November UFO List

1. Pillow
2. Scrappy DWR
3. ABC appliqué
4. 9 patches and stars
5.  Hand pieced hexagons
6. Stained Glass Stars
7. 16 patches
8. Churn dash block
9. Aegean Sea
10. The Assistant's Quilt

October 1: 10 projects
Started: 1
Finished: 2
October 31: 9 projects

I finished Aegean Sea and the Stained Glass Stars this month.  Those are both glorious finishes!  My only new project is a quilt for a friend, and as it’s already a flimsy, I’m not too worried about it.

from the room of Zana’s Ninis,
katie z.

Stash Report Week #43

No finishes, no purchases.  I have used 23 spools this year!

from the room of Zana’s Ninis,

katie z.

Basted Flimsy: Teal 16 Patches

Despite choosing completely to rearrange our storage room, complete with disassembling shelves and reassembling into different shelf heights, I made it to "basted" stage for my 16 patches!  I chose a lovely magenta for the backing and basted the entire thing Thursday.

No, I probably shouldn't be rearranging with my hand, but there're pounds and pounds of produce needing storage and no proper place, so I did it.  I will probably never learn.

I also began the process of sewing the segments for my last churn dash blocks for the year.  My hope is a churn dash flimsy in November.

Really, the rest of the year should see a flurry of flimsies: Emily's quilt, churn dashes, the Assistant's Abandoned Plus Quilt, and possibly another 16 patch quilt.  Then it will be time to start some new things!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,

katie z.

WIP Wednesday

Since my UFO for the month is finished, this isn't quite a UFO update.  Instead, I'll call it a "Work in Progress" update.

Here're most of the rows for a new quilt!  I didn't have this quilt on any of my lists at the beginning of 2018, but a neighbor who moved away (and will hopefully come back soon) suffered a traumatic brain injury and is still recovering.  Sounds like a good candidate for her own quilt, right?  So I'm at work.

The bricks are 3"x6", finished, which is enormous compared to my 16 patches constructed of 1" finished squares.  The speed of growth is quite nice, as I'm already sewing rows together, and I started sorting them into rows only this week.

I could be farther along, but I've been distracted by tearing apart my storage room and rearranging.  (DH doesn't know this yet!)  It's where our bulk food storage, miscellaneous goods, and garden produce are stored, and it was just a mess.  It will get worse before it gets better, but I have a plan and have made good progress!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Stash Report Week #42

Woohoo!  ‘Tis the season for quilt finishes, so I have another jump in stash numbers this week.

IN this week: 0 yards
OUT this week: 11 1/2 yards

IN YTD: 102 1/2 yards
OUT YTD: 89 1/2 yards
YTD Total: 13 yards IN

from the room of Zana’s Ninis,
katie z.

Finished Quilt: Stained Glass Stars

 I had ridiculous notions of, after the kids off school for an extra two days, writing my blog post Friday night and having it ready to post this morning.  The reality was a morning full of parent-teacher conferences (five of them!) and an afternoon full of the zoo and little people drama since they were tired.  It's all good, but I'm later than I'd like finally getting to the computer.

Thrilled would describe my feelings about this finished quilt.  I, of course, didn't remember to measure the finished dimensions and there's now a wet floor between me and it (I'm teaching my oldest to steam mop), so here it is.  It is slightly wider than a queen mattress.

 I certainly have a few puckers here and there, as some blocks were definitely slightly larger than 8" finished.  I don't think any of them are particularly visible.  My thread barely held out to finish the quilting, which was delightful.  I didn't want to order and wait for a new spool, so I'd picked out a close companion, but it would have been disappointed to do that.  Instead, here we are.

Can I tell you a not-so-secret?  It wasn't until I finished sewing the stars into rows that I realized they don't all spin the same way.  I thought I put so much effort into keeping the center pinwheel correct, going so far as to pull out an old block every time, but somewhere along the way, I went astray.  Alas.

All fabrics from the front and binding are Vicki Welsh hand dyed fabrics.  If you haven't tried them yet, please do so.  They are so beautiful and Vicki is wonderful to work with.  I miscut my setting triangles and had to order more, but this fabric had been a non-standard order, so she had to do more than the usual work to make it happen, but she did so.  There are a number of blocks that, as I went over them quilting or burying threads, I thought I should order this specific color.  It's a treasure trove of color!

In other news, I've been pinning and stitching on my 16-patches.  My hope had been to have the flimsy in five pieces by this morning, but the week was busy with digging sweet potatoes and days off school.  I have a plan to work on them this morning.  I'm not sure I'll be able to part with this quilt at its completion, but I think I can give it up to the guest bed a few nights a year.

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

P.S.  Others are sewing with dark green or sage this week.  I suggest checking out the link-up!

UFO Update: a Finished Quilt

I finished my UFO for October!  Aegean Sea is officially ready for guests at Christmas, down to the washing and drying!  In reality, I completed the quilt last week, but posting about my UFO, unfortunately, didn't happen last week.

 The directions, by Judy Martin, call this a twin quilt, but it's super wide, not quite queen-size, but maybe for a full? A queen-size would have had three more blocks, to make a square quilt, but I had quite enough to do keeping all these different fabrics sorted.  I used blue and green shades from the Color Wheel Solids, as well as a variety of neutrals from both Connecting Threads and other (lost to memory) purchases.  I organized the cutting from light to dark, although I would hazard to complain that the color wheel solids don't really "go" together in order.  They tend to be slightly varied more blue or more green than the previous or next selection.

My backing fabric is seamed down the middle, and is another fabric from Connecting Threads.  I am ever so grateful that it did not bleed when I washed and dried it!  I chose to use the yellow that peeks out from the stars in the quilt.  I think I had one 2.5" strip left, so it was perfect!

For quilting, I initially envisioned something more complicated for the large neutral spaces, but my sewing machine decided to die.  It turns out the brushings were never oiled by the manufacturer, so there was nothing I could do.  I purchased a cheap machine while I was waiting for the first to be repaired, and there's not much throat space in either, so I began to rethink.  I followed the lines of the fabric through the border, but the main part of the quilt is a simple meander.

I have another quilt waiting on more quilting, so I need to wrap this up and move on!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Stash Report Week #41

I have no changes this week, which is a pleasant surprise after the temptations of Christmas fabrics.  At one point, I had an extensive collection of star and snowflake fabric, so much so that I hand pieced an entire quilt from them.  I still pick them up here and there, so I’ve been daydreaming.

But I don’t need anymore fabric right now.  None.  My cart/shelving unit is plenty full, and I have a plethora of quilt dreams to work from without any new fabrics.

So...

IN this week: 0 yards

OUT this week: 0 yards

IN YTD: 102 1/2 yards

OUT YTD: 78 yards

YTD Total: 24 1/2 yards IN

from the room of Zana’s Ninis,

katie z.

Slow and Steady

Where did the time go?  It escaped with the warm weather and the rain, apparently.

I started with stitch in the ditch for the Stained Glass Star quilt, then progressed to the setting triangles, then dithered over the stars themselves.  Since they were stitched on more than one machine, with multiple skill levels on the cutting (remember that pesky broken hand?), and with different hand abilities, some are a little, well, bubbly.  All will be well in the end, although there may be a lump here or there.

 16-patches are at the difficult stage of requiring pinning for any progress.  Right now, they are all stitched in pairs and pinned to make strips of 4.  Once I use up another bobbin of dark blue, I'll return to stitching these.

I chose and cut the fabrics for the remaining 18 churn dash blocks, but I imagine those will wait for next month.

I did plant garlic this week, and bake for a funeral and a birthday, and DH was gone for a few days, so this is good progress.  Maybe next week I'll have a quilt to show you!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

P.S. The proper color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is dark green, but I haven't any more of those to make, so I'm finishing projects.  If you want to be inspired by green, go here!

Stash Report Week #40

Woohoo!  I finished a (large-ish) quilt, so we have some nice stash departure this week.  I only count fabric out when I complete a quilt (quilting, binding, and all), so it's been a while.  My adjusted goal for the year is to use more fabric than I buy.  I keep cutting and sewing and keep ignoring the sales fliers, so I'm making good progress.

I have worn out 22 spools of thread this year.  I need more piecing thread, but I can't find it on sale right now.

IN this week: 0 yards
OUT this week: 14 yards

IN YTD: 102 1/2 yards
OUT YTD: 78 yards
YTD Total: 24 1/2 yards

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

Pinning and Pressing

The past week has been, for scrappy sewing, round after round of "pin, sew, press, repeat."  Unfortunately, none of my scraps are green.  I sewed those up back when I was barely able to sew after hand surgery.

 All my 16 patches, at least for this stage of the game, are complete.  I sorted them out to make two quilts, one teal and one blue/purple/green.  I have enough for a good start on a third so there will be more 16 patches in my future scrappy sewing.

The 1.5" strip box is still not empty, despite its extensive use this summer, so it's a good thing I plan to make more 16 patches.  I think I'm going to add in gray since those scraps are lonely from neglect.  Those may come out to play in November or December, once I see where my other scraps take me!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

P.S. Be sure to check out the GREEN scraps this weekend!

October Goals

In September, I wanted to...
1.  Stay current with dark blue scraps: 16-patches.  Done.

2.  Since the scraps are down to one project, I hope to get my Stained Glass Stars into a flimsy.  Unfortunately, since I botched the cutting of setting triangles, I need to order more fabric.  Done.

3.  Finish Aegean Sea?  This may be ridiculous, but I’m going to try.  Ridiculous.  Yeah.  I basted it.

4. The  UFO number for this month is #9, my red white and blue project.  I finished this back when I was recovering from my hand being crushed, so I’ll tackle #6, which is a set of green and brown fabrics.  Hopefully, since it will be small, I can finish it.  Done.

5.  This is my third year participating in the Teal Mini Swap, and since it’s due October 2, I aim to finish this month.  Done.

In October, I hope to...
1.  Plow through more scraps: trim, cut the star points for the 9 patch and stars quilt, make one 16-patch flimsy, finish the light blue 16-patches, and finished the Stained Glass Stars quilt.  I also want to sort the fabric for the remaining 18 churn dash quilts.

2.  Finished my UFO, Aegean Sea.

3.  Maybe start another quilt?

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

UFO Wednesday Update

I've made progress this week!  I have the quilting well underway.  In fact, I need to remove a hundred or so pins and trim the edges to give me a little more space to maneuver.

I'm off to quilt!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

October UFO List

1. Pillow
2. Scrappy DWR
3. ABC appliqué
4. 9 patches and stars
5.  Hand pieced hexagons
6. Stained Glass Stars
7. 16 patches
8. Churn dash block
9. Aegean Sea
10. The Assistant's Quilt
September 1: 9 projects
Started: 3
Finished: 2
September 30: 10 projects

In September, I started and finished the Teal Mini Swap and a green and brown baby quilt.  I also "started" or took command of the Assistant's long-abandoned plus quilt.  She professes a vague interest in seeing it finished, but her time has been captured by sewing clothes and knitting scarves.

My goal is to keep my list to 10 or less projects, so I'm doing find with my UFO list.  Of course, as I wrap up scrappy projects, I find more and more quilts to start.  Somebody stop me!

from the room of Zana's Ninis,
katie z.

September Block Count

This month experienced a flood of new blocks.

I wrapped up the Aegean Sea units, with 42 new.
I made 155 new 16 patches.
For my green and brown baby quilt, I made 25 blocks.

That brings my September total to 212 new blocks and 1418 for the year.

from the room of Zana’s Ninis,
katie z.