Each quilter has different things that works for them, and different ways of working. A storage idea that's great for me, may be a nightmare for you. I can easily have a half dozen projects going at once, but you may be a start to finish quilter. I have fabrics from just about every quilting genre, and am absolutely fine with mixing them in a quilt. Maybe you only like reproduction fabrics or batiks, and never mix them. You know what? It's all good. None of that is right or wrong, it's just different.
I find identifying something that doesn't work every bit as useful as finding something that does. I like trying different things I see online or read about, some of those are winners, and some I decide are not my cup of tea, even incredibly popular options.
I've seen lots of quilters in online forums complaining they've tried Bonnie Hunter's scrap user system and it just sits there unused. It didn't work for them. It does work for me. I keep tweaking the sizes I save, but overall, it is incredibly helpful to me to cut my scraps into strips. I also use smaller squares pretty quickly. Charm squares (5") don't work for me. I find most of the time you have to cut them down and end up sliver trimming units which I hate to do. I'd much rather cut to an accurate size to start. EZ angle and Companion angle rulers work with my strips perfectly.
One day I was reading an online forum, and several quilters were talking about using their die cutters to cut other shapes from scraps, and keeping those on hand too. Well, next time I processed scraps, I tried that. I cut HST's, QST's, even some tumblers and drunkard's path blocks. I had them all sorted, then life happened, I had to dismantle my sewing room because another family moved in with us, and all of those pieces got dumped in together, and that's how they stayed, long after I got my sewing room back. The fact is, keeping anything besides strips and squares doesn't work for me. I never think to use them, and even if they had stay sorted, I still don't think I would have used them.
This week I took the time to start sorting the random shapes dumped in together. I also made a lot of headway on sewing the units together.
I ran out of neutrals for the 3" finished QST's, and I ran out of colors on the 4" QST's. I'll hopefully be cutting more in the near future, but this time I'll be sewing them into units ASAP.
I haven't finished pressing the 1.5" finished HST's I sewed up, but I've got a basketful, and you can see in the small white basket in the background that I have pressed quite a few. I still have more sizes of HST's to sew up, as well as some other shapes, but I think once they are units, I'll be able to actually get them into something.
I have a bin just for misc. quilt units; extra nine patches, four patches, HST's, QST's, flying geese, whatever units I made and didn't use for whatever reason. When do I actually use those units? Well, for me, the best time to use them if to make a backing just a bit wider. I tend to make my baby quilts 48" wide, so wider than WOF. My favorite way to make the backing wide enough, is to dig through the extra unit bin, and find stuff in similar colors to the quilt top, and see what I can come up with. I make an off center cut in the fabric and sew the pieced strip in. I have ended up with some really cute backings that way. I may stick orphan blocks in there too, but I start with the unit bin. I make twin sized quilts 90" tall or so, and I normally piecing the backing with a horizontal seam for those, but even 2 WOF isn't that tall, so again, I need it just a bit bigger. Out comes the unit bin and orphan blocks. Rather than having to cut more yardage, I find it the perfect time to use up quilt leftovers. Now that I'm sewing up those misc scrap units, I'm sure they'll get used in that fashion. I might use some of the units in quilt blocks, but since I don't have enough of any one thing, even if I sew up some blocks they will likely end up with the orphan blocks.
That's not all I've worked on this week. I finished the quillow I was working on last week.
All these fabrics have white or cream backgrounds, but some are awfully busy. I'm determined to bust a bunch of the busy ones from my stash. I've decided I like calmer backgrounds overall.
I've been quilting a UFO one hour per day. FMQ an hour per day DOES work for me! I'll finish it next quilting session, but that likely won't be until next week. I've got two of the grandkids this weekend, and one of the ones I'll have needs a weighted blanket, so I need to get that finished so he can take it home.
I have been having fun quilting the UFO. It's been basted for two years, and was likely a top for a couple years before that. It was from a floral fabric busting spree (I'm not really a floral kind of girl). I've been having a good time looking at the fabrics, and seeing what memories they bring to mind. A fabric might remind me of where I bought it, or other quilts I used it in. There are some fabrics I was gifted, and some I inherited. This quilt had some of the fabric I used in a quilt for my late sister, which she was using the last time I saw her at her house. That didn't make me sad, it made me smile, thinking that the quilt I made her brought her some comfort in her last days.
I've also been working on one of the weighted blankets I need to finish.
Although I really want to get all the weighted blankets done ASAP, I decided since they are so hard on my arm, it really isn't wise to try to do more than one per week, and even every other week if I need to. I do want those off my list, so I'm hoping to have them all done by the end of May. I think that's a more reasonable timeline. I'm pretty sure I have enough pellets for four blankets, but even if I only get three out of them that's OK. If I'm way off on estimating, and I have pellets left after four, I'm going to make the grandkids beanbags. I will use up those pellets one way or another!
Some other things that don't work for me? Fat quarter bundles if I keep them together. If I break them up and sort by color they'll get used, if I keep them together, they sit. Most of the time they are "too matchy" for me to use them together. Scrap quilts are my thing, so even when sticking with a strict color scheme I'll push those limits.
Quilt kits don't seem to work for me either. I've bought so many, actually sewn one, broke up several and stuck the fabrics in stash which then do get used. Oh, I do have one quilt kit cut out! Besides two quilt kits which I paid quite a bit for (one of which is the one I actually made), I've stuck to only buying them at deep discounts, so if I break up every kit I own and use the fabrics for something else, it's still OK. I don't feel like I have to use the quilt kit as designed. I may use the pattern with different fabrics, and use the fabrics that came with it in other quilts. That's all OK with me. I do have a couple quilt kits I do want to make as intended. I have learned my lesson though, and I don't buy quilt kits anymore!
Have you tried something that didn't work for you, even if you heard other people raving about it? (storing my thread on thread organizers where they got all dusty was a fail, now my thread is in drawers) Have you tried something and it changed the way you do things forever after? (Leaders/enders was a total game changer for me) Is there something popular you have no intention of ever trying? (No hand applique, thank you) I love hearing about what works (or doesn't) for other people.
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