Great Granny Squared and Done!

Sixty-four squares later, I have a quilt top! The 6" blocks were done in just a couple of days, and before adding the borders, I settled on an arrangement for the blocks and pieced them together.

Not too shabby, eh? Or IS it shabby...intentionally?! :) It's 48" square at this point.

I waffled between half a dozen border ideas before settling on flying geese, using the mango solid as the background. I wanted to get these flying geese done quickly, with little waste and still be scrappy, so I consulted my handy dandy All-In-One Quilter's Rererence Tool for the cutting sizes to do four flying geese at once. As much as I like the snowballing method of making them, this is a more efficient method for making a large stack of them. I spent an evening cutting, sewing and piecing them and used 24 different prints for the wings.

I love all the color! The part I tend to get the fussiest and most obsessive about is sewing the blocks together, because I don't want too much of the same color near each other. And if I somehow allowed the same prints to butt against each other? Lord, help me.

I'm not exaggerating when I say it took me an hour to settle on the above configuration before sewing them together. Ay yi yi. What a nut.

And there's the completed top! I'll quilt this one myself on my sewing machine. I've yet to use the Janome for quilting, so I'm excited to give it a go.

I also got a start on another new project, more on this one next time...

When Does Stash-Building Become Hoarding?

I have a thing with fabric. A big thing. While I wouldn't say that it's completely out of control (yet), I do have much more fabric than I can use anytime in the near future. It is not uncommon amongst quilters and sewers, but that's not excuse. I need to scale it back some, but that proves exceptionally difficult when there is always new fabric hitting the market. Apparently, I relish the opportunity to go, "Oh, for cute!" and then hit the ADD TO CART button, because it happens all too often.

Take for instance this morning. I was happily avoiding work and my web browser accidentally went to The Fat Quarter Shop (I just hate when that accidentally happens!). That's when I saw these...

They spoke to me, and then I did some speaking to my wallet. We had a disagreement, but I won. It's too easy to make purchases like that online, so I try not to make a habit out of it. A few weeks ago, I made a trip to S.R. Harris, a great fabric outlet that sells all their quilting cottons at 50% off retail, and midway through the trip my cart was already starting to fill up.

There were sixteen bolts in there when I took this photograph. By the time I made it to the cutting table, there were twenty-five! The most ridiculous part of that trip? Most of those fabrics on the right are from a great Riley Blake collection called Happy Harvest. It is a collection I already own, as a fat quarter bundle and some additional yardage. "Why then were they in your cart?" you might ask. Because I was afraid I would run out...before I even used them! And because issues. Madness. Luckily, I came to my senses and left with only 7 pieces of fabric.

I do take some amount of comfort in knowing that I'm not alone in this affliction. About a year ago, a well-written and researched article was making the rounds in quilting circles, Quiltanomics: The Real Cost of Quilts. There was a ton of good information in it, but the number that blew my mind was this one:

[Quilters'] buying power each year is $3.76 billion – with “dedicated quilters” spending over $3,200. What I found jaw-dropping was the statistic that dedicated quilters typically own $13,000 in tools and supplies, and their fabric stash is worth close to $6,000.

SIX. THOUSAND.DOLLARS. That's just fabric! That doesn't include the sewing machine, the tools, the furniture or the time (one of the biggest expenses). I keep that number in the back of my mind to make me feel like I'm in control. Some call that denial; I call it...well, that's probably what I would call it, too.

It's time for me to put a moratorium on fabric purchases. I'll take a few months off and give my finances a big break. Except for maybe a bundle of Halloween fabric. And maybe Lori Holt's Cozy Christmas bundle when it's released next month. Oh, and I need a few solids, too. Dammit!

Know who's sensible? Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts. Give her blog a visit, would you?