I had my pre-surgery appointments yesterday and the time until the big "H" is winding down. I realized yesterday while navigating the hospital that all my previous surgeries had been emergencies and I was completely unfamiliar with the concept of pre-admission tests and procedures. I got a fancy little wristband to wear until Tuesday but luckily it slipped over my hand so that I can just put it back on Monday night. I need to be at the hospital at 5 AM on Tuesday. My wonderful Honey is very kind and patient to not only take me at such an ungodly hour, but wait for me throughout the procedure, which will probably last a couple of hours according to my OB/GYN.
We are going to see the kids this weekend so I won't be able to work much more on the baby quilts until Sunday night, except for the one which I did get the binding started on. I really wanted to get them in the mail on Monday but at this point, Monday is going to have to be a marathon day with all I want to get done at work and in my personal life. Quilt guild meets Monday night too and I don't know that I will be able to attend with all the pre-surgery requirements, including an early night's sleep. I suppose that if I don't have the Hoopla baby quilts for show & tell, there's little point. The program is on EQ and is done by Susan Kraterfield ... since I don't have EQ and currently don't intend to get it, it might be lost on me.
I will take the GFG blocks to hand piece during the long car ride, though. It's five hours up and five hours back. I try to help my Honey with the driving but honestly, I like the daylight to sew by on the drive north, and by the time it gets dark we're around Washington, DC with lots of traffic and construction (and narrow lanes with Jersey walls right next to you), and I'm less comfortable driving his car than mine. Still, he often drives the whole way home and I can sew the whole way as a result. Or sometimes I read aloud to him.
I'm working on stacking up my Netflix queue and trying to get my office all wound up before I go out for weeks. It's been a strange week and I'll be glad to get on to the next part and get this over with.
Friday, September 9, 2011
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
New handwork project
It's been a week since I last blogged, or really sat down to work on the baby quilts. I'd better get a move on, since they were born yesterday! Yes, they're very early, and weigh less than three pounds each, but they're here, and they have names (for labels), and they will need quilts when they leave the NICU. So it's back to the machine I go tonight.
In the meantime, I've been doing more handwork when I've been sewing at all (the weekend was a projects-around-the-house kind of weekend, although the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee have been drenching us for days, so Monday became a movie marathon day with hand sewing). I pulled out this very old project last Thursday night for sewing at Kitty's and have continued working on it during my TV time: a reproduction 1930's Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt top.
The fabrics are the result of an internet swap from YEARS ago. I spread out the baggies of the pieces on the coffee table and see one of my own there with my address in Delaware, which we moved from in 2002. This was probably done well before that since most of my quilt swaps were before my son was born in 2000 and I got busy with sewing for him.
In the meantime, I've been doing more handwork when I've been sewing at all (the weekend was a projects-around-the-house kind of weekend, although the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee have been drenching us for days, so Monday became a movie marathon day with hand sewing). I pulled out this very old project last Thursday night for sewing at Kitty's and have continued working on it during my TV time: a reproduction 1930's Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt top.
This is what I have had put together so far, and below is another flower in progress. I use the Quilt Patis to piece. I believe I'm using the 1" per side hexagons. Interesting story - a few years ago, I was in Columbus and near Pati Shambaugh's Picking up the Pieces. I stopped in to meet her and buy some more Quilt Patis, and she signed my package for me. :-P
It should be a fun project to continue sewing as it grows and grows.
My Honey is away for the next few days and while I worked last night until almost 8 PM, tonight I plan to leave right at 5 to devote myself to finishing the quilting on the baby quilts and making some binding. I would love to finish them over the weekend on the drive up to Maryland to see the kids and then get them in the mail early next week before Tuesday's surgery.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
machine quilting
The last few nights I've been in my sewing room have been spent machine quilting the two Hoopla baby quilts on Baron von Quilthausen. I've been taking a lot of my confidence and inspiration from the professional longarm machine quilter Natalia Bonner at Piece N Quilt. She does such amazing freemotion work and I wish that I could become even a fraction as good as she is.
I decided to quilt each one slightly differently. I'm not sure how well you can see them in these photos:
Sometimes it feels like a labyrinth, trying to figure out a continuous motion design and not ending up on some distant side of the quilt, unable to get back.
I've finished the central parts of both quilts and began working on the borders last night. In the borders, I've been using a Mettler thread, and it has broken on me four times now on one quilt. I'm sure it's a tension issue, but I REALLY stink at trying to figure out tension (maybe that's another reason I love Old Sally - I don't think they had adjustable tension in 1930 when she was built!). If I don't adjust it, it looks like small loops on the underside with a line of bobbin thread running through it. If I do adjust it, the top thread breaks. Part of me wishes for a better machine, maybe one manufactured in the last 30 years, but my conscious keeps telling me it's user error, not the machine. Any advice?
This is the other reason why I don't do my own machine quilting. Sigh.
I've finished the central parts of both quilts and began working on the borders last night. In the borders, I've been using a Mettler thread, and it has broken on me four times now on one quilt. I'm sure it's a tension issue, but I REALLY stink at trying to figure out tension (maybe that's another reason I love Old Sally - I don't think they had adjustable tension in 1930 when she was built!). If I don't adjust it, it looks like small loops on the underside with a line of bobbin thread running through it. If I do adjust it, the top thread breaks. Part of me wishes for a better machine, maybe one manufactured in the last 30 years, but my conscious keeps telling me it's user error, not the machine. Any advice?
This is the other reason why I don't do my own machine quilting. Sigh.
Monday, August 29, 2011
Woweee!
Wow, wow, wow! Is there any way better to start a busy Monday morning at work than to catch up on your favorite quilt blogs and read that you won a giveaway for a new book?!?!?!
As I was reading Quilt Hollow, I saw that I won an autographed copy of Sue Abrey's newest book, "Pick Four"! (And, mind you, I didn't get this until after I entered the giveaway at Magnolia Bay Quilts, Bejewelled Quilts by Barb, and Insights from SewCalGal ... whoops! Time to go delete those comments!) The quilters on this tour have been posting so many good reviews and photos from this book that, with as many busy, scrappy quilts as I've been doing lately, I found myself longing for the soothing simplicity of a four-fabric quilt.
There are still several chances to win this book - go visit Sue's blog at Quilt Times to receive the guided tour. I'm adding a new label to my blog called "Pick Four" because you can be sure that I'll start planning a quilt the moment I get the book in my hot little hands.
As awesome as it is to win, though, I have to think that one of the best parts of a giveaway like this is finding new quilt blogs that I hadn't read before. Just earlier today in my last post I was writing about free motion quilting being a creative challenge to me. Lo and behold, I visited SewCalGal and read her previous post reviewing a book on free motion quilting by an author who also maintains a blog on the topic, aptly titled The Free Motion Quilting Project! This could be lifechanging stuff! I can't wait to pore over that entire blog when I get a free moment. But somehow two hours of the day have already slipped away from me with all this quilting excitement, and this is my busiest day of the entire month, so I'd better buckle down and find a way to contain my excitement!!!
There are still several chances to win this book - go visit Sue's blog at Quilt Times to receive the guided tour. I'm adding a new label to my blog called "Pick Four" because you can be sure that I'll start planning a quilt the moment I get the book in my hot little hands.
As awesome as it is to win, though, I have to think that one of the best parts of a giveaway like this is finding new quilt blogs that I hadn't read before. Just earlier today in my last post I was writing about free motion quilting being a creative challenge to me. Lo and behold, I visited SewCalGal and read her previous post reviewing a book on free motion quilting by an author who also maintains a blog on the topic, aptly titled The Free Motion Quilting Project! This could be lifechanging stuff! I can't wait to pore over that entire blog when I get a free moment. But somehow two hours of the day have already slipped away from me with all this quilting excitement, and this is my busiest day of the entire month, so I'd better buckle down and find a way to contain my excitement!!!
weekend sewing
It was an unusual weekend. I was so absorbed in Hurricane Irene that it was very difficult for me to wrap my head around the idea that it was not going to get dark and rainy and destructively windy at MY house this weekend. We did experience higher than usual breezes this weekend, and a few raindrops on Saturday, but were far out of the path. Luckily my dad decided to weather the storm at home (despite the mandatory evacuation order) rather than on his boat, and the storm surges there were not very bad so all was safe. However, there were trees down everywhere, and although my Honey had his daughters with us this weekend, he did not take them back yesterday because there were large trees felled on either side of their mom's house, on top of power lines. Their school was canceled for today so they stayed one more night and he'll take them back tomorrow.
On Saturday we all went downtown for some sidewalk shopping and lunch, but spent the afternoon at home. I went to the basement to sew, eventually my Honey joined me, and then the girls began congregating there as well. So I put them to work arranging my Drunkard's Path blocks into a quilt top. As you know, there are hundreds of different ways to arrange these blocks (and if you didn't, Inklingo drove that point home with their newest collection's design book consisting of 203 pages!). I have an easier time deciding what to do with these blocks when they are in two colorways, not four, so their taking over was a relief. And this is what they did:
I kept this the way they did it and sewed them together. I have a small bundle of coordinating fat quarters that I will probably do something with in the way of a border, but I count this as a finished quilt top.
I finished another as well, rather unexpectedly. I've been challenging myself with something new for one of my Honey's high school friends who designs gorgeous jewelry. We'd agreed to trade crafts and so I'd put together the basic top some time ago but was trying to brainstorm borders. Once I decided to showcase quilting in the border rather than applique, the top was finished. I want it to be a surprise to her, so no photos yet.
Anyway, I was looking forward to having the house to myself Sunday afternoon/evening when my Honey took the girls back, and didn't get that, so I retreated into my sewing area. I put on the Winona Ryder movie, "How to Make an American Quilt" as I pinbasted the two Hoopla baby quilts. I HATE basting so it really helped pass the time ... which wasn't that bad for quilts as small as those. After dinner, I began machine quilting one. The tension is not that horrible, but my Bernina seems to skip a stitch on occasion, leaving a loop of thread on the top, and I'm not happy about that. Both my machines have had MORE problems since taking them in for tune-ups than they had prior, so I'm hesitant to take them back ... especially with paying $100+ for each one. Not to mention that they had Old Sally for over a week the last time and didn't even know that she was knee-operated, so they called me to bring in the foot pedal. It doesn't inspire confidence.
By the time I was quilting at night, the battery on my phone was too low to take photos, so I'll have to see if I can get a few tonight. You know, I'm still toying with the idea of buying a "real" quilting machine but if I can't handle the creativity of free motion, there's no point!
On Saturday we all went downtown for some sidewalk shopping and lunch, but spent the afternoon at home. I went to the basement to sew, eventually my Honey joined me, and then the girls began congregating there as well. So I put them to work arranging my Drunkard's Path blocks into a quilt top. As you know, there are hundreds of different ways to arrange these blocks (and if you didn't, Inklingo drove that point home with their newest collection's design book consisting of 203 pages!). I have an easier time deciding what to do with these blocks when they are in two colorways, not four, so their taking over was a relief. And this is what they did:
I kept this the way they did it and sewed them together. I have a small bundle of coordinating fat quarters that I will probably do something with in the way of a border, but I count this as a finished quilt top.
I finished another as well, rather unexpectedly. I've been challenging myself with something new for one of my Honey's high school friends who designs gorgeous jewelry. We'd agreed to trade crafts and so I'd put together the basic top some time ago but was trying to brainstorm borders. Once I decided to showcase quilting in the border rather than applique, the top was finished. I want it to be a surprise to her, so no photos yet.
Anyway, I was looking forward to having the house to myself Sunday afternoon/evening when my Honey took the girls back, and didn't get that, so I retreated into my sewing area. I put on the Winona Ryder movie, "How to Make an American Quilt" as I pinbasted the two Hoopla baby quilts. I HATE basting so it really helped pass the time ... which wasn't that bad for quilts as small as those. After dinner, I began machine quilting one. The tension is not that horrible, but my Bernina seems to skip a stitch on occasion, leaving a loop of thread on the top, and I'm not happy about that. Both my machines have had MORE problems since taking them in for tune-ups than they had prior, so I'm hesitant to take them back ... especially with paying $100+ for each one. Not to mention that they had Old Sally for over a week the last time and didn't even know that she was knee-operated, so they called me to bring in the foot pedal. It doesn't inspire confidence.
By the time I was quilting at night, the battery on my phone was too low to take photos, so I'll have to see if I can get a few tonight. You know, I'm still toying with the idea of buying a "real" quilting machine but if I can't handle the creativity of free motion, there's no point!
Friday, August 26, 2011
Kaleidoscope!
As I mentioned yesterday, the Kaleidoscope quilt I'm making for my dad is going together so beautifully.
I'm making 9" blocks, and I'm using two fabrics that I purchased at Patchwork Plus in Dayton, Virginia. The white is really a white with very pale blue fern batik pattern in it. The dark has a lovely pattern that makes me think of stones at the bottom of a river, with grays and blues and browns. Here is an image I found on the web which gives an idea of what it should look like when all put together - I love the image of the curves:
Because the pieces are large and I stacked them when rotary cutting them, they go together SO fast. There was preseason football on last night (Go Ravens!) and it's my habit to let it record on the DVR for at least a half hour so that I don't have to watch commercials when I finally sit down. I think I zipped together about eight of these blocks in that half hour. Wow! I wasn't anticipating have this done as a Christmas gift, but at this rate, I just might!
I did finish hand piecing those Drunkards Path blocks last night - remember them?:
... so now I will need a new hand sewing project for Thursday nights with Kitty and to take to the beach next month. Assuming, of course, that the house that's been rented for our beach vacation is still standing after Hurricane Irene blows through.
See where that black dot on the red background on the North Carolina coast is? That's where the beach house is currently standing. At least my family no longer owns a beach house ... hurricane season was always stressful. On the other hand, my dad told me last night he's thinking about spending the night on his 43' yacht so that it doesn't break its moorings when Irene blows through his area. I hope he lives to get this quilt! Just kidding, he should be fine, especially if his girlfriend is with him - she's writing an autobiography about some of her most harrowing experiences in a lifetime of sailing around the world.
Anyway, I digress. I wanted to share one of my favorite places on the internet with all the fabric shopping I've been doing lately ... great deals at Green Fairy Quilts (right now, everything is 30% off their already way low prices, including new precuts!) and Burgundy Buttons (a Bigger Big Giant Clearance Sale has me supplementing an earlier order) have me anticipating what beautiful Moda fabrics will be hitting my eager little hands soon. So I go to Moda's website to download swatches and sample patterns to drool over while I wait. If you weren't aware, Moda offers all kinds of goodies for their fabric lines, including images to import into your quilting software and swatch cards to view and print. Many have free patterns to download featuring a new fabric line, and it's laid out so that you can tell at a glance which line has what, as well as sort by name of line, release date, or designer. There are 405 fabric lines in this chart right now so it's not just the most current releases either! How awesome!
The weekend is nearly upon us and I hope to spend a lot of it in my sewing room. If you're in the path of Irene, take cover and take some hand-sewing project to work on by candlelight like generations of quilters before us. Stay dry!
I did finish hand piecing those Drunkards Path blocks last night - remember them?:
Anyway, I digress. I wanted to share one of my favorite places on the internet with all the fabric shopping I've been doing lately ... great deals at Green Fairy Quilts (right now, everything is 30% off their already way low prices, including new precuts!) and Burgundy Buttons (a Bigger Big Giant Clearance Sale has me supplementing an earlier order) have me anticipating what beautiful Moda fabrics will be hitting my eager little hands soon. So I go to Moda's website to download swatches and sample patterns to drool over while I wait. If you weren't aware, Moda offers all kinds of goodies for their fabric lines, including images to import into your quilting software and swatch cards to view and print. Many have free patterns to download featuring a new fabric line, and it's laid out so that you can tell at a glance which line has what, as well as sort by name of line, release date, or designer. There are 405 fabric lines in this chart right now so it's not just the most current releases either! How awesome!
The weekend is nearly upon us and I hope to spend a lot of it in my sewing room. If you're in the path of Irene, take cover and take some hand-sewing project to work on by candlelight like generations of quilters before us. Stay dry!
Thursday, August 25, 2011
wall hanging
One of the tops I finished over the weekend was actually a companion piece to a baby quilt I made last year. I had bought a quilt kit designed with Moda's City Weekend fabrics to make a baby quilt for my girlfriend Janice, who was expecting her first child, and actually got it there in time for her baby shower (although I couldn't attend myself)! In my haste, I committed the ultimate sin of forgetting to take photos, and when she finally took some for me and sent them, I saw that she was using it as a <gasp!> wall hanging!
I told her to TAKE THAT QUILT DOWN AND WRAP THAT BABY IN IT and that I would make her a wall hanging instead. I had a few leftover pieces from this kit, and I also had a set of Moda candy bar cuts of City Weekend, so I finally got around to whipping up this Moda Bake Shop Recipe this past weekend:
Yes, those ARE the same fabrics as in the quilt - just a different camera, different lighting, and MUCH less red! The recipe is called Candy Bar Pinwheels and it was designed by Doug Leko of Antler Quilt Design. I didn't have enough of any one fabric leftover for the size border he suggested, so I just measured and cut what I had, and it finished at about 21" x 27". It will still look good over the baby's crib, I think. The room really is much softer with a lot of pinks, so I'm glad that the wall hanging turned out more muted than the original quilt (I do like making very bright baby quilts - I think that their eyes love them!).
I hope Laura at Star City Stitchery can quilt it; I'm not sure what size a quilt needs to be to fit on the longarm machine. She did the first one with an allover circle pattern that reminded me of different sized bubbles, and I'd like the same pattern quilted on the wallhanging, which would be VERY hard for me to do freemotion on my Bernina. Both this and the pink quilt are in my car ready to be dropped off as soon as Laura gives me the green light.
BTW, piecing the back of the pink quilt was a PITA. But I finished it last night and then rewarded myself with piecing a few of the Kaleidoscope blocks. They are going together so easily and beautifully! I will probably do a few more tonight before preseason football begins and take some photos.
Yes, those ARE the same fabrics as in the quilt - just a different camera, different lighting, and MUCH less red! The recipe is called Candy Bar Pinwheels and it was designed by Doug Leko of Antler Quilt Design. I didn't have enough of any one fabric leftover for the size border he suggested, so I just measured and cut what I had, and it finished at about 21" x 27". It will still look good over the baby's crib, I think. The room really is much softer with a lot of pinks, so I'm glad that the wall hanging turned out more muted than the original quilt (I do like making very bright baby quilts - I think that their eyes love them!).
I hope Laura at Star City Stitchery can quilt it; I'm not sure what size a quilt needs to be to fit on the longarm machine. She did the first one with an allover circle pattern that reminded me of different sized bubbles, and I'd like the same pattern quilted on the wallhanging, which would be VERY hard for me to do freemotion on my Bernina. Both this and the pink quilt are in my car ready to be dropped off as soon as Laura gives me the green light.
BTW, piecing the back of the pink quilt was a PITA. But I finished it last night and then rewarded myself with piecing a few of the Kaleidoscope blocks. They are going together so easily and beautifully! I will probably do a few more tonight before preseason football begins and take some photos.
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