Late Sunday Stash

I'm a little late to the party this week, but my weekend was SO worth it. 

We traveled to Idaho for a much-needed visit with family. I have to say, I was seriously hoping for some time out of the winter inversion. 

           Image credit: mountaintownnews.net

To my dismay, we encountered inversion almost all the way from Burley to Boise - although the inversion in Boise seems more gray than brown and sits a little higher above the city than the smog here. It was also still bitterly cold. 

Ah well. The bright, cheerful faces of our loved ones more than made up for the lack of sunshine!! 

This stash post is a catch-up from some purchases made during end-of-the-year sales. The Etsy shop at LimaSews was having some pretty great deals. 

Here's what I picked up. 

From left to right: 

- Camp Modern - Flight (Mahogany)  An organic cotton with a slightly heavier weight. It is the most lovely, saturated eggplanty-red color. I love it!

- Pearl Bracelet - HiHo Silver

- Color Me Retro - Dulcette Lobelia

- Chicopee - Shirt Stripe (Red)

- Koi - Smile and Wave (Water)

- Bungalow - Hive (Maize)

- Poetica - Rhythmic Gray

- 2wenty Thr3e - Cameras (Pavement) 

More organic cotton: 

- EIKO - Birds and Blossoms (Dark)

- EIKO - Playing Koi (Dark) 

            Both had appeared more blue online - in person they are much more gray. 

I had originally purchased these to use in my Barn Door quilt - but (one of the dangers of fabric shopping online) they didn't all match together very well when they arrived. I decided to make them some of my first stash collection that hasn't been already designed into a project. 

Linking up with Molli Sarah. 

WIP Thursday: Progress!

I think I'm having a sewing time-management breakthrough!! 

I have always been a terrible procrastinator, especially during my high school and college days. Just ask my mom. 

My motto was, "The only difference between a bad student and a good one is that the good student is more skilled at procrastinating." 

I still sometimes live by that motto. It's certainly how I had been managing my sewing projects. I usually don't feel motivated to make any progress on big projects until I'm under the wire...

Lately, I've been trying a different approach. I try to sew a little bit (an hour or two) every day. I can't always make that happen, but most days I can accomplish a couple small things - pinning squares together to prep for chain piecing, trimming my half-square triangles, etc. Over the last week or two, I am beginning to reap the benefits of that slow and steady progress. 

I'm definitely feeling more successful. Wanna see?!

My Barn Door Quilt is coming along!

The lighting is a little bit off - I promise my walls are not pink... I didn't have time to take any photos until after our Cub Scout activity tonight, and the sun had gone down.  

This picture is probably the closest to the true coloring of the quilt: 

I am loving working with Dowry. It is such beautiful fabric! I worry that this quilt might be just a little...or a LOT busy.  I'm hoping once it's bigger, the tone difference between the dark and light fabrics will help calm things down a bit. If not, I will still like it. 

I even took some time the other night to get working (finally) on my Lighthouse baby quilt for a friend at work.

I managed to get most of the A sections chain pieced. Next will be pressing and trimming. It's going well so far. I'm not sure paper piecing is my thing, but we'll see how I feel after I make a little more progress. 

Linking up with Lee. 

Working in COLOR!

Guys! 

I'm working in color again!! 

I've been working on my linen & lace tree skirt project for the last month. Since you haven't seen a finished post, I'm sure you can tell...I didn't finish it in time for Christmas. I knew I wouldn't, so I'm just chalking it up to being super on top of things for Christmas 2014. Ha. 

All of the blocks for the tree skirt are finished, so I took a quick break to put some time into my Barn Door quilt for Sarah's quilt along. 

It is SO nice to be working in color again! Of course, working with AMH means working with lots of it. While both of the blue fabrics "read" blue to me, each have 16 colors on the selvage! I'd say I'm making up for my time spent in a world of beige and ivory. 

Also, after spending a month with linen, moving back to quilting cotton is kind of an adjustment. The cotton feels thin and slippery compared to the linen. It's rather nice to have less bulky seams, though.  :) 

And did you notice the lovely new iron in the pic above?? It was my Christmas present this year!

She's a beauty! I have been working with a gross old Sunbeam, whose only redeeming factor is that it never shut off. Ever. Unfortunately it also ran so hot the plastic above the heat plate was starting to brown. Ick. 

I'm happy to have this lovely new Reliable. I'm hoping it's just that, reliable. It's nice and heavy so that, even with my bent old ironing board, it achieves nicely pressed seams without much effort. I had to put all my weight behind the Sunbeam, and would still have only moderately pressed seams before. The only downfall I've noticed so far with the Reliable, is that it is true to the 7 min timer. After 7 minutes, it turns itself off, even if I'm using it. Thankfully it beeps first, so I can hop over and turn it back on before it cools down. It also heats fairly quickly.  


In other news, I managed to injure my neck this week. I can hardly move - which makes sewing a bit of a challenge. 

I bet you're wondering how I injured myself?

I'll give you some guesses: 

1 - I was enjoying the fresh powder on our beautiful Utah slopes and managed to fall just wrong on my neck. (Falling...that sounds like me, right?)



2 - I took up professional wrestling, but Mr. Stone Cold was a bit much for my 5' 5.75" frame.
(yes, the extra 0.75" is necessary and important to me...)



3 - I was doing my hair. 

I know, I know...you all think I'm an amazing skier and a tremendous wrestler...but it was actually #3. 

EMBARRASSING!! 

**Imagine the phase with the same sing-song tone as Agent Wilde's "LIPSTICK TASER" from Despicable Me 2**



For real. Embarrassing.

I was pulling my hair back into my typical, wet, I-don't-want-to-do-my-hair-today bun before work, and somehow kinked my neck just wrong. At that moment, I probably looked about like Gru does in that picture above. I'm certain my facial expression was pretty close. And now I can't move. 

Maybe in a few days I'll feel more like myself again. 

In the meantime, if you catch me around town, I'll be waddling slightly to keep it still and turning my entire body to look at things. 


Linking up with Sarah and Lee. 

It's 2014!!!

Hey all!

What are your plans for this wonderful, fresh new year of ours? 

My plans are to sew, sew, sew! 

Well, in between work, church, home, and family responsibilities. 

Honestly, lately I've been getting really down on myself about my progress as a sewing blogger. I follow so many amazing bloggers who accomplish so much. Many of them finish 3 or 4 amazing, original quilts in a month. 

I can't match their pace. Between working 36 to 72 hours a week in the hospital, church and scouting responsibilities every week, trying to keep my house livable, my husband fed, and keep my sanity...I just can't keep up. 

So, I'm trying to set specific and realistic goals for 2014: 

Honestly - I don't know if I can stick to #5. I like to watch Netflix while I sew. Does that count? Maybe it's time to pull out the radio instead. 

What are your 2014 goals?