First – the stash report – Nothing Used, Added 7 yards….  My LQS was having a sale yesterday and I’m surprised I didn’t buy more.  It was buy 2 get 1 free so at about $12/yard on average normally for three yards for $24 that’s $8/yard!  That extra yard… well, that little piece was not on sale.  It had just arrived at the shop.  It was still in plastic and not yet marked for pricing.  That’s the second time I’ve done that!   I’ve been heading over to the Quilt Emporium almost every weekend these last few weeks for one thing or another and then buying a whole lot of yardage.  First, it was my birthday weekend.  Then I needed to get a constant yellow for Bonnie Hunter’s Grand Illusions!  And yesterday – I really need place mats and a table runner.  I’d already gone through my stash and I wanted something Fall’ish or Christmassy.  I didn’t have anything like that in my stash.  Those are not colors I generally fall in love with and just HAVE to buy.  I was originally just going to the big box store who’s name starts with J but when I got the email that there was a sale I just had to check it out.  I spent more than I would have but I’m supporting my local shop, I was able to help them make room for the fabric they are waiting to come in (hence the sale), AND whatever extra fabric that I have after my project is done, will be OKAY to put in a quilt!

I was supposed to work on the November clue of Tell It To The Stars and I did a little.  I’m having trouble with getting my points to meet up and I was really frustrated.  I cut a bit and I have a bunch of parts put together but only 2 that are done and I don’t like either of them.  I’m hoping my points improve in time so I can hide the two imperfect ones amongst the better blocks but I needed to put it away yesterday.

Tell It To The Stars
1 block from the November Clue
11/2/14

I have to make 32 of these and I’m not enjoying it at all.  So after getting frustrated and finally allowing myself to work on the project I really wanted to work on, I made this placemat…

New placemats
11/2/14

It’s not too Christmas-y or too fall so if I don’t make another set of place mats to replace these next season, they will still work.  I didn’t follow a pattern but I wanted something easy otherwise it wouldn’t get done.  I looked around Pinterest, the Internet, and the books and magazines I have and while I found a ton of beautiful samples that I loved, they all seemed to take more time than I wanted to put in these.  I want them done by next weekend if not today.  Originally I was going to do 4 patches but I like the look of the brown lines in there so ended up doing it this way.  Yesterday, I was able to get 2 placemats to the flimsy stage.  I started chain piecing the remaining 4 since I figured out the process.  I’ll have to jot down how I did it in case I ever want to do it again – or if anyone else wants to.  The table runner is still an idea running in my head… It’s going to incorporate some of these squares but will not take up the whole runner.  After I’m done with the 6 placemats I’m going to see what fabric I’ve got left and that will decide how the table runner will be.  That’s why I bought so much fabric.  The very nice lady who was helping me at the shop was doing the math so I’d know how much fabric I would need but after a few minutes I told her that 2 yards of each should be plenty and if it isn’t – I can always come back for more. 🙂  The only way I imagine it would not be enough is if I decided that I wanted a particular look and ran out of 1 of the fabrics for they pattern I end up using.  Anyway, I plan on getting the rest of the mats to the flimsy stage, and then do the table runner.  Once that’s done, I’ll figure out how the backing will be.  If I have enough I may do a different design on the other side and make it more of that red so it will be more Christmas-y.  That way I can just flip the mats over when I get tired of one side.  That’s the plan… I really want to get this done by next weekend so we can have placemats again.  I do not know what happened to our placemats from our old place but we haven’t seen them.  We’ve unpacked everything in the house and but there is still the garage.  I really need to tackle that one day but today’s not the day.

Used this week: 0 yards
Used year to Date: 21.5 yards
Added this week: 7 yards
Added Year to Date: 100.4 yards
Net Added for 2014: 78.9 yards

see more stash reports at  

~gone quilting!

Melanie