Between last night and today I got two triangles and 3 blocks quilted on “Insanity”! And I even got back to 
work on “Insanity Revisited” it had been about 6 weeks since I had touched it. All in all a productive day.
On the left are the triangles on Row J, and the photo on the right are blocks 2 & 1 (left to right) for Row J.
On the lower left is block #3 of Row J.
And the pretty red and white block is from “Insanity Revisited” and that is from Row G # 11.
Just click on the photo’s to enlarge.
Other than going to the fitness center earlier today it has been a bit of a lazy day for me. I think I am in a lazy mood after all the work last week and a little from the week before on the painting ect. It kind of tired me out and I had a bit of trouble with my shoulders and neck from all the painting! I have had to rest them out and do some stretching with them. It is feeling much better today. That painting can really get to you when you aren’t use to it.
The top is finished!! and it only took me since February to make it – 180 hours total. Not bad considering I worked on other projects at the same time. It isn’t hanging really well here where I took the photo, but I couldn’t get it to hang any better. I have a curtain rod that I keep hung up above the closet doors on the end of the sewing room and then put it to that but 
then I can’t get a straight shot without one end of the quilting frame in the way. Then when I was cropping the photo a little I noticed that the pull cord knob of the ceiling fan is dangling in the way. The next photo will be when I am working on it after it goes on the quilting frame. Hopefully that will be by the end of October so I can get it quilted in time for Christmas.
It sure was nice working in a nice clean reorganized room today. I was so busy though finishing up the 4th border and then sewing the borders on to the quilt that I didn’t work on anything else. I do plan to work on Dear Jane “Insanity” tonight when I get done with this.
I managed to get this basket full of items for future give away’s – books, rulers, patterns, notions, etc. I never realized how many duplicates I have of different items. Next giveaway will be when we return from our vacation, not enough time to concentrate on it right now. I will most likely have a give away every other month for a little while to get rid of these things! Even though I don’t want them I’m sure there are others who would like them. (the basket is not part of the give away, I have had that one for awhile and will keep it 
)
Thanks for all the comments on my sewing room I had so many e mails and comments of how nice you all thought it looked. Now I must get busy with “Insanity” – talk to you all later!
I had been pretty much at work all day finishing up the painting in the quilting/computer room. Finally at about 6 this evening (Mike is working late so I didn’t cook) I started to move things back into the room and try to organize! There are 
still a bit of things on the kitchen table waiting for me to go through. I did get “Insanity” back on the quilting frame – just finished doing that a little while ago.
Here is what it is looking like right now. This is the side that has my cutting table and the sew ezi table for my machine. I put my seven boxes of scrap fabric up high and the wire containers of fat quarters or less are now on the single shelf up high. I use to have bolts and folded fabric up there but when I would get things down they tended to fall. I think the wire containers will go up and down easier. As you can 
see the room isn’t changed that much other than the fact that the paint is fresh and my ceiling isn’t sagging!
This is the side for the quilting frame. I have made use of the under quilt area for book shelf and a basket of batting. Also my small hoops are under there also. My 
sewing machine travel case on wheels is under it also. Small room! I have to make use of every inch. The shelf above the quilting frame is holding the bolts of fabric and folded pieces. The bottom shelf has the bolt of fabric and colors that I got when we were in Pennsylvania for the “Little Brown Bird” yes I still intend to make it – when – I’m not sure, but I am collecting up the fabric needed to make it. The shelves still have room for me to put more things on them. I have photos in frames that I need to decide where to put and which ones, I had too many and some of them will go in the photo albums.
And here is Dear Jane “Insanity” back on the quilting frame. I have not worked on it for 11 days and really need to get 
back to work! I was moving along really well there for awhile and need to do a little before we leave for our three week trip to Colorado.
I am sometimes amazed at how poorly things are made now. I got this iron about 2 years ago – maybe? it might be more like one year. I was folding up the cord preparing to put it back on the shelf and the plug in fell off! Mike says he can fix it so it is set aside for him to do so.
I am going to try to keep the room organized and even though I still have some things to put away and the two drawers to clean out I think I will actually have more room than I had!
I’m glad everyone has enjoyed looking at the links to the free patterns that I posted for the last two days. I can’t take the credit for finding them. The list volunteer from the “quiltersbee” yahoo mailing group finds things all the time. I have been on this yahoo group for about 8 years or more! It is an on-line quilting group and Diana finds information constantly that she lets everyone know about.
More links to free patterns:
Makower UK LTD – I had not heard of this one. These are whole quilts not BOM’s.
Andover Fabrics: Quilt Designs
RJR Fabrics. I had heard of this one and looked at it before.
Angies’s Bits ‘n Pieces – BOM’s
Fraser Valley quilters Guild BOM’s
Jinny Beyer Studio – I have gone to her site many times to look around. Don’t you just love that fancy thimble she sells!
I got some things put away in my sewing room today. I have been going through so many things. I have all my books on the book shelf which I moved to under the quilting frame right up against the wall – it is out of the way and I can sit on the floor to get books. Before I had it in the corner of the room with the sewing table in front of it. It was very hard to get to the books I always had to move the sewing table to get to it. This way I can just sit under the quilting frame and look at books! LOL what can I say – small room. By moving the book case it makes the end of the room with the sewing table in the corner less crowded.
I have a plastic box right now about half full of things I do not use or are duplicates of things — how did that happen? I have one other big plastic box to go through still that has so many odds and ends in it. I really do not want to keep the box in here and I will really need to go through all this stuff and see what is keep-able. I have found that I only drag that box out from under the cutting table about once every 3 or 4 months so really needs to be gone through. I would like to keep some better project boxes under the table instead – one project in each box that I am currently working on. Like one for the second Dear Jane that is a work in progress and one for the simple quilt I am taking along with me in the camper.
So many picture frames with family photos in them. They had taken up almost an entire shelf and lots of wall space. I need to go through them, some I will keep others will get put away — too many! I also have two drawers in the cutting table they are a mess and I don’t know what is in them anymore. They also need to be organized. I will wait to put up photos until I am done — it really won’t look a lot different.
Yes we all like free patterns don’t we. On a quilting mailing list that I am on the “list volunteer” is always putting a lot of links to pages of interest and I thought I would share some of them if you haven’t already found them.
Have any of you made any of Judy Martin’s quilts? I have made at least one that I know of it is called “I Had a Dream“. 
Here is a link to her site that features free patterns for B.O.M.’s and Q.O.M.’s. This photo on the right is the quilt that I made of hers. It is hanging at a small art walk show that was held about 3 years ago. I made it all from scraps!
Another link is a place called Applewood Farms, I might have posted this link last year, it looks familiar but it isn’t one I am interested in making but maybe one of you are?
This is the first time I have seen a link for this one – b.dieges designs. Some look interesting.
I know I have seen a lot of blogs that featured embroidery designs. Some of them are redwork. This site has patterns for that. It is simply called “Free Redwork”.
This next site is called “Harmony Quilts” and it is from Australia. This BOM is 2009 Harmony Village.
And last but not least – most are familiar with “Bunny Hill Designs”. Go to that link to find the free patterns.
The sewing room is coming along nicely. Mike got the trim work up that I had painted during the week. I need to do a little touch up here and there. I will let the shelves dry out a couple more days and then start to load them back up. Tomorrow I hope to get my cutting table moved back in there and will start to hang things back on the walls. I intend to go through items as I move them back into the room putting things aside in a basket that I feel I will not use and have another giveaway one day. Most likely several giveaways! There are so many things to go through.
I have gotten a little more done on the 4th Christmas border and have one long stretch of greenery left to applique. I hope to finish it in a couple days working on it during break times from the sewing room.
Yes the sewing room is still in the stages of “undone”. Progress is slow while Mike is working long hours. He has managed to get a little done here and there in the morning before he goes to work. I think for sure most of the work will be done 
this weekend. I have started with some of the painting – working on the side of the room that he is done with the ceiling on. I have not done anything drastic with the 
paint color. It is a very, very light gray with a medium gray for the trim work. I really think the color of the bright stain glass dragon wall hanging will give it plenty of color. Also there is almost always a quilt on the frame and fabric stacked on the shelves. That gives it a lot of color. If I painted the room a bright cheerful color then all the other color would clash in my opinion — and that is the only one that counts here! LOL
I have not posted much in the line of photo’s since this work started so I thought I would show you my “temporary” 
sewing area – the dining area and one corner of the living room. Just look at all of that stacked up! What a mess. Even with all this mess I am trying to get some work done believe it or not. It has been moving really slowly. Here is the 4th border of the Christmas Baltimore Album - it is about half done and I started it a week ago. The 3rd border only took me a week to do so you can see I am slow on it.
We leave on our trip in about 2 weeks so time is running short that is why I have to try to get the sewing room back in order early next week. I am already trying to figure out what sewing projects to take along with me on our 3 week trip. I have learned from past experience to not to bother to take a lot with me as I just don’t get around to doing a lot of sewing while we are camping because we spend so much time out seeing the sights and hiking in the mountains. I will bring some of my “Insanity Revisited” blocks with me to work on as I haven’t touched it in months. I won’t bring a lot of them though – 
maybe 5 or 6 and I will be lucky if I get them done.
I think I am also going to bring something easy to work on while Mike is driving. I recently got a pattern and black fabric from the Twiddle Tail on-line shop that I mentioned about 2 weeks ago I think. I have my 5 inch squares cut out of all different colors. Next is to cut the black border pieces that go around them to have them ready and the white that goes around them. This easy quilt top is made with 35 – 5″ blocks and white and black borders around them. I will go ahead and hand piece it while we are gone. It should be a fun and easy quilt top to make!
I barely made a dent in scrap fabric when I was searching for the fabric for the 5 inch blocks. You couldn’t even tell I had taken anything out of the scrap boxes. I really have no idea how many scrap quilts can be made out of all of those scraps – I would really like to get rid of some of it so I can start buying more in the kinds I like more of now.
Hand piecing is easy and relaxing and you can take it anywhere with you. You really must try it sometime if you have not. Two different times now I have brought along a log cabin quilt to hand piece while we were traveling and it worked out fine.
I plan on having the Christmas quilt finished before we leave – the top that is! I haven’t bothered to try to quilt any of the “Insanity” quilt with a hoop while it has been off of the big frame – it is just too big and heavy to do with a hoop in the summer time. It can wait until it gets back on the big frame.
not much!! Work continues in the sewing room or should I say not much work – Mike is working this week from about noon to evening so he doesn’t have time to get back in there. I don’t think much will get done this week. I have taken all of the shelves and the trim work outside to the workshop to paint so at least something has gotten done. I hope to be painting the room by the end of the week – keep your fingers crossed for me.
I see that Fat Cat Patterns has a new block of the month going. Have you all seen it? This one is called “Southern Gentlemen” I’m really not sure why it was given that name. It is nice though and I’m going to start saving the patterns for it. It will go into my “maybe one day” file There is another one going on at the same time called “Chocolate Stars”. I’m not going to collect that one though. It is nice but I have so many star patterns that I could put together myself if I want to. I have also been collecting the “Baltimore Bliss” patterns that I mentioned awhile back.
I have no idea when I will start any of these patterns! but they are on my to do one day list. I have been working a little on my applique – the 4th border is progressing in between working on the sewing room and painting but I have not put a lot of work into it this week.
Now I think I better get outside and get another coat of paint on those shelves and trim.
I am not back in my sewing room the work continues! I had a feeling it would take more than the weekend. Being an old house nothing seems to be straight so it isn’t easy as pie to do a fix up. At least there were no surprises under the drywall (sheetrock as I call it). When Mike gets done I believe I will need to re-paint the entire room as walls are getting scratched ect. I kind of thought that might happen 
Today while he has been working in between running to Lowe’s to get this and that in the line of building supplies I have been working on culling out the big stack of quilting magazines that has been taking up too much room. I went through every single magazine and took out the patterns that were really interesting to me and tossed the rest. Some no longer had anything that interested me in them they had sat around so long.
I intend to go through everything piece by piece, pencil by pencil to see if it is something that really needs to go back into that sewing room. I just do not have room for clutter and too much has been gathering up. I do believe I just might have several bags of stuff put aside to be put in a give away for someone else who might really want some of this stuff!
I might need to rethink storing my fabric on the open shelves. It looks pretty but when I was moving things out of the room before Mike started to work I was discovering a bit of dust on the top fabric. I might have to resort to storing fabric in the plastic containers and not have it out being decorative. I will think on it. I like the decorative look so I might have to just start shaking dust off of the top fabric or actually drape a piece of fabric over the very top of a stack to be shook out every now and then to protect them.
No photo’s today sorry – I have been working on my applique but not much this weekend, been too busy. I’m sure I will get back to work this week though while Mike is back to work and just working on the room in his spare time, I hope to get to painting the room soon — keep your fingers crossed!! My house is looking way too crowded right now with all of this stuff in the dining room overflowing into the living room
Last night I managed to finish the 9th row I on “Insanity”. That means there are 4 rows of blocks and 1 row of borders left to do. But it is on hold for the weekend. The photo on the left is block 13 and the photo on the right are the triangles of that row.
I live in an old house which means once in awhile repair work needs to be done and this weekend we are doing some in the sewing room. I moved everything out of my sewing room this week while 
Mike was working – that is everything but the quilting frame – it is too big to move and I have no other place to put it. Of course I do not want the dear quilt to be damaged so I pinned basted very closely all that is left to quilt and took it off of the frame. We are going to be working on the ceiling – the sheet-rock needs to be replaced and then painted. I am hoping it will all be done this weekend but with an old house you never know what you will find under things so when the old sheet-rock comes down what will be under it and what will need to repaired – we will soon find out! LOL
When we are done I will put the quilt back on the frame and maybe work on it this weekend on break times using a hoop – we will see – I might just read a book instead!
Some of you read Judi’s blog “The Green Fairy” and know that she is going to Romania next month to visit an 
orphanage on some kind of mission trip. She is bringing quilts for all of the children. She does not have enough quilts and is asking if anyone has extra children quilts to get in touch with her. You can do that by going to the link in the sentence above. I had several tops that I have not gotten around to quilting yet and had no one in mind to give them to. I contacted her I am sending them to her as she said she will be able to get them quilted in time to include. They went off in the mail to her today. These are the quilt tops I have sent her, you might remember them from when I completed them earlier in the year. I also sent her a wall hanging that I have no use for as my grandchildren have so many quilts and things that they do not need this wallhanging too I thought it might help to brighten up the walls of the orphanage and Judi said to send it too and she would bring it to them. It was made for a challenge from the quilt guild.
I don’t know if she still needs more quilts but as of yesterday she was about 20 short. She is leaving in about 4 weeks I believe. If you want to help out and put a smile on a child’s face get in touch with her – it is a good cause.
Elaine is having another give away, she just had one a short while ago and had fun with it and decided to do another. I’m cleaning out my sewing room and just might come up with some things to have another one myself this fall.
It was actually nice outside yesterday, dark & cloudy which meant the temperatures 
stayed down in the mid 80′s. Much better than the 90′s. I still got some quilting done though off and on yesterday and then this morning as well.
I have six more blocks finished on “Insanity” (Dear Jane) and have Row I (#9) almost finished!! Maybe that row will be finished tomorrow. It depends on how much I get myself doing on it tonight. I normally like sitting outside in the evenings but lately the mosquitoes have driven me. I can only spray so much and when they keep attacking it is time to call it a night and go inside.
The zipper broke on my Omnigrid black tote bag that I normally use for storing the Dear Jane blocks in progress and keep all that is needed to work with it stored inside. I saw these plastic boxes at Joanne’s when I visited the store last week but didn’t need them 
at the time – the zipper was still working at that time a couple days later it broke. I had been having trouble with it for awhile so it wasn’t a surprise. After all I have had the omnigrid bag for four years now and it has traveled a bit and has been overstuffed at times! I could have gotten another to replace the original but I got the two boxes for less then the price of one black bag (on sale). I think with the clear boxes I will be able to grab what I need easier.
I went ahead and ordered two of the boxes and they came today. Two boxes to keep two different projects organized. It should work out ok I think. And, they were on sale! I keep a 12 1/2 inch square ruler and sandpaper board inside to help keep the squares flat while I work on them and have a piece of felt that sticks to the sandpaper board. It all works out really well. I might go ahead and get another sandpaper board set and ruler for the second box as well.
For those who have noticed I do tend to get a lot of work done on the quilts when it is hot outside – I tend to wilt outside in the heat and I do not get much done so better to be inside for part of the day.
