March

Anxiously awaiting spring here - did manage to get outside two days this week and pick up sticks and tree limbs.  Then the rain/snow came yesterday and today!

Had breakfast with a friend and our former pastor this morning.  His wife, her sister and her mother are all quilters and he was talking about his MIL's stash - aisles full in her 3 car garage!  She wants her daughters to help sew it up - and they will, but they have stashes of their own!  And we discussed buying more fabric!  We laughed about it, but it really isn't a laughing matter.  We spend outrageous amounts of money on fabric and the tools we need to make quilts.  We talk about leaving it to our kids or friends, or guilds, but the truth is - no one else wants our fabric.  My daughter doesn't quilt - what is she going to do with the thousands of dollars worth of fabric I have - especially since no one else wants it either.  So, we need to stop laughing about it, and planning on letting our kids deal with it.  We need to deal with it now.

So, I've been playing with my Go! machine lately and making broken dishes blocks:

 Late this afternoon I started putting the rows together and hopefully tomorrow I will have the quilt top put together.  This will be a 60" x 80" quilt for the homeless.  It will take about 4 yards to back it and I'll quilt it, label it and bind it on the machine.  

I took pictures of my stash hiding places and the mess my studio is now in, and I texted Chris (former Pastor) and told him I wouldn't promise not to buy fabric but I will make a concerted effort to use up as much as I can this year.  The quilts for the homeless don't have to be anything special - just plain blocks will do -- it's about  making them warm and usable.  I'm going to challenge my applique group of friends to start using their stashes and make homeless quilts also.

Until next time...blessings.