Another UFO Finished!

Our quilt guild's UFO (UnFinished Object) Challenge has been a great motivator this year, helping me clear out some old projects. Our assignment for April was UFO #2, and for me that meant finishing my Pinwheels Christmas Tree Quilt. It feels great to have this finished long before the Christmas season, and I know exactly where I will hang it when the holidays get here.

Pinwheels Christmas Tree, 39" x 46"

My quilt was inspired by a friend's quilt that was displayed in our guild's Christmas market booth in past years. This is Martha's Pinwheel Christmas Tree quilt.

Martha's quilt

I changed up the design a little bit, alternating the direction that the pinwheels spin from row to row, plus the star is different. My favorite part is the cute background fabric of Christmas lights, which had been in my stash for many years.

The backing fabric is a "Peanuts" Christmas print, which had also been in the stash for quite awhile. I managed to do some ruler quilting in the border, adding scallops all the way around.

I'm 3 for 3 on the UFO Challenge so far this year, and I hope to continue that way for the rest of the challenge. My project for May is a small one, so I'm hoping to get it done quickly and have time to work on some other UFOs.

Linking up with:

Wednesday Wait Loss at Inquiring Quilter

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday (TGIFF) at Quilted Delights

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA 

Sunday Stash and Stitching 4/19/2026

My weekly stash report shows a decent amount of fabric used for the week, and no new fabric was added to the stash last week. Maybe I'll actually get back to even before too long.

The fabric used last week was 2.75 yards for a new pair of pajama pants. I had a very old pair made from Milwaukee Brewers fabric (my favorite baseball team,) and they were so worn I was afraid they were about to fall apart in the washer. Here are the old pair along with the new ones. Yes, they really did fade that much!

2026 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                   2.75 yards

Used year to date:               33.0 yards

Added last week:                   0.0 yards

Added year to date:            43.75 yards

Net added in 2026:         10.75 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I've been busy getting ready for guests plus an upcoming trip, but I still managed to find at least a little time to sew or quilt every day.

15 Minute Challenge 2026

4/12 - 4/18             7 of 7 days

2026 Total        107 of 108 days

Success rate                 99 %   

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. Thanks so much to Donna and Kate for continuing to host these link-ups. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Sunday Stash and Stitching 4/12/2026

The weekly stash report is showing some movement on the fabric used side, even though quilting time was in short supply last week. The majority of my sewing time was spent on some simple tote bags that our quilt guild gives to the church where the guild meets to be included in the shoebox gifts they put together for children over the holidays. 

I made 10 bags using fabrics from my stash, 5 yards total. The adorable whale prints were a prize in a long-ago giveaway.

Unfortunately, I didn't have enough webbing to add the handles to several of the bags. I hope to get more from our community service chair next week.

I also made 11 bags from home decor fabrics that had been given to me (not counted as part of my stash.) Again, several of them still need handles.

My other sewing project for the week was to make myself a new apron. I got used to wearing an apron at work, and I still find it useful while sewing at home. It has plenty of pockets, including a good spot to hold my phone while I listen to audiobooks, plus a leather sheath to keep a small scissors handy for clipping threads. 3/4 yard of fabric used.

No new fabric was added to the stash last week.

2026 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                   5.75 yards

Used year to date:              30.25 yards

Added last week:                   0.0 yards

Added year to date:            43.75 yards

Net added in 2026:           13.5 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I'm happy to have made good progress on the tote bags, and they were an easy project to pick up for short periods of sewing time.

15 Minute Challenge 2026

4/5 - 4/11               7 of 7 days

2026 Total        100 of 101 days

Success rate                 99 %   

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. Thanks so much to Donna and Kate for continuing to host these link-ups. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Sunday Stash and Stitching 4/5/2026

It's finally time for some yardage to be counted in the used column on my Stash Report for the past week. My Lighthouse Inn quilt was finished a couple weeks ago, and I can now report 5.625 yards used for the backing, binding and hanging sleeve. You can read more about this quilt and see additional photos in THIS POST.

Lighthouse Inn, 56.5" x 81"

No fabric was added to the stash last week.

2026 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                 5.625 yards

Used year to date:               24.5 yards

Added last week:                   0.0 yards

Added year to date:            43.75 yards

Net added in 2026:         19.25 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I worked on a variety of quilts last week, including piecing the quilt top for a community service project, plus finishing my monthly UFO for our guild challenge.

15 Minute Challenge 2026

3/29 - 4/4               7 of 7 days

2026 Total            93 of 94 days

Success rate               98.9 %   

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. Thanks so much to Donna and Kate for continuing to host these link-ups. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Lighthouse Inn Finished!

My main quilting goal since the beginning of this year has been to finish some quilts before the end of March, the entry deadline for a local quilt show. The first of those quilts to be completed was Lighthouse Inn, a 2024 mystery quilt designed by Weeks Ringle and Bill Kerr of Modern Quilt Studio.

Lighthouse Inn, 56.5" x 81"

Lighthouse Inn was a mystery quilt-along unlike any other I have done before (and I've made plenty of mystery quilts!) We made blocks in a variety of sizes and designs for four weeks, then cut them all in half diagonally and joined a light half with a dark half to produce a whole new set of blocks. The blocks ranged in size from 3.5" up to 7.25", increasing in 1/4" increments. Here are my blocks before the background/sashing was added.

Choosing a quilting design for this quilt was difficult, but I went with a modern-looking design of interlocking boxes. I believe it is called Square Dance. Unfortunately, the pollen outside is so nasty that all my photos had to be taken indoors.

I found the perfect fabric for the quilt back, with spots of pink, orange, yellow and light blue on navy. I might need to order some more of this fabric for the background of a future quilt.

If you are interested in seeing other versions of the Lighthouse Inn Mystery Quilt, you can check them out at the Lighthouse Inn Virtual Exhibition page at Modern Quilt Studio. Their mysteries are always fun and challenging. I'm so glad to have finished my version on Lighthouse Inn, and it is currently hanging in a prominent spot in our house.

Linking up with:

Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

Monday Musings at Songbird Designs

Wednesday Wait Loss at Inquiring Quilter

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Sunday Stash and Stitching 3/29/2026

My Stash Report has taken a dangerous turn in recent weeks, with far too much fabric being added. I have been working hard on finishing up a few quilts for an upcoming quilt show, which will help balance out the numbers eventually. However, I'm not counting any of those fabrics as used until I share each finished quilt in a blog post.

The additions to the stash included 2 fat quarter bundles plus a few extra yards of Kaffe Collective fabrics, 11.5 yards total. These fabrics are so much fun, but I struggle with figuring out how to use them.

I also bought two bundles of remnants, most of them batiks, which added up to 6.5 yards after I gave a few pieces away on the free table at our guild meeting. The black fabric at the top of the photo is a 5-yard piece that was on deep discount, which should work nicely as a background someday. I also bought one charm pack (.75 yard, not shown.)

Total additions to the stash: 23.75 yards. No fabric used last week.

2026 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                     0.0 yards

Used year to date:            18.875 yards

Added last week:                23.75 yards

Added year to date:            43.75 yards

Net added in 2026:      24.875 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. My report covers the last two weeks because I was in Wisconsin visiting family last Sunday. For the first time all year, I had one day with no time spent quilting, but I more than made up for that as I raced the clock to meet the entry deadline for the quilt show.

15 Minute Challenge 2026

3/15 - 3/28          13 of 14 days

2026 Total            86 of 87 days

Success rate               98.8 %   

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. Thanks so much to Donna and Kate for continuing to host these link-ups. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

2026 Temperature Quilt, Version 2

Back in January I shared a post about my plans for a 2026 Temperature Quilt. I had such a good time making my 2025 Temperature Quilt that I was eager to start a new one. I decided at that time to keep it easy and started to piece a Herringbone Quilt. This section represents the highs and lows for the first 9 days of 2026.

Well, that plan didn't last long. Just a day or two after that blog post, I was talking to my sister Karen, who is also a quilter. She was considering making a temperature quilt, and we discovered that we were both very intrigued by a design by Jo Avery. The next photo is Jo's 2022 Sea Urchin temperature quilt.

I discovered that Jo teaches an online workshop that includes the Sea Urchin design, her Supernova class at The Thread House Academy. We both got signed up for the class and began our separate versions of this amazing quilt.

I'm using most of the same fabrics for my Sea Urchin quilt as last year's temperature quilt which are  Glaze and Glaze II by Libs Elliott for Andover Fabrics. Here's my color palette for the 2026 quilt. The hot pink diamond at the bottom center represents the hottest temps, over 100 degrees, and they go down in increments of 3 degrees, with the grey for the lowest temps. The black solid will be my background.

Jo's method for making this design involves drawing it out on light-weight non-fusible interfacing, which becomes the foundation for the piecing and is not removed from the blocks. The fact that the shapes are a little wonky and vary in size makes it easier to deal with the fact that the  number of days varies from month to month. Here is the pieced area of my January block from both the right and wrong sides.

The last steps for finishing the January block were adding the black background around the outside and at the center. I machine pieced the outer background to the foundation-pieced section, then hand appliqued the center. 

This is my block for January, 2026. The tiny safety pin in the top  segment marks January 1st, and the days move clockwise around the block. The outer wedges represent the daily high temperatures, and the inner wedges are the lows.

I have the foundation piecing done for the February block and need to get the four quadrants of it joined together before I can add the background. Karen and I are going to get together this weekend, and I can't wait to see how different our blocks look. My block represents the temperatures for the Atlanta airport, our nearest weather station, and hers will be for Madison, WI. We are not using the same fabrics, but our colors are similar.

I'm  linking up with:

Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

Monday Musings at Songbird Designs

Wednesday Wait Loss at Inquiring Quilter

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Sunday Stash and Stitching 3/15/2026

Spring has been putting on a show here lately, with several days of warm temperatures and all sorts of flowers and trees blooming. We spent a few days in New Orleans this week, and it was even warmer there (mid 80's) until one night when thunderstorms rolled in and cooled things off. We are back home now and expecting a major cool-down in a day or so.

Here's a tip for anyone planning a trip to New Orleans--the National WWII Museum is well worth a visit. We took a highlights tour in the morning, then spent more time after lunch exploring on our own. It was very easy to spend a whole day there, and we still didn't see it all. Highly recommended! We also spent some time wandering the French Quarter and ate lots of wonderful seafood.

St. Louis Cathedral/Jackson Square

New Orleans

My stash report is very brief this week because there is nothing to show and very little to tell. The only change to the stash was the addition of 2 yards of black solid for my new temperature quilt project, and I didn't bother taking a photo of that.

2026 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                     0.0 yards

Used year to date:            18.875 yards

Added last week:                   2.0 yards

Added year to date:              20.0 yards

Net added in 2026:         1.125 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. The trip to New Orleans reduced my quilting time, but I did take a hand-stitching project along. I also got to visit one quilt shop there. Now that we are back home, I'm finishing up the binding on a quilt.

15 Minute Challenge 2026

3/3 - 3/14                7 of 7 days

2026 Total            73 of 73 days

Success rate                100 %   

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. Thanks so much to Donna and Kate for continuing to host these link-ups. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Sunday Stash and Stitching 3/8/2026

It has been another busy week, with a little time spent quilting combined with lots of time getting the house ready for a birthday party yesterday. Having people over is always good motivation to get the place cleaned up. The party was last night, so I'm looking forward to more quilting time today.

The quilting highlight of the past week was finishing up my UFO #5 for our guild challenge, the Square Dance quilt. You can read more about it HERE.

I used 3/8 yard of fabric for the binding on this quilt, and there was no new fabric added this week. 

2026 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                   .375 yards

Used year to date:            18.875 yards

Added last week:                   0.0 yards

Added year to date:              18.0 yards

Net used in 2026:             .875 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. Along with the binding on the Square Dance quilt, I have been working on the February block for my 2026 temperature quilt. I also made the bindings for three quilts that are being long-arm quilted, and I just got the first of those quilts back a few days ago. It's time to start attaching binding and a hanging sleeve.

15 Minute Challenge 2026

3/1 - 3/7                 7 of 7 days

2026 Total            66 of 66 days

Success rate                100 %   

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. Thanks so much to Donna and Kate for continuing to host these link-ups. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Another UFO Finished!

The assigned number for the next UFO to be finished as part of our guild challenge was #5. As I'd hoped, it was a quick finish for me because my #5 project was a small quilt top that needed to be quilted and bound. This is my finished Square Dance quilt.

Square Dance quilt

40" x 52"

The blocks for this quilt were made as part of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge throughout 2020. The Square Dance pattern was the Stashbuster Challenge Block at Border Creek Station that year. Each block is basically a Double Four-Patch, with the black squares forming a diagonal chain through the block. 

I made about 30 blocks each month using the assigned color of the month along with the next color of the rainbow progression. By the end of the year, I had the blocks all joined together into two small quilt tops that measured 40" x 60" each. 

I could have joined the two small tops into a throw-sized quilt, but decided they would be more useful as baby/kid quilts. The first quilt was finished in the fall of 2022, and now I've finally finished the second quilt. I removed two rows of blocks before quilting, taking the size down to 40" x 52". I used one of my favorite flannel prints for the back, and quilted wavy lines through the chains of black squares. A black binding was added, and this UFO was finished!

I'm 2 for 2 on the UFO challenge so far this year, mostly because the first two projects assigned were easy ones. I've got my fingers crossed that my success rate continues for the rest of the year.

I'm  linking up with:

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

TGIFF (Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday) at Anja Quilts

 Rainbow Scrap Challenge at So Scrappy

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA