April Goal and TaTa Teal

It's gray and dreary with a bit of a wind and light rain in Paradise this morning. The sewing room however is just as cozy as can be, a great place to spend time indoors whether because of the rain or because of social distancing. There may be a gray sky out my window but in the sewing room there is no lack of color. The queen size quilt for my niece Abigail is on the design wall and brings me delight every time I walk into the room. I'm going to miss it when it's finished and gone. I'm more than half way done with the piecing and it's going relatively quickly now as each row is getting shorter since I've passed the half way point. Abigail's birthday is in June and I'd like to have it finished by then. So my OMG for April is to be at least half way finished with the quilting by the end of the month.

I missed posting to the Rainbow Scrap Challenge last Saturday, but did have the top of the teal and purple Sparkle Stars table topper done by the 31st. I'm practicing some free motion quilting that I want to try out on that little quilt. I've never done any free motion quilting before and am anxious to try, and this little quilt seems like a good place to start. A practice piece for a free motion feather is pictured below. I've been taking lots of classes from Bluprint this last week or so since they are being offered for free until the 16th. There are a bunch of great classes and teachers. I’ve always been intimidated by the thought of free motion quilting, especially feather motifs. The classes I’ve been taking are giving me the confidence to try. You can check them out at:  https://www.mybluprint.com/cr_maid=120946&cr_linkid=20200403_SVOD_WTW_hero&vpe=true&cr_source=Bluprint&cr_medium=Internal%20Email&st_id=19890224&cuid=20948247

A couple of weeks ago I found and printed out the Quilt Project Planner from Hello Melly Designs, available from Quilting Digest at:  http://quiltingdigest.com/print-this-planner-to-keep-track-of-quilt-projects/.  It has a good number of things listed that one would want to keep track of when planning a quilt. I used it as a jumping off point for my own planner. I love working with and designing databases and don't know why I haven't made one for my quilt projects before. It gives me a greater ability to track every detail of a project than a print out could. It also gives me a space to attach pictures which will be a great help with future projects. I've found that as I'm pulling out UFOs to work on I don't remember which fabric I had chosen for which part of the quilt. I've sometimes made notes about quilts I've started but have not had a single place to keep them, had any consistency in what was noted, or been able to attach pictures or even samples of the fabrics I intended to use. Now with the database everything will be in one place and notes made on the fly as I work won't get lost. It's also a place to keep notes on quilts that I've completed over the years. I've been surprised by the number of quilts I've done because I've never had a list of them before. Both the Roman Square quilt for Abigail and the Sparkle Stars table topper are in the database. I’m anxious to move them both onto the completed list.

I'm linking up with One Monthly Goal at Elm Street Quilts at: https://www.elmstreetquilts.com/2020/04/one-monthly-goal-april-link-up.html

I’m linking up with Rainbow Scrap Challenge at SoScrappy at: https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/