Quilting Marathon!

Actually it starts on TUESDAY - March 29, 2016.  HOWEVER - I just finished quilting (and binding) another quilt - and I'm on a roll!  Essentially!  So - I'm prepping for the quilting - and maybe doing some quilting surreptitiously along the way!  :)

Items I want to quilt............

1. The Valences (3) (yup - I'm quilting it - backing with a white sheet and then quilting enough so that the block will stay a block when washed!
2.  and 3.   These are 2 baby blankets that I pieced from blocks leftover from the  Valences - 4 blocks each!  And there are STILL leftover blocks I will use SOMEWHERE!
4. Charlestown baby quilt - turned into a flimsy this past January when I was SUPPOSED to be working on my Tobacco Road Couch quilt!
5. Yellow Brick  Road - and I FINALLY know how I want to quilt this.  Now to see if I can develop the skills I need!
6. New Year's Mystery quilt table topper (2010)
7 - 12 - Table Runners for different holidays
13. Summer Breeze - a full size quilt
14. Scrap Basket Quilt - a QOV I want to get finished and on its way!
15. Apple Cider table topper
16. Hurricane Sandy table topper

and I'm quite sure I can find others hidden away - uh - tucked away on my shelves!

Of course I need to clone myself and my machine several times over in order to get this all done!  So - I'm going to just list these here - then play elephant.  You know - how do you eat an elephant?  One bite at a time!  Probably starting with the easiest first (table runners, valences, baby quilts!)

What I did this past week and weekend!!!

Here's pictures of the Log cabin Quilt that I finished binding in January (not this past week - but also wasn't posted either!)  My daughter did all the quilt design of this (I did the piecing and the binding!)

Detail of the white parts

4 blocks together and almost pictures of the quilt stitching design

Log Cabin Quilt - all bound

Quilted and bound this past week.

Evan's "Big Boy" quilt

(he's being promoted to Big Brother in October!)

I did both walking foot quilting (straight lines)
as well as Free Motion Quilting (the flowers and leave -
which, of course, you can't see!)  First time FMQ on a big project!

You can almost see the blue thread of the flowers in this picture.
Almost, but not quite!

You can barely see the shadows on the backing for the design -
flowers with leaves!

Menues for WB 03-13-16

SUNDAY
B:Poached egg with corned beef hash, Applesauce, coffee
L:turkey burger Sandwich , milk
D:leftovers
S:

MONDAY
B: Cracked wheat, home dried raisins, coffee, milk
L:Soup - broccoli, milk
D:stir fry with cheese
S:

TUESDAY
B:English muffin, honey, coffee, milk
L:salad -  big leafy green with cheese, egg, milk
D:Eggplant parmesan casserole, tea
S:

WEDNESDAY
B:Poached eggs on toast, coffee, milk
L:peanut butter, jelly sandwich, milk
D:leftovers
S:

THURSDAY
B: cold cereal, milk, coffee
L:lo casserole, milk or coffee
D:corned beef and cabbage with potatoes and carrots (crockpot - 1 serving and freeze the rest)
S:

FRIDAY
B:waffles, milk, coffee, syrup or honey
L:lo, milk or coffee
D:Vegetarian lasagne (1 serving and freeze the rest), applesauce, challah
S:

SATURDAY
B:Bagel, cream cheese, coffee, milk
L:crockpot - chicken and rice - Hawaian Style with green peppers, sweet onions, pineapple, challah, coffee or tea
D:tuna salad, apple slices, challah

Quilting plans - what I did in January

New day - New Year - Fresh Start!

At least that's what I envisioned!  Fresh start being FINISHING a bunch of quilts!

January's plans - and it all started so simply.............

I re-did all my quilt lists.  To me, considering how SLOW (procrastinating) I work through some stuff - I decided to list SEPARATELY all hand work stuff, all STRING stuff, all APPLIQUE stuff - at least until some point when I could move them over to the quilting lists.  That was the plan!

There were those quilts that I had sort of not really almost started - you know, the ones I REALLY wanted to do, selected the fabrics and maybe sliced one strip of fabric from.  And that was about all.  Anyway - after last year's discovery that I might not even have a clue what the original pattern was - I moved all of those to WHIMs (wishful hopes in mind?) and there they sit!  They do NOT belong on the WIPs (works in progress) list!

And, of course, I wanted a group of FAST and EASY items so I could throw something together and GET IT DONE (such as when my number got close to the top on Stashbuster queen's list!)  Uh huh!

My January list:

1. Swap with Wendy
2. January numbers - the one I DIDN'T have - I substituted for LE my Tobacco Road quilt (at that point - only 2 strips of fabric sewn together).
3. January numbers - New Year's Mystery table topper.
4. Buckeye Beauty baby quilt - all sandwiched and ready to go.  If I was on a roll quilting wise - I could do THIS one as a swap.  If not - well there was the LE Tobacco Road

And that was it!

Of course - there was that cute Charleston picture that I wanted to change around - and - and .....

I decided that Tobacco Road would be a leader ender.  That decision lasted about 2 seconds.

RESULTS:

Swap with Wendy - DONE - for January anyway!
Only difference between this and the reality is
that the 4-patches are red and black

Tobacco Road - all pieces sewn together and started to assemble.  (sorry - no picture at this point!)

New Year's Mystery  Table Topper - still UNDONE 

No idea what I want to do re quilting it!

Buckeye Beauty baby quilt - still UNDONE.  One would have thought that since I didn't know what to do re quilting the NY mystery that I would have done this one.
NO idea how I want to quilt it.
Still, though, one would have thought.............

Charleston - ummmmmmmmmmmmm - well - uh - that started (very briefly) as a LE - and kind of took over.  Baby quilt ALMOST put together by the end of January (no picture at that stage however!)

AND I FINALLY got the binding hand sewn on the Log Cabin quilt.
Queen sized - with miles and miles and miles of binding!

February's quilting goals - and how I did...........

Here's what was planned:

1. Quilt January's New Year's (2010) Mystery table topper
2. Piece Work on Tobacco Road
3. Quilt February number challenge - Yellow Brick Road
4. Quilt February number challenge - Summer Breeze
5. Quilt Valentine Day table runner
6. Quilt Buckeye Beauty baby quilt
7. Piece Charleston

As you can see - 5 to be quilted (actually 4 - 1 is left over from January) and 2 to be pieced (actually 0 - one is left from January and the other was SUPPOSED to be a LE!!!  We see how that goes!

First - the GOOD news! (Provided of course I actually get the NEW pictures POSTED above each item!

#7 Charleston - as you can see - I finished the piecing - after changing sashing width and doing away with all the borders - it is now a very cute little baby quilt!

#2 Tobacco Road - not done, not even a flimsy - but definitely on its way!  Fun thing - because I apparently spin all my pinwheels backward - I had to start at the LOWER LEFT corner instead of the TOP LEFT like everybody else - which involved a lot of re-thinking how to put this together.  I REALLY like it though!  Originally I was going to offer my dil a choice of quilts - not now!  I'm keeping this one!  It's my COUCH quilt (no borders)!

And now for the OTHER news!

 Quilt January's New Year's (2010) Mystery table topper -
STILL not quilted (January project).
Not sure how I want to quilt this - X's???? Feathers????

Quilt February number challenge - Yellow Brick Road
STILL not quilted - not sure how I want to quilt it
but lions, tigers and bears come to mind -
as do wizards, lions, tin man, scarecrow, Toto and Dorothy.

Quilt February number challenge - Summer Breeze
ALSO STILL  unquilted.
And I keep thinking of blue yarn tufts

Quilt Valentine Day table runner
This one I actually started quilting - In MARCH!
Unfortunately I DON'T like the way it is going
so ALL the quilting needs to be taken out!  Oh joy!

Quilt Buckeye Beauty baby quilt
It is all sandwiched and ready to quilt - just NOT done yet!
I was having too much "fun" sewing strips of Tobacco Road
into a flimsy!

Now - as to what I will do in March - I'm hoping to focus on the March items.  Once ALL of those are done, then I can  move ONE above item into place and sew that - probably the Buckeye Beauty since it is all sandwiched.

March - my quilting goals

FINISH - 200 4-patches - 2.5 inch - red and black - (100 from February, 100 from March) - Swap


MARCH NUMBER CHALLENGE -

#4 - Valences

Made from extra valences - baby quilts

#41 - Scrap Basket Blues 

There are other things as well - BUT these are my primary goals!