Thursday, March 29, 2012

Couch Pillows not Couch Potatoes !

As I finish projects and WISPs, I am also trying to use up the leftover fabric from those projects.  Typically the fabric goes back in to the container/bag/basket/tote from whence it came, collecting dust and wasting space until I come across it again.  Then I usually say, wow, I really should do something with this . . . and nothing happens.  This time I sewed the tops of these pillows right after completing the quilt in January, but I had a
few other irons in the fire that were getting pretty hot, so to speak, that needed tending to first.  Once those irons cooled, I found a piece of backing in my stash that was big enough to quilt them both on the long arm at the same time, I quilted the pillow backs on my regular machine (just straight lines) and stuffed them with cut up bits and scraps (just like the pet pillows I made last year).   Actually, only one pillow is on the couch, the other one is on a chair, and they are both in the same room as the wall hanging, which we moved from the family room to the living room. STILL have fabric left over, but not as much and I will do one smallish wallhanging to fullfill a requirement from my sewing bee that is due in May.  I guess I better start planning!  Happy Quilting !!

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

March Madness

March is mad for many reasons this year!  I am crazy busy with the children's activities, customer quilts, my own long lists of WISPs and ideas and this completely insane weather is not helping one bit!  I was able to complete the two T-shirt quilts on my WISP/UFO list this month.  It's a pretty new WISP, but I knew if I didn't put them on the list, they might not have gotten done so soon.  My stash count hardly changed because the quilts were done as a favor for a friend, so although I purchased the fabric, I am to be reimbursed, along with the cost of the batting, quilting and binding.  I did use 1 3/4yds of scrap fabric to put together a sample first to see if I needed to change my needle type on my longarm and how the quilting would go. Just four extra blocks with sashing, didn't want to mess up while working on the "real quilts".  I didn't have any problems with the t-shirts, they were stabilized with pellon on the reverse and although I had to really slow down on the t-shirt fabric, it was worth it because I didn't experience any thread breaks or irregular stitching on the back.  It went very smoothly YAY!  Obviously my first T-Shirt quilts, and now that they're done, I wouldn't mind at all doing that again.

 It was SO cold when I got my DH and DS to hold the quilts up to take pictures, only 39 degrees.  Of course my DS doesn't feel the cold, so he wears shorts practically year round!  Today they say it's going to hit 80 degrees and that was just 2 1/2 days ago.  No wonder my sinuses and allergies are going wild.  My DD took the picture below on Saturday, the poor daffodils don't know what to do; although this little fellow is not nearly so droopy today!  Happy Quilting!