Embroidered State Flower UFO

Some quilters were talking about an Embroidered State Flower quilt their grandmother had on the Stashbusters yahoo group I belong to.  That brought to mind my mom's state flower UFO I acquired.  Last year she decided that she wasn't going to finish quite a few of her projects and I decided to help by taking some (25 total) home.    One of them is a state flower embroidery quilt she started when I was still in High School.  

I dug it out to see what was done, what was not done and if anything was missing.  I will be visiting her in a couple weeks as long as it doesn't snow!  

I was planning on visiting her this weekend, but thanks to this blizzard, I stayed home.   It shouldn't snow in April especially this much.

Well I found 29 1/2 of the blocks done.  More than I expected.

I then went through to see what was left and if any were missing.  This was a iron transfer and all the blocks were already transferred.  The problem is they bled and faded so none of them are very clear.  So the ones left will all need to be traced back on the blocks.  Going through the original patterns I found I was missing two.   

Oh no!   

So then I quickly went through the blocks to see if I could still make out the pattern for these two.  One is the half done block and that one didn't bleed or fade much. The other one I could make some of it out, but it was pretty faint.   

Ok, lets see if I can find this pattern or image of the quilt online somewhere.  I can't be the only one who has this.   And I found it here.    It is now considered Vintage.   Ok, I knew she had it a while, but I hadn't considered it vintage.  And lucky me the picture was of the California block I was missing.  Yeah!

I then drew the design the best I could and now have this block ready to embroider.  I can see it better than the picture shows.

Now I have this set up to start working on as my handwork so I can hopefully finish this vintage UFO. I am hoping to get at least one block done each month, so this quilt will still take me two years to complete. But I will get it done.

And I need to get working on my other UFO's before they become Vintage too.

Preventing UFO's with a couple finishes

Have you ever taken a class, but didn't finish the project in class and it became a UFO?   I have.  I still have a few of them waiting patiently for me to finish.  Ok, maybe they are not patiently waiting, but I stuffed them into the back of my closet, so they are not staring me down and screaming to be finished.  I will finish them, but first I need to finish some I started and keep them out of the UFO pile.

These two I prevented from becoming UFO's and finished them.  Because what good does it do you to finish your UFO's if you just create new ones?

Here is the project from my Path to an Art Quilt class I took at the beginning of March.  It is called Dragonfly Sunset.

And this next one is from a Progressive Applique clinic.  Each quarter in this clinic she introduces a machine applique technique and we meet each month to work on the project.  This quarter was the satin stitch technique, with lots of practice doing curves and points.  

I haven't done much applique, but I really like the looks of it.  So much so that I have several kits and a UFO waiting for me to applique for a couple of years.  So I am hoping this clinic will help me learn the different techniques and gain the confidence to finish those UFO's and quilt kits.  Next quarter is buttonhole technique.

Now off to finish my March BOM...  I fell behind on this one and need to catch up.  I can't let these BOM become more UFO's!

   

Get It Done - April 2013

April Showers?  or Snow?

Seems like spring just doesn't want to come yet.  So I finished up my winter theme projects with the hope that I can pack them away and spring will arrive. Think that might work?  I sure hope so.

So here is my update on the projects from my March - Get It Done.   Other Get It Done bloggers can be found here.

I haven't done as much quilting as I was hoping, but I have squeaked in a little quilting in small chunks and managed to get a couple things done this month.  

So these were my goals for March and what I manage to get done.

• Potholders - Done

• January BOM - Done
• Art Quilt - top made and pin basted
• March BOM - Not started.
• Nephew's Quilt - pin basted
• Spring Mystery - no progress
• Easy Street - no progress

Items that were not on my goals, but made some progress on.

• Applique Class project - quilted and just hand sewing the binding left.
• 5 yard quilt UFO - pin basted.
• Pansy Mystery UFO - pin basted.

I didn't get everything I wanted done, but I did make progress, so I am happy.  

So what happened? Well one of the things I learned from a project planning seminar I went to, is what ever your plan, their is a 99% chance of that plan NOT happening.  Too many outside factors will affect any plan for it to work perfectly.  So my goals are just to help me focus, it is not a failure if they don't ALL get done.   

So when I got my art quilt and the piece of batting was too small, I then used that for the applique project.  Now I didn't have a small piece of batting for the art quilt, so I decided to pin baste my nephew's quilt in hopes that would create a piece of batting that I could use for the art quilt.  I didn't see the need to cut a small piece of batting from a larger piece when I knew I could use left overs.

The problem I ran into this time was the backing I had cut was too small for my nephews quilt...  I had some smaller quilt tops ready to sandwich, so I grabbed my 5 yard quilt UFO that was waiting patiently to be quilted and pin basted that one with this backing instead.   Now since I had everything set up for pin basting, I just went with the opportunity and cut another bigger piece for my nephews quilt and pin basted that one and one more smaller pansy mystery UFO.  I was thinking for pin basting one more quilt, but I was running low on pins.

So now for my goals in April and my guess on how many hours it will take.

• Applique Project binding ~ 2 hours, but I do hand sewing while watching TV.
• March BOM ~ 5 hours
• Pansy Mystery - quilted and bound. ~ 7 hours
• Nephew's - quilted and bound ~ 10 hours
• April BOM ~ 5 hours
• Path to an Art Quilt ~ 5 hours
• Easy Street - borders and pin basted ~ 3 hours

Stretch Goals in case I have more time than I expect.

• Spring Mystery - finish piecing top ~ 10 hours
• Nephew 2 quilt - pin basted ~ 3 hours
• Alphabet BOM - A-D ~ 4 hours

Right now I will be happy if I get anything done this month as it isn't starting out so great.  My son broke his wrist on the 1st and we are still waiting to see if he will need surgery.  Hard way to learn that instead of running on top of the net lying on the Gym floor, it is better to go around so you don't slip.  The funny part is that two of his friends broke the same bone in their wrist in the past, so he thinks it is cool.   Go figure what a 12 year old thinks is cool.