UFO Challenge

I have been challenged to finish 3 UFO's by April 30th. So, I jumped in with both feet and here's my list....

1. Granny's Strings - finish quilting borders and bind

2. Baby Strings - add borders, baste, quilt, bind

3. Heart to Heart Quilt - complete blocks, assemble top, baste, quilt and bind

Number 1, Granny's Strings you've seen before. (Look in my Picassa Album for pics, link is at the bottom of my blog.) I am determined to finish this quilt.....it's been fun, but this quilt is so heavy that I only want to quilt on cold days. Fortunately, we had a cold spell while all my older children were gone and I got the entire top quilted, now I have just the borders to quilt. Deciding on what to quilt in the borders will be a bigger challenge than actually quilting them.

Number 2 and 3 are baby quilts for Dear Sister, so I can't show pics otherwise there will be no surprise for Dear Sister! I know she reads periodically!

Several days my machine was busy as Dear Mother pieced her grandbaby's quilt top. It turned out beautifully and she is in the process of hand quilting it! Can't wait to show pics of it too!

Ummm, oh, I also got all the blocks for my Country Stars done and assembled. It turned out nicely, it just needs some borders now. I should get that done this week and I will post pics of it once the borders are on.

So, because blogs without pics are boring, here is a pic of a top I made a couple of years ago, the scrappy backing and a close up. (BTW, this was hand pieced...back before I fell in love with the speed of a sewing machine!) When I get a break in the "have to get done" category of my quilting, I'll move on to this one! I fell in love with this fabric (Porch Swing) and bought the scripture blocks while on a Shop Hop with my quilty friends! That was a fun time....looking forward to the Spring Shop Hop this year.

Have a great quilting day!

Depression Top Completed!

Well, it's done! At least the top. And I used only stash fabrics to do it. The HST's (half square triangles) came from my 4 inch strips and the borders came from my stash.

I decided to use the outer fabric even though there was only one yard. I did the math and math told me that one yard would be enough. When I started piecing the border and sewing it on, I did get a bit concerned when all I had left over was a 2 1/2 inch strip. Would seven pieces be enough? Then as I pieced the border......this was all that was left, a small 6 inch piece. Talk about getting your money's worth out of a yard of fabric. I really liked that piece.....wish I had some real scraps to work with!

So, another UFO marked off my list! (Don't even talk to me about quilting it!) And, I'll have to pick another one to work on. Maybe later in the week. All this sewing has given me a backache. I'm off to spend some time running errands with Dear Younger Daughter. Fun, fun.....I bet we end up at McDonald's. LOL

Depression Quilt Top.....

Today was a lazy Sunday. While we didn't attend church, we did hear our fill in Pastor Dr. Adrian Rogers. This is really one of the toughest things about being a full time caregiver to Dear Hubby, missing church week after week. Dear Older Son was able to sleep in this morning before heading back to his East Texas Ministry. We did have lunch together, Dear Older Son, Dear Younger Daughter, Dear Hubby and me. It was nice to spend a few minutes alone before he headed out.

I spent the day today working on my Depression Blocks while Dear Hubby rested up after the crazy weekend. I got a lot done, and finished up all 30 Depression Blocks. I couldn't wait to see them put together, so I worked until I got the top put together. I even added the first small border, but I was too tired to take a picture of it. I'll finish up the outer border at some point this week and I'll post another pic. It sure felt great pulling out that UFO and making such progress in finishing up the top! I don't know how long it will have to sit unquilted, but at least the top is about done.

I hope everyone had a great Sunday, and here's looking forward to a great week.

Depression Blocks

It felt so good today to pull the house back together after all the rearranging of furniture to fit more tables and more family members for Thanksgiving. We had a great time. All the ladies got in the kitchen and pitched in and we got dinner ready in record time. Of course, it helped that Dear Mother had done so much the day before. Like shucking the corn and cutting it off the cob. Dear Niece and Dear Young Daughter snapped the green beans. Dear Older Daughter made two pies and I made a few dishes myself. Everything was delicious and the family time was even better. I have an amazing family!

I'm really glad to have my sewing area put back together. As I set the machine back on the table I felt inspired to pull another UFO (unfinished object) out of the cabinet. I already had 19 blocks completed and worked until I completed a total of 25. Now that they are all out on the floor, I'm thinking I need to make several more. This just won't be big enough for a queen sized bed, and that's my goal for all these scrap/stashbusting quilts. As I stated in an earlier post, the children, their future spouses and all my future grandchildren will need quilts! And they will want quilts to put on their beds, I'm sure! I better get busy.... I am really enjoying making quilts from my stash and from my baskets of strips, etc.

I found this Depression Block online where so many others get inspiration! Marcia's website is full of ideas just waiting to be created! I decided that I would use my 4 inch strip basket to make these blocks. Once the HST (half square triangle) is made, I just trim them down to 3 1/2 inches and make the blocks. I have decided that since I'm not the most accurate piecer in the world, I'd rather make them too big and cut them down than fret the entire time I'm sewing that they will be too small. Anything that makes me enjoy quilting more and stress out less..... I'm for it!

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! Now, on to the Christmas rush! LOL

UFO Day

Today, the ladies at church got together for a UFO day (Unfinished Objects). I chose to take my reproduction Civil War fabrics so that I could continue cutting squares for Jonathan's graduation quilt. (I know, he just turned 19....and he already graduated, but that's beside the point).

I am making a Double Four Patch Quilt which I found in the book "Quilts! Quilts! Quilts!". Here is the picture of my work.

The stack of 1 1/2 squares on the right is what I got accomplished. There are about 1000 of them now! I'm not worried that there might be too many, I'll just make another quilt.

And you can see some of the blocks I'm making too! I have 56 made already. These are all hand pieced and I need another 44, and that's a total of 100 blocks. Fun, fun....but special quilts (for my children only!) are being hand pieced and hand quilted, regardless of how easy they are. Just something special for graduation quilts. (Don't look too close, they aren't ironed yet!)

This is definitely a stash quilt, I've been hoarding these fabrics for years!