A Lost Weekend and a Failed One Monthly Goal

Sometimes the weekends don't go to plan, this one didn't on the stitching front.  We had Friday off, but there were some household chores that really needed to get done. So it was very late afternoon before I made it to the sewing room.  The Scientist in Training came home for the weekend, so spending time with her was definitely in the plans. My Guy needed help with the yard work Saturday morning, which resulted in a lost afternoon due to a Benadryl induced coma after my allergies kicked in big time.  And Sunday was pretty much spent with the SIT before she had to head back to college.  It was after 3 before I headed to the sewing room (at least I escaped another allergy induced coma). 

So my weekend stitching plans didn't work out so well.  There were two goals for the weekend, get caught up on the Meadow Mist Designs Mosaic Mystery blocks and get the Twinkle star blocks sewn together (that was the September One Monthly Goal). Neither happened, but at least there was progress.   I've managed to get about half of the house blocks done for the Mosaic Mystery September Link Up.

Mosaic Mystery
The Meadow Mist Designs 2019 Mystery Quilt Along

The next clue comes out on Thursday. My Guy is leaving on a business trip today, so I'm hoping there will be time the next couple of nights to get all caught up on these blocks before the next clue comes out.  

Getting the Twinkle Star blocks all sewn together ready for borders was this month's One Monthly Goal. But I didn't plan very well, so that didn't happen.  I needed to get Storm at Sea off the design wall, which happened a bit later in the month than anticipated.  Secondly, I didn't think about all the matching seams that would need to be pinned. 

There are 5 places were the seams need to match.  So that's a lot of pinning.  Even though the OMG didn't get done, I was able to go from this stack of blocks, 

to having the top two rows sewn together and an additional 5 rows partially assembled. 

Twinkle Stars

Tutorial by Andrea Feldbush of Soscrappy

I'm happy with the progress even though I didn't meet either goal.  September has been a rough month on the personal front, news that's not mine to share has made life a bit stressful and uncertain.  Unfortunately, the other shoe drops in October. Fingers crossed every thing works out and life evens out after the middle of the month.  

Linking up with:

Meadow Mist Designs Mosaic Mystery September Linky Party
Monday Making
Monday Design Wall

Week 39 of 2019: Stitching Stuff

Autumn is here, but it isn't.  Our temps haven't gone down much and everything is still green, so it certainly doesn't look like fall here.  It's still mostly summer.  While others in the US are looking at lots of snow soon.  It's been a weird year weather wise.  The warmer weather has affected my stitching time, we are have lots more yard work then we normally would this time of year.  How are you doing at balancing the freaky weather with your stitching time?  

I've been able to get in my 15 minutes fairly easily. The yard work has impacted the amount of stitching time on the weekends but I'm still able to work in at least 15 minutes. So that doesn't show in my weekly numbers. 

15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
15 minute days/Sept = 21/21 days
15 minute days/2019 = 243/271
Success rate = 89.67%

I'm almost back up to 90%, which was my goal for the year.  We'll see if I can actually make it. 

Though I've been doing a bit of stitching, I've used up so little stash that it just doesn't make sense to put out a stash report this week. At least there's nothing coming in this week. 

I don't know if it's the warmer weather or if it's just the right time of year, but our orchids are blooming again. 

I love that deep purple color.  

How did your stitchy week work out?  

1. Julie in GA 2. Chrisknits 3. Jocelyn and her Pesky Dresden Circles :)

4. Meloney 5. Shasta @ High Road Quilter 6. DawnyK

7. Amanda

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Scrappy Stuff

There's not been a Rainbow Scrap Challenge post on my blog since last March!  I knew there hadn't been many this year, but none in almost 6 months?  When I think about it, there are a few obvious reasons.  Both my personal and my professional schedules have been a bit nuts this year.  I don't have as much time to draft blog posts, I've chosen to stitch rather than get photos together and write.  Plus this year's RSC project, Wild and Goosey, isn't coming together very quickly.  Those little blocks take a while to get done. This is all I've gotten done so far this year.

Modified Wild and Goosey
Based on Bonnie Hunter's pattern in Addicted to Scrap

I just finished cutting a bunch of purple scraps for this month's color, but don't have any purple blocks started.

But there are some purple scrappy blocks back up on the design wall.  These are the blocks from the 2015 Rainbow Scrap Challenge. 

Twinkle Stars

Tutorial by Andrea Feldbush of Soscrappy

It's way past time to get these into a finished flimsy. 

So I've got two rows back up on the design wall and have started sewing the blocks together.  I'm excited to get this quilt to the finished stage.  My One Monthly Goal was to get all the blocks sewn together.  Hopefully I can do that by Monday!  

Linking up with the weekly RSC linky party and on Sunday with Oh Scrap.   

Stormy Stuff

Temps have cooled off about 10 degrees to the mid 80s. Seems this year we are very gradually easy into autumn.  We hung out with the Scientist in Training in Tulsa on Saturday.  Sunday was rainy and yucky, a good day to stay in and sew.  My project slate hasn't changed from last week. 

The blue and yellow pieces are for the Simply Sensational Summer Scrap mystery quilt which has already had it's reveal. I'm playing catch up with that one.  The purple and beige are for clue 2 of the Mosaic Mystery quilt along that started last month.  The bit of blue in the lower right is a Wild and Goosey block.  The white strips at the top are for the next border on Storm at Sea.  If I'm working on the next border for SAS, that means the pieced borders are all on. So it was time for a quick trip to the master bedroom to ensure the final borders will provide enough drop to cover the mattress. 

Storm at Sea
Paper Piecing Class by Carrie Randell (Quilter's Hideaway)

I'm really happy with how it looks on the bed.  The plan is for another 7" of border, one narrow white and a wider dark blue.  That should provide ample length/width to cover the mattress. Our current quilt (peaking out from under SAS) is just a tad short.  Drives My Guy nuts when he's making the bed. 

I'm taking Friday off, so maybe SAS will become a finished flimsy this weekend.  Or maybe not. Trudy is done with the quilting on Vintage Dresses, so that may be back ready to bind this weekend.  Or I really should get going on stitching all the Twinkle Stars together as that's my September One Monthly Goal. The blocks aren't even up on the design wall as yet, so I need to get a move on with that project.  

Linking up with the usual Monday show and tells:

Monday Making
Monday Design Wall
Main Crush Monday

Week 38 of 2019: Stitching and De-Stashing

Our temps finally dropped from the mid to low 90's to the mid to low 80's this weekend.  That made for a pleasant afternoon to hang out at the Greek Festival and sit on the patio at the coffee shop helping the Scientist in Training study for her chemistry exam.  Consequently there wasn't much time for stitching yesterday, but I got my 15 minutes in right before we went to bed.  It was a nice way to wind down from the drive home.  When you have to sneak in your 15 minutes in a packed schedule, does it stress you out or calm you down? 

It was a busy week, with stuff going on several evenings. It was nice to have those 15 minutes to pin a border on Storm at Sea or cut a few scraps for the Wild and Goosey blocks. 

15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
15 minute days/Sept = 21/21 days
15 minute days/2019 = 236/265
Success rate = 89.39%

Even with a busy week, there was a bit of progress in the sewing room.  Since several nights were just 15 minutes, the stash report is still a little anemic this week. 

Fabric out this week = 0.41 yards
Fabric out for 2019 = 37.07 yards
More fabric in than out

At least there was no fabric in this week.  I've been stitching on a few mystery projects where I've not been counting the fabric going in to the parts and pieces. Once I start assembling the blocks, my outgoing stash numbers should start looking much, much better.  

So how did your stitchy week work out?  

1. Chrisknits 2. Sensational September, SAL 3. Meloney

4. Julie in GA 5. DawnyK 6. Amanda

7. Shasta @ High Road Quilter 8. Christina's Handicrafts

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Just Stitching Stuff

Weekends are just way too short and the weeks too busy at the moment.  But I did enjoy my afternoon/evening of stitching yesterday.  At least once I got over the nasty surprise that the thunderstorms passing through last Thursday took out my sewing room TV, which meant no watching the first race in the NASCAR playoffs.  (I did get to watch the race via the computer, after navigating our cable provider's and NBC's apps. It's amazing what you can do on the computer these days if you have the right apps). 

Once the TV dilemma was resolved there was some progress on a bit of this and that. 

The blue and yellow strips to the left are for the Sensational Summer Scrap quilt, under those are some 4 patches for the same project and the pieced borders for Storm at Sea.  In the pinned pile on the right are a stack of Wild and Goosey blocks, diamonds for the SAS pieced border and at the very top of the photo is clue 1 for the Mosaic Mystery over at Meadow Mist Designs.  I just can't work on one project at at time.  

By the end of the evening, all the SAS border pieces were finished, the bottom border needs to be assembled and the top border is ready to sew to the rest of the top. 

Storm at Sea
Paper Piecing Class by Carrie Randell (Quilter's Hideaway)

My apologies for the slightly wonky photo. The quilt is almost too big for the design wall and it's hard to get all of it in one shot.  The current plans call for two more strip borders. Those last two will go faster than the pieced borders did, so maybe SAS will be a finished flimsy by the end of the month.  

Linking up with the usual Monday linkies.

Monday Making
Design Wall Monday

Week 37 of 2019 - More Stitching and Stashing

It's been another busy week, topped with a hectic Saturday.  I'm hoping that Sunday is much more relaxed. Fitting in even just 15 minutes of stitching time each day has been challenging.

On top of the busy schedule, the autumn allergy season is here. It's a few weeks early due to the wet summer and it's miserable.  Evening naps to dissipate the sinus headaches have taken another bite out of my evening stitching time. Even with that I did manage to work in my 15 minutes every day last week.

15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
15 minute days/Sept = 14/14 days
15 minute days/2019 = 229/257 days
Success rate = 89.11% 

My success rate has been below 89% since June, hopefully I can keep up the momentum to get back to 90% in the next month and keep it there till the end of the year. 

So things are looking up on finding time to stitch, that's not the case with my stash management goals.  There was this Halloween quilt pattern that caught my eye. I had such fun making a Halloween quilt last year, I couldn't resist. Then of course I had to order fabric to make it.  So this showed up in the mail earlier this week. 

Pattern is Witches Night Out by It's Sew Emma. Top fat quarter bundle is Gone Batty
 by Wilmington Prints. Bottom bundle is Raven's Claw from Northcott.

Unfortunately, my current project slate and limited stitching time isn't using a lot of fabric, so the outgoing numbers are still a bit anemic. 

Fabric out this week = 0.32 yards
Fabric out for 2019 = 36.66 yards
More fabric in than out

That was my stitching and stashing week. How did yours go? 

1. Chrisknits 2. Meloney

3. Julie in GA 4. Shasta @ High Road Quilter

5. DawnyK 6. Amanda

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Bordering Storms and Colorful Flying Geese

The weekend was both productive and relaxing.  We didn't go anywhere, but did get to some yard work and deep house cleaning.  But with the chores limited to the morning hours, that still left some afternoon time for stitching.  

Storm at Sea now has two of the pieced borders attached. 

 Storm at Sea
Paper Piecing Class by Carrie Randell (Quilter's Hideaway)

I'm happy with the pieced borders so far.  I've gotten a reasonable start on the top pieced border.  So this project is definitely moving along. 

Some time was spent trimming up scraps to use for the Wild and Goosey blocks. 

I've been working adding to the blue, yellow and green triangles for the last week.  Purple scraps were added to the list as that's this month color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  I'm going to need to go in search of more orange and teal scraps soon.  The Wild and Goosey blocks are small, but they sure use up a lot of pieces per block. 

 Modified Wild and Goosey
Based on Bonnie Hunter's pattern in Addicted to Scraps

Here's the set of blocks currently under construction.  I need to start a green one and a purple one.  But more paper piecing templates need to be printed before that can happen.  

That was how I spent my stitching time this weekend. Hopefully I'll have time to work on Storm at Sea and be able to finish off those pieced borders this week. 

Linking up with the Love Laugh Quilt for Monday Making.  

Week 36 of 2019: Stitching and De-Stashing

The week was fast, but thankfully the weekend has allowed for a slower pace.  Sometimes I find that it's harder to make my way to the sewing room when there's no time pressure.  I can spend another hour on the computer or reading or whatever.  Then before I know it it's bedtime and I haven't even walked into the sewing room.  When the schedule is full, it forces me to consciously allocate my sewing time.  How about you? If you have lots of time do you have problems directing yourself to the sewing room to get in at least your 15 minutes for the day?

Even with the busy week and the attack of the lazies yesterday, I still managed to work in at least 15 minutes of stitching stuff every day this week.

15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
15 minute days/Sept = 7/7 days
15 minute days/2019 = 222/250 days
Success rate = 88.8%

The de-stashing rate went up for this week.

Fabric out this week = 0.36 yards
Fabric out for 2019 = 36.34 yards
More fabric in than out

I'm hoping to hit 60 yards out for the year. I need to get busy to meet that unofficial objective. 

How had did your stitchy stuff go this week?  Did you get an attack of the lazies or did you burn the midnight oil working on a few projects? 

1. Julie in GA 2. Chrisknits 3. MaryR @ UrbanQuilter

4. Meloney 5. DawnyK 6. Amanda

7. Shasta @ High Road Quilter 8. Christina's Handicrafts

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September To Do List

It's September, so only 4 months left in the year.  It's definitely time to decide what might possibly get finished this year. The first step in that process is to decide what's going to be this month's One Monthly Goal. 

Vintage Dresses is ready to go out for quilting, but it likely won't come back for a few weeks, so finishing that project will likely wait till next month.  Looking at my 2019 quilt plan, the Red, White and Blue Stars quilt is up next. 

Red, White and Blue Stars

But I promised the Scientist in Training two quilts for her writing group buddies that are finishing up college this year.  In that case, I really should bump the Twinkle Stars project up to the top of the list. 

Twinkle Stars

Tutorial by Andrea Feldbush of Soscrappy

It would be faster to finish anyway as the blocks don't need sashing they just need to be sewn together.  So that's going to be the September One Monthly goal, get all the blocks sewn together and then decide if it needs a border or two.  

What else is on the to do list for September?  

Get Storm at Sea to the finished flimsy stage
Finish Clue 1 for the Mosaic Mystery Quilt
Make the 4-patches for the Simple Sensational Summer Scrap Quilt
Make more Wild and Goosey blocks (adding in purple)
Use On Ringo Lake as my leaders and enders project

That's a pretty good list for this month.  If I stick with this plan, there's a good possibility I'll finish at least 3 more quilts before the end of the year.  That would be nice as my PhD in 2019 program has pretty much stalled out. 

No changes noted in August. There is some good news there, at least there are no new starts on the list. Fingers crossed I can make at least half my goal before the end of the year. 

Good luck with your quilty plans for the month.

A Day Late: The August One Monthly Goal

Happy Labor Day for those in the US and Canada. Other than the trip to urgent care for the Scientist in Training, it's been a very quiet and restful holiday weekend.  I've even managed to get in a fair amount of stitching time, though not enough to meet my August One Monthly Goal.  

The plan was to get Vintage Dresses prepped for quilting.  Cleaning off stray threads and doing the final pressing has always been my least favorite part of finishing off a quilt. I tried really hard to get it done before the end of August, I'd gotten this far by midnight Saturday. 

I'd almost finished removing the stray threads from row four, but still had row 5 to do.  Even though I didn't make the August deadline, it was all pressed and folded by Sunday afternoon. 

The backing is so much easier to finish, that got done last weekend.  So now it's ready to go out for quilting.  Even though it didn't get done by the deadline, making it my August OMG ensured it got done.  

Before starting the clean up, I did finally get Vintage Dresses staged for it's finished flimsy shot. 

 Vintage Dresses by Charise Randell

This was such a fun quilt to make. I'm going to miss working on it.  

Now that Vintage Dresses is off the cutting table, it was time to get back to the borders for the Storm at Sea quilt.  

Storm at Sea
Paper Piecing Class by Carrie Randell (Quilter's Hideaway)

The left pieced border is almost ready to stitch on.  I've got a ways to go on the right one.  The top and bottom borders aren't even started yet.  Finishing more border blocks is on the agenda for today. 

Also on the agenda for today is to decide what's going to be September's One Monthly Goal.  That's it for me today, linking up with Monday Making and Design Wall Monday.

Week 35 of Stitching and Stashing

If you live in the US, I hope you are enjoying your three day holiday weekend.  Ours got off to a rocky start with a text Friday afternoon that the Scientist in Training's car wouldn't start.  So My Guy coached her and her roommate over the phone on how to jump start a vehicle. Then yesterday the poor girl had to make another trip to urgent care for a very nasty bug bite that looked to be getting infected. It was looking much better when she went to bed last night.  Hopefully the rest of the weekend will be smooth sailing with lots of hang out time with the SIT and some good stitching time as well.  How did your efforts go to fit in 15 minutes of stitching time each day this week of August? 

In spite of the end of the week drama, I did manage to get in some stitching time every day this last week. 

15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
15 minute days/August = 29/31 days
15 minute days/2019 = 215/243
Success rate = 88.48%

I've been hovering right around 88% for most of the summer. My goal for the year is 90%, so I'm going to need to work on my consistency.  

The stash end of things hasn't gone to plan either.  I won a gift certificate from The Fat Quarter Shop from the 2019 Finish Along back in April and decided it was about time to use it. I've noticed that I'm really, really deficient in teals, so I added a fat quarter stack of that color. 

   
Then also added a fat quarter bundle of Butterfly Blooms (Lunn Studios for Robert Kaufman Fabrics)

No plans for this stack as yet. The teals are going to be used for my Wild and Goosey project.  

Unfortunately there's not nearly as much going out as there has been coming in.

Fabric out this week = 0.09 yards
Fabric out for 2019 = 35.98
More fabric in than out  

The sewing room time this week was spent getting Vintage Dresses ready for quilting.  Which means there wasn't much time spent actually stitching seams. I'm hoping to do much better on the stash busting front in September.  

Did you manage to fit in 15 minutes of stitching time each day?  

1. Chrisknits 2. Meloney 3. Julie in GA

4. Mary-kay 5. karen 6. Jennifer in Indy

7. Shasta @ High Road Quilter

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