Sew Like the Wind!

DH just had six days off in row, and that rarely happens. Even rarer is me having time to sew when he's home a lot. BUT, DH just started a new project, which requires him to spend lots of time on his computer, at HOME! So instead of us going out all the time, we mostly stayed home, and I sewed while he worked on his new project. As long as I made dinner he was happy.

I've gotten a LOT done in the last week! The weighted blankets I was working on? I now have four tops completed. The herringbone quilt I was working on? Top done and it's basted! I also have three other quilts basted, with another laid out to baste tomorrow, and four more I hope to baste over the weekend. I've been piecing backings, adding borders to a couple quilts, finished more Flying Geese units for a UFO, and basically working on a dozen different things but making progress on all of them!

This is my basting setup. I have two 8 ft folding tables I set up side by side in the living room after moving most of the furniture. The 8 ft tables really fill up the living room, but even a king sized quilt doesn't hang off the end much. The two tables together are 5 ft wide, so I still need to move a big quilt around, but not too much. Today was the second day of my basting spree, and here are my newly basted quilts ready for quilting.

Four quilts basted so far, but I'm hoping I'll have nine basted by Sunday night when I have DH take the tables down. 

Here are my weighted blanket tops that are ready to match with backings. I plan to make three more tops before I start working on finishing any of these. 

This is one of the quilts I added a border to (it's folded in fourths for the photo). I had made the center a while back, and when the center was done, it no longer matched the border fabric I had chosen the colors from. I was very discouraged, But one day when cutting fabric, this Southwestern print caught my eye. This is one of the main reasons I like my stash on shelves with glass doors. I never would have thought to dig out a Southwestern fabric to put with a Celtic knot design, but the colors caught my eye and I realized this fabric might just redeem this project. I am much happier with this quilt now, and I found a terrific variegated thread to quilt it with, so I'm excited about this project now. This quilt top resulted in a bunch of bonus HSTs, from which I made another quilt top.

After seeing how well I liked the fabrics with that Southwestern print, I decided to audition that as a border with the bonus quilt too. Yup! I like it! The Southwestern print made the color choices make sense, even though it was a completely different fabric I chose the colors from. I only have about 25" of that Southwestern print left after cutting borders for both quilts, but that's OK. I'm really happy with how it ended up being used. 

Even if I make my goal of basting nine quilts in five days, I'm really happy I'm only using one wide quilt backing. I'm piecing backings for everything else, and I'm really seeing yardage fly off the shelves. 

I'm using two king sized packaged battings, and demolishing a partial roll of batting I had. I think to baste the last couple of quilts I'm either going to have to make some Frankenbatts, or open another roll of batting. Likely I will just open another roll of batting. I don't normally baste quite so many quilts in one spree, and to save time, I'll likely make the Frankenbatts another time. I don't mind piecing batting at all, and often when I know I'm going to have a basting spree I make a bunch of Frankenbatts ahead of time and match them to quilts. This time I didn't do that, but batting scraps aren't going to go bad, they just take up space. I'll see if I can get the batting scraps dealt with before my next basting spree. 

A Quick Trip and Getting Back to Business

DH and I took a quick trip to see that new grandbaby! He is a sweetie! We were only gone three days, it was a pretty quick trip. We got to look around the town we lived in when we were first married. We only lived there just under a year, and we haven't really been back since then. We have driven through, but not stopped. It was fun driving by the first places we lived. 

When we got home I tried to get back into sewing, but sometimes it takes me a couple days to decide which thing I want to make priority. I started sewing on a UFO, which is always a good thing thing to work on. I have over 1,000 flying geese units to make for that quilt, so I'm expecting to work on it off and on as I get sick of sewing the same units. 

I keep reading about the Stashbusters Yahoo group pre-cut challenge going on this year. January is charm squares (usually 5" squares), but for the purpose of the challenge they decided any squares would work. I had a stack of 4.5" squares left from cutting apart a weighted blanket that was deemed "too heavy" I had matched the jeweled toned squares with white squares, and decided to make them all into HSTs. My lines were drawn, it was ready to go, and I started all this in December so it's a UFO too. Sewing on either side of the diagonal lines worked well as leaders/enders for my flying geese units, so I started working on two UFO's at once. 

This was the results of two days of sewing diagonal lines. So much pressing to do, and snipping dog ears. All of that is done now, The big HST's are from those 4.5" reclaimed squares, the rectangular units will be Flying Geese units once I sew the other "wing" on, and the basket has bonus HST's that are cut offs from the Flying Geese. They will end up being yet another quilt. All of these quilts are purple/blue/green, and I've made a lot of quilts in that color combination in the last couple years. I'm getting kind of sick of it to be honest, but I have a lot of requests for that combination or similar. 

I sewed diagonal lines for two days, decided to take a break from that, and did some straight piecing. I am using the weighted blankets tops as my leaders/enders for that. 

Since I was getting two HSTs from each set of jewel/white 4.5" squares, I decided I'd make a herringbone quilt. I only have 12 HST's that are not being used in this layout, so I call that a win. When I'm making a quilt from leftovers like this, I never shoot for a particular size quilt, it is what it is. This is just up an the design wall, I'll start assembling it tomorrow. 

I got the rows sewn for two weighted blankets while sewing pairs of HSTs together. I even started on a third. Since I usually just make weighted blankets with two fabrics on top, they are easy to sew together without thinking too much about it. Once I'm sewing the rows together, I'll probably just work on the weighted blankets. All the weighted blankets I'm working on at this point are new starts. 

I haven't been FMQ anything, because I don't have anything basted. I am going to try to do a basting spree late next week, so I need to start figuring out backings too. I have one queen quilt that I gave in and bought an extra wide backing for, so that one may get basted first. I still do best when varying my activities, which leads to working on a bunch of stuff at once. Thankfully my mind can keep it straight, even if my body can't handle as much repetitive work at once anymore!

New Grandkid on the Block

I have a new grandson! The parents don't want me posting much about him, but I have their permission to post a photo.

Look at all that hair!!! This was the first photo taken of him, right after birth. 

Things have been kind of crazy around here. I thought we'd already be back from visiting this little guy, but things are in flux right now, and I'm not even sure the rescheduled trip will work out. We'll see.

I had planned on doing some sewing this week, but I didn't. I did continue with that cutting spree, sub-cut SO many pieces, literally thousands! When I do get to sewing I'll have plenty of projects ready to go.

I've been drawing lines on squares too. I don't mind drawing lines on squares, and if I can get bonus units that need no sliver trimming by drawing two lines on a square, I'll do it. I'd much rather draw lines to sew on than trim units. 

I dropped my favorite ruler for drawing lines today, and I can't find it. I even had the grandkids help me look for it and it seems to have disappeared into a black hole! (or under the washing machine or refrigerator, same thing) If it doesn't turn up in the next couple days, I'm totally buying a replacement. There have been several times I wished I had two of them, so if the first does eventually show up, I won't be sorry to have a duplicate. 

Change of Spree

I had planned to do a basting spree this week, but I changed my plans. I hadn't finished cutting out several projects on my list, so I decided to do a cutting spree instead.

^I cut out fabrics for six weighted blankets. I know I have enough pellets for these, when these are finished I'll evaluate how many pellets I have remaining and cut more, if needed. All of these are new starts. I bought quite a bit of fleece on sale, and I put all of it away while I was working on cutting out these squares. Some of what I put away I will dig back out for backing the weighted blankets, but I work better in a cleared space, so putting fabric away until needed works best for me. 

^Here are five projects I started cutting for in 2018, so these are all on my UFO list. Two of these projects still need sub-cutting, one still needs sashing cut, and one is completely cut out and ready to put on the design wall. A couple of these need lines drawn on squares which I plan to do next week. 

I did finish a non-quilting project. I've got all the baby bibs I was working on finished.

I was trying for a fun mix of boys bibs here. I figure nine bibs gives three days worth, and since most people with little ones do laundry more than once a week, it should be enough. 

I've got company coming tomorrow, and more the next day, so I'm glad I got most of my cutting goals finished this week. 

DH was sweet and dropped my Bernina 440 off for a spa treatment. It was overdue for one. Since I don't have anything basted, I'll be piecing on a vintage machine next week. That's not a problem as I do most of my piecing on vintage machines. I plan to work on the string quilt that's been on my design wall for a couple months, and I have LOTS of Flying Geese to make that will be good leaders/enders for string blocks. I've been a bit stressed lately, and string blocks are a great way for me to de-stress a bit. 

First Finish of 2019

I just finished my first quilt for 2019, and it was my oldest UFO!

This quilt started out as Bonnie Hunter's Double Delight mystery quilt from 2008, but a different layout, different borders, and "proper aging" may have morphed it into something else. This quilt is 92x108", so queen sized. 

I'm really excited to get this quilt finished, for several reasons. 

1) It was my oldest UFO, and somewhat of a mental roadblock for me. Having it done should free me to finish more quilts. 

2) I promised myself I wouldn't do another Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt until I was all caught up finishing ones I had started. I still have one more to finish, but it's already a pile of blocks waiting to be assembled, so hopefully I can get that one done before next mystery quilt season. 

3) I was about to be crowned queen of UFO's in my Stashbusters Yahoo group, so I eeked out a finish just in time to avoid that! For the second year in a row, I started in the top ten ladies in waiting, and the list moves fast in January. Now I should drop to the bottom of the list and have some breathing room.

I'm quite happy I got this quilt finished even with a houseful of company. I carved out some time (about an hour) for myself every day, and got those borders quilted. Last of the company left yesterday, so today I pushed and finished the last border and got the binding on.

Tomorrow I'll have some company just for the day, then I think Sunday I'll start a basting spree. That grandbaby due yesterday has his daddy's sense of time and is determined to make a late arrival. Because of that, we've delayed our trip, so I can sneak in a few days of basting some of the quilt tops hanging in the closet.