Stories from the Sewing Room

I was really hoping to pull off last-minute miracle and complete my 2025 PHD, but it wasn't meant to be this year. 

Linking with Ms. P Designs

I did complete 10 projects, which is not too shabby. (You can review my quilting finishes on my 2025 finishes tab.) I was really relieved to finish one of my older projects, the race car quilt. If you've been around for a while, you are probably as sick of that project as I was. 

Another project that was satisfying to finish is the knitted baby blanket I started back in 2017. 

I had three quilt tops that needed custom quilting on my list and I did not finish those. I do have a quilting plan fully worked out for one and am about halfway done planning a second one. I'm still struggling to come up with a plan for the third one. I will have to schedule in time to quilt them since I was planning to do them in December but didn't end up with enough vacation time.

I also added to my list an inherited a project from a guild mate who passed. I was hoping to finish it. I'm halfway through sewing the blocks, so I'll carry that forward and finish it in 2026.

I finished almost everything I started this year with the exception of a project from a class I took in March. The kits weren't complete at the time of the class, so I had to wait for the rest of it to be shipped to me. The hard components all had a fairly strong smoke smell, so they were in time out for the rest of the year. I forgot the process she taught, but after looking at the instruction pictures in her book, I figured out enough to resume working on it this week. 

Looking back over my progress, I see that my personal productivity really went down when I added the second longarm for work. I worked enough to fully pay back the personal loan I took to cover part of the longarm and all of the computer. That was a pretty big achievement, but I also worked so much that I was feeling pretty burnt out. I have basically worked out the logistics of running two machines and am planning to work less days in 2026. Hopefully that translates into more personal sewing time and more time to address other areas in my life, particularly fitness and house/garden maintenance, that really took a back seat in 2025. 

There are sewing techniques I'd like to pursue more in 2026, particularly trying to perfect my sloper and sewing more clothes for myself. I'd like to try some projects that use techniques I don't use often, such as curved piecing and paper piecing. Of course I'd like to finish more things in general because my closet is overflowing. But I'd like to enjoy working on them as well. I want to do things because I want to, not because I feel I have to.

My 2026 project list will hopefully address some of this, and as long as I can keep to my business plan for next year, maybe things will feel more fun. If not, any step forward is a step closer to a finish. 

I did do quite a few last-minute sewing projects for gifts since I last posted. I made this goose ornament using a free pattern from Ann Wood.

I made two tiny totes using a pattern from Craft Owl. There is a video that walks you through the steps. I found that helpful. You still need the pattern for pattern pieces, fabric and notion requirements, and sizes.

I made a string of prosperity hens using a tutorial from Pin Cut Sew. Use the free video tutorial or you can buy a PDF. The video is sufficient instruction. 

I knitted a ton of scrubbies. I lost track, but I think I made eight. I made one blue/white one that isn't pictured and the rest looked like the photo below.

Over the holiday I started a new knitting project, the Timberland Tweed blanket. I am making the larger size, which required 10 skeins of yarn. My local Michaels didn't have enough of anything to make it. The one closest to my daughter had seven skeins of Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick in the Dreamcatcher color way and we were able to pick up three more on the way to Michigan. I've already used up two of the skeins and I'm partway through the third! 

I finished off the last of this year's quilts with a binding last Wednesday. 

I can't say I've accomplished a whole lot since then. The weather took a turn towards deep winter. This picture was taken Wednesday the 10th. Although it looks almost sunny in my picture, it was bitter cold and rainy. My newer neighbors have a sense of humor. 

We did have small guild Friday night and we did our fat quarter basket swap. It was supposed to be like dirty Santa, but no one stole, we just picked and kept. So here is what I made for my basket. I went with an Alison Glass/stamp/writing/keeping in touch sort of theme. It was more of a color vibe than a theme.

The record coaster was a last-minute addition after I saw the directions come through in the Bernina email last week. I have some thoughts about this project. 

1. It's really difficult to stitch a perfect circle, particularly with fusible fleece/batting attached to one side, on your sewing machine. I think I would program this to stitch on an embroidery machine or maybe even the longarm if I had a big enough piece of fabric. 

2. It's also hard to cut perfect circles for the two inner circles. Again, programming the circles would yield a more precise finish. 

3. Pay attention. I was on the phone when sticking down the fusible "record label" color, which was supposed to cover the slit that was used for turning. I stuck mine to the wrong side, so then I had to try to cut similar shapes for both sides and get them to line up. Ugh. This is the back, which was supposed to be the front before I messed it up. Thankfully I had enough fabric left to cut additional print circles to cover the slit.

As you can see, I didn't quite hit the circles on the back exactly while stitching down the front, but it was okayish.

    

Back to guild, I chose Brenda's basket when it was my turn. Here are the non-perishable items. There was also a bottle of sparkling water, two champagne flutes, and a bag of Hershey kisses. 

Meanwhile, the guild advent calendar is still going on. Here is everything through December 16, minus the table runner that I shared last week.

I wish I could say I've been super-productive since finishing work last week, but I really haven't. I do have a finish, the started-in-2017 knitted baby blanket. I don't remember the previous version of this being so long and skinny. Maybe I didn't do all the repeats last time? 

I have been working on the race car quilt. The pieced borders fit fairly well. Each part of this quilt has been 1/2" smaller than the measurements given on the pattern. 

I worked on creating a pieced backing from the leftovers. There wasn't quite enough to get there, so I had to shop in my stash. Times like these (or any time I need a notion) I really miss Jo-Ann. Luckily I remembered to cut the binding before going to town on the backing. 

I also created a Frankenbatting from six batting cutoffs left at the bottom of various quilts.

It's loaded onto the frame, ready to be quilted. 

I also finished this scrunchy. I realize this seems like a minor project. I really wanted to add it to my UFO list on my PHD, but I refrained. It has been sitting here waiting to be repaired since I started making it at Quilt Con in February 2024. Yes, almost two years. I ripped apart and re-sewed the elastic in a more secure fashion and then pressed and hand-stitched the opening closed. Fun aside: the astronauts glow in the dark.

I've been slowly working on Nancy's Bonnie & Camille quilt too. This week has reminded me of how I prefer to work, which is not how I work when I am working/quilting for others. I prefer to jump around between projects, even alternating blocks of multiple projects at the same time. It helps me to pay attention and alleviates the tedium of doing the same thing over and over. 

I have not yet started the two gifts I still need to make. I have not worked on business things that need to be done, such as updating the website, doing year-end inventory, and so on. I have not finished enough things to complete my PHD this year. I'll be so close, but just not enough time. My goal next year is to work less so that I have time to live more. I've paid off the second machine and computer, so I think maybe I can try this?

I'm not sure if I'll post next week or not, but I will schedule the OMG link up to post and open on December 25, as scheduled. 

Linking with Quiltery and Alycia Quilts.

Friends, I am so close to my holiday vacation. I just have one binding to go. I considered trying to push through and get it done last night, but decided to take it easy and finish it up today. 

I know that I need to stop when I get tired. I'm not always great at stopping, but whenever I try to push through, things go sideways mechanically (why???) and I make mistakes. This is a goal to work towards next year. 

I did have a bit of time yesterday to get some of my own sewing done. I have completed the top and bottom rows of border for the race car quilt. 

I was really surprised to see some unexpected directions when I pulled out the pattern. I had assumed that the blocks would just alternate, but they don't. I don't even know what this repeat is! Probably no one would have ever known if I had just sewn them alternating, but I'm trying to follow the pattern. Considering how non-square my blocks were, they are going together fairly well. I'm still giving myself permission to just sew without making sure all intersections are perfect. It's kind of freeing and kind of cringe-inducing. 

These rows went together very quickly. I haven't measured them yet to compare them to the pattern measurements. Everything to this point has been 1/2" off from the pattern, so as long as that continues, the border in between should go well. Then I just have to figure out a backing and this thing will be done and donated.

I've also been making a bit of progress on the knitted baby blanket. I'm in the last repeat.

I'm having a lot of fun with the small guild advent calendar. So is everyone else based on the amount of group texts I'm getting per day! My gifts are days 10 and 11, so I opened day 10 (the quilting spray starch) yesterday so that I could get a picture of everything so far while the light was good. 

Brenda is a rock star and made every single person (14 or 15?) a quilt. Actually I haven't seen all these yet, so just going on group text info. She made me a chicken table runner and the note said she found the embroidered chickens at a yard sale. 

We have guild Friday night. I suggested we all bring our things Brenda made, which I knew would embarrass her, but she does such creative and innovative work (you should see some of the things she's come up with for the round robin quilts that I don't participate in) that I think it would be fun to see. We are also doing a fat quarter basket swap, so I'll share my offering next week. 

Okay, now for the last of this year's quilts. I bound two of Hannah's quilts that I completed recently. 

I started on Hannah's final quilt in this group. She requested Dunes and also wanted a cutout around one block. I had heard Dunes can be difficult to stitch due to the very slight curve and the amount of lines and stitching R-L and so on. It is a design that you set up as a block or an extended width rather than as an edge-to-edge. I didn't feel like I was having many issues, but it was pretty time-consuming to stitch. 

Then I got to the point in the pattern where I needed to do the no-sew zone and everything went to heck. Part of the pattern disappeared when I tried to split out the lines to remove part of the overstitching. I tried to add the pattern back in and then it didn't line up with the cut out. THEN I noticed that part of the previous pass had terrible tension and I had to remove that. It took forever to realign the pattern properly. Anyway, I eventually got it done, but it took multiple days. 

I bound her quilt and now they are ready to ship back to her. 

I also made the binding and sewed it to Cindy's mom's quilt. 

I started on Kim's quilt. She picked Orange Blossom Special for the quilting. The pattern stitches out really well, but it is really slow, so it took two days to stitch out. Like I mentioned at the top of the post, I still need to bind it. And then it's vacation time!

Look at me switching up the quilt photos with a dramatic night time image!

In other news, not a lot is happening (which is good). I was a little surprised yesterday morning that I was hearing machinery around 6:30 am. They were pouring the basement floor in the house that's being built kitty-corner to us. They had loads of giant work lights set up. It lit up my dining room and we're not even that close. I feel sorry for the people directly across the street from them!

Remember Jeri, whose quilts went missing for a while before being delivered with the box completely torn open? Thankfully the quilts were fine. Anyway, for the last batch we switched to UPS and I had an AirTag in the box. I also sent her a little gift. My husband laser-engraved these slate coasters with a picture of her dog. 

It's time to share my November PHD progress. Can you guess what it looks like? 

Linking with Ms. P Designs PHD program

Yep, pretty much the same as last month. It's killing me that I'm so far away from the PHD right now. But I have made progress on many projects this year. I added the approximate years I started each project in the chart just for fun. 

I did create a new quilt from start to finish in November. I call it Flying. I even wrote up a postcard-style pattern for it that I sent out to my longarm quilting mailing list and listed in one of my Etsy shops.

That leaves just one new start for 2025 that I haven't yet finished, the Linda Hahn class.

As far as the actual PHD portion of my list, I have made progress only on #11 and #14. I've completed the last of the blocks for the race car quilt (#11) and just have to sew them into rows and columns and add a border in between the rest of the quilt and those. Then quilt and bind it. 

I have two patterns repeats left for #14, the knitted baby blanket I started in 2017. It looks the same as it did last time I wrote about it, so I didn't bother with a new picture.

I'm wrapping up this year's quilts, hopefully this week, so maybe I can knock out a few more of my own projects by the end of the year. 

Here are the quilts I've worked on since last week. First is Hannah's, quilted with Echoed Swirls. I still need to bind this plus one of her others that I previously quilted. Side note on Echoed Swirls--this design is very dense! This is as big as I can get it. The lines are no more than 1/2" apart.

Next is Jeri's, quilted with Interlocked Orange Peel. I've written about this quilting design several times before. This quilt is a throw and it took me several days of work because the pattern would not line up no matter what I did. I ended up having to use every other row of my backup file to try to get close to alignment. Although I love how the design looks, this is the last time I will be quilting it for someone else. It's just too much hassle to get an end product I'm happy with. 

I quilted Maureen's Oak Leaf on Kayle's quilt. In my opinion this design stitches out best at a larger scale like Kayle chose. 

Kayle selected Stardust for this quilt. This quilt pattern is adorable and I love the pops of neon. 

Annie picked Radio Waves for this one. 

I quilted Bubble Glitter on Mary's quilt. This quilt alternates between this pieced part and large white swaths. It has a combo of high-thread count sheet and pieced parts on the back. 

I got the binding sewn onto all of Jeri's quilts. 

Speaking of Jeri, her box of missing quilts was finally delivered. The box was completely ripped open on one side and had been taped closed with two different types of tape. Thankfully the quilts were fine. We are going to switch to UPS for this group and also add an AirTag so we know where they are. 

Moving on to some fun things of my own, my small guild is doing an advent box where the participants each provided one purchased and one one handmade item to the hard-working organizer. She wrapped the items and made cute little bits of a story that are included in each day's items. She let me know Saturday night that mine was ready. We were in the middle of a snow storm, but my husband decided he'd drive me to her house to pick it up. I guess you can't take the Michigan out of him. 😏

As we were driving back into our neighborhood, we saw lots of flashing lights. Oh yeah, we forgot the fire department's Santa parade was driving through our neighborhood that night. I felt bad for the Santas standing on the back of the fire engine in the snow. Here's a totally lousy picture I took to send to the kids and urge them to hurry and open the front door to wave. 

Back to the advent box, here is mine before opening. 

Here is what was in the first two days. I don't have time this morning to find today's package and photo it before I have to leave for an appointment. There is a bag of sparkly binding clips, the little tin of cookies, a wee braw bag Kayle made, and the wooden thing is a needle holder and has some needles in it. 

Totally switching gears, I bought a new Christmas cactus (Thanksgiving cactus, probably). I thought the blooms would be light pink or white with hot pink stamens. Instead, the first flower is a strange yellowish beige with the hot pink stamen.

And here is something I found funny. I was cutting someone's fabric order and while folding the fabric I noticed one of the birds appears to have pooped. Hmm...I don't remember seeing when I cut other pieces previously. It is an unfortunately located manufacturing flaw. I cut the person a new piece and will be adding this piece to my own stash because it just makes me laugh.

I'll leave you with that. 😅