I Have Some Cutting to Do!

 I'm really trying to get all the projects I partially cut from 3.5" strips sewn into blocks. I never had a huge variety of 3.5" strips, so I ended up with a lot of duplicate blocks. I planned several projects with HST's made from 3.5" strips, and on those I have all the HST's made, and a few blocks made, but mostly those are stalled there. The thing is, all those HST's are in project boxes, not hanging around my sewing space. The pieces I'm sewing up now were just sitting on a shelf. I decided to sort these longer strips I'll be using for hashtag blocks. They will be big 15" blocks, so with sashing and borders, I only need 20 blocks for a twin and 12 will make a throw. I divided the sets up into three throws and two twins. The piles that are spread out will be the throws, and the piles that are stacked will be twins. I'm matching them up with background colors now. The pattern I'm altering has sashing in the same color as the background in the blocks, but I might not go that way on all of these. I think that mustard yellow may be a bit much in that big of a quantity, so I'll likely use contrasting sashing for that throw. You can see my instructions for April's murder mystery block peeking out in the lower left corner, and I need to cut that out too! 

I'll end up with five hashtag quilts after I cut the backgrounds and sashing/borders. They will be donation quilts, so duplicates are not a problem. They should be pretty quick to make once it's all cut out because the blocks are easy and big. 

I had some leftover strips cut for hashtag blocks but I'm sure I'll be sick of making those after doing five of them, so I cut the rest into the donut-ish blocks I showed last week. I think I have 70 blocks made with the gray background, and 90 or so with a white background, but I cut more white and now I have more to make with those. I'll definitely get multiple quilts from those blocks, but I'll get at least one quilt, if not two, from the bonus HST's I'm getting from making those blocks. 

I didn't finish any quilts this week, but I snapped a pic as was finishing up the quilting on Mr. T's birthday quilt.

I finished quilting this today, so once it's trimmed I can sew the binding on and it will be a finish! 

On the homefront, the ductwork is finished, and the holes in the walls repaired, but DH doesn't have time to repaint for at least a couple weeks. He's overbooked himself over the next couple weeks, so I will just wait for him to have time. I am terrible at painting, so I'm better off waiting than trying it myself. 

I had to switch out my seasonal clothes, and that makes me sad because I hate summer. Our highs have been in the 90's but the lows are still low enough that I've managed to keep the air conditioner off so far. It won't be that way for long, and I'm dreading the high electric bills, but really hoping that ductwork replacement pays off! 

I'm also in a reorganizing mood again. For now I'm trying to tackle the kitchen, pantry, and one of the bedroom closets. This afternoon I was rearranging the kitchen drawers. I emptied one drawer, but what I wanted to put there didn't fit. I do like some of the things I've rearranged, but some I'm still debating. I'm going to try using a knife block again, and I'm not sure how I feel about them being in sight again after they've been in a drawer. That said, I know from experience they are easier to access from the knife block. Just like I kept the knife block (which are crazy expensive now, so I'm glad I kept it) I'll keep the knife drawer organizer for a while until I decide which storage method I prefer. 

I want to move the most common cooking utensils to the drawer closest to the stove, but that drawer was the only one the knife organizer fit into. Now that I'm going back to the knife block I can go back to the the cooking utensils in the drawer by the stove. As I'm going through what's in my drawers and decluttering what I don't use often enough to warrant keeping it, I'm realizing I don't own a spatula I actually like. DH's favorite spatula is huge and takes up way too much space in the drawer, and I'd love to donate it but he'd definitely complain. I haven't been able to find a spatula I've liked for years, why are all the handles so huge??? My current ladle has a huge handle too, and I just don't get it. The handles take up too much space in drawer, they really don't work in a countertop utensil jar, so there are no good storage options for these giant handled utensils. I've been looking for a new spatula ever since DH melted my favorite one, and I cannot find one that same style anywhere. Our pots are stainless and can have stainless utensils, but I prefer non-stick frying pans so I normally buy non-stick safe utensils. If you have a spatula suggestion for me, send me a link, and I'll take a look. I've got too many spatulas, but until I find one I really like, I'm hesitant to declutter them. 

I hope any spring cleaning you are tackling right now is less frustrating!