Getting a production line going

Well, the production of the bridesmaid bags has really stepped up a pace now! It feels like a mini-factory here in Celtic Thistle land.

The frames, which are from uhandbag are the same frames used in this bag.

 

The fabric for the bridesmaid bags is an ivory faux silk from Plush Addict . I also bought a Skinny Dips bundle in lilacs and purples from Plush Addict so that each of the bags would have a different fabric for the interior.

 

The icing on the cake though are the beautifully machine embroidered Gothic initials courtesy of the very talented Benta, who translated our vision into reality. 

I have never been so nervous, knowing that I only had one chance to get these bags right as not only did I not have enough material for second attempts, but I definitely didn't have time to get the initials embroidered again. No pressure there then! 

We are past the halfway stage now, four bags down only three to go!

 

Beginning production

Three years ago when our middle son married I volunteered to make bags for each of my daughter-in-law's bridesmaids, so when our eldest son got engaged last year naturally I volunteered to do the same again. The wedding is this week so you might imagine that I would have had the bags all done and dusted a long time ago, sadly you would be wrong! As is my usual, I have been working right up to the wire on these.

To get back into the swing of things, bag making wise, I decided that the first bag made should be the one requested by my daughter-in-law, who bought this frame and picked out some fabrics from my stash.

The fabric is a Kona solid, but I have no idea which one!

The interior fabric is Fox Field by Tula Pink and was perfect for the owner of this little chap :)

There was talk of having him as the ring bearer, but it was decided that he couldn't be trusted to keep focused on hopping down the aisle of the church when there was all that tempting greenery around :)

One down, only seven more to go!

Kennedy Bag

Recently the lovely and very talented Sara at Sew Sweetness put out a call for pattern testers for her latest bag pattern, which she had named the Kennedy Bag. Even although I had plenty of other projects on my to-do list, I was so taken with the photo of the bag that came with the call that I couldn't resist volunteering to be a tester.

At the same time I received a shipment of great home dec fabric from the nice people at Terrys Fabrics so it seemed only natural to put the two together and come up with this!

My version of the Kennedy Bag.

Because of an impending visit to something called Quilt Market (???) the turnaround time for testing this pattern was relatively tight, to give Sara time to co-ordinate the feedback before she jetted off to tease us all with new fabric lines and quilting heroines and heroes on Instagram!

Unfortunately I didn't pay a lot of attention to the hardware requirements for this bag until I actually came to put it together. I then discovered that despite having more bag hardware than I will probably ever need, I didn't have the correct size buckles for this pattern. A trawl round every haberdasher within a 10 mile radius failed to find them either. They were available, however, on the MacCulloch and Wallis website, so a few clicks later and I was ready to start sewing. I have visited MacCulloch and Wallis' bricks and mortar shop in London and it is a real treasure trove, so I wasn't surprised that they had the buckles listed that I needed, when nowhere else seemed to stock them.

Whilst the bag was fairly straightforward to do, there are a lot of layers at times to wrestle through the sewing machine. I counted 10 layers at one point and I could tell that my sewing machine was not very happy with it :) Still we both gritted our teeth and hoped for the best and, fortunately, it all worked out.

Which is more than can be said for my buckles order, unfortunately, one of the items in the order was out of stock and although the lovely lady who rang to tell me this could not have been more helpful in finding an appropriate substitution it meant that I wouldn't get the order in time for the deadline date for feedback to Sara.

Clearly drastic action was required!

A frantic rummage through my store of handbags unearthed this bag, which has seen better days.

Those buckles were exactly the size I needed, so some quick cutting and I was back on track.

You would think they were meant for that bag strap wouldn't you??

The pattern of the main fabric was perfect for some outline quilting, which was an optional step in the process. I did debate about whether to do it or not, given the time constraints but I was glad in the end that I did. I think it makes for a more sturdy bag and given that this is fairly large bag, I think a bit of extra sturdiness will be useful. Sara recommends using Soft and Stable for the interfacing, which I think would make this bag even sturdier but I have not yet tried this.

As you can see from the photo above the buckle straps are decorative, the bag flap is actually closed with a magnetic snap. I like the look of buckle closures but find in practise that they are slow and cumbersome to open and close, so I think this is a great compromise.

I forgot to take a photo of them but the bag also has a zipped external pocket on the back and a divided pocket in the interior. Sara has thought of everything!

If you would like to make your own version of the Kennedy bag the pattern will be available as a free download at Sew Mama Sew later today. The pattern is now available for download here

Details;

Exterior fabric - Verve in Linen from Terrys Fabrics
Lining fabric    - Happy go Lucky by Bonnie and Camille for Moda
Accent fabric    - Quilters Basic Dusty Style by Stof

I am delighted with my new bag and look forward to getting lots of use out of it on our upcoming trip to France.


If you are looking for more bag inspiration check out the great bags being linked up at Sew Sweetness' Purse Palooza

 

The link up is open till November 11th, so you have plenty of time to get your own version of the Kennedy bag made and linked up to be in with a chance of winning a great prize.

Linking up to

Say it with Flowers

Welcome to my stop on the

I am delighted to be taking part in another of Madame Samm's inspiring Blog Hops. This time round our super-efficient cheerleader is Carol of Just Let Me Quilt, now that is a sentiment I can relate to :)

If you are new here, please feel free to take a look around and explore my little corner of Blogland.

When I signed up for this Blog Hop I thought that I hadn't actually completed many projects that were flower-related, but it turns out that I am more of a floral girl than I realised. I hope my DH is taking note of that as it is our wedding anniversary today, and I am keeping my fingers crossed that I am not the only member of the family "saying it with flowers" today :)


So here are some of the flower-themed projects I had forgotten about

The flower back of the summer quilt made for the Curved Seams Challenge blogged  here

Origami fabric flowers from a tutorial and kit by Knotted Cotton

1. Completed Fabric bag, 2. Colourful Clutch, 3. Pretty Purple Pinafore, 4. Amy Butler Origami bags, 5. Summertime Blues Bag, 6. Garden party bag, 7. Hearts and Flowers Bag, 8. Marimekko Highbrow Hobo Bag, 9. Ruffled wristlet clutch

Lots of floral bags! 

1. Beaded wirework brooch, 2. Linen and scrap pouches, 3. Mae's Tulip, 4. Star of Africa Block 1, 5. Crochet Flowers, 6. Fleur Bleu

Bee blocks and brooches.

My favourite flower projects though have been the Dresden plate Sunflowers that started as cushions 

 

Then progressed to a quilt

And now as my project for the Say it with Flowers Blog Hop have been incorporated into a bag :)

I know it is not yellow, so technically not a sunflower, but you get my drift. The fabric for the body of this bag came from this pair of my son's shorts!

 

Regular readers know by now that my sons and husband's wardrobes are frequently raided for my projects :) The ripped shorts were no use to him, but the cotton/linen mix fabric was ideal for my bag body. 

I used the Scalloped Dresden Bag pattern available free at During Quiet Time for the bag, and was delighted with how easily it all went together. The fabric for the scallops was part of a package I received from the lovely Jan in a Friendship Bag Swap, so it was a very economical bag to make.

 

My version of the bag is slightly different from the original pattern as I wanted to have interchangeable bag straps, rather than the cross-body fabric straps of the original. So, instead of adding straps I added a strap loop with a split ring to each side of the bag. The heavier strap above is actually a necklace that had a broken catch, whilst the lighter chain in the first photo was an extra chain that came with a clutch bag bought in a sale. Very little goes to waste in our household :)

Now that I have my flower bag all I need is the opportunity to go out somewhere smart with it. Fingers crossed that as well as saying it with flowers, DH takes the hint and will be whisking us off somewhere nice to celebrate this evening!

Don't forget to check out all the inspiring posts from fellow Blog Hoppers today at

May 30^th

A Quilt Lady

The House On The Side Of The Hill

Ella & Nesta’s Little Room

CLF by Nailaa

Atelier De Handwerktuin

Life, Quilts, and A Cat Too

Marjorie’s Busy Corner

Celtic Thistle

Elizabeth Coughlin Designs

Dreaming In Patchwork

Around The Homestead

There will be loads of amazing projects for you to drool over I am sure!

If you have used a Dresden ruler or made a bag for the first time this month, or tried anything new to you this month there is still time to link up to 

The link up will close at 12.00 p.m. GMT on May 31st so you can still sneak a link in to tell us what you have tried out in May.

Linking up to

A sneak peek revealed and a Giveaway

It isn't in my nature to be secretive so I am happy to be able to share with you the outcome of one of the sneak peeks I posted about on Monday.

The vintage buckle slider - 

was part of the equipment needed for my bag pattern test for Sew Sweetness. The pattern is available for sale today so I can now show you the bag in all its glory. (Check out the end of this post if you would like to win some bag patterns!)

And here it is

I 

I used an embroidered wool fabric that I picked up in a sale in Riga for the exterior and the lining fabric is from the 1001 Peeps line, and was also picked up in a sale in Riga. I knew those fabrics would come in useful someday :)

The twist lock I used for the bag is slightly different to the one Sara recommends in the pattern, but as I had this one in my stock of bag supplies already it made sense to use it instead. This one is screwed together unlike the recommended lock, and is slightly bigger, but it worked out just as well. It is available here

You can see it more clearly here. I love these twist locks they definitely add something to a handmade bag, don't you think?

Sara's pattern was very straightforward to follow, so I really enjoyed my first bag pattern test. Check out her blog to see the wonderful variations of this pattern, and to see the rest of her brilliant bag patterns. She is really churning out patterns at a rate of knots! She is also such a generous soul that she has offered to giveaway a five-pack of patterns for one lucky winner on this blog.

So if you would like to revamp your wardrobe with some fabulous new bags, just let me know the best/strangest thing you have discovered at the bottom of your handbag!

Each comment will be entered into a random draw and the winner will get five patterns from Sew Sweetness' pattern range. The patterns will be sent by email so make sure I have some way of contacting you.

As ever tell me you are a follower for an extra chance to win.

The draw will close at 12.00 p.m (GMT) on Sunday February 24th, when the winner will be randomly drawn.

I look forward to reading your comments. Good Luck!

Miss Maven ruffles my feathers

Have you ever been halfway through a project and wondered why you ever started it? Well, that is where I was with my latest project for 12 WIP's in 2012.

At the beginning of the year I committed to making a bag from Amy Butler's Style Stitches book, having only made the Origami bags since I bought it (and let's face it you don't really need this book to make them!) the book was turning out to be an expensive ornament!




I have been putting this off but couldn't put if off any longer as it was the only one of my remaining WIP's that I could reasonably complete in the time I had available. To be honest I had been underwhelmed by Style Stitches when I first looked through it so hadn't had much in the way of motivation to get cracking on anything. I think that part of the problem was the text heavy instructions. Style Stitches is full of arty photographs of the models and even of the completed bags, but completely lacking in photos of the techniques or process involved in making the bags. The odd hand-drawn illustration here and there just doesn't cut the mustard as far as I am concerned.

 I decided that I would have a go at the Miss Maven Ruffled Handbag, it didn't look too complicated! Hah! First problem was that I didn't have the double-sided fusible Pelltex called for, but I did have double-sided Ultra Firm & Flex, so thought that would be a good enough substitute. Well it was, but it was a real pain trying to fuse the fabrics as the Ultra Firm & Flex doesn't have a protective backing like the Pelltex has, so fusing only one side at a time per the instructions wasn't too straightforward! Lots of peeling the fused handle off of the pressing cloth was involved.

Making the body of the bag was straightforward although now that it is finished I really don't like the large inner pocket, it is just too big even although it is stitched in the middle. It runs the width of the bag including half of the side so it gapes too!
That as it turns out was only the beginning of my problems with this bag. Attaching the handles to the main bag and lining was tricky as not only were there curved seams involved but the double thickness of the handles with the Ultra Firm made manoeuvring the pieces under the needle difficult. Seams were ripped several times! Then this happened

Spotted the problem?

The instructions for this part were to "Pull out the remaining top edges of the exterior and lining main panels on each side of both handles. Match the top edges, and pin the top edges together." Now tell me that I am not the only one who would have matched the lining pieces together and the exterior pieces together. OK maybe I am!! I did try and convince myself that I could use the bag like this, but only managed to remain convinced for 30 seconds before reaching, yet again, for the seam ripper :(

By this time I was determined to beat this bag, and really pleased that I had followed the previous instruction to stay stitch the curved edges, as they were taking a real hammering with all the seam ripping going on.

Finally I ended up with this

The instructions tell you to attach the magnetic snap tabs when top stitching at the end, but I think it would have been better, and easier, to attach them when attaching the lining and exterior together. This by the way is the small bag,  you could probably use the large one to carry a small child if this one is anything to go by.

I suspect that all of this means that Style Stitches will revert again to gathering dust on my bookshelf.

Linking up to Craft Buds Craft Book Month
and Sew Darn Crafty
and Manic Monday
and Sew Modern Monday


Hope you spent less time ripping and more time sewing than I did this weekend :)

Dragon bags deconstructed and reconstructed

Although I managed to polish of most of my BOM's in the early part of this month, I somehow left my June project for 12 WIP's in 2012  until the last minute. So I have been sneaking in some sewing (and seam ripping) time in the last couple of days to try and get this in before June disappears.

Last year I wanted to make a special bag to have at my son's wedding, and when I saw u-handbag's Big 'n Beautiful Betty pattern I knew that this was it.  Finding the perfect fabric was not quite so easy, the bag had to match my purple outfit and I wanted the fabric to be extra-special. (I actually ended up with 3 outfits to choose from, all purple, but we'll not go into that now!) On a late night internet trawl I found an Alexander Henry fabric that fitted the bill perfectly, but as it was an old line it took some weeks to track down a large enough piece for my bag.

With the pattern and fabric I set to. I have made several purse frame bags from u-handbag kits and patterns so although this was by far the biggest frame purse I had attempted, I didn't think it would be any more difficult than the previous ones.

Well that frill along the top gave me all sorts of grief! I have always struggled a bit with the final stage of gluing the bag into the frame, but with a frill to complicate matters it took even longer, so that it was not finished in time :( As you can see, I did finish the bag, but after the first use I noticed that the frame and the bag were beginning to part company, so put the whole thing away resolving to sort it out sometime.

Well that time was this month, sorting out this bag was one of my 12 WIP's for 2012 and I hoped, the only one that I could feasibly finish in time for the looming end of June. So, I set to with scissors and brute strength to wrestle the bag from the remainder of the frame, no easy task given that the point of the glue is that it will withstand the very thing I was trying to do!

After a lot of tugging and pulling I managed to separate them both, where I discovered that my original gluing had been less than even, which was I suspect the reason that I had problems in the first place. So with the bag deconstructed I set about recycling the fabric to create another bag, using my favourite Kyoko Frilled Pouch pattern from u-handbag. Most of the fabric in the new bag was recycled from the old, except for the exterior bag base, which needed a small piece of the leftover fabric from the original bag.

Now that the bag is completed and (fingers crossed!) unlikely to fall apart, all I need is another wedding to go to :)

Unlike large parts of the UK, the weather here in Riga would be ideal for a wedding and there would be no shortage of flowers as these stalls at the Central Market show.

If we only had somewhere to put them we would be investing heavily in these hanging baskets and potted plants!

Another finish to tick off the list by the skin of my teeth! I shall definitely try not to leave it to the last minute next month.

Linking up to 12 WIP's in 2012 and Purse Palooza and Threading My Way features

Celebration Bags

Amongst the many things needed as a guest at a family wedding is, most definitely, a new bag, which is why you would have found me last week frantically sewing away the day before we were due to leave for Dublin! As it turned out though the sewing was the easy bit. I had decided to make myself a small handbag using the Kyoko frilled pouch pattern from u-handbag.com that I have used several times before. With no time to visit the LQS before our trip, I was really pleased to find the exact shade of red in my stash, along with grey satin lining in the perfect shade, this bag was meant to be! Once sewn the pouch is threaded on to a metal frame, which is where I hit a rather large problem. I had, I thought, brought the frame with me from Riga, but I discovered when I went to assemble the bag, on the evening before we left, that, in fact, I had only brought half of the frame, the metal rods that the pouch is threaded on to were languishing in the cupboard in Riga.

Fortunately I remembered that I had made this bag a few months ago for my son's girlfriend, who was also going to the wedding.

So, one quick phone call later and the frame was travelling to Dublin to meet up with my pouch the next day.

And here it is. I really like this pattern, it is quick to make and once you have a frame it only takes a minute to change around your bag, which was just as well considering.

The theme of the week has definitely been bags, as not only did I get the bag for the wedding finished I also managed to squeeze in some sewing on the patchwork bag that I had cut out before we left Riga. On the face of it this bag looked to be as straightforward as the frilled pouch, but the instructions were rather vague and I had to work out for myself how to join the squares at the side without having the seam allowance on the right side, and I am not altogether happy with the corners where the lining and the exterior join, but that might have something to do with me rushing it to get another finish in time for my May  entry in 12 WIP's in 2012 ! Given the colours of this bag, I have christened it my Jubilee bag as it is finished just in time for the Jubilee weekend.

Having only just recovered from the extravaganza that was the SewMamaSew Giveaway Week, there are even more quilting and blogging delights to be had this week. First up is voting for the Play mini quilt challenge quilts, which closes on Friday at GMT 13.00. There are some fabulous quilts in the challenge so you will be spoilt for choice. Click here to vote for your favourite.

Also on-going is the Let's get acquainted Blog Hop, organised by the very efficient Beth at Plum and June This week's blog posts are from

May 29
    Heidi from Fabric Mutt

    Amy from Amy's Crafty Shenanigans

    
May 31
    Jodi from Tickle and Hide

    Jennie from Porch Swing Quilts

They are definitely worth checking out! The Blog Hop will continue through till October so there will be lots of new bloggers to meet over the coming months. Check out too the guest blog and giveaway from Deborah at Whipstitch that's running this week.


As it is Wednesday again, here's how my current project list looks
Completed projects

• Shades of Green, Fleur Bleu, Checkered Heart, Orange and Reindeer cushions
• Orphan Block needle roll, Pieced Arc Tea towel, Purse and Padded Hangers Tutorial
• Sunflower and Sew Happy QAL quilts
• All blocks of FPPFTT
• Sibling Together 20 Blocks sent and received  
• First crochet project
• Play mini-quilt challenge quilt 
• Patchwork Block Bag 

Ongoing

• 3 blocks of In Color Order HST BOM (2 blocks behind schedule)
• (Almost) Irish Chain quilt basted
• 4 Zakka-style SAL projects completed (So many projects behind schedule!)
• First border of teatime quilt completed, blocks calculated and fabric cut
• 5 blocks of NY Beauty QAL completed and fabric cut for remaining 5 blocks
• 8 blocks of Craftsy BOM completed (on schedule)  
• Yellow rainbow cushion waiting to be appliqued 
• In the Bag Ugly Fabric fabrics sent waiting for swap fabric to arrive

Waiting

• Indigo and violet rainbow cushions
• Last block of Sampler quilt
• Amy Butler bag
• Bag Making Bible Fashionista Bag
• Dragon Bag
• Christmas mini quilts

The waiting list is getting smaller but that ongoing list doesn't seem to change much, I think I will have to do something about that in the coming weeks!

Linking up to WIP Wednesday
                     We Did it Wednesday

Circle of Geese and Shades of Green

Determined not to fall too far behind in the two paper-piecing Sewalongs, FPPFTT and NY Beauty, that I have joined, I have been cutting, snipping and sewing up a storm to get this week's FPPFTT block completed. The Circle of Geese block lends itself very well to becoming a cushion, so I decided to use up the last of my scraps from the Sew Happy QAL to make a matching cushion for my son. I thought that I ought to tackle this block first before attempting either of the two NY Beauty blocks, where the capacity for disaster seems even greater!


Mind you, this block was not without its' fair share of mishaps. Accidentally folding a piece under the wrong way and sewing it to the seam was bad enough, but quickly remedied but slicing through the last sewn piece when cutting off the extra seam allowance was really pushing it! Lesson learnt the hard way, concentrate all the time and more haste less speed will need to be my watchword from now on I think, otherwise those NY Beauty blocks are going to drive me mad.

With tomorrow being St Patrick's Day and an England v Ireland rugby game imminent, Irish feelings are running high in our household. Irish stew will, no doubt, be on the menu tomorrow and I have a recipe for a fruity soda bread that I am looking forward to trying out. In addition, the day gives me my first opportunity to use my Shades of Green handbag.

I really went for the Shades of Green theme with this bag. So the exterior is a fine green tweed, the interior is a brighter green cotton and as you can see I have used green satin ribbon to line the handles. There is more green cotton for my yo-yo trim and as if that was not enough green I added a shamrock button! If St Patrick's Day is not the perfect day to use this bag, then I don't know when is :) The bag pattern is from the City bag collection in Nancy Zieman's Trace'n Create bag templates. I have used them a couple of times and found them very straightforward to use. The patterns call for a number of Nancy Zieman products, which I cannot get here, but they are easily substitutable (is that a word??) with local available hardware, so it didn't cause any problems.

Last night we went to the National Opera house to watch a performance of the Ballet Don Quixote, the tickets were a birthday present for my husband from our son. Whilst sitting in the theatre waiting for the performance to begin, I caught myself thinking that I should have brought my camera to take pictures of the interior to post on my blog! Am I becoming obsessed do you think??

If you are ever in this part of the world, I would definitely recommend a visit to a ballet or opera performance. It is not something we did very often back in the UK partly because of the cost (especially if the whole family were going) but also because of the time and effort required in getting to the theatre. In Riga, the Opera House is within walking distance and ticket prices are very reasonable so whole families go, in fact you can see all sections of the society here at a performance from grannies with their granddaughters to students, visiting dignitaries and all groups in between. The dress code is similarly broad, so at the same performance you will see couples in evening dress, little girls dressed up (in flamenco dresses last night!) and students in jeans and jumpers. The theatre looks like I imagine it must have done decades ago, especially the cafe for the interval, where rows of cups and saucers sit on long, lovely wooden counters and delicious cakes are displayed in beautiful glass cabinets. You can definitely imagine ladies at the turn of the century in their finery sipping their tea in these surroundings.


Hope you all have a great weekend, Happy St Patrick's Day in advance!

Orphan Blocks, HST's and Needle Rolls

Last month the Pleasant Home Blog's theme for January was using up your scraps and there were some wonderful projects showcased. Although I have not been sewing long enough to have built up enough scraps to consider some of the marvellous quilts shown, like probably all quilters I do hang onto leftover fabrics from my projects, no matter how small, in the belief that they will come in useful for something!


So, inspired by the many projects I have been looking at in the last month, I decided that it was time to "liberate" some fabrics from the scrap bag, and realise their potential :) I spent a pleasant hour going through the scraps, remembering the original projects and trying to image new ones. To my delight I came across an "orphan block" from the very first quilt I made, which was for my eldest son, who was living in Madrid at the time and complaining of the coldness of the winter nights. As I also had some fabric left over from the original quilt too, I realised that there was scope for a new project using the block and fabric scraps.

Sitting next to the scrap bag in my craft cupboard, is the evidence of my infrequent forays into the world of knitting. My nice new knitting needles are jumbled together in a magazine file so it is not easy to find the right size or even a pair when I need them. Something needed to be done, and here is the something!

A shiny, new knitting needle roll made from the "orphan block" and leftover fabric, and lined with fabric cut from yet another of my husband's discarded shirts! They are coming in very useful these shirts of his :) My knitting needles have never been this organised. The needle roll measures roughly 22" wide by 17" high, with an inner pocket approximately half the height. I quilted channels of various widths from the top to the bottom of the roll before binding and adding a ribbon tie. I even discovered that I have purchased two pairs of needles the exact same size, but now that I am so organised I won't be making that mistake again.


By now I was on a roll (apologies for the pun!). Until now my knitting UFO's have resided in the brown paper bag that they were originally brought home in, but it is all too easy to ignore them in brown paper, so if they are ever going to be finished it was time to house them in something a bit more inspiring too. Last year I had made a couple of bags from jeans that were being discarded by my son (I seem to have become a bit of a magpie with my family's clothing!), from the bucket bag pattern by Lisa Lam available here. So I dug one of those out of the cupboard too and, voila, a new knitting bag and needle roll for no cost apart from time, and time spent sewing is never a bad thing.

Although we did venture out this weekend, it was not for long as we have found that when you can't feel your chin, it is time to head back indoors. So I had plenty of opportunity to catch up with the February block of the month at In Color Order's HST BOM, which this month is a Flying Geese block. I have always thought that these were beyond me, but having just finished the Flying Geese block for the Sew Happy QAL, I was feeling much more positive towards them, so set to work and finished that too.

We spent a glorious day last Autumn/Fall in the SW of France listening to the honking of flocks of geese and watching as they flew south overhead, and making this block conjured up those memories. Maybe one day I'll make a quilt from this block to keep that memory!



Linking in to Little Quilt Monday at a pieceful life

12 WIP's in 2012

Just came across AJ's blog with her 12 WIP's for 2012, what an excellent idea and just up my street at the moment, so I am signing in! We will, hopefully, be moving back home sometime this year so this is a great incentive to get things finished before the move. The WIP's are in two parts, six should be projects that have already been started and put aside (abandoned!) and six should be projects that I have the materials for but have never started and I have lots of these! To take part I need to send AJ a fat quarter of fabric and at the end of the year she will have a draw and the winner will get the donated fabrics, which is quite neat.

By typing these projects I am committing myself to finishing them, so here goes -  the first 6 of my WIP's are to:

• Back, quilt and bind the sunflowers quilt I have been working on for a couple of years. The quilt is pieced but hasn't got any further
• Back, quilt and bind the Irish Chain quilt I started last winter. Again the quilt is pieced but I mucked up the measurements so it didn't work as an Irish Chain and was consigned to the cupboard
• Make the final block for the Quilt As You Go sampler quilt I started a few years ago at my first ever patchwork and quilting class. The block is meant for the centre of the quilt and is a folded star block but I have lost the instructions on how to finish it, so it has been gathering dust for ages. It can't be that difficult to find instructions on how to finish it off, can it?

These are the three big WIP's hanging over me, the next three are less daunting but that hasn't stopped me putting off finishing them!

• To make buttons and buttonhole loops for my winter cushion to finish off the back. I cut the envelope backing a bit neat on this cushion so it really needs a button closure to stop it from gaping and I have seen instructions on how to make your own buttons with modelling clay, so that is what I plan to do

 

Reindeer Cushion

• To finish the Shades of Green cushion I have hand pieced and quilted but not backed and, hopefully, I will have learned my lesson from the cushion above and will cut the back to the correct size this time!
• To either finish (again) or recycle the material from the Dragon Bag I made to carry at my son's wedding. I did finish the bag before the wedding but never got to use it as the first time I carried it with belongings inside the bag came away from the frame! I have made several other bags with glued-on frames and it had never happened before, but none were as big as this bag so that might have been part of the problem.

Big Betty Bag pattern from u-handbag.com

That is a daunting list, but maybe if I start off slowly and work up, who knows, by the end of the year I could finally have some quilts on beds and space in cupboards! Fingers crossed.

The second half of the challenge is maybe not so daunting, although time will no doubt tell whether I am being overly optimistic again. My list for this only has two largish quilts in it, so is hopefully eminently doable even with the challenges I have set myself in the first half. So here is my list:

• To complete the quilt for my son and daughter-in-law that I have signed up for with Sew Happy Geek's QAL
• To complete the quilt I have signed up for at In Color Order's HST BOM
• To finally make the Days to Santa Countdown from Nancy Halverson's 12 Days of Christmas booklet. I have had the fabric for this for a couple of years now and promise myself every year that I will start it in time to have it completed for December 1st, and every year the time passes and I have missed the opportunity to get it done in time again!
• To sew for myself, or possibly my daughter-in-law or son's girlfriend, one of the bags from Amy Butler's Style Stitches, the book will turn out to be an expensive indulgence if I don't make at least one handbag from it
• To make for myself a fashionista bag from Lisa Lam's Bag Making Bible, I have made two of them already both for my daughter-in-law, but despite buying some lovely pink wool fabric in Tallinn especially for this bag and having all the hardware needed it hasn't even been started

• The final WIP for this challenge is another bag, a patchwork bag I bought the pattern and fabric for on a quick stop in the Scottish borders whilst we were taking our youngest son to University. The purchase was probably as much about being able to have my pick of quilting fabric and notions as about the pattern, as quilting cottons are not popular here in Latvia, so I am like a child in a sweet shop when I get in a quilt shop in the UK :)

I think that is probably enough to be going on with for now. Coming up with the list itself was an interesting exercise though as it did concentrate my mind on what was achievable and, in some cases, how little I actually had to do to finally finish something. No doubt I will be diverted in the coming months but having this in black and white will make sure I get back on track, at least that is the plan.

Let me know what your plans are for the coming year, so that I don't feel so bad about having so many unfinished projects cluttering up my cupboards!