A Garment on my Design Wall

I went to the Road 2 California quilt show last week and among the great vendors there, I found one specializing in antiques: antiques quilts, tablecloths, hankies, blocks, etc. I collect antique quilts and give a lecture to guilds on the history of fabric in America but I swore to be a good girl and not buy another for my collection. I came close to buying 2 redwork pillowcases with sayings that really got to me: the first one said, "I slept and dreamed that life was beauty", depicting butterflies and blossoms. The second one read, "I woke and found that life was duty" with an image of a woman with a broom in her hand. Sad, huh? Didn't buy them.

Then I saw a rack of blouses made out of vintage tablecloths, doilies and cutter quilts. OMG! They were wonderful! But at $110 to $150, a little pricy. Then, a lightbulb went off above me! I have 4 drawers full of embroidered and crocheted items that my grandmother and mother made and they've been sitting there, unused, for a couple of decades! I don't use them because they are stained and not the right size for my tables. Making them into garments I would wear would be a tribute to my forbears as well as the ultimate recycling of otherwise unusable items.

So, I found a simple, non-dart blouse pattern, chose an embroidered tablecloth my grandmother made eons ago and put it on my design wall. I made some calculations, marked it up and started cutting.

This is the back. It started as a 50" round tablecloth that fit a table my mother replaced with a rectangular one when I was about 10 (1963). It's the one I chose to make first because it's the least 'special'. If this one turns out as great as I think it will, I'll cut into the really pretty ones and make more! Can't wait to finish it and wear it!

UFO #6 FINISHED!

Six days early too! I'm so proud of myself! I really didn't want to finish this quilt--didn't really like it that much. (See the 'before' photo of #6 here). See, I made this on a mystery quilt retreat and I wanted it to be a Christmas quilt, thus the red and green fabrics. The pattern turned out not to look very Christmassy so I was disappointed. But, of course, now that it's quilted, I like it a whole lot more! You like the quilting? I did it on my regular machine, a Janome 6600. It's 60" x 76" and I'll probably donate this quilt to the next community service organization that holds a silent auction for some good cause. This is a quilt both men and women will like.

Looking forward to February 1st when Judy pulls the next UFO number. THANKS, JUDY!

A Naughty Girl. . .

First you need to know that I'm sitting in my hotel room at Road 2 California, a huge quilt show in Southern California. I'm here for 3 days, 2 of which are all-day classes with Darlene Zimmerman and Joan Wolfren. For those of you who've not been to this particular show, I call it a mini-Houston. Fabulous quilts from all over the world and over 100 vendors--oh, and the sunshine--in the 70s. Yeah. . .

So for this stashbusting report, please don't judge me. You know how it is when you're facing all that yummy fabric all those fun patterns and beautiful quilts. But wait--my husband actually told me he'd like to have a Civil War quilt. (This is the guy who asked me, like 5 years ago, "How many quilts does a person need, Sweetie?") Guess what? I don't have a single piece of Civil War fabric in my stash! What's that mean???? Say it with me, ladies and gentlemen. . . I GET TO BUY MORE FABRIC!!!!

So here are the stats for this week:

Yardage purchased this week: 10.75 yards

Yardage purchased year to date: 15 yards

Yardage used this week: 3 yards (for the classes I took)

Yardage used year to date: 23

Net used 2011: 8

. . . .and I was doing so well. . .

A Productive Week!

These 2 projects are on my design wall at the moment. On the left, the beginning of a mosaic-type wall-hanging I'm working on for my quilt guild's challenge, the theme being the same as our quilt show: "Blooming Fun". I'll show you the rest of it the end of next month when I complete it.

The other is the first block in Anne Sutton's free 2011 BOM. She's the creative genius behind Bunny Hill Designs and if you click this, you too can get her free monthly patterns for "Henreitta Whiskers", her adorable squirrel quilt.

I also finished a quilt, made huge progress on Judy's UFO Challenge #6 and have pinned and am ready to quilt the quilt I made in a mystery class last weekend! Woo-Hoo! I'll show them all in a future blog post. (Don't want to be a show-off!)

Stash Busting Time!

This week I managed to put backs on 2 quilts so used 8.5 yards of fabric from my stash! Backs are great stashbusters, aren't they? There was a time when, every time I'd run across a $4 or $5 per yard sale rack, If buy 5-8 yards of some not-so-beautiful fabric, but nonetheless, in "my colors" to use on the back of some future quilt. When I remodeled my sewing room last year, I found I had 41 of these bulky wads stacked on my precious shelves!! E-gads, what was I 'saving' them for? They are going to be used nicely this year because of Judy's UFO challenge and also the UFO challenge I have going at my quilt guild. YAY!

So, my stash report is as follows:

Yardage purchased this week: 0

Yardage purchased year to date: 4.25

Yardage used this week: 8.5

Yardage used year to date: 20

Net used 2011: 15.75

"Geese in the Wild Roses"

Three times a year, I attend a mystery class given by Linda Ballard of northern California. It's something my quilting buddies and I have been doing for, oh, about 10 years! (yeah, do the math--this may be why my mystery quilt tops take up a large portion of my UFO list!)

So, Friday night and all day Saturday, we worked on this quilt: The line of fabric is "Wild Rose" by Maywood Studios and I just LOVE it! My DH put up a new quilt rack for me for Xmas and I'm going to be making quilts that fit it just right so I can change them out on a regular basis. This one's only 42 X 52 so I'm sure to finish it quickly and put it right up!

BTW: the 6 blocks in this quilt are from an identical pattern. The value of the fabric is what makes them look different.

My First Stash Report

The Stash Report on Judy's blog always intimidated me and I never posted. When I read the last Stash Report post of the year and saw that some people had purchased hundreds of yards of fabric (and USED hundreds of yards of fabric), I decided i needed to see what my totals were. (I'm secretly trying to convince my husband that I really don't buy THAT much fabric!) I'm desperate to lighten up the stash I've been accumulating for 15 years so I'm going to be good and buy fabric only when I absolutely HAVE to. Judy's stash report is going to help me do just that!

And so, here is my first post of totals:

Yardage purchased this week: 4.25

Yardage purchased year to date: 4.25

Yardage used this week: 11.5

Yardage used year to date: 11.5

Net used 2011: 7.25