There isn’t anything on my design wall today.  That’s kinda weird.  Usually there is something going on.  I’ve been itching to start something new, but maybe its a good time to pull out a UFO.

This week I finished up the falling squares quilt, I added borders of equilateral triangles. They are made from the same scraps that I made the top from, alternating with some extra/cut-off backing fabric that I used for a quilt using these same fabrics.

I quilted and bound two baby quilts, the first is for my DH’s associate, the baby is due in June.  Yay! it’s done with time to spare.  The second is made from the last of the storybook fabric line scraps.  I’m happy to see the end of those, any thing thats left will go into the 2 1/2″ square bin.

 

After quilting those two, I decided to get my Sue Garman “Cox Comb Medallion” quilt on the frame.  I needed a backing, that was easy, this pretty gray floral was just the right amount.  I basted it on the frame and threaded up with some Mono-poly clear.  There is a lot going on in this quilt, so I thought it would be a good place to practice SID quilting.

It was going along swimmingly,  I reduced my top tension to 1 and was using bottom line in the bobbin.  Then my machine sounded like it was full of gravel.  Grinding gravel.  Not good.  I stopped and checked everything, no thread nests, no lodged pins, no vibrating things, nothing visibly wrong.  I started again, still making dreadful noises.  I shut it down and quit for the day.  I figured I could bring it in to the shop the next day.  Next morning I had to get the machine off the frame. Only 8 screws were involved, along with two poles and two cables.  As you can imagine that took about an hour to disassemble, I tried to leave my quilt on, but had to unpin it from the take up rail.  Long arms are relatively simple machines, but they are large and mine weighs about 40 lbs.  I was on the road to the shop by 10:30.  Luckily the machine guy wasn’t busy and he brought it in to the store and plugged it in.  Of course it worked perfectly.  Together we disassembled the coverings to look inside and make sure there were no problems.  But from what we could see, nothing was amiss.  The innards are mostly circuit boards and computer stuff anyway.   So back home it came, and after another hour of reassembly, I was quilting again.  The mechanic thinks I may have dislodged whatever was making the noise when I put it in my car.  In hindsight I should have made a video, then took the machine in.

In other news, I have given up on the scrappy Storm at Sea top, it is together and in the TBQ pile.  I think it’ll make a good picnic quilt, or dog quilt 🙂 I decided to start over with four shades of blue batiks and a definite pattern for the colors.  I’m still waiting for the yardage to arrive and I need to print out a few hundred paper foundations.  Thankfully this quilt is only sized for a double bed.

I am knitting the second pattern of Curious Handmade Sock KAL called Magnolia.  I am using yarn I got at Stitches West back in February.  The brand is La Jolla and the color way is Saturn Harvest.  This sock is going quickly, I am up to the instep after a week.  I got new Addi-turbo needles for this sock, but unfortunately I bought 24 inch ones.  They are too short to use for two-at-a-time socks.  I’ll have to make them one at a time.

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

Last week I decided to put the S@S together.  I figured that if I didn’t it would just become a UFO that would never see the light of day again.  I also hoped that it would magically look better once it was together.  Here is the top.  I may add borders, but for now, its a top.

This week I finished quilting my “Sheila” Blues for Monday top.  I did lots of swirling feathers, then pumpkin seeds and cross hatch on the trees.  I used a pounce and stencil to do the feathers.  It’s been a long time since I’ve done feathers and the stencil is a good guide for me. It seems to help me keep the feather loops equally sized and spaced.  I can also concentrate on the rhythm and motion, which creates a better looking feather as well.  My only problem is getting the blue chalk out of the fabric.  I bound the quilt and then put it in the dryer on air fluff.  It looks better, but there are still spot of blue chalky-ness.  I’m thinking of putting a dryer ball in with it to “beat” the dust out of it.  Or maybe vacuuming it with a upholstery attachment on my canister vac.  I am scared to wash it, as I picture the blue becoming a stain and never leaving.

Once Sheila was off the frame I put the sorority T-shirt quilt on and quilted that in a few hours.  I want to bind it today and get it back to my friend tomorrow.  I was a bit concerned that the appliquéd letters on a few of the shirts would be a problem.  I just slowed the machine down a bit and it sewed through them just like the rest of the fabric. I did have a slight problem with the minky poking through with the stitches.  It is more visible on the white blocks, but not overly so, if I don’t point it out, I doubt any one will notice.

I added borders to the baby boy quilt too.  I had to wash the backing for this quilt because a certain dog found the package of fabrics after it was delivered.  While playing his favorite game of keep away, the backing got a bit of mud on it.  Unfortunately there is still a light stain, fortunately, for the dog, it is near the selvedge, so it won’t be problem.

Finally, I had a few hours free Sunday morning, so I got the blocks for the Missouri Quilt shop’s pattern “Falling Charms”  out and on the design wall.  There are 100 of the 7 inch squares, and they went together quickly using Bonnie Hunters method of Webbing the top.  It needs borders, I still have enough 1930’s scraps to make something, maybe flying geese?

I’m itching to start something new, I have two or three (?) kits I got on sale from Craftsy a few months ago.  Or I could look through the patterns pile or maybe a UFO.  My kitchen/living area remodel is on the brink of starting, just waiting on the permits.  Moving all the furniture and kitchen things should keep my busy in the next few weeks.  Fortunately my sewing room and long arm studio won’t be affected, I’ll still have a refuge.

Linking up with Judy today at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts today for design wall Monday. Judy has a short tutorial about making a sweet replica doll sized quilt.

For the past week I have been trying to make this quilt top work.  It just doesn’t want to play nicely.  The blocks are paper foundation pieced, which means no design wall.  Crawling around on the floor is not conducive to inspiration for me.   I set it up, walk away for a day and the next time I look at it, it’s still not working.  I think it’s just too scrappy, I should have made the blocks with more consistent shading.  Something like all the inner squares light and the outer triangles dark or medium shades.  In the beginning I was looking to create an ocean of waves, sparkling with the many blues of water and wave and light.  I don’t think its a total loss though, I will sew it together and maybe with some strong quilting lines it will “gel”.  The last picture on the right is the final mock-up.

Last week I also worked on a T-shirt quilt with a friend.  Her daughter is in a sorority at San Diego State.  When they graduate, they have a tradition of making quilts out of their t-shirts.  My friend has been dreading making this quilt for the past few years, as she doesn’t sew and really wants to make it special for her daughter.  There is a whole presentation ceremony that goes along with this sorority tradition, as you can imagine.  We had a fun and stress free afternoon cutting out the shirts and stabilizing them.  She was in charge of the iron and I did the rotary cutting.  I asked her if she’d like to cut, but she was happy to iron.  She did the layout too.  I am going to add lavender sashing and a burgundy colored minky backing, the quilting is a simple bird (their mascot is a dove) with loopy flowers.

On my design table this week is a baby quilt for one of my Dh’s associates at work.  The pattern is from Carrie Nelson’s book “Schnibbles” called Reveille.  This is the small version, but I added nine more blocks, as the original quilt finishes at 37 inches square.  The fabric is a really cute collection called Stellar Baby.  I used most of a layer cake and about a yard of white to make these 6 3/4 inch square blocks and the border.

This week ended on an up-beat though despite the chaos on my floor, I hope to have the S@S quilt put together this week.

I’m linking up with Judy at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts for Design Wall Monday.  Check out her pretty Valentine Day quilt!

 

I finished quilting the Farmers Wife quilt the week before I went on the retreat.  I had some time to square it up and bind it this past Saturday.  First I needed to make 11 yards of binding, I thought I might go with scrappy, like the inner border.  I still had a bunch of scraps left from piecing this top.  But finally decided to use the left over backing scraps, which were already in long lengths and just needed to be cut into 2 1/4 inch widths.  I usually machine sew my bindings, I think the last one I hand bound was the Hampton Ridge Sampler (pictured below, un-quilted) two years ago.  Which also happens to be on my bed at the moment 🙂

My method is to cut the strips 2 1/4 inches wide, fold them in half and press them well.  Then I machine sew them to the back side with a 1/4 inch allowance.  Then I wrap the binding to the front, clip it with the magic clover clips and sew it down with a straight stitch about 1/16 of an inch in.  Neat and tidy, a bit faster too.

Getting back to the Farmer’s Wife quilt, I used apple green Kona to sash and border it. Tiny assorted squares break up the sashing and a border of 2 inch squares goes all around.  Those details are here The Last Monday of March , funny that it’s almost a year ago, but things get done, eventually 🙂 . Pictured below are most of my individual blocks, I made one or two a week for a year. I quilted it with a pretty simple pantograph, leaves and loops.  I couldn’t begin to think about individually quilting each block.  Many of them have lots of seam lines and tiny pieces, plus after finishing RD&G, a simple computer design was in order.  The quilt is so bright and cheery, I think I’m going to leave it on my bed for a while, especially as we have rain in our forecast for the rest of the week.

 

 

I’m steadily working on the Storm at Sea quilt made from assorted blue batiks.  I’m paper foundation piecing it, so its slow going.  My consolation will be at how perfectly all the points match up 😉

 

Linking up with Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict  for “Can I Get a Whoop Whoop” today.

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This week I have been working on the “Inner Circle” quilt pattern by Modern Quilt Studio.  I made my striped fabric panels, carefully ironed all the seams open and printed out the 35 sheets that make up the templates for cutting out the circles.  As I was cutting the circles out of me fabric, I thought to myself, these are not going to be fun to set into the background with the machine.  No, not at all.  What the pattern has you do is make two panels of contrasting stripes, cut the circles out of one, then cut corresponding holes in the other panel.  It then gives instructions to machine sew them together, matching all the seams.  This step was not going to happen on my version.  I consider myself a pretty good piecer and would much rather piece by machine than hand stitch.  But this quilt was telling me that those circles should be appliquéd on top and the underneath fabric cut away.  

I carefully pressed the 1/2 seam allowance under and used a bit of Elmers school glue to keep it folded under.  Then I pinned every stripe together, keeping it straight and true.  Hand sewing took a few hours, and made me think of an appliqué  UFO that has been languishing, maybe if I got it out I could work on it.  My hand work has been knitting for the past 8 months, but summer is coming, and I just don’t like to knit as much in the summer.  MQS has a YouTube video Inner Circle Tutorial on how to assemble this quilt their way, Bill Ringle makes it look easy.  For me, appliqué is easier, not quite as fast, but my resulting quilt looks good to me.

 I was able to use some of the left over circle stripes to add length to the backing.

Then, I got it on the frame, and started the E2E pantograph I choose for it.  Its called “Feathers and More” by Nancy Haacke of Wasatch Quilting .  Only 10 more rows to go, but it’ll wait, tomorrows another day.

Linking up with Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict for todays “Can I Get Whoop Whoop?”

Thanks for reading.