My Third Year Blog-Iversary and More Quilt Room Organisation

Three years ago I wrote my first blog post on the first Monday after I retired.  I am still smiling about the retirement part and still enjoying blogging, although I don't blog as often as I anticipated I would in the beginning.  Blogging is more time consuming than I expected it would be, maybe I proof read too many times.....

Here are some more organisation pictures of my sewing room.  This shows my full design wall and my ironing, or should I say, pressing station.

All the Dear Jane blocks I've made so far are on the design wall.  The grey wooden bench helps me reach the top of the design wall.  I have a shelf above the ironing board and it holds some tools, glue, starch, water and the iron when it's cooled down.  The picture frame under the shelf has a picture of Marilyn and I and another quilter when we worked together and made yearly raffle quilts for United Way.  I use white board markers on the glass and list my priorities on it.

In front of my sewing table is a four drawer cabinet.



The bottom two drawers hold my neutral stash.

One drawer has off white to beige to light brown solids and tone on tones which I use mainly as background fabrics in my quilts.  I prefer using off white to bright white for backgrounds.

The other drawer has whites to grays to blacks.  Some are solids and tone on tones but there are also quite a few black and white prints.

The top two drawers hold coloured fabrics that are at least a fat quarter or more in size.

The top drawer has cool colours, greens, blues and purples.  It also has some "rainbow" or multi-coloured fabrics with either black or white backgrounds.

The next drawer has warm colours, yellows, oranges and reds as well as a few pinks.

Most of these fabrics were bought with a specific project in mind and are left overs, but a few were bought because they were on sale and I liked them and knew I would use them in a future unspecified project.





The top two drawers were nice and tidy already, but I had to do some folding to get the bottom two drawers photo ready.  A few pieces of fabric that were smaller than a fat quarter got added to my rainbow scrap buckets.

My First Blog-Aversarie!

First of all, I can't believe it is my first anniversary of blogging which also means I have been retired for more than a year!!!

Overall I'm happy with the frequency that I blogged, which was not on a regular basis but instead was when I finished something or got to the next step on something.  However, I do appreciate and look forward to other people's blogs on a regular basis, so maybe I could try to blog on specific days.  Maybe I should start a "Touch Base Tuesday" post to show what I'm working on.  I also started a "Throw Back Thursday" post to show previous quilts I have made and I will continue with this now and again until I am up to date.  I do other crafts as well, mostly knitting, and I will post these items too.  How about in a "Switch It Up Sunday" post?  We shall see.

Here is a visual of the items I finished this year:

Two Pillow Cases

Two Comfort Quilts, both gifted

Heart Table Runner

Two Reversible X & O Table Runners, both gifted
(A third, mine, just needs quilting)

Cathedral Window Cushion Cover

Table Topper, there is a Shamrock on the flip side

Bird Beach Bag, gifted

Four Easter Pot Holders, gifted

Toile Baby Quilt, gifted

Mayflower Mystery Quilt

Cardinal Red Star Quilt

Anchors Aweigh Quilt, gifted

Storm at Sea Cushion Cover, made in collaboration with my daughter, gifted

Storm at Sea Wedding Quilt, made in collaboration with my daughter, gifted

Sew Together Bag # 1, gifted

Zen Wedding Quilt with Two matching Cushion Covers, gifted

Small Bag

Large Bag

Apron, gifted

Maple Leaf Cushion Cover

Two Baskets

Canada 150 wall hanging (I quilted, bound & labelled  it.)
Made for the Veterans Hospital by the Mayflower Quilters' Guild
Five Canadian Flag Cushion Covers, Four gifted

Sew Together Bag # 2, gifted

Wreath Wall Hanging

Candy Mug Rug

Three Santa Ornaments, gifted

Sew Together Bag # 3, gifted

Sew Together Bag # 4, gifted

Sixteen felt Llama Christmas Gift Tags / Ornaments, gifted

Irish Plaid Quilt, gifted

Lupine Wall Hanging, gifted

Tree Table Runner, gifted

Leaf Table Runner

Some plans for this coming year:

Last year I participated in the Fat quarter Shop 2017 Patchwork Quilt Along to benefit Make-A-Wish and kept up to date with all the blocks which just ended in December. Now I just need to put that quilt together:

I will keep working away on Bonnie Hunter's Quiltville Mystery Quilt "on Ringo Lake" as well as the her 2017 Leader & Ender Challenge (You can see a few of the blocks in the picture of my Sew Together Bag # 1 above.):

I made this quilt top at a workshop in September and need to decide if I want to add some of the extra blocks to make it rectangular or just quilt it as is:

This year I plan to quilt along with a group on a Dear Jane quilt. We are meeting next week for the first time so details to follow.

Last year my daughter and I worked on the Storm at Sea quilt shown above for one of her school mates weddings and we will be working on another one this year for another friend.

I will also be working on a Wedding Quilt for my daughter and Son-in-Law to be.  I will have to ask them if they want to see progress reports of it or if they want it to be a surprise.....  If its a surprise you will have to wait until September to see it!

I would like to get a few more comfort quilts made this year.  I do have some in progress, just need to quilt them.

This summer I will get back to work on the Irish Chain Quilt I have been working on at the cottage:

I will also be working on the treadle machine Fish Quilt:

My hand stitching project, La Passacaglia is on the back burner as it was taking me a lot of time to prep the pieces for hand sewing so I never had any ready when I needed them.  I will revisit this project and see if I can change my process.

I also have a few UFO's that will all get finished when they are needed and of course every day I see tons of new things I want to make which is what keeps it so interesting!

Looking forward to another year in the sewing room!