A FINISH... I'm SEW Excited!!!

I actually finished this on Sunday night, but we have had heavy clouds everyday and the colors in this quilt need sunshine to show their beauty. Finally the sun is out and I'm scrambling around my house trying to find the best light. I could also use a marching band or at least a drum roll...

Like all quilts, this one has a story. Let's cut to the chase and just say it involves a LOT of procrastination. Apparently this quilt loved life as a UFO. I think this was pieced in 2004. I do know that it was my first lap sized quilt top. I found the floral fabric used in the border and some of the star blocks at a quilt shop and fell in love with it. It's from In the Beginning by Sharon Evans Yenter.  Her book "Blended Wall Quilts" is one of my favorite go-to books for inspiration.

At that time I was a newbie quilter and didn't have the confidence to tackle a quilt from that book so I went with a pattern called Island Star from "More Fat Quarter Quilts" by M'Liss Rae Rawley. I carefully picked out 5 fat quarters to match my floral and a background fabric, trying for the "blended" look but in a simpler way. I don't know if all new quilters struggle like I used to with fabric choices. So overwhelming!

The beautiful quilting was done by Nancy Clayburn of Quilting by Design in April 2005. I know that because of her label on the back. Then, it sat in my closet until fall 2009 when my Mom who is a wonderful quilter (and a wonderful Mom!) took it home with 2 other UFO siblings to sew on the binding for me. One would think when you have a broken leg which puts you on your butt for months you would have ample time to do hand sewing. Well, I did one side of this quilt and back to the closet it went.  Shame, shame, shame...

So, this is my first finish in 3+ years. See the sparkly new tab at the top of my blog that says Finished Quilts?!? Hopefully Sure to be the first of many. Tucker wants more quilts to love, he literally does not leave this one alone. For the other pics I had to quarantine him.

I'm linking up to:

Can I Get a Whoop Whoop @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict

TGIFF@Quilt Matters

Sew and Tell Friday@Amylouwho

A Post About Me

I love this quote. This image is from the June 2009 page of a "The Artistry of Robbin Rawlings" wall calender which hangs where my sewing table used to be in my old quilting space. I love this quote so much that I never turned the calendar to the next month. Left it there all this time.

By the age of 35, I was well on my way to a dream. I grew up in a loving family, did well in school, went to college on a track scholarship, met a wonderful man who I married, built a consulting company that I thrived upon, had our baby girl in 1991, made partner in my CPA firm, moved into a beautiful home and topped it all off with our baby boy in 1996. Before our son was born, my husband quit his retail career to become "Mr. Mom" and excelled at it.

In the midst of this dream life, I was getting lost. But I didn't want to acknowledge it, didn't understand it and just wanted to keep living the dream. In 1998 I hired a wonderfully wise woman as a Life Coach who got me through another year. Kay was also the first person who diagnosed my deepening depression. I was totally clueless.

I made it to my better life with the support of my family, friends, doctors, therapy and modern medicine. My husband went back to school and got his teaching degree. I ended up losing my career due to my disability. We made a fresh start by moving to the north woods in 2001. My husband got a job at our local school after subbing for a year. He also coaches track, cross country and helps with our JO volleyball program. And, most importantly, loves it. I am grateful every day that he is still in my life.

Life is good. It challenges you and sometimes changes you. I wouldn't alter one thing about my life, because I wouldn't be who I am today without the experiences I've had. Good and not so good. I bought a frame last night to hang this over my sewing table in my new quilting space. I really do love this quote.

The Battle of the Bulge

No, I'm not referring to the infamous World War II battle... or my waistline... but THIS.

Quilting Disaster Zone!

I sat down at my machine yesterday thinking that I'd whip my Snow Country tree skirt blocks together and clear off my design floor.  Then, trouble set in.  Quickly.  I pinned, I sewed, I used my seam ripper, I pressed, I resewed, I re-ripped, you get the picture. All I wanted was this.

Yes Please!!!

Confession time... I am picky about my points.  Especially on a project where they stand out like these and on something I'm going to put out every Christmas for the next umpteen years.  On another quilter's project I wouldn't notice them... but on MY projects they light up like a neon sign.  I can't help it.  Sigh.

So I took the time to reset as many seams as I could and pressed them all open.  I even pulled out a can of Magic Sizing which I hardly ever use to tame the really nasty spots.

Getting There...

Finally!

My inner perfectionist was happy, but it was a bumpy road to the finish line! Maybe I can overcome my issues with points someday, but for now I have to focus on my biggest problem - UFOs.

Linking up to Freemotion by the River for Linky Tuesday. Check it out!

Time to Bind... and Watch Football

I've been putting off sewing down some bindings, which is plain silly considering that once the binding is done I will actually have a FINISHED project to snuggle under!  I'm heading around corner #3 on this lap quilt so just a quick post and back to my needle...

Gathering my Tools

Tucker is happy to test the snuggle factor of this quilt next to me as I stitch along.  He approves!

Tucker a.k.a. Quilting Supervisor

Oh, and the Vikings won.  Woo Hoo!

Back to Snow Country

In my quilting room that is... not outside.  We ended up getting less than 1" of snow overnight which has already melted and temps are due to be back in the mid 50's tomorrow.  A respite to finish cleaning out my gardens for the next few days!

The blocks for my Snow Country tree skirt are done and laid out on my design floor.  My pics are a little dark but the closeups show the fabrics better.

I Love the Pine Trees!

Closeup of  Pine Trees

A Bit of Red in the Corners

One curious thing about this Thimbleberries pattern.  Instead of listing all of the cutting instructions at the start this book breaks down the cutting & piecing instructions for each block section.  The star fabrics were to be cut and sewn first, small trees second, large trees third and lastly the corner triangles and the middle square.  I noticed as I was cutting for the large trees how little of the background fabric I had left.  I had started with the corner triangles (I don't always like to follow directions in order!) because they were the easiest section.  If I hadn't already cut the middle 8.5" background square I would have run out of fabric had I cut the strips needed for the large trees across the WOF (width of fabric).

Moral of the story is... 1) sometimes you are actually saved by going out of order and 2) if you are working on a UFO from a fabric line that is almost 10 years old read ALL the cutting instructions, plan ahead and cut carefully.   I'm sure I could have improvised a new middle square, but I really didn't want to!

Another Top for My Needs Quilting Pile

I've had these blocks sitting around for few weeks now since I've been busy excavating for UFOs and getting things settled in my quilting room. I'm the kind of quilter who likes to have multiple projects going at one time.  As much as I would love to be a "start-to-finish" quilter I think that is just my dream. So, today these pretty batiks caught my eye.

Here are the blocks sewn together.  The pattern is "A Little Twist" by This & That.

Then, I added the double border which really makes the light background stand out I think.

A couple of closeups (click on any of these pictures to enlarge if you'd like)...

I love sewing with batiks... they have such a nice smooth crisp feeling to them.  And, it's hard to resist their beauty!

Snow Country Tree Skirt

Our Northern Minnesota weather forecast later in the week is calling for snow...

so this is the UFO I have selected to work on this week.  Thimbleberries projects are a special kind of quilting comfort food with a warm country color palette and easy to follow instructions.  My local quilt shop has a dedicated Thimbleberries section and Lynette Jensen is a very popular Minnesota quilt designer. Snow Country was published in 2003, I was about one year into quilting and was intent on replicating a quilt with the exact same fabrics.  In other words, I had no confidence to veer off the proven path!

As usual, I had cut some of the fabrics and sewed a few block pieces before setting the project aside.  This time around, I'll keep at it (I CAN do it!!!).  I finished cutting the rest of the fabrics and pieced the gold/red triangle sections yesterday, the stars this morning and am working on the trees now.  I'm planning to make it into a tree skirt instead of a table topper as shown.

Happy October everyone~