That was fun!

Lots of things made this month!

1. Triangle Quilt; still too small, 2. Retro Flowers; Need Nine More, 3. Pinwheel Quilt Back, Binding, 4. Pinwheel Basting, 5. Pinwheel basting (how 'bout those shelves?), 6. Vivienne's Quilt - A Finish!, 7. Woodland Sampler - January - A Finish!, 8. And Sew On BOM January - A Finish!, 9. Craftsy BOM - unintentionally wonky :/ but A Finish!

Ok, making single blocks doesn't count as "finish" but I finished the blocks for the month, that's what I meant, and making this mosaic (my first) was so very time consuming that I hope you'll forgive me but I don't want to fix it.  I was a bit concerned (not a feeling I want to associate with sewing) that I had committed myself to too many "alongs" and "BOMs" particularly since I've never done ANY before this month.  

I didn't get two of my big projects finished - the pinwheel quilt or the triangle quilt - but I did get the former basted and the latter has all its required triangles added, though I still have two more months in order to do them for the 2013 Finish Along sponsored by Leanne at She Can Quilt and Rhonda at Quilter in the Gap. I did finish the most important one, the quilt for my new great niece.  I'm really happy with it.  

In addition, I made two hospice bears and pieced and basted two hospice quilts (I'll quilt and bind them this weekend); paper pieced the three blocks for the Pretty in Patchwork Holidays Sew Along, but didn't get their eyes or the actual pillows made; made one Swoon block (terrible picture here, yet that should still qualify for the 2013 NewFO Challenge by Barbara at Cat Patches); and picked and cut out the fabrics and zippers for the Triple Zip Along but I haven't taken pictures yet.

Linking up to Carrie at A Passion for Applique's Nothing But UFOs.  I was going to link up to the And Sew On linky party at Quiet Play but I missed the deadline - still, go look at all the great blocks everyone made!  

January is over, can you believe it?  We had a great month, skiing up at Mammoth Mountain where the weather was really beautiful.  Elvis liked it:

Happy February!

Holli

  

Retro Flowers

I cannot believe all the flowers are pieced!

We're being very indulgent and skiing for most of this month.   I had to bring my sewing machine (and as much gear and fabric as I could get away with!) with me, and all the pieces for this (and several other) quilts.  I had two blocks finished from earlier last year.  I was a bit bummed that I didn't select my favorite fabrics for this as it was so much work to do.  All that exactitude!  One print - the blue in the upper right corner - is a Liberty tana lawn.  I bought it from Purl Soho with a gift card the Captain gave me for Christmas 2011.  When I didn't know anything about fabric.  So, I guess that qualifies as a special fabric.

I'm so pleased with these flowers.  The Captain is decidedly NOT a flower fan, however.  Oh well, I made it for the challenge and because I like it.  It isn't a very big quilt, for all that work.  I think it needs at least nine more flowers, so that it is five by five.  Or should I sash it?  If I'm going to make nine more, why not make many many more and make two quilts, one sort of uber bright and one low volume? (Like birthing a baby, clearly I am forgetting how much cutting and pinning and pinning and cutting and pinning and finicky curvy piecing was involved and am only focusing on the end result [not that there was much cutting and pinning involved in birthing my two babies - haha].)  It represents reall progress toward my Finish Along goals!

Unrelated to the Finish Along, I did get my Lucky Stars Block of the Month for January complete.  Actually, I made three as I'd cut enough fabric before coming skiing.  They all look the same as this one, except one is the 6" version and two are the 12" (maybe its 12.5) version.  I had the hardest time with this, ripping out seams over and over because I wasn't paying attention.  I'll use one block for the quilt that will ultimately come from this activity, and I think I'll make the other into another pillow when we get home.  The little one will have to hang around until I figure out what to make of him.

Hitting the slopes for most of the day tomorrow!  Thanks for stopping by!

Holli

Finishing-A-Long

I have three quilts I'd like to finish soon.

First, a quilt for my first great niece who joined us in late November.  Its not like I didn't know she was going to join us, but I couldn't figure out what to do or even if what I was going to do would be worthy (I suppose that's ridiculous, but making something as a gift for someone feels like such a great responsibility).  I've pieced the top, basted it with its backing, half quilted it (I might take that all out and start over again), and have prepped the binding.  This should be my FIRST finish.

Second up is a quilt I started last year, or maybe even the year before.  This isn't what it really looks like - I was testing it out to see what I'd need to do to make it a full size quilt (a lot, it turns out).  I first started quilting in July 2011 as in - I made a quilt in July/August 2011 - so I might have started this later in that year.  I didn't know what I wanted to do, and didn't have a pattern, but - from my current perspective and looking at my notes - I must have heard something about 5" squares (charms) though for some reason decided to cut my fabric at 5-1/2".  I made what I thought was a quilt top but, turns out, it wasn't big enough, so into the WIP pile it went (it was the first).  I did just love the fabric combo though and have wanted to complete it.  And so I shall!  Unfortunately, I didn't have enough of the original fabric so I had to hunt a bit to find similar fabrics.  I think the new ones won't show up as 'new.'    I figure I need to add at least one additional row and four or five columns.

Lastly - at least for this go round - is my Retro Flowers.  I actually started this as a quilt for the new great niece (see above) but oh, my.  What a lot of work!  And difficulty matching, etc.  So I set this aside and made something (only slightly) less onerous.  I wish I'd used more loved fabrics for the flowers - I have an unfortunate M.O. of picking my less-than-favorites for patterns because I think I won't do a very good job and don't want to waste.  But I pretty much have liked everything I've made and would like it all so much better if I'd used fabric I loved!!  How about taking that as a lesson for the year . . .


Linking up (at the last minute!) with the 2013 Finish A Long hosted by Leanne at She Can Quilt.

Wednesday . . . Where was I?

I haven't made it to the cave today because I had to work at my (real) job.  I wanted to do WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced   Its on my list.  The linking to all the weekly things.  So, instead here's something I made last year and I'm pretty proud of it.

(Nice boat next door; those would be the Joneses . . .)

I made this 17.5' roman shade.  Actually, I made two.  There are 17.5' of windows on the other side of the main salon as well.  It was a bit of work to make these.

Sorry about the shadows (what am I saying? we get shadows because there is sunshine!)  This is the flybridge (the top part of the boat where the steering is) with all the furniture shoved to the sides so the big shade can be laid out and its battens attached.  Lots of measuring, trying to keep it straight.  Magazines holding the battens down while the glue dries.

What kind of magazines are read here? 

Here is the whole shade (one of them) with its battens all glued down.  This waited overnight and then was strung and hung in the salon.

This is a video that shows the shades going up and down - do videos show up on blogger?  Well, I guess we'll see:

Probably it won't video.  Well, this is the perspective from the front of the salon, looking aft.  The video shows the shade going up and down, all 17.5 feet with one pulley.  Its so great to have.  Nice to be able to get privacy from the neighbors; nice to block the sometimes too much sun.

I used all the instructions from Terrell's Roman Shades website.  She has a wonderful process.  I made a small shade first, as a tester:

Well, that's kind of dark, but this is the one I made to test the process.  Terrell has all of the hardware and calculations.  I used Bella Choma.  It was kind of a pain because we wanted the "stripes" to be vertical as we have way too much horizontal to the boat.  But the stripes begin and end with yellow on each selvage, so I had to cut and seam them precisely to get the shade to look like it was all of a piece.

It was quite a bit of work to make these.  They are so functional.  And lined.  I did make a mistake (well, probably more than one).  The lines to raise the shade (there are twelve of them) are secured to each shade with 96 little plastic rings . . . all sewn on by hand . . . after the shade is installed.  I didn't want the sewing of the rings to show, so I used monofilament thread thinking that would save me from having to switch between white, gray and yellow thread.  Well, the monofilament doesn't hold a knot very well and many of the rings came undone!  So I have had to re-sew 192 rings.  As if hand sewing 192 rings by hand once wasn't enough. 

I think I'll move this post to a tab (when I get to having tabs) about boat sewing specifically.

Thanks for stopping by!

Holli

Happy 2013 - Let's Get This Year Started!

Happy New Year!

I was excited to get the first block in Elizabeth's Lucky Stars BOM this morning and thought I'd get right to it.  But I also wanted to at least get started on the Monthly Woodland Sampler from The Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery so I picked out my embroidery floss (I'm a bit off on some of the colors, but they're so close I can't imagine anyone is going to be disappointed).  Then I stitched the wee-est bit of the first frame.  (That one might not make it through the year, but maybe I should give it another week . . . )

I was happy to see everyone's postings about everything they did in 2012.  Made me feel somewhat inadequate.  I went through my photos and pulled out everything I'd worked on last year.  Its a pretty good group of stuff.  But the quilty things did not reflect a lot of finishes!

I see that Carrie is hosting Nothing But UFOs in 2013 so I took out my box of UFOs, photographed them, and then decided which ones I (really) want to get done.  She wants us to list three for January.  Here they are:

Quilt for Baby V

1.  Well, that could be a better picture, but I'd like to get this post done :)  This is a quilt I'm making for my youngest niece's first child, a girl.  I must complete it soon.  To be fair, I only just started it right after she was born on Nov. 30.  I put the border on and quilted half of it today so I should be able to finish it this week.

2.  My first attempt at HSTs.  No pattern so I didn't make it wide enough.  I really like the fabrics but don't have enough of these specific ones to add columns.  But I want to finish it anyway.

3.  And last is this quilt top which I made using Ashley's (Film in the Fridge) Scrappy Triangles Tutorial.  I didn't have many scraps when I made it, and many of the ones I had I didn't like.  But I still like the way the top looks (even though its sideways in this picture - Flickr wouldn't let me copy the one I had edited) and it should be made into a real quilt.

So that's my list for this month!  I'm going to be doing (trying, I mean) more than UFOs this year, but I'd like to clear out the UFOs.

I didn't work on the Lucky Stars Block of the Month.  But I did make my very first Swoon block!

All the best to all of you - thanks for your help and for stopping by!

Holli