UFO Bust Report and Ironing Table

Until this morning, my UFO Bust Report was going to be "nothing accomplished." However, I found one of the charity tops still on my list along with the backing fabric I set aside for it.

My mom sent me some of the house blocks a few years ago. Maybe she made them or maybe she won them at her guild through a Block of the Month drawing. I don't know. I made a few more houses at retreat two or three years ago, sashed them and completed the top. I think I was trying to just finish the top at retreat and had to use what I had brought which is why there is planet fabric along the sides for a border to make it wider. The rest of the planet fabric is going on the back.

Kind of a crazy combination of fabrics, but hey, it's all from my stash! I'd like to get this basted and quilted this weekend but we'll just have to see. It is still ski season so the husband will be gone again at least one day this weekend. Also the son and I still have Market Day preparations to finish along with Valentines to address for Monday.

Today I thought I would show you the awesome ironing table my husband made for me a few years ago.

The ironing surface is 22" wide by 50" long. It has casters on one end so I can move it to access the fabric bins behind it. The shelves hold my thread bins, button tins and baskets full of embellishments and pre-fused fabrics. There is a narrow shelf right below the ironing surface for ruler storage. I don't know how tall it is, but it is a little taller than most ironing boards will go. I am tall so it is was made to be ergonomically correct for my height.

How did I do that?!

I'm still shaking my head about this one, but the crisis is now over. I finished quilting Hawaiian Hug late this morning. But check out what I found inside the quilt!!

I circled it on the photo in an attempt to make it more noticeable. (click on the photo to see it larger) Yup! That's a straight pin sticking out of one of the blocks on the front of the quilt. I found it by getting stuck while I was quilting. When I discovered this I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I put scotch tape around the end so it wouldn't go all the way in between the layers and so I would stop sticking myself with it. Here is a photo of the pin with tape around the end.

And it is one of the larger plastic pin head straight pins too! I finished quilting it then called my LQS to see if the Kona Navy fabric is in yet. Bummer, it's not. So I'm going to have to just use the Indigo I have in my stash. When you hold the two fabrics next to each other they are definitely different. But the two fabrics will not be next to each other in the quilt so I think it will be fine.

While I had my LQS on the phone, I explained my pin problem. I ended up driving my quilt over to the store so they could see the problem in person. It took a little doing, but we got it out through the back by spreading apart the weave of one of the more loosely woven fabrics and pulling it out. I will put a little fray check on the spot then I have a small piece of the fabric that I plan to fuse and hand applique over the spot. It shouldn't be too noticeable when I'm done. Whew! I was really freaking out at first.

I tried to take a photo of the finished quilting but I'm not able to get far enough back inside and it is very windy here today so I can't hang it on the clothesline. If the weather cooperates, I'll take one tomorrow.


I better get back to my sewing room. I heard from my husband a little while ago. Both husband and son are okay, but the guy they went with hurt his knee shortly after lunch today. So they are already at the hotel and don't know if he will be able to ski tomorrow. They may be back earlier than planned. He probably should not ski tomorrow regardless, but he and my husband are a bit ski-crazy. Husband broke his wrist last April skiing. Ski patrol would not treat him if he was going to continue skiing, so the two of them just taped up his wrist and continued for the rest of the day!

Plodding Along on Hawaiian Hug

I finally got back to quilting Hawaiian Hug today. I just have the outer border left to do. I decided to use the Ocean Current pattern by Leah Day. If you haven't checked out her site, click on the link in the previous sentence! She has done a lot of work recently organizing her designs to make it easier to find the right kind of design for your project. You can search by design type, texture, difficulty level and design number. It is awesome! Great work Leah!! Thank you!!

So here is what it looks like after I have done all of the foundational swirls on my first side and a little bit of echoing.

And this is what the finished side looks like.

Not a great picture but it got dark before I remembered to take a picture for you. I'll take more tomorrow. I hope to finish this up tomorrow. I have one of the long side borders already done and most of one of the short sides finished. The husband is taking the boy skiing for the weekend!!! (doing the happy dance vigorously!) So I should have plenty of time to finish the quilting on this and be able to send it off to the recipient next week.

I learned while doing the first side that it helps to sew off the edge of the quilt every foot or so when doing your foundational swirls. This gives you a good "stopping" place for echo quilting so you don't have to echo the entire length of the quilt. It just made it much easier for me to manage this almost twin size quilt in my domestic machine. I am also getting quite a bit of practice at stopping and starting smoothly on this project. I can't say that I am an expert yet, but I am getting much better.

Ski Season has begun

We had a nice Thanksgiving. I hope you did too. I cooked all day Wednesday and Thursday. I enjoy cooking and it is fun to do a big meal every once in a while. Bright and early Friday morning my husband left for two days of skiing. He got back late Saturday night and slept all day Sunday. I tell you this so that you know why I haven't gotten very much done over the Thanksgiving holiday. I sure was glad things were back to normal today. However, I didn't get any sewing done today either because of all the errands, grocery shopping and dinner making.

On Friday, in little spurts, I was able to make a few gift bags. Parker had a friend over for the afternoon. They played very nicely and left me alone for the most part. I made these two birthday bags as a gift for a friend.

Then I made a few Christmas gift bags. I made two each of these.

Once I get on a roll with these they are very fast to make. You can go to my pattern/tutorial for the bags I make by clicking here.

Happy Easter

Check out this cute crocheted water bottle cover one of my quilt guild friends made for Parker. It was so sweet and unexpected! This just arrived in our mailbox last weekend addressed to Parker. He has enjoyed using it.

Tony went skiing again today. The last two weeks he has said that this is the last weekend of skiing for the season, then gone the next weekend. He didn't say that this evening. I am going to the Quilt and Stitch Expo in Pueblo next Saturday by myself. If he wants to go skiing next Saturday he can take Parker with him or make other arrangements for Parker. Let me say again - I am going to the Expo alone!!

In between entertaining Parker today, I've been cutting out more thread catchers. I think I have about 16 cut out and partially sewn. I don't think I mentioned that someone else called me and wants to buy 4 more! That's in addition to the two already ordered by the lady who bought one at the guild demo day. So 6 of these are already sold! I could have never predicted that these would be so popular. Does anybody else want one? They are $10 plus shipping if you don't live locally. I'll only charge you what it actually costs to ship it. I hate it when sellers try to make additional money off the shipping. Stay tuned ... later in the week I'll post photos of the finished thread catchers I started today.

Disappearing 9 Patch for charity

This is the finish quilt top using the disappearing nine patch blocks that I am making for charity and as a sample for our next guild block swap. This top used 10 1/2 nine patch blocks, cut into quarters. I made the nine patch blocks from 5" squares. So the nine patch blocks measured 14" before cutting them into quarters. The top measures about 40" by 47" - a perfect size for a kids charity quilt in my opinion. My guild buys batting for the members to use in charity quilts. I picked up some batting yesterday to use for this quilt and a few others that I have ready to be quilted. Quilting these tops will be my main project for the next week or so.

My son has today and Monday off from school so I'm not sure how much quilting I'll get done before Tuesday - not much is my guess. In addition, my husband is going skiing AGAIN tomorrow. I thought ski season would be over by now, but not at Wolf Creek Ski Area. They got more snow yesterday.

I will soon be getting a new floor for my laundry room! Yesterday I pick out some nice vinyl and a guy came out to measure. I hope to hear from them today with an estimate for the installation and then schedule the job. I'm really motivated to get the ceiling finished up and have this room DONE, finally!

Thread Catchers

My guild is have a Quilt Demo Day at our next meeting, March 20th, which happens to also be National Quilting Day. If you are in the area and want to attend here are the details:

Monte Vista United Methodist Church, 215 Washington St. in Monte Vista, CO from 10 am until 2 pm. Members will be demonstrating various quilting and quilt related techniques. There will be quilts on display and a boutique selling member-made items.

I am thinking about making up a few more of these thread catchers to sell in the boutique. I made the one on the left months ago, maybe a year ago, but didn't finish it because I didn't have any sand for the pin cushion part. Recently I got some play sand and decided this morning to sew up the other one I had already cut out to see if this is something I could make up quickly. The jury is still out.

As I reported yesterday, Spring Break has begun here. In a surprise move, this morning my husband took Parker skiing. They will be skiing today, spending the night in a hotel near the ski area and skiing again tomorrow before returning home. So I have some unplanned time to myself! Woot! Woot! I don't know if I want to spend my free time making up these thread catchers or if I'd rather work on my Quilt University homework or if I should paint the laundry room or do something else. To add to the indecision, I was rearranging some more in my sewing room this morning and strained my back while setting a heavy basket of magazines in a hard-to-reach corner. Painting may not be a wise choice now, at least for today, but I really want this project done. I'm going to have a cup of tea and listen to a podcast before making a decision.

Crochet!!

At the December guild meeting Parker won some yarn and he wants to learn to knit. I have bad memories of knitting in Home Ec. class in 8th grade so I'm trying to convince him that crochet is better. I think that, for him, learning to use one needle effectively first will make for a more enjoyable learning experience and better success with whatever project we do. But ... before I can teach him, I need to learn myself! I found some great videos on YouTube and learned to do a single crochet stitch. The sample I made turned out pretty large mainly because I was enjoying practicing but also because I didn't know how to stop!* LOL* I'm going to try to learn another stitch tonight.

On the quilting front: I got my baby quilt basted together this morning. I'm not sure how I want to quilt it but I have a tight deadline so it may just have to be an all over large stipple or loops. Nothing very inspired, but done is better than not done. I have also been working on my stitched crop circles. I'll post a photo of it tomorrow.

On the home front: I'm a ski widow again today. My husband filled in for another math faculty member last month so he is cashing in his favor today so he can go skiing. He only teaches one class on Tuesdays and Thursdays and today they had an exam. Proctoring exams can be quite boring but it isn't hard so I think the other person is getting off pretty easy. He had to actually teach their class.

There was also a bit of milestone at our house yesterday. Parker walked home from the bus stop by himself for the first time. Here in Alamosa the bus drivers will not allow kindergarteners or first graders to exit the bus unless there is an adult waiting at the bus stop to claim them. Some drivers are stricter than others but Parker's driver for kindergarten and first grade always followed the rule. For second grade through fifth grade, they encourage parents to be at the bus stop, but it is not required. Until last weekend, Parker wanted me to meet the bus. On Sunday, he said that he wanted to walk home by himself. So I agreed. I did stand on the front porch to watch him cross our street but he did a great job. Actually, it couldn't have worked out better. Yesterday it snowed like crazy and was windy from about 3 pm until 3:30 pm. I have stood on the corner in all kinds of weather and am really not sorry at all that I don't have to do that anymore. He still wants me to walk him to the bus stop in the morning, but I don't expect that will last much longer. My baby is not a baby anymore.

Quiet Day to myself

I had a quiet day to myself today because my boys went skiing without me. I injured my left big toe a few months ago. The bruise underneath the nail has moved up enough that the nail is now separating from my toe. Ouch! I got a lot done though. I slept in a little then quilted one of the charity quilts I pieced at retreat. I will start on the binding tonight. I made another note pad cover and a tote bag, both for potential gifts. I finally finished the bag I cut from the "what was I thinking" fabric, photo above. It made a really cute tote bag. I cut up the rest of this fabric to use as backing for charity quilts. The bag turned out so cute I may have to find other backing fabric and make a few more totes with it instead.