Juggling Quilting Projects Chaos

 The weather in Podunk has been absolutely beautiful the last couple of days.  Sunny and 70 is perfect for opening the windows and doing a little spring cleaning.  And that's exactly what I did for a couple of days. Then I was ready to get back in the Studio and play with some fun spring projects.

As you can see above the Delightful Daisies quilt binding is almost finished.  All that is left to do is hand stitch it to the back of the quilt.  Getting to this point was not easy due to juggling multiple projects and every station of my studio is full of projects.

 The Daisy quilt was quilted and the backing fabric needed to be trimmed but my cutting table was full of HST's needing to be sorted into blocks.  Instead of moving them and possibly messing up the counted HST's I decided to finish the sorting process.

By the way....under the quilt in the picture above is the fabric for the pillow shams I planned to make.  Maybe this weekend the shams and curtains will make into the rotation. 

Back to the cutting table mess.  The HST's on are bonus HST's I've been collecting for many years.  This batch of HST's will be used to make 169 cake stand blocks.

It took about two hours to clear off the cutting table.  The HST's were sorted onto design boards.  Below is (169) sets of (4) matching HST's for the basket handles.

The next board is (169) sets of (2) matching HST's for the base of the basket block.

The last board is a bunch of 3 inch HST's for the basket body.  I still need to make more but can't find my scribble paper with the amount.   I mentioned the amounts in my last blog post so when it comes time to make more I can look there for the number needed instead of counting again.

I stacked the full boards and added them to the works in progress cart.  The cutting table was finally ready to trim the Daisy quilt.  I thought is rolling cart would help me organize my projects better.  And it would if I would stick to the rule of no more than 3 projects in rotation.

Right now, I have 6 projects.

1.  Old Town mystery - top of the cart

2. Cake Stand Quilt - middle of the cart

3.  Bumpkin Baskets - bottom of the cart

4. Pillow shams and curtains - pressing station

5. 2 bucks a block BOM - in a block storage tote(I've only made Jan. blocks)

6. Delightful Daisies - ready for hand stitching the binding

Instead of working out a plan or setting a goal to get back on track with just 3 projects.  I'm going to just let things happen organically.  When I get to them, I get to them.  No muss no fuss.  Quilting is my hobby, not my job.  I like a to be organized but I don't like feeling like I MUST do this before that.  It takes the fun out of quilting. 

I would like to start hand stitching the binding on the Daisy quilt today...sometime.  It's going to be sunny and 75 today.  A great day to be outside prepping the flowerbeds for the soon to sprout spring flowers.  Now there's a plan!

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Quilting, Sorting and Ignoring

 A lot of quilty goodness is happening out here in Podunk.  The Delightful Daisy quilt is looking pretty cute.  I can't wait to get this girl off the frame and on display.  By my unreliable calculations it should be ready to share here on the blog by next Monday or Tuesday.  I'll blame the quilting design for my slow progress because the quilting is 99% ruler work.  The only free motion quilting is the stems and leaves of the large daisies.  

But let's be honest, this quilt shouldn't even be in the rotation. Remember me setting up a new plan to only have three projects in rotation on this cart.  Maybe I need a cart with more tiers. HAHA!  In order to get closer to my goal, I will be removing the Heart Pops project out of rotation. The one block will be moved to the orphan blocks box because I just don't feel like making the B plan for this project.

As for the Old Town Quilt I'm ignoring it right now but it will stay in the rotation.  A couple more blocks have been made but I'm not seeing any progress on this until after Delightful Daisies is finished. 

What will take the place of Heart Pops?  HST's! A bunch of them.  I've decided to start tackling the THOUSANDS of HST's I've been collecting over the years.  This is my second session of sorting.  The first sorting session of HST's was the bag of 1.5 inch.  It came up short of what was needed for the planned project.  So, I grabbed the bags of 1.75 inch HST's. 

After they were sorted by color, I started sorting by prints and how many I would need of each print.  Oh my, what have I started!  This is going to take forever! But I already have more than what is needed for the quilt.  Yippee! 

The quilt will have 169 blocks.  Each block will need (4) matching hst's and (2) matching hst's.  The singles are extras not needed for the block.  

I bet some of you are wondering what happened to the green gingham project.  Well, the ruffler foot I order was not delivered on time.  As you all know when things get lost in the mail you never know when they will arrive.  So, I carefully folded it up and placed it on the ironing station and that's when I decided to start the HST quilt.  As soon as all the HST's are sorted and carefully placed in the cart of projects the gingham project will be snuck into the rotation.  It's a quick project that should only take a day to make.  Well, that's the plan...HAHA!

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WIP's Wednesday

 Hi Friends!  Yesterday while using my sewing machine to fill the bobbins for my quilter, I realized I had not shared the progress of my Old Town Mystery quilt blocks.

The plan is to finish piecing this quilt top as soon as the Bow-Tie quilt is finished.  

Piecing these blocks a slow process due to the petting and admiring each block and the many different background fabrics.

As you all know I like scrappy quilts, but most of the time I use a consistent background fabric...white.

The low volume adds so much interest to the quilt but doesn't take away from the beauty of the block.

Every time I make a super scrappy quilt like this one, I tell myself I should make every quilt with a scrappy low volume background.

When it comes time to cut for the next quilt reality kicks in...sigh...it takes much longer to cut a gazillion different prints.  Laziness?  I prefer more positive words like...eager to sew or too excited for slow progress.   

Anyway...I shared each block individually because I'm pretty sure many of you are like me and it will make you smile to see the many different fabrics.

  

Believe it or not and I know you do believe it because I do this all the time.  I set an easy goal and fail to achieve it.  I'm beginning to think it's my superpower.  My Monday plan was to have the quilt off the frame by Monday night.

The Bow-Tie quilt is still on the frame.  

Today's plan... I'm staying in my jammies. No cooking, no cleaning.  And due to the weather, no dog walking.  This quilt will be off the quilt frame today, no if's and's or buts!  

Well for now, I'm pretty sure...HAHA!

Only two more rows of Bow-Ties to quilt.   The edge of my quilt has been marked with blue lines to remind me not to quilt in the binding area.  Some longarm quilters will add binding to the quilt before taking it off the quilt frame.  I prefer to do it by sewing machine.  The less time I spend at the quilt frame the better.

I'll be doing a true quarter inch binding which means a quarter inch on the front and on the back. Instead of cutting the binding strips 2.25" or 2.50" wide, they will be cut 1.5" or 1.75".  Scraps of fabric will be used to test which width works best for this quilt's thickness.  Try saying that three times fast...which width works... HAHA!

On Monday's blogpost I was asked what fabric will be used to bind this quilt.  Good question, but I don't have a good answer because I haven't decided.  It's going to be a surprise for both you and me.  After the quilt is off the frame, I'll start pulling different fabrics, lay them next to the quilt to see which one I like best.

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Fabric Discipline

Slow progress is being made on my version of the Old Town Mystery quilt by Bonnie Hunter.

When I say my version, it means I've made some changes.  First change was the colors.

It needed to be changed to a more usable color pallet. I liked her colors, but would I really use the quilt?

The second change is the sashing.  When I participate in Bonnies yearly mystery, I always draw up her quilt in EQ after the big reveal.  Doing this lets me see how the color changes will look.  This one is cute, but I feel like my green sashing is too loud. It's screaming at me like a spoiled 3 yr. old child in the checkout lane of the grocery store.  So, as any good parent would do, I'm going to correct it now because if I don't the screams will only get worse as the years go by. 

Everyone has their techniques for dealing with screamers.  Mine has always been to give them attention.  I'm going to give this little one just what it needs to stay in the quilt and behave.  She was removed for a little disciplinary action.  Discipline takes a little extra time but it's worth it in the long run.  It didn't take very long to whip up a few star points.  Now she no longer screams at me.  What do you think, better? 

Now that she is calm let's see how she behaves under pressure.  The green sashing was flipped so the white touched the navy cornerstone. It made another unique secondary design.  It's hard to decide which one I like best.  Awe...my little cutie is so well behaved!

There may be one more change, the final borders. To me it's chaos and in need of some disciplinary actions as well. HAHA!

  

 Bonnie had us make the border units early in the mystery. If I change the border there will be a ton of scrap units to use in the quilt backing or save them for another quilt.  Sigh...at this point I'm just not sure what to do.  So, I guess I'll cross that bridge when I get there.

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Old Town Mystery Quilt Assembly

 It's been a couple of weeks since the reveal of the Old Town Mystery by Bonnie Hunter.  All of my clues for this quilt have been ready and waiting patiently for me to pay them a little attention. I'm loving this quilt block design and my color combination. 

As you can see, I didn't get much accomplished, just the one quilt block.  But I did manage to get all the blocks laid out on the design boards.  I can now project jump from quilting the Bow-Tie quilt on the frame and piecing the Old Town Mystery.  

The arrows below are pointing to the chain units that I placed in the wrong direction.  I didn't catch the mistake on the top row until after I sewed the row together.  It was fixed and I continued on with the rest of the block.

It's going to be a fun week!  

Let's hope the rest of the blocks go together faster than the first one.  Below was the second time I had to rip out stitches.  😂It always gives me a good chuckle to make such silly mistakes.  How in the world does this happen? 

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Oh, The Weather Outside Is Frightful....

 There's a big winter storm headed our way later today.  Up to 10 inches of the beautiful snowman making snow!  I can hardly wait to bundle up, go outside and play in the snow.  While I wait, there's plenty to keep me busy inside.  Today I'll finish up the sashing units for the Old Town Quilt Mystery by Bonnie Hunter.  If you too are making this quilt, you're probably wondering about my sashing units.  Well, I altered the pattern a bit to suit my style by adding the blue corner triangles.

The change was easy since the math was in the pattern.  It's the same size and piece count as the white fabric, just in a blue fabric.

I can get these stitched up today, then I can start building the quilt!

They could have been sewn together yesterday but I took a little detour when digging in the scrap bins for the fabric to complete the sashing units.  One bin is for larger scraps, less than a fat quarter but no smaller than 2.5" wide.  The other bin is for fabric scraps less than 2.5" wide.

Both bins had a little bit of everything in them.  After hours of sorting and folding, the bins were as organized as they were going to get.  While sorting, I pulled what was needed to complete these units and to complete the border of this quilt.

But I still wasn't finished with scrap sorting.  I found my old sewing room curtains hiding in the bottom of one bin.  The seams were removed and the fabric added to the scrap stash.

While sifting through the bins, I also found triangles for making more HST's. OH NO!  More HST's in my future.  It's never ending!  They were stored away because....

Today's plan is working on the Old Town Mystery.

and maybe building a snowman!

🎶AND SINCE WE'VE NO PLACE TO GO....🎶

☃️LET IT SNOW, LET IT SNOW, LET IT SNOW!☃️

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Old Town Mystery Revealed

Yesterday's Old Town Reveal was exciting and I'm glad it's over.  Participating in a mystery quilt along is a real challenge for me.  I'm a control freak when it comes to quilting but over the years I learned to trust Bonnie.   Now that I've seen the quilt design I can relax and enjoy assembling the quilt.  I didn't have any sewing time yesterday, but I did find the time arrange one block on a design board.

Before tackling the quilt assembly, I thought it would be a good idea to trim the 341 half square triangles.  Most of these were made from the scraps of the Old Town Mystery Quilt.  The smallest HST I will make is one inch. Not sure what I will make with a HST that small, but it sounds like fun challenge.

The stash of HST's has almost outgrown this container.  I think it's time to pick a pattern and make a quilt from some of these this year.

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