Quilt #34 - Three B's

This quilt has been finished for a while, but I finally got around to washing it and taking some finished pictures of it.  I've done quite a few posts over the past year on this quilt and if you do a search with the key word "Bento Box", you'll find all the posts.

This quilt was used entirely with 2.5" strips.  The non-white portions of the quilt came from one jelly roll pack of batik fabric strips.  The rest of the white background was pieces from my stash.

I used a slightly different batting this time around.  Its Quilter's Dream Cotton batting in their supreme loft variety.  Its a very thick cotton batting at 3/16 of an inch thick.  Once it was washed, it gives the quilting a lot of texture due to the thickness of the batting.

I used Superior Threads bottom line in the bobbin and King Tut for the top thread.  The top thread is a variegated green, but its a very slight variegated color, so its difficult to see unless you're in person.

I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with this quilt yet.  It was one of those things where I wanted to try out the Bento Box pattern and this seemed like a good time to try it. :c)  I'm sure I'll find a home for it somewhere.

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Stashbusting 2013 - Week 43

I've been pretty busy lately so I haven't posted for Stashbusting in a few weeks.  However, I did get a quilt finished up on my quilting frame, so its time to count the backing as busted!  :-)

Here's the quilting all finished up on Three-B's (batik bento box):




Close-up of one of the blocks:


So here are my stash numbers:

Added This Week:       0 yards
Added Year to Date:    47.65 yards
Used This Week:          5.05 yards
Used Year to Date:       21.48 yards
Net Year to Date:         26.17 yards

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Bento Box Progress

The other weekend I loaded my Bento Box quilt top onto my quilting frame and started stitching on it.  I don't recall the name of this pantograph, but its got a nice flowing design to it.


I'm using Superior Threads King Tut in Grotto Green in the top and a matching light green from the Bottom Line thread line.  They are quilting up beautifully and they play so nicely together!  :-)



The backing fabric is a single piece (extra wide) batik backing.  Its a green color similar to the dark green shades in the strips I used in piecing the quilt top.


I can't wait to get this quilt top done.  Its going to be very soft and snuggly and look great! :-)  The batting I'm using is Quilter's Dream Cotton.  Its in the thickest variety (Supreme).  It is beautifully soft and I can't wait to see what it looks and feels like after the quilting is completed and its washed.


Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Stash Busting 2013 - Week 38

Progress has been made!!  :-)

The last week or two I've been slowly making progress on some Winding Ways blocks.  Here's where I was 2 weeks ago:



And now...  All 12 blocks are made.  Nine will stay as a small wall-hanging type quilt.  The other three (at the top) are destined to become a table runner.


From just those blocks, I was able to use just over 1.5 yards of fabric.

The downside over the past two weeks....I bought fabric... and lots of it.  To my defense, Connecting Threads had a sale and I had a gift certificate to the store AND I bought fabric for the next large wall hanging (a mariner's compass style quilt).  I also bought backing material for my Bento Box quilt top that is waiting to be quilted.

Here's the connecting threads fabric (pre-washing):


Here's the backing fabric...and a cameo by the kitty. :-)


And here's the fabric for the Mariner's compass quilt.  Its a lot of paper-piecing so I bought more than I needed, but what's a little stash building here and there. ;-)


I also spent some time yesterday organizing my fabric and bookshelf.  Looks nice and pretty all organized...I wonder how long it will stay that way.


So here are my stash numbers:

Added This Week:       41.80 yards
Added Year to Date:    47.65 yards
Used This Week:          1.59 yards
Used Year to Date:       16.44 yards
Net Year to Date:         31.22 yards

I'm definitely back in the red now with the backing and extra fabrics that I bought.  I doubt I'll hit neutral again by the end of the year, but maybe I will get lucky.

Go on over to Judy's blog to see how others are doing.

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Lone Star Progress and Other Things

Its been a little while since I posted on here.  My new position at work has been keeping me pretty busy.  I'm generally at work by 6:45 or 7am and I'm not leaving work until 5:30 or 6pm.  Its been some pretty long days lately, but I'm getting the hang of things a bit more and don't feel quite so overwhelmed by everything.

I have been able to squeeze in an hour or two here and there for quilting, which has been good.  My progress has been slower, but I'm still getting that relaxing time, so its all good.  :-)

I was able to finish up the Bento Box quilt top.  This isn't a great picture of the top...I'll get some more when I start to quilt it.




I've also made some good progress on the Lone Star.  Here is one of the setting triangles completely quilted.  I did a lot of dense filler around the star motif and to highlight the squares outlining it.




In the picture above, you can see the quilting I did in the blue border.  After it was finished, I wished I had done something a little differently as it doesn't really stand out at all.  I am not picking out all that stitching though, so its going to stay as it is.

And here are some close-ups of the corner squares.  It takes me about 2-2.5 hours to do each square due to the amount of dense quilting.  Its not very thought intensive at this point, but just takes a while to fill in everything.




These off-angle shots show the detail a bit more....





The final quilt is going to be very pretty and I can't wait to get it hung up on the wall.  This is a 67 x 67 quilt and will be hung in our 2-story foyer.  Soon I'll have to start planning to put on the opposite wall in the foyer. :-)


Hope everyone is enjoying the nice weather.  Here in upstate NY its finally sunny (and no rain) and its supposed to be 85F today.  Its nice to have that sun out after having a month of almost constant rain.


Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Progress!

I have made some progress on the quilting front, but I just haven't shared anything in a while.  Here's my Bento Box top all complete.  I haven't quilted it yet... its in the line of quilts waiting to be quilted.


Here's a closer picture of one corner.  I like how the stones in the border set off the boxes in the middle.


Our garden has also been taking off lately.  Here's some of our poppies:


More poppies and our clematis on the lattice work is really starting to grown and climb.


These haven't flowered yet, but they're definitely getting bigger.


I absolutely love this Columbine plant.  The flowers look so delicate!  They're a nice reddish color, too.


And a view all the way down the sidewalk showing the various different poppies.


We have a nice pink flower, too.  I love the pinks.  They're a very deep pink when they first bloom.




I have some more pictures of the garden to show that are a bit newer.  We also had a very heavy storm come through earlier this week that resulted in flash flood warnings and tornado warnings.  We actually had a EF2 tornado on the ground for 17 miles on Tuesday night.  There was some damage, but not as much property damage as one would have expected given that we don't normally get tornadoes in this area.



Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Stashbusting 2013 - Week 18

Wow!  Two weeks in a row that I'm posting for stashbusting... maybe I can keep it up. ;-)

I used a bit more fabric this week for my Bento Box quilt.  I had to cut some more pieces to make the pieced border, and I cut strips of fabric for 4" borders around the entire quilt.



The borders are ready to go on, but today will be spent outside again with the garden and taking care of the property (along with laundry and grocery shopping and paying bills).

Yesterday, I planted 24 new perennials to replace ones that died over the winter and also 4 more broccoli plants.  This is the first year that we're trying to grow some veggies, so we're starting with tomatoes and broccoli.  Next year we'll try some beans and possibly corn, too.


Here are my numbers so far this year:
Added This Week:       0.00 yards
Added Year to Date:    5.86 yards
Used This Week:          0.88 yards
Used Year to Date:       4.89 yards
Net Year to Date:         -0.97 yards

I'm just one yard in the hole and I know I'll be able to bust that out soon.  I will have one quilt ready for quilting and the Bento Box quilt will be ready soon, so that will be some good yardage busted once I get those complete.

Go on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.


Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Guess What???

The text above the chicken says "Chicken Butt".

Yes - that was the lovely card my sister sent me for my birthday.  :-)  We got a good laugh out of it.  I actually had to check the back of the card to see if it was one she had special made or if it was something she found.  Believe it or not... it was a card that she found at a store! 

The "chicken butt" joke is one that has been running around the family for at least 10-15 years now.  I may have to recycle this card and give it to another sibling.

On the quilty front, here's my Bento box quilt with the pieced border sewn onto one side.  Its pinned onto the other long side, but I haven't had a chance to sew it on yet.  Hopefully that will happen tonight.


I'm slowly making progress on my quilts.  One would think that by sewing with a machine I'd get the tops done faster!  Too bad life tends to get in the way. ;-)

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Stashbusting 2013 - Week 17

Wow!  I can't believe its been so long since I last posted for Stashbusting this year.  I looked back and the last time I reported anything was back on week 8.  Yikes!

I've been doing a fair amount of quilting, but not using a whole lot of stash.  I've been working on some custom quilting for myself, which has been taking a long time to do.



I did get some quilting done this past week that used up some stash.  This quilt top is mostly together.  I have two side of the first set of borders on now and I've cut/sewn all the pieces for the pieced border (the little blocks in the picture below).


Slowly, but surely, I'm making progress.  I guess the good thing is that I've only bought one piece of fabric this year and it was backing for a quilt top.

Here are my numbers so far this year:
Added This Week:       0.00 yards
Added Year to Date:    5.86 yards
Used This Week:          0.68 yards
Used Year to Date:       4.01 yards
Net Year to Date:         -1.84 yards

Go on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Quilting!

I've finally been able to spend some quality time with my sewing machine and iron. :-)

This Bento Box quilt has been on my design wall for quite some time now.  Its not that its a hard pattern... its actually a really easy pattern.  I just haven't been spending a lot of time quilting lately with our traveling and trying to get caught back up at work and at home.

I was able to get the center portion of the top completely sewn together yesterday.



The "bricks" on the edge of the picture are actually a pieced border for the quilt.  There will be a solid strip of white all around the quilt and then a strip of the "bricks" and then another strip of solid white. 


My cutting table currently isn't setup in the sewing room as it pulls double-duty when we have people over at the house.  Our current dining room table can only seat 4 comfortably, so we use my cutting table on the end for additional seating/space.  I need to get that table back upstairs so I can cut the border pieces for this quilt.

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Make-A-List Monday

I hope everyone had a great weekend.  The weather was finally pretty nice here in upstate NY.  We had some sun and the temperatures were above freezing during the day.  It was still cold enough at night that we received a dusting of snow each night, but it was gone within a few hours during the day.

I did get some items done this week, but not as much as I would have liked.  I had some medical tests that I had to have run over the past few days, which ended up making it such that I didn't want to do anything.

Here was the list from last week:
1. Finish quilting the border for Lone Star. I didn't get to finish the quilting, but I have about half of the border done.

2. Post pictures of ceiling progress (we should get all the crown up this week). Done.  Posted about it here.
3. Press and photograph Bento Box pieces. Done.  I'll post some pictures here.

4. Setup Wildflower Fields for quilting. No progress.

I really hope to make some progress on the Lone Star quilting this week.  I'm at a stage where I can sit down and do 15-20 minutes of quilting easily and then be able to stop.  I find that when I am at stages where I can do just a little bit at a time, I am able to make more progress.  During the week its sometimes hard to find an hour or two to do something more complicated.

I have a guild meeting tonight, so that means no quilting will happen tonight.  I also have to make sure I start getting to the gym this week, so that will also take up some time.  We only have one full weekend left to finish the ceiling, so we're down to the wire and need a big push to finish that up.  So this week, my list is going to be shorter than normal.  Only two things on it this week...


1. Finish quilting borders on Lone Star.
2. Post pictures for ceiling progress.

Hope everyone has a great week! 

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Make-A-List Monday

I hope everyone had a great weekend.  Here in Upstate NY, it was a bit of a cold and dreary weekend.  We had snow/sleet off and on all day Saturday.  Sunday evening we had a short burst of snow, but in general it was pretty cold and damp feeling.  At least it was outside, inside we had the fireplace going so it was nice and toasty warm. :-)

I was able to get a few things done last week and even got a bit of quilting done on Saturday.  I was going to go on a "tea" road trip with Yarnkettle, but we decided to post-pone due to the yucky weather on Saturday.

Here's the list from last week:
1. Finish sewing the Bento Box quilt pieces.  Done!  The blocks are sewn, but I need to press them before I do any more pictures.
2. Quilt the marked border for the Lone Star quilt.  Done! I even got a little bit quilted.

3. Post pictures of the ceiling progress.  Done!  Its posted here.
4. Decide upon design to quilt Wildflower Fields.  Done!  I decided to quilt this using a panto called Bayside.

Here's the plan for the upcoming week:
1. Finish quilting the border for Lone Star.
2. Post pictures of ceiling progress (we should get all the crown up this week).
3. Press and photograph Bento Box pieces.
4. Setup Wildflower Fields for quilting.

Hope everyone has a great week!


Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Stashbusting 2013 - Week 8

I was able to get a bit of sewing done this week.  I made some progress on the Bento Box quilt.  While I don't have everything pressed yet, the pieces are all sewn together.  The picture below was from earlier this week before I sewed the last strip to the blocks.

Here are my numbers

Added This Week:       0.00 yards
Added Year to Date:    5.86 yards
Used This Week:          2.22 yards
Used Year to Date:       3.33 yards
Net Year to Date:         -2.52 yards

Go on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing with their stash.

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Bento Box Progress

Early this week I was able to get some sewing done.  In fact, it was while I got caught up on an episode of my latest addiction... Downton Abbey.  :-)

Nothing like having a relaxing evening of quilting, wine, and Downton Abbey.

I had a little bit of sewing to wrap up and then got all my remaining blocks for the Bento Box quilt pressed.  Here they are all stacked up:

I still need to sew that last top strip to each of the blocks.

I did get all the colored strips sew on after this picture was taken, but I still have the stack of white to go.  They are all paired up and ready to be fed through the sewing machine, so it should go pretty quickly.

Once I get those sewn, I'll probably set this aside for a bit to do some more quilting on the Lone Star quilt.  I need to get the borders quilted and the center star section quilted fairly soon.


Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Make-A-List Monday

Whew!  What a week last week was.  I was definitely glad when the weekend rolled around.  The weekend was a bit of a late start for me though since I didn't leave work on Friday until 6pm.  Nothing like being one the last people in the office on a Friday evening.  Yuck!  At least it was quiet and I got some good work done.

Today is another quiet day in the office.  Presidents' Day is a floating holiday for us, which means that a lot of people take the day off and our hourly staff have it as a holiday.  The office is definitely quiet here today.  With this week being mid-winter break for the schools in the area, the entire week should be a little bit lighter.

Last week was a productive week, even though I spent a lot of time at work.

1. Mark the border quilting for the large outer border on Lone Star.  Done! I started and finished marking on Saturday morning.
2. Post pictures of needlepoint and coffered ceiling progress.  Done!  I posted about it here and here.
3. Post pictures of Bento Box progress.Done!  I posted about it here.
4. Post review of tea maker. :-) Done! Posted here.

I don't have any pictures to share today, but I'm going to be leaving the office a bit early today to make up for last week and I hope to get some quilting done when I get home. I did sew a bit on the Bento Box quilt over the weekend, but no pictures to show for it.  On Sunday, my in-laws came up to help us out with the coffered ceiling, so we made some good progress there, too.

So here's the list for this coming week:
1. Finish sewing the Bento Box quilt pieces.
2. Quilt the marked border for the Lone Star quilt.
3. Post pictures of the ceiling progress.
4. Decide upon design to quilt Wildflower Fields.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations

Needlepoint & Bento Box

Most evenings, my husband and I get home from work and end up watching a little TV to unwind from the day.  I'm rarely able to just sit there and watch TV.  If I don't do something, I usually fall asleep! 

When I don't have binding to sew onto a quilt, I do needlepoint.  I started in high school and have gradually increased the complexity of the pictures that I sew.  Last year I completed a rendition of Starry Night.  Now I'm working on Water Lilies by Monet.  Here's how far I've gotten:

And a close-up.  I've finally gotten a start of a bridge. ;-)

This past weekend I also made some progress on the Bento Box quilt.  Here's the blocks up on my design wall:

The batiks are all from a 2.5" strip pack that I picked up from my LQS last year.

I'm really liking the purples and greens together.

Sunday, I was able to spend some time cutting the rest of the strips to get them ready for piecing.  I love the looks of the stacks all neatly arranged and ready to sew.  I'm a bit OCD sometimes. :-)

I've already sewn the two stacks on the right together and they are ready for pressing.  Maybe I'll make some additional progress on it this week.


Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations