Stashbusting Report

Okay I admit it – I was at the fabric store yesterday and if you read yesterday’s post you saw what somehow leaped into my possession. (I know, you are gasping in shock – I can hardly believe it myself). 🙂  And dang, I earned another gift certificate to use at the shop so I’ll have to go back. Oh the horror of it all.

So…something like 23 fqs for the Posey Pinwheels, backing fabric for that one (couple of yards), another 2 yards or so that was the end of the bolt for my asian fabric quilt.  I’ll get it all tallied and added to the spreadsheet later.  Oh well that’s the way it goes some days.

   This is the peacock I bought yesterday.  Isn’t he cute.  His head and tail feathers bobb in the breeze.  I’m debating if I really want to leave him outside.  He looked rather good standing sentry duty inside next to my front door.  I love his little “jewel” decorations.  But for now he’ll stay outside.  He needs some flowers to bright things up around him but haven’t made my trip to the greenhouses yet for spring flowers – maybe next weekend.

So far today I haven’t gotten to any sewing but that is going to change soon.  I’ve been busy baking and cooking up a storm in the kitchen.  Made some more orange chocolate chip scones, and then I had some rhubarba a coworker gave me to do something with.

  Lovely long thick stalks.  One of those stalks is more than a cup of rhubarb.  So I made a large pan of Ruby Razz Crunch — my favorite and a favorite of my coworkers – a rhubarb rasberry crisp with “crisp” on top and bottom for double the yumminess.  But still had some of the filling left over so mixed up some more crumb stuff and made a smaller pan I’ll stick in the freezer.   Then I had a bag of vidalia onions I had bought so have a batch of french onion soup simmering on the stove.   So much time has been spent messing up and cleaning up the kitchen but one final clean up, the crisp is nearly ready to come out of the oven, and the soup is nearly done simmering so I can get that in the fridge and freeze some (and maybe have a bit with a scone for a late lunch) and I can finally get to sewing.  

Never did get to cleaning out the closet but oh well – I resized the Posey Pinwheel block and figured out the the size of the pieces I need so I’m anxious to get a block made to see how it looks.  I have my priorities – and I’d better get busy.

Denise

Daisy design is now available

If you’ve already printed the main pattern pages for the May wallhanging – Bloomin’ Butterflies – it was missing the daisy pattern.

I’ve added it now as a separate page link on the main Year of Wallhanging page and here it is again. 

http://www.box.net/shared/nhftldb7uu

So remember you need both files in order to complete the design.

Denise

Dang! May wallhanging makers

Beverly just let me know the daisy design is missing.   Thanks! I forgot about it since it has to be printed separate from the center since it overhangs the borders.  I’ll add a second link to the Year of Wallhangings page for just that portion of the design so be sure you print two files in order to get the whole design.

Denise

Saturday Happenings

My plans for getting up and doing some cleaning….well they fell by the wayside.  Got a phone call to go out to breakfast instead so you know which one I chose!  Stopped to do a little shopping, including the quilt shop and the bookstore.  I found another fabric which I may use somehow in the border blocks of the asian themed quilt.

 

 

I bought the last the of bolt but don’t think there’s enough to do just plain borders (need to do some figuring since it’s a one way design) – so I may have to rework the pieced border I drew since the pieces would cut up the fabric more than I want.  But I’ll figure something out.  I think this is going to turn out to be a really big quilt tho which is fine – just not looking  forward to wrestling it as I machine quilt it.

 

I’ve had a print out of this design I previously posted pinned to my design wall for a week or more and the more I look at it the more I love it.  So while I was at the quilt shop, a whole bunch of batik fat quarters jumped into my arms that wanted to be included in this quilt.

  I need to resize the design smaller tho since those flowers are 24″ across and I really only want them 12″ across or so which means I need to do some redrawing.  But here’s what jumped unbidden into my hands.  Lots of pretty colors and the black batik they are laying on will be pretty for the black outline – it has a tiny seed print on it in shades of purple and blues.

Of course, this does not bode well for my stashbusting report! 🙂

Denise

Bloomin’ Butterflies

The May year of wallhangings pattern is now available after much wrangling with box.net to get it loaded.

Off to run an errand I forgot to do yesterday.  But I will tell you there was a trip to the quilt shop today (no I have done none of the cleaning I planned to get done since I was led astray by a friend who called to go out for breakfast and then we did a bit of shopping), so I’ll have some pretty fabrics to show you later once the camera battery finishes charging – along with “peacock” I just couldn’t walk out of another store without buying.  Now aren’t you curious about my peacock? 🙂

Denise

May Year of Wallhangings pattern

Thanks Janet P for giving me a nudge 🙂  I totally spaced on the May pattern.  Check back later to see if it’s posted.  I’m going to work on getting it ready right now.

Denise

A busy week

This week was a busy one – I can’t see my desk for the papers, boxes and files piled on and around it.  But hopefully next week I can get caught up.  But for now, I wont’ dwell on that mess but will concentrate on my mess at home.  I’ve got some cleaning planned for the weekend – maybe I need to clean the apartment since at this moment I can control that mess. 🙂  But time to break out the spring/summer clothes from their storage boxes and see what’s there and FINALLY pack away the winter clothes.  But tonight I straightened up the kitchen a bit – loaded the dishwasher and got it going, took care of the recycling, stopped for a few groceries on the way home, paid the bills – nothing too exciting but all stuff that needed to get done.

No sewing got done during most of the week – but I did buy a couple new yarns.  One a bulky one that is so incredibly soft – feels similar to chenille yarn but even softer.  But then discovered it won’t work for what I wanted it for — the pattern won’t show properly because of the fuzziness of the yarn.  I’m thinking  it will make a lovely soft and warm winter cowl (or two or three since I have a bit of it).    So off to the store again and this time found one I liked for the pattern I wanted to use  so have started on a shawl.  It takes forever to knit across a row because you cast on all the stitches along the top edge and then work towards the back bottom edge decreasing.  I’m also still working on the green cotton sweater – nearly ready to start the armhole decreases on the front.

Hopefully once the cleaning is done (or as done as I decide it will get for one weekend) 🙂 I hope to get back to the oriental quilt.  In the meantime, another design I’ve been playing with in EQ – drat another paperpieced one but it would be quicker to make that the other one at least.

This is the first version of it I did – I like it and it would be a good guy quilt done in these colors.

But then I played with it a bit more, coloring in other parts of the design a bit differently and I really like this one with the sort of flower petals of color that pop out but need to play with it a bit more since there’s a couple areas I would change yet.

Good grief – it’s 9 p.m. and once again the quilting elves have not made me dinner.  But I picked up some yummy looking croissants at the store so I think a turkey croissant sandwich will do.  So a bit of dinner and back to the shawl while I think about my plan of attack on tomorrow’s cleaning.

Denise

Tuesday play

No sewing tonight – I’m too tired to tangle with those long border strips.  So instead a little EQ play.  I keep going back to the center of this design. I just love the way it looks.  Only problem, it’s paperpieced and that’s not one of my favorite things to do — especially with all these pieces.  But I do really like this layout and if I find the right fabrics, I may just take the plunge and make it.

Denise

Another row added

The last section and vertical sashing is now added.

  I still need to add the vertical sashing sections to the left and right edges and then decide what I’m going to do about borders.  But I’m really liking it so far.

Time to find some dinner and then perhaps some knitting.

Design Wall Monday

The quilt I was working on yesterday is still on the design wall and I’ve got another divider section and row of blocks to add before I decide what I want to do about borders.  I may get them added yet tonight.

I remembered to take my camera with me today and got a shot of some of  the lovely tulips around the capitol building.

It looks like I got the photos just in time since they are starting to drop their petals now.  But don’t they scream spring!