Christmas Day Stitching

The DH & I had our big Christmas Dinner on Christmas Eve this year which left Christmas afternoon all clear for some quality time in my Studio. I had finished Clues #1, 2 & 4 for the Bonnie Hunter Good Fortune mystery.  That meant I could focus on Clue 3 & 5 to get all caught up. 

First up were the half chevrons & bonus HSTs. The method I used left a very scant seam allowance.  While I worked, I have some old Quilt Cam episodes I had missed, playing on the laptop and then onto the TV.

Much less than a quarter inch.  

I had a moment's pause but remembered this is a mini quilt that will not be wash & used like a bed quilt so this will do fine.  Not pressed, so they appear wonky but they're not, but they are done! 

Here are the turquoise units next to the blue HSTs to show the difference in the colors.

Next - the 3 triangle in a square units. By this time in the day, I was feeling very relaxed, in part due a lovely large Mexicali coffee and Bailey's, so relaxed that quilt math was not my strong suite.  Weird but this is the second time during this quilt that I had an issue with mini-sizing the unit construction.  Seems to me that time away from my Studio has NOT been good for me in more ways than one! I smartly made a test unit - the one on the left - the coral & neutral side was too small!

And then made another test unit - the one on the right - the coral & neutral side was too big! Third time was a charm!  

I went back to Bonnie's blog to re-read the instructions and confirmed where I made my math mistake. ARGH!! It was really a case of not paying close enough attention. I moved on to piecing all the units correctly. DONE!   

And I am officially all caught up on making my units for my mini mystery quilt! Tomorrow will be pressing, pressing, pressing.  Click  HERE to see what quilters around the world are up to with their versions of the Good Fortune Mystery Quilt.

I have to say being back on the Studio yesterday was a great feeling.  I felt the lack of quilting motivation lessening while I sat at Wild Cherry and pushed fabric under the needle. I'm not back to full speed ahead but it did feel better creating something. 

2018 Merry Christmas

AND

Distracted Quilting

Friends shouldn't let friends quilt distracted. Ever.

First, some background.

I've been lacking quilting mojo lately but I'm determined to make the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt again this year.  A fellow quilt blogger from down under, Vireya, (waving "HI") challenged me to get a few units of each of the first four clues done by the time this week's link up went live on Monday. I met (virtually, that is) Vireya 5 years ago via the link up for the BH mystery quilt Celtic Solstice (2013).  It was so neat to make a connection across the globe, share our stitching progress and see a lovely bright splash of Australian summer flowers on her Blog during our cold winter season.

I figured I would to get something accomplished for the link up, though most likely not all the units done.  My stitching time was limited this past weekend, as DH & I made our annual trek down to Chicago for the Christkindlmarket on Sunday. When I finally did grab some time in the Studio, I started with Clue #1 - four patches. 

How hard could that be? 

Right!  Harder than necessary, it turns out. LOL!! I ended up with 4 patch rectangles!  This is what happens when I try to quilt distracted by sixteen bazillion things on my mind.  Apparently, quilt math was beyond my capabilities for this step. I've done mini size versions of the mystery quilts before so I know how to do the figuring, but my brain was obviously NOT on the task at hand!

Friends don't let friends quilt distracted!

The good news?  I can trim them down to the correct size and shape.

The bad news? I've wasted some fabric and will need to make a few more strip set to reach my total. 

The even better news?  I did get Clue#4 totally completed! 

Okay, so I opted to cut solid rectangles rather than string pieces them in miniature size. But at least  they're the correct size.  Let's hope Clue#2 & #3 go better than Clue#1 started. Stop back next week or follow along to see what new trouble I get into in my Studio.

Santa Came Early This Year!

Santa Claus came a little early this year with one of my Christmas gifts. Probably because it took up quite a bit of room in his sleigh.

I was out and about one Saturday morning early in November, doing some errands and having some me time. I decided to check out an estate sale. Nothing there. Then I got a wild idea to head up to the Restore - Habitat for Humanity shop.  Just to look around. I mean, what could it hurt - I was just unwinding from a busy week. 

And then I found these!

Oh, my stars! These are HON steel lateral filing cabinets, in really great used condition, clean, with smooth action - with no price on them.  I tried to contain my excitement while the associate found the manager to price them, hoping she would be gentle, but fair with her marking pen. 

$30 each! $30 each! $60 for the pair! OMG!!! And to top it off, they were offering 20% off everything in the store for veterans, as it was Veterans Day weekend. $48 for the pair! And buying them helps support a good cause. 

The DH had had a bad night, with quite a bit of pain and was safely ensconced on his couch, trying to get some rest.  This was worth getting him up & out to the store. In the meantime, I literally sat on the cabinets until the very nice associate put SOLD tags on both of them. It took a while for the DH to get there, and get them loaded and home but they are mine!  

For my Studio. 

For my Stash.  

Several years ago I bought plastic carts with drawers that fit under my cutting table. And they worked for a while. But plastic is not sturdy enough to withstand time, the weight of all that fabric and constant use & abuse until they looked like this. 

The new cabinets fit under the cutting table, placed back to back. 

The whole stash fits in their four drawers! Previously, it took four of the old plastic carts, 12 drawers plus four other drawers. 

Loving the new clean look of these cabinets! I told DH that they are part of my Christmas gifts from him.  Their acquisition has kickstarted a cleaning and reorganization of the Studio - something that is long overdue around here. 

Mini Mystery!

I'm doing it!

I'm doing the Bonnie Hunter Mystery...in miniature!

This past weekend was a dog show weekend so no sewing actually got done.  What I did manage to do was convert all three clues unit sizes to mini (half regular size) and discover the little HSTs from Clue# 3 are going to be challenging. Those I haven't figured out which will be the best way to make them without making myself crazy or the machine eating tiny points. I'll get there!  I have two other clues units to make while I figure them out.

Since I'm not about to cut into the larger yardage pieces I posted last week, I needed to jump into the stash and find my colors/fabrics. 

I'm changing them up from Bonnie's like I said I was going to do.  Her green is my turquoise. Her red is my hot pink.

Interestingly, two of my batiks weren't washed - weird since EVERYTHING gets washed before going into the stash.  But I figured out that must have happened when I was re-housing my entire stash.  That will be another blog post.

Hard to believe there are three clues released already - I need to get busy! Thankfully, I only need to make a quarter of the number of the units than I would if I was making a full size quilt. If I did the math right, my mini should finish around 18 inches square.

Check out all the other Good Fortune mystery quilt makers progress HERE

Mystery Musings

It's time to get back to stitching something - anything!

I've been dealing with several issues in my life, one of which I would classify as Quilting Inertia. I've had nothing even remotely creatively quilty going on for months now. Nothing.  If anyone out there has some extra quilting mojo - please send it my way. Thanks!

In the meantime, I am bound and determined to get my fabric stash and my sewing machine back together for some quality time.  What better way to do this than to tackle a project that I don't have to design?  Bonnie Hunter's annual mystery quilt kicked off on Black Friday. I'm a little behind but if I do it as a mini, I can quickly get caught up.

This year's Mystery is called Good Fortune and the intro post can be found HERE . The colors reflect those from Bonnie's trip to China.  

While they are pretty, I'm going to change things a bit to reflect my stash.  

These are end bolts I bought over a year ago, just hanging out together waiting for a project.  

BUT (there's always a but) I had them earmarked for a quilt to match the wall hanging in the Michigan bedroom. 

And they are fairly large yardage-wise and I'm not keen on cutting into them for a mini or lap size quilt. Not to mention, they are as still unwashed. YIKES!  Going to have to remedy that, regardless of whether or not I chose to use them now. 

But ultimately, I think my colors for this year's mystery will be closer to these batiks, rather than Bonnie's selections. We'll see but a decision needs to be made and some sewing started - SOON!  Check out all the other quilters are doing for their version of this year's Good Fortune Mystery Quilt via this Link Up.