Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, Friends and Fellow Quilters!  Thanks for all the times you've come by.  I love to read what you have to say.  Hope to see you throughout 2018.

WIPs Be Gone Report

A WIP in Waiting

Meredithe at Pomegranate and Chintz has reported on her 17 UFOs in 2017 challenge. And it's time I did the same.  Actually, I did report earlier in December - go here.  I was hoping to get to edit the review and show more progress, but that didn't happen.

So I'm going to report on how I've done in the last three years trying to make my WIPs Be Gone.  Starting  1/1/15 when I gave myself the challenge to work on WIPs til today (12/28/17),  here's is what I've discovered.

WIPs finished/or worked on significantly:  20
Charity quilts made:  59
Spontaneous Construction/Commission Quilts/New Projects:  38
So on average I worked or finished per year  7 WIPs 
                                                                      20 charity quilts 
                                                              and  13 newer projects.

Most of the newer projects are finished.  All of the charity quilts are complete also.  So it doesn't look as I am very keen on finishing WIPs.  Yikes!

But looking at the life that happened in those three years, I need to give myself a bit of slack.  First off, half of those charity quilts were made in 2015, then I broke my leg and everything quilt-wise came to a halt for most of the next 6 months - it took a full year to get back to normal.  Slowly I got back into the studio, and then I finished about a fourth of the charity quilts each of the following two years.  Same with the newer projects and WIPs.  Yes, I do favor new projects, but I"m not tired of those remaining WIPs yet.  It's that they're much bigger projects and do take time. And I had several commission quilts this past year.

So as I wrote on Lynn's blog, What a Hoot, "I'm taking a different approach - kind of like Judy Laquidara used to do with her stash reports - just count what you've used and what you've added. So yes, WIPs aren't finishing as fast as I hoped- but I'm going to count only what I've worked on or what new project I'll start for 2018 - 18 at hand at this point. But who knows what I'll add."

PS: Meredithe has mixed it up a bit for next year.  It's 6 & 6 in 2018 - 6 new projects and 6 UFOs.  I'm keeping my 18. Let's see what new things I start.  Go here to read about this highly motivational challenge. 

Happy New Year! Let the 2018 quilting begin.

Merry Christmas!

Thank you for all your kindness and support, your comments and suggestions.  You make my heart smile.  See you next year!

On my Design Wall

The quilt is bound (see last post). The block is mailed and the trees are now a table runner top. So new things on the design wall.
I'm calling the first one Morning thru Night Forest.  I'm going to put it aside til July when I do more Christmas sewing.  The block below it is that other medallion I made with units found in the scrap bag.  Must grow to 30 - 36" .  Depends if it's going to the NICU or the clinic.  We'll see.

I used .66 yards between the two projects above and about half of my ORL clue 3  which brings my YTD total to  74.59 yds destashed YTD.  Every little bit helps.  I haven't even started ORL clue 4 yet. But I have been getting acquainted with my new granddaughter. That takes precedence.  Welcome Grace Xinling   She's such a sweetie!

I'm linking to the usual Monday parties:  Oh, Scrap, Sunday StashDesign Wall Monday, and BOMs Awayand Monday Making.  Don't miss the lovelies there.

Baby Quilt Finish & ORL #3

Quilted, Bound


and ready to turn in tomorrow:
I hurried up and made this top in August. Showed it at Guild, put it in my bag to take home and promptly forgot about it what with the grands coming soon after.  I found it a couple of weeks ago and thought I'd better get her done. An unintentional WIP crosses the finish line.

I'm working on clue three of Bonnie's mystery On Ringo's Lake.  A lot to do, but at least I've started.
This is one I know I won't have finished by Friday as I have the St. Anne's meeting tomorrow and Mom is coming to spend the night.  Guess what we'll be doing?  lol.

I'm  linking to Amanda Jean's Finish it Up Friday, Sarah's Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?, Myra's Finished Or Not Fridays , and Jennifer's Wednesday Wait Loss. Do go by and see all the lovely postings. Blessings.

Some of This; Some of That

What with finishing the NICU quilt top, making my geese for ORL, cutting binding for my quilted baby top, and making a Covered in Love block, plus a little tree, I used 1.64 yds from the stash. That brings me to 73.93 yds destashed YTD.

On my design wall, I've got my Covered in Love block, the binding for the quilted baby quilt, and the tree for my table runner.  Yes, it's not the same size as the other on the right, but then not all the trees in the forest are the same either - hehe.  Fact is I couldn't find my templates to make this last tree the same size as the other three.
Off the watch a new episode of the Crown and hand stitch on my almost complete applique block.

I'm linking to Oh, Scrap and Sunday Stash, Design Wall Monday, BOMs Away and Monday Making. Check out their link parties - so much eye candy and news.   Blessings to all.

One NICU Top Finished

Here's my first completed top from that bag of scraps I showed you in the last post.  This is my 6th enlargement of a Nearly Insane block.  Mine is 30" finished.  The Nearly Insane one finishes at 5".  I fussy cut the sheep for the 16 patch. It's a bit dark but I think some Mom will want it for her little boy in the NICU.

I then went on to finish the units for Bonnie's Part 2.  I made my flying geese with the No Waste Method of Patchpieces.

I like this method as I don't have a lot of fabric in the colorway Bonnie chose for the mystery, and this method uses a lot less fabric for making flying geese.  Here's all I had left after making my 50 units.

While I was making them, I did a few more log cabins as leaders and enders. I now have 24 blocks finished and 6 more started.
Lastly, I've been promising my DH a pie, so I finally got a frozen peach filling from the freezer and made a crust, and baked this beauty.  My mom gave me a bunch of peaches back in June.  They were so sweet I didn't put any sugar in the filling.
YUM!
I'm  linking to Amanda Jean's Finish it Up Friday, Sarah's Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?, Myra's Finished Or Not Fridays , and Jennifer's Wednesday Wait Loss. Do go by and see all the lovely postings. Blessings.

On My Design Wall

I pulled another scrap bag of bits from my closet.  Am using only fabric from this bag to make more baby quilts.
Here is the center block I came up with for another NICU quilt based on Nearly Insane block 12.
These partial blocks below were in the bag .  Another center - both centers measure 15 1/2" square.  This one I'm just going to wing it and see what comes of it.
Started my part 2 of On Ringo Lake.  Have a ways to go. My biggest hang-up is finding neutrals as I've used a ton in the past year. May have to go to a LQS - lol.
What are you up to?  Come by and I'll visit to see your work. I'm linking up to Oh, Scrap!Design Wall MondayBOMs AwayMoving it Forward, and Monday Making.

Some of This; Some of That

All I used this week was from the stash was 1/4 yd for the binding of that baby quilt. That brings my YTD total to  72.29 yds destashed.  

I started quilting another baby quilt - This one I made in August, showed it at guild,
and then promptly forgot all about it as I left it in my meeting bag and never took it out. This scrappy baby quilt is so busy, I"m not trying to do much to the front. Above is the back. Just about done with the center of it.  Also I did finish my scrappy medallion baby quilt.
I used about a 1/4th of a good size trash bag of scraps for this one, so that was good.  So many scraps! Sigh.  

Think tomorrow I'll just sit down in the living room and hand stitch on my hexies and applique. Would be nice to  get my circle done already.

I'm linking to Oh, Scrap and Sunday Stash. Check out their link parties - so much eye candy and news.

Quilted, Bound and Ready

Quilted  this was a "pulling out hair FMQ" as I was trying to FMQ around those squares and it was HARD.  They're better than my last attempt - what with all the ones I've done - but it isn't a cake walk yet.  I can go up or down okay, but turning corners or going right to left or left to right still causes me headaches.  I'll stall in the corners and get a build up in thread in the back which I don't like.  I guess I'll just have to keep practices - I know that helps because after doing 36 of them I could see I was better at it.

Bound

This is the more true color of the back.














Ready to gift

I'm  linking to Amanda Jean's Finish it Up Friday, Sarah's Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?, Myra's Finished Or Not Fridays , and Jennifer's Wednesday Wait Loss. Do go by and see all the lovely postings. Blessings.

SAHRR Round 5 and 6

  Ready to show rounds 5 and 6. Actually, the prompt for 5 was make 4 of something. So I chose four patch, and actually since that made my q...