How is everyone doing this week? What quilting projects are in the works right now?

Hope to see everyone posting in this forum soon!

Tammy

This week has been busy for me. I finished up a watercolor log cabin wall hanging over the weekend, along with a small dog quilt. That is, the quilt was for a dog. I'll be posting pictures of those soon, but first I have to mail them to the recipients. There's a little quilt for the cat, too. Sydney and Emma both made a set of four-patch blocks for a swap, and I made a set of 3" nine-patches for a swap of mine. I started making blocks for a charity quilt, but it's been so hot that I haven't done much on it yet. I just started it last night. I'm strip-piecing a log cabin quilt, and we'll see if I end up having enough fabric. I'm using some that was donated to our group. Oh, and I made a very small wall hanging for Todd's cubicle. It's a landscape quilt of a waterfall-very quick and easy. I was pleased with how it came out. I'll be starting my Lord of the Rings blocks soon. I thought I was going to start them this week, but I need some metallic gold fabric to start the pattern I made for Sting (a dagger, for those who are uninitiated). I tried to find something to make it glow in the dark blue, but everything glows green or orange. Oh, well! I plan on devoting a large portion of web space to the fifty blocks that are being made for this swap, so you can all see what a fantastic job that is being done.

Wow! Laura you have been busy especially since you're in the process of moving into your new home, homeschoolling, etc. I haven't done much of quilting since January.

I still haven't finished Greg's quilt, but I do have all the rows sewed (except for one, waiting for some fabric from my MIL). I have about three - five quilts in my head that I will be doing. I just need to buy the patterns and such. Three of them are for friends that live out of state.

Another one is a T-shirt/Sweatshirt quilt. My plan is to use the T-shirts as the front and the Sweatshirts as the back. I don't think I'm going to put batting in between and will just tie it together...what do you all think? I figured the sweatshirts will be heavy enough.

Then the other one in my head is just one I need to begin to start using the fabric in my stash! But all of these probably won't get started until around mid-Summer or so.

We're still painting my house. Monday we finish the stairwell and hallway. Then we'll start work on my bedroom and the bonus room. So...that's my creative life in a nutshell!

Wow! This was long...

Good to hear from you guys! Laura, it sounds like you have been busy with quilting!

Kathy - I wonder how that t-shirt/sweatshirt quilt would be made up like a shaggy quilt? It might be hard to sew the "X" if there is printing on the t-shirts though. Good luck with your painting!

Tammy

Laura - I did some looking around for glow in the dark products and found this:

[url=BellaOnline ALERT: For anti-spam reasons, we restrict the number of URLs allowed in a given post. You have exceeded our maximum number of URLs.

You weren't kidding about the first one being pricey. I swear I looked and looked through page after page of thread and didn't see any of that! The second link looks promising. If you see any paint that glows blue, I'd be interested in that, too. Thanks! You may have saved me with that thread. Yay!

Hello, I have just found this forum and I am keen to make friends with like-minded people. I love quilting which I have been doing for about 12 years. Still have lots to learn. We are a bit behind in Australia with quilting products etc. so it good to read what it available elsewhere. We are catching up though!! At the moment I have put my sewing on hold so I can give my sewing room a good clean out. Boring, but necessary!! Hope to talk again soon.

Hi SueM!

Nice to meet you and glad you could join us. Looking forward to getting to know you better!

Hmmm, What if I, depending on the design of the shirts, only sewed the *X* as much as possible? Meaning...the center of the *X* wouldn't always be there, but the arms would. Does that make sense? I'll have to organize all the shirts and see how that would work.

SueM, how's your clean up going?

Kathy, the cleaning up in the sewing room is going s..l..o..w..l..y LOL. I can't believe how much stuff can be collected over the years. I have tried different crafts over the last 25 years, and I have a bit from each craft in every drawer and cupboard in that room!! The plus of this cleanout is more room for more fabric. I have also found fabric I had forgotten and a couple of UFO's that I will finish off and give as gifts. It will be worth it, won't it? Say yes!! <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Sue, I always thought of organizing the sewing room as a lot of fun. Just think of how usable it will be when you are done! Just last night I was talking organization with my husband. I was searching through my scrap tub, trying to track down all of my strips of red. Right now we're waiting to close on our new home before I can really get things like I want them, so I was opining about how fun it's going to be to get these things like I want them. And he suggested that I actually THROW AWAY my scraps! What was he thinking!? That led to a discussion of where I am storing the kids' stashes (they all have their own), and I said, right now it's all together. He doesn't believe me that I know where every piece of fabric came from and who's it is.

Anyway, if you need any suggestions for organizing let us know. I'll be posting pictures of my new space in a few months. If you want to see some really great spaces (and some really great messes), take a look at Ami Simm's site, here.

I think being organized (in any area of life) is worth it in the long run. I'm a much happier camper when my home is neat and organized. I've been in the process of throwing out stuff in the house and decluttering rooms.

Boy oh boy! Checked out those *stash* pictures and I can't imagine having as much fabric as some of those ladies have. To be honest, I'd be overwelmed! I wouldn't know which fabrics to use at one time. I loved that woman's studio (from Illinois)...wouldn't it be nice if we all had that space in our home (or access to a space like that).

But the pictures did inspire me to organize more of my little sewing space. I bought some plastic cabinets from Target for my fabric, so that's all organized. Now the kid's beauty salon, board games and the cat tree need to take a hike, so I can either add another little table or put my ironing board upstairs.

SueM - welcome to the forum! Thanks for posting.

I know what you mean about organizing moving slowly - it seems like I have to reorganize after each project because my sewing room turns into such a mess.

Laura - thanks for that link. Now I don't feel so bad. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Tammy

Hi, everyone. I looked in on the Ami Simms' site awhile back and it made me feel inadequate!!! I showed DH and told him never to complain about the amount of fabric I have (he doesn't complain, because I don't think he has ever noticed). I have my fabric stored in plastic crates under the bed in my sewing room which is really a spare bedroom. It is kept as a bedroom for guests, usually family, staying over.
I, too, am in the process of decluttering my house. We have asked our two older children to come and collect all their bits and pieces, that they somehow always say they don't have room for. This despite the fact their homes are much the size of ours. I am going to clean out the kitchen cupboards next and get rid of excess casserole dishes, plastic containers and, well you know what I mean. Only three at home now and I don't cook in large quantities as often. I would like to replace some of my old, scratched pyrex and buy some new non-stick bakeware. I like old things, but feel the need to modernise some of my old cookware. The only thing I can't declutter is my wallunit in the living room. It contains ornaments that mean too much to me and DH. Gifts, souvenirs from our trip to England and little things that bring back memories. I also find I can't get rid of books as these also bring back memories.
Well, I seem to have written a novel. Talk to you all soon.
Sue

Laura, I forgot to mention that I visited your site. Your quilts are all lovely, but I particularly loved the floral quilt you made for your friend Gail. I have the pansy fabric you used and your quilt gave me an idea to use my collection of floral fabrics. Thanks!!
Sue

Sue, thanks for the compliment. I have been working on the web site a lot in the past few days.

It must be that time of year since everyone I know is talking about decluttering. We decluttered in January when my husband got a new job. We moved (quickly) from a five bedroom home with a formal living room and family room and lots and lots of extra storage space to a three bedroom apartment with no extra storage. I packed everything we didn't absolutely need and put it in storage. Now we've found a new house in our new city, and we are moving again. I'm packing up what we have had on hand, and finding we needed even less of this junk than I had thought. When we move into the new house everything is living in the garage first, and I'm unpacking one box at a time. Anything that we have done without for the last five months will get special consideration, and then we're having a mega garage sale in June!

I just spent the afternoon kind of sorting through my fabric, getting it in a little bit of some kind of order to move it. I did have it all dumped in three of those big, 16-gallon totes, but one of them broke in the last move and I couldn't use it again. I knew I had a lot of fabric, but this was even more than I thought. And it's all blue!

Hello Quilters,
I haven't quilted in years but was browsing through this site for the first time and decided to make a couple of comments.

First of all, I encourage you to "think outside the box" with your quilts. I recently decorated a table for a Women's dinner (church.) I used a quilt that my grandmother made almost 70 years ago as my tablecloth. (I covered it with a sheet of clear plastic to keep it clean.) It was a tremendous success. Everyone stopped to look at the quilt and "remember." (By the way, my theme was "Precious Memories -- Grandmother's Kitchen."
These women would never have gotten to see this precious quilt (Dutch Girl pattern) if I hadn't used it in this way.

My granddaughter just celebrated her 3rd birthday. A lovely friend of mine made her a doll quilt using the Sunbonnet Sue pattern. Granddaughter has carried that quilt around every minute of the day since, and has slept with it the past two nights. What a treasure she has!
You may not be able to manage big projects but a little one like that might be worth looking into.

Happy quilting!