this week. However, I was really good and didn't buy any material either! ;-) So here's the report:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 45.4 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 7.20 yards

Net Fabric: 38.2 yards

Hopefully everyone else had a more productive stash busting week!

Pictures! Pictures! Pictures!

I finally got around to taking some pictures of the stuff I've been working on the past few days. I actually ended up taking them early this morning while I was waiting for my tea to brew before leaving for work.

I've finished up sewing the binding on the tea cozy. Its not as great as I had hoped, but it was a good testing ground for some free-motion quilting.




I also finished up putting the rows together for the Rainbow 9-Patch quilt. I was able to get the 9-patches done during the Quiltathon last weeked, but the rest of it was done in the evenings this past week. I'm waiting to get to the fabric store for some tan fabric before I add borders, but hopefully that will happen this weekend. I still need to put the setting triangles on the four corners, but its pretty much set at this point.



The only item I can't take credit for is the stuffed bear. My Mother In-Law (MIL) loves to knit. She knits like a mad-woman and can make just about anything. She's made bags, purses, sweaters, kid clothes and now toys. For Christmas, Rich and I gave her a book for a whole bunch of patterns for really cute kid toys, and she was able to finish the teddy bear and gave one to us. The bear is completely knitted and the sweater is knitted, too. The sweater even has these tiny little buttons on the shoulder so you can take the sweater off and put a different one on. Its completely adorable!

Quilting Away

I know I don't have any pictures to post right now, but I have been doing some quilting stuff this week. The class that I'm taking at work took up a few hours of valuable quilting time, but at least my homework is done for the class and I can REALLY start quilting now. ;-)

I finished sewing the binding onto the tea cozy last night. I had originally intended on sewing the binding completely by machine, but it was pain to get the awkward shape of the tea cozy under the sewing machine so I decided to do it by hand. I also have all the 9-patches and setting squares/triangles sewn into rows. The QST on the four corners of the quilt aren't sewn into the rows yet, but they'll be added after I have the rows trimmed up.

I hope to have some pictures for everyone in the next day or so. I won't be able to do the borders until this weekend, but I can do pictures of the majority of the quilt top. I had originally sketched the quilt on paper and colors just the 9-patches, but after receiving EQ6 for Christmas I put the quilt on there and colored everything. I decided I didn't like a black and white border because it just looked like too much white. So I need to make a run to the fabric store this weekend to get some tan fabric for the borders. I want the borders to kind of have a picture frame feel with the tan and black.

Aside from quilting, its been STUPID cold here the past few days. Currently it is 2 degrees with a windchill of -6, which surprisingly is up from yesterday when the windchill was -15. I've had to break out the REALLY warm winter coat and wear my wool pants to work to try to keep warm. Thankfully I have a little heater under my desk so when I get into the office in the I turn it on and try to thaw my feet out. I'm glad that I have a hobby that involves doing stuff inside right now! :-)

January Quiltathon - Sunday

I didn't get as much sewing done as I would have liked today, but I did get some done. The morning started out with having to clear the driveway of 7.5" of snow. Since we don't usually get a ton of snow in the winter (typically just one or two good snowfalls), we don't own a snow-thrower and the clearing is done the old fashioned way....brute force. My husband and I were out for about an hour clearing the snow so that he could go snowboarding and I could go get a facial (my one vice that I really allow myself).

Once I got back from the facial, I put the crock pot on and started the laundry. I had to press all those little squares that I had sewn last night before I could put them into the 9-patches, so that took a while. Eventually I did get everything sewn together. I have a total of 30 9-patches that will be a finished size of 4.5". I still need to press the white material for the setting squares, but that will be another day.


Hope everyone else had a good quilting weekend!

Stash Busting - 1/11/2009

While I didn't get much sewing done this week (a little bit yesterday), I did get a bit of stashed used...mainly because I had to supply the backing material for the quilt that I'm having quilted. So I've used 5 yards of material this week. I'm not counting the fabric for the Rainbow quilt because I already had that planned and didn't count it as part of the stash. Here's the final report:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 45.4 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 5.0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 7.20 yards

Net Fabric: 38.2 yards

Quiltathon 2009 - Saturday Evening

I was able to get some sewing done today despite having to do a lot of errands and help put together a bookcase. So the first two pictures are an experiment of mine. I'm a big tea fan, but I do not have a tea cozy to keep my teapot warm. So I decided to try to make one with some fat quarters I had laying around. I also decided that it would be a good thing to practice my free-motion quilting on. I know it looks a little funny, but I'm sure it will work. Today I was able to put the two halves together and to machine sew part of the binding on the bottom. I was going to machine sew the entire binding, but its a little difficult to fit under the machine, so I'm just going to do it by hand.


Now here are all the little squares I had cut out earlier this morning. I'm about halfway through the last set and its time to clean the machine, put a new needle in and all that.... so its waiting until tomorrow to get finished. ;-) I have plenty of sets of 3 to press tomorrow too, but you can see the fairly large pile of sewn pieces. Right there is about 80 of the sets of 3. After I get them all nicely pressed, it will be time to match all the those seams and make 9 patches.

On the weather side....it looks like we're going to be having a lot of snow. The snow started around 7:30 and its only gotten heavier and isn't supposed to stop until tomorrow at lunchtime. Then it will be time to move all that snow! Yuck!

Quiltathon 2009 - Saturday Update

The quiltathon is on! While I did get up early this morning to get to cutting fabric, the majority of the cutting got delayed a bit. My husband insisted that the Christmas tree come down this morning, so we spent about an hour or so taking down the tree and boxing everything up. Since Mother Nature is deciding that Albany should be in the Golden Snowball Race this year, we had to do our grocery shopping since we have a winter storm warning in effect from 4pm until tomorrow afternoon. We're expecting to get about 8 inches of snow.

I did however get some "quilty" stuff done. I dropped off the "Fifty-Four Forty or Fight" quilt to be quilted. I also did get the colored fabric cut for the "Rainbow Patch" quilt. Here's some before and after pictures from the cutting:


I'm hoping that I'll be able to get a few of these sewn this afternoon before I quit for the day. Happy Quilting!

Quiltathon Tomorrow

Judy over at Patchwork Times is hosting the first Quiltathon of 2009 this weekend. I'm really hoping that I'll be able to sit my butt down and sew this weekend. I've spent most of my evenings this past week washing and refolding yardage and fat quarters. Last night I pin basted a lap-sized quilt that I was originally intending to start quilting this weekend. However, I'm still waiting for some stencils to arrive, so no quilting will be done on that quilt this weekend.

The plan for tonight and this weekend is to pin baste the Irish Rails quilt and start cutting and piecing 9-patches for the Rainbow Patch quilt that I'm going to be making (there's no picture of this one yet). Basically its various 9-patches of two shades of fabrics from the Moda Marbles collection and the 9-patches are set on-point with white setting squares between them. I'm hoping that I will get it pretty much completed this weekend, but that will depend upon how often my husband decides that he needs or wants my help doing something. :-)

Another Winter Day & Stash update

Today is yet another yucky day here in the northeast. Just about every school is closed in the area today. We received about 2 inches of snow overnight and now its freezing rain. Everything is getting ice coated again like it was back in December. We're supposed to have freezing rain all day today and the roads are supposed to get worse as the day goes on. Thankfully, my work gave me both a workstation and a laptop so I can actually work from home today... which I'm definitely doing!

The past two nights I've spent washing a bunch of fat quarters that I bought in December. I didn't include them in my Stash Report on Sunday, but I feel they definitely need to be added to the Stash Report since they are a significant source of fabric! ;-) So here are my new numbers....

Fabric Added this Week: 45.4 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 45.4 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 2.2 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 2.20 yards

Net Fabric: 43.2 yards

Wow! I need to get sewing!! Too bad I end up putting in about 9 hours of actual work (10 hours with lunch and commute included) outside the house. That leaves me very little time for sewing. I'm jealous of those who can sew and sew and sew all day. ;-)

Long Day

Today was my first day back at work after being on vacation for 2 weeks and let me tell you, it felt like today alone was 2 weeks. A part of me was glad to be back in the routine, but another part wanted the vacation to last a little longer. Aside from doing the usual minor grocery shopping tonight, I was able to get the rest of my fat quarters trimmed (they raveled a bit in the wash) and folded about half of them.

Does anyone else wash and fold their "stash" fabric before using it? I guess the way I see it is that if I wash and fold it neatly, then at least I can see my fabric and I know I can pull it right away and just press it before cutting. No waiting for the washer! ;-) My husband doesn't quite understand this and gave me funny looks when I was folding fabric that I probably won't use for a while.

I think I'm going to have to revise my stash report from last week. I didn't include my fat quarters in the count and after my "retail therapy" in early December, I really should count the fat quarters since I have a few. ;-)

Rock Climbing

I've gotten a few comments (make that two comments LOL) about my rock climbing habit. I haven't done rock climbing in a little while now after having surgery on my foot last year, but it is incredibly addicting! I only do indoor rock climbing where the safety ropes are tied off to the ceiling and someone else is holding the other end of the rope so if I lose my grip I don't go falling very far. The longest I've ever fallen is about 2 feet.

The first few times I went climbing I was pretty scared since I have a "thing" about heights. However, it is actually somewhat interesting because while you're climbing up you don't notice how high you are and since you don't actually have to climb down (the other person lowers you) you don't even have to look at the ground to see how high up you are. At first my goal was just to get to the top, but then I after a few times going I was able to actually follow a planned route up the wall.

If there's a place near you, I would definitely recommend trying it out. Its pretty liberating knowing that you can do it and its all very safe. Most places let you rent shoes and a harness so you don't even have to buy the equipment to try it. It does require some strength in the upper body, but if you try it a few times and just keep going, you build up the strength without having to do anything else (like lifting weights at a gym). Just enjoy doing it!

Stash Busting - 1/4/2009

This will be my first year in really having a stash to "bust" for quilting. Just after Christmas I was able to get a bit of fabric from a Joann's store that was closing. I'd like to keep track of how much fabric I really do buy and use. It will be interesting to see how the numbers change throughout the year. So here's my report:

Fabric Added this Week: 32.4 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 32.4 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 2.2 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 2.20 yards

Net Fabric: 30.2 yards

Irish Rails Quilt

Just before Christmas, I was able to finish up a quilt-top that I had been working on. With everything going on, this is the first chance I've had to take some pictures to post of the quilt. I'm making this quilt for my Dad who was diagnosed with cancer in the beginning of October. He's very much into the irish theme, hence the Irish Rails name for the quilt and the green fabrics. Enjoy the eye candy.

Winter Weather

After spending a few days at my parents' place, Rich, Laura and I headed back to Albany for some much needed quiet. The drive back was "interesting" to say the least. It took us an hour to drive a section of the highway that usually takes only 30 minutes. Here's two pictures taken from the car while traveling. I particularly like the 2nd photo where you can barely see the vehicle in front of us.

I haven't been able to get a lot of quilting done lately since we've been pretty busy hosting and visiting people. I did take advantage of Joann's store closing near my parents'. All books were 50% off, fat quarters were only $1, all fabric was 40% off with an additional 10% if you ended up buying the entire bolt. I stocked up on some FQ's, yardage of blue fabric with stars, and some muslin. I was also able to get a few pre-packaged batting sizes. Now I just have to figure out where to store it. ;-)

Christmas Craziness

Now that I'm starting to recover from Christmas preparations, I have some time to actually post something here. My older sister, Laura, is up visiting from Florida so its nice to have almost the entire family together for the holidays.

Christmas day was pretty busy around here as we hosted Rich's family for Christmas. We don't have a large house, so it was a little tight with 7 people and a puppy here. We did have a good time though. It was my neice's first Christmas and while she's too young to really understand what was going on, she was cute and she could kind of unwrap her own gifts. I don't have any pictures right now, but I plan to have some in a few days.

Currently, we're at my parents' place and having "Christmas" with them. We exchanged gifts yesterday since one of my older brothers was here yesterday, but he had to leave last night to drive to his girlfriend's family in Pennsylvania. Its a little crazy here, as it always is, but at least its quiet for the moment.

My Dad's treatments are progressing and he has about 35 treatments left now. He has to go 5 days a week until sometime in February, but at least they are doing something for it at this point. He's in decent spirits since he doesn't seem to have any side effects from the actual treatments. They treatments themselves are going much better than the pre-treatment stuff, so its getting better.

I hope everyone had a good Christmas. I know I did and I now have even more ideas for quilts and I have lots of patterns to choose from! ;-)

Christmas Hope

Ever since I was a kid, I always saw Christmas as a hopeful time of year. As a child, I'm sure it was because I was looking forward to the new toys and games that came on Christmas morning. Now that I'm older, I look forward to it because its a time that my entire family is able to get together and share some good laughs. Some traditions we still do, even though we don't have to, but we do them just because.

When we were all younger, my Mom used to cook a big meal on Christmas Eve and drove herself nuts trying to do it while getting all the presents wrapped, rolls made for the following day and all of us off to Christmas mass. So one year she just said she was done with the dinner and we were getting pizza. We all love it and it was incredibly simple and was ready for pickup right when mass was done. We still have the "Christmas pizza" despite the fact that we could easily make the meal now and my Mom is able to get rolls done days before.

While Rich and I don't decorate much for Christmas, I do insist that we do a tree and decorate the mantle. I'm not all into the outdoor lights because, frankly, its stupid cold out when you have to put them up and take them down. I'm all for enjoying my lights in the comfort of my warm house. ;-) So here's some pics of the tree and the mantle from last year (my husband has the camera up in VT right now, so I can't take any current pictures).

Quilty Stuff

I haven't fallen off the face of the earth.... yet! Sometimes I wonder if anyone actually reads my blog or if its just taking up random space in the void of the internet. Feel free to leave comments once in a while! ;-)

We survived the 1st winter storm of the season with very little trouble. Our power was out for about 3 hours during the ice storm, but that's a heck of a lot better than most people. There are still people without power today and its been 3 full days since the storm. Thankfully the power lines in our development are underground so as long as power gets to the start of the development, we'll have power.

I did get some quilting done this weekend. I finished up the quilt top for "Irish Rails" but unfortunately I don't have any pictures of it yet and I won't until next weekend. Rich is going snowboarding this week up in Stowe, VT and taking the camera with him. Hopefully he'll come back with some awesome pictures and no injuries. ;-)

My Christmas shopping is all done at this point and I just need to wrap the gifts that we ordered on Saturday. Everything else is already wrapped and under the tree. Now its just a matter of cleaning up the house for when company starts to arrive. My older sister is staying with us for most of the Holidays, but she's spending Christmas day with my parents while we entertain Rich's family for Christmas. So she'll be at our from 12/20 until 12/22 or 12/23, then on 12/24 Rich's uncle will be staying with us through 12/26. Late on the 26th or possibly on the 27th, we'll be driving out to my parents and staying there until the 30th. On the 30th, we'll drive back home with my older sister with us and she'll be at our place until Jan 3rd. Then on the 5th its back to work. Its going to be a crazy two weeks and there's a lot to be done. I just have to try not to get too stressed out about so many people coming in and out of the house and having to go everywhere.

Anyway - hopefully I'll get some quilting done and I need to practice free motion quilting with the BSR foot. If anyone has some tips for a beginner, I'd definitely appreciate them. I'm not very good right now with loops and changing direction, but I think that will come with practice.

Quilting and Snow

Once again, Judy over at PatchworkTimes is holding a quiltathon this weekend. This is actually the first time that I'm able to participate. Yay! I was able to get a few things quilty done yesterday along with putting up our Christmas tree.

Here's a quilt I've been working on for the past few days. I have the blocks sewn into rows at this point, but just didn't have a picture of them, but I have this one when I had laid them all out into the pattern.

And look what I woke up to this morning! Its finally snowing here! We had a few cases of snow flakes in the air a few times over the past two weeks, but this is the first time that its actually staying. The grass is still visible, but at least its starting to look white. There's a few pictures of outside the front of the house (of course from the comfy warmth of being inside) and one from the backyard. Its finally starting to look like Christmas!

Turkey Day

Now that I've recovered from stuffing myself silly on Thanksgiving... :-)

Thanksgiving was a busy and somewhat hectic day. We went to my parents (out near Syracuse) for Thanksgiving on Wednesday night after work. The traffic was horrendous! It was the worst we've ever seen on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. At times, we were only going about 40 mph when the freeway speed limit was 65. It was a little weird because we thought the trip would be quick since when we got on the Thruway, traffic in the "slow" lane was travelling at 80 mph. However, shortly after passing Amsterdam, it dropped down to about 70-75, then towards Utica it really bogged down and that's when we were travelling at 40 mph for far too long!

Thanksgiving day itself we spent at my Aunt's house with the extended family. There were about 35 people crammed into the house, but thankfully there were a few quieter places to hang out. I ended up making some hot apple cider to take with us and I carved the turkey when we got there. Somehow I ended up doing it one year and I did a good job. I've had to do it every year since then. We had a good time visiting with people we hadn't since in a year and stuffing our faces. Hahaha!

We spent all of Friday and about half of Saturday also at my parents. I helped put up the small Christmas tree in the living room and its fully decorated. Rich and I both helped put up the big tree in the family room (its about 12 feet tall), but that one didn't get decorated while we were there.

The rest of the weekend was spent watching NCIS and doing just about nothing. ;-) It was perfect! I didn't do any quilting, which is a little sad, but the time spent doing nothing and just relaxing was definitely needed. I've been pretty stressed out lately due to a lot of things and the down-time was necessary. I feel a bit recharged now, but not quite. Hopefully I'll be able to hang on another 3-1/2 weeks until I have Christmas break. That will be a busy time, too, but I won't have to go to work for almost 2 weeks. Yippee!