First Finish in 2015

I am on track to finishing one UFO per month in 2015.  Do you remember the Honor Flight quilt that I started before Thanksgiving last year?

It is now quilted, bound, washed and ready to be given to one of the WWII veterans for their upcoming flight in April to the World War II Memorial in Washington, DC.

I found this American flag fabric in my QOV stash and thought it would make the perfect backing for this little quilt.

This may only be a small finish, but I hope this will motivate me to keep moving in the right direction for using stash and cleaning up many UFOs that I have started over the years.

Fabric Report - Week 4, Jan. 25,

Not much time was spent in the sewing room this week; but I did finish one pillowcase. Only one yard can be counted as used since last reporting.

This week has flown by so quickly.  It started Monday with a Quilts of Valor sewing day, followed by a sew day the next day with one of my quilting groups.  We bring handwork to work on and I took the red quilt to continue sewing on the reversible binding.  It's almost done.  I'll post pictures when I get it finished. I did take some pictures for a tutorial as I did it, but they are on my cell phone, and I haven't figured out how to get them onto my blog yet.  It wants to download all 850 photos from my phone and I don't want them all!!  Just the last few. 

Thursday found me on a road trip with two friends to A to Z Quilt Shop in Quincy,Illinois.  This is a fairly new shop and it offers large variety of designers and styles of fabric. You can find everything from batiks to homespun, civil war, flannels, Thimbleberries, modern solids, stripes and the popular zigzag, minky, wools and more. They are enlarging the classroom area and it has great lighting with lots of beautiful samples displayed everywhere. The shop owner is also a long arm quilter too. Be sure and check it out if you are in that area.  It very close to Hannibal, MO too.

Our next stop was The Dutchman's Store. in Cantril, Iowa.  About an hour from the quilt shop.  This was so much fun.  It has an old time feel of a general store and is run by Mennonites.  There were bolts and bolts of fabrics shelved by colors, or themes and types of materials. They also carry wide backs, batting by the roll, quilting notions and books, and almost anything you can imagine -- in one section of a huge building.  But fabric is not the only thing of interest in this quaint store.  You can do your weekly shopping for groceries, shoes and clothes for the whole family, hardware supplies, bulk spices and dry goods and great meats and cheeses and all kinds of other foods, free coffee while you shop and fifty cent ice cream cones. I had a great time browsing and loading my cart as I strolled the aisles.  Although tempted, I held steady to my goal of not adding to my stash quite yet and did not put any fabric into my shopping cart. It was so tempting though because of the good prices.

Here's the fabric report:
Fabric Added - 0

Fabric Used - 1 yd

Fabric Added YTD - 0

Fabric Used YTD - 10 yds

Net used in 2015 - 10 yds

Hope you are making progress on using your stash this week.  Drop on by Judy's to see what everyone else did this week.  

Stash Report - Week #2

Got in a little sewing this week. I found some more coordinating fabric for another cuff on those dragon pillowcases and made a bunch of reversible binding for this quilt.

The top side of the binding is the red and white stripe and the reverse side matches the backing material. This is a good binding to use when you don't have enough for a one color binding.  I use 1" wide strips for the front color and 1 and 1/2" wide strips for the back color.  Does this look like 420 inches of binding?  Trust me, it is.  Now the fun part begins.

The binding yardage was counted last week since it had been cut, so I can only add one yard used this week for the pillowcase..

Fabric Added - 0

Fabric Used - 1 yd

Fabric Added YTD - 0

Fabric Used YTD - 9 yds

Net used in 2015 - 9 yds

To see how others are managing their stashes, drop by Patchwork Times. 

New Project On The Needles

Here it is, the second week of January and I'm still on track with my 2015 goals. Haven't bought any fabric yet, but I have added new yarns to my knitting stash.  Good thing I'm not keeping track of yarn yardage, and since there was nothing in my goals about not buying yarn, I'm good, right?  

Santa brought me some new knitting needles along with some beautiful yarn.  I've been anxious to try this wonderfully soft yarn (baby alpaca and bamboo) on my new Addi Turbo Lace circular  needles.  The yarn is from Classic Elite Yarns and it's called Chateau.  Here's how far I've gotten on this cowl. The pattern is Augustine Cowl and you can see the two ways you can wear this cowl on Ravelry here. 

I'm using the yarn they suggested in the pattern in colorway #1456 (a medium purple). 

Today another squishy package arrived from Simply Socks Yarn Co. and I'll share what was in it as soon as I get a picture.  I chose yarns to make warm hats, mittens and socks in a DK yarn, which I've never tried before.  

Take a look at Judy's Patchwork Times to see what other knitting is going on this month.

Fabric Report - Week 1, 2015

I am off to a good start on my fabric management goals for 2015.  I made 8 pillowcases from wild fabric that came to me as a surprise.  Oh, I bought it, no surprise there, but didn't check closely what I was getting.  The price was right and home it came with me, thinking this would be good for a backing or two on a wild and crazy quilt or a scrap quilt that needed a little punch. It was in a plastic bag and I could see the colors, but I didn't take it out to inspect it better.  What a surprise I got later.  I am now the proud owner of 40+ yards of flame orange/red/yellow with a black scroll design pre-cut into 27" lengths.  Hello pillowcases.  It will be a challenge to come up with enough different fabrics for the cuffs to make sewing them fun, but here are my first ones for the year.

That floral one is thrown in there to rest your eyes. Not really, it is one of two for a gift. I needed a break from all the orange and black.

Fabric Added - zero
Fabric Used - 8 yards
YTD Added - 0
YTD Aused - 8 yards
Net Used - 8 yards

You can hop on over to Patchwork Times to see other fabric starts for the year.

Welcome 2015

Here it is 2015 already.  Where did 2014 go so fast!  It seems like only a few months ago I was thinking about what I wanted to accomplish in 2014 and now it's gone forever.

Many of you have already posted your goals and new year resolutions for 2015.  I spent a good amount of time reading them last night.  It reminded me that I had not done anything about that.  Heck, I usually don't make many resolutions any more, but there are a few standard ones each year that come to mind.

- Eat healthier - Did somewhat better in 2014
- Get more exercise - (More steps on my Fit Bit) - yes! Increased daily miles to 3/day
- Use more stash fabric and don't buy much fabric - No on first half,  yes on last part.
- Learn to do "something" that I've always wanted to learn - yes - knitting socks
- Finish up more UFOs - NO - not even one of my UFO's finished. Bad me.
- Keep in touch with friends more frequently - Needs more attention
- Post more frequently on blog - Needs more attention
- Quilt 12 Charity quilts -  finished 16 in 2014 - Yipee!

My goals for 2015 will be to continue last year's list with major improvements on
- finishing UFOs - I have way too many and at least 16 flimsies are ready to quilt
- fabric management - much more out than in
- keeping in touch with friends
- posting on blog more frequently
- trying new knitting patterns and stitches

In addition to these, another main focus for me will be to Declutter and Organize my sewing areas and my life.  I want to slow down and enjoy the process and not be so stressed and rushing all the time.

I'm in complete agreement with Bonnie Hunter who says her mantra for the new year is "More with Less."

What are you looking forward to in the new year?  I hope you make those dreams and goals come true.