Sunday Stash

After my big hit last week  I was worried that this week's usage was going to seem meagre in comparison. However one way and another the yardage used this week has slowly increased.

I made a 12" block to into a community quilt that our group is making. I'll be putting it together as well no doubt. It will be my third one for the year. I don't think we have any more blocks to go together although I will check. I quite enjoy the challenge of putting the blocks together and especially fitting in little left over bits into the borders etc. This time we have 9 pinwheels made from hst made from the trimmings of the flying geese blocks.

Before I made the extra block and the extra pinwheels

We finished putting together the top for Newspaper Mama last week and this week at Patchwork I pieced a backing for it from my own stash. I also contributed some extra fabric for the borders on the top and have given them fabric for the binding. I am not sure if I am going to be the one to put the binding on but at the moment I am counting my contribution as finished and that way I can count the fabric I donated. 3.96m

I can't see where I have counted in the other blocks that I have made for these community quilts... the ones for the blue and white one either. So I've counted the yardage for all of them too. 5.12m (Incl Newspaper Mama)

I need to get on and quilt Playing in Sunshine, my latest scrappy quilt. Its been pinned and ready to go since Wednesday but I just haven't felt the mojo to get started with it. Perhaps this week... tomorrow even. But so far not feeling the mojo.

I've made some more hanging kitchen towels. Each one only uses 2 10" squares (and even then there is some left over). Some of the fabric I used came from the stash we have at Handmade Love so since I didn't count that in I can't count it out. Still the fabric I contributed does slowly add up... I have made a total of 13 hanging towels, half of which I used my own fabric. .58m



I thought I had another week of no fabric additions but when I was sorting through some stiffening I had bought at Spotlight a month ago I found 3 fat quarters I had also purchased.. whoops. So they have gone into this weeks Stash addition. That's .77m (yeah you would think that it would just be .75 but because the fabric is 110cm wide.....)

So my stats are

Week 29

         Fabric Used                     5.70m
         Fabric Added                   0.77m

Year To Date
         Fabric Used                    96.71m
         Fabric Added                  36.12m
         Net Used/Added             60.58m        

Linking up with Judy at Patchwork Times

WIP Wednesday

I thought we had a big stall for Handmade Love at the end of the month but the powers that be within the group decided we wouldn't go to that particular market. I had made a big effort to get  all the hand towels I had sitting in my box made into hanging kitchen towels but now it turns out I need not have worried. Still they will go into the suitcase of goodies we are making for the next market stall they are having. I haven't finished them quite... still sewing on press studs and decorative buttons but that doesn't take long. The photo isn't all that flash... but the finished ones that I could have hung up to show are in the suitcase with the co-ordinator!!n(I've finished 6 of 12)

I also finished off a clutch bag for Handmade Love as well. It too was just waiting on a press stud and a decorative button. I forgot to photograph it. Oops

I have been working on my Playing with Nine Patches quilt as well. I made a border for it using more 2.5" squares from my scraps and from the background fabric. I think its called a checker board border. For the corner stones I used nine patches in all bright colours. The only 2.5" squares in this entire quilt that I had to cut, besides the ones from the background fabric, was a few bright ones for these corner stones. The rest of them I pulled from my stash of cut 2.5" squares - all 1000 of them!! I can't believe I had that many of them in the shoebox but... I've even got some left!!

I was thinking about what I would piece for a backing of the quilt but I found that I had a piece of backing fabric that is big enough so I don't have to piece one. That is quite a relief. I do like a pieced backing but sometimes they take me as long to make as the top. I fiddle around fitting various bits and pieces in. 

This quilt is probably going to be given to a friend who lost much of her home to a fire a month or so ago. I do want to get it finished sooner rather than later. I got it pinned out at Patchwork today and will stipple it myself soon. I've decided to call it "Playing in Sunshine".

Today at Patchwork I also made a backing for Newspaper Mama. I had forgotten to measure it, and I had left it up on the board at our patchwork rooms as it is a group quilt.  I sorted through my stash and found several pieces that would work in for a backing. In the end I used one large piece of black and white checker board in a checker board which I joined down the middle to make it wide enough and then cut through the other way to insert a piece of solid black to make it long enough. We off centred the black strip so that it won't be noticeable if the quilt backing isn't quite centred when it goes together. I didn't take a photo of it either. Its a backing so not that exciting.

Speaking of Newspaper Mama... its name came from the fact that its Black and White and Red all over... newspaper That brings the song Newspaper Mama to mind. This song was written and performed by the Australian Children's singer Peter Coombs. My kids had several of his tapes when they were little and loved him. His Christmas CD is still a favourite of ours. I found this clip on You Tube and thought I would share it with you.

I've been working on the 2 POD blocks that I need to get done. I got the tea cup one finished yesterday. I love it. (Block 27)



For block 28 we had a range of choices for the 5" pieced block but I went with Trevor the Toad. I have Trevor together as I write this but still have to make the books in the block and put it together. The next one should be released tomorrow and after that there will only be one more official block. Like many others doing this block though I intend to make the broom stick to lean against the book case and perhaps something else to go on top. Fangirl has laid claim to this quilt and I am thinking it will be her Christmas present.

The other thing I have worked on this week has been another Sarah's Choice block so we will have 9 of those to make into another donation quilt for our group. I am hoping this one will come together more quickly than the last two group ones I have put together. We have some left over half square triangles from this as well that have been made into pinwheels to go into the border. I don't think I will even sash the blocks, just sew them together in 3 rows of 3 and then do the border with the pinwheel and perhaps another narrow border. Its all pink and white and I am hoping that we will give it to the someone who is having a fundraiser for breast cancer and they can raffle it.

I forgot to take a photo of my block and the quilt as a work in progress today but this is how it was looking before today's efforts. I was able to make extra pinwheels from some more hst leftover from other blocks. There is enough for one more pinwheel in the centre of each row and one for the back. Pieced  back coming up obviously!

The link  to this block on Quilters Cache is here

Linking up with

 

WIP on Thursday

Hey everyone

I've been rather quite this week. I went away on Thursday right after I wrote my last WIP post. I was away all weekend and rather busy with limited internet access and it wasn't really appropriate for me to be on the net anyway. We didn't get home till very late on Sunday night and we were really wiped. We slept in all morning and didn't do much at all the rest of the day.

Tuesday wasn't a lot better. Wednesday I got to my patchwork group in the morning and then in the afternoon I had some surgery on my shoulder. Nothing major. I had a lipoma cut off my shoulder... a lipoma is a fatty cyst. It was a fairly straight forward procedure and hasn't been as painful in the recovery as I thought but it has knocked me about far more than I expected. I was left feeling rather queasy afterwards and I have taken it really easy since. Being awake for the procedure meant I didn't have any residual anaesthetic in my system. But I did feel the pulling and pushing and the memory of the smell and sound left me feeling a bit off. 

So I've been a bit out of it today too.

So I haven't actually got on with a whole heap done this week.

I was able to do some knitting whilst I was in the car and while home in bed. I finished off beanies for Beast and Kombi Boy as well as two rainbow themed ones for friends involved with Emmaus.

On Tuesday I got a parcel. My quilts I had sent to the long armer  arrived back. I have trimmed the excess off and now have to make the binding for them. I had thought I would have them done by now but my lethargy has taken all my enthusiasm... and I thought I should let my shoulder heal a little first.

Yesterday at patchwork I finished off Newspaper Mumma, the red, white and black themed quilt made from BOM our quilt group did at the beginning of the year. I was just a bit short of the red I wanted and so had to patch in some white which is a bit of a shame... bit disappointed in that but on the whole it looks good. The finished quilt will be donated to a charity of some kind. I still have to make up a backing. I could buy some backing fabric and the group would pay for it but if I can make it from my stash I am happy to donate it. I donated the half square triangles that make up most of the border and the red fabric used in it as well. 



I now have 2 POD blocks to do. The new one was released last night. Sigh. Hopefully I'll get my oomph back this weekend and I'll get it all done.