BOMs Away - Once Upon a Star; also Martha's Holiday Spin

Welcome to the link-up for BOMs Away Mondays!

Where we share what we're doing on a BOM-type project 

so they don't stall out in UFO-land!

(Linky at the bottom.)

I've had a fun weekend of working on Christmas projects. For BOM work, I pulled out a McKenna Ryan project that I've only ever enjoyed working on. No problems with this one.  ;D

"Once Upon a Star" is getting trapunto work while I do all the stitching of the many-many fusible pieces, as well as of embroidery on the main elements before it will be quilted. Without that, the fusible applique just stays so flat and disappointing to me. Photographing this project is disappointing, too, because it's so much prettier in real life than I can get the camera to show. 

I've got the cute baby seal finished, and aren't those whiskers fabulous?

And I did the central scene with Santa and company. 

The star got stitched with a holographic silver thread - super pretty!! But it doesn't begin to show from the camera's point of view, so you can't see how terrific the effect is.

I've got the puffins ready to go for next time. Their 3-D stocking with its fish lives in a bag in my scissors drawer. This quilt will be entirely finished and on my wall the day after Thanksgiving next year!

And earlier in the week, I pulled a Christmas UFO out of the closet. It's not a BOM, but I was in the mood.  This one needed all of its border work. I got that finished up yesterday. It's queen size.

The colors are a little better in this indoor shot - lots of really great quilting potential in this one! 

I would like this to be a fun Christmas in July finish when I have more longarm templates to play around with.

~*~*~

Kate over at Katie Mae Quilts has joined me in hosting this meet-up,

and linking up from either end puts you on the party at both sides.

December NewFO

I love Barbara's NewFO parties each month, and they're really helping me get these kits pulled out of stone-cold status and on their way to becoming quilts before my youngest is out of high school.  ;D  Lots of other fun projects emerging, so take a fun  stroll through the other links!

December was a month of greatly-reduced production, but I knew it would be with the cruise and the holidays and all.  :D  So I won't be doing an end-of-month report. But I do have a NewFO to share.

Before the cruise, I pulled out an old Christmas quilt kit called "Martha's Holiday Spin" from 2007. I'd hoped to get the fabrics washed and ironed, but they just felt so nice in my hands that I went ahead and cut everything (except the borders' final lengths).

But once it was kitted up so nicely, I couldn't resist getting some of the sewing done on it before it has to go back into storage. I got all the main blocks made - 12 Martha Washington Stars on the left and 6 Spinning Shirleys on the right.

And I did up the 4 border cornerstones while I was at it since they're just the insides of the Martha Washington Star blocks. 

And now it's coming up to the New Year, when I have to cut back on quilting hours to really get down-and-dirty with my thesis until August. So this goes back on the Christmas Storage Shelf, probably not to see the light of day again until next year's holiday season. At least it's quite a good ways on its path to flimsyhood! The pattern has lots of open areas for awesome quilting, so I have high hopes for this quilt's final state.http://catpatches.blogspot.com/2013/12/december-newfo-linky-party-and-giveaway.html