Backing and Ready to Quilt

I'm ready to quilt my Friendship Churn dash. I sewed the borders on early in February and then went on to finish other things. This is one of the UFOs I listed as a first quarter finish for the 2018 Finish Along. Last week, when I was working on the Dresden Rings, I thought I wouldn't get around to finishing this after all. I didn't even have the backing for it.
Yesterday I finally got out to shop and after making a quick stop at Joann's, where I found nothing, I went to the quilt shop and found several choices.  Yes, I know..... I should have gone to the quilt shop first but I had a coupon and I was going to get batting (I didn't get that either).





I  decided in this large floral print and I am so happy to have decided on this instead of  one of the others I considered. The quilt top is 48 inches wide and the fabric is 43 inches wide without the selvages. I bought enough to piece the back but I didn't want to fuss around matching the print  so I looked through my fabric stash to see what I might use to insert  2 long strips. I was not having any luck until I looked in my recently sorted scraps and found 5 inch wide strips of the border fabric and YES!!! I had enough. I pieced the backing and layered and pin basted the quilt and I am ready to get it finished.

 I have about 1 1/4 yard of the floral print left; maybe I will start rebuilding my stash of floral prints. In 2010 when Melody Johnson had a "Quilt Along with Melody" I joined and my goal was to use up all the floral prints that I had collected when I was making  "colorwash " quilts. I've made a lot of quilts with the floral prints since that time and really pared down my floral stash to almost nothing (nothing that I like much, I should say). I like all of the quilts I made using those fabrics and I realize that I miss them in my stash. On the other hand, I am not so sure I want to accumulate a large stash of fabric again; maybe I will just start buying floral fabric for what I am going to make. I guess we'll see how that goes.
 For now, I am going to move some furniture and set up to quilt.

Finish A Long 2018

I've been looking for a quilt related goal setting link up,  something not too demanding but one that will keep me moving long. I settled on Finish Along 2018, you can read about it here. I like that I can set a quarterly goal which means I won't have to make a long list of all my UFO's right now. I probably don't have many by some peoples standards but I know from past experience that I have more than I can think of without digging through all my "stuff".

I am only going to list 2 projects for this quarter because I have a long term projects that will be ongoing.

First project is the Fancy Forest quilt that I have been working on. These are the blocks I have finished.  I have 2 Owl blocks to make and then I can put this together. I am having a hard time deciding on the fabrics for the owls but I think I can at least get them cut tomorrow. I want to finish this soon for my great grandson who arrived 2 months too soon but will soon be going home from the hospital.





































The second project is a small throw or wall hanging.  These Quails nest blocks are for The Friendship block swap group I belonged to and they are probably 5 years old. I have more of the blocks that are lighter and closer to pastel values and at some later time I will make something with them. I think the arrangement on the left  is the same as the blocks sewn together with sashing in the  photo on the right.
This quilt just needs a border and it will be ready to layer up. I think I will keep this one for some much needed color in the living room.


                                    

 I think that both these projects are doable for this quarter and that I will have time to work on my long term project as well. We'll See!