Yesterday, I was puzzled to see a crowd of honey bees on my doorstep. They were sort of flying around drunkenly, and crawling on the concrete. I am allergic to any kind of stinging thing, including bees, but I am fascinated by them and respect them. I called my neighbor who has a hive, and asked her if they were hers, nope, hers were all together in their home, not active yet. I continued to watch them through the day, I thought maybe there was a swarm, but couldn’t see any from my vantage point, and I wasn’t keen on going out there to look. At around five, my DD came home from work and she told me that when she got out of her car she could hear a buzzing and looked up, and there in the small oak above was a massive swarm. They were there all right, and I could see them from the safety of my kitchen. I called my neighbor back and asked her if she was sure her’s were home, yes, they were. She also said that the bee keeper who helps her was coming tomorrow, and he could take a look and take them with him to a new home. That was my excitement of the day. They are still hanging out this morning, I am hoping the Keeper will be able to get them. In a way, I’d like them to stay, find a nice hollow tree somewhere, but I can’t risk it. They will have a new hive later today.

I got about half of the evolution quilt top rows sewn together yesterday, I worked on it after making a bunch of strip sets for the Hampton Court QAL. I had to quit after half, because I had been at the machine too long, my upper back was starting to ache a bit. The Hampton Court strip sets are going quickly. In my last post I explained that I mistakenly cut the brown strips for the single piece piecing plan, and realized half way through. I sewed the all the right sized strips I had together to make as many strips sets as I could. Then I got creative and figured out I could sew the rest in web-mode. I sewed the pairs or three’s of the prints together, cut them to width and then made a web with those strips and the brown spacers. It was quite a bit slower than normal strip piecing, but I only had so much brown. I’m glad I went with the brown, I was afraid that it would be lost in the prints, but it is a nice rich color, like the Sequoia fabric line. I want to finish these sets (36 more) today, and if I’m up to it the Evolution quilt top too.

Happy Worldwide Quilting Day!

Be Kind.

The best laid plans…

I waver between liking quilting patterns and free form quilt making. Maybe because I can get lost both ways. The Evolution quilt top is almost a top, I web stitched it vertically together. I was able to put most of it on my design wall, I had to use the wall sideways on a chair, but it help most of the pieces. The lower third were on the floor, and I remembered to keep the door closed, so the dogs only walked through it once. This pattern-less quilt went through three different design attempts, it is much different than my original idea, but the colors are the same. Sadly, the main reason I started this was to use up the Arctic charm pack. I think I’ll just make something simple with that, maybe a disappearing 4 patch. I want to sew the rows on this one together this weekend. First I have to fix that errant HST in the second row.

I got side tracked when the Essex Linen for the Hampton Court QAL got here. I had already cut the fat quarter bundle into the proper sized pieces called for in the pattern. Just had to cut the solid, easy strip piecing ahead. I didn’t end up liking the linen color, Sierra, with the Laundry Basket Sequoia prints, it was a bit too pink. No worries though, since I ordered a bit (ahem) too much, I can use it on the backing of one of two other quilt kits I have in the queue. I started cutting the brown strips, only to discover that I had been looking at the wrong page/chart. I cut about 30 strips for the separate piecing version, not the size for the strip piecing version that I wanted to do. At least they are the right size, so I’ll be doing both versions of piecing this pattern requires. I figure, this way the fabrics will be sufficiently mixed and I will experience the fun of making a half and half quilt.

Was watching a FlossTube video the other day and the hostess was talking about her stitching WIPs. She had 41, FORTY ONE. I guess its possible to get that backed up, especially if that’s your main hobby, but really? I’m about half way done with ‘Pet All The Dogs’ to date, and I have two projects kitted up and waiting for me when it’s done. ‘Strawberry Fields’ and ‘Heaven and Nature’, SF is pretty small, and H&N is a medium size sampler.

I’ve seen a couple of cute smalls or minis lately, but I’m strangely not interested in actually starting any thing new. I have, however, found a few new charts on Etsy, that I might have to have.

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I have to remember I am a quilter first. Yep.

Linking up with Denise today for Put Your Foot Down #91 at For the Love Of Geese.

Be Kind.

This weekend I worked on a new project, which I am calling Evolution. I started out with the intent to use up a charm pack and a roll of 8 inch wide Boundless brand solids. The charm is a collection from Elizabeth Hartman, called Arctic. The two color families complimented each other nicely. I started out by cutting 5 inch squares from the solids and sewing them together with the Arctic squares in a random fashion. I wasn’t thrilled with how it was looking, dull and boring. I thought I’d add some four patches, still, not interesting. Hmm. Maybe some HST’s? I need a constant here, gray, coal gray, and I had two yards of it. The HST’s were looking good, I decided to drop the Actic charms. They just looked too washed out, the cute polar bears looked forlorn. I needed to let it rest for a day or so. On Friday, I was looking at Sarah’s site, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, and saw a link to Crafts, Cavies and Cooking and her current project called Sunny Lanes. I googled Sunny Lanes, I should have put the words “quilt pattern” in the search though, because SL is also the name of an “actress” of a certain type of films. Ugh, this should be an interesting next few weeks on social sites. Anyway, I found a bunch of patterns with the same name, some similar to CC&C’s, but I liked her version. It’s pretty simple, a sixteen patch block and four HST’s in a block. By rotating the blocks you get diamonds surrounding the sixteen patches and the seem to float in the background of other sixteen patches. I had a plan. Now the counting and figuring started, I finally mocked one up on EQ8 so I could count the pieces. I needed more fabric, I dug through some left over charms and found half a pack of Kona charms called “Dusty”. They matched pretty well, and since this is a stash quilt, that is good. I finished up the HST’s yesterday and need to iron them. This is going to be a design wall quilt, as achieving the proper random-ness will be easier that way.

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Also this weekend I got the bindings on three quilts, the two Mia Charro baby quilts, and Grassy Creek. I did end up cutting the outer row of squares in half to cover the quilting stitches that were, um, where they shouldn’t be. I cut out the Halloween Figs BOM blocks too. The mail brought another installment of the Holiday Snow Village, now I am two months behind. I’m really trying to like this quilt, but I just don’t like the way the printed accents look, too fake. I received the original brown yardage I bought for the Hampton Court quilt-a-long too, but I am waiting for the Essex linen I ordered to arrive to make a final decision on which to use. We are supposed to be putting the pieces together in the next two weeks to finish by 3/29. It’s doable.

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Pet All the Dogs is progressing too. I did the border, thankfully, it joined up on the left side. I also took it off the frame, trimmed it and finished the edges with an overlock stitch. I was hesitant to do so before stitching the border, as I didn’t want to cut off too much. Waiting meant I could have a three inch outer border with which to frame the piece. It is still a bit too wide for the frame, but I folded the extra inch under and it works fine.

It’s a rainy day today, I think I’ll get the ironing done, and head out to the post office, then get the long arm set to quilt the Garden City quilt.

Linking up with Judy at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts for Design Wall Monday today.

Be Kind.

Hmm, WordPress has changed my font, Okay then.

I finished the quilting on Grassy Creek yesterday. I am a little unhappy with it though. The quilt top wasn’t as square as I thought it was. The lines of quilting came up a little short on the right side as I progressed down the quilt. When I started, I trimmed all the rows at one time, which works on square quilts. When doing the layout on the computer it’s a bit easier too. I usually try to go over the edges by about an inch, that way the design looks like it goes to the edge and the stitching ends are covered in the binding. The OTHER way to do an all-over Panto is to trim it row by row. It’s sort of like the difference between rotary cutting and scissor cutting quilt pieces. I am thinking of trimming the outside border squares, so that the straight stitches are covered by the binding. That’ll make those outer patches look like they are 1 inch, instead of two.

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After I removed GC from the frame I measured and cut the pink minky and pinned it to the leaders. That’s my start, today I’ll get the tops on and start quilting. It’s like assembly line quilting, right? Plenty more quilts in this line. These two tops, the Irish chain Mia Charro Forest Friends tops, are going to be quilted side to side. I set them up next to each other and make the machine quilt across both. Same panto, with a two inch space in between. It’s very efficient, but it does require a bit more watching when the machine gets to the spot in the middle of the two. You have to watch that the foot stays on top of the quilt, and doesn’t get caught underneath. Bad things can happen, and with minky, it can be difficult to remove errant stitches with out leaving a mark.

Which reminds me of something I wanted to post about. When I was piecing the backing for the large tee shirt quilt, I was using some strips of burgundy in-between the navy to make it wider. There was a bit of stitching on the burgundy that I had to remove so I could use it. The was a very visible line in the fluff left after the threads were cut out. I was thinking about how, when making a stuffed toy, one must (can)pull the fluff out of the seam lines with a needle or stiletto to make it look better. I didn’t feel like carefully doing this with the minky though. I came up with a different technique, a soft tooth brush. I found that brushing the area with the grain and then against it, actually helped to erase the stitch lines.

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Going to get the binding done on GC today, have to trim it up first. Always a fun time on the floor with the three dogs “helping”.

Be Kind

I am making shopping bags this week. Just two, and a zipper bag to hold them. The shoppers are designed like those nasty plastic ones, only they are reusable and washable. Plus they are a lot prettier to look at. The recipient of these bags enjoys visiting London UK, sense the theme here? This is a linen print I picked up as a remnant, Cotton and Steel, I only had a yard, which was enough to cut the main parts for two bags, but only the handles for one. Stash to the rescue, I have a bunch of Essex linen scraps, this gray was perfect. The linings are Bella solids, simple. The zipper bag pattern came from The Polka Dot Chair, I used Annies foam stabilizer in between the fabrics and denim instead of canvas. It is “cushy” and padded, I don’t think is big enough for an iPad, but a good idea for one.

Speaking of stash, on our local neighborhood email group, someone posted a need for fabric and yarn. They are part of a local charity that makes blankets and things for homeless and low income families. I asked if they could use batting scraps, and yes, they could. I found three bags full, and another three bags of yarn, just hanging around. I stuffed them all into my car, for drop off later today. Yay! for de-stashing.

Yesterday I wanted to finish up the quilting on my Grassy Creek quilt, I even turned everything on and got ready to line up the next row. Then I remembered that our power supplier was going to work on equipment near by, which means they shut the power off on our road. For hours. It makes me angry, not that I don’t have power, but that they let the infrastructure degrade so much over the past 50 years, that now they have to replace rather than maintain. Reminds me of another big state in the news recently. Anyway, we had gotten letters saying that they were going to do said work on 3/9/21. Rather than have the power cut while quilting mid-row, I opted to cut out the bags. Of course, they didn’t shut it off, and they don’t have to tell us that they aren’t going to do the work on that day. They’ll just send a re-schedule notice next week. I am hoping to get GC done today. The power company can’t shut us off without 72 hours notice, thankfully. So I am safe for a few more days.

Be Kind.