EOM/EOQ

End of Month - End of March, End of Quarter!! I finished binding the last of the snowman panels, (total 4), threw together & finished the little bunny wall hanging ! As I look back on the good and bad of March, Good - successfully completed at least one Christmas present, (snowman panels), and finished a charity project (pillowcases for operation pillowcase). I can't help but notice that although I used 30 1/2 yds of fabric, I purchased 27 3/4 yds, making my total OUT for this month only 2 3/4 yds! I'm glad I vowed (previous post) to not buy anymore fabric, because I REALLY mean it this time! I should have made all of the pillowcases out of my stash, but then that would require me to go digging and looking, and then unfortunately, I start to feel overwhelmed and then accomplish nothing! I also resolve to ONLY make pillowcases out of my stash from now on. There, see resolutions aren't only for January! Well, I am over halfway done with Gram's quilt, so I'd like to finish it today. Hope your March was productive!

We Have a Winner!

My dear daughter's first skating competition on Saturday was a raving success! She was so exhilarated and euphoric upon completing her program, she had tears in her eyes, as of course did I! She really seems to enjoy performing in front of others, I so admire her for it as I am quite the opposite!! I freeze up in front of people and would much rather go unnoticed, fortunately I am very good at hiding my true feelings in this area, as neither of my children are affected as I am. She placed third and received a bronze medal! She made a few beginners mistakes, but she looked so graceful and poised, unless you were familiar with her program you wouldn't have noticed. Shortly after she finished she said "When is the next competition?" We volunteered for duties during the competition since it was held at our home rink, so we were there the entire day, at the end we treated her to the move "How to train your Dragon" which we all enjoyed. Not a stitch of quilting, but a wonderful day just the same! I made up for it Sunday and Monday, I completed 16 more pillowcases, I've done 28 in all, and now have the 25 ready to be sent to Afghanistan. I used more fabric from my stash (10 1/2 yds) but again was weak and purchased 6 more yards of snuggle flannels. They are all sewn up and I vow no new fabric will be purchased in the month of April. really. final. answer. So anyway, I emailed Debra at operation pillowcase and am just waiting for instructions to send them. I could only get 21 in the box, since there are so many flannels, I guess I'll hang on to the extras for the next box. Now I must go fix what my stinker cat Samantha did sometime this morning while I was exercising (and apparently ignoring her). Happy Tuesday!

Friday Already?????

I'm not ready for it to be Friday! What a quick week this was! I had appointments on two separate days, spent one day unexpectedly running errands, one day cleaning the house (ugh) which leaves only today for sewing - not enough! I was expecting company this evening, as my daughter has her first figure skating competition tomorrow, but they cancelled last evening so the day dedicated to cleaning was for naught! I know, I know, it's nice to have such a clean and orderly house, but I would have rather saved that for next week. Fortunately, I have two more finishes! I had some time waiting for my appointments, so I was able to finish sewing the binding down on two more snowman panel thingys. I took a photo of one of them Wednesday afternoon, but I didn't finish the third one until last night and I can't take a photo of it on the outside hanger as it is pouring rain out today. I got my gram's quilt top pinned on, but not the backing, will do that hopefully after posting this. I'll cut the batting, and then I've got to run out again. So sad, a neighbor in our development passed away, so I thought I'd make lasagna for the family, but I need to get one of those disposable pans so they can freeze it in case they want to save it for later. I made the sauce yesterday, so I'll just have to cook the noodles and assemble it this afternoon. Gloomy news on a gloomy day. Well, here's hoping everyone has a great weekend!

Spring Finishes

This was the first, first day of Spring in quite some time (for me anyways) that it actually felt like Spring! We had a glorious weekend!! It was spent mostly outside, either on yardwork, or a jaunt to Historic Yorktown for a walk along the crowded beach! I finished two more pillow cases and quilted another QOV. I forgot to take pictures of them, but I will before the month is out. I need to figure out a binding for this QOV, as one did not come with it, but it is an all color scrappy quilt, so I'll just hunt through my stash to find a nice match! Last night I finished my monthly Christmas present! A snowman panel hanging for my brother and his wife (they like dogs). I took the picture on our outside hanger, I just need to find a hanger for them. That would make a nice gift, and that way I can just keep adding seasonal panels or quilts for them to put on it. I have three more of these to finish putting the binding down on. Very nice size to take along to appointments, practices, etc., I finished sewing the backing together for Gram's brown & green quilt, had to piece some of the larger border in there to make it big enough. I will pin that on today and start quilting that. Well, better get to it! Happy sewing!

Package from Gram!

Look what I received in the mail! My dear Gram has been very busy this winter, bless her heart, and she finished two quilts that I had cut the fabric for in late December/early January. She's actually been finished since February, but after failing to find backings from her stash, she had to wait for the weather to clear up a bit so one of my cousins could take her to a Quilt store. (she lives in western Massachusetts) I will help finish these, as I have the fabric for one of the borders for each quilt. So I will put on the borders, sew the backings and quilt them for her. She wants me to do the green and brown one first, as she can't wait to see how it will turn out. I washed the backing of the QOV and am in the process of sewing it together now, and I've also started working on the borders for Gram's green quilt. Too bad I can't count finishing Gram's WISP's as finishing my own! I did finish those two batik pillowcases, 2 more yards of fabric OUT!! Tomorrow is the workshop for QOV, so I'd best get back to sewing!!

Before and After

There is the stack of QOVs to be quilted, and there they all are quilted !! I was able to quilt them all before Friday, the day of the guild, but I was only able to get one completely bound. I had only one side of my QOV bound, but I brought it to guild for my show and tell. It had rained quite a bit the previous days and as I brought the stack of four quilts to my truck, the bottom quilt unfolded and fell on the muddy driveway! Fortunately it was MY QOV, which I wasn't ready to turn in and I was going to wash before sending it off anyway. It was only the backing that touched the mud so by the time show and tell came along, I was able to brush the mud off and no one noticed. I picked up 3 more QOV's to quilt by April's guild meeting - April 9th. These are all quite different and very interesting. I was going to quilt one yesterday but as I pulled the quilt out of the bag I saw that the backing was not pieced together and the pieces were all wadded up and horribly wrinkled. The fabric is just loaded with sizing so I am going to wash that quilt and the backing pieces later today before I quilt it, that way it'll be easier on my longarm needle and not get so gummed up. My quilt room was just getting horrendous, so I vacuumed, dusted and organized instead. I found two yards of pretty batik fabric I had purchased on clearance at a LQS during their Christmas sale, I was going to make a purse, but I have dozens of yards of fabric I've bought to make purses, and never do!! So I ironed it, cut and pinned it and I just need to start sewing on them, when they're done they will be two more pillowcases for Operation Pillowcase! Well, best get started - Happy Monday!!

Operation Pillowcase

I ran across this blog while looking at OPAM winner, Wendy F's blog. (Isn't it amazing how one can go from one to blog to another, and another, and yet another, and then forget where you were?) As I am highly distractable to begin with, it doesn't take much for me to get sidetracked, but anyway, Debra is holding a really neat drawing for a beautiful basket. I am going to try to copy the photos and link back to her blog, but we'll see how that goes! I think I've got it Gift Basket Giveaway! This is such a great idea, I can imagine what a morale booster this must be, something so small, yet a reminder of the "real world" as they say

I don't think the photo's are quite where I want them, but at least I have them on. I am quite confident that there was an easier/quicker way to accomplish it, but it is done :) Speaking of done . . . The top photo is of 12 pillowcases that I have completed so far. I would love to say that all 12 pillow cases came from my stash, but in all honesty, I cannot. I went to JoAnne's to pick up some navy blue thread and noticed a 50% off sale on snuggle flannels and . . . well, 9 yards of it somehow found it's way home with me! The good news is that I used 3 2/3 yds from my stash and that all 9 yards of new fabric have been completely used. I worked on one of the 4 QOV's waiting to be bound, will try to do more tonight! Hope all the links work!

March Finish

Finally finished binding the rail fence. Didn't get to take credit for all of the fabric since all of the quilt top fabric came from my Gram, but used my stash for the backing. I had purchased the binding at JoAnne's but now it's used up! It was a beautiful weekend, lots of sun and warm temps, spent much of it outdoors raking, pruning, & cleaning up. Went for a walk with DH and a bike ride with the entire family, hope it stays like this for awhile! Didn't watch much T.V. therefore didn't get any of the QOV's bound - maybe tonight! My kitties Samantha and Hermione approve of the scrappy backing on the rail fence. I used 5 oz. poly to quilt it, and they love the thickness of it (as do I). Happy Monday!

Been Kinda Naughty

Monday morning I awoke to a clear & pain free head! I celebrated by spending the entire day cleaning the house - long overdue! DH arrived home safely from Wisconsin (Thank you, Lord) and with him he brought some things I needed from my dear friend's Quilt Store. Note the change in my stash report eeek! But . . . I needed the white & beige as backgrounds to go with fabric previously purchased, cut and waiting. The red white &blue paisley I just love for the backings for the Quilts of Valor, and the dark blues are going to be binding for QOVs, with the extras going to my stash! My dear friend also included a lovely surprise! A traveling ironing board! How cool is that? I will be able to take this with me to workshops or even put it my room if I don't want the ironing board up! Of course I really wanted to be the one to go to Wisconsin, but my DH has promised me a trip there this summer, or maybe I'll be able to go by myself in the fall, so I can do some real damage in that store myself! Hopefully I will have so much done by that point that he won't even notice the new additions! Unfortunately, I haven't finished anything. Quilted another guild QOV, and finally quilted the QOV that I pieced together ages ago, I worked out the label and am very pleased with it, I'll have pictures of it when I have it bound. I did not have the right blue for the binding of my QOV, so DH had yesterday off so I talked him into exploring some local quilt shops with me. His brother is getting married this summer and I have offered to make the lovely couple a quilt. They gave me a few ideas as to the fabric, so I wanted DH along for his perspective. We went to four shops, one of which was out of business, but still had their website up! Shame on them for not taking it down or updating it - shame on me for not calling and double checking first. Lesson learned, since that store was the furthest store - would have saved us 1 hour had we known. No luck on finding the wedding quilt fabric, did get 3/4 yd of lovely blue batik for my QOV binding. Speaking of binding . . . I'm still not done with the rail fence, or the third QOV, need to sew the bindings ON the fourth QOV and my pieced QOV - I am badly bogged by beastly bindings!! Better be on my way!