PHD in 2024: End of the Year Wrap Up

It's always an adjustment to move from the previous year to the new year.  Mostly it's a mind reset, but it did take me the better part of the morning to reset my quilting tracking spreadsheet for the new year.  That first meant making sure all of the quilty stuff that went on in 2024 was captured. With that all done, it made pulling all the information for my end of the year PHD report easier. 

The year ended with six finishes, six projects moved to finished quilt tops, progress on the rest of the UFOs on the list and six new starts.  So I broke even in terms of finishes and starts for the year, there was no net change in my UFO numbers. But I finished double the number of quilts in 2024 than I did in 2023.  So I'll take that as successful year even though I didn't earn my PHD for the year.

The finishes this year ranged from some of the oldest on my UFO list to one of the new starts. 

First row: A Flutter (self designed), Blue Birds (self designed), Shadow Demon (self designed)

Second row: Rhododendron (Bonnie Hunter), Diatom (Quilting Jetgirl), String Lights (Meadow Mist Designs) 

The projects that became finished quilt tops also range from some of my oldest UFOs to one of this year's new starts.  

First row:  Chocolate Marshmallow (Seabreeze Quilts), Squared Away (So Scrappy), Chilhowie (Bonnie Hunter)

Second row: Malted Mystery (Meadow Mist Designs), Indigo Way (Bonnie Hunter), Betty (Meadow Mist Designs)

There was good progress on a few other projects this year as well.  

Grandmother's Choice (renamed Kate's Choice) was supposed to be my quilt as you go project. It hadn't been touched in twelve years. I finished all the blocks, but didn't do much on the learning to quilt part of the project. There's always 2025 right?   

I didn't do as much on the Butterfly panel this year.  One butterfly and some of the fill in foliage got finished.  This is my travel project. It went on a few trips, but this year I was able to take quilts that needed to be bound on a number of trips away from home. So I still got a lot of hand work done, just not on this project.

Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter) has been on the active list for the last couple of years. I make a few blocks each week.  This year all the orange blocks got finished. I only need to finish 3 more of the red blocks to be done with that color.  That should happen this month, then I'm left with all the cool colors to finish. 

The Simply Sensational Summer Scrap quilt (Kevin the Quilter) wasn't on my PHD list for 2024, but it became an active project when I needed something that would empty out my scrap bins a bit and be a good leaders and enders project.  I need over 200 of the blue 4 patches and over 100 of the yellow. There's ten 4 patches in each stack, so I'm a long way off from that.  So this will probably be my leaders and enders the rest of the year.  

Of the six new starts for 2024, one is a finished quilt (Shadow Demon), one is a finished quilt top (Betty), the remaining 4 are in various stages of completion.  

I hadn't planned on doing the guild BOM, but it was such a different design that I decided to go for it. I mostly kept up, except for December.  All the blocks are made, all that's left is assembly and cutting all the sashing and border strips.  This should make it to finished quilt top before the end of the first quarter this year.  

Marble Mystery (Meadow Mist Designs) was going along pretty well until December. I've made some progress on the last clue but, didn't get it done before the January clue came out this morning. This morning's clue includes the instructions for final assembly and I'm excited to see how my version comes together.  

Old Town kicked off in late November.  A month and a half later, I've finished clue 1. Made decent progress on clue 2, but am way behind on all the other clues. There is some of each clue finished, but not enough for more than one block I'm guessing.  We'll see what I can get done before Friday's clue comes out.  

The last new project wasn't planned for at all.  But when I agreed to take on the guild BOM this year, it meant I had to have the January block ready to show at the December guild meeting.  I've made this quilt before, but with the same background for all the blocks. This time I'm going scrappy on the background as well.  

That pretty much wraps up my 2024 in the sewing room. I'm hoping for a successful 2025.  Linking up with Miss P Designs USA for the 2024 PHD Wrap Up.  

Best of Life In Pieces for 2024

This was my second full year of being retired.  I learned some lessons last year and made some different choices for this year. Not sure I've got it all figured out, but I'm in a better place this year than I was last year.  I think that showed in my blog posts. With the new year less than two days away, I'm linking up with Cheryl at Meadow Mist Designs for her Best of 2024 Linky Party to remember the best things that happened on the blog this year.  

This is Cheryl's 10th year to host the linky party. I've written a post for all of them.  Cheryl leaves it up to us to define the "best of" for the year.  Here's what I consider the best of what was on my blog for 2024:

5.  To Do Lists: I've been playing along with To Do Tuesday since late 2019 (most recently hosted by the Quilt Schmilt). Some weeks the lists are short, some weeks they are long.  For some reason my May 7th to do list had the most views of all my posts this year.  There wasn't anything special in this post, no near finishes. It was the post with my first to do item for Grandmother's Choice, the Barbara Brackman quilt along from 2012. 

I finished all the blocks in August. Now I just need to quilt them. Having a to do list each week really helps keep me on track with my projects.  So that's definitely one of the "best" things for my quilting.  

4. 15 Minutes to Stitch (Stitching Stuff): I've been challenging myself to stitch for 15 minutes a day since 2011. I've hosted a linky party off and on over that time period. When you are a working women, wife and mother, it's so easy to decide oh I'll sew later. But then later never comes because there is always something to do, someplace to be and the ever present, I'm too tired.  Even being retired you can fall into, oh I can do that later thinking, but then later never comes.  So I've stayed intentional about getting in my 15 minutes each day. My last stitching stuff report says I've stitched every day this year as of 12/28.  

Making an effort to get in the sewing room each day pays off in lots of progress on projects. It's amazing what you can do with just 15 minutes every day. Posting my progress on the blog is motivating, so it's one of my "best" reasons for blogging.  

3.  Finishing one of my older UFOs, Scrappy Butterflies (A Flutter). 

    

A Flutter was my first finish for 2024.  Started in 2013 as my Rainbow Scrap Project for the year, it sat until last year when I finally figured out a setting for the blocks.  This is my current couch quilt. When I sent it out for quilting it was the 4th oldest UFO on my list.  So it felt nice to get this oldie, but goodie off my UFO list and into use. 

2. The most fun quilt to make this year was Shadow Demon, my Stay at Home Round Robin project for 2024.  

  

This quilt was for Grad Girl and her very own shadow demon, Queenie.  She helped me pick out the fabrics and she had a say so on what went into each border. It was fun collaboration.  Even better, she loved the finished quilt, so does Queenie.

1. Our Girls weekend when Grad Girl got her first sewing machine lessons is my "best" post for 2024.  

 

I tried for many years when she was growing up to interest her in learning to sew, video games were more her thing then.  But as she's gotten more and more into embroidery, she'd like to make some of her projects into other gifts, like bags and pillows.  She brought her sewing machine home for the holiday. We are signed up for a retreat next weekend. No telling what we'll get up to in the meantime.  

That's my "Best of 2024".  Thankfully, I had lots of posts to choose from this year. It was hard to pick just 5.  I liked all my finished quilts this year, it was hard to pick just 2 to highlight on this post.  Hopefully you'll go by Cheryl's blog and check out a few other "best of" to get a good vibe for what needs to be on your to do list for 2025. That's my plan.  

Our Girl's Weekend

My sister and I left Oklahoma for Texas on Thursday and got back home Monday night.  That left us Friday, Saturday and Sunday for lots of crafty stuff.  I found a great rental to use for our retreat.  

 

The dining room table was big enough for 3 sewing machines. Just mine and my sister's are set up in the photo.  We were able to use the center island for cutting and pressing.  It was a very user friendly set up.  

Grad Girl had stuff going on for most of Friday, so she wasn't able to take off as she'd planned. But she joined us by early evening with a new to her sewing machine. 

It's a Singer Start.  It's pretty basic, but that's pretty much what she wanted, basic.  Grad Girl had never wound a bobbin or threaded a machine.  We started with those basics.  Learning to control the speed with the foot pedal was probably the hardest thing for her to get used to.  That's a practice makes perfect thing.  

She really wanted to make a pin cushion. I have a pattern that I really wanted to make, Meadow Mist Design's Cathedral Window Pincushions. So we went to Joann's bought some fabric and made a couple of pin cushions. 

This probably wasn't the easiest pattern to start Grad Girl off with, but she really enjoyed it and liked the challenge. Learning to top stitch while trying to master the foot pedal was challenging, but she got better as we went along.  Neither pin cushion is perfect, but that's OK, we had a blast making them. I had once thought to make a quilt using Cathedral Window blocks. Making one block may be enough to fulfill that need.   

I found a rental that allowed cats, so Queenie came to spend the weekend with us.  

 

She's not had the chance to be a sewing room kitty and decided that anything hanging off the ironing board was a toy.  She especially liked my yellow measuring tape when I was measuring borders for String Lights.  

I delivered Grad Girl's  quilt and she got a photo of both her Shadow Demons. 

Both Grad Girl and Queenie tested out the "nap on the couch" worthiness of the quilt. I think it passed that test.  

That was our girl's weekend. It was a lot of fun and we decided we definitely need to do another one in the next year or two.  Linking up with Monday Design Wall (just a little late). 

August 2024 PHD Report

With all the hot, hot days in August, the sewing room was the nicest place to hang out most days.  Consequently there was a lot of progress on the various projects.  Now that we've moved into September it's time to link up with P Designs USA for the August PHD Report.

Another finish added to the chart with no new starts. That's definitely a good month.  So I'm up to three finishes for 2024.  The latest finish was my 2024 Stay at Home Round Robin (Quilting Gail) project. 

 

This quilt, named The Shadow Demon, is destined to live at my daughter's apartment and be snuggled by her black cat, Queenie.  It was such a fun project to make and turned out better than I expected.  Grad Girl is thrilled with it and that's the best thank you there is.  It's also nice to finish one of the quilts that was started this year.  

Just one finish, but there was good progress on a number of other projects in August.  

A few more orange blocks filled in the center of Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter). 

It takes so long to get all the blocks up on the design wall, I'm just going to stick with summary shots of all the blocks of the color I've been working on. Since September is dark neutrals, I'm going to continue with the orange this month as all my blocks have black in them.  Still a long way to go before all the blocks are finished, but I'm happy with the progress so far with this project. I'll probably need another year or two to get all the blocks done. We'll have to see what next year's quilt plan looks like, it could become a primary project to finish next year.  

Not a lot of progress on the new leaders and enders project, The Simply Sensational Summer Scrap Quilt (Kevin the Quilter). 

I've been alternating making yellow and blue 4 patch blocks.  So far one blue and one yellow set of 10 have been added to the project box.  

It's definitely been a year for catching up on Bonnie Hunter mystery quilts. Back in February all the blocks for the 2022 mystery, Chilhowie, were finished as a leaders and enders project.  It went back into the project box as I was in the middle of several other quilt alongs. In August, Chilhowie came back onto the active list as my next quilt top to finish. 

The sashing is finished and I've started on the borders.  Chilhowie won't be finished with all the pieced borders Bonnie used.  My plan for the left over blocks is to use them on the back.  

Diatom (Quilting Jetgirl) became a finished quilt top during the month. It's next on the list to be finished.

The backing fabric has been washed. Hopefully, the backing will be pressed and cut soon.  

The 2023 Bonnie Hunter mystery, Indigo Way, became a finished quilt top during August. 

I'm not sure it will become a finished quilt before the end of the year. But I am thrilled to have it to the finished quilt top stage before the next mystery comes out.  

The August block for the Guild's 2024 BOM was finally cut out and pieced. 

Just two more blocks and then the setting pieces left to make, so just three more months of clues left.  

The project tracker is definitely showing more color/longer bars. 

One more finished quilt and two more finished quilt tops are the primary reasons.  I had hoped for more finishes this year, but it helps to see the progress in other areas.  There should be one more finish in September and hopefully another one in October. That would get me to five this year, so better than the last couple of years for sure.  

Two for Two

The plan for the later half of the year was to finish a quilt a month.  As of August, I'm 2 for 2.  The 2023 Stay at Home Round Robin (SAHRR) was finished in July. This month the 2024 SAHRR (Quilting Gail) is a finished quilt. 

The binding was finished last Tuesday, but it I wasn't able to get photos till this weekend.  This quilt is for Grad Girl. Of course the inspiration for the quilt was Grad Girl's kitty, Queenie. I had planned for a black and orange quilt (Oklahoma State colors), but had not planned to make it a Halloween quilt.  But those were the fabrics Grad Girl liked, so that's how it went together.  

Queenie certainly doesn't have orange eyes, but she's very black.  In a dark room she's startled Grad Girl and her roommate more than once, earning herself the nickname of "Shadow Demon".  So of course the quilt absolutely has to have the same name.  

Trudy Lindemann did the quilting with swirls and stars, which works so well with the Halloween fabrics.  Of course I'm sure you can see the close resemblance between my center block and Queenie. 

The back of the quilt is pieced using a couple of Halloween fabrics.

  

The orange print has spiders on it (not one of Grad Girl's favorite things, but hopefully it won't wig her out too badly).  The center fabric also has black kitties on it. You can see that clearly in this close up of the backing.

My Guy said the haunted house on this fabric reminds him of the one on the Scooby Doo intro.  Which was one of Grad Girl's absolute favorite cartoons when she was little. 

Shadow Demon turned out much better than I expected. It was such a fun quilt to make. Grad Gril is really excited for it to make it's way to her couch. That won't happen till October, but she should have it in time for Halloween.  

Linking up with Design Wall Monday and Patchwork & Quilts.  Also linking up with Favorite Finish over at Quilting Jetgirl.  

To Do List for the Week of 07/30/2024

Summer is well and truly back. We've had heat advisories pretty much every day since late last week.  It is almost August. The first two weeks of that month are typically our hottest.  Which isn't fun to contemplate considering how hot early July was.  

Since there wasn't much to do but hide in my sewing room, there was lots of stitching time last week, which made pretty quick work of last week's to do list. 

To Do list for 7/23/2024

1.  Rhododendron: Prep back for quilting ✔

2.  Kate's Choice: Continue making blocks ✔

3.  Wild and Goosey: Continue making teal blocks ✔

4.  Indigo Way: Continue quilt assembly as leaders and enders ✔

Definitely a good week. But it was as pretty short list.  This week's list is longer as I'm at a transition point for some projects. So some will fall off the list this week as I add others on. 

To Do List for 7/30/2024

1.  Rhododendron Mystery (Bonnie Hunter): Prep quilt top for quilting

The backing was pressed and de-threaded last weekend. I don't remember there being any fabrics in that project that unraveled badly. Hopefully it will be a quick clean up.  

2.  Kate's Choice: Make last two blocks

Just two blocks left and then it will be time to focus on developing my quilting skills a bit so I can attempt to finish this project as a quilt as you go.  

3.  Indigo Way (Bonnie Hunter): Make blocks for pieced border

After working out the borders in EQ, I need to make some blocks for cornerstones and 8 more triangle in a square blocks.  Shouldn't take me too long to finish those.

4. 2024 SAHRR (Quilting Gail): Make label, binding, trim quilt

 

Trudy did her usual quilting magic.  I'm looking forward to finishing this quilt off. I've drafted a label, time to finalize that and decide on the binding.  

5. Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter): Finish teal blocks, start orange blocks. 

I had to pull out my scrap bins and cut a few more teal triangles to have enough triangles for another 2 or 3 blocks before I switch over to making the orange blocks.  

6.  Diatom (Quilting Jetgirl): Determine layout, start assembly. 

All the blocks were finished exactly a year ago today.  Yvonne's layout had no sashing and no borders.  I'm going to play around a bit with different layouts to see if I like either of those options. I probably won't get as far as to start assembly this week, but as several other quilts will drop off the working list soon, it seemed wise to start prepping this one to take one of those slots.    

7. Simply Sensational Summer (SSS) Mystery (Kevin the Quilter): 

Since Indigo Way has advanced to needing borders, a new leaders and enders project was needed.  This project was started back in 2019.  It needs almost 200 blue 4 patches and almost as many yellow 4 patches.  My 2.5" strip storage bin was really full. I use a lot of blue, so pulling those strips to use for this quilt really helped create space in at least one bin.  This project isn't on my 2024 quilt plan, but I really needed to do something with all those scraps I've been processing.  Rather than start something new, it seemed prudent to pull out a UFO. 

That's my list for this week. I'll be happy if half the items get checked off.  Normally everyone links up with the Quilt Schmilt for To Do Tuesday, but Carol lives in Canada near where the wildfires are burning.  So there may not be a place to link this week as she's got far more important things to worry about. Update (Carol was able to post a link up, things are still looking pretty dire though) If you have a spot in your prayer list I hope you'll add her and all in that region.  

2024 Stay at Home Round Robin: Border #2

It's been a cold and rainy day, perfect for lots of sewing time.  My focus today was to finish the second border for this year's SAHRR.  Last week's prompt was from Anja Quilts, using just two colors do anything you like for the second border.  I decided to go simple. 

The rail fence borders were pretty easy, but those 9 patches with the 1" orange strips weren't as easy.  I didn't do too badly at matching the corners up with the sides, but even being just a tad off shows up with those bold colors. Grad Girl likes it, which is all that matters.  I'm looking forward to seeing what guidance we get for border 3 on Monday morning. The quilt is just 26" x 28", I'm going to need to use some larger blocks in the next 3 rounds to get this to a good couch sized quilt.      

Linking up with the 2024 SAHRR Round 2, Design Wall Monday, and Patchwork & Quilts.  

The First of the Year Quilt Alongs

I did this to myself last year too.  Being retired it was so easy to say, "I have lots of time for new projects."  Ha! Maybe that would be true if I'd just stick with one new project after the madness of the Bonnie Mystery that wrapped up New Year's Day.  But no, I really wanted to play along with 2 quilt alongs that started in January.  It took me all weekend, but I'm caught up on both!  

The Just Two Charm Pack Quilts quilt along sponsored by Cheryl over at Meadow Mist Designs kicked off on January 2nd.  I'm making the quilt Betty from the book.  I'm supposed to have half of the quilt blocks made by January 29th.  I finished those a day early. 

I'm not a pre-cut collector, but my blue/purple/green 2.5" strip bins were full. So I raided those blue and purple scrap strips for my version. I don't hate it, but I'm not in love with it at this stage.  But I've got 10 more blocks and the sashing to add, so it's still possible that my feelings on this project will change. I have till February 15th to finish the last 10 blocks.  

The 2024 SAHRR kicked off on January 15th with the center block (you can see all of those here). Last Monday, Wendy at Pieceful Thoughts kicked off the first border of signature blocks.  I actually finished my first border today, just before border two comes out tomorrow. 

I'm pretty happy with how it worked out.  I went completely scrappy last year. I'm not going scrappy this year, I have a limited fabric palette to play with. It certainly goes faster when you aren't hunting up scraps the right size.   The center with the first border is 20" x 22".  I want to end with a lap sized quilt, so border two will probably need to be a larger block.  I'll come up with a plan once the next round is posted at Anja Quilts sometime on Monday, 1/29.  

Linking up over at Pieceful Thoughts for the first round of the SAHRR and my usual Monday linky parties for Patchwork & Quilts and the Monday Design Wall.  

2024 SAHRR: The Center

Last year was my first time participating in the Stay At Home Round Robin (SAHRR) hosted by Quilting Gail. I really enjoyed playing along and ended up with a really fun quilt for the 2023 SAHRR. 

 

This quilt was intended to be My Guy's new TV recliner quilt.  However, Grad Girl decided that it needed to be hers.  She took the last quilt I made for My Guy, so it was time to come up with a quilt she'd like better so My Guy could keep this one.  She'd been asking for an orange and black quilt, Oklahoma State University colors.  So what to use for the center that would tempt her more than the birds in her dad's quilt? 

Her very own black cat, Queenie.  I modified a block pattern from one of the teacher quilts made many years ago and came up with this. (The pattern is out of print). 

Very Queenie like, except for the red/orange eyes.  Queenie's nick name is Shadow Demon, because she can scare the fool out of you when it's dark in the house. So that's the working name of this year's SAHRR, The Shadow Demon. 

You can find all the other centers for this year's round robin over at Quilting Gail's.  There are some really fun ones.