Stash Busting - 9/27/2009

We've had a lot of things happening lately. Still trying to sell the house....

Earlier this year we joked that we didn't want to be selling the house, buying another house and buying a new car at the same time. A few weeks ago, R's car started really acting up. We took it to the mechanic and the clutch along with the transmission were bad. So we ended up getting a new car. R really wanted a blue car (he's always had a blue car) but since we wanted a 2009 model and they're hard to come by now, we ended up with a dark grey metallic. The paint has little flecks of metal in it that reflects the light around it. Its also fun to drive! ;-)

I also got a finish done this past week. The Sweet Dreams quilt for a co-worker was finished and its even washed already.

I've been also making progress on the Rainbow Skies quilt. Its about 1/3 to 1/2 quilted. Its been taking a while to mark it and then actually do the sewing. Plus, my cat, Ellie, has insisted on helping. ;-)

So onto the report.... Just a little bit bought this week so that I can test out my new toy. Nothing used as I've already counted binding for Sweet Dreams and the backing for Rainbow Skies.

Fabric Added this Week: 6.0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 115.5 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 35 yards

Net Fabric: <80.5> yards

New Quilting Toy

I'm so excited...I'm getting a new toy this weekend. :-) I've been toying with the idea of getting a frame for my Bernina sewing machine so that I could do machine quilting a bit easier. I researched the frames a bunch and found a frame I liked, but then after reading some other things about machine quilting realized that at most I'd only be able to quilt a maximum path of 4" using my Bernina. :-( Sigh.

So I happened to go onto Craig's List for my area and found someone selling a lightly used Husqvarna MegaQuilter. This other quilter was upgrading her machine quilting system and decided to sell her old one. While the MegaQuilter doesn't have a HUGE amount of throat space, it is 9"x6" so its almost double what mine is on the Bernina. It also comes with the Inspira frame that can be setup in either a 5' length or a 10' length. Here's some pictures from the Craig's list posting....

So on Saturday morning, the woman is coming over to drop it off. She was very kind in driving over to our place as she has a van to transport the frame and machine in while I only have a small car. We were pretty confident that it would fit in the car, but just in case it was easier for her to drive over since its not too far (about 10 miles). I know what I'll be doing over the next few weeks...Playing!! ;-)

I also signed up for a class at a local quilt shop that teaches you how to use their MegaQuilter. I think its the same frame even. So for $25 I get a 3 hour class up there on how to use the machine, set it up and actually use the machine. It will definitely be good to use their machine to learn the really basic stuff and then use mine to get better at my quilting and to get some quilts quitlted.

Stash Busting - 9/13/2009

Once again...its been a while since I posted. I really am getting some sewing done though! ;-) I just haven't posted about it since everything else in life has been super busy.

I don't have pictures right now, but I did get the binding put onto the Sweet Dreams quilt that I posted about here. I also finished all the quilting on the Stars & Hearts quilt that I posted here. Finally, I started quilting the Rainbow Skies quilt. Its only about 1/16th quilted at this point as it takes me a while to mark the pattern and then take it over to my little sewing machine and start sewing. I have my eye on a used Viking MegaQuilter on Craig's list that I might purchase. It might make the quilting go a little faster, but I'm not convinced I want to spend the money on it yet or if its worth it.

Anyway...for the report!! Nothing bought...lots used (at least lots for me)!

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 109.5 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 6.5 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 35 yards

Net Fabric: <74.5> yards

Sweet Dreams Quilt

It seems odd to be posting twice in a few days when it had been a month since my previous post. Maybe things are settling down a little so that I feel like I have the time to post stuff. At least that's what I'm hoping. :-)

I finished the quilting on the center part of the Sweet Dreams quilt last night and tonight I just finished the quilting on the border. I had originally sketched some "swoops" in the border, but then decided I hated it. So I ended up using Power Point to create some stars and moons in the size I wanted, cut them out and traced them onto the quilt border at semi-equal intervals and just free-handed some loops between them. I'm completely surprised how appropriate it looks on the quilt...and how good (at least to me).

Here's some pictures of the quilting on the borders and a little bit on the edges of the center. Sorry about the colors being off a little...since its 9:45pm right now, there's absolutely no natural light so the flash was all I had. Once I get the binding made and onto the quilt, I'll be able to wash it so all the chalk marks come off. I ended up using a combination of Fons & Porters chalk pencils and some tailors chalk. I like the tailors chalk, but it doesn't keep a crisp line very long...and it doesn't show up on white. I'm going to have to experiment with some marking methods. Enjoy the pictures!

Stash Busting - 8/24/2009

It has been a few weeks since I last posted. Things have been EXTREMELY busy between work, vacation and personal stuff. Work was insanely busy with not one, but two design reviews in late July. They were both within a week of each other which meant a lot of long hours at work to prepare for the reviews. Once those reviews were done, I was finally able to take a vacation. It was about a month overdue at that point! Vacation was good, but we didn't go anywhere special. I went to visit my Grandmother who's health was in very poor condition, and we went to visit my husband's Grandmother. We also spent a few days at my husband's parents as they have a cabin on a lake in the Adirondack Park and its very peaceful and quiet there...especially during the work week.

However, vacation ended on a bit of a sad note. My Grandmother whom I had just visited passed away on Friday, July 31st. While it wasn't unexpected has her health had been declining and she was 93, it was still sad to lose her. It was a very difficult few days and even now I run across photos of her and it makes me sad. She was a wonderful woman though and she spent the last 75 years of her life putting her family first. She was always there for all of us (4 kids, 15 grandchildren, 9 great grandchildren and 2 great-great grandchildren and too many neices and nephews to count). I do have very fond memories of her and she will always be an example for me to follow.

So back to the present....

I've finished up two quilt tops in the past few weeks. The first quilt top is for a co-worker who is expecting boy this fall. I've called this one Sweet Dreams. While I don't have any pictures of it while I was piecing it, I do have a few pictures of it about 75% quilted. I still have to outline stitch the yellow stars and put something into the center of the white blocks. The border also needs to be finished up, too. The best thing is....this quilt is 100% stash!! :-)

The second quilt top I've put together is from a pattern. The pattern is by Tammy Tadd and I posted about it here. I don't have any of it quilted yet, but here's the completed top along with a close-up of the appliques. This was my first time doing appliques and I think they came out really well for the first time of doing them.

So here's my stash report for the past few weeks(since I've been pretty delinquent):
Fabric Added this Week: 0.5 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 109.5 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 5.38 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 28.4 yards

Net Fabric: <81.1> yards

Stash Busting - 7/19/2009

Surprisingly, I was able to get a fair amount accomplished this week despite work being insanely busy. Here's a picture of the quilt that I finished last weekend and never got a picture of:

This is a closeup of the quilting...sorry its a little fuzzy.

Here's the quilting on the back of the quilt.

This week, I was able to finish up the quilt top for Rainbow Skies. At this point, I'll have to put it on the shelf for a little while because I have 3 baby quilts to make (babies due in October, November and January). So I'll be making little quilts for a while, which may be nice after the last few being larger. Here's the Rainbow Skies with borders on it....the colors aren't as good in the picture as they are in real life. I'm not sure why the colors are off a bit in the picture. The variation in colors comes across really well in person.

Some of my stash used this week was for the borders on Rainbow Skies. They're 3.5" wide borders (finished) so it used a fair amount of fabric with very little sewing! ;-) The rest of my stash that I used this week was for one of the three baby quilts. Here's a picture from the book that I'm making it from. Its called "A Star is Born" by Tammy Tadd. Its a very cute quilt and it will be my first foray into applique.

Here are my numbers this week:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 109 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 2.50 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 20.54 yards

Net Fabric: <85.96> yards

I'm slowly whittling down the stash. One of the baby quilts already has fabric bought and it was added to the stash back in May. Another of the baby quilts will be completely made from stash (not buying a stitch of fabric), but the third one will most likely involve some fabric purchases. I'm also hoping I can get a few other stash busting quilts done, but it will highly depend upon work and how busy it gets over the next few months.

So how did everyone else do with their reports??

Almost......

.....Done!

I'm so close to being done with making the quilt top for my Rainbow Skies quilt. I finished putting the entire quilt top together tonight with the exception of adding the borders. The material is pressed, but I need to cut it and piece some strips together to make the pieces long enough for the quilt top.

My handy quilt holder, Rich, was kind enough to hold this up for me...with a little bit of convincing from me. :-) High maintenance is not having to hold a quilt top for someone! The flash made the colors a little washed out in the first picture. The colors are very vibrant and the darker colors are in the "jewel tone" family.

Here the colors come out a little bit better since the flash isn't directly facing the quilt. You can see Ellie, my cat, thinking about walking across the quilt. She's learned that if a quilt is on the floor and she walks on it, she gets yelled at. Once its folded up sitting on the back of the couch, or the sewing table, or the ironing board...its fair game! :-)

Enjoy!

Stash Busting - 7/12/2009

No pictures to show for the progress I've made, but I was able to get some things done this week. All of my applique pieces for a baby quilt are cut along with 288 squares for the main pattern of the quilt. I still have to press and cut the main colored squares for the middle of the quilt along with the white background pieces for the appliques.

I also got some pictures from my sister. I had shipped a quilt to her just before July 4th and she received it earlier this week. It looks really nice in her condo.

Its absolutely gorgeous here today so I'm not sure how much quilting I will get done. :-) Here are my numbers so far this year....

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 109 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 1.25 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 20.54 yards

Net Fabric: <88.46> yards

Happenings....

Around the middle of June, we had a pretty bad hail storm come through one evening. We ended up losing power for about 3 hours which is a very long time for us. The power lines in our development are all underground, but the storm took out the power everywhere around us so there wasn't any way for the electricity to get to us. Our roses survived the storm, but many of our other plants really took a beating. Here's some photos as the storm was ending (just rain coming down at this point) and you can see the amount of hail that we received....

This past weekend, after spending July 3rd at my parents' visiting them, we were back here in the Albany area. Saturday afternoon we decided to go hiking at a local nature preserve. We've been there before and saw some nice waterfalls, but we thought with all the rain we've had recently that the waterfalls should be really good. And they were! ;-) We took some pictures above the first waterfall and leaning out over the waterfall. Then we were able to hike down to the base of the first and second waterfalls. Our feet got a little wet, but not too bad. Enjoy the nature shots!

Plotter Kill Nature Preserve

Entrance Bridge

Part of the upper stream

1st Waterfall from above


1st Waterfall - looking down below

1st waterfall - leaning over the edge to get an awesome shot

Stream below the 1st waterfall

stream below 1st waterfall again

Base of 1st waterfall

Closeup of 1st waterfall

Another close-up

2nd Waterfall

There's another set of waterfalls further down the gorge, but we were starting to get a little tired and decided it was best to call it quits at that point. We could have hiked further in, but then you have to get back out!! Next time we go we'll probably get down to the other set of waterfalls.

Stash Busting - 7/5/2009

This week was actually a rather productive week considering I didn't touch the sewing machine until Thursday! I was able to add binding AND finish the hand sewing for the Rainbow 9-Patch quilt (I don't have a picture of it yet, but I will soon!). The little bit of stash used this week is for the binding on this quilt. However, I did receive the kit for the Purple Squared kit, which ended up being about 2 yards (not including the backing which hasn't shipped yet....so I haven't counted it yet).

A few weeks ago I posted about making the "Rainbow Skies" quilt and I had a few requests for pictures (I didn't have any at the time). I now have a picture of the full quilt laid out on the floor (minus borders). I wasn't too careful when laying it out so it looks little off-square, but once everything is sewn together I think its going to look awesome!

I also started another quilt this weekend (surprise, surprise). My cousin and his wife are having a baby girl this November, so I started making a quilt for them. Its my first time doing applique, so its a little daunting right now. I did trace some of the shapes yesterday (sunday) and transferred them to fabric and cut the pieces out. Now I just have another 26 pieces to go. Hopefully I'll get most of the shapes done this week and I can then count it as stash busted!

So here's the damages.....

Fabric Added this Week: 2.00 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 109 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0.42 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 19.29 yards

Net Fabric: <89.71> yards

Stash Busting - 6/28/2009

Not a whole lot of progress on the quilting front that I can show. I was able to sew a bunch of the rows for the "Rainbow Skies" quilt into pairs. Next I have to press them so I can pin and sew the rows into sets of 4. However, that quilt has been put on the back burner for a little bit.

I went back to quilting the Rainbow 9-Patch quilt (sorry - no pictures right now). I finished quilting the center of the quilt a few weeks ago but was trying to decide what to do in the borders. I've never tried free-motion feathers or anything like that and while I thought about doing it, I decided I didn't want to try it out for the first time on this quilt. So instead I did SID between the black and brown borders and then did stippling in the brown borders. I hadn't really done stippling before either (I know its probably one of the easiest and I now agree after doing it). I did get most of it done Sunday morning with the exception of one half of one side.

I have about a dozen quilts in the queue right now including two baby quilts for babies due this fall. Once I get the binding added to the Rainbow 9-Patch quilt, I'll be focusing on the baby quilts to make sure I get those done in time for the babies.

So here's the stash numbers:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 107 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 0.25 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 18.87 yards

Net Fabric: <88.13> yards

Oh...the fabric added YTD will be growing this week. I purchased a quilt kit from Keepsake Quilting a few weeks ago called "Purple Squared". I'm not sure exactly how much fabric is in it, but I bought a yard of backing and the quilt is 32 x 40, so probably about a yard and a half or maybe two yards in the top. So I could be up by 3 yard, but probably 4 yards once it arrives.

Stash Busting - 6/14/2009

Another week down and not a lot of sewing done. Work has decided to be very busy later this year and I've been trying my hardest to work ahead as much as I can. We also went out to visit friends many nights this week, so no quilting on those nights. I think the only thing I got done on the "quilty" front is cutting my HST that I messed up last time. I did test it this time before I cut all of them, so at least I know this time they'll work. :-)

I was able to completely finish sewing the rows for the Rainbow Skies top. The rows aren't put together yet as I need to put the triangles on the ends of the rows first, but the top is about halfway done. Here's some of the rows that I had laid out earlier this week:

On the house front...we are having another open house today. We actually had someone call to request a showing for today, so they are going to come during the open house. At least now we've had someone purposely call to come see the house. Our roses are really flourishing now, so maybe that will tempt somoene to give an offer. ;-)

Anyway...so here's my stash numbers. I used a little bit this week with finish up the rows, but I added the fabric that I bought last weekend for the baby quilt....so I'm still in the red.

Fabric Added this Week: 6.50 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 107 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 1.25 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 18.62 yards

Net Fabric: <88.38> yards

Lots o' Pictures :-)

Last night when I got home from work, look what I found waiting for me. The strawberries were absolutely delicious! And they were still warm from the sun. Yum!!

While snacking on my strawberries I had a chance to enjoy some of the flowers in the garden. Its taken a little while for things to start blooming, but now that we've gotten some rain and a lot of sun, they've really taken off. Here's one of the annuals we put in this year. I absolutely love the orange color on them.

After admiring things for a while, I went inside and got changed so that I could start mowing the lawn. I mowed about three strips and went to empty the mower bag and look what I saw in the other part of the yard!! The turtle was HUGE! At least huge for our area. I had never seen a turtle in our yard before (we've seen lots of rabbits, chipmunks, snakes, frogs...). This one was a large snapper, so there was no way I was going near the front end of that thing. Apparently she was looking for a nice place to lay her eggs and tried to find it in our rose garden. Thankfully she moved on before she could dig a large hole. When she started heading toward the road, my neighbor across the street was nice enough to come and move her for me so that she wouldn't go into the road. She was none too happy about being picked up though. You could hear her snapping her jaws shut from 15 feet away!

After the turtle excitement, I didn't get a lot of the lawn mowed! Oops! ;-) I finished up the first half or so and my husband finished the rest up while I sprayed the roses and went inside to fix dinner. I did get some sewing done last night. I was able to get all the remaining rows sewn last night and laid them out. There's only one color missing from the picture below, which is a very dark red...almost a brick color.

Now I just need to iron and re-cut the setting triangles for the ends of the rows. Hopefully this time I'll cut the right size or even a little big is OK...just not too small again. ;-)

Happy Quilting! ~Sarah

Stash Busting - 5/7/2009

My quilting has taken a major hit with trying to sell the house. Between cleaning up and searching for the next house, I haven't really been able to sew much. I did get most of the quilting done on one quilt, but I don't have any pictures of it yet. This was the first weekend really spent at home and I did make some progress this weekend on using "the stash"; however I also bought some stuff. Since I haven't counted how much yardage yet...I'm not posting it this week. Next week I will have to add it in. I was able to start sewing the Rainbow Skies quilt this weekend, and I actually make quite a bit of progress on it. Here's a picture from Friday evening. I do have a lot more done at this point...more than half...probably about 2/3rds done. The only downside is that I cut my QST's wrong and I had to go and get more fabric to get the right size triangles. :-( I'll have to figure out a use for 64 QST!

So here are the latest numbers:

Fabric Added this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Added YTD: 100.50 yards

Fabric Used this Week: 2.5 yards
Fabric Used YTD: 17.37 yards

Net Fabric: <83.13> yards

A long overdue update...

Its hard to believe its been almost a month since my last post. Our house is now officially on the market and we had an open house this past weekend. We had 6 different couples come to the house (7 counting one nosy set of neighbors) and while most of them liked the house but didn't seem overly interested, there was one older couple that stayed for a long time and seemed very interested in the house. Maybe we will get lucky and they will send us an offer.

In the meantime, here's some pictures of our roses. They have finally started blooming this year and hopefully some more will come out this week.

Here's also a picture of the planting bed at the front of the house. The phlox in the back are starting to get VERY tall, but no flowers yet. The only ones we have flowers on are some annuals and the painted daisies in the front. It will look really nice later this summer. I think this is one of the few things I will miss about this house. Rich built a wonderful stone wall by hand and the flowers are just spectacular. We're hoping we'll be able to make an even bigger planting bed at the next house and surround it with a similar stone wall.

On the "quilty" front, I have been doing some sewing, but not as much as I would like. With the house on the market, I have to pick up everything EVERY night and put it away and then take it out the next night if I want to sew. While it makes my sewing area very neat and organized, its not very conducive to sewing. ;-) However, I did get the binding finished on our quilt a few weeks ago and its been on our bed. The weather has been mostly cool, so its actually being used at night.

Hopefully I'll have some pictures this week of the quilt that I'm in the process of quilting. I'm doing a feathered wreath pattern in the setting blocks and its coming out pretty good.

Happy Quilting! ~Sarah