2020 Planning Party

I'm joining Quilting Jet Girl Yvonne's 2020 planning party. We're sharing plans, goals and resolutions for the new year. She's giving away lots of nice prizes, so it's definitely worth checking out and joining in!

Tubs stuffed with neglected FQs

I'm not normally one for setting things out in advance like this, but had already been thinking about playing a game with myself in 2020. Normally I participate in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. This year I'm changing it up a bit and making it the Rainbow Stash Challenge. And more specifically, the fat quarters in my stash. They have been languishing, unused, lately. So as Angela announces the new color each month, I'm going to try to make a dent in the FQs of that color.

Deep drawer o' orphans

In addition, I have enough orphan block projects for Covered in Love that each one can be kinda-sorta assigned to a color:

Red: Patriotic red, white and blue orphans
Pink: Caribbean houses
Orange: Orange/green mix orphans
Yellow: Donated kit of yellow and blue florals
Lime green: Lime stars
Dark green: Green and purple mix orphans
Aqua: Primarily aqua mix orphans
Light blue: More patriotic blocks and scraps
Dark blue: Lone star top to be finished
Purple: Purple and chocolate brown orphans
Brown: Autumnal blocks
Black: Bright colors with black background orphans

Big stack o' panels

I also want to make a dent in my novelty and themed fabrics and panels. So I've divided them into 12 subjects and will draw one out of a hat each month to work on. Doesn't this sound like a fun game? Time to get these happy fabrics launched!

Cats
Dogs
Birds
Butterflies
Fish
Adult beverages: coffee/wine/beer/cocktails
Horses
Science/space/Earth
Trains
Camping/fishing
Food
Scooters

(Edited to add:) I went through my panels a week after writing this and decided to add 5 more themes. Time to stop hoarding these panels!
Farm/Chickens
Jungle
Tools/Trucks
Dancing/Music
Beach

I know myself well enough to expect a LOT of deviation from the plan! After all squirrels come in all colors, and if trains are chosen for purple month but I have some great purple butterflies, then I MIGHT get derailed. (Heh. See what I did there?) But it doesn't really matter, you know? Whatever gets worked on is fine!

Do you make these kinds of advance plans? Or are you a "fly by the seat of your pants" type?

Christmas in July in the Big Apple

Hello, hello! Since the flurry of finishes in my last post, I haven't had too much to blog about. We moved the boat all the way from Palm Beach to New York City in one long hop. The seas were very calm and I was able to sew a little bit each day. I also straightened things up in the studio and did some ironing with all the extra power the boat engine puts out while we're moving.

We arrived in New York in time for Independence Day, some nice fireworks, and the announcement of red as the RSC color of the month. Since then, I've been puttering away in the studio, doing little projects. I worked on my red blocks, made a couple secret project blocks, a whole bunch of miscellaneous crumb blocks, and some red, white and blue star blocks for Kat's latest Covered in Love drive. It's all felt rather patriotic.

We also had a major medical crisis with this little nubbin. After months of being away from any kind of veterinary care, she wisely waited until she was in The City That Never Sleeps to get sick. After two nights in an emergency animal hospital, she's recovering slowly from triaditis. Poor Angel, they shaved her belly for an ultrasound and she gets nasty medicines twice a day. But she hasn't used up all nine lives yet!

We are finally in a place where I can receive mail, so I had all our accumulated packages sent at once. I won a gift certificate to Stitch Stash Diva from Sandra's Playtime Plus QAL and bought these nice basics. At the top of the stack are two yards of black with subtle metallic polka dots, very fancy! Thank you so much to SSD and MMM for my PrizePrizePrize!

I also finally got to see my prize for participating in the Hands2Help charity challenge. This is a bundle of 30 super cute fat quarters from Moda. The fabric line is Hometown Christmas. Thank you so much, Sarah and Moda! All of Sarah's sponsors were so generous this year.

Karen of KaHolly sent me some orphan blocks, left behind after one of her friends passed away. They are about a half dozen machine appliqued flowers with beading details. Most of the charities I support ask that our quilts have no beads, buttons or other loose embellishments. So I'll remove the beads on these, clean them up a bit with some thread painting, and find a new home for them. They may end up with Quilts Beyond Borders. Thanks, Karen!

In addition to my freebies, two big boxes of fabric that I bought on eBay also arrived. This batch is all fun food themed pieces, including fruits, tea cups and silverware. Another box contained over 20 yards of bright blenders. After almost five months without fabric shopping, it was great to recharge the ol' stash. And it might be the season to celebrate the 4th of July, but it sure feels like Christmas here when all the boxes arrive!

Speaking of Christmas, Sarah is running her annual 12 Days of Christmas in July blog hop and quilt along. The quilt she designed for the QAL really spoke to me, so I decided to join in. She shows it in several colorways, including classic green and red, patriotic RWB, and frosty winter blues. My pile of red scraps were already sitting out for RSC, so I decided to do an all scrappy version.

The pattern uses the Tri-Recs rulers that I already own. Here are the side triangles cut for the scrappy neutral background.

I decided to make my third color turquoise/teal/aqua. I don't really need another Christmas quilt, and while I really like the patriotic/QOV look of red, white, and blue, something about aqua and red together is just so bright and fresh. This was last month's color for RSC, so all my scraps were already neatly pressed and organized. After a few happy hours of trimming, I'm all ready for the next steps of the QAL.