Happy new year!

Hi friends! My plan A (catch up on everyone else's blogs) didn't work, so I'm going with plan B (start fresh and hope y'all don't hold it against me!). I have no great excuse for not posting - just lots of little bumps in the road, like a new computer (my first Mac! and this old dog is not having fun learning new tricks!), minor illnesses, travels, internet outages, stressful work deadlines, you name it. But nothing serious - life is good here, and I'm so happy that the holidays are over and spring is on the way!

Before I start posting about my recent projects, I have one very overdue thank-you to take care of. Check out this fantastic apron that Amanda sent me!!! I just adore it. Every time I see it, I just want to blow off work and get all domestic in the kitchen! Thank you so much, Amanda! Oh, and go check out her shop - I bet if you asked nicely, she'd make an apron for you too!

Even though I've been neglecting this blog, I'm happy to report that I've been keeping myself busy with the thrifty/crafty stuff. My number one goal for 2011 is to finish up as many WIPs as I can, and to try like crazy not to start any new projects until I get the existing ones done. To keep myself on track, I started a list of all the projects I have in progress. Some are small (like individual bee blocks, or hanging up some miniquilts in my sewing room), but I'm writing down everything as I encounter it, and celebrating every item that I mark off. It's been very motivating for me!

I have a few holiday projects to show, but to heck with catching up chronologically. Instead, I'm going to start off with my most favorite project I've finished lately. You might remember some test blocks that I made last May, and this little table runner I whipped up:

I wasn't in love with it then. But now... I love, love, LOVE it. Behold!

It's going to live happily on my credenza (that's a 'fancy nancy' word for big filing cabinet). I love having something in my office that I made just for myself! And maybe it will help keep me from piling crap on top of there (um, not working at the moment, I have to confess!).

The back is just as pretty! I used one of my favorite vintage sheets, and the colors are perfect for the "tiffany" blue walls.

Now I just need to get busy on the actual bee quilt. I've received all my blocks from my bee partners, and I'm almost ready to start putting them together. It's on the big list! :-)

I have two other goals for 2011. My big list of projects includes a bunch of Project Linus quilts I've got cut out, and I'm hoping that I can use up all the polyester batting that's taking up WAY too much space in my closet. If I don't use it all by the end of the year, I'm going to donate the rest and be done with it.

My last big goal for the year is to blog regularly, and to reply to all the comments you wonderful friends leave for me. I do appreciate them, and I know I've sucked at this in the past. But I'm recommitting. Go ahead - try me! :-)

still here...

Yes, I'm still here. Sorry for the incredibly long absence... I had a big work deadline this week, which slowly ramped up the pressure over the last month or so. On top of that, there were bouts of sickness, snow days, holidays, birthdays, feeble attempts to get ready for xmas... Blech. I know I should love this time of year, but I honestly don't.

And I know it doesn't take long to make a blog post, but... I'm also utterly behind on reading blogs. My reader had been pegged at 1000+ for weeks now!! I somehow feel wrong to post when I haven't caught up on all my friends' blogs (or even worse, emails). So, friends, please forgive me for not having my act together. I'm working on it. And if you soon get some comments on really old blog posts of yours, you'll know why!

Meanwhile, here's a little show and tell from last month. I finally finished the Project Linus quilt I started way back in July!



The standard crazy patchwork back...



I did all the quilting at the November PL meeting (killing two birds with one stone!), and it was pretty interesting to do the quilting in front of a room full of people. I was surprised that so many of them had never done free-motion quilting! I'm no expert, but I did my best to demonstrate, and answered lots of questions.



I did stippling in the large strips, and tried a couple new-to-me things in the narrower strips. The loopy quilting in the pink strip was fun, and I did okay on that. The wavy quilting in the green strip, on the other hand... not so great! I think I was getting tired and sloppy by the time I got to that. Oh well, it was good to try it out anyway!



Sorry again for dropping off for a while. I'll try to do better in the future. :-)

I'm so crafty, I make...

Hair! Ha! I've been growing my hair out for a Locks of Love donation, and last week was the big day. So, in memory of Julie, and my aunt Georgeanna, and in honor of my friend Kelli and everybody else fighting cancer... I went from this:

to this! Big thanks to Hannah at Gretchen Scott Salon in Woodinville, WA, for a fantastic (and free!) haircut. I really love having shorter hair again.

Funny thing is, I hated (hated!) my red hair when I was growing up. If I had been given a chance to get a wig back then, I wonder if I would have said "hey, make mine blonde, please!". Oh well, I hope my donation helps make a kid happy, whether they already have red hair or just want to try it out for fun. :-)

October bee blocks

Here are my bee blocks for the do. Good Stitches bee (nice and straightforward)...

and the vintage sheet bee.

I have to admit, I was a little intimidated by this block. With all those seams, I was worried about having it come out the wrong size. But the directions (and my 1/4" foot!) are spot-on. I only had to trim a tiny bit, and it was perfect. I think it's going to be a really cute quilt. Though if I was making this myself, I know I'd take the easy way out (just do a straight patchwork, and set it on point). :-)

loot!

I had some great scores at the thrift store last weekend! Wouldn't these three sheets make a pretty something together? I think I can hear Amanda's sharp intake of breath - I know that one on the right is one of her favorites. :-)

And how about some more butterflies? I really debated about the one on the right - It's a Vera print, and I have it in purple (and love it, of course), but brown and orange aren't the most popular colors. Oh well, I always err on the side of buying!

I seriously almost squealed out loud when I saw these pillowcases! I love this print, and have it in orange and pink. It pained me a little to fork over $2 each for them, but wow, I just love them!

I also found a bag of new FQs from Joann, 7 of them for only $1! Very timely too - I just used the one on top for one of my bee blocks!

And last, but not least, some vintage fabric that had been sewn into a duvet cover. I love the orange and pink combination!

No thrifting for me this weekend - I'll be too busy sewing instead! Yay!

retreat - project #2

After all those triangles, I was ready to slip back into my comfort zone! I was inspired by this quilt on Jeni's blog In Color Order (another vintage sheet fan!), and knew this would be a fun and simple retreat project. I went through my stack of pre-cut sheets (6" squares), and grabbed any that I liked that I had at least 5 of. I brought about 80 prints, when all I needed was about 30! Oh well, it gave me plenty to choose from at the retreat!

I really love the simplicity of it. I didn't think too hard about the layout - I just narrowed it down to my favorite prints (anything 'colorful'), and then I slapped them up on the design wall. I did some minimal rearranging as I went, but I really tried not to over-think it.

(I stole this picture from Karen's blog post). The purple square really jumps out, doesn't it? I probably won't get this quilted until next year. In the meantime, it will languish in 'quilt purgatory' (draped over the stair railing upstairs), where I'll get enjoy petting it whenever I walk by!

retreat - project #1

The quilt retreat was awesome! I was fighting a stupid cold the whole time, but I was determined to not let it get the best of me. There were no super late nights this year, but when we weren't eating or sleeping, we were sewing! Here are my buddies Quynh and blogless Suzette (not great pictures, sorry! I hate my new camera.... grr....)

My biggest project by far was a half-square-triangle quilt. It's been on my wish-list since I saw this quilt last summer. Loved, loved, loved it! I started with 5" squares, with white for the background, and 32 prints from my stash (mostly "colonial" type reproductions), in all sorts of pink, peach and salmon-y colors. I came to the retreat with all the squares cut, and the white ones marked for sewing. It took me about 8 hours just to sew, cut and press all the HSTs! I made them in the standard fashion (sewing 1/4" on both sides of the diagonal), except that I trimmed the corners before I cut along the diagonal. I don't know where I read this tip, but if you fold the square along the diagonal and snip across the corner (perpendicular to the raw edges, not perpendicular to the fold), it makes a notch in the corner such that you don't have to do any trimming after you cut and press the HSTs. It works great - but only if you're very precise! My HSTs were pretty good, but not exactly perfect. I was torn - should I spend the time to square up all 256 of those blocks (ug!), or just throw caution to the wind and sew them all together (and maybe end up disappointed)? I had some (40) extra blocks, so I decided to make a test mini quilt to see just how far off my squares were. Turns out that they were fine! Or at least fine enough for me. :-)

And after 8 more hours of sewing, and I had 16 blocks of 16 HSTs! Yay!

I would have sewn them all together and called it done, except certain friends kept pestering me with suggestions... How about a different arrangement for the blocks? Like maybe this...

Or maybe all pointing out...

Or maybe all pointing in...

And how about sashing around each block? Or maybe just around the groups of 4 blocks? Would the sashing be the same white? Or maybe an orange or gray would look cool! Arg!!!! After 16 hours of working on it, I was in no frame of mind to make a decision! I gathered up the blocks, and moved on to a different project. I'm going to let it percolate for a while. If you have any opinions or brilliant ideas, let me know! :-)