To-Do-List Tuesday 11-14-23

Another busy week.....I knew I had an ambitious list that I wouldn't be able to finish, but as long as the customer stuff got done, I was okay with it. Here's the lineup:

1) Finish up on the Star of Bethlehem quilt. No. Uggghhh....this is taking me forever. I finally chose some fabric for the borders and got them cut, but nothing is finished.

2) Bind charm pack table runner. Another no.

3) Keep plugging away on charity quilts. Yes. I kind of changed direction with what I was working on, but it's all progress. 

4) Quilt two customer quilts. Yes.

5) Bind a customer quilt. Yes. 

6) Put borders on vintage quilts—maybe. No.

And, now it's a new week and time for a new list. I have a feeling my new list will look a lot like my old list. 😉

1) Finish Star of Bethlehem quilt. This one is turning into a have to do as I have poked around long enough.

2) Bind charm pack table runner. I am going by the quilt shop today and look for some binding. I haven't been able to find anything here I wanted to use.

3) Quilt two customer quilts.

4) Quilt two charity quilts.

5) Put borders on vintage quilts.

That's enough for now. I'm feeling the push to get things done as I know next week is Thanksgiving, and life always gets super busy after that until the end of the year. I'm hoping for the best! I am going to link this to Quilt Schmilt. Have a good day where ever you are reading this.

Weekend Update

 

Our weather went from warm and humid to cold and rainy, and now it seems to be stuck in winter mode. We had a dry summer, so I’m sure the rain is needed, but man, is it ever gloomy outside! It’s great weather for sewing. I worked on some of my customer orders on Friday and Saturday. I finally got the binding on Karen’s quilt.

It’s the one that I had to rip out two rows of quilting and change the batting, so I’m glad to have it finished. I still need to use the lint roller on it at least another time. 

I got the quilting and binding done on this charity quilt.

It’s one of the ones I added borders to, and I’m really happy with it. I couldn’t get a good picture because of the dark, gloomy weather….I’ll try and get a better one later.

I also sewed extra borders to this one:

I’m anxious to see how it looks quilted. 

On Sunday, Our Lady of Lourdes had their annual turkey dinner, so another lady and I went over to the community center and ate after church.

I picked up two extra plates for my neighbor and dropped them off on my way home. Once home, I wasn’t in the sewing mood so I changed the bed including the sheets, blanket, and quilt. I put the new vintage quilt on, and it’s a nice change.

I did a load of laundry, ran the dishwasher, and swept and mopped all the hard floors. The dogs had the family room and kitchen all tracked up from the rain. I still need to dust and clean bathroom fixtures, but I ran out of steam. It happens. I managed to get another load of laundry done before I went to bed, and I sewed some 2-1/2” squares together. I made some four patches and some 16 patches.

I don’t have a plan for these yet, but it was something to do. I’ll figure out something to do with them.

A New Old Quilt

I love old quilts--my favorite pattern is the Improved Nine Patch (aka Glorified Nine Patch). I have a couple of old ones in that pattern. In fact, you might have noticed my blog header is one of them. We have a box at church where we collect used coats and sweaters for the homeless, and someone put a vintage Improved Nine Patch quilt in it. The lady who distributes the coats asked me if I wanted it, and of course I did. It was pretty yellowed and dingy, but I soaked it for about 10 hours and hung it up outside to dry, and now look at it!

It is so much brighter! I didn't think to take a picture before I cleaned it, but it is clean now.

It isn't quite square, and the back has some stains. I'm not sure if I will try to deal with the stains or just leave it alone. After all, they didn't come out after soaking it, and they're not terrible.

This quilt is around 75" x 82", and the weather is getting cool enough to have a quilt on the bed, so that's where this one is right now. I'm enjoying it, and I like the vintage look. I don't normally gravitate to anything blue, so I don't have much of that color in my collection. Anyway, I felt a little funny about taking something that was donated for the homeless, so I went by Walmart and bought a jacket to put in the donation box. I think that's a fair trade?

More Charity Quilts

Yesterday's post had a lot of pictures, so I cut it short and didn't post everything. My friend Betty is on a mission to use all her accumulated fabric. In addition to quilts she's making for grandchildren, she pieces extra blocks and puts them into tops which she brings to me so I can quilt them for Midcoast Family Services. Midcoast operates a residential shelter for victims of domestic violence. While it can be men, it is pretty much exclusively women and children. 

Betty comes by about once a week and drops off a quilt top. Here are most of them (I may have forgotten a few). 

In addition to the quilt tops, she often drops off extra fabric to use for pillowcases or bags that can be donated with the quilts.

More tops:

The pink sticky notes in the corners are where I wrote the measurements and pinned it to the tops. That way, I only have to measure them once, and I know what size of batting and backing I need if I have some leftover pieces I want to use up. I am planning to quit accepting customer quilts this month so I have all of December to get these tops quilted. 

Speaking of customer quilts, I finished Pat's today.

It's a pretty one. I also got the binding sewn onto another customer quilt. I still need to topstitch it to the front. Maybe today. There's a quilt guild board meeting this morning, and then some of us will go out for lunch when it's done. 

Working on Charity Quilts

A few months ago, I was getting in a panic about having enough time to piece tops for the charities I support. When I have customer quilts to work on, that takes precedence over my own stuff, but the charity quilts are my passion. Well, I decided to get busy and see what I could get done. That’s when I did these:

I’m sure many of us read Jo Kramer’s blog, Jo’s Country Junction. She is a great facilitator of the charity quilt community, and she posted about that time that she was looking for readers who wanted to finish some tops. I emailed her and then sort of forgot about it. A few weeks later, I got a package with four tops in it. 

Oh so nice, but three of them are a little small for my needs. I have been adding borders. Here’s what I’ve done so far:

In the meantime, Betty brought me a few she had done that she wanted to contribute to the cause, so now my cup runneth over. Isn’t that the way is always goes? I am so thrilled! I am hoping to take the month of December to just work on these. The Christmas rush should be over by then, and I can take some time to work on my own endeavors. I will show pictures tomorrow of the ones Betty dropped off.

To-Do-List Tuesday 11-7-23

Happy Tuesday quilting friends! I've had a busy week, but I didn't do very well on my list. Here's the progress:

1) Star of Bethlehem quilt. I got the middle section together, so not too bad on this one.

Betty was here a couple of days ago and helped me brainstorm what I needed to use for the border. I have several things on hand that will work, but I want it to look better than good.....I want it to look great.

2) Finish the borders on two kid's charity quilts. I opted to work on two I haven't showed yet on here. I will post more about that on tomorrow or Thursday.

3) Work on Lickety Split quilt. No.

4) Repair the seams on vintage quilt. I ended up taking it home with me and was able to get this finished Sunday night in front of the TV. 

5) Make a table runner with the Christmas charm pack I bought last week.  Almost. I got the runner sewn together and quilted.

I just need some binding. I am trying to decide between black or green. I don't want to use red as I plan to use it on top of a red table cloth thingy I got at Hobby Lobby, and I don't think I can match the reds.

You know, I thought I hadn't made very good progress, but when I see it written down, it's not too bad. Especially since I spent a lot of time at volleyball and soccer games. My grandson had the last game of the season, so I'm off the hook until spring. Here he is with his team.

And with mom:

and dad and grandpa:

The volleyball game was long, and ultimately didn't have the outcome we had hoped for. The girls were so disappointed at losing. They played well, but the team they played was just a little better. In fact, they were the TAPPS (Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools) 5A state champion runner up team last year. Their coach had a filthy mouth as did the girls. I would have loved to have beaten them.

Our girls:

Kathryn can be cheered up with barbecue, and since we were in Wharton, we went over to Hinze's which we all like. 

Okay, enough of that. And now, I need a new list. Here goes:

1) Finish up on the Star of Bethlehem quilt.

2) Bind charm pack table runner.

3) Keep plugging away on charity quilts. 

4) Quilt two customer quilts.

5) Bind a customer quilt.

6) Put borders on vintage quilts—maybe.

The two customer things will definitely get done. The other four are sort of a pick list. I am going to link this to Quilt Schmilt. 

Friday--Finally!

It's been a long week! I was so happy to have a productive day yesterday--not that the other days weren't productive; there just wasn't much sewing or quilting. I finally did finish the Cardiac Rehab at the Healthplex. That was three long months of doing the prescribed exercises wearing a heart monitor while the nurses collected the electronic data. I had the final discharge (stress test) on Wednesday, and the doctor informed me I am in great shape "for my age". I hate when they add the "for your age" qualifier--especially when said doctor is my age or maybe older. Oh well. Even though I am 20 pounds overweight, I am pretty active and I feel I'm healthy, so it's nice to have it confirmed. I probably need to work off getting that 20 pounds gone though. 🙁

There have been a few more volleyball games lately.

The girls won their final district game and are the district champions (same as last year),

then they played Bay Area and Houston Second Baptist (Area playoffs) and won both of those games.

Saturday they have their regional playoffs in Wharton against Fort Bend Christian. That will be a tough game, but honestly, so was the one against Second Baptist, so I'm hoping for the best.

I got some quilting time yesterday and finally got all the stitching removed from the quilt I wasn't happy with. It was the one where the 80/20 batting bearded through to the back. I don't have the option of using black batting because the front has quite a bit of white in it. I am going to try it with a thin poly (I already got the customers permission to change the batting). While I was stitch ripping, I quilted a table runner and a placemat panel.

I was going to use white thread, but I changed my mind and used a silver gray. Glide Cool Grey 3. I also used it in the bobbin, and I like the way it looks on the white backing.

I also worked on some charity quilts, but I'll save that for another post. I'm going to Houston today to the International Quilt Festival. It's been such a hectic week, I wasn't really looking forward to being away for the day, but now that's here, I'm feeling better about it. I'll just have to work extra hard next week to make up for my absences.