It's All In the Prep Work

I am part of a group of quilters through our church, the Loving Hands Quilters.  We make baptism quilts for the babies in our congregation and those who are baptized in our church.  We donate quilts to various charities both local and worldwide. We enjoy working together.

Everyone has a task they like best, but we all do various things.  Over the past couple of years I've become the "kit maker".  We pick various patterns to sew, and I cut up fabric from our stash and pack each kit in a zip-locked plastic bag.  I label the bag with the pattern name, and everyone works from their personal copy of the pattern.

We cleaned and organized our stash recently.  I ended up with a large tub of fabric, tied into bundles of fabrics that go together.  Now I have to start cutting.

Normally we're what we call 'self-funded'... that is, we are on our own for finances.  This has been OK for a long while, because we have donated fabrics to work from, and we've made do with things from our various personal resource centers.  Once in a while we get some money and go pick up the things that we're missing.  Most of the time we buy solids or tone on tone fabrics, and batting.

This month I have the pleasant task of spending a few dollars to fill the gaps in our stash.  We have a lot of floral calicoes, and we need some coordiates and some muslin.

The ladies requested that we do a couple of heart applique patterns.  I picked up a bolt of Wonder Under at Joann's with my 40% off coupon.  Then I used my ASG discount for another 10% off.  I spent this afternoon tracing my heart templates onto the paper side, and ironing them onto swatches of the various florals and other small pieces of fabric. 

Then. I. Cut. Them. Out.  Wow, even when watching reruns of The Gilmore Girls, that makes for a long, boring afternoon!!  Then, more ironing onto 6 1/2 inch squares of muslin. 

I hope someone else wants to sew around the edges of these hearts.  I think I may be tired of looking at them...