When the Covid stuff hit I was in what I called a "hang over" after doing the Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt and had lost my mojo. Covid came and that put me in a real funk. That was here in Seattle and was months ago now... took me about 3 weeks or so after lock down began to start sewing again. The reality is that my life is rather isolated anyway by choice, I quilt, I play video games, I read, garden, do other mostly solitary activities and we are doing ok. My hubby is still working, my son is working from home, my DDiL worked for Ikea, but she gets to be home with her new born now so that is pretty awesome! I like to sew/do something fabric related for about an hour a day. Some days more, but I'm prewashing, cutting, piecing, something, so to have had 2-3 months of zero activity is really rare.
I'm also having problems getting going on one of my "serious" projects so am choosing quick small bursts of projects in-between mask making. I really don't want to be making masks at all but the need is there. I'm not counting because I don't want to know but It's somewhere between 20-100. I'm making "walking around masks" for healthy people, it's just an 8.5" by 16" rectangle, sew right sides together along the short edge, turn right side out and slightly off set the seam. Make your three pleats, pin and stay stitch. Since we are out of elastic I've used up all my left over bias quilt bindings. I trim them to 1,5-2" (sadly, jelly roll 2.5" are just too wide and too heavy) and make them into double fold. I cut each side at 36", center on the masks, cover the raw ends and then just zig zag down the length of the tie.
Some days, yeah, I'm making myself do things and my heart isn't in it so much. That's usually my mask making days! But sometimes I'm working with my stash, either organizing it or getting it into a bigger mess pulling pieces for other people. This can be a good time to look at your UFOs or maybe kit up a few projects/at least put fabrics together. If you have unfinished tops, do you have binding and backing to go with them?
This week I'm preparing some tops/backs to go to a beginning long armer who needs some practice pieces. Two of them from my Unfinished album (Wonky Bright and Confetti) are going, along with some of my thrift store purchases that I didn't even count in my unfinished because I didn't make them. Tops that end up in the thrift store often have various issues. Since I didn't put in the initial work, I don't mind putting in a few additional fixes and things here and there. A lot of time they need a backing, and are just larger than one width of fabric. Other times they are an awkward size and need something added or taken away. And some times they are just so bad they can't be saved accept for the usable fabric!
So the Bright Thrift top, came to me in two pieces. It was very long and skinny, I think they got carried away putting even numbers of blocks together and actually meant to have one more width row than it does and be shorter, but there were workmanship issues (a lot of double sewn seam, so a 1/4" seam plus a second on the 1/2", and I wasn't going to take apart. But I was willing to cut some off one end... Top was less than $5, the large scale bike back was another less than $5 thrift store buy and I think it goes better with this top than anything else I can think of, and I added the elephant border.
The Turtle Panel was another thrift store buy, as was the backing fabric. I originally was going to use a piece of turtle fabric I had in my stash but it was too small and figured this was the perfect opportunity for the large print.
Today's project is a simple rail fence, think I got this for less than $2, it had a skinny flimsy poly blend broadcloth green border around it that I took off. I think it needs one more set of blocks and I have many of the same fabrics, so I'm going to make them and add probably about an 8" border all around of the dark print up top which will also be the back and binding. You can't see it at all well but it is a dark purple with lighter purple flowers, from VIP Concord, about the same time period as a lot of those fabrics. I'm estimating it to be about a 2-4 hour project, but I spread it through the day in 5 minute bursts
