A January Finish!

Since I had been looking through my quilting notebook recently, and had it handy, I looked to see if I had ever had a finish in January. Well, since I started recording in 2009, the answer is no. I happen to know that the 2nd and 3rd quilts I ever made were finished in January, because I made them on Christmas break from homeschooling. I had to hurry and get them finished before I went back to teaching 5 different grades, so I know I had them done early January, not sure of the year, maybe 1999 or so. They were matching denim quilts for DD# 2&3. We were pretty broke at the time, so I used our old jeans ( a family of seven has a lot of these) I bought one set of sheets on clearance and used that to back them. I had to cut apart the fitted sheet, and piece it together with fabric from the pillow case to make it large enough to back the quilt, since I made the quilts about the size of the flat sheet. I had no idea how to quilt, so I tied them. Both of those quilts are still around, though a bit worse for wear.

Well, this year, I have a new January finish!

This quilt for my newest great niece is done and ready to mail. The blocks were made from bonus HST's from the Carolina Christmas mystery quilt several years ago.

Now that the twin's birthday has come and gone, and my first deadline quilt is done, I've been working on other misc. projects. A couple non-quilting projects are on my list to be completed and crossed off this year. I've been working on some of those, and also getting a couple quilts to the next stage. No good pics of anything yet. DD#3's work hours are ramping up, which is good for her, and bad for my sewing time. I am figuring out some things I can do while I'm watching the twins, though actually sewing isn't one of them. Mr. L is really curious about sewing machines, and if I set one up in the living room, I'm thinking he'd end up with a needle through his finger, if I had to leave the room for anything.

I did think of something I will have the twins help me do. A couple years ago, DD#2 and I went through all my fabric scraps and divided them by color. Those are still divided by color, in the tote I put them in when I first did it. Yeah, I don't use scraps when they are divided by color. I USE scraps when they are cut to size in my scrap user system. That said, I am going to have the twins help me divide all the newer scraps by color too, then I will combine the old scraps and the new scraps by color, and start cutting them for specific quilts! I have a few color specific quilts I want to make in the next year or two, and my scraps have been taking over. Sometimes I take the time to cut up all the scraps after a project, and that is certainly my goal, but when I'm really busy, it just doesn't happen.

I need to start dealing with the scraps, but it's so much at this point, it's overwhelming. I figured cutting for specific quilts was my best bet, and since I'm going color controlled, I won't have to look at all the scraps at once. I'm thinking if I make myself stay out of the strip drawers (which is normally the first place I look when starting a quilt) and instead cut the pieces from the color divided scraps, eventually, I will have the scraps down to a not-so-overwhelming pile, and I can just process whatever is left into my scrap user system. I'm trying to process those scraps like eating an elephant, one bite at a time! I have debated just getting rid of the scraps I have, but that's hard for me, since scraps are my favorite things. I'd rather give away yardage, really. In my quilting world, yardage is for backings, but scraps are where it's at.