Wednesday, August 24, 2011

A charming gift

I was the lucky recipient of Nancy's blog giveaway. She sent me these beautiful charm packs! Thank you, Nancy, for your generosity! It's time I start thinking about a giveaway.

The Christmas pack is Nature's Gift, by Moda. The other is an assortment of rich solids.

I recently took a Pat Speth (Nickel Quilts) workshop & it opened my eyes to all the possibilities of these sweet little charm squares. Pat is such a nice person & the workshop was great. She taught all kinds of techniques and tricks. I highly recommend her workshops and lecture, especially if you love scrap quilts.

Louise


August Lotto blocks

I finished the August Lotto blocks for the Sunshine group & will mail them off in a day or so. I really like doing these blocks. It was fun to play with purple & yellow, which I don't usually use. As a bonus, I used up some scraps! Tammy (of Sunshine) will incorporate these blocks into donation quilts for kids.
September's theme is "bright colors".....and another opportunity to use up scraps!

Louise


Friday, August 19, 2011

Friday design wall.....UFO progress!

Today I was in the mood to dig through a bin of older UFOs.
I pulled out this project. This morning all it was were the animal panels & small squares. My progress so far today:




I had an almost identical top in the box that, except for borders, is already done.

These two are destined to be donation quilts. I think some child will like the animals. In fact, I think that I have some animal print fabric that would make great backs! Use up that stash!


Periodically, I consider all my UFOs and feel so overwhelmed! It'll take me years to finish them all, I'm sure. I've decided to try to at least get them all to the "top" stage, with backings and bindings all set to go. That way, I can pull out all the related scraps and fabric pieces and either donate them or file them back into my stash, so they're readily available for something else. Small scraps will be chopped up into blocks or strips.

For years I've accumulated many styles of fabric: kids, brights, reproductions, batiks....anything that I "just had to have" at the time! My tastes are changing and my quilting time is limited, so I've decided to just sew what I really love - Reproduction fabrics, especially 1900 or before. As I sort through UFOs and stash, I will cull fabric and donate it. I don't feel guilty anymore about how much I paid for it all. I really just want to pare down my stash to the stuff that I really love working with! The donated fabric will be useful to someone else, and will benefit my favorite non-profit thrift store.

Louise