Off Work but not relaxing :( - part 2

Nothing like accidentally hit publish before I actually put anything on the page. 

So, here we go.

It's cold today but we got the snow last night.  I am so tired of shoveling out.  Even though I am in my 60s, I don't have others to shovel out for me.  that's ok.  I'm doing it in shifts and it IS good exercise.

I did get in the mail today, my other fabric from Pineapple Fabric.  This is Benartex - Cream Batik.  I love it.

Then I've been adding to my UFO container.  I find more projects so they get written up and added.

The rest of the pictures today are the snow pictures.  Time for me to go back out and shovel a bit and start the car.  Then I'll collapse inside for the rest of the day.  :)

Everybody stay warm. 

PS:  Sorry about the blank post that went out.  hehe.

Having fun with stickers

When I don't want to work on anything, I pull out some stickers and pretend that I am getting organized.  This weekend my pretend organization was to get stickers and setting up my UFO container as well as getting washi tape and other stickers.

I finally figured out what to do about my UFO projects.  I will be putting the names of the UFO on pieces of paper and put them in my UFO container.  Each month I will draw a name and that will be the UFO I will work on in that month. 

These are little boxes that are around 3".  The top one will house the names of my UFOs while the middle one has some of my stickers and the bottom the washi tape.  The stickers will probably overrun the middle and move down to the washi tape eventually.  I will be putting more washi tape on a roller or something (not sure yet).  Sometimes things work, sometimes they don't.  It was fun though and that was key in this cold winter day.

Now that I had stickers to play with, I put some in my journal.  It will be there for when I write in it next or when I put samples of my fabric for LeFleur.  I already put my fabric samples for Delft in there.  I think I like those squares for my samples.

How are you doing on your UFO's or new projects?  Are you still following your New Year's Resolution?

I also made some soup and sloppy joe's. 

Chicken and couscous vegetable soup

 I will be good for a bit on food now.  :)

I will be posting some recipes from the Taste of Home magazine that I have on another page but I'll post them here too tonight.  Remember that these are from Taste of Home  and not my original creations.  Taste of Home is a great magazine.  Enjoy.

That's it.  Have a great night everybody.  Stay warm.

Is this cheating?

Is it cheating if I just post a picture of what  I wrote in my journal?

I promise I won't do it all the time but since I can't put the washi tape on here, without covering up my computer screen and only *I* could see it, this seemed like the best way to do it.  See that top Washi tape?  I found it while rummaging in my drawers for something to use.  I guess I found something because I found that plus the butterfly tape.  :)  The top one reminds me of a railfence pattern.  Maybe I'll color it in and see how it goes.

The butterflies were to cute to just leave in the drawer so I had to pull them out and stick them on the page also.  I haven't done much else.  I printed up some of the grid pages and other pages to put in the journal.  If nothing else, the gridded page can be used for quilt patterns if I color them in.

Oh, speaking of quilting...I think my fabric from Pineapple Fabrics will arrive today or tomorrow.  The first one to arrive is the largest one but I also ordered another fabric from them when it was on sale.  That was only 1 or 2 days after I got carried away so it too should be here soon.  Now I have to be 

I done it!

I have started my 2019 journal.  I know, it's not much and I am still thinking on what I want to do.  My theory is that I will have my general journal as well as specific journals.  General journal is like my note journal.  The place where I put my thought on what I might want to do or tell you guys about.  It's my "keep me on track" type journal versus let's make it all pretty and organized.   I don't always do well when I'm all organized.

So what am I using?  Here is my start as well as some pictures of the interior pages.

I'm sure you recognize what type of book I am using.  It's cheap but sufficient.  I will probably do doodles in it also.  You never know with me.  What did I put in it already?

Always start with a to do list.  I will do some, some I probably won't do. But it is a place where I can put down my thoughts and semi keep on track.

Then there is my UFO list.  This will grow but these are the ones that I remember.  The green dots/stickers are just to bring some color to the page.  (grins).  This will be the list I will use to start my thought on how to do UFOs.  That is, take the names and print them up.  Put them in a hat/jar/something so at the start of each month I will pull out the paper and see what I will work on that month.  If I finish then great.  If not, the name goes back into the jar to be pulled out another time.  There is a good possibility that once finished some of these might go on the "flimsy" list.  I'll talk about that later.

Of course what would a new year be if not for the collection of patterns.  Be it for a BOM, BOW, or just to collect.  They will be worked on.  I have colored coded the group.  Yellow dots mean just collecting the pattern.  Orange means that I already know that I will be making these.  For instance the Delft Blue and LeFleur I have already started so they are coded orange.  The pink is the ones that I'm not sure I will make or not but they have intrigued me enough want to collect and see what they might look like.  An example of that would be Hospital Sketches from Civil War Quilts.  I'm not sure if I will make the Morning Glory Design yet or not since they haven't shown what it will be.  They haven't even named it.  We'll have to see how that will look like.

I also have started a wish list but am not happy with it.  That will be redone.  When I have it where I want it, then I'll take a picture and show you.

So what about the patterns I know I'm going to work on?  I'm going to put them in their own book.  I'm not sure if it will be a "subject" book like for school or another one of these.  Those books will only have information on the project that I'm working on.  That way everything for that one project stays in one place.  Everything will be in two places I should say.  I have put them in their own container so all the fabric for that project is together and when I print up the patterns they go in the container too.

What do you think?

The Land of UFOs

I was reading Bonjour Quilts blog today and I liked what she said about UFOs.  Some of the things that are pointed out are:

There isn’t any rule that says YOU have to finish them.

The final outcome doesn’t always have to be what the UFO was first intended.  Did that baby grow out of the baby quilt size?  Can you add more rows to it.  Did your quilting Mojo go in hiding and you can’t stand to work on another full size quilt or larger?  Can you cut it back and make a baby quilt or wall hanging out of it? 

Basically, take stock of our UFOs and look at them.  REALLY look at them.  Do you really want to finish that project?  “What’s the minimum effort required to get it to a useful state?”  What great advice!  What’s the minimum effort required to get it to a useful state.  I think it should be printed out, embroidered or whatever and put where you can see it.  First of all, who doesn’t like minimum effort.  We are all busy and don’t always have time to do things.  So rethink how you do things.  What HAS to be done to finish the project.  Does it need 3 borders?  Maybe 1 would work?    Do you need another quilt for the bed?  Perhaps you can cut it down to make it a wall hanging to go OVER the bed.  Perhaps you can redo it so that the one large quilt can be made into a couple of smaller quilts so next time you get the “oh look who is having a baby”, you might already have the quilt done.

Check out her post and see for yourself.  

https://www.bonjourquilts.com/finish-quilt-ufos/

Perhaps 2019 can be the year we try to cut back on our own stress as well as get UFOs finished.  That’s my goal.  To cut back some stress.  I don’t have a lot of it but I know that as I get closer and closer to retiring, my stress levels will go up.  I will try to keep it to a manageable stage which means I will have to do cross stitch and quilting.  

I am doing pretty good so far.  I am collecting some of the blocks from various BOMs but not working on them.  That takes some of the stress out right there. 

I will work on them when I will have time but I can’t work on them unless I collect them.  Did that make sense?  For instance.  In order to get some UFOs finished, I am not going to work on all the 2019 BOMs or BOWs that catch my eye.  I might download them but won’t let myself work on as many until I finish a UFO.  That means I have to start out making a list of my UFOs (shiver) as well as a list of what NEW projects I would like to see done in 2019.

It’s a start.  I’ll work on that this weekend.  I already have a partial list but, to be honest, my UFO list was getting too long so I stopped writing them down.  Yes I know it is called avoidance but you know what?  It works.  LOL. 

Everybody have a great day and I’ll post up a picture of what Block 2 for Delft Blue in the next day.  That’s a weekly BOW so I will feel lucky if I get them cut out and fused in a week.  I know I can’t stitch that fast.

Until next time,

Happy Stitching

Delft Blue BOW - Block 1

I'm pretty pleased with how this turned out.

The background is white on white but with the lighting in my apartment, it didn't come out that clear.  I need to also go through and erase my placement markings.  I used Fons and Porters grey making pencil.  I used it on another block (for a different project) and it erased well.  I used a stiff brush and also a white eraser to get the markings off.  I cut the end off of the white erase so it was clean and I wouldn't be rubbing in any other colors or such from previous uses.

So this weekend will be the alternating between three projects.  The black and white sunburst which I am hand quilting (large stitch), this block, and the first block for LeFleur.  LeFleur I am doing as a block of the month.  Delft Blue is a Block of the WEEK though.  That means I at least need to download the pattern each week and hopefully get it fused down.  I have all my fabrics now though and after this first one, I figured out a couple of things I will need to improve on.  Sometimes old ways ARE the best ways. 

I hope everybody has a great weekend and if you are in the area that is getting snow, hang in there.  If you are NOT in the area that is getting snow, want some?

Until next time,


Keep on stitching.

It's 2019? Already?

I am sorry that I haven't written before now but the new year, while I knew it was coming, snuck in behind me and took over.  Of course burning my hand, getting an infection in my thumb, and all the other various aches and pains of old age, didn't help any.

I was productive though.  I know it's not much of an excuse but it's all I got.  I did start the Fleur block.  I was going to put together all the 9 patches since they were all the same (do you hear the BUT coming?)...BUT I miscut my fabric TWICE which made me have to run out and get more.  It wasn't MY fault.  I mean the miscut was but not the getting new fabric.  I HAD to go and get more, right?

Eventually I got it put together and drew out my applique shapes and cut them out.  I laid out the block but you know what?  It had too much plain black in the design and the black that WAS in there was too thin.  I don't know why I didn't notice it before but now I didn't like the black fabric.  Off to Hobby Lobby I went.  I found what I needed so I scooted out of there before I spent more than the $60 I just did and I went home.

After tracing, cutting, fusing, and cutting the applique again, I laid it all out.

Now I was ready to start to stitch the fused pieces down.  I started in the middle and am working my way out.  How do you like my DMC cone of black floss?  It's 6 strands and I have enough of it for a SUPER long time. 

I also had a little bit of time to work on my cross stitch.  I picked up my the New Mini Owl again and did some stitches.  It's coming along.  This is page 2 I'm working on.

That's it for this blog entry.   I'm heading over to my getting healthy page to type up a little post on Spices.    Head on over if you want.  Either way, I hope you enjoy your weekend.  I'll post any updates probably on Monday.

PS:  I bought some more HAED cross stitch patterns.  I'll update that also....hehehe