A Few Finishes

I haven't posted in a long time - I missed the entire month of May!  I have a good excuse....binding.  I spent almost all of my sewing time over the past month binding two queen-sized quilts for the show. The quilt that was supposed to be my fourth entry didn't make it back from the quilter in time (I think it should be here this week). While I was a little disappointed, I have to admit that by the time I finished binding quilt number three and got sleeves on all of them I was actually relieved that the other one didn't make it!  So far this year I have sewn a little over 96 ft of binding.

All three of these quilts were on my UFO list for this year. First up is Easy Street, the Bonnie Hunter mystery from 2012:

It's so hard to get decent pictures of these monster-sized quilts!  Even with them hanging at the show I had to take them at odd angles. I think I need to invest in a quilt display rack just for pictures!  My second quilt in the show was my Hunter's Star. My daughter has claimed this quilt so it will be heading to Kansas City in a week or so.

Last but not least is my LeMoyne Star quilt. This one is my favorite of the three. It was quilted by Jane Hair - she did a wonderful job.  The blocks in this quilt are all hand-pieced.  

I did manage to spend a little time at my machine last month in between binding sessions and finished piecing the spool quilt I started in one of my classes with Edyta.  

The center went together very quickly, but the applique border will take forever to finish. There are a lot of pieces!  Edyta's finishing kit for the border is almost too pretty to disturb.

Sorry about the glare from the plastic bag - but this is one side of the roll. There are beautiful blues and reds on the other side. We had the option of choosing her Silhouettes (laser cut pre-fused applique shapes) for the border and while that would certainly be much faster, I much prefer needle-turning to machine stitching so this top is destined to be a UFO for a long time. 

It's a relief to have the show over and not have any deadlines hanging over my head (quilt-related, anyway).  I am not sure what I machine project I am going to work on next. I am thinking that I need to focus on doing smaller quilts for the next show - having to sew on sleeves after all that binding adds insult to injury!

As far as other new projects are concerned, I did agree to do another BOM for the guild. This year's project is a Nancy Page pattern that I have wanted to do for a long time. It's called Laurel Wreath and we will be doing the five birds and four of the flowers. We're going to stick with just the motifs for guild as the laurel wreath part of the pattern isn't supposed to be added until the blocks are sewn together.  Actually, looking at the original pattern, I'm not convinced that the designer ever actually made the quilt.  The pattern calls for vines to trail off the top and bottom of each block and then supposedly line up to make a continuous curve when the blocks are sewn together. Talk about difficult!  Here's the first block:

I am also really hoping that my Primitive Gatherings Summer BOW shows up today. The wait is killing me!  I am considering taking a half day of vacation today if it shows up. I can't wait to get started!

Quilt Shows & First Finish!

I've been on the road for work the better part of the last two weeks but managed to squeeze in a couple of quilt shows in the middle of my travels. I traveled home from Kalamazoo, MI last week via the Chicago and made a stop at the Quilt Festival on Friday. The best part of the trip was meeting up with the Chicago area quilter that is going to quilt Celtic Solstice and Grand Illusion for me. She;s hoping to have them both finished in time for me to bind them for our quilt show in June. If all goes as planned I should have five queen-sized quilts finished by early summer.  That definitely makes a dent in my UFO list!

I had not been to the Chicago show since it moved back.  I was very disappointed.  It seemed considerably smaller than in years past - a lot of the vendors I usually expect to see at a major show weren't there, and there really only seemed to be about half the number of vendors they used to have. A large portion of the quilt exhibits were repeated from Houston, too, so it didn't take me a lot of time to buzz through the show.  I was in and out in about an hour and a half.  

The version of the red and white exhibit at Chicago wasn't nearly as impressive as Houston but it was still very eye-catching.

I didn't get any other pictures at the show. Most of the quilts that caught my attention were in the "no photos" exhibits.  I am really disappointed that the Quilts Inc. folks prohibit photos.  I know that they want you to buy the books (which I always do!) but sometimes you want to get that close-up of component of the quilt that you just can't see in the book photos.

On my way home from Chicago I stopped in Bloomington, IL and visited the local guild's quilt show. They had a fabulous show!  They had a wonderful featured quilter, lots of really great quilts and a very nice selection of vendors.  I didn't take any photos since I was a bit pressed for time....had to get the rental car back before 6 pm...but I really enjoyed the show.

Now that I am back at home I finally managed to finish the binding on my Hunter's Star quilt. My daughter claimed it back when it was a pile of blocks so it's on her bed until show time. So far that's 386" of binding for the year....I'm off to a running start!

   

Not Much Getting Accomplished Here

It's a bit sad that I follow up a post about an incredibly productive retreat with one that sadly shows almost no progress on any projects, but I have a pretty perfect excuse.  Her name is Belle and she came to live with us exactly one month ago today.  She is the sweetest and most loving puppy!

This picture was actually taken a couple of weeks ago and I think she's grown an inch or two since then.  She's going to be a big girl!  She's an incredibly calm, well-behaved little girl. I find myself spending all of my time playing with her instead of getting anything done. Her big brother requires a little extra attention, too.  He's still trying to get used to having to share me. I'm hoping he comes around - he needs a playmate!

I attended the new Kathy Dunnigan Applique Academy a couple of weeks ago. It was a wonderful event and while there weren't all that many participants from TESAA it seemed like a very natural transition and felt like home. There was a very nice tribute to Elly Sienkiewicz that featured some gorgeous quilts.  The following picture of Elly was borrowed from Cynthia Collier's Facebook post since I was unable to get anything that didn't include a bunch of backs of heads...

My conference workshop was taught by Evelyn Crovo-Hall. We were working on a Baltimore-style beehive block that is supposed to look like this:

 

I managed to finish a couple of stems, a couple of leaves and part of the beehive during the class. Preparing the edges of the little pieces was extremely tedious and didn't really hold my attention. Add in a couple of work meetings I had to attend and I was the slowest kid in the class.  I made sure to stand at the back when we did the show and tell at the closing dinner.

I have been trying to get caught up with an online crazy quilting class I am participating in (trying to, anyway).  I finally pieced my block yesterday.

In retrospect I think I needed to switch fabrics 2 and 4 (the tan with scribbles and the light one that you can't see the print on).  I really don't have the time or desire to do it over again...I want to get started on the stitching.  I am hoping the instructor will let me move forward even though my contrast isn't all that great.  I will submit it today and see how it goes.

One other small thing I did manage to finish last week was the stitching on the first block of my Sunflower Gatherings BOW.  I also made progress on block two - I hope to finish it this week,

My goal is to have this top pieced before the new BOW starts at the end of May. Perhaps not realistic, but a girl can dream!

Most Productive Retreat Ever!

I'm a little slow with this post - my retreat is really a distant memory after the crazy four day, 60-hour work week that followed it...  The weekend before last I went on a four-day quilting retreat with friends.  It was probably the most productive retreat I have ever had!  I took along multiple projects - a couple of which I never touched - but I did manage to finish one top and nearly finished another.  Both are on my top twelve UFO list so I am off to a strong start for the year.

I originally wasn't in love with the teal cornerstones in the Grand Illusion mystery quilt setting and had started using black instead.  Then a very creative quilter posted a slight variation of the pattern on the Quiltville Facebook page and my mind was changed - the simple addition of a teal inner border completely pulled it together!  She also added a couple of other 2" borders that increased the size to around 96" square which worked better for me.  So, following her lead, here's what I ended up with:

I absolutely LOVE it!  I am very happy with how it turned out, crazy bright colors and all.  I decided that I will use some black batik that I have on hand for backing. Now I just need to find a quilter....

After that top was complete, I moved on to my LeMoyne Stars. I had ordered a couple of pieces of Japanese taupe fabrics from Homestead Hearth as possible sashing and luckily one of them worked out well.  The blocks were a bear to work with!  I have definitely learned an important lesson about hand piecing - cut the outer seam allowances really large!  I will also pay better attention to where the bias falls next time.  After all of the handling in piecing the outer edges were a little off-square and required a lot of finessing to get right.  By the time I got the center together I was too exhausted to deal with the outer borders. It took the better part of two days to get it to this point:

I am very happy with how it is turning out!  I have two more borders to add - a 2" blue one (the same fabric as the sashing) and a wide (6") one of background fabric - and then it will be ready for quilting.

This past weekend was our annual Wool Club Camp at Nola's.  I didn't accomplish much - it was very crowded and just not conducive to working on my giant rug.  I also think I was too exhausted from the week and too distracted by a rescue puppy I fell in love with on Facebook (she's still available and I am trying to control the impulse to call about her....) to do much hooking.  Here's a peek at where it stands currently:

I still have quite a way to go, but I am making progress. I also made some progress on a couple of other projects this week, one which is on my UFO list and one that is not.  I made a bit of progress on the second diamond wedge for my Rising Sun while flying to and from New York this week - it wasn't picture-worthy.  Over the weekend I pulled out a project that has accompanied me to several retreats but returned home untouched - My Garden Album.  I did all of the scrappy cutting for the sashing blocks and even started piecing them.  

At this point they are just a messy pile next to the sewing machine, but it's a start!  Considering I have had all of the applique blocks finished since 2010 or so it's about time to get this thing together.

All things considered, I feel like I am off to a strong start for the year! There are about three new projects calling my name but I have resisted temptation thus far...  And then there's that puppy...Not sure how long I can stay strong!

2015 UFO List

It's that time of year again - that time where I set a bunch of goals that I don't achieve. I've never really been into resolutions, but I am a proponent of setting goals, even if they are a stretch. I actually made pretty decent progress on my 2014 plan to reduce my backlog of UFOs. A couple of quilts I started in 2012 are currently at the quilter (they've been there since June!), a couple more are much farther along than they were at the beginning of the year, and I made a decision to part ways with a bunch of older projects I am no longer interested in. This year I have been inspired to create a "Top 12" UFO list by a blogger I found through Bonnie Hunter's Monday Mystery Link-up.  I'm not promising that these will be the only projects I work on, and I am certainly not committing to not starting anything new (I already know of at least two projects I will start this year!), my goal is to make significant progress on the projects on this list.

1. Hunter's Star - easy one; just needs to be bound and labeled when it returns from the quilter 

2. Easy Street - another one that just needs to be bound and labeled when it comes home

3. Celtic Solstice - top finished; need to purchase backing and find a quilter 

4. LeMoyne Star - sashing fabric ordered; hoping to start assembling soon (this won't be the final layout...when I finally got the dog to get up off of the blocks I saw that I had two of the same blocks right next to each other) 

5. Grand Illusion

6. Sunflower Gatherings

7. Baskets - I am dying to get back to these...I love them!

8. Sister's Choice

9. Rising Sun

10. Prairie Peony

11. Blessings Quilt - another project I completely love and want to get back to

12. Tree Skirt BOM - mainly because I desperately need to replace the sorry excuse for a skirt that I have been using for 25+ years

My Memory Bouquet project was a runner up for the list - I finished two blocks over the holidays. We are doing nine blocks of this one as a BOM for our quilt guild. I have a feeling that after I have finished the nine this one will sit for a while.

On the rug hooking front, my goals are simply to finish Stacey's Floral Runner (the gigantic rug I am currently working on) for the April 25 rug show and then to finish Grandmother's Garden (another gigantic rug) before my November workshop with Sally Kallin.

Here's to a very productive 2015!