Watery Zoo : Finished quilt

I loved working with all these deeper colors.

I was forced into them a bit when Leigh and I were working on getting 5 quilts done without buying any fabric.  I was getting really low on same-lot whites, so I had to pull out other plans and neutrals to get quilts done.

So glad I did!

The solid pluses are made with hand dyed fabrics from Cherrywood Fabrics.  They have a great depth, and I thought they looked a bit like the sea, hence the Watery part of the Zoo.



I was super happy after laying out that back - one of those where you pull out the bits leftover and add in a couple other pieces to make it all fit together.

This was an attempt to hang a quilt on the wall in the basement to photograph straight on. Not the best lighting! Upstairs the problem is that all my walls are either windows or occupied by furniture. Maybe I just need to clear a room out specifically for quilt photos. The oldest could be off to college in 3.5yrs - maybe that's a good plan for his room. It gets fabulous light all afternoon. Ha!



I actually made friends with sashing on this quilt, if you recall back here.  I did all kinds of stuff I normally don't do with this one - sashing, dark neutral, straight line quilting (still not a fan in-process but love the finished look here).

A fun little quilt. I listed it in my shop.

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i spy......

I have a fun little giveaway planned and want to try out Rafflecopter.

It seems to easy and cute - and they have an adorable little helicopter mascot that needs naming right now. There's a link below to enter to give him a name - a free Kindle Fire if they pick it! Seemed like a fun thing to do this evening.

I have a couple more bits to gather before I do my giveaway. But it goes along with a WHOLE bunch of modern i-spy fabric I've been pulling from my stash.



(HELP Leigh........ I already bought more fabric this month!)

It's Beautiful

I checked the date - it's JANUARY 6.  We are outside with just light jackets.  

We live in Chicago.  Very very strange, but I'll take it.  

Then Becket ran for the camera.  

He took about 40 pictures.  It just kept getting better.

It's beautiful Mom!

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State of the Stash : 2012

The past two years I have been both tracking and trying to use my stash. I feel like I have a lifetime's worth of fabric, but there is always that NEW line that you're sure you NEED.

Tracking both amounts in and amount used for every project has been a fabulous exercise.

In 2010 I added nearly 117 yards, and actually used MORE - at 120 yards. Hurray for me.

Last year I added 107 yards, using about 94 yards - for a balance of 13 xtra yards which will be carried into 2012. I'll chalk that up to last year's Christmas fun at the Fabric Shack when I bought 30 yards. I completed more quilts this year, but a bunch of them were actually started in 2010.

I'm still working on getting them all blogged, as I finished a whole bunch up at once. Leigh and I had a 5-quilt-finished pact that was a HUGE help in both finishing lingering WIPs as well as not buying new fabric.

For 2012, I started it once again with a Christmas outing to The Fabric Shack.  Honestly, it is a must when your in-laws live only 20 minutes from the shop.  But I was much more controlled this year - after two years of tracking everything in and out, you seriously think about every thing In and decided if it is truly needed.

I plan on continuing using my stash.  It's a fabulous feeling when you make a quilt without pushing some buttons or running to the LQS.

One big lesson learned from the quilt exercise with Leigh is that I use way more whites/neutrals than I would guess.  It was challenging to finish fronts and piece backs without going out to buy more white!  I expect that most stash additions this year will be background fabrics.  Anything outside of that will be added mindfully.  I'm really getting a better feel for the kinds of fabrics I search my stash for every time I start a new quilt.

Here's the accounting of the first fabric additions for 2012:

I literally spend hours searching The Fabric Shack for treasures.  My first stop is their scrap cart - and lucky me they had TWO overflowing when I visited the day before Christmas.  Anything on the cart is $3.98/yard - you buy the whole piece.  I pull pretty much every Kona solid I find, and came up with white, blue and pick this year.  The pink and blue pieces on the left really caught my eye, and then I think I squealed a little bit when I found 1.25yd of those letters!  I bought a FQ last year and had been carefully using every last bit of it.

The next place I park myself is at their FQs - any that are already cut are only $1.95 each.  I found five favorites.

There is also a little drawer of fat eighths and I couldn't pass up these.  I think I pulled/returned them three of four times before finally deciding to keep them.

Anybody have a good use for a fat eighth?!   The prints in this line are so awesome together that I think I would like to use them as a group.

Finally, a small group of FQs that I had them cut from yardage.  You should have seen these bolts on the shelf - there is no way you could pass them up!

That's it for a while I hope.  Now off to sew!

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