It has been awhile since my last post, but you already know this. I am just trying to get my thoughts and projects together for this year. I have a lot of UFOs to finish (who doesn’t) and things friends have ask me to make or do. You have already made your list of things to finish (not into lists), or already hopping along with Blog Hops, or already started that new quilt.
My goal for the year is to grab whatever I have not quilted and send it out to be quilted. OH YAH, I don’t have any money for that. I might have a few bucks that I might be able to get a least two quilts done. The rest I might have to go with stitch-n-the-ditch or I think I can do some echo stitching (that's not to hard).
I love making tops, put the quilting is beyond my expert
ices, so I will be following Leah Day on her Building Blocks Lessons on quilting. This will give me some things to work on while I am finish up those UFOs.
Now, I must confess, I DO NOT WASH MY FABRICS. Is that the fabrics police at the door? I know, I know, that you should wash your fabric, but it’s so hard to wash 2 or 3 yards of fabric and then have to iron it. Should I cut it into segments and loose some of it? What do you do?
You have this long piece of fabric that you have to starch until it is stiff again before you can cut it. Then fold it for cutting, oh the pain of it all, my arms are not long enough to get those edges straight.
I might complain about this most scared of duties, put I did it anyway today. I washed 10 yards of fabric (four 2” pieces and iron (not press) them to a good stiff, cutting ready fabric, all while watching t.v. and cooking dinner. While the fabric was washing, I took the time to cut up my 10” squares of batting and some fabric I had wash about 2 years ago (could have been longer) that I will be using for backing, a really scrappy backing of different fabrics. I do not plan to use my good KONA or HUFFMAN fabrics for this project. I ran over to Walmarks to pick up some passable cotton fabric for the top. I wanted to use black and red, but I only found black and blue. It will work, since it is the colors Leah is using. Hopefully tomorrow, if I do not have to go to work, I can start on the first block.
Yah!! We got snow today, about 3 1/2” so far looking at about 7” at the most, temperature dropping to around 24 degrees . So they closed the government with teleworking as a option.
I was already off for today, put looking forward to not having to work tomorrow, but will telework from home. I know this is not much snow for some of you who live in the snow belt, but it is a lot for us here (D.C., Maryland and VA).
Well, I guess I better get back to ironing the other 6 years of fabric, so I will be ready to cut tomorrow. Keep warm, keep quilting and have fun.
The Slow Quilter (Felicia)
I dont pre-wash unless the fabric has a funny odor or feels gritty (usually something that has been donated). The finished quilt get a wash/dry when finished. You will learn a lot from leah and will help you to feel confident in doing some of your own quilting. Enjoy your snow day
ReplyDeleteI prewash my reds, learned a really good lesson about that. If a piece is really stiff I know it's probably full of sizing, so it gets a wash. I'm still a bed, reading this on my Kindle; got more puter stuff to figure out, maybe I can even do a blog post today!
ReplyDeleteI don't wash my fabrics before cutting them. I think it is a lot of work for nothing. Besides, I like the way the fabric feels before washing it. And I think it looks a lot better to wash it after your project is finished. If I am worried about the colors running, then I use a color catcher sheet in the washer
ReplyDeleteI would love to have some of that snow. I live in Georgia and all we have had is COLD weather-Rain, wind and cold-great sewing weather!