December Goals and Upcoming Contest/Give-Away

I am working on getting a quilt naming contest/give-away together since I am horrible at naming my own quilts and I need some help. I am just working on some suitable prizes for the winners and one bigger give-away item for a random winner. Stay tuned.

So I set my December goal for "A Lovely Year of Finishes" via Flickr this month. It was to finish the top for my Riley Blake Challenge hosted by the Modern Quilt Guild.

Fabrics were already cut when I made myself that goal. But guess what... I already finished my goal for the month. The very next day!

Now what am I supposed to do with the rest of my month!?! Just kidding, I have plenty of projects.

So here is my to do list for the rest of December. December for me includes a whopping two weeks off from my job for Christmas and we're not going anywhere because my hubby has to work, so in my mind that equates to two weeks of sewing!

1) Get the top of the Community Quilt put together, at least in a 5x6 block layout. I'm still missing one Skyline block, which someone has offered to make, and four house blocks, which I don't have any takers for yet. It took me long enough to make one, so I'm not keen on making another four.

My house block.

The Skyline blocks so far.

The four "odd" shaped road pieces.

I still need to put together several straight road pieces, square up the house blocks, and sew blocks together. I am already loving the Skyline blocks.

2) Finish sewing together the Giant Churn Dash blocks. Fabric is already cut out, just need to piece them together.

3) Start cutting half hexis for my sister's wedding quilt. Colors requested were blue-green and dark green, with potential grey. I may choose something besides grey, depending on how dark the rest of the quilt gets.

4) Work on the Java wedding quilt. I'm very tempted to just rip out the second borders I have on the first set of blocks and put the blocks together as is. Won't be much of a pineapple blossom design, but it may save my sanity and actually get this thing done.

5) Continue putting together the Plus Wedding Quilt. All the rows are done, just need to sew them together.

6) Keep cutting fabric for the Scrappy Swoon Wedding Quilt.

7) Decide if I want to participate in the Modern from Repo guild challenge. If I do decide to participate, I need to come up with a design by December 15. However, except for the solids and the blenders, none of the fabrics we're actually supposed to showcase really speak to me. So I'm having designer's block big time. Benefit of participating is that we get all the fabric needed for the project for free. Front, backing, and binding.

8) Decide on a project for the February quilt show at the Anacostia Arts Center. We need to have pictures of at least the front (or a portion of the finished front) by sometime in January. I might actually start on that Pixelated Michigan quilt I promised my hubby. Who knows. Alternatively, I may enter my Riley Blake Challenge or the Giant Churn Dash quilt, if I get it done in time.

I think that's plenty, although I have two other projects I could/should be starting on.

Productivity is Good

I've been quite productive lately. Spending some time in my craft room every day has been amazing.

I have finished one of two Color Bee Shocked blocks for October. It turned out great, but man does it suck to trim 28 HST's to 2.5" square. Almost as much as pressing those suckers. Next up the same block in red. Tutorial for the block can be found here.

I also cut the rest of my Kona Sprout for my Giant Churn Dash blocks, and put three of them together.

I am using my Christmas blocks as the Leaders and Enders, so I have four of those completed as well, and one more in my machine as my Ender block.

Trying on a New Habit

I've heard differing accounts, but the one I ascribe to is that it takes 21 days to form a new habit. The habit I'm trying to get into is to do something in my craft room every day. Either sewing, cutting, or cleaning (that hasn't happened yet, just in case you were wondering).

I have now completed 5 of the 20 Giant Churn Dash blocks I need and have had to call a hiatus on that quilt until I get more Kona Sprout. It's on its way, so hopefully it won't be a long hiatus because I love these blocks. I have more blocks cut, but they all have colorful centers and I want to make sure that all the ones with green centers get done first so I don't realize afterwards that I don't like my choices.

 

I have also finished another Christmas block. And yesterday I spent at least an hour cutting fabrics for the Wedding Plus Quilt and for my Japanese X and Plus quilt. I also finished cutting the additional Christmas fabric prints and now just need to tackle the Kona Snow.

 

 

This is my stack of cut fabric for the King Sized Wedding Plus Quilt for my brother and future sister-in-law. And I still have more to go. Each one of those pluses is a different yellow, grey, or coral fabric. Crazy when you think about it, but great for building up my stash.

Block Progress

Two posts in one day... crazy. Then again, I'm trying this new things were I spend some time each day in my craft room, and it's been incredibly productive so far.

You saw the first four Giant Churn Dash blocks. I have all of the prints cut and all of the background fabric I had as well. Now I just need to start sewing the blocks together. Unfortunately, I'm going to need to order more background fabric, because I'm short several blocks.

The flash washed this picture out horribly. It's block 5 of 20. And the churn dash is a rather bright red and the background is Kona Sprout.

I have also been working on my Christmas quilt as the leader and ender blocks, but I'm running out of cut Kona Snow, so I'll have to cut some more soon.

I have more blocks complete, but this is what I've finished in the last few days. The blocks currently measure 9" and will be 8.5" finished. I also have a few with white borders and a print in the center, but I made those a while ago.

I also finally finished the block for the September Color Bee Shocked queen bee. It took a while, because I didn't want to touch anyone else's fabric while I was sick, and there were a lot of HSTs to square up. Especially since the red fabric didn't want to cooperate. But it's done and it looks good. Almost makes me want to try this slightly larger. I have this obsession currently with huge blocks.