FOCUS - it's a good thing

I think I mentioned this once before, but one year I kept track of everything I sewed. ALL of it was for swaps, exchanges, Block of the Months. NONE of it was in the name of advancing my own projects. I should try and find that list - I know it's in a book somewhere. I was shocked at the end of the year. This year will be a whole lot different.

There are so many temptations everywhere but I'm sticking to my guns and I'm not participating in any of these projects. I want to get my own stuff done and I'm making great progress. Have you noticed that there's a group for everything and we seem to have a need to be part of a group so we can compare our photos to what everyone else is doing? I love that part, but I just don't have time. I'm marching to my own drum this year.

We were a full house yesterday at Monday sewing - seventeen of us crammed into our sewing space. But we had a blast. There's nothing better than seeing the real projects being worked on and the conversations and laughter are the absolute best part. We even talked about poop again!

Someone asked me when I prepped my stuff for Monday sewing. I try to do right after I get home on Monday so that whatever happens during the rest of the week, I'm ready for Monday. It's an important day and I would hate to get there and not be prepared. I used to do the prep on Sunday, but then I was doing last minute stuff on Monday morning and I'm trying to not do things last minute.

Here's what I got done - I was thrilled with my progress. While I have been sewing the double wedding ring arcs as my ender and leader, I knew that I needed more red squares for next week so I cut the last of the red fabric that was in the bag. I know there isn't enough. I'll dig out some more red next week.

Red squares cut for ender and leader project

 And why do I need to get back to that? Because I made great progress on the missing melons for the double wedding ring quilt. I needed ten more. Two are completed and the rest are in various stages of finishing.  I need six melons to finish the quilt, the remaining four are for the small project. I'm going to work on this at Thursday's sit n sew. I could be done at the end of that day!!!

Great progress on the extra 10 melons for the double wedding quilt

Yes - I made progress on The Farmer's Wife quilt as well. I got five blocks completed. Let's just say that I had fun with that darn basket block. It was tricky to sew together but it's done.

Five more blocks for The Farmer's Wife quilt

I got various parts together for more blocks but then ran into an issue with fabric or method. But all is good and I should be able to get my quota completed next week. I'm not sure how many blocks I have left, but I would say in the 30's. I think I'll be finished by mid-September at the latest.

I also sat down last night and prepared the paper piecing patterns for the tricky ones that didn't have cutting instructions.

The prepped blocks for next week

This is all I have left for fabric and I need to paper piece some of those blocks. I just threw the entire bag (trust me - it's small) into my sewing bag. I may need to get digging into that basket I had dug out when I got back into this project. For now, I'm good. The paper-piecing tools are in the Monday bag - we ARE going to get this thing finished.

Extra fabric for the paper pieced blocks

I still have a bag (much smaller now) of blocks that are cut and ready to sew. I add a few to the Monday sewing bag as I need. No sense carrying the entire thing around when I know I won't touch it. Since when did I become so rational?

These blocks are cut and waiting to be added to the Monday sewing bag

I got this top together. Yeah - I love it.  I had cut the borders last week, but I wanted to bring it home and give it a good press when I wasn't having to share the ironing board with 16 people. I'll get the borders on next week (hopefully).  I think there are 3 borders so that will take a bit of time to put together even if they are cut. And I must dig out some backing fabric for it.

The blocks for the wall hanging are together

Back to that table of stuff that was hanging out at my house. It's time to get some of that done instead of shuffling it on and off the tables are I have Sit n Sew days. This is the floral flannel project. It's on the UFO list from last year, but way more fabric than just one quilt. I've now cut up all the strips and scraps that were in the pile. Not sure how big of a quilt I can make with this. But it's in the pile for Thursday.

Floral flannel prepped for Thursday Sit n Sew

I still have some yardage so if the quilt isn't big enough, I can cut some more. I hope to make the backing and the binding from this pile. I want to get this project off that UFO list!

Floral flannel yardage

 There's still a box of small scrap pieces. I know most people would throw this away, but I'm going to try a very scrappy quilt with the leftovers. Don't ask me why - it's just me. That's why there's so much stuff in that room. I know there are people out there and we won't mention any names (right Shirley?) who make the quilt and give away all the leftovers. If only I could do that - I've had hardly anything in that room. OK - who am I kidding. There's still be lots, but that would be awesome to get rid of those bits.

Scraps for a very scrappy flannel quilt

You can see that I've made a number of quilts with this fabric - here are the bindings from the quilts. These pieces will get joined to make the binding for the one I'm working on.

Leftover binding bits

We all put up with things in our studio. Things that wouldn't take long to fix, but we just don't get to it. On my bulletin board, I had this holder for paper and pens. It's jammed with pens and I could only find one pencil so I guarded that closely as I use pencils for marking various things. The other day at Sit n Sew, the holder fell off the board. OK - I think it's trying to tell me something. I put all the paper in the paper holder. Look at all the pencils I found - LOTS!!

Paper and pencils in the holder

 But look at how many pens there were in the paper part. Really???  How many of those pens even work? I need to take a quiet few moments with my audiobook and a piece of paper and see how many I need to keep. The dead ones need to be thrown out and the rest should go in a box so when I need a pen there is one for me. Seriously - how does one collect all these pens?

Pens to be sorted

I got this cute little basket as a gift the other day. It's very cute and now what to put in it? I could put all those pens in there while they're being tested. Then once that task is done, I can find something nicer to put in it. But seriously - I also have a lot of pens in my desk drawer, but I think we have ONE pen in the kitchen. Obviously, some work needs to happen on the pen front in our house.

A little basket with a cute bicycle

As a sad note and a reminder to myself, yesterday was the fifth anniversary of Bob and Irene's death. They were the couple that was killed on our bicycle tour. The anniversary came up on Facebook. I remember that day because it was the day I visited the Terry Fox memorial just outside Thunder Bay. Just a reminder that life is precious - live each day like it's your last - which is why instead of working last night after I had prepped my Monday bag, I finished another book. Oh well. 

Oh - I also had a peek at some of the documentation for the computer software for the long arm. AHA - I found out some very important information that should save me time. Going to try it out tomorrow.

On that note, I'm out of here for today. Anotherjam-packedd day and I can't wait to get started.

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!!