ALYoF Nov goal Met (mostly)

That Fabric I was all mad about not getting use on the dress I wanted to because the pattern was crap? Yeah, there wasn't enough for a dress anyway! So I found some other dramatic and ugly fabric to make a dress with. 

My dearest husband, love of my life, eternal companion, told me it makes me look 70. I'M ONLY 30. Lovely.

I have been working on making a shirt out of the original fabric but with my mom and sister coming in for my 8 year old Russell boy getting baptized it didn't work out too well. Ah, well. It will happen.

ALYoF - November Goal

So I have been given a lot of fabric, even more since I moved into this giant house. The last fabric, copious amounts of it I might add, came from an old lady from church who had moved to a nursing home. In it was some horribly ugly fabric, lots of it. I don't even know why I kept it. I've been going through my fabric recently, trying to get it in totes so I can stack it easier and the cat can't pee on it all, and I found this horrible stuff, red and purple and green and just all around ugly. Then I was going though my large suitcase of hand-me-down sewing patterns and found a dress pattern that I desperately wanted to make. It was knee length, v-neck, long bell sleeves with slits up to the elbows... amazing! And suddenly I wanted to use that super ugly fabric to make this dress. They just wanted to be together! So much for hating it, right? I kept telling myself if I made it through all of my Halloween sewing (we went with a Despicable Me 2 theme this year) then I could make my dress. Great. November first I was so excited. I pulled out my pattern, opened all the papers and SH*T. Whoever had the pattern before me (my guess is Sharon Welz, I got a lot of patterns from her) altered it in a manner that I could not salvage. And there was no instruction sheet, which yeah I could wing it but I had a fire going so in the pattern went! I was sad. I went through all my other patterns looking for one that would satisfy my desire for a new dress but alas, none was to be found. So I decided to organize my patterns and in the process found some I had forgotten about in a different part of the HELL that my craft room is and found a pattern that will be sufficient. Not perfect by any means, but I have some kind of feeling toward it at least. 

My goal this month is to get this dress done. I want to wear it with my purple nylons and combat boots. Yes, please!

Blogger's Quilt Festival: Hand Quilted Flowers

Last minute entry, as is my forte. HQMelissa just posted yesterday to let me know what I was missing out on. Apparently there is an online quilt show, the Blogger's Quilt Festival, going on right now. How exciting! This is my first ever finished quilt I am entering into the Hand Stitched category.

I made this quilt following along on Happy Quilting Melissa's Star Surround QAL last year. I love QALs! It's the only way I manage to finish a top. I didn't get the quilting done until this year, and I didn't manage to finish in in the time frame I had wanted to. My intention was to get to the ALSA of South Texas before April so it could be in their Fiesta Flowers event. It didn't happen, but because it didn't happen I got to deliver it in person when I visited San Antonio in person and that was exciting.

Each block is 32" wide. I decided to make it more a flower instead of a star because of it's intended destination. I think if I had used a color other than the green it would have been better, but picking colors with 3 children hanging on you is hell. I think the green still works. I tried to have a quilting party to get it done but only 4 people came to help. This is a queen size! I did most of the stitching myself. Let me tell you, I had to take a break and lay on the dog in the sunny window at one point because it was just so... Maybe if I hadn't had to get it out of the ballroom for a birthday party I could have let it linger and enjoyed the stitching more.

I also made this 24" pillow cases to go with it. 

ALYoF - August finish!

Got them both done!

ALYoF - August Goal

I've been struggling with goals lately. I'm so invested in the farmer's market and making monkeys but those don't really count towards ALYoF goals. Also, I got an email from All for the love of yarn the other day and I was so confused because their tag is AFLoY which is exactly the same letters as the Finishing party's but rearranged. WOAH! 

August my goal is going to be making 2 hoops. I know the finishing goals have to be for one thing but I won't count it if I don't get both. There is a Hoopla-a-long on Craftster and I've been wanting to participate in it but it hasn't been anywhere near the top of my priorities. Well this month it is! July's theme was "food" and I had an idea for it that I really wanted to make but didn't get to. August's theme is "whimsical" and I have no idea what I'm going to do but I will do it! Those are my goals! I already picked the hoops and fabric today so there is no stopping me now!

July's has to do with the alpaca fleece I cleaned, oohh... food? Alpaca? Where am I going with this?

For time and all eternity

May Complete!

May Goals: 

1: Dresses Complete! 

2: 20 Monkeys Complete! I could have done more, but I had to work on those dresses.

3: Yarn complete! No photo of it, but he library does have the "Fizz! Boom! READ!" yarn for the year. 

June Goals?

Well, I have a couple 1 inch stitcheries to make that aren't really on my goals list any more than feeding the kids but I'm going to stitch them!

And I need to get at least 30 monkeys done this month.

And I'm going to dive into the new bag of alpaca soon. That's going to be an adventure! 

But I don't know what my real "goal" will be for the month, ALYoF wise. Hmm, We will see what happens.

ALYoF: April Finishes/March Goals

How did I do on April's Goals? Well...

1) My Picnic Quilt Top was finished on time! I didn't win but I did finish the top so in a way I guess I did win.

2) The Hoop for my Craftster Swap was finished almost 2 weeks late. Boo... but considering all of the life that happened last month I'm not too upset about it. I totally meant to take a picture of it, though, and totally spaced it until I was sending the Sent! message. There were lots of French knots!

3) Pillows! They are so done! This was my mail goal for the Lovely Year of Finishes party so Hurrah! 

 Here they are Quilted...

 And here they are all bound up! I'm not going to send the pillow forms with them to SA because that would be way more expensive, but I am still going to donate them to the ALSA. 

4) Monkeys: I just now finished up getting the rest of the monkeys into the Hooker Stage. So many! 6 full boxes of Hookers in my stair well. 

5) The Temple Dresses did not get done. BUT I have another month to work on them so I'm not too upset. Like I mentioned, LOTS of life happened this month so it's cool if I missed 1 goal of 5. 

 80% is not bad for a month with that many of those kinds of goals, eh? 

So what about May?

1) Temple Dresses! Yup, gonna get them done with month. And they will be my official "goal" for the month as well. 

2) Monkeys: I need to get at least 20 monkeys done in May. At least. Hopefully my number will way surpass that but with how much life happened in April and how I am expecting to happen in May, I will be realistic. Included in that 20, however, needs to be at least 1 mini-monkey and the monkey for the Library's reading program.

3) Speaking of the reading program, my third and last goal for the month will be to finish this Yarn I've started that I want to donate to the library. The theme this year is "Fizz, Pop, Read" and is supposed to be a science theme. The shirts are going to be black with neon green so I'm designing another black yarn with neon bubbles. I've made I think 12oz of this yarn before and sent them to a friend in a personal swap, but that stuff had pink in it and this time I'm only going blue and green. I would omit the blue but I don't know if I have enough green to do the whole thing. The monkey I have planned is going to match the yarn.

Not too much for May. I think these 3 things are highly attainable, hopefully even surpass-able, and I'm excited to get started! But even if I don't get more done than I have set, even meeting all 3 of these I think will make me feel very successful. 

Cutting it Close: HQMelisssa's QAL finished!

It's tempting to go ahead and link this into each of the week's  but since I'm not posting each step as I finish I'll just link the last one. Here it is! I'm done with it! Now on to the other 4 goals of the month, and possibly a road trip and a new house mate. Wooo!

ALYoF: March complete! April goals.

So I finished my quilt for the ALSA Battle with Flowers Fiesta Event but not in time for this year. But they have the event every year so I will still be sending it in to them. I don't even get to go this year so it's just as well, right? It's always more satisfying to send stuff in when you get to go and see it up for auction and keep obsessively checking to see how much it is going for, right?

I'm not perfectly happy with the results of this quilt, but I did learn a lot. Every time I see it, though, all I see are my mistakes. *sigh*

It's all hand quilted, mostly by myself. I tell ya, at one point I just stopped mid-stitch and lay down in the sunshine on the floor with the dog. It sucked doing this all by myself with a deadline! I had a couple people come help but not enough, I say! 

So there is my Lovely Finish for the Month of March. Now I will tell you my goals for April! I have lots of them! Lots of motivation to get them done, too. Here's the list:

Picnic quilt top: By Wednesday, Apr 2 I have to have this done in time to get entered into the drawing for the 4 $75 gift certificates. YES PLEASE! Thank you HQMelissa! I'm over a month behind, ugh. I can do it! Kids, leave me the hell alone until Wednesday, right?

Hoop: I am currently in a hoop swap and have to have this hoop done by April 14th. Have plans. We'll see how they pan out. 

Temple Dresses for the girls: We were planning to get sealed next weekend in the San Antonio temple but plans have changed. Now we're shooting for the end of May, near our original wedding date. Yay! I still need to alter my wedding dress for it but more than that I want to make dresses for the girls, maybe a suit for the boy, but the dresses I want to have done by the end of April.

Pillows: To send with the quilt above to the auction next year I have 2 single blocks made that I am going to quilt and make into pillows! I'm not looking forward to it but my goal is to get them done by the end of April too. That's my official goal. I have the other 2 goals that have date but this one is officially my April ALYoF goal. Woo! Look, here's a picture of the blocks:

Monkeys: I sell sock monkeys at the farmer's market in the summer. I have well over 100 monkeys in different stages all around my house. Seriously, I was trying to keep them contained in the craft room but not only did we have to move lots of shtuff out of there because of upstairs plumbing issues, but there are so many monkeys I can't keep them all in there! Some are in the living room, some are in the "common area" outside the craft room, some are even in the ballroom stairwell! They are all in all stages from cut socks to finished monkeys, though I'll be honest: not very many are completely finished. My last goal for the month of April is to get them all at least to the Hooker stage, which is what I call them when they just need faces. Faceless bodies = hookers. So I have some to sew, some to stuff, and a bunch to assemble, my least favorite step. I want to start designing faces May 1st. That's the plan. I'm excited. 

And those are my goals! I'm not allowed to start cleaning up my craft space, or the space outside of it, or the office, or work on anything else until those things are done. Let's hope I don't burn out first. ;)

A Lovely Year of Finishes - February Goal

Remember this quilt from last summer? I'm getting it quilted! I hope to have it done by the 14th so I can send it off to be a part of the ALSA Fiesta Fund raiser auction in April. We got it started on Saturday. I don't know if I will make it by my deadline, but it will definitely be by before the end of the month. I also want to make some 24" matching pillows to send with it but we will see how that goes. So much going on this month!

I also have a rainbow party to throw for my Jo. Eep! It's so close!

I also need to get some dresses made for my girlies so we can go to the temple! I'M GETTING MARRIED! For real this time, y'all. Woo hoo! 

Star Light Star Bright - HSTs

So following along with Melissa still.

I have about 2 more hours of trimming these babies, at about 20 minutes/star, but I may be done tonight. That really depends on how well the kids go down. 

Still no camera battery charger, but hopefully the new one I ordered will be in in time for next week's assignment to be "turned in!" 

Star Light Star Bright flying geese!

I'm doing another Quilt Along with Happy Quilting Melissa! It is now the end of the 3rd week, 3rd assignment is due, and this is my first post about it. Sad face. But I have been following along fromt he beginning! My camera's battery charger has gone missing and no matter how much I search and search and search for it, and pray and pray and pray about it, I can't find it. But I had a thought tonight: I have a scanner on my computer. So while I can't scan in all of my fabrics and all of my flying geese, I can at least show you some of them, right?

Here you can see the 3 colors I'm using, blue orange and grey, and the 3 patterns I'm using as well. I got a 1/2 yard bundle from the Intrepid Thread of 6 cuts from a line called "Hipster" that included the top 2 prints in the O&B&G colors so to finish off the set I went and got 3 solids to match. The background fabric is more of a cream color I think but it came out pretty white in the scan. 

Yay! I am now on track. Now if I just just the charger before the assignments get too big...

ALYoF January Finish!

I spun silk! I did it, I'm awesome. I met my goal. I have over 300 yards here.

It is so thin. I think I want to use some for embroidery, that's how thin it is, even 2 ply.

I met my goal for the month so even if I don't win from ALYoF, I still win, right?

Oh, that other goal I had... 

Hmmm... 

It's still in progress. I did buy shelves, though! And my fiber is pretty much organized! And I can walk around in there so that's good, right? I knew it wouldn't be done done this month but I did work towards it. Progress! 

January Goal

A Lovely Year of Finishes = Monthly Goal Making

My January Goals:

Smaller goal: I finally want to spin some silk! I need to get something on this bobbin soon, and I really want it to be silk, these hankies to be exact. Although I did jsut get some angora bunny and kid mohair in the mail the other day... Maybe I'll card those after I spin this silk. Probably won't get to spin them before February, though. And that month is going to have all different goals!

Larger goal: get some order to this room so I can actually do something in there! I managed to get it so I could actually walk around in there on Monday night, but there is so much more I want to do in there, like sew! And use my carder! And all kinds of crazy crafty stuff! We'll see how far I get on this in January.

I never can get the button to work right so here is just a link to where I'm linking up for this.