Sunday Stash Report

I didn't get around to writing my Sunday stash report last week... and to be honest it was because I had some input and no output so I avoided having to confess my sins by not writing. Simples.

So now 2 weeks later and I confess to some more input BUT I have had a couple of finishes too so all is not lost.

Firstly lets do the finishes.

Actually I did have a few finishes that first week I avoided writing my stash report (week 11)- some little things.

Whilst in Brisbane I had finished off 2 easy cosmetics bags, a dodgey small boxy bag and then when I got home I made a large messenger bag, the size to take a lap top. Apart from the dodgey boxy bag which will probably be given to some small unsuspecting child, the other items I made are all for the Comic Con stall I am going to be having for Handmade With Love in September.

This past week (week 12) I have had 2 big finishes. I managed to finish off my En Provence quilt. I had quilted it on the long arm at our club, using a pantograph. It was my first go at doing a pantograph and I was quite pleased with how it turned out. I chose a pink checked fabric to bind it in and think that it has turned out really well. I still haven't come up with a special name for the quilt so its going to just be En Provence and I'll be done with it! 10.15m

My second finish for the week is a t'shirt quilt that I have made for my daughter aka Fangirl. Its been a long time in the coming... she's been giving me t'shirts to go in it for about 10 years. She has nothing to complain about though.... her brother aka The Beast has only ever received 2 quilts from me where as she has already been given 3. His is coming... eventually. 5.93m 
There will be no photos because whilst she knows its coming I still want it to be a surprise for her

And now to my purchases. 

Whilst in Brisbane I bought on metre of some cute spider web fabric. It was 150cm wide so was 1.5m

At home a local  shop had a big big sale on. The sad reason is that they are probably going to go out of selling fabric. Anyway, they had a 40% off sale and I succumbed... 

My first forray into the shop was quite legitimate. I needed some fabric to finish off the backing for my A to Z quilt. I found some suitable stuff (but didn't get enough and ended up having to spend ages piecing the back with lots of little bits). No photos of this yet though as it is part of the A to Z challenge which starts in 5 days (eek)


 but whilst I was there also bought some stuff that will be good for the Comic Con stall - some cute ghosty type characters plus some co-ordinating red and greys that will be great for linings. 7.57m

Then... that 40% kept ringing in my ears. I had seen some red and grey Star Wars fabric - brilliant for the stall... and also I have the Labrynth pattern. I bought it a few years ago but then forgot about it and only found it again in January. It is one that I really couldn't make from scraps at all. It has to be made from the 4 fabrics - tones of a colour in order for the illusion to work. I really want to make it ... and so ... off I went and purchased all the fabric for it in one hit. (apart from the backing). Because I had to do the conversion from yards to metres I wasn't sure that I had bought enough. The sale was ending the next day so I came home and cut it all out so as to be able to go back and get any extra the next day if I didn't have enough whilst they still had it and whilst it was still on sale (I think I told my dear readers all of this in my WIP Wednesday post... sorry) 13.88M

Anyway

Weeks 11 and 12
Fabric used          17.44
Fabric added        21.45
Net usage            -4.01m

Year to Date     
Fabric used       78.47
Fabric Added     43.05
Net Usage        35.42m

linking up with Patchwork Times

Its Whoopsday Again... WIP Thursday

Once again I am a day late with my WIP - Work in Progress report. Its coming to you on Thursday BUT its still Wednesday somewhere.

This past week I have achieved some great things. I was going to settle for Good but no I will claim GREAT. This week I learned how to do a Pantograph on the longarm. Well I started to learn. I will still need lots of help doing them but I did use the pantograph on 2 quilts and that rates as great. My friend Lorraine had to help me each time we had to advance the quilt, and help solve any hassles BUT I got 2 quilts quilted AND I used a pantograph so that rates as Great. No photos (I feel a bit self conscious taking photos in public so to speak for my blog... silly probably but you get that).

I did the quilting Friday and Saturday. I have since then trimmed both quilts and made and attached the binding on one of them and tied off the ends of the threads. So one, En Provence is completely finished (apart from the label) and the other still needs to be bound. I have also loaded (With lots of help from Lyndi) another quilt and I plan to go and quilt it today (in between bible study, house work and helping with worship at our aged care facility). This one will be free motion quilting but I am hoping to mimic the pattern from one of the pantographs I used... a series of circles in circles... a bit like bubbles.

A local quilt shop is having a 40% off sale this past 2 weeks and I am afraid I caved (my Stash figures are going to be woeful this week). Whilst cleaning up and sorting my craft cupboards in January I found that I had the Labrynth pattern - that gorgeous puzzle like pattern that was doing the rounds on the internet last year and a few years before that too. I got tagged in it numerous times by various people who really liked it. Obviously I must have too (the first time it went around) and bought the pattern and then forgot about it. Anyway... I decided since it was a pattern that I had to buy fabric for, that I couldn't shop from my stash to make, I would lash out and take advantage of this sale.

So yesterday I visited the shop and purchased the many metres of fabric that I was going to need and came home, went back to get my pattern that I had left on the shop counter, and THEN when home started cutting for the quilt. I wanted to get it all cut out for 2 reasons.

1. I had to convert the required fabric from yards to metres and I wasn't confident that I had got it correct
2. If I had made a mistake and needed more then I needed to get back before they sold all the fabric and before the sale was over!

So I spent the rest of the late afternoon and evening cutting fabric and... I had heaps. The patterns are usually pretty generous and I didn't cut back too much for each measurement (A metre is about 3" more than a yard).

So that was another great achievement. I am not sure when I will actually start sewing it. I want to get on with some more sewing for Comic Con but with it cut I can take it with me when we got away and work on the blocks as we travel.

I made another large messenger bag for Handmade With Love during the week using some gorgeous monkey fabric. Whilst not strictly pop culture it is cute and quirky so should appeal to the crowd that goes to Comic Con (at least I am  hoping it will)

My other sewing for HWL this week has been sewing 2 size one rompers at our weekly get together. I am not a great one for sewing clothing with cotton fabric (I learned to sew clothes using knit fabric and was confident sewing that for many years although since I got into patchwork I haven't sewn much of the other) Anyway Peggy, our HWL leader is a fantastic sewer. She had cut out two pairs of rompers and I sewed them with help from her. She did a fair bit of pinning and we would work out the next steps together. She did the overlocking. The look really cute.

That is about it for me... a great week of sewing. Hope you too have had a good week.

Linking up with 

WIP Wednesday

At the beginning of the year after I had finished my cleaning and sorting of my craft cupboards, I felt like I had a cupboard full of UFOs and half done WIPs. I've made really great progress on them though and am at a stage where I only have one project truly a WIP and since it is a mystery quilt and I am up to date with it there isn't much I can do

Well that isn't strictly true. I have 2 quilts sitting near my machine, pinned and ready to be quilted. Sparkle baby quilt and the Club Mystery quilt. 

I have finished En Provence, -  took off the upside down border and turned it round and restitched it. I have also made all the left over units (or nearly all of them) into a strip to go down the centre of the backing and found some suitable fabric for the rest of the backing. Its a purple, cream and green table cloth I was given by someone (I keep thinking of my sister Dorothy) I split the tablecloth in half and inserted the strip. Then I realised that the piece wasn't going to be quite wide enough so added a strip that I had cut off the end to the sides and it should be wide enough now. I cut batting and its now in a basket to take up to the club and quilt sometime the long arm is free which might not be for a while as the club has made a heap of charity quilts that all need to be quilted.

During the week I put together the blocks for my A to Z Challenge quilt. I remade 2 of the blocks as I wasn't happy with them - one was over 1/2" too small and the other I was unhappy with the fabrics I had chosen. I am wondering about adding a border to it. I would like to use some alphabet fabric but would have to buy it. I found some I liked on EQuliter. I am trying to work out how much I would need for the border and perhaps the backing as well, although I am going to also use the Z block on the back as well as the 2 blocks that I remade. I am not sharing photos of the quilt yet as I am saving it for April for the A to Z Blogging Challenge

I have also got a new project underway that I can't blog about as the person it is for sometimes reads my blog and certainly follows me on facebook. (which I link to my blog posts) so no more information and no comments. The top is done - unless I add a border and of course then there is the backing to be made.

So really I have 5 true works in progress - En Provence, Club Mystery Quilt, A to Z quilt, my secret project, and Sparkle baby quilt - oh and Charlotte Hawks Scrap quilt. 6.

At Handmade With Love this week I helped Peggy make some signature bears. These are a special order from the church that I attend. We give a signature bear to baptised babies and children. The lady who made them moved away and we were buying them from a store but they stopped selling them. Hence a request came that we make them. They are taking a bit to work - we had to source a pattern and then buy the fabric and stuffing and then we had to work out the pattern. We are getting there though.

During the week I cut out a stack of zipper pouches using the Easy Cosmetics Bag from So Sew Easy. I cut them from the fabric that I had previously made the Satchels (or messenger bags) from. I mostly bought .5 metre of each of the different Pop culture fabrics. 

Once I have made the messenger bag and the Easy Cosmetics bag I still have some of each fabric left and I plan to make a round headphones cord carrier and a small zipper coin purse. I was thinking about the pot holders I have made previously which have been popular. I might end up buying more of each fabric and making them as well. I do have some of them left as well as some hanging towels (left from the Christmas Craft fair)

I have run out of the iron on stiffening and am also low on zips. I've ordered more of the brightly coloured zips from Ebay and will need to buy the stiffening from our LQS. On Tuesday after I came home from making bears at HWL I sewed up 3 of the cosmetics bags that I had previously cut out. 

I have one more that I can sew up but then need to wait for more zips and/or stiffening (I know that isn't the right word but for the life of me I can't remember what is the correct word)

Today was our Patchwork group. I worked on my secret project and also quilted one of our charity quilts (we are making a pile for the children's hospital in Brisbane) and got the binding machined on.

So its been a busy week with lots of progress made on various projects.

Linking up with 

WIP Wednesday

Another busy week in which I got one of my WIPs finished off and made substantial progress on some others.

Stringen' Em Along. 
I got this quilt finished off in time to count it in my Stash report for the week Yay.

En Provence (Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt)
I worked steadily on this for several days and finally got the top together last night. Now to make a back for it! I ended up with heaps of the white/neutral 4 patches left over. I must have seriously miscounted. I will probably work on incorporating them into the backing.

It was only after I was showing a friend this photo I realised that I had put the top border on upside down. Oops

Surrounded by Scraps 
This Charlotte Hawks latest mystery quilt. Clue 2 was released on Feb 8th (here) in the US which was Thursday in Australia. I worked on it straight away and was pleased to get it finished Friday. Now to wait till March for the next clue to come out :)

Hexagon Quilt
Today at Patchwork a couple of friends helped me load the Hexagon quilt onto the quilting frame at our Club rooms. The idea was that I would get it set up to quilt tomorrow but I got started on it and since the others didn't mind me doing it whilst they were there I kept right on and got it finished. We had a few issues with the quilt backing - getting it to load properly - I had appliqued a strip of hexagons to the back and it meant it didn't stretch as much as the rest of it. We managed to get it relatively straight and it just meant that I had to carefully monitor it as I fed it through to make sure it was all sitting straight. I still have to trim off the excess and get the quilt squared up. The binding is all ready made and ready to go. I plan to machine it on so it won't take too long to getting it finished (hopefully by this Sunday)


I've been working away on some messenger bags for the Comic Con stall. I got 4 made yesterday and now I am out of magnetic clips so can't make any more till the ones I order arrive.

Hope you all make good progress on your WIPs this week.

Linking up with 

WIP Wednesday... lots of progress

Despite still not being 100% energy wise (but maybe that's age and heat related too) I have accomplished "Great Things" this week! I am so pleased. I haven't finished any of the WIPs but have advanced a lot.

Hexagon Quilt.

I have had the backing made for this for ages and even the batting cut but when I went to load it onto the quilting frame at Patchwork I found I had cut it too small. I finally cut it again and HOPEFULLY its the right size this time. I also made the binding for it. I blogged here about how I didn't really like it any more. I am still a bit unsure of it but its such a massive undertaking I will certainly finish it. I've arranged with my friend Lyndi to quilt this next Thursday. Woot.

Handwork Heritage

I attached the piano key borders. The centre is made from doilies that I inherited from various family members. I only cut up the ones that were stained or had holes in them, or were shop bought. These were sashed in various 1" finished pink scraps. The borders were made from the scraps left over from the centre blocks and more pink scraps. I had kept on making the piano key borders till I ran out of doily scraps. When I went to put them on I had enough to go around 1.75 times almost. Oops. They went into the backing. The leftovers I put into the backing interspersing them between strips made from vintage sheets. Having finished the backing I also made the binding (pink checked) and cut the batting.

If I get time next Thursday after I have quilted the hexagon quilt I may try to get this one loaded and quilted too.

Sparkle Sparkle

My latest baby quilt finish! There are 2 babies due this half of the year to whom I will gift a quilt. This is another adapted from Jenny Doen's Sparkle quilt pattern. I am not sure which of the bub's it will go to. The top for this one has been finished for a while. This week I made the backing, a simple affair this time. I added 2 strips to a wildly colourful width of fabric animal print to make it wide enough. I made the binding too. Today at Patchwork I got it pinned ready for me to quilt it on my domestic machine. (One of the 3 I got pinned today)

Stringen' 'Em Along.

This quilt made to Bonnie Hunter's String X pattern is for our Japanese Granddaughter (daughter of our Japanese host son) She will be just over one when we get to see her in July this year. I finished the top last year and wasn't sure who was going to get it - I made the pattern cause I fell in love with it. I hadn't gotten around to making the backing. When I decided that I loved it so much it had to go to someone special, our grand daughter was the obvious choice. 

Because the front wasn't very baby orientated I wanted the backing to have more pictures and fun stuff, and also reflect the Australian side of things. I fussy cut out heaps of Australian Animals from various fabrics I had on hand, framed the pictures with various 1" finished strips and then made them up to 10" size with an assortment of fabric including plains and Australian fabrics. A couple I framed with some Japanese fabric I had used on the year quilt I had made the year Sho was with us.

I pinned it ready for quilting today at Patchwork. It was one of 3 I pinned up there today.

Club Mystery Quilt

Last year our club ran a mystery quilt. Each month we were given instructions for a particular unit for 6 months. It was fat quarter friendly - in fact we were told to choose 6 coordinating fat quarters for it. In the end we were given a design we could use but were also invited to make up our own design which is what I did. Mine had ended up being very dark so I added some extra orange to lift it a bit. 

I had put the centre together last year but was yet to finish it off. Looking at it this past week I decided it needed more orange so put in a final border. Monday I worked on the backing for it. I wanted to use up the left over scraps of fabric and left over blocks too so I made them into strips. Then I raided my scrap drawers and pulled out all the 5" strips that were in the colour scheme of the front.

The result isn't all that striking or wonderful but I am happy with it. It took the best part of the day to put together but you get that. Now the batting for it is cut too and the binding (more orange) made. And at Patchwork today I also got it pinned. 

That makes a total of 5 quilts ready to be quilted.

En Provence

I finally got around to assembling a couple of the blocks on the design wall. I have cut all the yellow squares needed to complete them. I have yet to sew any together but at least I know what I am aiming for now

I've also worked on a few things for the Comic Con stall I will be having in September. I've now made one zipper bag and 3 satchels/messenger bags featuring Star Trek, Star Wars and skeleton cat fabric. 

I started work on another project today. Its going to be a secret project so I won't be posting any photos - but I did start work on it today.

And finally I did a bit of a clean up of my sewing area on the weekend. I spent Saturday morning cleaning up the cutting table and sewing table and then sorting through all my notions and redistributing stuff to places where they will be most useful. Its been great to be able to put my hand on various things as I have needed them as soon as I have wanted them. 4 days later and I have managed to mislay my fabric marking pen and one of my quick unpicks (seam ripper)

How have you gone with your WIPs this week?

Linking up with 

WIP Wednesday

This time of year is so busy for many of us. So much has happened in the last week that trying to pull things out from my crowded memories to recall what I have accomplished sewing wise is proving VERY difficult.

I had managed to get a heap done the previous week but with Christmas preparations underway and our daughter here for a couple of weeks, sewing at the machine wasn't a priority!

For some reason my scrap basket was calling to me. It was absolutely overflowing everywhere and one of my 2016 resolutions had been to keep it under control and empty it every month. Believe me when I say that didn't happen. Maybe 2 or 3 months I got it emptied but not for the last 6 months anyway. I had managed to keep it a little tamed this last month or so by digging through it to cut scraps up rather than going to my drawers of already cut up scraps. However I decided to try to make a major assault on it and see how much I could reduce it.

My first step in this process is to iron the contents. This makes them easier to cut up. Pressing seemed to take AGES - several evenings as least. I sorted them as I went into smaller squatter pieces - ones that would fit into a container I had on my ironing board (about 8" x10") These would make squares and bricks as Bonnie Hunter calls them. Then I had a pile (draped over the back of the recliner lounge near my ironing board) of strips - longer pieces of varying widths up to about 6". And then I had a pile for wider pieces. It was all a bit haphazard but helped me get a bit of order.

Then it took a couple of evenings watching various tv specials to get the container of small pieces cut into useful units. I have started on the narrower strips and am perhaps half way through it. Still a lot of cutting to go.

 My cutting table is located behind the big couch in our big room downstairs that used to be the kids toy room and then became the tv room and which I now claim to be my sewing studio that just happens to have the tv and lounges in it. (My claim on the room is disputed when the family is all home). The position of the cutting table means that I can stand and cut and watch tv and not interfere with anyone else's viewing. The ironing board is located behind the recliners so I can stand there and again not interfere with anyone else's viewing.

En Provence, the Bonnie Hunter 2016 Mystery quilt has seen progress. Clue 5 came out sometime on Friday. Usually its 9PM Australian time but this week I think it may have come out a little earlier. Anyway - I looked at it Friday evening and said "Right HST" and didn't do anything more about it till yesterday. I got the 64 made (I blogged about it yesterday here)

Have you managed to get any sewing done this week?

Linking up with 

Clue 5 En Provence Mystery

Bonnie's clue 5 came out just a couple of days before Christmas and I've been very busy and other wise engaged and it wasn't till today (Tuesday in Australia) that I have had a chance to get to sew. I did spend a little time on Christmas Day pinwheeling my purple 4 patches from clue 3. The rest of the family were playing a board game and wanted me to stay near them even if I wasn't going to play. So... I enjoyed their company whilst unpicking the little stitches to enable the centre seams to pinwheel. Later whilst watching tv during the evening I pressed them.

In making the half triangles this week I used a variety of techniques, depending on the size of the scraps I was using. Some I made using the 4 at a time method, some 2 at a time and a couple I cut the triangles and so made them one at a time. Once again my accuracy has wobbled about and my sizes have varied a little bit. Still... they are looking pretty good.

How have you gone with Clue 5? Are you keeping up with the clues as they come out?

Linking with  http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2016/12/mystery-monday-link-up-part-5.html

En Provence Clue 4 Progress

I was later getting to start this clue than usual. It wasn't till today that I was finally able to get to start it. All for good reasons mind you. Our daughter, Fangirl arrived home Saturday midday for the holiday. Saturday (when the clue is effectively available here) was taken up with getting ready to see her and then enjoying her company. Sunday was busy with church all morning, then guests for lunch and some more in the late afternoon. I didn't actually get to do more than look at the clue till late this morning. I had started to cut fabric in preparation for another mystery quilt that I am going to be participating in that starts in January. I had started cutting for it on Thursday and wanted to get it finished before starting this clue. This mystery is called "Surrounded By Scraps" by Charlotte Hawkes and is due to start on January 11th.

  

So that delayed things even further. Eventually this morning I was able to get started.

I had a few mix ups. To start with I cut too many of one of the side triangles. Oh dear. And then I found that I had cut a heap of them too small. Rats. It means I wasted a heap of fabric as I had to cut new ones.....and I'd already cut too many. Oh well I might be able to use them in another quilt block (or I can put them into stuff the dog bed pillow I'm making).

I worked on the clue from midday today and by dinner time I had them all done. They have ended up a little small so not sure what I did wrong. To be honest most of my blocks this time around have ended up a bit small. I suspect it must be my 1/4" foot. I've always been slack at checking accuracy. I am hoping that I am going to be able to fudge it if they are all a little small. I still have to trim the tag ends off.

Linking up with Mystery Monday Linkup Part 4

WIP Wednesday - bits and pieces done

This week has been busy. I had hoped to get 2 quilts quilted this week on our Patchwork club's longarm but unfortunately 7/8ths on the way through the first quilt the machine stopped picking up the bobbin thread and so that was the end of my quilting. Discussions are ongoing with the supplier re getting it working again. It was ok for me as I didn't have any schedule for my two but there were others booked behind me who are wanting to get quilts finished for Christmas so it is really bad timing..

My Quilt on the long arm. You can see I was up to the last pass when it broke

Only 6" to go in most places. Grrrr

On Friday evening Handmade With Love, the sewing group I belong to, had a stall at the Uniting Church's "Walk Through Bethlehem". A lady bought our last 3 mini stockings and wanted another 10 so I got them made over the weekend. The pattern seemed to get a bit wonky and so they aren't quite as good as the originals but pretty good.

I managed to get "Stringen' 'em Along", my Strippy X quilt, one of Bonnie Hunter's free patterns on her blog, together. I am still deciding about a border. I think I will use the background fabric as another 2 inch border and then do a scrappy binding.

This is the top still to be sewn together. The photo of the quilt is on the ipad and I haven't gotten it off yet.

Speaking of Bonnie Hunter. Clue 3 was released on Friday - 9PM here so I didn't start it till Saturday. This week it was 168 purple 4 Patches. I finished them off by Monday although I have to "pinwheel" the centre seams. I miscounted and ended up making 183 of them some how. I detailed my progress in my blog post on Monday here.

My other activity for the week has been work on a couple of satchels that I am making as Christmas gifts. . I am not sure that they read my blog... but here they are anyway

With only a bit over a week till Christmas I hope that you have gotten your Christmas sewing done by now and aren't doing late, last minute mad sewing.

Linking up with 

Clue 3 En Provence - some progress

I am not having a lot of luck these last few days. Today the longarm I was using at our club rooms (yes our Patchwork Group has its own longarm) played up and I couldn't finish off the quilt I was working on (it stopped picking up the bobbin thread after a series of thread breakages)

Over the weekend it was my Janome that wasn't sewing nicely really interfering with the progress I was trying to make on clue 3 of En Provence, the Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt. 

Having changed the needle, cleaned out the bobbin case, muttered, mumbled, whined and grizzled, I finally changed the thread I was using... and all was well. Sigh. Wished I had tried that a day earlier. 

Anyway - despite all my hard work I didn't get the 168 4 patches finished. I have made all the 2 patches I needed (336!) 

and am now working on making the 4 patches.

 I have made 71 of them - so 97 to go!

How have you gone with your Clue 3

Late breaking news. I got them all finished Monday night (Australian time) Still have to do the pinwheels on the back but the 4 Patches are DONE. Actually more than done.... some how I managed to make 183. Not sure where I lost count but whatever!

Linking up with the Part 3 catchup

WIP Wednesday

This week I have managed to decorate my house for Christmas. I've got the trees up (a big one, a small one and a number of miniature ones) They are all plastic trees. In the summer heat in Australia real trees don't last too long. 

 We used to get a real one  when I was still living at home but we could only cut it on Christmas Eve and it was dropping all its leaves on Boxing Day. My inlaws were still cutting a real tree when we were first married and I loved it but after a few years they got a plastic one too so it would last longer. I admit to being a tad disappointed but...

Anyway - decorating the house has been a work in progress all week as I have gradually unpacked the boxes of decorations. The only things still to go up are my quilted wall hangings. I can't find any of the rods. I suspect I have taken them up to church over the year to hang quilts up there. I've tried to buy some from Big W but they didn't have any but will check out the hardware shop. 

Besides decorating the house.... I have done some sewing. (surprised you there didn't I!!)

I finished off the 5 Darlek potholders I started to make last Wednesday. I finally got the labels stitched on at Handmade With Love yesterday and posted them off to Allison, who commissioned them from me today. (I didn't get a photo of the finished 5 so here is a cropped photo from last week )

Bonnie Hunter's En Provence Mystery quilt, clue number 2 came out Saturday morning Aussie time and I got the 100 units made that day. They are a long way from perfect but done is done. I still need to trim off the tag end bits from the triangles. 

I have also worked on the 4 patches from last week. We had to make a pinwheel at the joins of the 4 blocks on the back which reduces the bulk at the seams (Check out Bonnie's blog for the explanation of how and why) I hadn't read that instruction when making the blocks.... and also that the blocks needed to spin in the one direction. I sewed some wrong and so whilst they are all now pinwheeled, some are clockwise and some anti clockwise but meh you get that.

I am working on a Christmas present for a friend. I wanted to test the pattern before I used the special fabric I had ordered in for the project (ok asked my daughter to buy and post) so I made it out of some cat fabric. I really love the way it turned out

One of my goals for this month is to finish off my 2012 Amy Gibson BOM. To do that I need to make a backing. I have some fabric that I thought would be good but there wasn't quite enough so I decided to piece a row of orphan blocks down the centre to join the two pieces and make it big enough. Yeah ... well I dived into that basket of left over blocks and before long I was having lots of fun making them into a backing. 

There were too many for just a strip so instead it ended up that I pieced almost the entire back with just wide borders of the fabric that was going to be the backing to make it large enough. 

That of course took way longer than just piecing a back but... it was fun. And I used up heaps of orphan blocks and left over bits. I decided that this was appropriate to have a sort of sampler on the back given it was a sampler on the front. I think it looks great!

How have you gone with your WIPs this week/Month?