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.

Actually, needs more fabric is a better title, but I like the old SSNL skit with Christopher Walken. Last month I signed on to Busy Hands’ quilt-a-long for Myra’s Hampton Court quilt. This is a monthly check in, low stress, fairly easy pattern, with nice community of quilters and I liked the quilt. First task was to choose the fabric, I wanted to use the two rolls of 30’s type florals I had bought when Blueprint had a clearance sale. But the more I looked at it, the less I liked the idea. Then the fat quarter stack of ‘Sequoia’ from Laundry Basket Quilts caught my eye, yes, that’ll do. Now to find the perfect accent solid for the pattern, I picked “earth” Bella Solid (small piece in photo), and ordered three and a half yards from The Fat Quarter shop. I then started cutting the strips from the FQ’s thinking I could get it done while waiting for the solid. That chore was finished last week and I still don’t have my accent fabric. Then I had the idea to order a different color/type from a different shop, and it would be here sooner. On average my last few orders of yardage from The FQS, have taken three weeks, precuts and supplies are faster though. I picked a pretty rust colored Essex linen ‘Sierra’ over at Equilter, checked the pattern and read 8 yards of contrasting/background needed, okay, done. I was happy that I had caught my mistake of not ordering enough fabric in the first order. Then I started thinking, wow, eight yards is a lot of fabric for this pattern. Yeah, like four and a half too much, darn it. I mis-read the pattern PDF, in my defense (lol) it was vertical on the screen, and reduced in size, and threes can look like eights. Mmhmm.

Now I have a bunch of fabric coming, a bunch because I had to buy a few more yards to get free shipping on both orders too. It’ll be a fun day when it all finally does arrive. I am thinking that the Earth colored Bella will also go with my collection of Tim Holtz fabrics, definitely a quilt or two worth of those. And, a pieced backing for the Hampton Court quilt will finish the linen. That’s my plan.

I am slowly working my way through the quilting of my Grassy Creek quilt. I am using wool batting and a pretty swirling feathery panto called Seaside Feathers. I like the puff, and the light weighted-ness wool batts give to a quilt. Once GC is off the frame, I have the two Mia Charro baby quilts (above) to get done, and the table runner I made for my DS back in December. Work is just piling up around here. It’s a rainy day today, so the lure of being outside is not as strong, good day for quilting.

I’ve been making progress on the Pet all the Dogs sampler. Started the side border yesterday, and finished the motifs on the right side. I’m kinda wishing I had incorporated a bit more color in this sampler, but I’m committed to finishing it as is. I finally got all the threads and fabric and patterns together for my next two cross-stitch projects, Heaven and Nature Sing and Strawberry Fields. They are all kitted up and waiting.

Be Kind.

The tee shirt quilt is done, quilted and bound. The quilting was finished Sunday and the binding yesterday. I did something “different” with the binding, I used minky. I was a little hesitant, but I have seen it done on YouTube, so it must be do-able. The quilt was so soft and drape-y, I didn’t want to put a plain cotton binding on it, too stiff and scratchy. I had enough left over minky from the backing to cut long strips, perpendicular to the grain/stretch. I started with 2 ½ inches wide, but discovered that 2 1/4 was better. I sewed it to the back right sides together and then folded it to the front and sewed the cut edge to the front. It worked well, as I didn’t think I would be able to sew the two folded edges on top of each other without a struggle. I did use my seam guard set at ½ inch for the back side and 5/8 for the front side to keep it on the straight and narrow. Happy to have this project finished.

After I took the Tee shirt quilt off the frame, I pinned the backing for the Grassy Creek quilt on it. I like doing this, as then when I want to quilt, it is almost ready to go. Unfortunately, I didn’t pin it right and had to redo the top rail, so much for time saving. I seem to remember buying or finding in my panto library, an appropriate design to use, I should write these things down. I think I want to do something leafy and swirly.

Another start was a baby quilt for a regular customer. Coincidentally, I had just finished designing a block to use with the Mia Charro Forest friends fabrics. It is so sweet and springlike, as luck would have it, the baby was a girl and my customer liked the pretty flowers and animals. I decided to make two while I was at it, since I had enough fabric and I was using my Accuquilt strip cutter. For the first top I cut the individual squares and chain pieced the blocks. There are four blocks, but they are 20 inches square, really 16 ten inch blocks. The second top, I wised up and cut the strips and sewed sets of five together.

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I ran into a bit of a problem with the animal prints, they are 4 1/4 by 6 inches. When I was figuring the block sizing out, I used 4 1/4 by 6 ½ inches. I had to increase the upper and lower white pieces to 2 3/4 inches wide and it all worked out. I ended my day with quilt #1 on the design wall, waiting to be put together and the strip sets for #2 sewn together. I think I have enough pink minky for the backings for both, I may even do another minky binding.

I need to get to cutting the pieces for the Busy Hands quilt along quilt, Hampton Court, this week. I decided to use this pretty pile of fat quarters from Laundry Basket Quilts, called Sequoia. I am wavering on what color to use for the contrasting blocks, I bought some ‘earth’ colored Bella solid, but it isn’t here yet. I may use tan, or gray, or white, maybe green would work too. So many options.

Pet All the Dogs stitching has been happening too. Once I finished the house, the other motifs are a breeze, I’m trying to get a bit of the lower lines done now. I’ll probably finish the right tree tonight and the brown dividing line. I ordered a bunch more Weeks floss for the Heaven and Nature sampler and the few skeins I needed for Strawberry Fields this past weekend.

I also saw a beautiful (free) blackwork quilty type sampler at Blackwork Journey , called Tiny Treasures. There is a square and a rectangle version, I downloaded the PDFs for a possible future project, this one would require the magnifiers assistance.

Time to get a move on.

Be kind