Hmmm…so I started an update last week but never finished it. Not surprising. However, here I am with the 3 sew-alongs…
Plaidish…
Someone in my guild suggested this timeline, so I am going with it:
Complete cutting by January 25th
Complete A blocks by February 1st
Complete B blocks by February 8th
Complete C blocks by February 15th
Sew blocks into top by February 22nd
Baste and Quilt by March 7th
Bind by March 14th
The pieces were all cut on time and sitting in their neat and tidy piles. Somehow I thought that I had until next week to finish the A blocks and so I started on Friday by sewing the navy blocks to the medium rectangles and then light squares to medium rectangles and then yesterday finished sewing them together and pressed. I put them up on the design wall to admire. Just now did I see that the target finish time was when I actually finished them… and here I thought that I was ahead of the game! Here they are for you to admire also.
Vintage Lace QAL
Week 2 was to cut all of the pieces and week 3 was to sew the half-square triangles -henceforth to be know as HSTs – and then cut them apart. I finished the cutting in time for week 2 and completed week 3’s mission early in the week. Trimming…for you non-quilters out there … is something that is tedious and requires precision. I decided to tackle it bit by bit. First I did some of the pink and purples.
Then I just kept it all out and did it 10 or 20 at a time. Not that I counted. Some folks have beautifully aligned towers – I have piles.
Gradually the untrimmed pile became noticeably smaller and that then spurred me on to finish. Audiobooks helped.
When done I had a lovely little pile of trimmings
And then I put one unit up on the design wall to check it out.
This is half of a medallion and there will be 8 units like this in the quilt. Pretty pleased so far!
Go Quilt Sewalong
I missed week 1 on this one, but it was just about color choice and perhaps cutting, but I am going from stash/scrappy on this one, so I will choose colors/shop my stash and cut each week. Right on time I finished rows 2 and 3.
I have been taking pictures of them hanging on the laundry door. Better light. Next they spent some time on the design wall. but now are hanging out on the dining room door.
And other things…
I never made or sent anything to my spouse’s siblings’ families for the holidays. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t. We are all adults here and it is just as random if they send us anything. Over the years I have made placemats and potholders and mug rugs, etc. It is hard to decide on anything for people you rarely see and don’t see the colors in their homes. However, my spouse was heading there and so I wanted something to send along.
A few years ago I was in some sort of swap – something to do with a soup recipe and something to go with it – and received some bowl cozies. I think the idea is that you put the bowl or mug in the cozy into the microwave and then heat your food. When done, the bowl or mug will be hot but the cozy not. You would need to be really sure that the fabric, batting and thread are all cotton and can take the heat. However, that is not how we use them. When we are not eating at the table we use them so we are not holding a really hot bowl. Hmm, I am pretty sure that they don’t always eat at the table.
OK, now I had an idea. I found several tutorials on the web and decided to use this one from Bluprint. I like the shape in that it did not have pointy corners. I know that the sibs like batiks, so I went into my old batik bin and came out with some contenders. Here are the finished cozies.
If I was to make more of these – which I am likely to do – I would make two changes. I would make the darts 0.25″ – 0.5″ longer to make a deeper cozy. Also, since this was a total stash project, I used scraps of batting left over. And, since I generally use thinner batting for quilts, I had thin batting for scraps. I would use an extra layer of batting, or maybe even a layer of Insul-brite. I was pretty much out of Insul-brite after my attempts at making oven mitts… a story for another time. For some reason all of the stores around me were out of Insul-brite, so that was not happening. Plus, you need to be darn sure that you don’t put the Insul-brite in the microwave. So…done, sent off.
Still reading?
Goals for this week:
– 3 read and white chunky cross blocks for Serenity Circle of do. Good Stitches
– DCMQG bee block
– B blocks for Plaidish
– Start chain piecing rows for Vintage Lace Quilt
– Row 4 for Go Quilt
Looks like a lot. We’ll see!
Tinking along 