FNSI Update

I must confess that "Friday Night Sew In" ended up being more of a "Friday Night Cook In" at my house so I didn't get all that much accomplished that evening (unless you count the homemade chicken pot pie and ranch pretzels).  I did manage to get the December block from my guild's BOM program completed.

The red I used is a little darker than most of the blocks I've made thus far but going back through the stack I found a couple of others that are fairly consistent in color.  I have quite a few blocks left to complete so I will have to be sure to make a couple of others in these darker colors.

I made a start on the January guild BOM but found as I started the final assembly that the pattern instructions were wrong. I was probably too tired to be sewing - I knew the flying geese seemed wrong but it didn't occur to me until I sewed them together that there was no seam allowance above the points.

I threw all the flying geese in the trash and went to bed a bit frustrated as I had already cut the excess off the corners of the geese and figured I would be starting over. On Saturday I decided to give it a little more thought with fresh eyes and after doing a bit of math (even used the Pythagorean theorem!) I figured out that the instructions called for cutting the geese rectangles a half inch too long. I carefully unstitched all of the geese, trimmed the base and reassembled them.  They didn't seem too worse for wear and I was able to get the block together.

I decided I would get back to my Magic of Christmas project next and finished another one of those blocks (I'm making two of each).

I was originally planning to stick with the MoC blocks but when I took a break from the machine to tidy up the sewing room a bit I ran across a kit I purchased at Renee Nanneman's open house last summer.  I am absolutely not a pink person but I love baskets and couldn't resist the kit. In a moment of weakness I decided to break into the kit and play a bit.

I made 12 of the little baskets (the pattern calls for making 12 from each of 14 fat quarters).  I still need to stitch the handles down but was happy with how quickly these little blocks went together. I have started countless basket quilts that are all very involved and as a result are all UFOs. This one might actually be reasonably practical to finish!

I didn't get a chance to post last week but I did get a lot of sewing done over the long MLK holiday weekend.  I am still waiting for smaller triangle papers from Primitive Gatherings so I haven't officially started Triangle Gatherings but I did make one 6" block for fun. It isn't Primitive Gatherings fabric (bought from them, but not Lisa's lines) so it doesn't really count, but it was helpful in figuring out that I really need to iron seams open and use pins. There is a lot of bulk in some of those corners!

I also managed to finish piecing my En Provence top.  I originally thought I might want to add more borders but decided it really doesn't need them. I don't want to have a solid border - seems wrong with all of that piecing in the neutral border - but my original idea for piano keys would make the quilt huge (well over 100" square).  I think I will probably leave it as is. I do like it now that it is together but have to admit that I saw a few other versions that I liked a little better.

I am making progress on both of my January UFOs and hope to be able to report a finish by the end of month. I'm off to a good start for the year - now if only I can keep it up!