Keep on Pedaling - A Finished T-Shirt Quilt

A three-in-one post to finish out the year in t-shirt quilts!

I made three quilts for one family, using shirts and cycling jersey from the patriarch who passed away this summer.

His shirts tell a story about a man who very involved in what I assume was his kids' high school sports, college alma mater, and cycling. {I googled the Death Ride. I can't make it up one mountain pass, much less FIVE!}

He also liked the Raiders and his church - there was a Serve Day shirt for every quilt.

Since I was listening to the Hamilton soundtrack as I finished these, I started thinking about "who lives, who dies, who tells your story."

When I'm feeling sentimental, I think about the part I play in helping people tell their story, and how honored I am that people let me do that.

And then I cried - which is not shocking because I cry at the end of the Hamilton soundtrack every time. {Spoiler alert - Hamilton dies!}

I got to tell sixteen stories this year - a college graduate, a fireman, a close friend, bunches of runners, and five in memory of people who passed away. Every one has meant so much to me. *sniffle* I love you all, thank you so much for trusting me with your stories! 

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Goals for 2018

I'm coming off a fairly successful 2017 - 30 finished quilts {16 t-shirt quilts, 14 of my own} and a longarm purchase - so it's tempting to repeat the same goals as 2017.

Wildflower Log Cabin, made from scraps of a 2011 sampler

Focusing on UFOs helped me finish ten projects that were started from 2011-2016, and most of my small finishes were things that were hanging around for a year or more. But... It wasn't really fun to not really start anything new this year. Of the four new finished quilts, two were planned in 2016, and one was a commissioned quilt.

The Best of the PacNW was really the only brand new project of 2017.

Which kind of sucks, creatively - I didn't spend very much time pulling fabrics and planning out patterns and that kind of thing. I wasn't able to join Meadow Mist Designs' Mystery Quilt even though I knew the design was gorgeous. {She has a sneak peek option, which is awesome!} 

So that's what I want to change in 2018, and I've already made some small steps toward adding new projects back into my rotation. First, I bugged Jennie until she designed some new patterns just for me.  {Okay, maybe also for the rest of you. And check out her Tulip QAL!}

I joined a private Bee on Instagram, so I get to pull a variety of fabrics and try a new block every month. Hosting BOMs Away helps excuse "adding" another project like that. I may have collected an actual full month of Block of the Months now!

I'm going to do 18 in 2018, APQ's 12 UFOs, and Patchwork Times' 2018 UFO Challenge. But I'm lazy and there's no way I'm pulling down 12-18 boxes just to take a picture of each UFO. I'll add a monthly before/after picture. And I'm just going to work from the top down, rather than assigning a number and having to pull a box from the bottom just because it's number is up.

{My January OMG goal - definitely the Cars fabric box and a quilt for my nephew!}

I'm going to copy Confession of a Fabric Addict's Scrap Attack on the months that it interests me. {Double Wedding Ring does not. Using my bags of leftover HSTs does.} And again, I'm being lazy and not making my own plans.

I'm going to do 6&6 in 2018 - that way if something interests me throughout the year, I have an excuse to add it to the list. And since January is a "new project" month, I'm going to start Meadow Mist's mystery.

Not to mention the ever faithful t-shirt quilts, with two already waiting for the holiday season to finish up.

Oh, and I bought EQ to work on designing my own patterns. So THAT'S a pretty big goal!

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BOMs Away - Rail Fence Christmas

Merry Christmas to all who are celebrating today! By the time this posts around midnight, I'll have been woken up by my youngest three times, probably. He woke me up on the 22nd at 5:30 am to ask about presents. Man, six year olds are so much fun this time of year! 

My in laws are here, but it's the end of the month, so I just have a short report on my leader/ender, the RWB rail fence.

48/192ish, moving right along. I did some of Celtic Solstice's HST as leader/enders this month, too, so that accounts for a bit fewer additions this month. But I also found a bag of RWB 1.5" scraps, so my bin is chock full of next month's work.

So did anyone else work on their BOM? Or a project broken into {slightly} more manageable monthly pieces? Or just a monthly report on a leader/ender project? Link up here or at What a Hoot! 

Since it's the holidays, we're carrying over the linky party from last week. If you did something new, go ahead and add it even if you linked last week!

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Dr Who Epic - a Finished Quilt!

Another year, another 40th birthday quilt! This time it's for my {older} sister, who is a pretty giant nerd. Not that we're ashamed of nerds in our family - see Because Science, Minecraft 2 and Bad Boys of Minecraft...

So there's an awesome bag-maker on Instagram/Etsy named RockBabyScissors, and she has a massive Spoonflower Dr Who collection because her customers are nerds. I bought her scraps in a destash twice, which gave me a well-rounded collection of Dr Who fabric.

Add in the prints sold at Joann's and Fabric.com, and it becomes epic.

I did simple patchwork of 6.5" and 3.5" unfinished squares, fussy cutting out details and trying to use every bit possible. I think it ends up being about fifty different Dr Who prints, nothing used more than three times.

My original plan was to have the smaller four-patches make an X across the quilt, but it didn't look right as a square, so I scattered them around and used a 10x12 layout.

There's still just a hint of the X in the center of the quilt.

There was one piece that was too big to fussy cut, so I used it as the label. I figured it was a good one for that honor!

The binding is a blue stripe I've had in my stash forever - I'm finally down to the last fat quarter of it. The backing is {obviously} more Dr Who - flannel this time. The quilting is lazy freehand orange peels.

60x72"

{And I have so many scraps of the scraps, I'm going to be selling custom ones in my shop!}

See also: Finish It Up Friday, Whoop Whoop, TGIFF, Needle & Thread Thursday, Finished or Not Friday, Show Off Saturday, One Monthly Goal, Finish Along{list}

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