To Do Tuesday for the Week of 10/27/2020

Just a few days left in October. November will definitely be underway when we make out next week's list. But I should focus on the here and now to come up with this week's list. Before doing that, I should take a quick detour to look at the progress on last week's to do list. 

Weekly To Do List for 10/20/2020

• Frolic: Prep for quilting and mail - progress
• Red, White & Blue Stars: finish sashing the blocks
• Morewood Mystery: Continue to make October's blocks
• Unity: Make more HSTS and blocks for clue 4

It wasn't a stellar week on the stitching front.  The only progress last week was on getting Frolic ready to send out for quilting.  The trip to my mother's took up a couple of days and work took a bite out of a couple of evenings.  Some weeks are just going to be that way.  Hopefully this next week will be much more productive.  

Weekly To Do List for 10/27/2020

Frolic: Prep for quilting and mail

All that's left to de-thread and press is the bottom and side borders.  So just one more evening should be enough to finish this off.  I'm off work two days this week, so it shouldn't be hard to find time to finish packing the quilt up and get it to the post office.  

Christmas Mystery: Trim quilt, make label and binding

This quilt came back from Trudy last week. The quilting looks great. So it's ready for trimming up and binding.  I've been working on the label off and on since the quilt was sent out for quilting.  I may have a few more tweaks, but the label is close to done. The stash will need to be raided for a suitable binding. This to do should be pretty easy to mark off. 

Red, White and Blue Stars: Continue sashing blocks

There was no progress on the stars last week. Hopefully I can get the rows all assembled this week.  

Morewood Mystery: Work on the October blocks

Another project with no progress last week. The next clue comes out Thursday, so I'm likely going to fall behind on this mystery.  

Unity: Continue with clue 4 HSTs and blocks

Unity, 2020 Bonnie Hunter Sew-In-Place Quilt Along

Another project where there was no progress last week.  Just a few more friendship stars are needed to finish off the last border in clue 4.  The border's not going to get done, but all I'm looking for on this to do is progress.  

That's my list for this week. Hopefully I'll make better progress on it than I did on last week's list.  Linking up with Home Sewn by Us for To Do Tuesday.  

Fourth Finally Finished

It's always a bit surprising how quickly we can slide from the cooler days of fall in early October to the miserably cold days of late October. Parts of the state will get freezing rain tonight, we'll just get the cold and wet weather.  It's a good thing the October One Monthly Goal got done early in the week.  

The binding on Storm at Sea was finished last Monday.  But photos didn't happen till yesterday.  Here's the finished quilt. 

 Storm at Sea (Streams)
Paper Piecing Class by Carrie Randell (Quilter's Hideaway)
Started:  March 9, 2019  Finished: October 19, 2020

I'm really happy with how it came out. The quilting is a swirly wavy line. 

Trudy did a great job with the quilting. The binding took longer because, one it's a big quilt and two, I went with a two fabric binding. I really wanted to use the dark blue fabric as the binding, but there wasn't enough left over from the borders. The two tone binding was the best solution to that problem.    

So there was an extra step of sewing the two binding strips together before stitching to the quilt.  

You can see the dark blue just at the very edge of the back. Ensuring a bit of the dark blue was visible from the back meant you couldn't see the light blue from the front. I can't claim that a two tone binding is one of my favorite things, but it's a good thing to know how to do if you are short on your preferred binding fabric. 

After the photographing was done, Storm at Sea (Streams) was put to good use as the new quilt for our bed. 

My Guy likes it. This quilt is a bit bigger than the old one, so it's easier to make the bed.  That may be My Guy's favorite part of the new quilt.  

Linking up with the One Monthly Goal finished linky party. Also linking up with the normal Monday show and tell posts: Monday Making and Design Wall Monday. 

Stitching Stuff: Week 43 of 2020

It wasn't a great week on the stitching front.  End of year projects have picked up and it's been a struggle to get home on time. Thankfully no real late nights, just enough to really sap my stitching mojo. Hopefully as the weather has started to turn colder, your stitching mojo has been going up. 

Most evenings I only had the energy for 15 minutes. 

• 15 minute days/week = 6/7 days
• 15 minute days/Oct = 23/24 days
• 15 minute days/2020 = 267/298
• Success rate = 89.60%

I took a day off last week to go visit my mother.  I hadn't been home since July, so it was definitely time. The Scientist in Training showed up Friday evening after her last midterm. We had a nice couple of girls days, just hanging out and doing just a bit of shopping. I didn't get in any stitching time that first day, but that's OK.  I'm still doing well on my 2020 goal to stitch at least 85% of the days this year.  

So how did your stitchy week go. Were you able to find at least 15 minutes to move a project along or start something new? 

1. Julie in GA 2. Chrisknits 3. Meloney 4. karen

5. Sherrie 6. Michelle 7. Loulee (Manxgirl) 8. Amanda

9. DawnyK 10. Shasta @ High Road 11. Quilting Gail

Powered by... Mister Linky's Magical Widgets.

To Do Tuesday for the Week of 10/20/2020

There are only 10 weeks left in 2020.  Just 10 more to do lists left for the year, just 10 weeks to make progress on this year's goals. The weeks always seem to go faster this time of year. So it's definitely time to decide on the priorities for the rest of the year.  Before looking ahead to this next week, how did week 11 eleven go? 

Weekly To Do List for 10/13/2020

• Red, White and Blue Stars: Continue sashing blocks ✔
• Morewood Mystery: Work on October blocks ✔
• Unity: Make HSTs and blocks for Step 4 ✔
• Strom at Sea: hand stitch binding down ✔
• Frolic: prep for quilting, progress

Not a bad week, four and of five to do's with check marks and progress on the last item.  Four to do's seems to be my sweet spot. That fifth one is just hard to finish in a typical week. 

So what's the focus for this week?  

Weekly To Do List for 10/20/2020

Frolic: Prep for quilting and mail

 Frolic, 2019 Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt

About three quarters of the quilt has been well pressed and de-threaded.  The backing is already pressed, cleaned up and packaged for shipping.  It shouldn't take much longer to get Frolic prepped. It should be easy to get this done and to the post office before the end of the week. 

Red, White and Blue Stars: Finish sashing the blocks

 Red, White and Blue Stars, self designed setting

Just three more sashing strips to make for the center of the top.  It won't take a lot of time to finish assembly. Then it will be time for borders, but that's for next week's to do list. 

Morewood Mystery: Continue to make blocks for October

Progress has been really slow on these blocks. My focus has been on getting the Red, White and Blue quilt sashed.  There's only two more weeks left in the month, so I need to bump up the effort on these blocks or I'll be behind when November's clue comes out.  

Unity:  Make more HSTs and blocks for Clue 4

Progress on Unity has been slow as well.  I just need one more border strip to finish off step 4.  Not sure that will happen this week.  The goal is to just keep the project moving.  

That's the list for this week. I'm back down to just four items. Hopefully I can check them off before next week.  Linking up with Home Sewn by Us  for the Weekly To Do List.

Creeping up on Finishes

Not much happened in the sewing room on  Saturday.  We met up with the Scientist in Training in Tulsa to switch out cars. The front end damage from that accident in August was finally fixed. She was thrilled to get her car back. She's been driving My Guy's 21 year old Jeep.  To be honest My Guy's feeling was mutual, he was just as glad to get his car back as the SIT was. It turned cold and rainy on Sunday.  Perfect sewing room weather and I made the most of it.  

I had hoped to finish getting the binding on Storm at Sea, but that didn't happen. So no finish to show off today. There's another 50 something inches left to stitch. I'm off work this afternoon, so fingers crossed I'll have time to finish it today.  

There is some visible progress on the Red, White and Blue Stars quilt.

 Red, White and Blue Stars, setting self designed

Just one more row of sashing strips to make and I can concentrate on getting this stitched together. 

The post office must be having equipment issues. It took a week for my payment for quilting the Christmas Mystery to reach Trudy because at some point the envelope was completely mangled. That quilted project should be on it's way back today. The plan was to have Frolic ready to ship out once the Christmas quilt was on the way back.  I didn't get that far. 

Frolic, 2019 Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt

The backing is de-threaded, pressed and packaged for shipping.  I did get started on de-threading and pressing the Frolic top, but didn't get very far. I've managed to clean up about a third of the quilt top.  It should be ready to ship out by the end of the week. 

Finish was my word for 2020.  So far I've finished three quilts. That total should be four by the end of the week. With one more quilted and another ready for quilting, my finished numbers are slowly creeping up.  I want to keep an emphasis on finishing next year. I'm determined to get the number of WIPs and UFOs cut down significantly.  So what's another word for "finish"?  I've got a couple of months to figure that out.   

Linking up with Monday Making and the Monday Design Wall.  

Stitching Stuff: Week 42 of 2020

 The work week wasn't horrible, but getting back to the office on Monday after a few days of vacation wasn't fun.  Thankfully, only one late night to play catch up.  So it didn't greatly affect my ability to work in my 15 minutes every day this week. How did you do at finding a few minutes to stitch each day this week?

It was a good week for stitching, there was about an hour of stitching most nights. 

• 15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
• 15 minute days/October = 17/17 days
• 15 minute days/2020 = 261/291
• Success rate = 89.69%

I'm on track to meet my stitching time goal this year. It may be the only goal I meet.  Keeping up with the stitching time has helped moved projects along this year.  Even though I'm probably not going to get all the finishes I'd hoped for, there has been good progress so far and there are still a few more weeks in the year. 

Just 15 minutes is enough time to pin a few things

Then I can stitch them the next night. There are three different projects in those pinned piles. 

I've also been working in some hand stitching on Storm at Sea. I just stitched down corner number 4.

I've got one last side to stitch down. I'm hoping to have a finish before the end of the weekend. Linking up with Kathy's Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday. 

How are you doing at working in a bit of stitching time each day?  Even 15 minutes a day can make a big difference in how much progress there is on your WIPs each week.  

1. Julie in GA 2. karen 3. Chrisknits

4. Shasta @ High Road 5. Amanda 6. Quilting Gail

7. Loulee (Manxgirl)

Powered by... Mister Linky's Magical Widgets.

To Do Tuesday for Week of 10/13/2020

The first day back at work after a week of vacation is always hectic and full.  I was glad to see the end of the work day.  It's going to be a long week, with lots to catch up on. That may affect how much time I have to work on the to do list this week. Even with the away time last week, it wasn't too hard work through last week's to dos. 

Weekly To Do List for 10/6/2020

• Red, White, Blue Stars: Continue sashing blocks ✔
• Moreword Mystery: Start October blocks ✔
• Unity: Make HSTs and blocks for step 4 ✔
• Storm at Sea: Start stitching binding ✔

The goal last week was just to make progress on each item. That's probably going to be the same tact I take this week, especially since there will likely be some late work nights this week.  

Weekly To Do List for 10/13/2020

Frolic: Fix piecing error, prep for quilting

I didn't notice till I was photographing the quilt top that I had one corner flying geese turned the wrong direction.  It shouldn't be too hard to fix. Since the Christmas Mystery quilt should come back from being quilted this week, it's time to get this quilt prepped for quilting. The big goal for the week is have both the top and the backing ready to ship out for quilting by next week. If I get this to do done, it will have been a successful week. 

Storm at Sea: Finish stitching down the binding. 

I'm about half way to corner three.  This will likely get done even if I have to work late. Even if I'm tired, it's not hard to take a few minutes to hand stitch through one length of thread.  

Red, White and Blue Stars: Continue sashing blocks

The goal on this project is to keep making progress. If I can get all the sashings made, then I can focus on assembly next week.  

Unity: Keep making HSTs and blocks for Clue 4. 

The last border strip has been started.  Unity has been my leader and ender project as I've worked on other items so it won't be hard to at least get a few HSTs finished off. The goal is progress this week. 

Morewood Mystery: Keep working on the October blocks

All the fabrics for the October blocks are cut and I've got the subunits for the 3 and 4 patch blocks at least started. The goal is progress. I may alternate these blocks with the Unity HSTs as my second leader and ender project. The goal is progress.  

That's an ambitious list considering how busy this week is going to be.  If I don't get them all checked off this week, I won't beat myself up.  If I can get Frolic ready and Storm at Sea finished, that will be a good week. 

Linking up with Home Sewn by Us for To Do Tuesday.   

Storm, Stars and Unity

 It's back to work this morning after a week off. I'm expecting a pretty rough day and a long week.  That's usually the price for taking the week off.  Still it was nice to have some time to relax and recharge a bit. Hand stitching the binding for the Storm at Sea quilt fit in with the sit and soak it up agenda for the week. 

I've turned two corners so far, so not quite half way finished. 

We were home for most of the weekend, so I did get in some good sewing room time.  Unity is sporting one more step 4 border.

2020 Bonnie Hunter Sew-In-Place Quilt Along

I changed up the Friendship Star just a bit, so my border is a bit different than the one that Bonnie used, but I like it.  Just one more border left in step 4.  

There was also progress on the red, white and blue stars quilt.

 Red, White and Blue Stars, setting self designed

Only the first row of sashing and blocks is stitched together. The rest of the rows are still in progress.  I like it so far. Just a few more sashing pieces to make and then assembly will move pretty quickly.  Then comes the borders which always take so much longer than I think they should.  

Good progress on multiple projects, so definitely a good week. Linking up with Monday Making and Design Wall Monday. 

Stitching Stuff: Week 41 of 2020

 We spent this last week hiking and just hanging out together.  We both had vacation that needed to be used, so we rented a cottage in Eureka Springs, Arkansas and socially distanced somewhere else for a few days. That may seem risky, but at least Eureka Springs has mandatory mask rules. We don't have that here at home.  I took plenty of hand stitching to work on while we were away. It wasn't hard to find at least 15 minutes to make a bit of progress on that front.  How did you do at finding at least 15 minutes of stitching time each day? You can link up and share at the bottom of this post. 

• 15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
• 15 minute days/October = 10/10 days
• 15 minute days/2020 = 254/284 days
• Success rate = 89.44%

It's been a pretty good year on the stitching front. With all the social distancing, it's been a lot easier to work in some sewing time most days. The hand stitching this week was on the binding for Storm at Sea. 

Stitching on the binding will continue today.  I've only turned 2 corners so far. SAS is a big quilt, 96" X 112", so it's going to take a few more days to get that binding all stitched down.  Linking up with Kathy's Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday.  

It was beautiful weather for hiking, the leaves are just starting to turn.

We hiked around Lake Leatherwood just outside of Eureka Springs. Even with the leaves changing there are still a few blooming things growing along the trail. 

And a few butterflies are still flitting about gathering up the last of the nectar. 

This Pearl Crescent was taking a rest before moving on to the next set of asters.  

So we had an excellent week of being outdoors, hanging out on the back porch to read or stitch and ordering take out from some of our favorite restaurants in the area.  How did your week go on the stitchy front?  

1. Julie in GA 2. Meloney 3. Sherrie 4. karen

5. Shasta @ High Road 6. Chrisknits 7. katie z. 8. DawnyK

9. Amanda 10. Loulee (Manxgirl) 11. Quilting Gail

Powered by... Mister Linky's Magical Widgets.

To Do Tuesday for Week of 10/6/2020

Even with a nothing but stitching day over the weekend, I didn't get to everything on last week's to do list.  So it's not just having the time to stitch, but the priority you put on each project.  Checking off three out of the four is still a pretty good week.  

Weekly To Do List for 9/29/2020

• Storm at Sea: Make binding ✔
• Red, White & Blue Stars: begin sashing blocks ✔
• Unity: Make HSTs and blocks for Step 4 ✔
• Morewood Mystery: Start October clue - no progress

I really wanted to get the binding stitched onto Storm at Sea, so that was the priority to do last week.  Making a duel fabric binding wasn't on my radar  when I was making out the to do list and it turned out to be a lot more time consuming than making a traditional binding. So getting a start on the October clue for the Morewood mystery will just have to go back on this week's list.  

Weekly To Do List for 10/6/2020

Storm at Sea: Hand stitch the binding to the back

I've turned one corner, but still have three more to go. SAS is a big quilt, something like 96" x 114", so it's going to take a bit to get all that binding stitched down.  The plan is work on it a bit every day, if it doesn't get done, that's OK.  Progress is the goal for this week. 

Red, White and Blue Stars: Continue sashing blocks

Red, White and Blue Stars: Setting self designed

I put the first sashing sections up on the design wall with the blocks. The strips aren't sewn to the blocks yet, so they will narrow down just a bit once that happens. I'm liking it so far. I don't think I'll get all the blocks sashed and stitched together. That's OK, the goal is progress on this project too. 

Morewood Mystery: Start the October clue

I have the whole month to play with this pretty blue and gold print.  The goal for this week is to at least get the fabrics cut.  

Unity: Make HSTs and blocks for Step 4

Unity, 2020 Bonnie Hunter Sew-In-Place Quilt Along

Just need one more block to finish border three of clue 4.  That should happen this week.  Bonnie Hunter usually releases her first clue for the yearly mystery just after Thanksgiving. That gives me just under two months to move Unity along to finished quilt top. Probably not going to happen, but I can decide to just stop after any given clue.  

That's my list for this week.  Linking up with Home Sewn by Us for the Weekly To Do List.  

Nothing But Stitching

 Weekend's have been busy lately with yard work and family stuff, consequently my sewing room time has been pretty curtailed.  I made up for it this weekend.  Saturday was a nothing but sewing day and Sunday afternoon was reserved for more of the same. 

First thing on the list was to finish off the Halloween face masks requested by the Scientist in Training.

Mask pattern from Laundry Basket Quilts 

The SIT requested one more chemistry themed mask and the butterfly mask is for me. The spider web masks are for me and the SIT, while the skeleton is for My Guy.  The kitty cat is for the SIT's roommate and the zombie's is for one of the SITs high school buddies.  I made a zombie quilt for this buddy as a high school graduation gift and she asked if I had any of the fabric left if I would make her a mask.  These were definitely fun to make.  

On the finishing a quilt front, the binding is now sewn to the front of Storm at Sea. 

The binding is made from two fabrics. The dark blue will be on the front and the light blue will be turned to the back.  Storm at Sea is going on our bed, so My Guy has to like it. He really wanted the dark blue to be on the front of the quilt. I didn't have enough of it left to make all of the binding, hence the decision to make the dual fabric binding.  That was a lot more work than the typical one fabric binding.  SAS is a big quilt to start with. So having to assemble two strip sets, stitch them together and then press the seam, then the pressing in half took a lot more time than normal.  It's going to pay off, but it took a big chunk of my stitching time this weekend.  

I stared cutting strips to make the sashing for the Red, White and Blue Stars quilt. There wasn't much more progress than that, though I did decide on the block placement. 

I'm really looking forward to getting these blocks into a finished quilt top.  The star blocks are some of my favorites. Fingers crossed that the sashing fabric works well and I still like the project once it's all stitched together. 

That's the progress for last week. Linking up with Monday Making and Design Wall Monday.    

Stitching Stuff: Week 40 of 2020

It was pretty much a nothing but sewing day for me yesterday. I needed the sanity stitching.  It was a nice way to cap off a busy week. Nothing but sewing days are a rare event in my schedule, which is why working in those 15 minutes of stitching time each day is so important. It may not seem like much, but that extra hour plus of stitching time each week does make a difference. 

Finding those 15 minutes each day wasn't too hard this last week. 

• 15 minute days/week = 7/7 days
• 15 minute days/September = 28/30 days
• 15 minute days/October = 3/3 days
• 15 minute days 2020 = 247/277 days
• Success rate = 89.17%

The goal was to stitch at least 85% of the year. I'm doing well on that front at the three quarters point of 2020.  The end of the year tends to be busy, so fingers crossed I can maintain the success through the next three months. 

Since it's a new month, it's time to link up with Quiltpaintcreate for the monthly stash report.  

• Fabric used in September = 6.9 yards
• Fabric used YTD = 53.19 yards
• More fabric in than out for 2020

I didn't set a goal around how much fabric I would use this year, so I'm on track there.  There's more fabric out this year than there was the previous two years, so that's positive.  I need to piece one more back before the end of the year, so that will up the numbers a bit more.  

How are you doing with your stitching goals for 2020?  Have you been able to work in enough stitching time to use up a bit of fabric and cut down the UFO list?  

1. Julie in GA 2. karen 3. Chrisknits 4. Meloney

5. Shasta @ High Road 6. DawnyK 7. Quilting Gail 8. Amanda

9. Jennifer in Indy 10. Angie in SoCal

Powered by... Mister Linky's Magical Widgets.

Stitching Along

 I was definitely ready for Saturday to get here.  The plan is for a nothing but stitching day to celebrate the end of the work week and the beginning of October.  Just three months left in 2020. Though I will be glad to see the end of this year, there's not much time left to finish my 2020 PHD. 

There is an update to my tracking spreadsheet, but it's not a new check mark in the finished column.  

The Morewood Mystery quilt September clue had me cutting into the fabric to make last months blocks.  I count a quilt started once I cut the fabric, so it had to go onto the tracking sheet as a new start in 2020.

 

This mystery quilt is a planned start, it was part of my 2020 quilt plan.  This quilt along won't end till sometime in 2021, so not finishing this quilt doesn't count against my PHD progress this year

So one addition, but no check offs.  But there's been good progress in the last month, so there's hope for some finishes before the end of the year. 

Storm at Sea is back from being quilted.  Trudy as usual, did a wonderful job with it.  Now I need to make the binding and label, then get them attached to finish off quilt number 4 for the year.  This is my October One Monthly Goal. 

The Christmas Mystery quilt has been sent out for quilting.

It should be back ready for binding before the end of the month.  So it's possible there will be two new check marks in the finished column by November. 

A backing was pieced for Frolic.

The backing and quilt top need to be prepped for quilting. That should happen this month.  So fingers crossed that puts another check mark on the PHD tracking spreadsheet before the end of the year.  

Borders were finally selected and stitched on to the Daisy Chain Mystery Quilt. 

Daisy Chain Mystery
2019 Little Bunny Quilts Mystery
by Alison of Honey, Bunny & Doll Design

Next step is to search the stash for something to back it with. Not sure that will happen this month, but it's on the list.  

Progress on Unity has been slow. 

Unity, 2020 Bonnie Hunter Sew-In-Place Quilt Along

 

I'm still stitching HSTs and making Friendship Star blocks for step 4. 

September saw enough progress to add a new UFO to the "in progress" list.  

Red, White, and Blue stars is my oldest UFO.  The blocks have been made for a while, but I could never decide how to set them.  After a few new stash additions and photo mock ups, I finally ended up sticking with my original fabric choice.  Hopefully this project will be a finished quilt top by the end of the month.   

So no new check marks this month. But it's looking promising that there will be a few added between now and the end of the year.  Linking up with the Quilting Gail for the 2020 PHD Challenge.