WIP Wednesday 2/8 - still waiting around

Well, another week and still no baby. That means I've still been plugging along in the sewing room. It's a good distraction and a lot easier on the body than cleaning. :)

Here's what is new this week:

I started a Retro Flowers wall hanging for Samantha's room. I have loved this quilt pattern since I first saw it. And we just got the 'big girl' furniture for her room which left some bare walls. I have a bit of fabric left over from her bed quilt so I'm using them to make a small version of this quilt to hang in there. These blocks are fairly time consuming with a lot of cutting and squaring but totally worth it!

Still in progress:


I decided to end the X block creation and pieced all of them together. This is probably the busiest quilt I've ever made. I want to do a solid double border on this to calm it down. I probably won't get out to the LQS until after the baby though so this is temporarily done.

I also started piecing my scrappy hourglass blocks into larger blocks. That way it won't be a nightmare of hundreds of little blocks when I finally finish the individual blocks. And I can also get a sense of how big it is becoming. The trick is making these blocks random. I seemed to be pulling all the same colors!

I finished putting together all the quarter square triangles for my version of this Red Pepper Quilt.  I used all the charms from Kati's Color Wheel Charm Swap.  I'm sure mine is going to be much smaller than the RPQ version. Now I need to decide on the layout. Here's my first pass. What do you think? Should I mix up all the colors? Right now it's just hurting my eyes.

And lastly, I've been attempting machine applique on my Dresdens. It looks okay, but I might still give hand applique a try and see if I like it better. Once I get a few done I'll do a few layouts of sashing options.

Waiting for quilting:
Double Wedding Ring
Kitchen Windows



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WIP Wednesday - February 1st

Wow, February 1st?!  Alright, let's get to it.

Finishes:

I finally got my backing done for the Double Wedding Ring. Though I won't be doing any quilting until post baby (basting is a problem!). I may send this off to the quilter.

I also finished the Kitchen Windows top. You are only getting teaser pictures though. I couldn't get it to hang temporarily for photos and it was too cold, I really didn't want to go outside for pictures!


I could use some quilting ideas on this one. Right now I'm just thinking wavy line quilting across the short side?


In progress:

I managed to get done all 12 of my dresdens for the Scrappy Plate Club. Now I'm just waiting for the next set of directions. :)

Finished some more of the quarter square triangles for my color wheel charm swap quilt.

Lots more hourglasses for my scrappy quilt. I'm having a problem with all these scrappy quilts. The scraps never end, how do you decide when to stop? Right now this is still a pretty small quilt, but I feel like this one could be never ending!

And a whole bunch of blocks for my x-block quilt. This brings my total number of blocks to 72 so I'm going to start piecing them! I think I'm done making the blocks - woot woot!

I also did my 3rd free motion quilting attempt (I followed Leah Day's 2nd Quilt-a-long). My motion was a lot better on this one.

But when you look at it closely, I still have some tension issues. You can see how spikey it is. I have my tension at 10 (as high as it goes). So I guess I need to start playing with my needle and thread combos. I have a couple more resources to watch/read so hopefully that will help.

As usual, I'm linking up with Freshly Pieced. Head over and add yours to the linky party!

WIP Wednesday 1/25/12

First off, I have to admit there was not a lot of sewing done this week. I was cleaning and prepping the nursery and had a lot of my scrapbooking stuff stashed there. I found a whole stack of photos that I never did anything with.

Since I've started quilting I now use regular photo albums that have space to write in rather than scrap booking.  These photos somehow were in the middle time wise of all the photos in my albums. So I couldn't put them in the photo albums chronologically. They would however fit in my scrapbooks. So I hauled everything out and actually did a whole bunch of pages (about 20!).

I have to say, I think quilting has helped with my scrapbooking. I was much more confident with my color choices and design decisions. And since I was only going to use what I had on hand it was much easier to put together pages. I also think I had a little of the stash/hoard problems with paper that I now have with fabric. And it felt good to let go of that and just use anything!

Yesterday, I finally got to put it all away and get back out the sewing machine. I was definitely itching to sew! I started with another attempt at free motion quilting. After all the tips and tricks I was given after my last post and visiting The Free Motion Quilting Project I was ready to try again.

The pink thread was what I started with and I still had tension issues. Thankfully the bobbin ran out because I wound up re-threading with Aurifil and had much better success. I had to put my tension all the way to 10, but it looks much better. Here's the close up.

Still need to work on my movement, but at least part of the battle has been helped.

So before I put away my sewing things early in the week I did get a few things done. I started laying out my Kitchen Windows quilt.  I'm excited to get this one put together!

I also got done 8 of my Dresdens done for the Scrappy Plate Club. I think I've decided to back them with Moda White and then use this raspberry color as the sashing. Thoughts?? The centers will be pulled from the fabrics in the plates I think.

And I also joined a small I Spy swap being hosted by Kati. We each send in charms from 4 fabrics. These are my initial four. I've got some others pulled in anyone is unhappy with these!

I think that is everything I got done this week. I'm looking forward to pulling out my other projects today.

I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday with Freshly Pieced. Head over and add your projects to the list.

Work In Progress Wednesday

Another edition with crappy photos. Sorry guys. If only the sun would come out.  Here's what's going on this week.

Finished: Charity quilt. Again, waiting on the sun to take some real photos of this before I send it off. I'll do a full post with all details when I get those photos.

In progress: Made some more center strips for my X Blocks. I'll have to lay this one out soon and see how big it is.

Got a bunch more scrappy hourglasses finished. These have made a good leader and ender project. And I need a bigger container for these! They are only 3.5" finished so I am going to need a LOT of them.

Which reminds me, where do people get those giant zippie bags? Every once in a while I get one in a swap or bee and I always wonder where they come from. I know my grocery store doesn't have anything bigger than gallon size.

New: 
I started putting together my dresdens for the Bunny Hill Scrappy Plate Club.  Instead of going scrappy, I used this color palate from Design Seeds and pulled a bunch of FQ's. I realized my scraps were basically too small for this.

But because there are so many colors in this one, I think the Dresdens look pretty scrappy anyway! I also wish I had chosen some brighter colors. These are feeling a little dull to me. But, I've cut all the wedges so I'll keep going on this one.

And I finally started cutting my Kitchen Windows quilt. I'm way more excited about these colors! I've been hanging on to that Sanctuary fabric for a long time.

Stalled:
bibs
backing for Double wedding ring.

total WIP: 7

Head over to Freshly Pieced to link up your WIP's with me.

WIP Wednesday 2012 edition

It's been a while since I've done a WIP Wednesday and I've missed it. I'm definitely a list person. At any given time I have at least 3 lists going. So it definitely helps me to list out all my works in progress. Here's what's I'm currently working on:

Finished tops:

Double Wedding Ring - no photos yet. I have to decide how or who will quilt this one.

This is a charity quilt I'm making. I'll post more about it later. I just finished the top and need hubby to help me spray baste it.  The belly is way too big for pin basting right now!

In progress:

I've been making these with my Color Wheel Charm Swap charms. I decided to play with the color values rather than the rainbow aspect. Although we'll see. I haven't started laying them out yet. The rainbow may still come into play.

My Sew Modern Bee blocks arrived for this month and I've got them all laid out. Starting to sew. This month most of the work is already done, it's just assembly. So I figure I'll get them out and done quickly.

 And as I posted about the other day, I'm working on making more of these X string blocks. These were my Sew Modern Bee blocks. They are only about 6 inches so I need quite a few of them. I haven't decided how big this will be.

And the scrappy hourglass blocks are always in progress. They are really  little so I'm definitely going to need  a lot of them. I'm not sure this will be done in time for the Scrap Attack Quilt Along.

These fabrics have been sitting aside for a long time. That's a FQ stack of Sanctuary and some additional prints and solids I've chosen to go with it. And I've been wanting to make Elizabeth Hartman's Kitchen Windows pattern. I'm hoping to get to cut into those today.

I pulled some fabrics for the Bunny Hill Plate Club based on this Design Seeds color inspiration. I need to look at them a while before I start cutting them though and fine tune my choices. They were all straight from stash so I'm excited to use up some stash!


Finally on my list with no photos is a case for my new iPod Touch. I found this great tutorial that I hope to follow. I've pulled some Neptune (surprise) and I'll let you know how the tutorial goes!


I think that's everything. At least I hope so. That gives me 9 total WIPs at the moment. I'm linking up with Lee at Freshly Pieced. Go add your WIP's to the linky party.

Work In Progress Wednesday: Pre-thanksgiving edition

Ahhh, the day before Thanksgiving. This year I'm just relaxing because we are going to my in-laws. I usually prepare the meal here so I'm usually in pie-baking mode. Well, there may be pies this weekend in addition to a mini-thanksgiving meal. After all, I love leftovers and any excuse for dessert is a good one. Hope you all are getting ready to enjoy some family time.

Here's what's been going on in my sewing room.


Finished this week:
Pink Flannel Nightgown

In Progress:

The binding is going on the Aviary Birdbath quilt. This should be on my WIP list for a little while I would think.

I put together my leftover blocks from the Fast Forward Baby Quilt (which needs a new name) for the backing. Just have to finish the large fabric chunks and I can send it for quilting. I've decided to cross this off my list and send it away instead. I think it needs some more skilled quilting than I can give it.

I finally got it together and finished the sewing for all my bedroom curtains - wohoo! I am marking the grommet holes and once those are put in I can hang them. I've also taken pictures for a tutorial, so hopefully that will be up soon. Just waiting on hubby to hang them so I can get that "finished" photo.

I've started a scraps hourglass quilt. I've been using this as a leader and ender to my sewing and amazingly the blocks are getting put together quickly this way. This will definitely be on the wip list for a long time. These blocks are pretty small!

The gifts have finally made it on my WIP list. These will have to remain somewhat secret until they've been given. This one is obviously a christmas themed present!

And this one? Well, it's some Neptune. ;)

And you may have already seen this photo of the progress I made on my double wedding ring arcs at our PMQG sewing night.  I haven't done anymore since then though.

Stalled this week:
X-quilt - need to make a few more blocks
do. Good October quilt - still waiting on  a few blocks
Teacher gifts for my daughter
apron
baby scrapbook album
nursery decorations

Total WIP this week:  lucky 13



As usual, I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced. Stop over and link up your own!