UFOs on Parade

Some years ago (at least 13), the city of Chicago had an outdoor art exhibit called "Cows on Parade." Different artists decorated life-sized fiberglass cows, which were then placed all around the city. Many other places copied this concept. Okay, maybe Chicago didn't start the trend, but they're the first city I'm aware of who did this.

This summer when we went out west, one of the towns we stayed at in South Dakota had "Buffalo on Parade." I posed with this buffalo that had a lone star quilt painted on its back.

In a similar fashion, Judy is encouraging us to parade our UFOs. No, she doesn't want to see photos of alien spaceships, rather Un-Finished Objects. They say confession is good for the soul, so here are some of my UFOs:

I started making these Dresden plates for our first house. We had a little breakfast bar in our tiny kitchen that had room for two barstools. The idea was to make each Dresden into a cushion for a barstool. I obviously didn't get real far, and we sold that house 14 1/2 years ago, so these babies have been sitting in the UFO pile for quite some time!

Many years ago, I started making this red and white Double 9-patch quilt. Somewhere I had read a tip to sew two long strips together after you sew strips for a different project, almost a leader/ender project, but they never mentioned leaving the strip in the machine to save on thread. I slowly got lots of strips sewn together and then cut into 3-piece units. Then they sat in this box for a long time. Since hearing about Bonnie Hunter's leaders/enders idea, I've been working on Easy Street as my L/Es, but when I'm sewing the Easy Street units into the blocks, I've been using these 9-patches for my L/Es. (I hope that makes sense!) I keep this box with its envelopes on the table next to my machine, so I can just grab two units when I need a L/E.

This is my dozen long-stemmed roses wall hanging. I had seen a similar quilt but with daffodils in the center, hanging on the wall of a house in some magazine. I came up with my own dimensions and I used roses and stems from Elly Sienkiewicz's book Baltimore Beauties and Beyond. The applique is all hand needle-turned, with stuffed, 3D roses. There was a perfect spot in our master bedroom at our 2nd house, so I was making this for that area. But we moved out of that house 5 years ago. I LOVE this quilt and would really like to finish it, but I'm a bit unsure of how to quilt it. So it sits, all folded up and forlorn, in my UFO armoire.

Back in January when I came up with my 2013 Goals, I mentioned having some UFOs made of Christmas fabrics. This is one of them. The pattern came from a magazine (I can't recall which at the moment). It's supposed to be a gift for a certain someone if I ever finish it! I have all the blocks made.

Here's another Christmas UFO. This one will make a star when it's put together. All the blocks are made. Another someday gift...

And a third Christmas UFO to be a gift, from another magazine. I have all the 9-patches made, but they are supposed to alternate with stars, which I haven't even started.

Does it count as a UFO if I've only cut out the strips, but not done any sewing yet??? This will be another Christmas quilt, a red and green log cabin, but I'm keeping it for my hubby and me. Yep, I do love my Christmas fabrics!

Here's one of my more recent UFOs. It's called "Climbing Roses," and I got the pattern from a "Quilt Sampler" magazine. I don't usually make a quilt with the exact fabrics that are shown in a magazine or pattern, but I absolutely FELL in LOVE with these fabrics. Top is all put together (not looking so great after being folded for the past few years); needs quilting and binding.

Then there are a few other UFOs that I didn't drag out for photos. I have another red and white quilt that consists only of two different sized squares (top is not finished yet); my All-Star quilt that I've been slowly working on each month since the summer; Northern Lights, a patriotic star block that I was going to use in my All-Star quilt, but I didn't like how different it was from the other blocks (I plan on making it into a pillow); a small (wall-hanging or pillow) quilt with American flags in the shape of hearts (started that at a class, I think it's ready for quilting); Robbing Peter to Pay Paul red and white quilt that I started hand-appliqueing because I didn't want to do curved piecing (less than half the blocks are done); a broderie-perse type doll quilt I started in another class (needs fusible applique to finish the top). There might be more lurking about the back corners of the armoire.

That doesn't include the numerous projects that I've got in progress right now! If I would just focus on one or two and not start new projects, I could probably finish a lot of these up. But where's the fun in that?????

Head on over to Judy's to see more confessional UFOs on parade.

Happy stitching!