Barnyard Bats

Sometimes you gotta make a quilt.  So here is my Barnyard Bats quilt.

I made it this weekend, using the tutorial from Elizabeth at Oh, Fransson!  It was nice to actually start and finish something in a reasonable time frame!  It used .74 yards.

(Please ignore my messy cube and that damned PC that frickin BROKE today.  Don't ask.  When you take Excel away from an accountant, you take your life into your own hands.  Just sayin'.)

Well, hi

Yeah, well, hi.  It's been a bit since I posted.  Here are some updates on various things.

Knitting - I'm back into knitting.  I have several projects started and so now I have a UFO problem there!  I am not making sweaters or buying super-expensive yarn or anything.  I'm making a lot of scarves, shawls, etc.  Right now I have 2 on the needles: a blue wingspan and a mauve simple-shawl.  I want to make sure these 2 get done before I start anything new or head over to a different UFO.

Crochet - Same thing as knitting, but nothing I'm diligently working on.  Once I get the 2 knitting projects done, then I'll reassess all yarn things and get it organized.

Yarn reorganization means that I need to take bookcases out of Renee's room and move them into my room to hold the yarn stuff.  So yeah, I have to clean out the corner the bookcases are to go in, then move them in there and reload them.  And figure out what to do with Renee's stuff until her room is painted and ready for new bookcases....you get the idea.

Quilting - I'm handling this slowly due to all the entertaining we need to do between Election Day and New Year's.  It's like 5 or 6 events.  Anyway, I started the barnyard bats little project on Oh Fransson! and I need to get all caught up on all my BOM blocks.  Stashbusters says to have a Fall Finishing Party and try to get 3 more UFOs done.   I think I will be doing it slightly differently.

I want to finish the yellow LCRR, but it requires a lot of handwork.  So that is slow-going.

I want to finish the Christmas quilt, but that requires a lot of room, which I don't have right now.

I want to finish the barnyard bats and by God I will.

I want to make a jacket out of the $5 BOM I am in.  Since the last block is due to be picked up in the first week of December, that will be a nice project to work in there at year-end.  Work is due to be very busy this year-end so stress relief will be needed.

I want to finish the barn raising quilt by Michelle's Romantic Tangle that I started.

I have no idea how this is all going to get done.  Right now I need to schedule a plumber for my front powder room and so getting ready to have my main floor presentable to people is my number one goal. So far so slow.

But I passed my insurance exam....

In which I deviate....

Normally I write about quilting and crafting here.  Sometimes more frequently than others.  But I am not defined only by my quilting.  (Although if I were, that wouldn't be that bad!)  I have other things gnawing at me.

Right now in my life, for the remainder of this year, I need to clean my house.  Yes, for the holidays, but more importantly, because I feel driven to do so.  You know what I mean.  You just *have* to.

Except I have no energy.  I do not know why.  Well, I know one piece-  I hate to clean.  But I am driven!  I want this done!  For the first time in my life, I am inspired to decorate!

But it requires energy.  And I don't have any.

I have heard some chatter about dietary changes boosting energy.  I am a firm believer in nutrition, although you would not know it to look at me.  My friend says you would know it to eat at my table; I do a lot of from scratch cooking.

So I'm trying to clean and maybe make a change or two.  It all begins with walking away from the Super-Sized Coke....

42

What is today, you ask?  Why, it’s the World Wide Day of Play!  So get outside and have some fun!  And yes, it’s that too.  I am now the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, The Universe, and Everything.

(test post to see if blogger and I can be friends after I opened a gmail account....)

Friday check in

So Monday I wrote about my year end plans here for chipping away at that UFO list.  Here’s where I stand.

I got paid yesterday, so there should be a finish.  I have an hour of binding work to do on one quilt and it will be done.  I should finish that this weekend and post it here and make my move me down post and also post for Judy.  Whew.  Lots of posting but it will be a finish. 

My machine is ready!  So I will head up north and get that tomorrow.  Yes, in all of the rain from Hurricane Isaac.  Sadly the rain will be too much too late for this year, but if it sets us up well for next year, then maybe we can recover.  With the machine being done, I plan on sewing up the rows for my yellow LCRR, doing the BOM block that I have to pick up on Sunday and finishing the blocks on the Christmas 2 BOM.  The Christmas 2 BOM has 25 blocks to it.  12 have been finished and 12 more need some sort of coping borders to get them to the right size.  Then I have to do the 25^th block myself.  If I can get through all of that this weekend, I will be far on that one.

For mindless piecing and other work, I hope to work on a PIF quilt which is Bonnie’s Weed Whacker.  I have 75% of the strips cut.  I’d like to finish cutting the strips and then start sewing up the pairs. 

The next 2 weeks do not hold a lot of promise for sewing.  I hope to do the hand work for the yellow LCRR rows in that time, as well as the binding on another quilt.  That will get me through another payday....

Fall Plans

And now it's time for the plans themselves.

I started the year with 26 declared UFOs.  I have completed 4 of them (I think).  I need to do at least 8 more to have done one per month; 9 would be better.  That is the first goal.

Done
Seaside Rose jacket
Chiclets table runner
Purple Strings
Watermelon Slice

To Do in 2012
Australia quilt
Red hearts quilt
Yellow LCRR
St. Pat's LCRR
Christmas 2 BOM
Orca Bay
Renee's BOM quilt
Hopscotch
Huge Fence Rail

For the record everything I have started this year I have finished except for 4 things: 2 BOMs and 2 PIF quilts.  Not too shabby.  I get the last block for one of the BOMs December 1 so that may not become a UFO.  1 if not 2 of the PIF quilts may get done before year end as well as a leader-ender.  The last BOM starts mid-year and that is just the way life is.

To accomplish this, I need to do 1 UFO per paycheck (I get paid every 2 weeks) and 2 of them better have 2 finishes.  While I am out of pocket for a machine this week, there are some prep things I can do, plus 2 of the above items are in the binding stage, so finishes are forthcoming.

Fall

Well, it's almost Labor Day, which is the unofficial start of Fall.  Actually nowadays I think it might be the start of school which indicates the start of Fall, but that was way back on August 22.  But anyway, as the corn continues to turn brown and the beans are beginning that process, it's time to think Fall.

I have been away from quilting for a bit; I just finished 2 sister quilts for my nieces, one of which was migrating up to a big girl bed for the other, who decided to be like her maternal grandmother and make a grand entrance a week late.  After finishing those 2 quilts, which I loved to make, I took a quilty break.  I can only do so much at one time and since it is Fall and Back to School, Girl Scouts is more demanding of my time right now.

But BOMs wait for no one, except the passage of time.  So Friday I was done with work at 12.30 and I came home and sewed one block.  It's one of those Buck a Block ones but this one does not give enough fabric to do 2 blocks per packet; the blocks are more detailed than in past years.

So I sew my one block, run out to the LQS, come back from the LQS (64 miles round trip) and neat the school bus to my home.  We watch Iron Man while I sew up the rest of the BOMs.

I always get 2 of the Buck a Block BOM kits and this time, there isn't enough fabric to make the positive and negative versions of the block in each packet.  So I am making 3 blocks per 2 packets.  The odd numbers months will have 2 lights and 1 dark, which means the even months will be the opposite.  So anyway, I sewed up months 1 and 2 and now have a baggie with all my BOM crap in it in the red sale bag for my LQS.

The other BOM that I am in I did the block way back at the beginning of the month when I got it just to get it out of the way.

All of this was done in preparation for my beloved Janome Jem 760 Ruby to go off to be cleaned.  I had planned to drop her off at the dealer on September 1, as I had to be in Chicagoland anyway.  But Dad needed some surgery and so I had to go up yesterday.  I dropped off Ruby yesterday in the rain and I hope to pick her up on September 1.

So where am I going with this?  Oh heavens, I should get back to that.  I had time to think during all the driving I've done.

I have some Fall plans.  I'm going to put them in another post so I can find them quickly.

August

It’s been a while. Life has been both exhausting and crazy at the same time.


On a quilty front, things are moving along, albeit slowly. I need to quilt to keep my sanity but things are so busy, I am not getting enough time. So I am carving out the time as I can.

I’ve decided that my goal right now is to get as many things as possible to the hand binding stage. I need to have my machine serviced desperately and I will drop it off on September 1. But I won’t get it back for quite some time, like September 22. That’s OK, as the other aspects of my life will be beyond busy at that point, but I will need stuff to do. So if I have a pile of binding ready to go, that will help.

What was the red strings quilt, which is now just the red hearts quilt, is to this point. The Australia quilt has been there for a few months. I am now starting the process of joining all the yellow LCRR blocks together after FINALLY finishing quilting them all last night during the Olympics. I have 2 more quilts I’d like to get to this point as well. That would make for 5 things that would need to be done and frankly that should be more than enough. 4 are UFOs.

Go! and feet

2 things:

I'm pretty sure the left foot pain I am having is planar faciitis.  I need to make a doctor's appointment to figure out exactly which treatments are wise.  If gym shoes are wise, please, sweet Jesus, let me get a doctor's note.

The other thing is that I was at my LQS today in the sale room.  I start there.  I had forgotten my store tote, which can function as a coupon on regularly priced items, so I was going to limit purchases to sale items, which the bag doesn't work for.  So I'm in there and I find a backing for something and then I am wandering around and I do a double-take.

They had not one, but two, Accuquilt GO! Babies in there for half off.  That's $70, people.  My credit card bill rolls over on Thursday and I have to go out that way on Friday to get Renee from week 4 of camp, so I will be stopping by and grabbing some GO things.

I had decided long ago that I was only going to get a GO if and only if it was under $100.  This fits the bill.  The Baby's dies fit my needs.  The 2.5 strip is there, the nickel is there and the small tumbler is there.  Those were the big desires.  There are others, but those were the big ones.

I'm so giddy with excitement.  I mentioned it to Ted and he was fine with it.  So double yay.

Mid-Season Report

Well, we are at the half-year mark.  Time to reevaluate. 

I have completed 4 UFOs from my list and for many things, if I have started them, I have finished them.  This is not a bad thing.  As for my 100 yard dash from stash, I’m at 23.11 yards, which is fine.

My goals for the year are to complete 19 or 20 UFOs, thus showing that I completed 75% of my list.  That’s not too shabby.  I also want to continue with the idea that I finish what I start in 2012.  For now, that is the 6 Pay It Forward quilts.  Again, not too shabby.  I need to make 3 more things super-quick this month, but again, they have to be done by month-end, so it’s all good.

When I look at what I want to complete in the near future, this is the list:

UFOs (7)

Red strings

Yellow LCRR

St. Pat’s LCRR

PIF-Weed Whacker

Christmas 2 BOM

Black and White BOM

Australia FQs

New Items (3)

United Way jacket

Sophia 1600

Layla 1600

My goal is to get all of these with the binding attached by the start of the Olympics and then I will bind like crazy.  In actuality, I will get 7 of them done and progress on the other 3.  Any progress is still progress.  If I do get the 7 done, that would be 40+ yards from stash and nearly 2,000 inches of binding, not to mention 4 off the UFO list. 

I am also using Wednesdays as Orca Bay Wednesdays, to see if I will ever finish this quilt.  I made some good progress this week.

Happy 4th!!!

Happy 4th!  As we all know, freedom isn't free, so for everyone who is serving or has served, thank you for making it possible for me to sit around, drink coffee and type this post.

I love parades, especially the one on the 4th.  When the 4th falls on a Sunday, Hinsdale and Brookfield have their parades on different days, thus giving me TWO parades!  I'm giddy with excitement!

Alas and alack, B-N does not do a parade for today.  They do parades for Memorial Day and Labor Day, but not for the 4th.  At least we get fireworks.

And the corn is tasseling....

Camporee!

OK, this isn't a quilty post.  As you know, I do Girl Scouts.  I wasn't a Girl Scout as a child, but I am as an adult.  This weekend, we hosted about 70 girls and 25 adults for the weekend of camping at our local GS campground.  This has been over a year in the planning.  I was in charge of food.  I now know what $1100 in groceries from Sam's Club looks like and I can confirm it fits in my minivan.


First of all, now that I have seen how horrible the weather has been this past weekend between heat, fire, crazy storms and power outages, I am incredibly thankful to God that we are all safe.  We had no first aid issues either.


It was incredibly hot, incredibly humid and incredibly busy!  We dealt with 100 degree heat indices, blazing sun, lightning, thunder, rain and cool fronts.  We ate, drank and played.  Field games were played, cardboard boats were raced in the lake and girls made friends.  (We intentionally mixed the girls up from their troops into color teams to build friendships.) Our wildest expectations were exceeded.  We have had both kids and grown-ups sign up for next year's committee.


And we are so tired.  OMG tired.  Like, I came home and took a nap at noon tired.  I have laundry everywhere, no food in my house and I just don't care.  I took tomorrow and Tuesday off for my weekend.  Thank goodness Wednesday is a holiday!  Then I have to slug through 2 days at work before another weekend.  


Well, I guess here's a quilty note.   I've declared all Wednesday sewing henceforth Orca Bay sewing.  So welcome to Orca Bay Wednesdays!                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

MIA

I know I've been MIA for a while.  I have not been feeling that great and I do not know why.  Well, I know a few pieces - work, diet, etc.  But today I woke up and wanted to go back to bed for like days.  This is not like me.  My husband took my temp.

We did get Renee off to camp, which seriously took everything I had.  I had a sinus headache, which left with medicine, and then a half hour later a migraine hit due to being outside in the sun and heat handling camp check-in.  I was a bona-fide mess.  We came home and I slept for 2 hours.  Then I made Ted run out and get Chinese for dinner.

I took the rest of the evening off.  I need a slug day or two or ten.  But for tonight, I am resting.

The string hearts quilt will be next up, as I need it for Relay for Life.  The Australia quilt has 2 feet of binding left to do.  I then want to focus on finishing up a few more things.  If I could have a big binding stack for the Olympics, that would be wonderful!

But I also have the homefront to worry about.  This week, I want to clean out Renee's room.  I seriously want everything but the bed out this week.  She has been informed and she is OK with it.

I did pass my insurance exam.  1 down and 6 more to go to get this certification.  The bonus will buy my next sewing machine.  Motivation!!!

12

Well, well, well.  Neither 6 nor 12 have been pulled so far this year, so this is a new box to delve into.  What do we have?

Box 6

6a         Bird Crewel – A piece of needlepoint needing some finishing.  Status:  In pieces.

6b         Beau’s – I swapped with Nancy , Near Philadelphia for the Miss Mellie quilt and Ashley’s quilt.  It only makes sense that I bring everything together for a huge quilt called Beau’s quilt.  Status:  Most blocks completed.

6c         Dog Bandannas – I have many bandannas from my dog and a friend’s.  Status:  In pieces.

6d         Black & White BOM – The BOM won’t finish until July, but when it’s done it will be finished in blue and hopefully go to DD.  Status:  Some blocks completed.

The obvious way to go is 6a the Bird Crewel.  I may just do that. 

6b is a ginormous project, so I hope to make some progress on it this month.  I want to lay everything out and see if I can get a pleasing design.  By rights, there are no more blocks to do; we’re down to making the top and quilting the danged thing.  Let’s aim to get the top figured out by June 16 so that I can buy backing when I go to get the last BOM blocks for 6d.

6c would be fun to get done, so let’s see how that one comes together when I take it out.  While I may not finish it this month, this may be one that just sort of stays out and it gets moved forward bit by bit.  No crime in that.

6d is well-timed.  June is the last pick-up of blocks, so I am good to go.  I have been sashing the blocks for finishing as I have been doing BOM blocks.  In April, I sashed months 1 through 4, and in May I did months 5 through 8.  This month, I think the goal will be to finish block 12 and get months 9 through 12 sashed.  Also Renee has to pick her room color by then, so then I can go any buy backing, border fabrics and the like.  She says that she most likely wants both colors in her room.  She picked a lovely blue and a lovely yellow and so she will get a quilt in black, white and the room color.  These 2 quilts need to be done by the time school starts back up, so while they will not finish in June, they have to finish soon.

A few updates on what is out and lying around.

1b         Christmas 2 BOM – This one is out and half the blocks have had their coping borders added.  I really want to just get the top done.  But I will not put it away; I will figure out a back and get it sandwiched and quilted and all of that.  Goal is done by my birthday!

1d         Red Strings – This project has evolved over time.  The 2 packages of die-cut hearts do not go together at all.  I am going through and making a quilt now for my Relay For Life team, so something will be done by June 22! 

2b         Huge Fence Rail – There’s a huge tuck in the front of the quilt (it was quilted backing-side up) and so I am ripping a lot to smooth that out.  Slowly but surely.  My goal is by the end of the summer.  Ripping is a fine car trip project.

2d         Yellow LCRR – This one is in progress.  I am quilting each block and then I will join them, using techniques from Marti Mitchell’s book.  Aiming for July.

4d         St. Pat’s LCRR – The top is done and I am dragging my feet on the pieced back.  And then I will drag my feet with sandwiching.  Goal is July.  This one is my April finish.

5b         Australia FQs – Sitting in the car waiting to have the binding hand-stitched down.  Will be done this weekend I hope!

Post script - Now that I have seen the quilts in the new Bonnie Hunter book, I'm so glad I never used the 33 hearts package!!! I have a new idea!

Suspense

I am leaving you all in suspense.  I did indeed finish the 16 string blocks quilt.  The binding was completed while driving 3 hours (each way) to a family event.

I need to take a pic of it and submit it to the UFO challenge to move down the list.  I'm #33 right now.  It's also my May finish.

I have lots of thoughts swirling around my mind right now.  I need to attend a sprinkle soon.  That's a baby shower for the second baby.  So I need to figure that out too.  Whee.

Friday progress

Hey remember that quilt I quilted last Friday?  Well, hey, guess what?  The binding is now attached and now it's ready for the handwork.  

Progress.  Yay!

I've also cut half of the strips needed for the Weed Whacker quilt.  I'm alternating tasks so I can keep working on stuff.  The Weed Whacker is the reward.

I of course have triple-planned the weekend with what I want to get done, but whatever gets done will still be progress.

Garden Progress and a BOM

Today I left work a bit on the early side.  Tomorrow I plan on leaving at noon.  Anyway, back to today.

I got home and relaxed, etc.  At 5 I decided to go make up my Buck a Block BOM blocks.  You get 2 blocks (one positive, one negative) per kit and I buy 2 kits per month.  So I had 4 blocks to make.  I got that done about 6.15 and I also realized I had NO leaders or enders ready and I am now officially dependent on them.  I swore I would never....never mind.

So I went upstairs and started dinner.  I decided at 7 that I would go out and garden and told everyone.  I did go out at 7.  The sun was blocked and the wind was really blowing, but it was not as hot as it could have been.  Renee and I worked on weeding while Ted worked on edging.  After about 15 minutes Renee bailed on us.  I continued to weed out the square foot bed.  The tomatoes were transplanted (not all of my transplants from the week before made it), and the weeds are gone.  I added plant food to the bed and Ted dumped in a 2 cubic foot bag of garden soil in there.  I raked it all up, leveled it out and called it a day.

So right now we have the tomato bed on the south side of the deck, 2 window boxes off the south deck railing which hold lettuce, 1 pot of mesclun lettuce, 1 pot of lemon verbena and basil, 1 pot of thyme and basil, 1 pot of spearmint, and a square foot bed ready to go.

So this weekend, I will see if there are any onion sets at Home Depot and plant my bell peppers and kale and sow some seeds.

I also decided on a quilty note (since this is a retreat weekend) that I am going to allow myself a mini-challenge of starting a new quilt while I work on my UFOs, which are all in a low point for me.  I will start the Weed Whacker quilt by Bonnie Hunter.  This is one of my pay it forward 2012 quilts and I have already set aside the fabrics.  So I guess my MAYDAY call is for my mojo.

Weekend Update

While I did a lot of gardening last week, the weekend proved a bit more balanced.

On Friday night, I got the purple strings quilted.  This was a huge achievement. 

Saturday was a run to the LQS and a break to go see the Avengers movie, which was a lot of campy fun.  I also iworked on months 5 – 8 on the BOM blocks, finishing them all with sashing.  I also dud 5 more yellow LCRR blocks, which take a long time to prep.  Man, a long time.

Anyway, Sunday was my GS meeting, so a lot of time went into that prep.  After we got home, we were under a thunderstorm warning so we went and hid out the in basement.  I went ahead and finished up the BOM blocks, trimmed the Austr quilt, prepped its binding and even attached it.  Wow!  And then I was super-tired and I went to bed.

On the gardening front, the tomato bed looks pretty pathetic.  I have no idea if anything will survive the transplanting.  After last night’s rain, we are in for a week of hot sun, which is arriving according to the farmers a month early.  So now it’s time to water twice a day.  I also still haven’t transplanted the last 3 things, but hopefully this week.

My goals by EOB Thursday:

Trim, prep and attach purple strings binding

BOM blocks

Some yellow LCRR blocks

And now I"m #35 on the list. Slow down, people!

UFO 2c - 16 string blocks

I took those 16 blocks, sliced them in half, put dark purple as the other half, made some HUGE HSTs with them and set 30 of them 5 x 6 for the quilt.  Took at last block and cut the triangles in half again and made those the corners of the borders, which were more of the purple fabric.

Then I sandwiched it and it sat in my living room for 2 weeks.

Tonight I quilted it.  One set of quilting on the diagonal.  Another for the vertical lines and lastly for the horizontal lines.  It took 2 hours and killed 2 spools of purple thread.  (I buy garage sale thread and use it up this way.)

I'm so excited!

Gardening

A week has elapsed. And what a week.


Sunday we went to the Sox game and of course Renee wiped out. Never a dull moment.

Monday I stayed home for the day and got 2 flower boxes planted with lettuce, 2 large pots planted with herbs and one small pot freshened up, as its contents were spearmint and it regenerated over the winter. I also cleaned up the back deck a bit and did some weeding in the front yard. I made lemonade on this day off, so to speak.

Tuesday, I went to work and then stayed and worked overtime until the migraine took me. I ate chocolate and within 5 minutes I was overcome. Grrr…..

Wednesday, I went to work and then left an hour early to head to a wake. The prior two days were spend convincing my father to go to the wake and coordinating getting him there.

Thursday, I went to work, had lunch with Ted for our 16th (!) anniversary, came home and we promptly gardened. Renee and I weeded out a bit of the square foot garden, and then we set our sights on the tomato bed. That involved removing every plant and weed, adding 2 cubic feet of dirt and food, mixing it all together and replanting the good stuff. We had dumped a lot of tomatoes into this bed last fall and we have about 18 tomato plants, some larger than others. We’ll see what made it through the process. Ted worked on the back bed, which involved figuring out where the retaining wall stones go and getting them level, making it straight, etc. He made great headway, using the leftover stones from the tomato bed. We were out there about an hour. While I finished planting everyone back in the bed, Ted and Renee cleaned up and then he watered everything while I got cleaned up. We rushed to the local ice cream shop for treats to celebrate. We had never been there and it was very good. It is 20 minutes away from our home. There are basically 2 local ice cream stands and we’ve tried the other one and I was unimpressed. I’ve tried like 3 times. This one was a homerun right from the start. Reminds me of Stop ‘n Chat, a memory of my young adulthood.

Today I am once again at work, but it is Friday! Yay!

No I didn’t sew at all, but once the garden is in and everything our there is tidy for the year, it goes into maintenance mode and then I can start sewing again. Tomorrow holds promise, as does Sunday.

So, my goals:

Attach binding to Australia quilt
Quilt all 20 yellow LCRR blocks
Quilt at least half of the purple strings blocks quilt
BOM stuff
Still aiming to have binding attached to 5 quilts by the end of Memorial Day weekend. 3 are doable and the last two may or may not make it.