May Finishes and Junes Goals

May Goals

1. Scavenger Block - Sunbonnet Sue - Queen of Hearts and Embroidered Block.  Not totally sure how I'm going to do this but I may paint part of it like I did the frog.   Goal Met. 

I changed my mind a couple times on this and it's funny each month how I'll think of doing these blocks one way and then do them totally different.  

Isn't she cute?  :)  

2. Buttermilk Basin  Finish "T" Block  and "I"  Block and prep the next "T" Block.  Goal Met ??  They released an extra block in April with the letter "I" it was a snowflake.  I have been watching and looking and waiting, but have not seen the next letter - "T" released. So I've done the two blocks from April - and I can't prep a block I haven't received. 

3. Work on gifts!  Towels, Scissor Fobs - need to make progress on gifts to give. Finish Ronni's Mat by Retreat time. Then I  want to also paint another block and make it into a wall hanging for a friend.  So this may be my gift goal for this month.     Goal Met - I did work on the gifts. 

I did the last little bit of Stitching on Ronni's sewing mat and gave it to her.  :)

Then I worked on the painted wall hanging that I wanted to do for my other friend and it kept wanting to bleed on me. I don't think I've had it do that to me like that.  

Time for a do over.

I will now quilt it and make into a wall hanging. 

4. Quilt something.  Not sure what just get some quilting done. I keep saying Bee Hive Baby, but maybe I need to pick something else to get me going. :)  Here are a few that already pin basted - so I just need to get going on them.   Goal Met - don't fall off the chair I actually did quilt something.  

Here's a close up of some of the quilting.  I'm still working on my free motion quilting and this was my first spider webs.   Not perfect but it was fun.  

5.  UFO's  APQ random ufo buster # 7  Which is too funny.  Because I am doing 6 UFO's for 2 month's each #7 is the same as #1.  Which is the same as last month.  :)   Porch Time.  As always the goal is to make progress. Goal Met!   I wanted to get even more done - But thankful for what I did get done. 

 I worked on this area - I got one of the small hands appliqued on and then put the strips on the side so I could put the next hand on. 

I got the flower blocks trimmed and sewn together

And then I prepped most of the blocks in this sections and appliqued the star block.

Again - wish it was more - but it was some progress.  

6.  Retreat Projects - Make Progress - Yep got another retreat going on.  May 19 - 21. Back in February when the power went out on us - well they offered us free rooms because of that - So what do you do with a free room?  Well we book a new retreat.  :)   I reserve the right to change my mind but as it stands now I am planning on taking my very old "Quilt as you go" Quilt to finish up.  Nope didn't take this one. 

Next I am planning to continue on with the "Snowman Collector" that I took to the retreat in February.   I have one more block to applique and top stitch and then I can start making the sashing and borders.

This one I did take and made progress so - Goal Met.  

I had this one last block to do.  

Then I needed to put all the 2" squares for the sashing and borders. The blank area above will contain the letters to spell out "Snowman Collector".  Which my friend cut on her AccuQuilt cutter.  

The Retreat was a little different than some of the others I've gone to but still ended up being good. You can read more about it Here.  

7.  Charity!   Goal Met

7a. I want to finish up the 1/2 quilt that I've got going on for the CRQ guild.   Done

7b. Along with that I need to work on some charity stuff for the SNR guild.  Here are some orphan blocks I'm going to sew together to make a couple of tops.

Here is what I got done.  

7c. Bonus Points -  If I get the quilt made for SNR  then quilt it.     No Bonus Points for this - However I have a feeling it will be in with Junes goals.  

8.  Blog 7-10 times.  Goal Met! 

Extra's - 

The wallet - I blogged about it here and here.   

I re-covered some dinning chairs -  Not a quility thing, but I wrote about it here. 

And the Dress for my Great Niece.  I blogged about it here.

And a picture of Ava in the dress and Ava with her twin sister Brynn.

Well  I did pretty good this month I at least met each goal except the bonus points so I'm happy about that.   So what does June Bring?  

June Goals

1.  Scavenger Block(s)  At the June SNR guild meeting, our last meeting for the summer, I will be handing out the remainder of the scavenger block clues. The goal is for everyone to get the blocks done and a quilt made by December's Christmas Party which is the Second Tuesday in December.  That should be plenty for June - Then I can use July and August while we are dark to do some of the others.

Goal for June is to get at least one block done and Bonus Points if I can get more done.    

Junes items are:    Any Star Block - Snowball and Musical notes.

July's items are:     Flip Flops - Thimble and Polka Dots

August items are:  Something Plaid - Spool of Thread and Hankercheif

  

2.  Bear Quilt - I haven't had that one on the list for a month or two and I need to get back on it.  I want to work on getting the bears on the background with the Aspen tree's, branches and leaves in and around them.  This will involve the tracing cutting and fusing of all the tree parts - So the goal will be to have the bears placed and fused along with the some of the tree's and leaves. 

Since there are two of them I need to figure out how far apart I want them and then will fill in with the aspen trees and the branches and leaves. 

3.  Continue with quilting.  This needs to be an all quilting summer.  I want start quilting  the train quilt for my grandson.  Goal is to have it at least half done.  

4.  More quilting.  I have 3 charity quilts for SNR that need to be quilted. I thought I was going to be able to hand them off - but the couple that does the quilting have 90 quilts backed up for charity so I think I need to do these myself.   Goal:  Have at least one of them pinned and quilted. I have 3 months while the guild is dark to quilt 3 quilts so I need to do at least one a month along with my own stuff. 

5.  Buttermilk Basin BOM - The next letter.  They normally release them on the 3rd Friday of the month.  If that's when it's released my goal is to have it prepped and ready to stitch.  It should be the letter  "T".    

6.  APQ   UFO Buster # 10  - Christmas Quilt.   This is a pattern by Cheri Saffiote Payne. I originally started this with a group of friends when I still lived in Oregon and we would get together one Saturday a month and work on it together.  At the time I was still trying to finish up my "Sweet Land of Liberty" quilt that the rest of the group had already finished and did not get very much done on this one.  It is small though so hopefully I can make some good progress this month.   

Beginning Status: 

 I am doing this turned under with a primitive whip stitch with black quilting thread. Since this is how I started this - I will continue it that way. 
This is where I left off.  And it's been so long since I've worked on this I wasn't even sure what it was.  LOL  But it is Santa and I posted the pattern below it.   So it looks like I have about 1/4 to 1/3 of the top blocks done.

Since this is my first of 2 times to work on this UFO this year - I may be able to finish this UFO this year. But before I get ahead of myself :)  .... for June 2016 

Goal:  Make Progress

7.  Blog 7-10 times.  

Bonus Points

There is always something that comes up that I either need to do, or I want to do. Or my sweet husband thinks I'm talented enough to do.  (chairs)   Since I don't really know what these things are ahead of time I am going to award bonus points to the extra's - whatever they may be.   :) 

I'll keep you posted on how it goes.

Have a Blessed Day - Lynn 

Of Mice and Men - And A new C.I. "The Retreat"

If you've known me for a while there are two sayings I throw around a lot.  "NLIP"  "Not Like I Planned"  and "Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men".
I am a Plan-A-Lot-Amus.  I like to plan, and I like to over plan and prepare. If I'm having a dinner party - I will over prepare food rather than have too little. To me the RSVP at the bottom of an invite is not a suggestion or a request - it's a courteous requirement.  However I have come to a point in my life where I accepted the fact that just because you plan it, doesn't guarantee it will happen.  And almost always will not happen exactly like you think it will, especially if there are others involved.   That being said -  Part of the retreat was a challenge and even so I still had a very nice time.
I will spare you the loooonnng story of what all happened with teaching the wallet. All is well that ends well and it ended well. I will however share a few tidbits, and lessons I learned.

1,  Don't teach a class where the students haven't had a chance to purchase the pattern if you are not going to give them the pattern.  I did not copy the pattern.  ( It is Copy Righted and for sale locally)

2.  Don't teach off a template that someone else thinks is going to work. - unless you've had time to get together ahead of time to verify it will work.  :)

 3.  Don't wait for students that don't show up on time.

I spent Thursday afternoon trying to figure out the template copies we were going to hand out. By Friday morning I realized they weren't going to work.  I waited around for one of the ladies to show up and by the time I did other things happened and I couldn't start the class until Friday afternoon. This caused one lady that had a pattern go on her own.  The wallets required hardware and the hardware was malfunctioning.  It just had it's issues. LOL
But out of 7 people, 2 people made multiple wallets, and only one person left the retreat without the wallet made,. That had in part to do with malfunctioning hardware.
I will be teaching this again in September to our guild.  I now have a much better plan on how I will be doing it.   I wish I had pictures of the few that were made, a few of the ladies were out of town so I can't get them but maybe some of the locals will bring them so I can get a picture.
Here was mine:

So as of Saturday morning I did a little bit of finishing up help for a couple of the students and their wallets, but was now getting ready to work on my stuff.  As you will see from my last post - I took a bunch of new projects I wanted to start.  After the wallet experience - I didn't feel in the mood to decipher yet another pattern to start either the purse or the Locker Caddy.  So I started working on my "Snowman Collector".   I was able to finish block #12

Then I worked on putting the top together.

And as the last man standing I got the first border around it before I left on Sunday.  It still needs two plain borders, and then another pieced border that has trees.

The open part at the top will have the words "Snowman Collector"  - which my friend was so sweet to take home and cut out for me with her AccuGo Cutter.   And I've already received in the mail.

Now About the NEW C I

We have our very own Judy Niemeyer Certified Instructor.  

After two years of long hard work and several quilts she was surprised to tears when her sweet husband brought in a cake for all of us  and flowers for her at the retreat making an announcement on how proud he was of her.   That is her oldest son with them.

Here are the quilts she had to make at the final certification workshop.  (These are not her only quilts - she has several)

So that's about it for now - it ended up being a very nice retreat and I did get some stuff done.  I was very tired and have slept a lot in the last few days - but looking forward to my next retreat in October. But they do take a lot out of you so kind of happy that it is a few months down the road. 

Have a Blessed Day - Lynn