{Post 1,712} Stay-At-Home

Have any of you done something new or different from your normal routine? I have not been going to my booth once a week or getting allergy shots once a week. I definitely don’t go to the store at every whim. We have not gone to meet with our church in over two weeks. Something I have STARTED is making a to-do list for the next day. I make this right before I go to bed. It gets things off my mind, and I can prioritize my list for the day in the AM. I find that I need to do the thing I want to do least first. For example, I rarely put all the laundry away the day it is done. It is either hung up or folded, but it’s not at its final destination. I have one laundry day a week so that I don’t have to spend lots of time with it on my mind every day. So that is often the first thing I do when it’s on the list.

Since the stay-at-home thing has started, I have spent several evenings cooking or baking to distribute to friends the next day. Our church family is quite spread out, but there are several areas that contain most. I made large batches of chili, beef vegetable soup, and cookies. Dollar Tree has round containers that are perfect for transporting and storing soup. I bought some paper products and crackers to include in each box. That was fun and fulfilling.

I need to get more exercise in. That will take some planning and rearranging of things. Every day I think about how important it is, but I don’t do much about it.

Above is my string shirt block quilt. It is on the design walls in our guest bedroom downstairs. I added a few more sashing units today. I only need 16 more. I will probably get them made either tonight or tomorrow AM. Then I will get the quilt blocks off the wall and in a pile for webbing. 

I should knock out a few of the quilts I have that only need machine quilting. I have two customer quilts to do, then some of my own. If only my wishes came true as soon as I wished them.

{Post 1,711} I Can See My Cutting Tabletop

This is the cleanest my cutting table has been for simply ages. Here is the before and after.

All that is on it is a small, beautiful Christmas wreath quilt. All it needs is binding, and that’s what the red bolt of fabric is for.

Then I got set to clear off the floor beside the cutting table (that nearly prevented me from getting TO the cutting table). This pile is completely gone, but I did not take a picture.

I found numerous projects, most near completion. At least now I have some hand-quilting projects to choose from should I get the whim. These were all in the pile closest to my cutting table (green curtains underneath).

This just needs the basting stitches removed and a pillow back sewn on.

This was a sampler from Kim Diehl. I have two of the smallest blocks to hand-quilt and the binding put on.

This is a 20” pillow cover that just needs a back (it has a twin somewhere, but it hasn’t turned up yet).

These two pillow covers are finished. All they need is pillow forms inside.

This only needs hand quilting on the bottom right side of the cream and a backing put on. It is a pillow. The design in the white pumpkin area is called Pumpkin Seeds. I. Love. It. It was just spritzed with water to remove the Mark-B-Gone to show where to hand quilt.

I also found a pumpkin quilt that has the rows sewn together. I just need to sew the five rows to each other to complete the top.

In spite of getting so much done today, I feel like I slacked off most of the day. At the bottom of the blue laundry basket that held all these mostly-finished projects were five shirts to be deboned. My scrap string shirt bin was full (it is not very big anyway), so I pieced the color portion of 16 blocks for a Bonnie Hunter’s Virginia Bound quilt. It’s paper pieced. I thought it would diminish my shirt string scraps, but I can’t tell I used any. I need 80 for the quilt. I found 16 foundations while I cleaned up today. The sides get covered with neutral strings. This is the only quilt I have made more than once. I have completed two of them so far. Now I’m starting my third. I like it so much because all width of strings can be used.

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