Where do I start?

With bins and bins of scraps, where do I start? The more I thought about it I came to the conclusion "this is not rocket science". I am not out to do anything revolutionary; I just need to turn these scraps into decent, usable, and hopefully cute quilts. I can see a lot of checkerboard, 4 patch, 9 patch, or 16 patch quilts. Making a lot of blocks and then playing with contrast and color will be the way I plan on approaching this. I just need to start and not get hung up on results.

These leftover bits and scraps were on top of one of the bins so that is where I am starting.

I think I will pair up the white and black strips with this pink and aqua fabric.

I have a lot of small yardage whites, off whites, and grays that will work the other colors.

I also pulled out these squares and strips I had cut from scraps over a year ago. The squares are 4.5", 3.5" and 2.5". The strips are mostly 2.5". Pairing these with white or off white should yield a lot of blocks.

I think this is enough to keep me busy this weekend! LOL!!

I did get another package from Amazon. It is an adapter. It doesn't fit anything I have.

1st and 2nd finish for 2020

My friend and I were still sewing on New Years Day and I finished baby quilt number 9 and 10 so they are my 1st and 2nd finishes for 2020.

The lap sized quilt and one of the baby quilts are already earmarked for someone. My brother will be seeing the fellow at the end of the month so I need to get the labels on these two plus one more quilt that is not in this stack. My brother will be in town next week so I am hoping I can hand the quilts over and not have to mail them.

My goal this year is to try and make a dent in my scrap hoard,

and keep my fabric buying to a minimum. I did have to buy some fabric for the back of the t-shirt quilt I have been commissioned to make. I bought 7 yards of the blue and instead of paying shipping I got 4 yards of the gray.

My spreadsheet shows my stash increased by 202 yards including the 50 yards I ended up from my friend and I used 149.5 yards for the 23 finishes and several lap sized tops I sent to Vicki. I need to try harder this year and reduce my stash.

I ended up with 38 empty spools for the year.

In the last 10 years I have made 173 quilts of all sizes.

2019 finish 21, 22, and 23 and Happy New Year!

I finished these three yesterday. I still have two to bind so I guess those will be my first two finishes for 2020. LOL!!

16th, 17th, 18th, 19, and 20th finishes for 2019

It has been a binding marathon and I am halfway done! Here are pictures of the fronts and backs. The quilts with the smaller squares are 40 1/4" x 47 1/2", the one with the larger squares is 36" x 48 1/4", and the lap quilt is 48" x 59 1/2".

My friend is here today and spending the night for New Years Eve. Look at all those cute bunnies she is machine appliqueing!

My goal is to get the other five baby quilts bound today.

Not what I planned

I had planned to bind at least some of those quilts Saturday and Sunday, but you know how plans can change when opportunity knocks. The opportunity was a friend and her significate other coming over and installing closet doors in one of the bedrooms. The doors have been sitting for about two years so I was excited to finally get them installed. Before I had anyone over I needed to do some cleaning and straightening up. I spent all day Saturday straightening out the fabric storage room, putting stuff away the had piled up in the studio, vacuuming, and generally making the place not so lived in if you know what I mean. LOL!!!

My friends brought lunch and made cookies for desert.

Here is the closet opening

Here are the doors

and now they are installed!

I will have to stain the doors, paint the jambs, and install the trim. With the doors installed I can now finish the baseboard and get this room done!

I am having a sewing friend come up for New Year's Eve so I have to unload all the quilts I have stored on the guest bed. Ugh! More straightening up! I did the grocery shopping this morning so I could feed her and now I plan on spending some time getting binding on at least a few of those quilts.

Let the binding-palooza begin!

I got the lap size quilt quilted so now it is on to the binding for this and the 9 baby quilts.

It is quite a pile!

Before I start binding I have to head outside since it is 59 degrees! I need to wash the car and get out the leaf blower to clean up the backyard. I did spend about 2 1/2 hours cleaning up the garage yesterday and it is looking a lot better.

Another one quilted

I now have baby quilt number 9 quilted!

I decided to put this fun print on the back for a bit of variety instead of using that African print with the bird on it. I still have enough of the bird fabric for a couple more baby quilt backs.

I now only have the lap sized quilt to quilt and I can start binding. I would love to get all 10 bound before the end of the year. I plan on machine stitching the binding. I don't mind machine stitching for baby quilts; I think it makes them more sturdy.

The temperature is going to be 60 today so I plan on spending some time cleaning up the garage. I have stuff that has been accumulating.

I received another box from Amazon. I got another pair of windshield wipers! They are the same size as the last ones and don't fit my car. I will pass them on to someone who can do something with them.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. Mine was good and we all had a good laugh when I discovered one of my son's cats took a walk thru the pumpkin pie I had made. It was wrapped in a heavy terry towel so it was still eatable!