Guilt Through Association

(It's been a whirlwind  July and August...a week in Portland in July, followed by the somewhat sooner than we expected passing of my father-in-law, rushing to finish the Kaffe scrap quilt for the fair (it won a 5th place ribbon :-( -- seriously!--but quilt judging is a subject for another blog post), a celebration of dear FIL's life hosted by us in August (accompanied by a tad more than the usual family drama)....I'm now trying to regain my footing and continue down the path toward some semblance of normalcy)

In the interest of getting back on track, I thought it might be enlightening if I harnessed my inner OCD and documented every project I have started and intend to finish (note I said 'intend to finish'..... this allows me the freedom to not list a few remnants hanging around from workshops that didn't turn out to be all that fun, or failed experiments in piecing...) . And while I was at it, I also decided to take stock of my 'good intentions', and make a notebook for all those projects I want to do, for which I already have most of the supplies (I didn't count the various patterns, or books purchased because they included a project I want to make--no, that would have required a trip to the office supply store for extra notebooks).

I'm big on lists....mostly because the Queen of Procrastination finds that making a list is an extremely effective tool for optimizing procrastination time. And also because there is nothing more satisfying to a listmaker than ticking off completed items from a 'to do' list. No matter how trivial, the sense of accomplishment is food for the soul.

As a productive person, I thought it better to just list some project notes regarding materials in the 'on deck' notebook. Who knows if I'll even get to these projects in this lifetime...no sense detailing project management steps for something not yet started.

Bottom line....I have 25 UFOs and 31 projects On Deck (it's the end of summer, last chance for baseball analogies). While I'm trying to convince myself that these are reasonable numbers for someone who has only been quilting for 5 years, I've got the hubs in my ear asking if I've been to the basement to count the needlepoint/crewel embroidery UFOs that have been in boxed up for the last 40 years....."(whine) I'm still waiting for my needlepoint chessboard that I picked out of a catalog for you back in 1973 (whine)"....the man is relentless (and I'm hoping that moths have destroyed any evidence of past transgressions).

In the meantime, guilt has gotten the best of me and I have dug out a quilt I began before I was a quilter (aka the "I Had No Idea What I Was Doing" quilt), and have begun the arduous process of ripping out every quilting stitch I managed to make (without a quilting foot/feed dogs up, through cheap see-thru cotton borders, sandwiching the lamest polyester batting known to man) before I folded it up and buried it in a closet, half (ass) quilted.

One small step......and a 2-pack of replacement blades for my Gingher seam ripper.

Time Flies!

Oh my gosh! It's been over a month and I haven't posted, which means that a month has passed that I have not finished a quilting project. (This is how UFOs develop).

So to not look so lame, I'm going to post a photo of my Ugly New York Beauty challenge block which I created as a challenge project for my Yahoo quilting group last month. The object was to pick an ugly fabric and to make it look okay through the use of layout and color.

Obvously I didn't win this challenge, but I did learn how to paper piece, and I got to work with curves, spikes, and most importantly, I got in some practice with freemotion.

And since we're rehashing old projects, what better time to pull out the 'almost' quilts and the UFO....

This is fused applique with machine satin stitching. I made this from a pattern to hang outside my daughter's classroom door. It was fun, but tedious. Not exactly a quilt, but in the same family....kind of like chicken and cornish hen.

This is a wall hanging (also made from a kit) I whipped up for my sister who has a large Americana display. I thought this might go well with it. The cool thing about this was how all the little squares were pieced together. You stitched all the different red strips together lengthwise into a tube and then you cut them into strips along the width. Next you ripped out a seam in different places in the tube so the fabric patterns of the strips were now random and no two fabrics aligned next to each other. Really neat. Stitched in the ditch (do we detect a pattern here?)

Let's close this post with the granddaddy of all UFOs.....my HGTV Strolling the Block quilt. The photo shows a pieced top. We are actually sandwiched, all the ditch stitching is done and we have started some freemotion. I'm not exactly sure what the problem is. Either:

a. I'm sick of it (it's been a work in progress for at least 5 years), or

b. I've got so much time and labor invested in it I'm afraid I'll screw up the quilting, or

c. I have nowhere to use or display this so what is the point?

This is fused applique, every single piece is meticulously hand blanket-stitched. There are major emellishments throughout (embroidery, buttons, charms, fishnet, etc.). More of a wall hanging (albeit it almost twin bed sized) rather than a snuggle under--all that 'charmage' does not bode well for comfort.

One day I'll look back on this and laugh about how long it took to complete (sigh)