Sea Turtles - Part 1

My next project is going to be another reverse applique wall hanging, this time with sea turtles as the theme.  I'm still working on the actual reverse applique design and hope to have that finalized shortly.  I have also been working on putting together the sea turtles layer.  This is the one that lays underneath the top layer and gets exposed when the reverse applique design is cut out.  Here is what this layer is going to look like, I still have to finish sewing together all the columns.

The top layer is going to be lighter in colour and these are the fabrics that will make up that layer. The plan for this layer is to do more free form curved piecing to try and give the look of waves on the ocean. The blue in the upper right hand corner appears to be rather dark in the photo but in relation to the fabrics in the turtle layer it is a fair bit lighter.  The lighting in my sewing room is great for sewing since I have lots of windows and natural light, but I guess my camera things other wise.



UFOs - Finished the Gloria Loughman Wall Hangings

I finally finished the 2 wall hangings from the Gloria Loughman workshop that I took back in the fall of 2008.  It's great to see them finished and have a couple of items no longer be UFOs. Unlike some people in blog land who I see have long lists of UFOs, I find personally that if my list of UFOs gets too long it starts to give me anxiety.  I think in part it has to do with my upbringing which was working class and there were many a time that things were tight because factories had layoffs during down times so you learned to live frugally and with purpose. So when I see too many UFOs on my list I start to question myself why did I decide to do tht project if it's just going to lay around collecting dust and never get finished. 

There are many legitimate reasons why projects get put on hold but for me I like to keep those numbers down to a dull roar. Also every now and then I will take a hard look at what is there and decide if something will ever get finished or is there something about a particular project that in my books it will likely remain a UFO forever.  If that is the case then it is time to donate it to someone who can put it to good use and finish it.  Why should it collect dust in a box for decades.  So I have decided that the Kaffe Fassett diamond quilt project will never get done.  I have lost complete interest in it and have no desire to complete it. I will donate the cut diamonds to the guild that I belong to for their charity quilt group where someone will gladly make it up into a quilt for charity.  I'll even make sure to provide some fabric for the back and binding and hopefully there will be someone interested in working on it.

So here are the finished wall hangings.  This one is called Colour is Magic.

This one is called Layer by Layer.

Here is a close up of the quilting that I did in the borders of both of these wall hangings.

So now to decide what I will be working on next, stay tuned.

First Snow of Winter

We finally got our first so called "snow storm" of winter and in reality it's not much of a storm here in Toronto.  We have had an incredibly mild winter so far and most of the precipitation has been in the form of rain including a major soaking yesterday.  The latest system was actually 2 systems that crossed paths over the great lakes and were suppose to bring our first real taste of winter.  There was a Texas Low coming up from the south full of moisture followed by an Arctic Low bringing the cold temperatures needed to make snow.  Yesterday with the bulk of the precipitation the Arctic Low hadn't quite made its way to our area and now that it is here most of the moisture is to the east of us where they are expecting significant snow falls.  We will likely see an inch of snow when it's all done but this morning things got pretty messy when the wet roads from all the rain froze.

Here are a couple of pictures from my balcony of the first snow of the winter, it really doesn't look all that spcetacular because it's not the big fluffy kind that sticks to trees and creates those beautiful post card images.  These are the very fine flakes that don't really stick to much.

Hope everyone is keeping warm and safe today.  Have a great weekend and hope you find some time for your quilting projects.

2012 New Years Goals

I hope everyone has had a pleasant New Years Day.  I went out with friends last night to a lovely French restaurant to ring in the New Year.  It was a great time catching up with good friends and a most enjoyable meal.  Today has been a quiet laid back kind of day.

I've done my review of projects that I would like to get done this year, and here is the list. As always it will be interesting to see what gets completed, what doesn't and what new projects come along.

I also listed my UFOs that have no commitments at this time for completion and this list I only added one new project from 2011 so that's not too bad. I think as quilters it seems that everyone has the never ending supply of UFOs.

Jan: Finish quilting the 2 wall hangings from Gloria Loughman’s workshops
Jan: Develop my design for the reverse applique quilt "Sea Turtles"
Feb: Create the "Sea Turtles" quilt top
Mar: Finish the quilt top "In full Bloom - Poppy" from Elaine Quehl's workshop
Apr: Design and create the quilt top for the shoe wall hanging called "Stiletto Heels"
May: I'm signed up for Hollis Chatelain's workshop "Quilt Line as the Third Design Element" and need to bring in 3 quilt tops for discusion and quilt design creation. My plan is to take the "Sea Turtles", "In Full Bloom - Poppy" and "Stiletto Heels" quilt tops.
Jun: Finish quilting "In full Bloom - Poppy" so it is ready to give to my mom for her 90th birthday in August
Jul: Attend Ricky Tim's Super Quilt seminar being held in Rochester NY. I enjoyed this so much when I went to Cape Cod back in 2010, that when I saw it being held so close to home, I figured it would be worth while to attend a second time and hopefully several of the gals from my small quilt group will also come.
Jul - Aug: Finish quilting "Sea Turtles"
Sep: Finish quilting "Stiletto Heels"
Oct: Finish Falling Splendor quilt
Christmas charity quilt: Using blocks from the Friday Block Party 2009

Any time:
1: One block wonder quilt ( I already have the fabric and am curious as to how this will turn out)
2: Start my own unique design of a Rhapsody quilt based on Ricky Tims techniques – the plan here is to have a completed design ready to start a quilt the following year, this in my books is a major project
3: Create a landscape quilt based on the Picture Piecing techniques of Cynthia England

UFOs that are outstanding: I wonder if any of these will come off the plate this year
Hawaiian orchid pillow – hand quilting
Kaffe Fassett – colour in design diamond quilt
BOM: Drunkard’s Path Variations
Tranquil Moments quilt – quilting left to do
Small Wall Hanging (that was to go into a silent auction) – quilting done, need to finish beading and sew binding

So there's my list for 2012. It will be interesting to see what new things will come in to tempt me and change priorities along the way.

Happy New Year everyone.