More FMQ

I finished up my First Quilt. I've had no chance to get a photo, yet, but that will follow. Meanwhile, I had another look at my WIP list. I seem to have a disjointed stack of tops, backs, and battings in the box. Battings that fit get scavenged for other projects that come up! I shouldn't do that to myself, but it seems easier than a run across town for new batting, when I have some on hand. So it seems I currently have 2 battings on hand, along with tops and backs to go with them. In keeping with my previously stated goal to get all these tops turned into quilt this year, they are next on the list.

For now, I've pulled out this quilt from deep within the storage boxes. I'd worked on it some years ago, and did not do the sandwich properly, so the back had quite a few puckers. Very frustrating to not know what I was doing at the time! I am now resolved to get this one fixed up and finished. Sometime between then and now, I fixed all of that puckering, so I can proceed with the quilting.

It's funny, I had started quilting this with echo quilting and stippling. Having a little more experience now in Free Motion Quilting, stippling doesn't much interest me. At that time, it was all I knew how to do! There are so many other possibilities now, but I will finish what I started, with lesson learned. It's going well. I had forgotten how much I liked these red applique hearts. Makes me want to start another applique project. . . Maybe.

Linking up with WIP Wednesday over at TNTN as usual, here, Off the Wall Friday, here, Anything Goes, here, and FMQ Friday, here.

Rose Progress

I finished doing all the random heart FMQ on the unnamed red and denim quilt, which is now ready for binding. I want to put in a hanging sleeve before the binding goes on, which is not ready, so it will wait for a bit before it it finished.

In the meantime, I have been adding a few stitches to my October Rose piece that I wrote about here. You may be able to see the difference. I have a lot of pink threads now to use, and they have made a difference. I am aiming for a bit more contrast than the original photo has, so the rose shows better from a little distance.

I only have a little bit left of the petals to stitch. There are a few more leaves and stems to stitch, too, but for some reason they seem to go in much easier than the petals. I've decided to put it up on the wall to look at it for a bit to determine what it needs next, but now I'm looking at this photo of it on my computer screen and I can already find places to add a few more lines. Sometimes the hard part is to know when to stop!

While it waits, I have other projects to do. Have you figured out, yet, that I don't work on something from start to finish? I always have a number of irons in the fire.

I'm linking up again with the Needle and Thread Network, here.

Still Sandwiching

I'm still heavily involved in my stack of quilt tops, which I recently wrote about here. I've been preparing backs and bindings, and setting up quilt sandwiches. Not very glamorous, I know, but these jobs need to be done if I'm to finish up any of these tops. It becomes mind-boggling when I start using other orphan blocks for the backs, and end up with a stunning backing and want to use it instead for another quilt top! Decisions, decisions. I've not progressed to the quilting part of them, but hope to get on with that soon.

And I've realized that my love for piecing quilt tops is drawing me away from these tasks. See the pile of quilt blocks in the photo. I cut these out a while ago, and want to put them together into yet another quilt top instead of making quilt sandwiches.And there is a pretty rose quilt that I printed out that wants to be thread-painted as well. There just aren't enough hours in the day.

I'm linking up this up with WIP Wednesday on the Needle and Thread Network, here. Have fun checking out some of the other bloggers.