2003-2004 Girl Gang Feathered Star

This quilt is one of my two oldest UFO's. It was the new Girl Gang project when I first joined the Girl Gang group is fall 2003. The group met at Cottons in Battle Ground, WA - a wonderful shop that was featured as one of the top 10 shops in Quilt Sampler magazine early on. As long as I attended meetings I kept up nicely - finishing the blocks for each month. I even put the year I expected to finish in the center block, figuring that would give me a year to quilt it after the last block was done.

Shortly after I started the Carolina Lily blocks Cottons suddenly announced they were closing in a couple weeks. Once the shop was gone the Girl Gang group that met there disintegrated, and I was no longer motivated to proceed. We did receive the rest of the patterns, but without the incentive of showing the finished blocks every month I moved on to something else.

Skip forward to November of last year. With only three long-term projects (formerly UFO's) remaining in the unfinished top stage - all applique projects - I decided to work on them all BOM style this year, as I explained in this post. I spent some of December prepping the blocks (all of which I finished during the "plague".) After I finished the two Carolina Lily blocks I figured I'd prep the other four blocks soon, so would need to put the quilt onto my design wall to help in choosing fabrics.

A couple days ago I spent some time putting everything up on the wall. I cut a bunch of setting triangles so I could arrange everything in the final set up. Sure looks different this way - much farther along than it looked with just the blocks hanging on a skirt hanger in the closet. When I stood back and looked I knew I'd have to get the rest of the blocks finished quickly - I was eager to turn it into a finished top. (Of course, I didn't discover that the lily block on the right is turned around the wrong way until AFTER I took the picture!)

I looked at it again yesterday afternoon as I was sitting appliqueing. I've decided I don't like the fabrics I chose for the setting triangles. So I have a new batch picked out - quite different from these - and tomorrow I'll cut new triangles to see if I like it better. I'll probably start prepping the remaining blocks - two eagles and two flower bouquets.

The quilt has a zigzag border on top and bottom outside the setting triangles to turn it into a rectangle, then four large appliqued borders to finish it off. Hopefully I'll be able to show you steady progress on this top the next few months. I'd love to have the top finished end of summer if not the beginning.

Appliqueing I will go

It's truly amazing how much applique one can finish when one does nothing else all day for several days. Just so you have an idea how much time I'm talking about - during the week when the virus was the worst I listened to unabridged versions of Pillars of the Earth and Shadow of the Wind, plus a Nevada Barr mystery thrown in between the two epics, appliqueing the entire time - almost 70 hours total.

First I tackled the third block of Times Remembered, which I prepped at the end of last December. The pieces were large, so it didn't take that long to finish it. Now three blocks are done, with six more to prep and finish.

Next I got out the two Carolina Lily blocks for Jan Patek's Feathered Star - Girl Gang 2003-2004. Those took a little longer since there were two of them.

My fourth applique block was the last block I had prepped from my Mid-Century Album class. I really loved how it turned out. This is another that I prepped at the end of last year. It was so much fun choosing the fabrics for this one. Now I need to prep a bunch more blocks so progress on this quilt can continue.

Lastly I pulled out the borders for Heirloom Stitches and started working on them again. I finished one border and now have the second border almost completed. When I finish it I'll sew those two onto the quilt top and take a picture to post. I'm sure most all of you have forgotten what this quilt looks like. I'm determined to finish the last two borders this month also so I'll have a finished quilt top by the end of the month.

Before I started the applique marathon I did finish the piecing I'd been doing before I got sick. I finished nine more blocks for the Hourglass Quilt - for a total of 13 blocks. Then I tucked that project away again, as I didn't have the energy to piece.

All this applique has really gotten me into the mood for hand stitching again - the virus effectively ended my desire to piece for the time being. Since my oldest WISP's are applique projects I guess that's a good thing!

A change in direction

I was going to prep the first block for Celebration of American Life after I finished posting last night. I spread out the background squares that I cut several years ago - right after the book came out - and realized I just didn't like them anymore. In fact, I didn't like the entire color scheme I was going to use any more. All the background fabrics were old fabrics - one a blue stripe from the 1980's! It was similar to the twill Barb Adams used in her quilt in the book - the quilt I really liked when the book came out. I didn't realize my tastes have changed so much. I'll still make the quilt - eventually - just not the way I originally planned. The nice thing is I can make a great quilt back by sewing together the 12 background squares I cut out.

So - I should do the smart thing and have only 3 BOM's going at once. But in for a penny, in for a pound - I'll just start working on the Civil War sampler from my current Eileen Trestain class. I've really been wanting to start this quilt, and the applique will be easy and quick.

Block of the Month Projects - Patti Style

The more I thought about treating my long term appliqué projects as block of the month programs the more I liked the idea. It gives me good, doable monthly goals, resulting in the steady forward progress of multiple projects. I decided to prep only one or two blocks at a time - after all - when one is getting a BOM in the mail one receives only one or two blocks each month.

To the left you see the next 16" block for the mid-century album quilt. As there are two sizes of blocks in this quilt I'm going to shoot for one of each size each month. Tomorrow I'll prep an 8" block to go along with this one. This one isn't finished being prepped - there are still a few leaves and 17 grapes to go - however stitching of fruits below those need to be completed before they can be added. If you'd like to see the other blocks in this quilt, click here.

I've already prepped two identical blocks for the 2003-2004 Girl Gang quilt - they can be seen here. The next block for Times Remembered is in the previous post. I've decided that I will also prep a block for Celebration of American Life. The backgrounds for those blocks have been prepared for several years, so I decided it's time to really get started on that project.

I've listed these four Block of the Month Projects - Patti Style on my blog sidebar. I'm hoping I'm not taking on too much - I figure that's one BOM to focus on each week of the month. I'm calling the blocks I'm prepping now "December blocks", so I'm getting a head start. Hopefully that will leave me time for other quilty things - playing with scraps, quilting at least one of my own tops per month, and progressing forward on my other long term projects. I guess time will tell. I've decided the only yearly goal I'm going to set is the stashbusting goal - the rest will be monthly goals. Lots more to cross off that way - resulting in lots of satisfaction - and a clean slate at the beginning of each new month.

How does that sound? Anybody else like this idea? Do you think it will work? I sure hope so!

Now I need to head to bed. Another Joseph day tomorrow - a nasty bug sure has bitten his other grandparents, aunt and cousin so he's staying away until they are all well. That's OK - I have so much fun watching him!