Stash Report

Stash Report
Nothing to report as far as finishes this week which is a bit sad!

 I have been working away on a couple of quilts and have two tops finished - the blue "Shirt Off My Back" quilt and another one made with some of the left over 9 Patches same pattern but using brown sashing. I still need to get the backs for them made and then  get them pinned and quilted.

I hate pinning quilts. It takes me so long and I am no good at it. Sigh. Had a disaster pinning the first of my disappearing pinwheel quilts the other day. First time in a long time I managed to not have the top not centred properly and so ran out of wadding and had barely enough backing on one side but plenty on the other. I contemplated trying to add a bit of wadding and backing to that one side without unpinning it all (it was barely 1/4 inch short) but after a fortnight of ignoring the pinned quilt that needed the extra attention I unpinned it all and will pin it again when I am up at our patchwork rooms on Wednesday. Hopefully I will be able to get the three quilts all pinned then. Since I have a key to the rooms I could go up tomorrow and get a start on them. Its our meeting on Wednesday and I am the (slack) secretary. Its my birthday this month and we celebrate everyone's birthday for that month with a cake and special lunch after the meeting. I had better get these quilts finished as I am in the birthday club and will be receiving my squishy parcel of fabric at the meeting... so that will be a sizable input. That's incentive to get working.

The 3 quilt tops done but needing to be sandwiched and quilted

Anyway as far as the stash report goes
Stash usage remains at 18.25m

Fitness

Very excited here. Today (Monday) I ran 6.34 kms in 54 mins. My average time for a km was just under 9 mins. I have been trying to build up my speed on my shorter runs. I restarted the c25k program and have been trying to run faster in those periods

I got a FitBit during the week which I am finding fun to use. I wimped out and got my husband to set it up for me. I did download the program but I find I get a bit overwhelmed with the technology at times (eg my daughter had to bail me out and set this blog up for me) Anyway I am finding it great. It is more sensitive than my pedometer app on my phone which often seems to miss steps. I am finding the food record part of it great too although it is in calories and Australian food is in kilojoules so I have to convert things all the time. I am trying to be conscientious about the whole thing and record everything I eat so sometimes I look at something and go "Nah... can't be bothered having to record it" especially if I have to work it out first.

My Fitbit Flex.

I have joined a community on the FitBit website that is made up of quilt pod-casters and their listeners. Its going to be fun and motivating to be part of that circle too... I hope. At the moment among my own circle of fitbit friends I am 2nd last... of 6 but hopefully I can keep going and catch a few of them

My other exciting fitness report is that this morning, post run I was under 90kgs. Woo hoo. Go me. Yes I was no doubt dehydrated having just got back from the run but I don't care... I loved those numbers 89.8 kgs flashing at me from the scales. That means I have lost 10 kgs from my heaviest back midyear and have just under 10 to go so I'm half way. I am especially pleased to have lost weight despite the weekend I had. On Saturday afternoon I went to a "High Tea" fundraiser for Our Rainbow House. I organised for 5 friends to come with me so we had a lovely table. We got to spend a couple of hours relaxing, chatting, eating gorgeous food, being served tea, coffee, cold water and punch constantly through out the afternoon.

My friends and I at the High Tea.

 At the event the lady who is the driving force behind the charity which set up a school for orphans and destitute children in a village in Zambia, mentioned that she needs some help in the office and I have offered my services and am going around to talk to her tomorrow about that.

Work In Progress Wednesday

WIP Wednesday
Two projects have kept me busy this past week or so.
Wednesday at our Patchwork Group sewing days (we have them weekly. We are blessed to have our own club rooms supplied by our local council) I have been working on a blue version of the Disappearing Pinwheel. Made good progress on it. I have all the 10" blocks sewn together cut and have started to make the pinwheels. I have also made the units to make the pinwheels for the border.

some of the fabric for my Blue Disappearing pinwheel quilt

At home I have been working on a quilt I have called "The Shirt off My Back"
Last year at the quilt retreat I go to called Patch n Peace, I entered a men's shirt swap. We all took along a certain number of 2nd hand 100% cotton men's shirt which we cut into 4 pieces ( 2 front pieces and the back cut in two) and swapped among the groups we were put into, keeping one piece for ourselves and swapping the other 3. The challenge is that we have to bring back a quilt this year using the fabric. We are supposed to have at least one piece of each shirt in the finished product and we can use some other back ground fabrics. Actually we are going to be pretty easy on the rules. We all wanted to end up with a quilt that we liked and would use.

I found inspiration for my quilt on a Facebook group I am a member of but I can't remember which of the several groups that it was on so can't find the post that so can't give credit there. It was based on 9 patches with sashing on two sides arranged in such a way that whilst the blocks are all sashed the sashing lines aren't in a continuous straight line but each one is offset.


Firstly I had to cut the shirting into strips. I chose 2". I ended up with quite a pile which I had to iron nice and straight.

 Then I sewed 3 strips together, trying to match lengths of the strips but not worrying about the colour combinations

The seams were all pressed flat, going the same way and then sub cut into 2" units and the resulting 3 patch units were sewn into 9 patches. As far as possible no colours were repeated but some repeats slipped in but so long as two units the same colour weren't next to each other I tended to let it go. My original aim had been to make 120 units. The 9 patches measured 5" square. With 2" sashing on two sides they would end up 6.5". A quilt 10 x 12 units would measure 60" x 72" plus borders and would suit my purpose. I didn't realise that the amount of shirting I had would eventually make 350 of these units! I just kept sewing till all the strips were used up and then kept sewing units till they were all done

Each pile had 10 9-patches in it. I had more piled on the ironing boar

I wanted to keep the recycling theme going with the sashing fabric so I looked among my 2nd hand fabric and found some nice blue stuff that I was able to re-purpose. This was going to determine how big my final quilt would be. It turned out that I had enough to sash 123 9- patches so I can either make it 10x12 as I'd originally planned or 11x11 if I chose to. Haven't decided yet

"The Shirt off my Back" quilt laid on on my floor

That's as far as I have gone with it. I am really thrilled with how it is looking

I've added this to a blog linky sponsored by Freshly Pieced Modern Quilts

Stash Report

Stash Report

I finished "Into the Rainforest" which was begun in 2007 at a workshop our Patchwork Group ran. It involved painting the background and some of the fabric that we used for water and tree trunks. Then we cut out and machine appliqued (raw edge) various leaves and plants onto the picture. I pulled up about there and for 6 years it was in my ufo pile. I finally dragged it out and decided that I was never going to applique more to it and to call it done and finish it off. I sewed on borders and then started to hand quilt it. It languished for a while longer but going away to Sydney was the impetus I needed and I got lots of hand stitching done whilst sitting with my mum in her room or at her craft group and also whilst travelling. I have a lovely picture of me and mum stitching together but the program keeps turning it sideways so gave up trying to post it. Came home and did the binding and a meeting the week I got back meant I was able to finish the hand stitching on the binding and the hanging sleeve. Now it is hanging proudly inside my front door. I would have been better with more leaves added to it but ultimately done is better than not done and I really like it anyway.

Into the Rainforest begun July 2007 at a Gloria Loughman workshop. Completed Feb2014

Last Sunday was the baptism of a good friends little girl who is a month old. I wanted to get her quilt done to give to them then. But I also wanted to give another friend a quilt for their baby who is 10 months old. I knew they would be at the baptism so the race was on to get both these quilts done in time. And I made it! Yay me. Both quilts were presented to their recipients on Sunday and both sets of parents were very pleased with the gift - which is lovely. It is so rewarding to give a quilt when it is appreciated.

Miss G on her quilt Jungle Jive. Photo sent to me by her lovely mum

She was fascinated by the pictures. Apparently the Hippo has been a favourite

Miss L's quilt Pretty Stars from a Kimberley Einmo pattern

So stash report

Into the Rainforest 1.19m fabric used
Jungle Jive 3.16 m used
Pretty Stars 5.6m used.
Total 9.95m

No purchases since last report

So that makes it net usage for the year of 18.25 m



Fitness
Very excited to report that I have run 5 kms three times this month. I ran it first whilst in Sydney, running on an oval near my sister's place. I took about 42mins 30 secs. Then I ran 5 km when I got home on the road but was a bit slower - about 43 mins. Then last Monday I ran again and I broke 40 mins. I was very excited and very exhausted too. I have been trying to run 3 times a week but the other two days I am trying to do interval running using the C25K program but running as hard as I can for the run parts and then jogging or walking the rest parts. I walk on the days I don't run... unless its raining or I'm feeling lazy. Today I ran 6 kms. I didn't run fast just kept on going. I am very excited and think that one day I might even make 10 kms. I have a Rainbow Run coming up at the end of March. That's 5kms. Then in May I plan to take part in the Mothers' Day Classic which will be a 7km run

Weight wise its coming down slowly. I've lost over 9 kgs since the middle of the year but have at least 10 to go according to the charts. I am no longer obese but merely overweight! This morning after my big run I was under 91kgs which was very exciting.

Sorry to have been so irregular in my postings. I am hoping to get more reliable. I am also going to have to sort out my photo hassles. And improve my photography. Sigh.

Stash Report

Stash report
This is my first stash report. Ever since Pam on Hip to Be a Square started talking about her stash report I thought it would be really cool to track my stash usage. I decided to wait till the beginning of the new year to start tracking and I have to confess I cheated a little bit... I did that so that any stash I got for Christmas wouldn't be counted. I also deliberately well semi deliberately saved up two big finishes till the new year so that I could count them. To be honest I didn't really have time to finish them in all the rush up to Christmas and having a houseful of family for a couple of weeks. Once Christmas was over then I happily settled in and got those two quilts finished off.. and wow it was the New Year and I got to count them.

So for January I got to count as finishes
1. My cousin Syd's tie quilt... Family Ties: The Ties that Bind. It was 204cm square (being Australian our purchases are always in metres/centimetres so even though quilt patterns are all in inches its going to have to be converted to cms so as to be able to track the purchases against the usage) a total of 9.52 m of fabric
2. My sister Beth's quilt Forest Pinwheels 184 cm Square total of 7.79m
3 Great nephew Lucas's baby quilt Jungle Fever  123cm sq total of 3.60m

January monthly total 20.91 m fabric used and zero purchases.

February isn't looking quite so healthy. Shopping in Sydney and Brisbane whilst on holidays saw me add a total of 9.61m fabric and my daughter Fangirl's things she sent back by sea for the UK arrived and she was able to give me my Christmas gift from her... 3 m of fabric. Really cute picture fabric... some Kombi van fabric, some vintage toys and vintage seaside. I'll take some photos and add them soon... phone flat and camera in the room with DH who is asleep.

Net usage to date 11.30m

I've been working on several quilts but no finishes yet.
1. Disappearing Pinwheels the top is finished, binding made but still to make the backing and then pin and quilt.
2 Into the Rainforest picture quilt has the binding machined on but still have to handstitch it down. Meeting tomorrow night will see that done
3. Grace's Jungle quilt top is finished and the back made but have to make the Frankenbatting (Pam's from HTBAS word for batting that is made by patching pieces together)
4 Kimberley Einmo's mystery quilt from Craftsy class has been pinned awaiting quilting for a while. Really need to get stuck into that. So with a concerted effort I should bounce my numbers quite substantially.

This blog post is really boring... no photos. Sorry about that. Will try to pretty it up when I am not so tired.

Family Reunion

Family Reunion
This weekend we had a family reunion to celebrate amongst other things my sister Beth  and my cousin Syds' 70th birthdays. The invitation specified no gifts but I had made both of them a quilt. (I never could do what I was told) Actually I had embarked on the making of both quilts before the invitations to the party were issued but my story makes me out to be more of a rebel.

For my cousin I had made a tie quilt based initially on 14 ties that had belonged to his dad (who died in 1970) which were found in his mothers things when she died last year (aged 99 and 9 months) I gathered up ties from other family members, friends and from second hand shops. It was quite a mammoth undertaking but I really enjoyed the whole process. Firstly I washed the ties and then pressed them. I used iron on interfacing to stabilize the ties and stop them stretching out of shape. Ties are cut on the bias and so stretching can be a real issue. Then I made 25 crazy patchwork blocks using the blue and red ties from the 60 plus ties that i]I had amassed. I cut a 5 sided shape from the widest end of the tie  and attached it to the centre of a 14" sq piece of white fabric  (from an old sheet) I used a bit of fabric glue to do this. Then I built up the block with strips of the ties working my way around the shape till all the white fabric was covered. I trimmed the block to 13" square. I sashed the blocks with navy blue fabric and then put on a plain red border around the centre. Next I put on a piano key border using left over ties, red fabric scraps and fabric from my uncles old pajamas. I paper pieced the corner blocks so that the piano keys went around the corner.

I thought that my cousin knew I was making the quilt for him but apparently not. He was stunned by it when I gave it to him and very appreciative. Lots of my extended family are on facebook so had been following the quilts progress as i had posted lots of progress pictures on Facebook and so they were delighted to see the quilt in reality. Their interest was most heartwarming.

Syd and I with his quilt "Family Ties: The Ties that Bind"

The quilt I made my sister was a surprise to her. I made it using a variety of half square triangles from knitnitblogspot in green and brown fabrics. There were 16 blocks each from a different green fabric with a plain brown in the half square triangles. My sister was delighted with it. I stayed on with her after the reunion weekend and we looked at it in detail and i explained the half square triangle concept to her. She and her husband were fascinated by the variety of blocks that could be made from the one unit. Whilst my cousin's quilt (which I called  Family Ties:The ties that bind) featured heavily on Facebook my sister's quilt didn't get shown at all because she is my friend on Facebook.

The front of my sister's quilt. It also featured a piano key border but no pieced corners this time

The back of the quilt. it took as long to put together as the front I swear!

 My sister and I were discussing why I chose green and brown for her quilt. They are not her colours and don't feature in her current decor but they were the ones I was strongly drawn to when choosing the fabrics for the quilt. In discussion we remembered that 35 years ago, at the end of the 70s when I was living in Sydney attending teachers college and regularly visiting their home their kitchen chairs were lime green and the family room had a lot of brown trim in it. This was the period that I would have spent most time with them - visiting regularly, babysitting my niece and nephew, getting some family time. So we decided it came from then. She has already used it to snuggle under for a nanna nap whilst I have been staying here with her.

Beth and I with her quilt

I also bought with me the quilt for my newest great nephew Lucas. He wasn't at the reunion but I was able to give it to his grandma, my sister J.

Disappearing Pinwheels

apologies. The photos on this blog entry are all sideways or upside down. I don't know why. I have tried to do what Fangirl did for me last time but it hasn't worked so I am feeling frustrated. Figured if I don't get them up tonight its going to be another week and I am trying to be posting more regularly... trying and failing. So... hope you don't get a cricked neck looking at them

Disappearing Pinwheel

Have you caught the Disappearing Pinwheel craze that has been sweeping the internet? The quilters that I follow on Twitter were all a buzz with it. Its a video tutorial on YouTube produced by the Missouri Quilt Company. A bunch of the twilters (tweeting quilters) that I follow on Twitter decided to have a sew in on the Martin Luther King Day holiday in the US and sew this new block/quilt. My fellow twilters are mostly from the US alhtough I think there could be a Canadian or two amongst them. As far as I am aware I am the token Aussie :) At my local patchwork group that week our president came in very excited about this new block that she had seen and which she was keen to teach us all about. Yes it was the Disappearing Pinwheel. I have also seen reference to it on one of the facebook groups I belong to. How could I resist. I decided to make my Disappearing Pinwheel quilt as a gift for a new baby born to a lovely couple at church so would only need to make 16 of the blocks. Well I only made 16 blocks but with the sashing I added and borders... its a big quilt for a baby but no doubt she will grow into it. (the Disappearing Pinwheels come in two variations. I chose to use the churn dash one shown here)


All the fabric I used in the top came from my stash.



The instructions talk about using layer cakes but I used 10 inch squares that I had cut up during my scrap busting organizing frenzy I have been on since Christmas (cutting my way through my fabric stash and cutting any piece of fabric smaller than a fat quarter into useful units concentrating especially on some units I haven't collected before namely 10" and 5")

For my neutral I used white. I had heaps of pre-loved white fabric by way of sheets, pillowcases etc some of which came from my aunt's estate. I got a real sense of satisfaction in using the fabric I had been working hard at sorting and cutting. So good to be able to just go and pull out what I needed.

 I also decided to put the pinwheels around the side, as in the tutorial. Again I was able to use 5" squares that I had precut myself in the previous weeks. Again it was so satisfying to be able to do that.

large and small half square triangles done

Final layout for centre of top.

I haven't finished yet. I have the top put together but still working on the pinwheel borders

Finishes

I had one finish this week. I completed my quilt for my great nephew Lucas. It used a panel I bought a couple of years ago which I put together with some half square triangle blocks.

"Jungle Fever"

I have been watching my Craftsy class Machine Quilting Free Motion and more with Wendy Butler Bern and it has really helped me try some new things

I also got another baby quilt top finished for another friend's baby. Top only so far but that is a start. I still have to make the backing for it before going any further.

Fitness

I completed the 5k running program I was doing. My final run was for 35 minutes and I ran 3.88 kms. Yesterday I ran for 40 minutes and was really looking forward to seeing how far I had run but my phone went flat on me so I am not sure exactly but I did run for over 4 kms so that was a milestone for me. I have lost some weight too which is very pleasing. I am now consistently below 94. Have been down to 92.3 but that was after my big run so dehydrated but this morning I was 93 which is good.

Family

We are off to Sydney this weekend - DH, youngest son S and I. We are going to a family reunion where we will celebrate the 70th birthday of my oldest sister and my cousin. I will be able to give my cousin the Tie Quilt that I made for him using some ties of his fathers (and lots of others that I collected from family, friends and op shops)

Family Ties - the Ties that Bind

DH is only having the weekend in Sydney with us but S and I will stay on for the week to be able to see a bit more of my mum and other family and friends. Then we fly back to Brisbane. He will stay there then for his next uni term. I will have the weekend in Brisbane with Fangirl. We are going to the Dr Who Spectacular on Saturday night which is going to be awesome. Hopefully over the weekend in Brisbane I will be able to catch up with my son Kombi Boy and his partner Earthy Yu

New Beginnings... I hope

Had been thinking about writing a blog for a few months now and decided to have a go and came on to the computer to find that I already have one. Now I remember I was going to write one when I went overseas in 2010 with daughter Fangirlstitches and oldest son G. I wrote one blog before I left and that was it. Oh well never mind. I wonder if I can keep it up any longer this time. With my record probably not.

Its now January 2014. Earlier this month I signed up for the 365project. When you are supposed to put up a photo a day. I got one up. Then I also saw this thing about getting your stuff in order and the starter project was to tidy for 15 minutes every day and to throw out 15 things and donate 15 things every day for the month. I managed it twice... but not on 2 consecutive days. Oh and the things I was going to donate... still in bags in my bedroom. Ho hum.

Hoping that on this blog I can record/report on a few different things in my life.

My Crafting

 I am a keen although not necessarily proficient quilter. I like to do scrappy quilts. I often design my own quilts and they are a bit organic... I don't always plan them out before I start which is why they are sometimes more scrappy than I intended. This last year I have also gotten into making banners (wall quilts) to use in our church to augment our worship time. These have been more along the lines of art quilts than anything else I have attempted before. I have been really encouraged in this by our minister and good friend Suzy who has always been delighted by my attempts and gladly used them.

  

The banner on the left was made for ordinary Sundays (green) It features a vine winding from the bottom to the top with appliqued and 3D leaves. The banner on the right was done in 4 crazy patch panels in white and gold for the seasons of Easter and Christmas.

An going project for me is making baby quilts for my great nieces and nephews who seem to be coming along with increasing rapidity. I am one of 8 children and my mum has 24 grandchildren and at last count 18 great grandchildren with one on the way. I also make quilts for some other babies in my life - grandchildren of good friends, a cousin's grandchildren and a few babies at church. Keep me busy enough. My mum is 91 and still does embroidery. I trace pictures onto fabric for her and send them down to her (she lives in Sydney whereas I live in central Queensland) She completes them and sends them back and incorporate them into quilts.

I am planning on blogging about my quilting - my plans, my completions, my UFOs. 2 years ago I cataloged all my UFOs and determined to try to bust them. For a year I didn't start any new projects, I just worked on old ones (except when I had to make a baby quilt that I didn't have anything suitable on the go for) I also put myself on a fabric diet, only buying fabric that was needed to complete a project. I stuck with that pretty well (apart from busting out once at a Spotlight sale. I got fabric to make some baby quilts) I managed to knock over a fair few of them in the 12 months. I continued to work on them last year although I also started a number of new projects as well.

Again, inspired by Pam at HTBS I have started to track my fabric usage this year. I have set up an excel spreadsheet (ok Fangirl set it up at my request) and hope to calculate my fabric usage and my fabric acquisitions. I hope to report on it regularly... perhaps monthly... unlike Pam I don't complete a project or several projects a week so there won't be that much movement.

My Fitness Regime

I am in my mid 50s (55 in March) I am somewhat overweight. I am currently 93.5kg (205 lbs) I was up to 100 earlier on in the year so it is coming down. 95 was a really hard number for me to break through but after several months of getting down to there and then bouncing up again I finally broke though and am slowly creeping down. I am 179cm (5ft 10.5") so fairly tall. According to various charts I should be 75-80 kgs for my height. So.... we shall see how I go at losing the rest of the weight 7 down 13 to go. I did get down to under 80 kgs a few (6.5) years ago but couldn't stay there. 83 seemed an easier weight for me to stay at (and I did for a number of years) Still would like to get to 80.

Inspired by podcaster Pam from www.hiptobeasquarepodcast.com I took up running again. In 2011 I had completed the C25K running program and was able to run for 35 minutes. I let it all go though (my hips hurt, my knees hurt, it was too hard, there was no point etc) However I have restarted it and this morning I ran for 25 minutes. I have completed week 7 of the 8 week program so Monday will start again. My aim is to run 5 kms and to run in a 5 km fun run by May. Last year there was a Mothers Day fun run here in town but no word of it being organised this year (and I am not volunteering) There is one on Hamilton Island but my husband isn't enthralled by the idea of us going there (its beautiful but expensive) and when I remember the terrain (we were there for a wedding last Easter) yeah... maybe not (massive hill divides the tiny island and if we have to run 5 km we would have to go up and over that hill at least once)

My family

I am married to DH who is an engineer. We've been married for over 30 years now and still crazy about each other. We have 4 children. Daughter Fangirl (fangirlstitches.blogspot.com.au) who is an OT and has just returned to live in our home town after having lived in the UK for over 2 years (yes it is lovely to have her back in oh so many ways). Oldest son G who lives in Melbourne and studying to be a massage therapist. Middle son C, lives in Brisbane with his partner A. He is half way through a university degree to become a nurse. Youngest son S (my baby)  completed first year of an engineering degree 2013 but has decided to switch to education and become a teacher instead. C. A and S live together in our townhouse in Brisbane whilst they attend university.

We also have 2 dogs and 1 cat, Dogs are Annie a 9 year old Australian terrier fox terrier cross, Jack a Jack Russell Shiatsu something else cross (he is tiny but thinks he is a rottweiler) and Pippin a 6 year old Siamese cross. 

    

Tiger cat, mentioned in previous post died a year ago and we still miss her.

So there you have it. Its taken me several days to get this far and a visit from Fangirl to help me work out the photo uploads (my photos kept uploading sideways. All good now)