Big Blockheads Plans

In keeping with my optimism to stay till the finish of a Blockheads sew-along, I am diving in on this BH3 version currently in week 6. And I am doing reasonably well. I will need a bit more time to finish the applique block of week 4, and I made an extra block for week 5, but will get to work on the one for my BH3 group, and I have the current block to make. I am hoping that tomorrow will see weeks 5 and 6 finished off. (Keeping all that straight??)

I sorta' started off at a disadvantage, though, when the fabric I chose to use was a fat-eighths pack from years ago. I wrote about the limited fabric in this post. An out of print line, and only fat-eighths. Good grief. Could I have made a worse decision? But get this! I believe I have solved my dilemma.

Yesterday, DH and I took a pretty drive across a bit of southern Ohio to McArthur Quilt Shop. Pretty day for a drive, too! Such sunshine! I had some hope that I would find a fabric for a project, so I figured I could also look for suitable fabrics to substitute in to the pack shown above.

Before we left, I dug into the stash and found a stack of potential add-ins for this grouping. Those are stacked at the top of the picture. The only one I bought new is the brown on the right. I feel as thought these additions will work just fine, and I will be sure to check that some of those from the stash are pink and not peach or orange. I'm feeling pretty good about how this is going to work.

Now, the title says big plans, and so far nothing I've described here has been out of the ordinary.

Since BH3 started in mid-January, I decided that I would work on BH1 from 2 years ago, and do those blocks week-by-week as well. That is going very well, and I am staying relatively caught up - about the same as for BH3. I am using my stash of French General fabrics for BH1 and I believe I have enough of that to make things work. Fortunately, if I should run short, I know I can easily get more.

Aaaannnddd...what about BH2? I really did get that one started on time, and I had two quilts going at once - one in a bright historic fabric grouping, and one in a muted floral calico grouping. By week 8 of that sew-along, I threw in the towel. I was entirely unprepared for the unexpectedly large blocks, and I was running out of fabric, especially neutrals - same story for me, right??

So, I figured, why not go ahead and see what fabrics I could find - first from the stash, and then in McArthur - to at some point try to finish both of my BH2 quilts? Sure! Why not? Every quilter needs to have about a dozen quilts going at once, right?? *good grief*

This picture is the grouping of bright historical prints. I am willing to bet that it is hard to tell which is newly added and which is from the original pack. The blue, red, and cream fabrics folded at the top left of the picture are the new pieces. I think I got pretty lucky with these finds. It gives me renewed interest in getting back to work on those blocks.

My muted floral grouping also has some new additions - they are the five fabrics folded across the top of this picture. Again, I am feeling pretty good at how these appear to work so well.

With that, I believe my fabric shopping trip was successful. I found "fillers" for 3 quilts. I will give my best effort to stay caught up. I know I run the chance of the classes and grading to cut into my stitching time, but I believe I can always get caught back up if that should happen.

So, yes, I do have big plans. We shall see if I can accomplish them! If you'd like to see some of my previous Blockheads efforts, here are a few links - BH3 week 2, BH3 week 1, BH2 week 2.

Oh, guess what?

Last night, I cut out a baby quilt.

Yeah, I know. Too many quilts going at once! But I do love it so.

Happy Quilting, Friends!