A Catch Up Week

Sometimes you just need a week to play catch up. I hadn't worked on my temperature quilt in a month, and I had two blocks to do for my Murder Mystery quilt. 

I did catch up on the temperature quilt, and I was hoping to have the first six months of rows sewn together, but alas, ironing is no fun in these high temps. I need to press all the columns before I can start any kind of assembly. 

This is July's column so far, even those couple of pinks are 100 degrees. Thankfully, I haven't had to use the darkest red I have yet, that's for 113+ and the highest we've been is 112. We had measurable rain once more this week, so I have another down FG to add on. In this pic it looks like there's a lot of down pointing FG, but in reality there is only one. I just have it flipped around to fit it in a reasonably sized photo. 

I was supposed to make the dragon head for the Murder Mystery quilt back in May, but I had no printer access at the hotel. Since I missed the May deadline, and I was pretty sure we'd end up making a tail for the back of the ship, I just waited until that block came out and did them together. I'm pretty happy with how they came out, and very happy I'm now caught up on the Murder Mystery quilt. 

I've been quilting on Mr. L's quilt, and it looks like I'll have the grandtwins for a couple days before school starts. I'd like to give him his quilt when I see them, so the clock is ticking. 

Lately my goal when making a quilt is to use up all the fabric I took out for the quilt, For me, that's usually at least one more quilt. In the case of Mr. L's quilt, it's turning out to be three more quilts! I didn't pull out enough fabric for 4 quilts originally, but I hate wasting any part of stripsets, so I ended up cutting up the leftover parts of the stripsets in different ways which led to three different patterns going on. After evaluating what I had leftover, I actually pulled more fabric, to make the three bonus quilts the size I wanted. I've been very careful when pulling extra fabric, sewing up just a bit at a time, and counting to make sure I don't end up with ten more quilts in these colors. 

The quilt on the left uses the same blocks as Mr. L's houndstooth quilt. His quilt just has plain blocks as well. I'm going to assemble those and add a border or two. The checkerboard quilt on the right still needs a few more blocks made for it. 

These are the other style blocks I got from the beginning and ends of the stripsets. Since half spin one way and half the other, I always set these with sashing. I've decided on a pieced sashing and cornerstone for this quilt, and I've figured out cutting requirements for that, but haven't done the actual cutting yet. 

My goals for August are making a baby quilt for my niece that's due in early October (it's cut out) and making the quilt for the scooter rally in November. I really love the pattern I chose for the baby quilt, so I'm actually cutting a bunch of extra blocks out and I'll use those for donation quilts. Oh, I have everything to make more burp rags now, so I need to get those made too. I don't mind staying in and sewing when the weather outside is so hot and miserable. I haven't been wanting to go anywhere! 

I've had a chance to catch up on some other things too, not quilting related. Now that DH and I are both home and things are back to normal, I've taken the time to evaluate the pantry and freezer a bit, and start getting things built back up. I needed to make some gluten free flour blends, and order more of certain ingredients for that. I like to do certain food prep so meals are quicker to make (more sewing time that way.) One of the things I do for that is to buy a large amount of onions, slice up half for carmelized onions which I cook in the slow cooker. Once those are done I freeze them in small recipe sized amounts. I chop most of the remaining onions and freeze those in a ziploc bag. I usually keep a couple onions for anything I need fresh onions for, but if they are going to be cooked, using them from the freezer works just fine. 

I was in the middle of a freezer/pantry cleanout when we ended up going to Yuma, so it's taken a while to figure out where I was in that process. We had used most of the homemade freezer meals I had, so I'm starting to restock those. There are still a few things I'd like to clear out, so I'm meal planning around that. It's good to get a handle on what you have and what you need. Something I likely don't do as often as I should. 

The slow cooker is getting a workout these days, because I'm trying so hard to not turn on the oven. When it's 110F outside, cooking just doesn't seem like a good time. Slow cooker meals work perfectly with long sewing days though, so that's a win anyway! 

First Rain of Monsoons!

 The high temps aren't going down, but we finally had our first bit of rain from monsoon season! It's only rained once, but we got quite a bit of rain (and hail) in the short time it rained. This summer has been brutally hot and worrisomely dry. 

I've been mostly doing Nana things this week, but I did manage to finish another quilt before Nana duty started. 

It's one of the quilt tops I made in the hotel room, and it's now a finished twin sized quilt. It's finish #13 for the year. 

Next week's goal's are catching up on the temperature quilt and the murder mystery quilt. Anything else is a bonus. I did manage to get another deadline quilt mostly cut out. I can start piecing it now, but there will be some applique on top of the piecing I haven't prepped yet. That's ok, because I have multiple quilts that need applique prep done, so I'll just try to prep it all at once. 

I hope it's cooler wherever you are, temps near 110F are getting old. 

Finish #12

 It feels really good to be posting finishes instead of just piles of blocks!

This crazy quilt is now finish #12 for the year! It's approximately 60x70, so a good sized throw. 

I had just enough of this fabric in stash for the backing. There is the tiniest amount left, probably will get tossed in the string bin.

So far today I've finished quilting a quilt, and trimmed it for binding, plus I just finished assembling a quilt top for Mr. L. I need to press the top and get it layered so I can baste it tomorrow. I really hate assembling quilts in the summer. There's no way to do it without a lap full of quilt. It's been so hot our air conditioner can't keep up, so although it's way nicer inside than out, it's still hot to have a quilt on your lap.

I keep seeing chances for rain, but we haven't gotten any rain at our house since April. May and June are normally very dry, but July-September is usually rainy season, and it can start any time now! 

Most of next week I'm on full-time Nana duty, taking care of the grands while Mama and Daddy are out of town. I'm not expecting to get anything done while I have the grands, and I'll likely need a couple days to recover after they go home. Right now my goal is to get to a good starting place for when I get back to quilting. Basting Mr. L's quilt will have my FMQ hour per day ready to go. I'm hoping to finish sub-cutting some units for some quilts that are started, and I'd like to get the baby quilt for my great-nephew on the way cut out as well. If I can accomplish those before Tuesday when Nana duty starts,  I can jump right back into quilting at good starting places. 

To me it's never about a good stopping place, there are lots of those. The trick to being productive is to stop at a good place to start the next time you do that activity. It's a lot like trying to load the dishwasher and realizing you never unloaded it. That's not a good starting place, even though running the dishwasher is a stopping place. It's a happy day when you go to load the dishwasher and it's empty, that's a great starting place. I use the same ideas in quilting. Sure, I can baste a quilt as a starting place, but it's a better starting place if the quilt is already basted, since my normal sewing day starts with an hour of quilting. If I have to baste before that, I'll likely not quilt an hour that day. The same with having a quilt cut out. Cutting a quilt out is already a starting place, but if I'm going to have several days of not sewing, then having the quilt already cut out is a better place to get back into sewing. I can just sit down and sew instead of having to cut first. I'm always working on several projects at once, so there's always more to cut and more to assemble, and more to baste and more to quilt.  (I usually bind right after I finish quilting so that's not normally something I have a backlog of)

It took me so long to get back in the groove after being in Yuma for three months, that I'm trying to be careful to not mess up my mojo with the next interruption. We'll see how I do!

Finishes #10 and 11

 Now that DH is also home, and we are back to "normal" schedule, I'm finding it a bit easier to stay on track. Well, on track at least as far as my FMQ an hour per day goes. 

I all of a sudden had several grandkids ask for new quilts, and most of them wanted them to be specific themes. Making a themed quilt necessitates fabric acquisition when they want novelty stuff, and I've been doing that, but the grandtwins did not want anything themed, just color preferences. 

Miss S wanted a orange and black quilt, and she asked first. I told her I had a quilt basted and ready to quilt that was black with orange, red, and yellow. She wanted to see it and when I showed her she said she'd take that one. Since all it needed was quilting and binding, she jumped the queue to the front. 

I finished the quilt this week, and gave it to her last night. 

I had fun quilting spirals with variegated thread. The bobbin thread was just a solid orange. 

Now for Mr L. Since his twin jumped the line, I felt like he should too. I try to treat the twins as equally as possible. When I asked what he wanted in a quilt, he said he wanted a red and orange quilt. Now the quilt his sister already claimed would have fit the bill, but she already claimed it. I gave a quick look through my quilt tops, and the closest I had ready was a gray, orange, and yellow quilt top, but he nixed that. The funny thing is, I had designed a houndstooth quilt while I was in Yuma, and I had bought fat quarters for it in warm colors. I had planned on starting that quilt while I was there, and I had some cream colored yardage I had set aside for background. I showed him the quilt in EQ and he liked the design, but wanted a black background instead. This week I got that quilt cut out, and I'm starting to sew up the blocks now. When he saw his sister's quilt, he wanted variegated thread for the quilting too, and I have another large spool of it so I can do that. I think I'm going to quilt flames on his. 

After I finished the quilt for Miss S, I grabbed a basted UFO, and got it finished as well. 

It's nothing fancy, just one of the tops I made when I was busting 2" strips. 

I even busted scrap fleece on the back of this one. 

I just finished quilting yet another UFO this morning, but I'll show it after I get the binding on. It's not finished without a binding! 

I only had one more baby quilt basted, which I can easily finish in a couple hours of quilting. I did take the time to baste a twin sized quilt this week, so between those two I have enough to keep me quilting through next week. 

It's definitely time for a basting spree! I just need to bite the bullet and spend a week basting as many quilts as I can, but I've also been trying to cut out all the deadline quilts I have. The only one I've managed to cut out is the one for Mr. L. 

The main piecing I've done this aside from working on Mr. L's quilt is the June "block" for the murder mystery quilt I'm doing. 

It's the same as another month, but a different colorway. I think this one came out better than my last one, but that's partially because I changed the cutting directions a tiny bit, and my way worked better for me. I didn't measure this row or the previous one, so I'm not sure how close they are to the same size, but I'm hoping close enough to fudge it in the final layout. 

I still haven't done May's block yet, but I'm going to do the applique version, and I have another project I need to start that also has an applique section, so I'm figuring since I already missed the May deadline, I'll just do all the applique at once. I did get the June "block" done in time for the bonus clue. July's block comes out next week. 

My next quilt to cut out is going to be a baby quilt I'm making for my niece who is pregnant. I forgot I'm out of burp rags so I need to make those too. I usually make burp rags in big batches and just keep them in the gift closet. I guess I've given out more baby gifts than I thought, because I'm completely out of them! I've got the burp rag die, so they don't take long to cut out or make, but I do need to move them up on the priority list. 

It's been a busy week, but I need to stay busy while I can. I have a bunch of deadline projects, but also a couple extended periods of time coming up where no sewing will be happening, so I have to keep that in mind.