Quilting & Sewing
September 30, 2020. I'm beginning to learn how to quilt using techniques I'm finding on Youtube. I'm so grateful to all those creative people who take the time to teach! I don't know if any of these pieces will end up in a quilt or not...so far I'm just practicing.
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As I worked on the facemasks, I had tossed the leftover scraps into a popup bin. By the end of the project, it was overflowing. I layered the pieces to both smooth them out and save space in my small work area. When I realized I really was going to make a quilt, I (almost with regret) deconstructed my lovely pile and sorted the fabrics by color.
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I decided to dive into this brand new venture by working first with the colors I probably would not want in a finished quilt. Red is not one of Julie's Preferred Colors, so I started with it. I chose some of the fabrics I liked best, and following the YouTube video, further sorted them by large design, medium design, and small design. I arranged, rearranged, and rearranged again until the design was pleasing to my eye. It's going to take a while before my eye gets good at knowing what pleases it.
I can tell that I need to get better at keeping my seams straight! |
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I had a lot of red fabric, so I made another one, trying to improve upon my large-medium-small pattern placement. Actually, I think I did better in that regard on the first one. If I were going to do this one over, I would replace the large blue flowered piece with something with a smaller pattern.
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October 1. Browns came next on my list of not-preferred colors. I used the same technique of combining odd-sized pieces, looking for an eye-pleasing design. It came out okay, but not particularly great.
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October 2. For my next piece, I divided the greens into light and dark, and when I combined the light green with pink, I loved the effect! This time I used a different technique, cutting same-size blocks, sewing them into two-block pieces, and then making sure each one of them was perpendicular to all the adjacent blocks. What I learned on this piece: It's really important to cut all the pieces EXACTLY the same size. And then sew them using EXACTLY the same seam allowance. Also, for some reason, combining four-block pieces so that they would fit into the design scheme was easier than combining six-block pieces. I thought perhaps I was going crazy when initially something looked correct, but then suddenly it became apparent the pattern wasn't right at all, and I had to re-combine the pieces. I'm still puzzling over that.
It was also at this point that I realized I simply HAD to find a solution to the dull blade in my rotary knife. It seemed to get dull right after I had changed the blade, and that mystified me. I found a rotary blade sharpener on Ebay. Who knew they even had such a thing? I'm semi-patiently waiting for it to arrive.
It was also at this point that I realized I simply HAD to find a solution to the dull blade in my rotary knife. It seemed to get dull right after I had changed the blade, and that mystified me. I found a rotary blade sharpener on Ebay. Who knew they even had such a thing? I'm semi-patiently waiting for it to arrive.
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And then I did the dark greens. There was a lot of changing around going on as I made this one. I learned not to use colors that wouldn't actually be complementary to the piece, even if they matched the idea of the color. Yeah, they might be green, but they were UGLY green!
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October 4. I wasn't happy with the way the brown piece turned out, so I decided to make another one, this time with pink added in. I also found a new technique to use called crumb quilting. It's really free-form, and it's REALLY labor intensive--it took eight hours to make this 18-inch by 18-inch piece--but I love the way it turned out. There are more than 150 pieces in it. I got tired of counting, so I'm guessing. You can count them if you want to.
I learned the same lesson on this piece that I learned on the dark green one: Don't use colors that don't really go with the scheme. I ripped out and replaced some of the pieces that I had originally put in, and I was much happier with the result.
Which brings me to my philosophy of ripping out and redoing. It's all part of the process. If I realize that I'm not going to be satisfied with the result, I don't mind discarding what I've done and doing it again. I do it in knitting all the time. As John Denver said to one of his fellow musicians in response to the question, "Is this practice?": "It's all practice."
On to the next one.
I learned the same lesson on this piece that I learned on the dark green one: Don't use colors that don't really go with the scheme. I ripped out and replaced some of the pieces that I had originally put in, and I was much happier with the result.
Which brings me to my philosophy of ripping out and redoing. It's all part of the process. If I realize that I'm not going to be satisfied with the result, I don't mind discarding what I've done and doing it again. I do it in knitting all the time. As John Denver said to one of his fellow musicians in response to the question, "Is this practice?": "It's all practice."
On to the next one.
October 6. There were so many blues that I had enough for two blocks. Many of the fabrics were used for kids' facemasks, so there are lots of dogs and cats and other animals, as well as flowers and other fun designs.
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October 8. I watched a video that showed "string quilting" with strips of fabric. Using this technique, I'm working on getting better at combining colors. The blade sharpener came yesterday, and I had fun sharpening my first blade. It took about five minutes. I was VERY careful not to cut myself.
I think my next purchase has to be an Omnigrid ruler that will help me cut blocks with straighter edges. |
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October 9. After researching the prices of Omnigrid rulers (!!!), I went to ScrapsKC to find either a used one or something that would work as well. Since right now I don't care about exact sizes, all I needed was square or rectangular things that would work as templates. I found a bunch of things in different sizes at a total cost of $3.00.
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Using my newly sharpened blade and the templates from ScrapsKC, I reworked the gold blocks and cut some green ones, still using the string design. They're looking better, but they're still not as crisp as I would like them. I'm thinking the unevenness and waviness is caused by the differing weights and content of the fabrics. If I were using all cotton "official quilting" fabric, I think the final product would be smoother. I learned that with this design, I need to press all the seams in the same direction.
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Whoo, boy. I watched a video yesterday about ironing for quilting. No wonder I haven't been happy with how these pieces have been turning out. I was ironing them incorrectly, which stretched them. I now know the three-step process of pressing quilt pieces: set the seam (press it with fabric front-to-front), open it and finger press the pieces apart, and then press the front without moving the iron. Those steps have already improved the look of my pieces!
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October 10. Big news! I've been puzzling over how I'm ever going to get a quilt actually put together after I finish the top. It shouldn't be a big deal to find batting and the muslin that constitute the other two elements of a quilt. But putting it all together? THAT's a big deal. Fortunately, Fabric Recycles offers a quilting service that does all of that, plus adding the binding. I'm a happy girl!
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October 11. I spent the morning practicing my cutting. I'm getting better...decided to move the blade away from me instead of towards me, as I've seen in most videos, and for some reason, that really does work better. Although I bought a quilting ruler yesterday at Fabric Recycles, I don't find it as useful as the 18-inch ruler with the metal edge that I've been using all along.
I thought I was going to do a block with the gray pieces, but they were so dull and uninteresting, I decided to make a black and white block instead. I'm still not happy with the waviness I see, but since the fabrics are of different content, maybe that's just the way it has to be. For now. The fabrics are darling! |
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October 12. Yesterday I watched a video on coin quilting. Today I found some fabric that I had intended to use for facemasks but then discovered the pieces were too small. However, cut lengthwise, they were perfect for this technique. So here's my first coin quilting. I'm working on both my pressing technique and the accuracy of my seams. This one came out better because of both of those factors, but also because all of these pieces have the same content. They may have even been originally sold as part of a quilt bundle.
I watched a video about pillowcase quilting. It's a technique used for smaller pieces to eliminate the need for binding. As it happens, it's the exact same process as the one I used for the 3,566 face masks I just finished, so no learning curve will be required. I also found a video about how to use my industrial machine for freeform quilting. Now I know how I'm going to finish the smaller parts that don't make it into the final quilt. This is getting quite exciting... :) |
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October 13. Learning to do sashing, the fabric that connects the two blocks. In this case it's white, but that's only because I didn't have enough of anything else that was more exciting. If I wanted to continue the sashing, I would put another strip above and below the blocks, and then connect more rows of blocks.
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Flamingos! I wasn't able to use this fabric for face masks because the design was too large. But it's perfect for quilting. I already see some things I would change if I were to do it over. But for this stage of my learning, I'll just leave it the way it is and know what to do differently next time. |
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Took a little trip to ScrapsKC this afternoon to find batting. What do you know...they had some. I'm going to experiment with the pillowcase finishing technique on some smaller pieces.
Another piece of learning from a Quilty video: Use water sparingly while pressing, and preferably ONLY on the finished block or quilt. Otherwise, you risk distorting the fabric. Aha! (Again.) She recommended not using the steam feature in the iron, but spraying water from a bottle.
Another piece of learning from a Quilty video: Use water sparingly while pressing, and preferably ONLY on the finished block or quilt. Otherwise, you risk distorting the fabric. Aha! (Again.) She recommended not using the steam feature in the iron, but spraying water from a bottle.
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October 14. Playing with pink panels. I wanted to do a kind of mobius effect by putting the outside strips over and under at each corner. It was complicated to do...I'm not sure there was an easier way to do it. But I like the effect. (BTW, I bought a set of rulers today from Arteza. It was a good price, and I think I'm going to continue playing with quilting for a while.)
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October 15. Oh, my. This is getting to be too much fun. I've starting adding batting to some of my practice pieces, and I can't believe how it changes them. Even the brown piece that I didn't like is now looking pretty good. I'm using the pillowcase technique, so there's no binding. The funny thing is, the pillowcase process is exactly what I was doing to make the face masks: the top piece goes front to front with the back, with the batting on the bottom. Sew the edges, leaving an opening for turning. Turn right side out, stitch 1/2" from the edge, and there you have it. I used "stitch in the ditch" for the quilting on most of these. I'll add free motion quilting later, after I've practiced a bunch.
My 31-15 does passably well with sewing curves, but I've ordered a free-motion foot to help me with that. I also found a new Youtube channel where I downloaded a helpful pdf, 101 ideas for quilting. It'll help me figure out how to proceed with the brown one.
My 31-15 does passably well with sewing curves, but I've ordered a free-motion foot to help me with that. I also found a new Youtube channel where I downloaded a helpful pdf, 101 ideas for quilting. It'll help me figure out how to proceed with the brown one.
October 16. Having fun adding batting to all my small pieces. I've used stitch-in-the-ditch (stitching following a seam line) for each of them; I want to add some free-motion quilting to them at some point. I'm waiting for that foot to arrive. Patiently waiting.
I have to say something about the piece with the cats. I'm sorry I didn't take a before photo of it...it's an ironing board cover that I got from my sister. The design was just so dang cute that even though it had a couple of burned spots on it, I wanted to do something with it. It's now a quilted wall hanging. And it's also waiting for some free-motion action.
I have to say something about the piece with the cats. I'm sorry I didn't take a before photo of it...it's an ironing board cover that I got from my sister. The design was just so dang cute that even though it had a couple of burned spots on it, I wanted to do something with it. It's now a quilted wall hanging. And it's also waiting for some free-motion action.
October 18. Kris helped me manhandle the lever on my machine to change the stitch length to zero so I can start practicing free-motion stitching. I think that particular lever had not been moved in a looooong time, and it was frozen in place. It's still hard to move, but I can manage it. So now I'm practicing the alphabet on batting sandwiches.
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October 19. I love Sundays. I can play in my studio all day. I had so much fun--after I got over my self-doubt about my ability to put fabrics together. It's rather daunting. I'm at the bottom of the learning curve, and it feels like there's so much to discover. But I plowed ahead, and I'm pretty happy with how this piece turned out. I used some fabrics from Fabric Recycles in addition to the scraps in my stash. I also did some "fussy cutting," which is when you cut out a particular piece of a design. I did that for the elephants, zebras, and giraffes.
I also used a technique I learned from Karen Brown of the Youtube video channel Just Get It Done Quilting. She says when a fabric is ugly, you just haven't cut it small enough. I did that with the two multi-colored strips above the yellow and below the orange. As a two-inch strip, it was pretty dang ugly, but I wanted the colors. I split it into two one-inch strips, and it worked! I have the colors without the icky design. (I had also alternated the ugly fabric with some red pepper fabric.) I asked Kris to replace some bulbs in the overhead can lights, and it's much brighter in the studio now. From there, I found a new way to photograph hanging pieces. The piece is hanging from a ruler braced against the two knobs on the closet doors. I cut a piece of mat board to cover the opening between the doors, and now I have a good background for photos. I'm going to revise this piece just a little...I see that the yellow block above the tigers is a little off. I know it's because of the foot I'm using. I need to get a walking foot in order to keep the three layers even as I sew. Otherwise, I'll get the "creep" I see on the top layer and the resulting unevenness. |
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Yesterday I also redid two of the three flamingo pieces. I had finished them as standalones, but I decided I wanted them in the quilt. I had taken them apart earlier in the day, and just before I stopped (it was hard to make myself go to bed!), I added the polka dots that had been on the back as layers on the front. Love it!
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October 20. I'm so happy with this panel. I saved my favorite colors for later in my learning process so I could commit my rookie mistakes on the earlier ones. I LOVE these colors, and the design is SO pleasing! I like showcasing a design in the center and framing it with multiple layers. This one gives the feeling of being on the outside looking into an aquarium. Or the ocean.
I used the same technique I described above (regarding ugly fabric that has good colors) for the horizonal bands. However, this time the fabric wasn't ugly, but the design was very distinct; I was avoiding the conflict between its design and the main one by making the bands so skinny that all you can see are the colors. Maybe I can use that fabric again somewhere else; it's cats and dogs, and how can I not feature it somehow! Both the new blades and the grid rulers came today. I used both of them as I made this panel. Gosh, it's nice to have a sharp blade! |
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October 22. So much to learn! My new Juki free-motion quilting foot came yesterday. I've begun practicing with it. To be honest, I'm intimidated. It's quite different than anything I've done with my machine before, requiring several adjustments (stitch length -> 0, foot pressure adjustment, and of course, the new foot). The hard part is going to be training my hands, foot, and mind to coordinate well enough to create designs on the "quilt sandwich." So far my practice pieces look downright awful.
In the meantime, I've also finished another panel featuring pastel greens and oranges. I started with the six-inch square (-ish) that I made a couple weeks ago. Since I still had lots of scraps with those colors, I decided to alter it and expand it. I took out some of the solid orange in the middle and added a floral pattern. |
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When I ran out of the lighter oranges, I started looking around for scraps in the other color bags and found more that would go with what I already had made. I ripped out my first "final" border and found another that I liked better. Ripping is my friend.
I ordered a walking foot from Singeronline.com that will help me keep all three layers of the quilt even as I sew. It may be my final purchase for my quilting adventure. We'll see. |
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October 23. Well, that idea didn't last long. I ordered an Ott-Lite floor lamp from Jo-Ann Fabric this morning. It's my third floor lamp, in addition to a desk lamp on my sewing machine. I just HAVE to have good lighting in all work areas of my sewing room. I've been moving the lamps back and forth every time I move from one to the other. I'm not sure if this purchase is a luxury or just good sense. You can be the judge. :)
This morning I altered the dark green panel both to make it square it and to eliminate the large green band. I love how malleable this craft is--at least, when you're doing it free-form like I am. I'd imagine using a pattern is very different. The before and after photos show what I did. |
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But I've skipped over what I did last night. At the suggestion of the many video instructors I've watched, I made a big pile of sandwiches for free-motion quilting practice from sheets left over from the face mask project and batting scraps from ScrapsKC. By the time I've used all of them, I should be making some progress.
Sneak peek into today's panel: I left the purples for last! |
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I love the colors in this one. I was thinking about perhaps adding more pieces, but I'm going to leave it as is, at least for now. The yellow makes a good frame around the darker colors. It's not nearly the same size as the other panels; I'll have to work around that when I put them all together.
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October 24. The black and white panel was too small compared to the others, so I added some new 2-inch strips.
Tomorrow I'll make the flamingo panels larger and start a new pink block. I guess the purple one wasn't the last one after all. |
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October 26. Yesterday was another lovely Sunday. I began the day by enlarging the two flamingo panels. I realized if I'm going to meld all of these into an actual quilt, they need to be more similar in size. I deconstructed one of my practice pieces in order to use some of the pink strips from it. Again, I'm enjoying the flexibility of this art. I'm saving the other pieces for another time. If I stick with quilting long enough, I'm sure I'll find some way to use them.
I'm particularly happy with the pink panel. I went back to the original idea of putting patterns together by using large, medium, and small prints. I think I did that well in this piece. I'm also happy with the way I was able to use several blocks of each smaller print surrounding the larger prints. If you look closely, you'll see two strips of the bright circles, two strips of the large polka dots, two strips of the pink, blue and yellow flowers, and three of the strawberry shortcake. I love having to work within particular parameters. Having to choose among the fabrics I have requires me to consider, reconsider, and consider again as I try out different combinations. It's fun. |
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I ended the day by practicing FMQ, and this time--finally--I began to feel more comfortable with it. Trying to control so many things at once was hard, so I created a wooden block to put under the treadle to limit the speed of the machine. (BTW, it IS electric...I'm not pumping it with my foot!) I thought maybe that would eliminate at least one variable so I could concentrate on what my hands were doing. It seemed to help.
This morning I added another quilting aid. Rather than spending $30 or more on a slick surface for my machine table (I forget what they're called), I found a $3 sign blank at the hardware store that works just fine. All I had to do was poke a hole so the needle will pass through it. With my purple sticky garden gloves and hot pink slick surface underneath the quilt piece, I think I've got as much (colorful) help as I'm going to get. Already I feel more in control. And as I know about myself, that is VERY important! FMQ is beginning to be fun. 
I added some strips to the light green panel to bring it up to 18 inches square.
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Here's my cutting area. Please note the plastic container that holds all my teeny tiny scraps of fabric and thread. I'm determined not to waste anything, and I get a kick out of putting my cuttings in it. When I was making masks, I threw many larger scraps into the wastebasket, which is totally unlike me, but I wasn't thinking about how they might be otherwise used. When the project was over and I finally realized I could have used them for stuffing dog beds or other donatable items, I was horrified at my thoughtlessness. I'm trying to take a live and learn attitude about it, but it still bugs me. Never again! As the container gets full, I empty it into a pillowcase. Those tiny bits will continue to have a use, at least until some dog chews up his bed.
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October 27. Another new panel...blues and yellows this time. As it turned out, all the larger pieces I found were kid fabrics, and even so, I had to piece together a couple of them to make them come out relatively even. I paired the smaller designs to match larger panels they framed. Because the larger panels were not exactly the same size, I had to do a lot of fiddling to get all the seams even. This is another standalone because of its odd size. I'm waiting for the walking foot before I finish it, because I plan to stitch in the ditch, and I don't trust the regular foot to do a good job. The back side is a sheet that I had used for lots of masks; while I like it, it doesn't go especially well with the front side. It's the closest I could come to a fun blue fabric. Considering what I had to work with, I think it came out pretty well.
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October 28. Two things worth noting today. I found the perfect batting for my quilt at ScrapsKC this afternoon! Queen size, 100% cotton, and brand new. Twenty dollars. Yippee! Also, after almost an entire week of practicing FMQ, I'm finally to the point where my output is not totally embarrassing. Here are the front and back of my "best" piece to date. Urghh. I'm continuing to watch Youtube videos to learn more about how to do this well.
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October 30. I'm practicing every day. I'm improving...but there's nothing to show until I make some REAL progress.
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November 3. I'm continuing to practice FMQ and awaiting my walking foot for straight-line quilting (which should be here tomorrow). But finally, I have something new to show. Yesterday I put together yet another pink panel, this time with some aqua/turquoise added in. It appears that this quilt is going to have quite a bit of pink in it. Perhaps the back will be pink as well.
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November 5. Dang! Still waiting for my walking foot, which is finally supposed to be here this evening. And I've ordered quilting gloves (Machinger's) and a slippery mat (Sew Slip) for my sewing table from Ebay to help me improve my FMQ. I haven't totaled the amount I've spent on this endeavor, but I think at this point it's about $250. Maybe $300.
While I've been practicing FMQ (thank you, Man Sewing and Just Get It Done Quilts and Sugaridoo on Youtube!), I bought a $4 bag of fabric scraps from ScrapsKC. I wish I had taken a "before" photo of that pile of wrinkly stuff, because I've made a beautiful panel from some of it. Doesn't everyone like a before and after story, no matter what the subject? I just loved choosing the pieces and putting it together. I'm thinking this is my style...not a quilt made with a pattern, but random pieces that fit whatever parameters I've set. In this case, it was: 1) Made from only pieces from that bag of scraps (plus one cheat...I used some material from scrubs I cut up a couple days ago to make more masks for Mark) 2) Purples and lilacs 3) 18" square You can probably tell that I like symmetry. And I just adore these colors. |
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November 8. I've been practicing with my new walking foot, and to be honest, I don't see much difference between what it does and the foot I normally use. It took some thinking to understand how it works, but now that I've figured it out, it still seems to pucker the cloth as much as the other one does. I'm still working on how to hold my hands and how much pressure to use. I've also used free motion quilting on my first project--the blue and yellow hanging. I'm not quite finished with it yet. Stay tuned.
I've made a bunch of squares from the ScrapsKC four-dollar bin fabric. I especially love the two with the cats (of course) and the one with the dog. I've already changed the one on the lower left in the first photo. The middle part wasn't very inspiring, so I cut it up and redesigned it.
I've filled the scrap jar with thread and fabric scraps three times now, and I'm in the process of filling another pillowcase for the next "dog bed" (Or pillow. Who knows?) (Update: I used a bunch of it to make a pillow form--December 17 entry.)
I've made a bunch of squares from the ScrapsKC four-dollar bin fabric. I especially love the two with the cats (of course) and the one with the dog. I've already changed the one on the lower left in the first photo. The middle part wasn't very inspiring, so I cut it up and redesigned it.
I've filled the scrap jar with thread and fabric scraps three times now, and I'm in the process of filling another pillowcase for the next "dog bed" (Or pillow. Who knows?) (Update: I used a bunch of it to make a pillow form--December 17 entry.)
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November 8. Another lovely Sunday. I spent hours playing with pink and red, mostly the scraps from ScrapsKC, but adding in pieces from the mask project. I didn't finish anything, but just pieced things together. I discovered angles. I love them! I also practiced with the walking foot, finishing the blue and yellow hanging piece in the process. New learning: When using the walking foot, lighten the pressure on the quilt sandwich (there's a setting on the machine) in order to lessen the possibility of puckers at the end of the line of stitching. Also, sew in short bursts, using my hands to move the material toward the foot. The foot will even it out as it sews. It is important to quilt the entire piece evenly in order to keep it from curving or twisting.
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I wasn't thrilled with this little blue block, so I rearranged it. Lesson: if you're going to frame something, make sure it's interesting enough to frame!
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November 9. I spent another day piecing, adding to the ones I made on Sunday. I added to and then split and rearranged the red panel.
I also practiced free motion quilting with my new Sew Slip mat. It really does make a difference...I can move the quilt sandwich so much more easily, which makes my FMQ much smoother. I don't remember practicing on anything this much since I took violin lessons as a kid. I feel a twinge of dread as I do it, knowing how bad the results look (still). I don't know WHY those curves are so hard to do! But if I don't practice, I'll never get better. Sigh. |
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November 10. More piecing. It's so fun putting these designs and colors together! These are yet more scraps from the face masks. I'm getting better at combining the designs, and my sewing is more precise, too.
At this point, I don't know how I will incorporate these long strips into the quilt, but I'm sure I'll think of a way to do it. As I said, it's all practice. |
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November 11. I LOVE aqua!
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November 12. More piecing, more practicing. My new gloves should be delivered today. I sure hope they give me more control over that pesky quilt sandwich.
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November 13. I remembered that Karen Brown showed how to put up a temporary "board" to help figure out the design of your quilt. I taped a flannel-backed tablecloth to one of the only walls in the house that was open enough to accommodate it...the wall of my staircase. I used the opposite wall, too. It helped somewhat, but since I can only see one wall at a time, it doesn't really help me see the overall design. I'm thinking the floor is going to be my only real option for that.
And both tablecloths fell down that night. One hit the floor just before bed (with Sunny's help, I'm pretty sure), and the second one fell after I had been asleep for a while. I instantly recognized the sound of the tape giving way. Everything ended up in a heap on the ironing board until morning. |
November 14. I spent my play time constructing new blocks and reconstructing others. I want an entire row of "framing" blocks somewhere in this quilt...the ones that highlight a central character. It's hard to explain...just look at the photos. I'll alternate them with the ones that don't have characters. I also created another blue 18" block from some of the strips.
November 15. I took a major step today. I laid out all the panels I've made and began to design the quilt. I had to keep all the cats out of the bedroom so I could use the bed. They did not like that at all.
After I played around with them for a while, I discovered I had almost everything I needed to finish the quilt. I added height to the cabbage rose panel and created two new panels from some of the strips I had made, adding in new colors to match the adjacent panels. I'm going to play around with the rows some more to get the best color arrangement, but I'm pretty happy with what I've done. Only one more purple panel to make. Then it's on to the task of actually fitting them together. The finished quilt will be 84" by 92". It'll be quite the trick to get all the rows to come out even. Another consideration is that I'll need to add a border so the little pieces of the panels don't get cut off during the quilting process.
After I played around with them for a while, I discovered I had almost everything I needed to finish the quilt. I added height to the cabbage rose panel and created two new panels from some of the strips I had made, adding in new colors to match the adjacent panels. I'm going to play around with the rows some more to get the best color arrangement, but I'm pretty happy with what I've done. Only one more purple panel to make. Then it's on to the task of actually fitting them together. The finished quilt will be 84" by 92". It'll be quite the trick to get all the rows to come out even. Another consideration is that I'll need to add a border so the little pieces of the panels don't get cut off during the quilting process.
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See the blank spot? That's going to be a purple panel...
I took a little time to run to ScrapsKC to choose more fill-a-bag scraps for a new panel (or two or three). While I was there, I also bought 10 yards of muslin that Julie Morrand had saved for me. November 16. All three cats claimed the bed this morning. They are so funny! |
BEFORE...
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AFTER washing, drying, ironing, and folding. A new pile of bits and pieces ready to be made into...something.
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November 17. I had an adventure while making this one. After I had constructed it, I saw that there was no contrast between two of the layers. I had read about that situation, and I didn't want to let it go when I knew I could make it look better. So even though I knew it would be tricky to replace a middle layer, I took it out this morning and replaced it. The only way I could insert the new pieces was by top-stitching over a layer I had already sewn. This is one of those times when perfectionism just has to be tossed out the window. It ain't perfect, but I like it a whole lot better! Tomorrow I'll lay everything out on the bed again and see what design shows up.
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November 18. After shutting the cats out of the bedroom, I laid everything out again. I switched things around quite a bit, and I eliminated a few panels from the mix, realizing that less is more. The rows will work better with only four panels across rather than five, which will allow for a border around the edges. Also, I decided I needed one more (!) black and white panel to give the bottom row balance. So that was my project for the evening. When I finally looked at the clock, it was 12:30. Where did the time go?
Oh, now I remember where the time went. I had told Mom a few weeks ago that we could lay everything out on her rug, and she could help me with the design. Since she's in lockdown again (Covid 19 is rampant in Johnson County right now...that's another whole story...), I can't visit her in her apartment. We decided I would print photos of each panel. She no longer takes pictures, so she suggested that I number each panel. She can play around with them (like paper dolls!) and call to tell me the order she likes. So I collated all my pictures in Publisher and printed them. I need to add this one last panel, and then Kris will take them to her today. I'm happy to give her something interesting to do, and I'm curious to see how her vision is different than mine.
Oh, now I remember where the time went. I had told Mom a few weeks ago that we could lay everything out on her rug, and she could help me with the design. Since she's in lockdown again (Covid 19 is rampant in Johnson County right now...that's another whole story...), I can't visit her in her apartment. We decided I would print photos of each panel. She no longer takes pictures, so she suggested that I number each panel. She can play around with them (like paper dolls!) and call to tell me the order she likes. So I collated all my pictures in Publisher and printed them. I need to add this one last panel, and then Kris will take them to her today. I'm happy to give her something interesting to do, and I'm curious to see how her vision is different than mine.
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I cut strips on the diagonal this time, because I had never tried that before. When I was almost done with the panel, I realized I had more black and white fabric to choose from. That led to another redo. Can you see the one strip I changed?
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November 20. After playing with the puzzle pieces myself and re-watching a video about sashing, I decided I should enlarge the rose panel that was smaller than the others to make it easier to put this thing together. Fortunately, because of my recent foray to ScrapsKC, I had just the right color fabric do to it. This is definitely one of my favorites.
I'm still puzzling over the beautiful blue-purple-yellow panel. It's about 21 x 13 rather than 18 x 18, and I'm considering leaving it out of the quilt because it would be tricky to fit in. :( On the other hand, I could alter it to 18 x 18. But it looks great the way it is. Decisions, decisions.
...Well, I made the decision. It's too pretty to not include it in the quilt. I'll just have to figure out how to handle the sashing. Here's the widened panel. It's now 21 x 18.
I'm still puzzling over the beautiful blue-purple-yellow panel. It's about 21 x 13 rather than 18 x 18, and I'm considering leaving it out of the quilt because it would be tricky to fit in. :( On the other hand, I could alter it to 18 x 18. But it looks great the way it is. Decisions, decisions.
...Well, I made the decision. It's too pretty to not include it in the quilt. I'll just have to figure out how to handle the sashing. Here's the widened panel. It's now 21 x 18.
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Kris came up with the BEST idea! He was looking at these two panels and he said, "These are so pretty, and they're so different from your whimsical ones. Why don't you make two quilts? One with the whimsical ones, and another with the pretty ones?"
Light bulb moment! Of COURSE that's what I should do! I'm already rearranging the paper pieces--literally! Here are the panels that will go in the pretty quilt. It'll be twin size. I may have to make a few more...
Light bulb moment! Of COURSE that's what I should do! I'm already rearranging the paper pieces--literally! Here are the panels that will go in the pretty quilt. It'll be twin size. I may have to make a few more...
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November 21. I still had some long strips of pink pieces, so I reconfigured them into another panel. Can't seem to stop doing that...I have some blue ones left, too.
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November 22. And...here's the blue one. Okay. I think this is REALLY the last one for this quilt. But I do want to make another pretty one for the twin size quilt. I found a few possibilities for the center of it last night.
It's another Sunday. Yay! I want to update my paper pieces one more time to include these two, and then (maybe) create a "final" design. We'll see how that goes. |
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I changed this panel. I guess I just don't like horizontal strips. The smaller pieces appeal to me much more.
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I just had to change two of the smaller pieces. They were bugging me! I love that this art form is so malleable. To a certain extent, you can change things when they don't work the first (or second) time. However, it's a real treasure hunt as I'm searching through my scraps to find a piece of the right color that's big enough to work.
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I used the paper pieces to decide on the layout of the small panels. What a fun and effective technique! So now I'm in the process of adding sashing (2 inches wide) to connect them. As I'm doing so, I've discovered that the panels aren't exactly even. Since the sashing needs to match up from one set of panels to the other, I'm changing them on the fly, so to speak, so the whole thing will come out even.
November 23. I stayed up way too late playing with these small panels. I tried one kind of sashing that I had had in mind for ages--strips that I had used in a rag rug. I thought this would be a perfect use for them, but unfortunately, the pattern was way too big and overpowered the designs in the panels. So I started all over again with a wonderful purply-blue sheet that I had used for many masks. I never looked, but I'll bet that sheet was a king size. I have plenty of it left. Because of the stripes in it, I can't use the entire thing, but I'm willing to bet it'll be the background for the whole quilt. If I don't have enough, I'll figure out something else.
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November 24. It took a looooong time and a lot of adjusting, but all the small panels are put together.
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November 24. After I finished the rows of small panels, I decided I wanted to add yet another two panels to make the piece wider. This would make eight panels in each row, which would be easier to match with the rows above and below them. Kris laughed at me. I laughed at myself, and then got busy. It does appear that I'm finding excuses to do more piecing.
I LOVE the way the last two came together. I'm really getting good at choosing complementary fabrics. |
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November 26 (Morning).I skipped a day of journaling, because I was using all my brain cells to figure out how to put these things together! Turns out, I wasn't the best at making all the panels the same size. I'd imagine this doesn't happen if you're following a pattern, because it would say in black and white, "Cut all blocks the same size!" Since I'm making this all up as I go along, there were no instructions to tell me that. (I should have realized it, nonetheless.) Bottom line is, I've had to add and subtract pieces in order to get the panels to line up. All the blocks are approximately the same size now (with the emphasis on "approximately"). I've had to physically compare each block to the one below it before I attach the sashing on its left and right. There's been a lot of mathematics involved, too, because the quilt has to fit the batting I bought, with 4 to 6 inches to spare on all sides. Oh, and I needed to leave room for a border, also, as I mentioned before. If I don't, some of my piecing will get cut off in the quilting process.
So here's what I've got so far: three rows attached, two to go. The sashing connecting the rows is one inch wide. The sashing between panels is two inches wide. As you can see, the no-cats-in-the-bedroom edict was overruled by Scuti. Sunny has gotten her way, too.
So here's what I've got so far: three rows attached, two to go. The sashing connecting the rows is one inch wide. The sashing between panels is two inches wide. As you can see, the no-cats-in-the-bedroom edict was overruled by Scuti. Sunny has gotten her way, too.
Oh, yes. I must mention another change in plans. Remember the black and white and red panels that were going to be at the bottom of this quilt? I changed my mind on that. Even though this is supposed to be a memory quilt of all those face masks--red, black, and white just won't fit in this color scheme. Guess they'll have to have their own quilt. And now I have to make more panels in colors that will work. Too bad! :)
Evening. I spent all day today making three more panels. I focused on using up as many of the pink and green scraps as I could. It's getting easier and easier to do this! I feel downright skillful at figuring out a pattern, choosing fabric, and piecing it together. Along with the brown and pink block from way back at the beginning of this project, I have enough now to continue connecting them and finish the quilt.
Evening. I spent all day today making three more panels. I focused on using up as many of the pink and green scraps as I could. It's getting easier and easier to do this! I feel downright skillful at figuring out a pattern, choosing fabric, and piecing it together. Along with the brown and pink block from way back at the beginning of this project, I have enough now to continue connecting them and finish the quilt.
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November 27. I've learned so much along the way that now I want to make some of the earlier panels better. Here's one I wasn't crazy about and how I changed it this morning.
Evening. I put together the fourth row this afternoon and added it to the quilt. I was two inches short of the sashing I needed...so I pieced together the last little bit from the scraps. I'll need to find something else to use for the last row. I tried to find something today, but ScrapsKC didn't have what I needed, and Fabric Recycles was closed. I wasn't ABOUT to go to Joann's on Black Friday! |
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I decided on the back of the quilt. For years, I've had a lovely pink flowered queen size sheet that has been sitting in the closet. It will be PERFECT!
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November 28. I had a brainstorm last night. I'm going to change some of the blue sashing to another color to make this quilt more multi-colored and to make it work better with the green and the pink sashing. There's just too much blue in this quilt! This morning I took the last (blue) row off in preparation for its new sashing. And then today my thoughtful sister, Mara, gave me a gift card to Fabric Recycles for my birthday. I immediately went there and bought a bunch of new color choices to finish the sashing. I don't yet know how it's going to go together, but it will be a lot more colorful and fun!
Evening. I used this lovely yellow/gold material that I found at Fabric Recycles to replace the blue vertical sashing. It took hours to do, but I love the results. The colors look much more balanced. Now I'm thinking about the sashing colors for the last (top) row. I love the design process!
Evening. I used this lovely yellow/gold material that I found at Fabric Recycles to replace the blue vertical sashing. It took hours to do, but I love the results. The colors look much more balanced. Now I'm thinking about the sashing colors for the last (top) row. I love the design process!
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The cats have taken over.
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November 29, my birthday! Decisions, decisions. I thought and thought and thought about how to finish this quilt. It seemed the closer I got to finishing it, the more in doubt I became about how to complete the sashing. Since my trip to FR yesterday, I had several choices for the top row, but none of them were IT. I considered replacing the pink sashing on the second row to a darker color and using a small pink print on the top row. But that would entail replacing all the sashing on the second row, AND it wouldn't match the theme of plain (no pattern) sashing. Then I thought about keeping the pink sashing on the second row as it was and using a contrasting color on the top row (which is all pink panels). I had some pretty blue green material with a faint pattern, but I was pretty sure I didn't have enough of it for the vertical sashing AND the one-inch horizontal sashing. I knew FR had a little bit more of it (I had seen it on Saturday), but I didn't know if they had enough for what I needed. And then...I had the perfect idea. I was thinking about aqua, one of my favorite colors, when I realized I had an old tablecloth that I rarely use that I was pretty sure was the exact right color. It's a large tablecloth, so even after poaching it for the sashing, it's still big enough if I ever want to use it again. Voila! Except for the border, the quilt is finished.
And for good measure, Sammie finally made it into the bedroom.
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December 2. Just a few niceties to accomplish now. I added the border to the top and bottom yesterday, which makes the final dimensions 80 x 90 1/2. (It was so long, I had to cut off about ten inches from the bottom before I added the border. That took a lot of courage!) I'm going to cut the batting and backing to 8 inches bigger than the top and buy thread for the binding, which is going to be the pink print. FR will put all of this together, leaving the back side of the binding for me to do.
Kris took the quilt top to Mom this afternoon so she'll have a chance to hang out with it before I take it to Fabric Recycles for quilting. It'll probably be six weeks before I get it back, and neither of us wanted to wait that long for her to see it. She's my most enthusiastic fan. I'll pick it up from her on Saturday.
Mom called to tell me how wonderful the quilt is, and how proud of me she is. She was so excited! I'm proud that she's proud. :)
Kris took the quilt top to Mom this afternoon so she'll have a chance to hang out with it before I take it to Fabric Recycles for quilting. It'll probably be six weeks before I get it back, and neither of us wanted to wait that long for her to see it. She's my most enthusiastic fan. I'll pick it up from her on Saturday.
Mom called to tell me how wonderful the quilt is, and how proud of me she is. She was so excited! I'm proud that she's proud. :)
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I spent quite a bit of time today measuring 20 times and cutting once...well, actually twice: the batting and the back sheet. I think I did it right. They each measure eight inches larger than the quilt itself: 88" x 98 1/2".
Uh-oh. I was talking to Kris, and another commitment fell out of my mouth. I'm going to REALLY learn how to free motion quilt by the time this one comes back so I can finish the next one myself. Yikes. Six weeks to practice! |
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I made a pillow for Mom, using the rest of my sunflower fabric.
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December 9. I took the pieces to Fabric Recycles last Saturday after picking up the quilt top from Mom. She was so excited about it and so impressed with my handiwork, that I'm going to share the quilt with her. When it comes back, I'll finish the binding and then let her keep it for a while.
She mentioned that after the quilt is put together, I won't be able to see the stitching I did. I had never thought about photographing the back side...but once she said it, it seemed like a good idea to take a few pictures. |
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I'm still practicing FMQ and really beginning to see some progress. It feels so much easier now to control the machine speed. I've figured out all the settings on the machine, so I'm not constantly wondering if there's something that needs to be set differently.
I've been in touch with Singeronline.com to because I finally determined that the walking foot I bought does not fit my machine. There's two problems: the hook is too far to the left and doesn't reach the screw that keeps the needle in place (which it's supposed to fit around), and the hook is too small to fit around the screw. They're sending me a smaller screw. If the screw itself doesn't fix the problem, I'll need to bend (gulp!) the hook to the right until it fits around the screw. There is no other walking foot for the 31-15. |
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December 10. I took time out from quilting the past few days...I've been sewing nightgowns as gifts. Ava is getting a nightgown and a knitted hat for Christmas (space theme). Mom is getting a nightgown for Chanukah (butterflies). Mara is getting her annual nightgown for her birthday (cats). As a Chanukah gift, I'm going to make a pillow to go with her afghan from last year.
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December 11. And then it's back to quilting. I offered to make Eve a pillow for her new bedroom. She told me the colors are teal and green, so I selected the appropriate scraps from my pile. I decided to insert a zipper into this pillow--the first one I've done in DECADES--so Eve could clean the pillow case if necessary. It was off to ScrapsKC to find a zipper. Or two or three. Or seven.
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December 12. I gave Mom and Mara their presents today, and they were both delighted. And both showed a lot of enthusiasm for the pillows I offered them as Chanukah gifts. We spent some time on the floor...at Mara's, choosing fabrics from my scrap box to go with her family room carpet, and at Mom's, choosing fabrics that didn't particularly match anything, but were colors she liked. Oh, boy! More projects!
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Now here's a little bit of minutiae that's a little hard to explain. I've been building quilt "sandwiches" from scrap batting and a top and bottom layer of sheeting left over from the face mask project. As I used them for FMQ practice, I filled them up with doodlings, lines, swirls, and circles. When they were completely full, I put them in my purple pop-up basket. I figured I'd re-use them somehow, as pillow stuffing or something. Today I tried covering one with another layer of sheeting, wondering if I could reuse it for practice. It worked! I suddenly have twice the practice material I had yesterday. That's a good thing...because I still need LOTS of practice.
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December 14. I worked on Mara's pillow all day yesterday. I'm really happy with the way it turned out, zipper and all. I decided to separate the fabrics she had chosen into two sections because they seemed so different both in color and mood. I made them into the front and back sides.
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December 14. Today I made my first potholder with the special heat resistant batting that came in a bag of miscellaneous pieces from ScrapsKC. I love how it turned out. We'll see how the cook/baker in the house likes it.
I spent the rest of the day (it's Monday, but business is slow!) making Mom's second pillow. She likes bright colors. I'm happy to report that this zipper went in much more easily than the ones I inserted in the first two pillows. |
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December 16. Oh, boy. These pillows are just TOO easy and TOO fun! After a trip to ScrapsKC to pick up whatever pillow forms they had (they had three) and more zippers, I quickly made another pillow from the stained-glass piece.
It appears I am now semi-retired. No business all week so far. No problem! I'm having fun playing in my sewing room all day. I'm ready to show my latest FMQ practice piece. It's still not great, but it's better...and I think I've got my signature DOWN! |
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December 17. I turned another of my lovely panels into a pillow last night. Because it was an odd size, I made my own pillow form, using about half of the trimmings, thread scraps, and other materials from my "trash" pillowcase as stuffing. I used some of the muslin from ScrapsKC for the case. I just love the cabbage rose in the middle. I think I've mentioned that before. :)
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December 19. Today was gift-giving day. We had a three-person party to celebrate my sister's birthday at Mom's apartment, and I gave both of them their Chanukah gifts. I had given Mara her birthday gift--her annual nightgown--last week.
I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of Mary Ellen's nightgown, which I gave to her today. She sent me a photo of her in it, though. Thanks, Mary Ellen! (I kinda hate to do it, but for privacy, I cropped out her head...) I made two more potholders today, using the regular foot and making up the quilting part as I went along. They're a gift for a friend who told me she likes ocean colors. They're so easy to make, I want to do more. 
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December 20. Just to see what they were like, I made a couple of bowl cozies.
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December 21. My FMQ is FINALLY beginning to look decent. It took a lot of practice pieces (84, with some of them used twice and a bunch of smaller ones) to get to this point.
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December 23. I had a great time the past couple of days making potholders for Linda (green) and Helen (red), the friends I met at ScrapsKC who have been my creative mentors. I had wanted to use my walking foot, but the screws I discussed with Singeronline.com about two weeks ago are still not here. I used my regular foot in a wonky line pattern, and they came out okay. I had practiced Helen's name with my FM foot, but I chickened out. I'm not confident enough about my skill. And I'm not confident that the bobbin won't get stuck and create a snarl, which it does ever so often.
I delivered them today. I'm pretty happy about that! |
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December 24. Oh. My. Gosh. Got a call from Paige at Fabric Recycles to tell me that she accidentally attached the back sheet to the longarm machine 90 degrees off. She's done more than half of the quilting and just realized her mistake. It's a disaster...or it would be if I hadn't already realized that quilting is one "make it work" situation after another. I can't imagine how difficult that call must have been for her to make.
I had measured that sucker 20 times before I cut, so I was chagrined to think that I hadn't done it right. But that wasn't the problem. It was cut correctly. The instructions I left with it were to make sure the roses were facing up. (When I left it at the store, I had a nudge to pin a note to it saying "this side up," but I didn't do it!) Since the roses are at an angle, looking at it either vertically or horizontally it would appear that the roses were facing up. If she had measured the piece, it would have been obvious which way it went. But she didn't. I took the 16 inches of sheet that I had left to the store. It'll be interesting to see how she attaches it...I don't envy her that job. In the meantime, I had a chance to see it on the longarm machine. It's looking good! |
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December 27. And...the machine screws arrived yesterday! Only took a week after being mailed 2-day delivery. I've tried one of the three different kinds, and it fits. Still working out the stitch length. Even on the longest stitch setting, the stitches are tiny. I'll keep you posted. (Update: It's all a matter of finger pressure as the fabric goes under the needle.)
In the meantime, I gave three potholders to my sister...a beautiful purple/blue/yellow one and two that I had intended to give to Kelly, but then realized I could choose better colors for her. Here's the one I made for Mark. It suits his energetic personality perfectly! |
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December 28. Yesterday was all about learning new techniques for potholders. I was using my regular "pillowcase" technique (sewing the pieces together front to front, then turning and topstitching, then quilting) when I discovered that the batting (along with the four other pieces I had cut) was actually the kind that adheres to the fabric when it's heated. I don't know how that's going to affect its performance as a potholder, but I'm hoping for the best.
After I had that realization, I decided to learn how to make and attach binding, which allows me to do the quilting BEFORE binding, and let the stitching run into the seam line. My first one is a little wonky at the corners. I'm sure the next one will be better. :) This is giving me practice for the quilt when it comes back...I will be hand-stitching the binding.
...I took out the wonky stitching and resewed it to make it neater. Of course I did! |
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December 29. I picked up the quilt from Fabric Recycles today! It looks better than I could have imagined. I'm going to be spending some time finishing the binding. Stay tuned...
December 30. It didn't take that long to complete the binding...just a couple hours yesterday and about an hour today. Here's the finished quilt. I love it. Not only is it beautiful, it's the perfect weight...not too heavy, not too light. Here's the ironic part: I can't leave it on top of my bed. The cats would make a mess of it, either by getting fur all over it or in the case of Scuti, biting it. She loves to play, and that includes nibbling on whatever she's playing with. So this will never be the top quilt. I'll put another, less important one on top of it.
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I put together another pillow (18") from two of the leftover panels. The zipper was pretty easy this time. I'm getting better at that.
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January 1, 2021. Happy new year! I've spent the last couple of days playing with potholders. I did quite a bit of musing and thinking about the colors of Kelly's potholder. Her kitchen is blue, but her living room (adjacent to the kitchen, and I'm pretty sure where she eats) has much more complex, muted colors. I'm so glad I took the time to think about it, because hers is really an art piece, in my opinion. Also, Erica at Fabric Recycles told me about a better way to make the loop at the top, and I'm having a great time playing around with that.
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January 2, 2021. Here's a fun, practical item I picked up at ScrapsKC that has become my newest favorite tool. It looks like a plastic teapot, but it's actually a huge suction cup that lets me hold my plastic template down firmly in order to cut around it. I'm so glad to have it!
Potholders 'R Us! I guess I'm making these for future gifts.
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January 3, 2021. Shelley's potholders. I love them! First a photo of the fabrics I chose...then the finished potholders. Can't wait to do more.
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January 5, 2021. I mailed Shelley's potholders to her yesterday. Can't wait to hear how she likes them!
I've been creating a quilt out of the three remaining red panels. I added some strips to bring it up to 36" x 36" and then completed the rest of the steps I've learned in order to finish it. I am not particularly happy with the quality of my free motion quilting--the weight of the piece made a HUGE difference in my ability to move it around with any kind of grace. I'm going to have to play with my tables and other horizontal surfaces to support the next one. But other than that, it came out really well. I loved hand stitching the binding with invisible stitches. I'm not sure who is going to get this one.
I've been creating a quilt out of the three remaining red panels. I added some strips to bring it up to 36" x 36" and then completed the rest of the steps I've learned in order to finish it. I am not particularly happy with the quality of my free motion quilting--the weight of the piece made a HUGE difference in my ability to move it around with any kind of grace. I'm going to have to play with my tables and other horizontal surfaces to support the next one. But other than that, it came out really well. I loved hand stitching the binding with invisible stitches. I'm not sure who is going to get this one.
January 8. I made two potholders for Joe and Nancy a few days ago.
Here are a couple panels I put together today. I just love displaying roses!
A friend asked if I would I make a quilt panel for a mutual friend who has cancer. Another friend is collecting 30+ panels to make a quilt to comfort her during her chemotherapy. I'm making a panel for myself and one for my friend to contribute. Hers is the blue-green one; mine is pink and green, to symbolize the heart and life. I signed it using free motion quilting (only because they wanted each panel to be signed...normally I wouldn't do that).
January 10. I took the quilt to Mom yesterday for a two-week loan. She LOVES it! I also showed her the red quilt and the panels I made during the time I couldn't see her (COVID rules got relaxed this week, so I can visit her again).
I have actual work to do today, so even though it's Sunday, I'll need to be at my desk. This is a hardship! My fingers are itching to do some sewing.
I have actual work to do today, so even though it's Sunday, I'll need to be at my desk. This is a hardship! My fingers are itching to do some sewing.
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January 12. I found a new face mask pattern that's even better at keeping fog off of eyeglasses. There are only two pieces: the body of the mask and the nose piece. To satisfy my itchy fingers, I made three for myself and three for Kristopher, altering the pattern to fit his face. (For the record, I added about 1/4" in width at the fold and 1" in length. I also used 9" elastic pieces rather than 8 1/2".) He tells me they fit perfectly, and there's no fog. The original size fits me well.
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January 13. Two more potholders...these are for Nicole and Lisa. Their new kitchen will have gray counters and melon accents in the kitchen. I love the design and combination of fabrics I chose.
January 15. Fun, fun, fun! Yesterday I made another potholder for Nicole and Lisa...then found a new pattern with hand pockets that I wanted to try. I made that, too (probably for us). Then there was this fun musical fabric that was calling my sister's name, so I made her another face mask with the new no-fog pattern.
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January 25. It's been a while since I posted. I got totally caught up in an engrossing project and didn't take the time to write about it. Before that, though, I started a few fun potholders. Then they had to wait until the project was done, and I just finished them today.
I also cut the 18" green panel into quarters and made two potholders out of it.
So here's the project that had me going for an entire week. A friend--who is quite a bit bigger than I am--offered me her old chenille bathrobe, thinking I could cut it down and make a robe to fit me. Oddly enough, I had been sitting on an old well-loved chenille bathrobe of my own for many years, thinking I would one day take it apart, make a pattern, and create a new robe. I can't even say how many years I had been hanging on to it, waiting until I was smart enough to tackle it. Maybe ten. Maybe more. At any rate, her offer got me going. I thought with all my new quilting experience, I could figure it out somehow.
I was right...I did. I deconstructed my old robe, made a pattern on craft paper, and went from there. I had the very good idea to make a first-draft robe out of some fabric that I didn't care about. It was lucky I did: There was one piece that had me puzzled. It would have been a good idea to take photos of exactly how the pieces went together, but I didn't think of it until they were all apart. That piece turned out to be the back of the neck, which attached to the two lapels. Good to know! I learned a lot by doing the first one, and by the time I began considering how to alter her robe, I had an idea how to do it.
I took her robe apart and used the pattern I had made to make a new old robe. It fits me perfectly, and I am thrilled with it. I am also pretty dang proud to have made the leap from "oh, someday" to "today's the day" and to have made something so beautiful and useful. I also got to repair some of the worn spots on the elbows by embroidering a running stitch through the holes left by the disappeared chenille. Because I have every single color of embroidery floss in the entire world, I was able to match the bluish-purple color of the robe exactly.
My friend is happy because her robe has a new life. And her sister, who gave her the robe, is happy too. That makes three of us.
I was right...I did. I deconstructed my old robe, made a pattern on craft paper, and went from there. I had the very good idea to make a first-draft robe out of some fabric that I didn't care about. It was lucky I did: There was one piece that had me puzzled. It would have been a good idea to take photos of exactly how the pieces went together, but I didn't think of it until they were all apart. That piece turned out to be the back of the neck, which attached to the two lapels. Good to know! I learned a lot by doing the first one, and by the time I began considering how to alter her robe, I had an idea how to do it.
I took her robe apart and used the pattern I had made to make a new old robe. It fits me perfectly, and I am thrilled with it. I am also pretty dang proud to have made the leap from "oh, someday" to "today's the day" and to have made something so beautiful and useful. I also got to repair some of the worn spots on the elbows by embroidering a running stitch through the holes left by the disappeared chenille. Because I have every single color of embroidery floss in the entire world, I was able to match the bluish-purple color of the robe exactly.
My friend is happy because her robe has a new life. And her sister, who gave her the robe, is happy too. That makes three of us.
February 6. You wouldn't know it to read my posts, but I've been very busy quilting the past couple of weeks, learning how to quilt as you go (QAYG). I've just finished my second quilt using that method. I learned a lot making the first one, which was pretty sloppy. The second one is much different, because I figured out I needed to continually even out my edges so the blocks would match up properly. I also shortened my stitch length, which makes a big difference in the overall quality of the piece.
I pieced the blue quilt randomly and then tried to figure out how to place the blocks in some kind of coherent design. I'm surprised I was able to make some kind of design with them, considering I didn't plan it in advance. The first two photos were taken before the blocks were stitched together. I used a labeling system of 1A, 1B, 1C, 2A, 2B, 2C, etc. to designate the rows and columns. It worked very well to keep things in order before I stitched them together. My method was to do each row by itself, then attach two rows together, and then the two remaining rows. The last step is stitching the two two-row pieces together. That way, I only had to deal with the entire piece three times: once to sew the halves together, and then twice more to sew down the sashing pieces.
March Update: I did not have a recipient in mind as I made this one, but I gave it to Mom. In late January she fell in her apartment, broke her hip and leg, and has been in Rehab for the past several weeks. I thought she really needed something cozy to cheer her up. She loves it and mentions it frequently. I'm glad I can give her something tangible to remind her than I'm thinking about her.
I pieced the blue quilt randomly and then tried to figure out how to place the blocks in some kind of coherent design. I'm surprised I was able to make some kind of design with them, considering I didn't plan it in advance. The first two photos were taken before the blocks were stitched together. I used a labeling system of 1A, 1B, 1C, 2A, 2B, 2C, etc. to designate the rows and columns. It worked very well to keep things in order before I stitched them together. My method was to do each row by itself, then attach two rows together, and then the two remaining rows. The last step is stitching the two two-row pieces together. That way, I only had to deal with the entire piece three times: once to sew the halves together, and then twice more to sew down the sashing pieces.
March Update: I did not have a recipient in mind as I made this one, but I gave it to Mom. In late January she fell in her apartment, broke her hip and leg, and has been in Rehab for the past several weeks. I thought she really needed something cozy to cheer her up. She loves it and mentions it frequently. I'm glad I can give her something tangible to remind her than I'm thinking about her.
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I enjoyed using the QAYG method, so I decided to make another quilt, actually designing it in advance. After a few tries, here's the design I came up with. I had a huge amount of gold fabric left over from the face mask project, which I paired with a complementary striped fabric. I wanted to make diamond shapes in the corners of the blocks, so I made a template to help me place the triangles correctly on the blocks. I cut some triangles with vertical stripes and some with horizontal stripes. I used the former for the diamonds, and the latter became the half-diamonds on the edges of the quilt. As you can tell by the pattern, some blocks had two triangles and some had just one. I had to make the correct number of blocks with the horizontal and/or vertical triangles, which was kind of a challenge. When I placed the blocks on the bed to make sure they were correct, I discovered only one that I had done wrong...it had two vertical triangles instead of one vertical and one horizontal. I fixed it, of course.
In the QAYG method, you create each block with the top, batting, and backing in place. I made the backing 11 inches, with the batting and front 8 inches. After you quilt it, you use the extra fabric on the back to create the sashing, which is used to attach each block to its neighboring block. After the row is complete, you attach the bottom part of the backing to the top of the next row. At the end of it all, you use the backing on the edges to create the binding. And that's it! In the first photo below, the first row is sewn together, while the remaining seven rows are still to be done. The point of QAYG is that you can do the entire process on your home machine rather than taking it to a longarm service to have it quilted. It has its own challenges, but it's much more doable than trying to wrestle a huge quilt under a free motion foot. |
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I'm going to call this my Sammie quilt, because it's the color of my orange and white cat, Sammie. However, because cats have their own ideas about what they want to do at any given time, I could NOT get Sammie to pose on the quilt, even though I made a tempting nest out of it. Scuti did the honors instead.
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I decided to create a potholder for each quilt I make. Here are ones to commemorate the blue and gold QAYG quilts.
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This potholder doesn't commemorate anything...it's just fun fabric that I wanted to play with.
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And now onward to a Valentine's quilt! It's taken a while to coalesce in my mind, but it's apparently going to be pink, red, and white with a bunch of hearts. And maybe one big one in the middle. I'm going to learn to applique to make this one.
March 3. And...it's a month later, and the Valentine quilt is finished! I didn't post all this time because I was so engaged in actually doing the work and learning the techniques I needed for this kind of quilting. I used another kind of QAYG, which I'm also calling Learn As You Go. Because that's what I did.
I feel like I've been on a long journey, and I'm a little intimidated about trying to re-create it in words. But here goes. I found a heart-themed quilt online, which I used as a jumping off point. I found a QAYG technique on Youtube that involved cutting the front, batting, and back of each block all the same size (as opposed to a much larger back, with its sides becoming the sashing, which I had used for both the blue and the gold quilts). With this technique, the blocks are held together with separate pieces of sashing that are the same length as the blocks. First you connect the blocks into rows, then connect two rows together (in this case four times), then four rows together (twice), and finally, connect the two halves. By that time, the quilt is pretty dang awkward to handle. But with this technique, you only have to deal with that bulk for a short time.
I decided on an 8 x 8 format: 64 blocks of 8 inches each, and I wanted to make it reversible. Why not? That way it would be pretty on both sides. (Mom had surprised me by loving the back side of the original quilt--which was that pink rose sheet--so much that she used it as the top.) Using almost entirely just the fabric I had on hand (with a couple of trips to Scraps and Fabric Recycles to fill in the gaps), I cut out all the blocks, sashing strips, and batting. That in itself took quite a while. As I worked on that, I was still designing the quilt in my head. I wanted to learn to applique, so I watched some videos on the topic. Using the turn-needle technique was not a lot of fun, whereas I LOVE to embroider and use pretty contrasting colors. So this is how it came together: A huge pink heart on a background of white. All the interior blocks would have some kind of embroidery on them, as well as lace or tatting or whatever I found in my stash. I would use up the leftovers from the pink rose sheet from the original quilt as sashing. I'd also design the back of the quilt in (almost) random pink, red, and white blocks.
While it was coming together, it became obvious to me that this quilt is going to be Mom's. She loves the colors, and I was incorporating the rose sheet she liked so much. She's still in Rehab, and because of COVID, I haven't been able to visit her in her room, so I've brought pieces and parts of the quilt for show and tell during our window visits. Her eyes absolutely light up as she looks at it. I can't wait for her to return to her apartment so I can make up her bed with the finished quilt.
Back to the process. While I was putting the blocks together in rows, I was very careful to keep them even and straight (although some of them still came out a little wonky. I don't understand how that happens!) The sashing process was interesting. The front sashing was 4 1/2 inches and pressed in half; the back was 2 1/2 inches. Both front and back pieces get attached to the first block; the the back piece gets attached to the back of the second block. Insert a batting piece that's 1 1/4 inches wide, and top-stitch the front of the sashing to the second piece. Then top-stitch the sashing itself and quilt it. I chose to make four straight lines down the length of it, first sewing down the middle and then dividing each of those parts in half with another line of stitching. I had to be VERY careful to keep everything even and straight during this process. And most importantly, when I began connecting rows to rows, hand basting was essential to keep the batting from rolling over on itself. I discovered this only after I had already completely finished one of seven of those long rows and realized that it was lumpy. Rats. I was NOT going to undo all that hand work.
Speaking of doing things over, I employed my usual philosophy of there's no hurry to get it done--just do it over if needed so I'll be happy with the finished product. And I did, on many parts of it.
I feel like I've been on a long journey, and I'm a little intimidated about trying to re-create it in words. But here goes. I found a heart-themed quilt online, which I used as a jumping off point. I found a QAYG technique on Youtube that involved cutting the front, batting, and back of each block all the same size (as opposed to a much larger back, with its sides becoming the sashing, which I had used for both the blue and the gold quilts). With this technique, the blocks are held together with separate pieces of sashing that are the same length as the blocks. First you connect the blocks into rows, then connect two rows together (in this case four times), then four rows together (twice), and finally, connect the two halves. By that time, the quilt is pretty dang awkward to handle. But with this technique, you only have to deal with that bulk for a short time.
I decided on an 8 x 8 format: 64 blocks of 8 inches each, and I wanted to make it reversible. Why not? That way it would be pretty on both sides. (Mom had surprised me by loving the back side of the original quilt--which was that pink rose sheet--so much that she used it as the top.) Using almost entirely just the fabric I had on hand (with a couple of trips to Scraps and Fabric Recycles to fill in the gaps), I cut out all the blocks, sashing strips, and batting. That in itself took quite a while. As I worked on that, I was still designing the quilt in my head. I wanted to learn to applique, so I watched some videos on the topic. Using the turn-needle technique was not a lot of fun, whereas I LOVE to embroider and use pretty contrasting colors. So this is how it came together: A huge pink heart on a background of white. All the interior blocks would have some kind of embroidery on them, as well as lace or tatting or whatever I found in my stash. I would use up the leftovers from the pink rose sheet from the original quilt as sashing. I'd also design the back of the quilt in (almost) random pink, red, and white blocks.
While it was coming together, it became obvious to me that this quilt is going to be Mom's. She loves the colors, and I was incorporating the rose sheet she liked so much. She's still in Rehab, and because of COVID, I haven't been able to visit her in her room, so I've brought pieces and parts of the quilt for show and tell during our window visits. Her eyes absolutely light up as she looks at it. I can't wait for her to return to her apartment so I can make up her bed with the finished quilt.
Back to the process. While I was putting the blocks together in rows, I was very careful to keep them even and straight (although some of them still came out a little wonky. I don't understand how that happens!) The sashing process was interesting. The front sashing was 4 1/2 inches and pressed in half; the back was 2 1/2 inches. Both front and back pieces get attached to the first block; the the back piece gets attached to the back of the second block. Insert a batting piece that's 1 1/4 inches wide, and top-stitch the front of the sashing to the second piece. Then top-stitch the sashing itself and quilt it. I chose to make four straight lines down the length of it, first sewing down the middle and then dividing each of those parts in half with another line of stitching. I had to be VERY careful to keep everything even and straight during this process. And most importantly, when I began connecting rows to rows, hand basting was essential to keep the batting from rolling over on itself. I discovered this only after I had already completely finished one of seven of those long rows and realized that it was lumpy. Rats. I was NOT going to undo all that hand work.
Speaking of doing things over, I employed my usual philosophy of there's no hurry to get it done--just do it over if needed so I'll be happy with the finished product. And I did, on many parts of it.
- I chickened out of doing free motion quilting (again). After working so hard on each block, I didn't want to take a chance of ruining it with bad quilting. So I did straight-line stitching at different angles on each row. Maybe next time...
- As I laid out the blocks, I used a row number/alpha column system to keep them in order, as I did for the last two quilts.
- I appliqued hearts onto the interior pink blocks, then realized that there wasn't enough quilting on those blocks to make the batting puffy. I went back and hand-stitched some semi-circles onto the corners.
- I learned to make half-square triangles on this one so I could make the large heart shape. Thank you, Karen Brown (Just Get It Done Quilts)!
- I also learned (too late to change it) not to use a dark fabric back-to-back with a white fabric, even if there's batting in between. Oh, well.
- I learned how to hand-stitch the quilting by doing so on the seven long, long pieces of horizontal sashing. (It was a little boring). That's when I discovered the importance of basting the batting.
- I learned not to use seersucker in a quilt. It's too stretchy.
- As I was putting the two-row sections together, I discovered that there was a full two-inch discrepancy in width between the top section and the second section! That almost put me under. But I knew there was a way to fudge it with the miracle of easing. I eased the heck out of those sections! I gave up on the idea of the vertical sashing being perfectly matched in favor of being able to put the entire quilt together without whacking off pieces of the ends.
- I really love hand-stitching the binding with invisible stitches. I used Karen Brown's technique by inserting one folded-over end of the binding into the other at the bottom of the quilt. Thanks again, Karen!
The finished Valentine quilt.
April 18, 2021. Oh, my goodness. I've made three quilts since I last posted, which was six weeks ago. I can see where this is going. My energy is going into designing and making the quilts, and not so much recording the process. So be it. I've learned a ton, and the journey is SO interesting. I'm going to post the photos, because I really do want to track what I've done. If some major learning comes to mind, I'll note that, too. But to take the pressure off, from here on it's going to be mostly a picture book.
In March, I made an almost-full-size, double-sided quilt-as-you-go (my preferred method at this point) housewarming quilt for Kris' daughter and her family. It got finished before the house did...it's sitting in my sewing room waiting for Kris to firm up his travel plans to St. Louis so he can give it to them. Kris had requested a "foodie" theme, since Nicole is a baker/cook/big-time foodie. I didn't have any food fabric, but I had this wonderful wine bottle fabric. I do hope they like wine. The back is made of large blocks of complementary colors, featuring orange, the color Nicole told me would be the "pop" of color in the new house.
Apparently my style is also design-as-you-go, because I planned out only the large strokes of this quilt before I began. I recall making a few trips to both ScrapsKC and Fabric Recycles to find just the right fabrics to complement what I had already made. I also tea-stained some muslin--another new-to-me technique--hoping to get the right tan/brown (it worked). I changed the sashing about a million times before I settled on the final pattern (I will spare you all the iterations), and I changed out some of the fabric choices as well. The quilting is wavy lines, done with the walking foot on each block before I pieced them together. The first two photos are the fabrics I intended to comprise the major part of the quilt; but because they were so similar, they competed with each other, and I couldn't make it work. I couldn't use the grape fabric on the reverse side, because I didn't have enough of it, and it didn't blend at all with the other, brighter colors I wanted to use. It ended up as the binding, and it was perfect...it reflected the exact color scheme of the wine bottles, but without competing with the design. The last two photos are the double-wide "potholder" I made to commemorate this quilt.
UPDATE: Kris finally visited Nicole in their new home in July, taking the quilt along with him on the train. She loved it.
In March, I made an almost-full-size, double-sided quilt-as-you-go (my preferred method at this point) housewarming quilt for Kris' daughter and her family. It got finished before the house did...it's sitting in my sewing room waiting for Kris to firm up his travel plans to St. Louis so he can give it to them. Kris had requested a "foodie" theme, since Nicole is a baker/cook/big-time foodie. I didn't have any food fabric, but I had this wonderful wine bottle fabric. I do hope they like wine. The back is made of large blocks of complementary colors, featuring orange, the color Nicole told me would be the "pop" of color in the new house.
Apparently my style is also design-as-you-go, because I planned out only the large strokes of this quilt before I began. I recall making a few trips to both ScrapsKC and Fabric Recycles to find just the right fabrics to complement what I had already made. I also tea-stained some muslin--another new-to-me technique--hoping to get the right tan/brown (it worked). I changed the sashing about a million times before I settled on the final pattern (I will spare you all the iterations), and I changed out some of the fabric choices as well. The quilting is wavy lines, done with the walking foot on each block before I pieced them together. The first two photos are the fabrics I intended to comprise the major part of the quilt; but because they were so similar, they competed with each other, and I couldn't make it work. I couldn't use the grape fabric on the reverse side, because I didn't have enough of it, and it didn't blend at all with the other, brighter colors I wanted to use. It ended up as the binding, and it was perfect...it reflected the exact color scheme of the wine bottles, but without competing with the design. The last two photos are the double-wide "potholder" I made to commemorate this quilt.
UPDATE: Kris finally visited Nicole in their new home in July, taking the quilt along with him on the train. She loved it.
And now a brief pause (paws) to look at the studio-turned-sewing room. It's constantly morphing from one iteration to another as I try to improve the flow of the space. The basic work area is a triangle: sewing machine, cutting table, and ironing board. I recently switched the placement of the sewing machine and the cutting table; then I added a table behind the sewing machine to handle the weight of the quilt as I sew the rows together and it gets cumbersome to manage. And then I replaced the five-foot table with a four-foot table. I sit on the futon for all my hand work. The "coffee table" holds many of my tools, which are handy to both the ironing board and my sit-down work. My stash is constantly growing, so I keep adding baskets to accommodate the new items. There are, of course, many cats in these photos.
April 19. After I finished Nicole's quilt, which took about three weeks, I found an intriguing cat face pattern on Joann Fabric's website. I had never used a pattern before, so I learned new skills by having actual instructions and templates to follow. Of course, the pattern was not QAYG, but that's the way I made it. I used yet more scraps left over from the face mask project. I'm still not all the way through them, but that stash is much smaller than it used to be.
Using a narrow-sash QAYG technique that I had found on YouTube, I made a five-block-across, five-block-down quilt. The cat faces were composed of pink, blue, green, and orange scraps. Serendipitously, I made just the right number of each color to place them diagonally in a cohesive pattern. What a pleasant surprise! For the background, I used a 30-year-old white sheet that I was no longer using as bedding. I had a pretty blue print in my stash that I used for the back side. To make the quilt bigger, I added a white border. Then I sewed strips of all the scraps I had used to make a colorful narrow border, and then added another white border outside of that. Because I didn't want to stitch in the ditch by machine, I hand-stitched the quilting. The binding (my favorite part) brought it all together. And then, of course, I made a potholder.
Using a narrow-sash QAYG technique that I had found on YouTube, I made a five-block-across, five-block-down quilt. The cat faces were composed of pink, blue, green, and orange scraps. Serendipitously, I made just the right number of each color to place them diagonally in a cohesive pattern. What a pleasant surprise! For the background, I used a 30-year-old white sheet that I was no longer using as bedding. I had a pretty blue print in my stash that I used for the back side. To make the quilt bigger, I added a white border. Then I sewed strips of all the scraps I had used to make a colorful narrow border, and then added another white border outside of that. Because I didn't want to stitch in the ditch by machine, I hand-stitched the quilting. The binding (my favorite part) brought it all together. And then, of course, I made a potholder.
April 20. I learned so much making the cat face quilt that I wanted to make the same pattern again and do it better this time. I wanted to cut all the blocks more carefully so they would go together better and the rows would be even without having to manipulate them so much; I knew my quilting lines could be straighter if I used the water soluble pen to mark them before I stitched. And I wanted to use different colors for the faces and background to see how they looked. So, using yet more of the face mask scraps and other fabric I had acquired, I made a pink cat face quilt. I chose the colors for the front based on the striped fabric I used for the back.
April 21. And on to the next one! I wouldn't let myself start another quilt until I had written about the last three. Now that I'm up to date, I'll start on one with a new block style called "dancing 9-patch." It sounds like so much fun! The colors will be blue and yellow, one of my favorite combinations.
April 23. Well, maybe the blocks won't be dancing. I've finished all the 9-patch blocks, which entail a 3 x 3 grid with a border all around. There's not enough room in the borders to accommodate the tilted effect that's needed to make them dance. I'll settle for learning about 9-patches on this one. The next one will dance.
As usual, I'm using what I have, and I never know exactly how much fabric any particular part of the design will require. I made as many blocks as I could with the fabric I had. Then it was fun figuring out what design I could make with the 22 blocks of one set of fabrics and the eight blocks of the other. I think it came out pretty well, and I love the blue and yellow together. My next challenge is to QAYG an entire row before attaching it to the next one. I think I'm about ready to try FMQ on something besides a practice sandwich. Almost. Urgh. Scary.
As usual, I'm using what I have, and I never know exactly how much fabric any particular part of the design will require. I made as many blocks as I could with the fabric I had. Then it was fun figuring out what design I could make with the 22 blocks of one set of fabrics and the eight blocks of the other. I think it came out pretty well, and I love the blue and yellow together. My next challenge is to QAYG an entire row before attaching it to the next one. I think I'm about ready to try FMQ on something besides a practice sandwich. Almost. Urgh. Scary.
Update: The non-dancing nine-patch has become my first UFO--unfinished object. I was in the process of making it as I was waiting for my new sewing machine, and I was just at the point where I needed to decide to do it as quilt-as-you-go or to put the entire top together, which would necessitate quilting the whole thing at once. I got impatient to see what it looked like and sewed it all together. I also designed and sewed the back layer. It's beautiful. And unfinished. I'm afraid I'm going to have to pay Fabric Recycles to quilt it for me on their longarm. In the meantime, it's sitting in my cedar chest.
April 27. Oh, boy. Now I've done it. I've ordered a new sewing machine. I spent a really frustrating hour last Friday trying to practice FMQ--but before I could even get to the point of practicing, I had to fiddle with different top and bobbin thread weights, different needle sizes, and pressure and tension settings on my Singer. I was getting absolutely nowhere with it. All I got was snarls and snags and completely wonky tension. I finally determined I would never be able to get a good result with this machine. Although I had been able to get quilting feet for it, it really wasn't built for quilting. Even when the tension is set correctly, no matter how much I practice, the bobbin thread still snags every minute or so. I end up with fairly graceful circles and then a snag. More graceful swirls, and then a snag. It simply wasn't going to work.
My research actually didn't take all that long, because I ran into the perfect machine almost immediately. At Joann Fabric a nice man named Charlie demonstrated a way-over-the-top Viking for me. Computerized, dozens of stitches, automatic everything. Not for me. I knew I wanted a mechanical, metal workhorse of a machine with not too many bells and whistles. At a second Joann's, there were no demonstrators, but a pleasant clerk pointed me to several machines she liked. I took the promo flyers home and began exploring the internet. The very first one I looked at is the one I bought (although I did look at others, just be sure there wasn't something I'd like better). It's a Janome HD5000. I could write all about it, but there are so many features that please me, I'd be writing all day. I'll wait to sing its praises until after I've worked with it a while. I bought it from Ken's Sewing Center in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and it's on its way, even as I write. It was their Youtube video that convinced me that it was the one I wanted. (The owner's actual name is Kevin, and he was the one who made the video.)
I think I spent more time trying to find a table than the machine itself. After briefly considering retro-fitting it into the Singer table, I decided I wanted to keep my Singer functional, so I needed to find a sturdy table of just the right size. I've just ordered it from Home Depot. And now my head is swirling with the exciting challenge of restructuring my little sewing room to accommodate TWO machines, as well as a cutting table, ironing board, and storage. I'm still working on it.
My research actually didn't take all that long, because I ran into the perfect machine almost immediately. At Joann Fabric a nice man named Charlie demonstrated a way-over-the-top Viking for me. Computerized, dozens of stitches, automatic everything. Not for me. I knew I wanted a mechanical, metal workhorse of a machine with not too many bells and whistles. At a second Joann's, there were no demonstrators, but a pleasant clerk pointed me to several machines she liked. I took the promo flyers home and began exploring the internet. The very first one I looked at is the one I bought (although I did look at others, just be sure there wasn't something I'd like better). It's a Janome HD5000. I could write all about it, but there are so many features that please me, I'd be writing all day. I'll wait to sing its praises until after I've worked with it a while. I bought it from Ken's Sewing Center in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and it's on its way, even as I write. It was their Youtube video that convinced me that it was the one I wanted. (The owner's actual name is Kevin, and he was the one who made the video.)
I think I spent more time trying to find a table than the machine itself. After briefly considering retro-fitting it into the Singer table, I decided I wanted to keep my Singer functional, so I needed to find a sturdy table of just the right size. I've just ordered it from Home Depot. And now my head is swirling with the exciting challenge of restructuring my little sewing room to accommodate TWO machines, as well as a cutting table, ironing board, and storage. I'm still working on it.
July 20, 2021. You might notice that there's quite a large gap between the last post and this one. That's because I've been so busy quilting and sewing with my new machine that I just couldn't make myself stop long enough to write about it. And eventually, I didn't even think about doing so. What follows is a photo gallery of the projects I've made, along with brief comments about who I gave them to or other relevant or interesting notes.
And, BTW, I love my new machine. The only drawback is that my body doesn't quite fit it...when the machine is high enough that I can see the needle mechanism as well as I want to, the table is too high for my arms and hands. And when I lower the table, the housing of the machine is in my sight line. So far I haven't been able to resolve the problem. But the machine is wonderful. The feed dogs give great traction and the stitches are beautiful and even.
And, BTW, I love my new machine. The only drawback is that my body doesn't quite fit it...when the machine is high enough that I can see the needle mechanism as well as I want to, the table is too high for my arms and hands. And when I lower the table, the housing of the machine is in my sight line. So far I haven't been able to resolve the problem. But the machine is wonderful. The feed dogs give great traction and the stitches are beautiful and even.
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I have restructured my sewing room and table many, MANY times since April. I love organizing as much as I love sewing. On some mornings I get out of bed, wander over to the sewing room, and check to see if I can improve on any little work-flow or storage option. It gives me such a thrill when I find something that makes the organization just a tiny bit better. Silly me! Here are a few shots of my sewing room over the past few months.
Place mats for Mom (May). As usual, I was watching a video on Youtube that inspired me to try a quilted place mat. I did a little bit of free motion quilting, including an almost-invisible "Joie" in each line of stitching. The matching round coaster will go under her candy dish.
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May. Eve bought a pair of pajama pants that were WAY too big for her. I was able to take out the elastic, create a casing, and insert a ribbon. They look GREAT on her!
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Dog beds! (May). I had made so many quilt sandwiches to practice FMQ, I needed to do something with them and get them out of my sewing room. I made dog beds and cut up the sandwiches to use for the stuffing. Which lucky dogs got the beds? See the photos.
The second nine-patch (May-June). This time it's dancing. I really enjoyed the nine-patch concept, so I made another one, also blue and yellow. This time I was able to cut the angles so the design "dances." However, if I make it again, I need to make the original squares larger so I can cut a sharper angles to make the dancing more obvious. I gave this quilt to my friend Joe, who was delighted to receive it.
Potholders and Oven Mitts (May-June-July). I found a large amount of Insul-Brite at ScrapsKC, so I had a lot on hand when I decided to make a few potholders. Which turned into a LOT of potholders and oven mitts. The pattern for the oven mitt came with the fabric, so of course I tried it.
Mom's Birthday Present (June). A while back, I showed Mom this whimsical fabric panel that I found at ScrapsKC. She expressed great delight in it, saying it reminded her of the Dazzlers, her former tap dance troupe. I tucked that idea in the back of my mind. As June rolled around, I started thinking about how to create something with that panel in a way she could use it in her apartment. She already has plenty of pillows, and her wall space is limited. I decided to make a wall hanging anyway, thinking she might hang it inside her closet. When she saw it, she immediately wanted it in her kitchen and was happy to move her current things around to accommodate it. I call that a score!
Pop of Color (June-July). Oh, my. I loved this pattern so much, I actually bought it. Choosing the fabrics was fun. I love every single combination of the colors and designs. Each large block (14 inches) is made of four smaller blocks that are then sewn together. I made this with the quilt-as-you-go method, which means I designed the back at the same time as the front. One of my principles is to use the leftovers from the front for the back, figuring out how to design it based on whatever scraps are available.
Mom loves this one too, so she's getting yet another quilt. She's willing to give up her current bedspread in order to receive this. That being the case, I need to make pillow shams so she has a complete bed cover set. I'm in that process now. I brought one of her pillow shams home to use as a pattern. Fortunately, I still have some fabric left over from making the quilt. I've decided to make the squares larger on the shams--three lines of color rather than two. We'll see how that turns out. Her current shams are closed with buttons on the back. Guess I'll learn how to use the buttonhole feature on my machine. Oh, boy!
...So I learned how to use the buttonholer, but I was too chicken to use it on the shams. Maybe next time.
Mom loves this one too, so she's getting yet another quilt. She's willing to give up her current bedspread in order to receive this. That being the case, I need to make pillow shams so she has a complete bed cover set. I'm in that process now. I brought one of her pillow shams home to use as a pattern. Fortunately, I still have some fabric left over from making the quilt. I've decided to make the squares larger on the shams--three lines of color rather than two. We'll see how that turns out. Her current shams are closed with buttons on the back. Guess I'll learn how to use the buttonhole feature on my machine. Oh, boy!
...So I learned how to use the buttonholer, but I was too chicken to use it on the shams. Maybe next time.
July 25, 2021. So what are my unspoken principles about quilting? I haven't actually given this much thought, but I alluded to having them in a recent post. So now I'm thinking about it.
First, I never buy new fabric. I buy second-hand fabric from ScrapsKC or Fabric Recycles. I also buy it at yard sales or estate sales or thrift stores. I'm open to receiving fabric from someone else's stash. This isn't just about wanting to save money; it's more about the challenge of making something from "found" fabric--taking something that wasn't going to be used and making something from it.
I believe in buying fabric when I see it and not waiting until I'm working on a project that requires it. Of course, given where I shop, it's necessary to buy it when I see it, because the next time I'm there, it might not be there anymore.
However, there's a corollary to that. If I need a color or pattern in order to fill out a design that's not in my stash, I'll go looking for it. I always find something that will work.
I generally start a project based on color. I choose a combination of colors I like and then seek out a pattern. Or make one up using a technique or block I've learned on Youtube.
Ever so often, like with the Pop of Color quilt I just finished, I start with the pattern and then choose the colors. I did the same with the cat face pattern.
Youtube is my go-to teacher. Everything I know about quilting, I learned from one of the teachers who share their knowledge on their Youtube channel. When I get stuck, I look for the solution on YT. Between Google and YT, you can learn just about anything.
Despite what all the teachers say, I resist joining a guild. I'm not a joiner in general, and I like doing things by myself.
I like to either make something or organize my sewing room every day. That's what gets me out of bed. Many mornings I get out of bed, wander over to the sewing room, and start reorganizing some little piece of it. It serves the double purpose of satisfying that putting-things-in-order itch and also getting me to move my body, which is a little creaky for the first hour or so of the morning.
First, I never buy new fabric. I buy second-hand fabric from ScrapsKC or Fabric Recycles. I also buy it at yard sales or estate sales or thrift stores. I'm open to receiving fabric from someone else's stash. This isn't just about wanting to save money; it's more about the challenge of making something from "found" fabric--taking something that wasn't going to be used and making something from it.
I believe in buying fabric when I see it and not waiting until I'm working on a project that requires it. Of course, given where I shop, it's necessary to buy it when I see it, because the next time I'm there, it might not be there anymore.
However, there's a corollary to that. If I need a color or pattern in order to fill out a design that's not in my stash, I'll go looking for it. I always find something that will work.
I generally start a project based on color. I choose a combination of colors I like and then seek out a pattern. Or make one up using a technique or block I've learned on Youtube.
Ever so often, like with the Pop of Color quilt I just finished, I start with the pattern and then choose the colors. I did the same with the cat face pattern.
Youtube is my go-to teacher. Everything I know about quilting, I learned from one of the teachers who share their knowledge on their Youtube channel. When I get stuck, I look for the solution on YT. Between Google and YT, you can learn just about anything.
Despite what all the teachers say, I resist joining a guild. I'm not a joiner in general, and I like doing things by myself.
I like to either make something or organize my sewing room every day. That's what gets me out of bed. Many mornings I get out of bed, wander over to the sewing room, and start reorganizing some little piece of it. It serves the double purpose of satisfying that putting-things-in-order itch and also getting me to move my body, which is a little creaky for the first hour or so of the morning.
August 9. I've made a bunch of projects in the past week or so, during this "in-between-quilts" period. Luckily, I took photos of all of them, because I'm not sure I can depend on my memory to recall all of them.
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I found a wonderful freebie cross stitch pattern on the internet. It inspired me so, I just HAD to stitch it! It expresses my current feeling about life. I chose the colors of my sewing room, pink and green. Rather than framing it, as I had originally intended to do, I found the one perfect oval embroidery hoop in my stash and wound it with the perfectly colored yarn. It's hanging on my sewing room wall--which in itself was a trick, since the room is a dormer and has very little wall space.
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Another potholder to commemorate the colors in Mom's Pop of Color quilt. I'm enjoying the steadiness of my sewing machine's walking foot that allows me to stitch ALMOST in the ditch.
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Okay. This one has a back story. I belong to a Facebook group called Buy Nothing. The point is to give away what you don't need or want to somebody who can use it. And you can request to be the recipient if you see something you want. Also, if you're looking for something, you can post to see if anyone has what you need. In this case, a woman was giving away an unfinished baby quilt. I immediately responded because I wanted to see if I could finish it. She gave it to me. It was delightful to make something so rough into a finished and fun quilt. I ripped off the green border fabric, because there was no way to back it. I quilted the entire thing with wavy lines using my walking foot and bound it with a yellow check fabric. It's adorable! I posted it back on Buy Nothing to find someone who needed it. The original poster asked for it. Turns out, she's sponsoring a homeless woman whose baby is due in two weeks. Win-win-win! (She also told me at this point that the quilt had sat unfinished for thirty years. Her son is now 32.)
The pillowcase I use to store all the outtake thread, stuffing, and scraps was full to overflowing, so it became apparent that I needed to make dog beds. I had two pieces of dog design fabric that I had gotten from Hilda that were perfect for the job. I made the forms with muslin, stuffed them, and made the covers, complete with zippers so they could be cleaned and reused. I gave the beds to Great Plains SPCA.
Another friend from the Buy Nothing group noticed that I had finished the baby quilt and asked if I could repair her raggedy, loved quilt. Always up for a challenge, I said I'd try. We talked about how to clean it before I picked it up. When I saw her Sunbonnet Sue quilt, I was blown away by its cuteness. And how soft it was. The repairs included replacing a small amount of batting (using Stitch Witchery to keep it in place), re-sewing some of the binding, and replacing one bonnet. First I tried replacing just part of the bonnet, but it didn't look right, so I decided to take a leap of faith, rip out the whole thing, and replace it. Because I keep such a great stash of fabric, I had some pink cotton that was close enough to the original that it worked. I loved the doing the hand-stitching on the applique. By the time I was finished, I was in love with the pattern and knew I wanted to get to know Sue better. Toni was not able to tell which bonnet I had replaced.
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My cousin Marian came to town to visit Mom. No visitor leaves without something made by me...she got a potholder in her favorite colors, blue and lavender. I forgot to take a photo of the other side, but I've included a shot of the fabric I used. And then, of course, I used the walking foot to create wavy lines. Love those easy curvy lines!
In the meantime, I'll tell you the back story about Sunbonnet Sue. My mom's mom (born in 1896 in Kansas City, Kansas) was member of a group of girls who called themselves the Sunbonnet Sues. Those friends stayed together from grade school until they were all very old ladies. I think Grandma was the last of them to die (in 1984). I have always been in awe of the length of those friendships. You just don't see that these days. Grandma loved her "girls." 
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I was so inspired by the Sunbonnet Sue quilt that I'm considering making one myself. I knew Mom would want it if I made it, so I decided to make her a pillow of her own before I started on the quilt. (As awful as it sounds, that may keep her from claiming yet another quilt. I want to give them to other people, too.) Making a pillow would also allow me to be sure I wanted to spend such a huge amount of time on applique (Toni's quilt was 30 panels of SBS!). I was able to reuse an old pillow cover that I had salvaged a long time ago when I used the pillow form from it. The colors were too good not to keep it, but it was probably ten years before I would begin quilting. (BTW, the green in the photo is not at all accurate. It's actually lime green. My camera won't cooperate.) The batting inside was so thick that even my new machine had difficulty with it. But I made the pillow, zipper and all. I'm happy with the way it came out.
August 12. Help! I've fallen into a Sunbonnet Sue hole! I'm playing with the idea of making a SBS pillow for each of my three cousins and my sister. So far I've quilted two sides for each pillow (using the same design as the original pillow--criss-crossed double diagonal lines) and constructed and sewn three appliques. I chose a different style bonnet from the first one I made, using a pointed brim rather than the rounded one. I love figuring out the color combinations. That actually takes as much time and thought as the applique process. I use Stitch Witchery to affix the pieces onto the background before I sew. As I do more of these, I'm getting better at making a uniform blanket stitch.
Did I mention I spent several days organizing my scraps last week? As a result, I have a box of skinny strips, a box of 2" and 2 1/2" strips, a box of 3" strips, and a modest pile of larger scraps. As I choose fabrics for each of these little girls, I also use my ongoing scrap box. It feels like playing with paper dolls. I loved that when I was a kid!
Did I mention I spent several days organizing my scraps last week? As a result, I have a box of skinny strips, a box of 2" and 2 1/2" strips, a box of 3" strips, and a modest pile of larger scraps. As I choose fabrics for each of these little girls, I also use my ongoing scrap box. It feels like playing with paper dolls. I loved that when I was a kid!
August 16. As I may have mentioned a hundred times or so, I enjoy organizing, and my sewing room gives me plenty of opportunity to put things in order, then another order, and then yet another order. I had been dissatisfied with my storage of the original face mask scraps. They were separated by color and stored in ziplock bags in a basket under my drawing table. They felt ugly, awkward, and messy. A couple weeks ago, I watched a Youtube video about scrap storage and decided to renovate that part of my space. I spent two days cutting 2-inch, 2 1/2-inch, and 3-inch strips of scraps that were long enough for that; those that weren't ended up in a pile of "larger scraps." I found just the right size boxes to fit into my 4-drawer storage unit and completed their change-over from yarn to fabric. The yarn ended up in no-man's land behind my cutting table (where it's REALLY hard to get to). The new boxes of fabric have taken over their space. Here's what those drawers look like now.
September 2. ...Aaaand it's a wrap! I took a break from quilting when I got so excited about the idea of cross stitching a Sunbonnet Sue. I'm over it now...it wasn't as much fun as I wanted it to be. The colors just weren't right, and when you like to wing it like I do, there's a limit to what you can do with cross stitch compared to the variety and unending design possibilities of working with many different fabrics. I'm not saying this very well. Compared to how easy it is to change my mind about design and color as I'm putting together a SBS for quilting, cross stitching was pretty limiting. If I had used a particular color for a while and changed my mind about it, it was a LOT of trouble to change! Not that I didn't do it, of course. But I'm happy to be done with this project. When and if I stitch another one, it'll be smaller and better thought out on the front end. However, I WAS happy with the overall design. I used the same template for this as I did for the quilted ones.
September 6. A couple weeks ago, I bought a mixer for Kris for his birthday. It's smaller than his commercial mixer, and he's excited that he can use it for smaller projects. We're keeping it on the back porch with the other one. I looked at it the other day and thought, "That mixer needs a cover." So I made one.
I found a tea cozy pattern online and used the instructions to figure out the pattern size. Without telling him why, I offered Kris a pile of fabrics and asked him to put the one he liked best on top. I stitched together a lot of batting scraps (so satisfying to use all those up!), quilted it together (straight lines with walking foot, as usual) with muslin for the back and the yellow and blue fabric on the front, and then cut out the pattern and put it together. Easy as pie!
I found a tea cozy pattern online and used the instructions to figure out the pattern size. Without telling him why, I offered Kris a pile of fabrics and asked him to put the one he liked best on top. I stitched together a lot of batting scraps (so satisfying to use all those up!), quilted it together (straight lines with walking foot, as usual) with muslin for the back and the yellow and blue fabric on the front, and then cut out the pattern and put it together. Easy as pie!
Well, it's now been almost a year since I posted...
...and it's time to get back to it! I got so busy quilting that I didn't want to take the time to write about it. But before it gets TOO overwhelming to ever post again, I'm going to create an abbreviated version of my exploits. The problem with doing it this way is I've forgotten what I learned with each quilt. But never mind. All that knowledge and all those techniques are now stored in my brain (somewhere), and I can use them when I need to. Month by month, here's what I've been up to...mostly quilting, along with some cross stitch, mending for others, and many other smaller sewing projects.
September-October 2021
Log Cabin Polka. My friend Shelley said she was never going to use this pattern and gave it to me when I told her I LOVED it. I made a queen-size quilt. Each 18"-inch block is comprised of four smaller pieces. The little dots in the middle are a confounding factor. How in the heck do you attach to those? The secret is that you sew only part-way on the first seam of the dot. After you do that, the rest of the process becomes (semi-) obvious.
As always, I laid out the blocks on a grid and used my alphanumeric system to help me as I determined which block went where. I used fabric left over from the front to brighten up the back side.
In November, I displayed this quilt at a show at ScrapsKC, along with some of my others. I sold the pink cat quilt to a friend I had not seen in 20+ years.
As always, I laid out the blocks on a grid and used my alphanumeric system to help me as I determined which block went where. I used fabric left over from the front to brighten up the back side.
In November, I displayed this quilt at a show at ScrapsKC, along with some of my others. I sold the pink cat quilt to a friend I had not seen in 20+ years.
November 2021
Nine-patch Blue & Yellow. I like this color combination SO much. I had already made a nine-patch quilt in blue and yellow, but I wanted to do it again. So I did. This one is sized for a futon.
Pastel Basket-weave. Something attracted me to a basket-weave pattern, so I explored online to find one. This one is so simple that it came in the form of a postcard, which amused me. I used up some scraps and employed the quilt-as-you-go and stitch-in-the-ditch techniques. As (almost) always, the back side reflects elements of the front.
Bibs. Mom needed some bibs to save her clothing from spills. She'd become ambidextrous when she broke her right wrist last summer, but since her stroke in October, she has had to completely retrain her right arm and hand. As I'm writing this in August of 2022, I'm happy to report that her eating has become much neater, but six months ago, her clothing was taking quite a beating.
Later I made her longer bibs; these were my first attempt, which did not provide enough coverage. I used a couple of new dish towels and some older ones that brought back memories. The white one is from the one and only marathon I ran (in 1981).
Later I made her longer bibs; these were my first attempt, which did not provide enough coverage. I used a couple of new dish towels and some older ones that brought back memories. The white one is from the one and only marathon I ran (in 1981).
December 2021
Gift Bags. A friend gave me a gift bag that someone had made for her. I was curious enough to take it apart to see how the box-bottom had been made. And then, of course, I had to make some myself.
January 2022
Joe's Denim Quilt. I was curious about quilting with denim. I put out the call for old jeans, and my friend Joe surprised the heck out of me by bringing me 14 pairs of his old jeans! They made quite a pile. A quilt and two pillows later, I gave them back to Joe. After all, the billfold outlines and frayed knees were his memories, not mine. He was delighted.
A few months later, I made another denim pillow for my (former) foster brother, David. He loved it. I also made an I-don't-know-what-it-is item from leftover fabric and some denim pockets. Oh, my, it's cute!
And I still have a TON of denim for future projects.
A few months later, I made another denim pillow for my (former) foster brother, David. He loved it. I also made an I-don't-know-what-it-is item from leftover fabric and some denim pockets. Oh, my, it's cute!
And I still have a TON of denim for future projects.
Cathy's Quilt Repair. A friend asked on Facebook whether someone could repair and add binding to an old quilt. I raised my hand and waved it wildly in the air. Pick me! Pick me! And she did. I just love neatening up things that need it!
February 2022
Pastel Scrappy. I can't remember what inspired me to make this one. I probably just liked the look of the pattern. I used up another bunch of scraps and made this futon-sized quilt.
Adar's Baby Quilt. My niece Stephanie had her third child, a beautiful boy they named Adar. I was delighted to send this quilt to Israel via my other niece, Allie, who happened to be traveling there from Washington, DC at just the right time. The timing was not all THAT coincidental, since she was going there to meet her new nephew.
I had found a small piece of an adorable animal fabric at ScrapsKC and had only enough to create the center of this quilt. From there, I kept adding borders until it was large enough to call it a quilt. I did what's called fussy-cutting to highlight specific parts of the fabric (note the monkeys, giraffe, and elephant around the outside edges). I used the heck out of what I had!
A few months later, I found another piece of the same fabric in a different color scheme. I had just enough to make a pillowcase for Kristopher.
I had found a small piece of an adorable animal fabric at ScrapsKC and had only enough to create the center of this quilt. From there, I kept adding borders until it was large enough to call it a quilt. I did what's called fussy-cutting to highlight specific parts of the fabric (note the monkeys, giraffe, and elephant around the outside edges). I used the heck out of what I had!
A few months later, I found another piece of the same fabric in a different color scheme. I had just enough to make a pillowcase for Kristopher.
March 2022
Five-sided Log Cabin. One of my favorite YouTube creators made a video about a scrappy five-sided log cabin design, and before I knew it, I was making one. As usual, I didn't have too much of a plan. I just chose some fabrics I liked from my stash and went from there.
This was at the time Russia invaded Ukraine. What a travesty. I was pleased to be able to use bright blue and yellow, the colors of the Ukrainian flag, for the back of this quilt.
This was at the time Russia invaded Ukraine. What a travesty. I was pleased to be able to use bright blue and yellow, the colors of the Ukrainian flag, for the back of this quilt.
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Box Pillow. Someone on my Buy Nothing Facebook group asked for some eggcrate foam for her mom's wheelchair. Using the box-bottom technique I had learned for the gift bags, I made a pillow cover for the square of eggcrate I had kept in the closet for the past umpteen years and gave it to her. The cover has a zipper so she can throw it in the wash when necessary.
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April 2022
The war in Ukraine is still going on (I'm writing this in August). I made several items in support of that country. I gave six tiny flags (they fit on the end of a pencil) to Ava to share with her classmates; Mom has a tiny flag and one of the heart hot pads; I sent a flag to my cousin in Arizona; and I'm flying the flag right outside my sewing room window every day in good weather.
The hot pads are made with the paper piecing technique. I'll say more about that later.
The hot pads are made with the paper piecing technique. I'll say more about that later.
Kelli's Quilt Binding. My friend Kelli added batting and backing to a quilt top that she had inherited. She didn't want to bind it...she wanted someone else to do that little chore. Of course, I raised my hand again. It was a fun and interesting challenge to work with this very old hand-quilted piece.
X Marks the Scrap. Another YouTube quilter I follow offered this free downloadable pdf pattern. I had just started working with paper piecing, and this pattern was all about that. I used freezer paper along with the foot I had bought for stitch in the ditch. I also bought an Add-a-Quarter ruler. The combination of these tools made paper piecing so easy that I learned quickly. I used up a bunch of small scraps from my pop-up bin. Another pleasure was being able to use a fabric for the binding that would have been dated and ugly in the quilt itself--but in the binding, so little of it is visible that all you can see are the colors, which are pretty. Score! I am very proud of the straight-line quilting on this one. It's the first time I felt like I REALLY did a good job of it. I gave the quilt to my cousin Marcia.
Paper Piecing. This technique enables you to use very small and/or skinny pieces to create shapes that you can't make with regular quilting. I started with this cat (of course) and then moved on to other shapes. I have not used these blocks in a quilt...so far they're just for practice.
May 2022
Charleston (Nell's Star). This quilt began as another bit of practice with paper piecing. Each block is composed of four squares. I liked the block pattern so well that I just kept going, choosing bright colors that appealed to me. As is often the case, the colors pulled me along. By the time I had made enough blocks for a futon size quilt, I realized it would be better in a larger size. I offered it to my sister, who has a twin size guest bed, which settled the size question. I decided on a checkerboard pattern--alternating with plain navy blue--to put some breathing room between all those stars. Mom and I played with the design, trying to figure out how the different colors in the blocks related to each other and how to place them. After quite a bit of back and forth, I decided that a random design worked best. The back side is navy, with a pop of colors from the front at the top and bottom. I used straight-line quilting in three different patterns for the quilting of each block (using quilt as you go). When I saw the finished quilt on Mara's guest bed, I realized she needed a sham to go with it. And then the project was finished.
Scrap Art. I played around with all the beautiful scraps from the Charleston project. The colors were so pretty, I didn't want to put them away. Here's what I came up with, using double-sided fusible webbing. The last four photos are fronts and backs of commemorative pieces--they're not hot pads, but reminders of the Charleston quilt.
A MAJOR CHANGE IN THE SEWING ROOM
I'm not sure what flipped the switch, but at the end of May I felt an urge to begin exploring a new setup for my sewing machine. I think I was just tired of having my machine at a less than optimal height for my arms and hands. I had never been able to get it quite right, even though the table I was using was adjustable. It was either too high or too low, no matter how I adjusted it.
After a brief flirtation with the idea of an electronically adjustable table, I decided I would rather have an actual sewing cabinet. It didn't take long for me to find Arrow Company, which specializes in them. They even offered a thirty-minute consultation with someone who can help you figure out which cabinet is best suited to your needs. I signed up right away for the consultation, because I knew I needed the help. Which is how I met Lynn, my new quilting friend. I bought my sewing cabinet the next day. I couldn't be more thrilled with it.
It's August, and Lynn and I are still texting. There's so much to talk about!
But back to the new cabinet. It's called the Kangaroo and came with an extra bank of drawers they call the Joey (because it fits into the cavity of the Kangaroo). There's an extension table on the back to hold the weight of a quilt, as well as an extra table attachment to the left that fits on top of the top drawer. There's an extension to the right as well, but I don't use it because of space limitations. The custom acrylic insert fits my Janome perfectly, so I no longer have to deal with a sewing machine sitting on top of a table. It's flush with the cabinet surface.
The boxes came within just a few days, and Kristopher had himself a PROJECT! He put it together in two days with a minimum of cursing and hacking because the instructions were well written and illustrated. The one improvement he made was to attach the Joey to the Kangaroo with an eyebolt at the bottom to keep it stable when I pull the drawers out...they're just a little stiff.
It's taken me months to calm down about how much I love the new setup. Although I still have my moments of bliss. Not only does the new cabinet fit the space, but because it's bright white, it reflects the light from the window and the overheads. It works well with the four Ott Lights and the Vivilux, which is velcroed to my machine, to illuminate the space, even if I'm working late into the night. Which I often am.
Of course, I had to recover my bench and paint it white to match the new decor.
I'm so pleased with the ergonomics of my new setup. I no longer even think about the alignment of my shoulders, hips, arms, and hands. They are at ease.
The photos below show the various iterations of my sewing space.
After a brief flirtation with the idea of an electronically adjustable table, I decided I would rather have an actual sewing cabinet. It didn't take long for me to find Arrow Company, which specializes in them. They even offered a thirty-minute consultation with someone who can help you figure out which cabinet is best suited to your needs. I signed up right away for the consultation, because I knew I needed the help. Which is how I met Lynn, my new quilting friend. I bought my sewing cabinet the next day. I couldn't be more thrilled with it.
It's August, and Lynn and I are still texting. There's so much to talk about!
But back to the new cabinet. It's called the Kangaroo and came with an extra bank of drawers they call the Joey (because it fits into the cavity of the Kangaroo). There's an extension table on the back to hold the weight of a quilt, as well as an extra table attachment to the left that fits on top of the top drawer. There's an extension to the right as well, but I don't use it because of space limitations. The custom acrylic insert fits my Janome perfectly, so I no longer have to deal with a sewing machine sitting on top of a table. It's flush with the cabinet surface.
The boxes came within just a few days, and Kristopher had himself a PROJECT! He put it together in two days with a minimum of cursing and hacking because the instructions were well written and illustrated. The one improvement he made was to attach the Joey to the Kangaroo with an eyebolt at the bottom to keep it stable when I pull the drawers out...they're just a little stiff.
It's taken me months to calm down about how much I love the new setup. Although I still have my moments of bliss. Not only does the new cabinet fit the space, but because it's bright white, it reflects the light from the window and the overheads. It works well with the four Ott Lights and the Vivilux, which is velcroed to my machine, to illuminate the space, even if I'm working late into the night. Which I often am.
Of course, I had to recover my bench and paint it white to match the new decor.
I'm so pleased with the ergonomics of my new setup. I no longer even think about the alignment of my shoulders, hips, arms, and hands. They are at ease.
The photos below show the various iterations of my sewing space.
June 2022
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Another dog bed. My scrap debris pillowcase (as opposed to my scrap bin) was overflowing, so it was time for another dog bed...which looks suspiciously like a denim pillow, but made with thread cuttings and tiny bits of fabric and batting that can't be used for anything else. I made the cover with a zipper so it can be cleaned. I asked Kristopher to take it to Great Plains animal shelter.
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Popsicle Wall Hanging. After the twin quilt I had made for my sister, I needed a break from large projects. I was attracted to the very summery theme of popsicles and found a paper piecing pattern from Irene at Sugaridoo (another YouTube creator). I made four different popsicle blocks, sewed them together with sashing, and added borders, which is when I discovered that I had inadvertently created a large blank spot in the middle. I filled it with appliqued letters, using fusible web and then outlining each letter with machine stitching. Kelly liked it so much that it's on loan to her for the summer.
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July 2022
Ice Cream Cones Wall Hanging. Sticking with the summer theme, I found another paper piecing pattern for ice cream cones. I was beginning to get the hang of sticking on the applique pieces with fusible web and then outlining them by machine. To create a way to hang the piece, I hand-sewed round plastic stitch markers (that I had used for knitting) on the back to hold a dowel rod.
Ice Cream Cones & Popsicles Wall Hanging. It's still summer, right?
Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. I figured I had exhausted the summer treats theme, so I switched to the sky, but I stuck with paper piecing and applique. I found the background and star fabrics at ScrapsKC as part of a kit. It started out as a four-square design, but that looked way too regimented. I solicited feedback from both Mom and Kelly to help me with the design. After trying many different iterations, I eventually added smaller stars to fill out the sky. Sunny offered support, but not much design help.
Fly Me to the Moon Wall Hanging. This one started out as Star Light, Star Bright--in fact, I had already cut out all the letters--but I liked this better. Mom and I listened to Frank Sinatra's version of the song as we played with the design. Kelly helped too, by adding movement to the lettering. Such a smart one, she is!
Cross-stitch again. Something was calling me to do cross-stitch again. If you want to see what I stitched during August, check out the Cross-Stitch tab.
September 2022
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And...then it was time to quilt again. I had a big stack of 5" x 5" scraps. I had had some of these since the face mask project two years before, and I was tired of seeing them--or even knowing they were there. What better way to make them disappear than to make them into a quilt? I'm sorry I didn't take a photo of the stack, because the transformation was so unbelievable. But here's a photo of some of the leftover pieces.
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This was going to be a process of making a quilt using exactly what I had. (I did purchase some fabric for the sashing, but not for the blocks.) I decided on a nine-patch design. I decided on a center piece and then chose the eight other pieces to go around it. I invited Kelly to get in on the fun, because I admire her color sense and knew she would enjoy playing with me. We had SUCH a good time and admired each other's creations. After we had come up with a design for each block, she had to leave town, so I put together a pdf of all the blocks. I assigned letters to each of them so we could cut them out and rearrange them. We each did that and discussed the layout by phone. Then, of course, I got Mom's input too in order to get the final layout. We were all tickled pink. I couldn't even decide which block I liked best. There were so many color combinations that thrilled my heart!
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I used the quilt-as-you-go technique, as always. This time I found a really clever way to work with the very linear design that did not require ANY thread burying. All the quilting ran off the edge, so the threads could just be cut off.
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The next step was to find fabric for the sashing. Of course I hadn't planned that in advance. I didn't even know what the major colors of the quilt were going to be until I had made all the blocks. Kelly recommended dark gray, which sounded just right. We needed a neutral that would not compete with the many strong colors of the blocks. I found the perfect gray and black dotted fabric at Joann's. It provided just the right amount of distinction between the blocks without overwhelming their individual designs. I also made a 5" border all around so the quilt would fit a full size bed.
As always, I wanted to add something interesting to the back side. I made a long strip of leftover 5x5s and cut it down the middle. I used these thinner strips to make a border on the plain white backing fabric (which I think may have been a sheet that had been donated to the face mask project).
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By this time I had decided to give the quilt to Kelly, who was delighted to receive it. She chose red and orange for the binding. We are SO proud of ourselves! We're going to make a label that reads:
Designed with joy Stitched with love Shared by friends Julie & Kelly 2022 Kelly, whose handwriting is SO pretty, did the artwork, and I handstitched the label to the back of the quilt. Many months later, I finally got a photo of Kelly with our quilt. 
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Another scrap quilt. At this point I was a little bit hooked on the idea of using up my scraps. I had decimated that pile of 5x5s, so I turned to the long strips I had collected. I didn't really have a plan when I started, but I liked having a distinct middle with framing around it, so I started with that idea. I chose a small square of colorful fabric and started building from there in a log cabin design. Before long, I had a lot of blocks that were (again) very colorful! I worked very hard to get away from linearity and symmetry in this quilt. I was going for a wonky look. As each block came into shape, I let it be whatever size it ended up being and figured I'd make them all even by adding however much blue fabric was needed so they all ended up as 12" squares. That blue fabric was a freebie from ScrapsKC. During a bag sale, they provided a free table for anyone to leave or take whatever they wanted. The blue was obviously a leftover from someone's quilt, because it was long, long long! I was able to use it to frame almost all of the blocks. When I ran out, I found a similar shade in my stash and completed the fourth side of the rest of the blocks.
And then on to the quilting. I added batting and backing (plain muslin this time) and using the walking foot, sewed wavy lines all the way across each block. I loved the effect. After Mom and I fine-tuned the layout, I added sashing (a cheerful purple dotted fabric from my stash). I bound the quilt with binding that was left over from previous projects. I had just the right amount of blue and yellow. On this quilt, I used a new technique to finish the binding so that it appears there's no beginning or end. Very tricky!
On the top right corner of the back side, I added one block that included many of the fabrics I had used on the front. It took FOREVER to make!
On the top right corner of the back side, I added one block that included many of the fabrics I had used on the front. It took FOREVER to make!
Kris claimed this one. He had never asked me for a quilt before, which had kind of mystified me. I was happy to give him this one, both because he liked it and I wanted him to have it, and because it would stay in our house. It's SO cheerful! The last photo is the "remembrance" block I made for this quilt. Mom saw it and immediately claimed it. Guess I don't get to keep that one. I hung it in her bathroom.
October 2022
More dog beds. As long as I was clearing out old stuff, I thought I would lighten my load of stuffing. I had a full pillowcase plus another half. Using some (ugly!) dull green canvas and some scraps from a tablecloth, I made two zippered covers and made inserts for them, using all those batting and fabric scraps. I donated the dog beds to Great Plains SPCA, leaving a note to make sure they knew the covers were washable. I was happy to receive a phone call from them just a few hours later acknowledging the gift. A couple of lucky dogs were already enjoying them.
Which brings me up to date! I'm working on yet another scrappy quilt using the leftovers from the leftovers from the leftovers. I think this will conclude my trilogy of scrappy quilts. The scraps from this one are going to be too small to work with.
For this third scrappy quilt, I challenged myself to break out of my linear way of doing things. I consciously tried to make angles and odd width pieces. I tried for some randomness in colors as well. Although I put like colors with like, I didn't try to match anything...at least, not too much. I built some of the blocks in a log cabin pattern with something interesting in the middle (like the yellow duck with the striped hat), and some of them were just random pieces sewn together, their design determined by the shape of the scrap. Oddly enough, I ended up with four blocks in each color combination: oranges, pinks and purples, pinks and greens, black and white and red, turquoises, and brown and tans. The bright blue sashing was perfect to tie it together...at least as much as you CAN tie disparate colors together. I added a border to bring the quilt to a futon size. For the back of the blocks, I used mostly muslin, but as usual, I didn't want to leave it at that. I used most of the leftover colorful scraps to add stripes to some of the blocks to reflect the colors on the front. I stitched together more leftover scraps to create the side borders.
While I was making this quilt, I learned a new technique for connecting the ends of the binding. It's SO much better than what I had been doing and is so invisible, I regretted not learning it sooner. Ah, well. You don't know until you know, right? I also settled on wavy lines as my go-to quilting design. It's easy to do, and can be done randomly. And the theme of this particular quilt is definitely random.
As I was working on it, I didn't think I was going to like this quilt, but I was wrong. I liked it so much I had a little bit of internal difficulty giving it away. I offered it to my family members. My cousin knew her grandson would appreciate it because he liked hers so much. So off it went to Wisconsin, on its way to Thailand.
While I was making this quilt, I learned a new technique for connecting the ends of the binding. It's SO much better than what I had been doing and is so invisible, I regretted not learning it sooner. Ah, well. You don't know until you know, right? I also settled on wavy lines as my go-to quilting design. It's easy to do, and can be done randomly. And the theme of this particular quilt is definitely random.
As I was working on it, I didn't think I was going to like this quilt, but I was wrong. I liked it so much I had a little bit of internal difficulty giving it away. I offered it to my family members. My cousin knew her grandson would appreciate it because he liked hers so much. So off it went to Wisconsin, on its way to Thailand.
November 2022
Renovating Vintage Quilted Pieces. Speaking of random...a friend gave me several old quilted items that, judging from their fabric, had been made in the forties. They might have been baby changing cloths, but they were pretty skinny for that. Some were in ragged condition, but I thought it would be fun to try to do something with them. They seemed to be crying out for applique. Enter Sunbonnet Sue...again. I had played with her a lot in August of 2021, but not since. First I needed to wash each piece carefully and take them apart. Interestingly enough, these pieces did not contain batting. Had the batting disintegrated through the years? After washing them, I carefully ironed them using a little light starch, added batting, and quilted them, following the original (straight line!) seams. I chose complementary fabrics for the little girl, using iron-on webbing to make the pieces stick until I could finish them by hand with a blanket stitch. I added binding with my new favorite invisible technique and sewed three plastic rings at the top of the back to accommodate a dowel rod so they could be hung. I absolutely love how they came out. What a gratifying process!
I was having so much fun hand sewing the binding that I decided to revisit the Sunbonnet Sues that I had never made into pillows, as was my original intention. They were were ABB...all but bound. So I chose the fabric, added binding to each of them, sewed rings on the back, and offered them to my cousins in honor and memory of our Grandma.
But I wasn't finished with Sunbonnet Sue yet...my niece's family was coming into town from Israel, including two girls (ages 5 and 7) and their baby brother (9 months). I wanted to make something for each of them. I asked their mom for their favorite colors. One said purple, white, blue, and red. The other said "rainbow." Baby Adar is too young to have a color preference, so I found a cute fabric in my stash and created an applique for it.
And now for the big news...
I bought a Featherweight! Also known as a Singer 221, it is only 11 pounds, 2 ounces. The one I bought from Ebay was manufactured on April 10, 1940. This particular model was engineered with the idea that the owner could maintain it herself. I've been learning about the history of Featherweights as well as how to maintain mine. I bought a kit of oil, grease, tools, and a book, and I've already done what I think needed to be done to make it ready to use. I've also bought a few replacement parts. The stitches on this machine are incredibly even, and the motor just purrs along very quietly. I think I'm going to LOVE this machine! I bought it as a backup, for when my Janome might need to go to the shop for maintenance, but now I'm thinking the Featherweight might be my main machine. Time will tell.
My good friend Kelly, acknowledging that I had fallen into the rabbit hole of Featherweights, commemorated the fact in my birthday card.
My good friend Kelly, acknowledging that I had fallen into the rabbit hole of Featherweights, commemorated the fact in my birthday card.
December 2022
The Featherweight has indeed become my main sewing machine. It is a treasure, as many people before me have discovered. Here's what I have learned in the past month:
- There is a 5,000-member group on Facebook called the Featherweight Club. Well, now it's 5,001.
- There are other groups on Facebook, too: e.g., Featherweightology, Featherweight Friends, and groups celebrating vintage sewing machines.
- I'm learning how to maintain my Featherweight by watching Youtube videos and asking questions in the FB groups. I love being able to do this. I'm also learning a lot by making mistakes and figuring out what I did wrong.
- My machine requires fairly frequent oiling and semi-annual greasing. I'm okay with that.
- The Featherweight Shop in Idaho seems to be THE place to go for all things Featherweight. Instructional videos, parts, supplies, etc., and refurbished machines.
- Feet for the Featherweight are easily available, as are pretty much any replacement part I might need. I have bought a couple of quarter-inch feet, a walking foot, and a zigzagger. That's all I need for the kind of sewing I do.
- I LOVE THIS MACHINE! Besides being fun to sew on, it's a pleasure to look at, too. It's so cute!
I played with a couple more vintage items in early December before I moved on to other things. Since this one was already quilted and had the wonderful inscription "For My Dolly" embroidered on the front, I did not take it apart. I added a new back side to the existing one, quilted it again over the existing stitching, and then appliqued Sunbonnet Sue (in coordinating colors) onto the back. I created one more Sunbonnet Sue piece with the leftovers from another I had done, and then I felt the Sunbonnet Sue project was finished. For now.
When Marcia called to thank me for the quilt for her grandson, her husband Gabe half-jokingly said, "When will I get a quilt?" I told him all he ever had to do was ask, and I immediately started planning his quilt. With Marcia's help, I chose a pattern and got started. It took most of the month to finish it, and I am SO pleased with the result. It's my best one so far. The pattern is called Seafarer (Gabe is a sailor). It's really not geared for quilt-as-you-go, but since that's what I'm comfortable with, I modified it, using sashing between the blocks. Another challenge was that it's set on the diagonal, which really messed with my mind. It's completely different than sewing straight side-by-side blocks, especially when you're adding sashing.
I started with five or six different fabrics, but I was pretty sure I wouldn't have enough of any of them, so I added different fabrics as I went along. Each block needed about 10-12 strips. I started by adding strips (on the diagonal) in the middle of a muslin block and worked my way out. It took 48 full blocks and 20 half blocks, plus two corner triangles. For the backing, I intended to use a cotton bedsheet, but as I was searching for a suitable one at a thrift store, I happened to get in touch with my friend Linda. She had in her hand at that very minute some batik fabric she intended to give away. It was PERFECT in color and design. I used a combination of the navy bedsheet I found and the batik to complete the back. I used every bit of that batik!
The block for the sailboat was paper pieced. It took focus to follow the directions. I surprised myself that I did not have to redo any part of the block. Ta da!
I used my Featherweight to piece this quilt, as well as to make the wavy quilting lines. Turns out, the FW easily does curves. Laying out the blocks was another challenge. I wanted to put the darker blocks at the bottom and use the lighter ones as I moved toward the top. That wasn't the hard part, though. It was getting my mind wrapped around how to attach diamond-shaped blocks to each other in the correct order. I did it mostly correctly, and I only had to redo a few pieces. (I discovered the mistakes when I saw the wavy lines were going up and down instead of across.) Mom helped me reposition the boat more toward the center. Good eye, Mom!
I used more of the bedsheet for the sashing on the front and the batik for the sashing on the reverse. I hadn't realized that adding sashing would add to the length and width, but of course it did, since I wasn't losing half-inches to connect the blocks. Bonus!
I'm very proud of this one. Not only did I learn a lot, but I have improved my precision in measuring and cutting. I mailed it to Gabe this afternoon. Can't wait to hear his reaction!
I started with five or six different fabrics, but I was pretty sure I wouldn't have enough of any of them, so I added different fabrics as I went along. Each block needed about 10-12 strips. I started by adding strips (on the diagonal) in the middle of a muslin block and worked my way out. It took 48 full blocks and 20 half blocks, plus two corner triangles. For the backing, I intended to use a cotton bedsheet, but as I was searching for a suitable one at a thrift store, I happened to get in touch with my friend Linda. She had in her hand at that very minute some batik fabric she intended to give away. It was PERFECT in color and design. I used a combination of the navy bedsheet I found and the batik to complete the back. I used every bit of that batik!
The block for the sailboat was paper pieced. It took focus to follow the directions. I surprised myself that I did not have to redo any part of the block. Ta da!
I used my Featherweight to piece this quilt, as well as to make the wavy quilting lines. Turns out, the FW easily does curves. Laying out the blocks was another challenge. I wanted to put the darker blocks at the bottom and use the lighter ones as I moved toward the top. That wasn't the hard part, though. It was getting my mind wrapped around how to attach diamond-shaped blocks to each other in the correct order. I did it mostly correctly, and I only had to redo a few pieces. (I discovered the mistakes when I saw the wavy lines were going up and down instead of across.) Mom helped me reposition the boat more toward the center. Good eye, Mom!
I used more of the bedsheet for the sashing on the front and the batik for the sashing on the reverse. I hadn't realized that adding sashing would add to the length and width, but of course it did, since I wasn't losing half-inches to connect the blocks. Bonus!
I'm very proud of this one. Not only did I learn a lot, but I have improved my precision in measuring and cutting. I mailed it to Gabe this afternoon. Can't wait to hear his reaction!
Oh, my! Gabe and Marcia sent me a 4-minute video of the unboxing. It was so sweet and enthusiastic! So satisfying to know that Gabe loves it.
Another dog bed for Great Plains. I made this one from upholstery samples, an old bedsheet (to make the insert) and scraps of fabric, thread, and batting from recent quilts. Installing the zipper is getting easier, at last.
Mara's birthday demanded another nightgown, but I forgot to take a photo of it. It looks exactly like all the rest I've made for her, but in the fabric shown below. She's a little overloaded with nightgowns, since I've been making them for her every year for a looooong time. I may have to rethink this next year. Kris needed a hat to keep his head warm, so I finished one that was on my needles. I think of these little items as palate cleansers between my larger quilting projects. It gives me time and space to think about the next Big Idea.
My last project in December was Linda's quilt. Her mother died recently, and she gave me a lot of fabric that her mom had intended to use for quilting. There was a zipper bag of 4-1/2" pieces already cut for a quilt top. I didn't know what design she had had in mind, but a pattern showed up in my email inbox that was just perfect for these squares. The process was so interesting. I started by creating nine-patches with four color fabrics, four white squares, and one consistent color fabric in the middle. I then cut each nine-patch down the middle, both vertically and horizontally, and rearranged them so pieces of what had been the middle square showed up at each corner. I later discovered that this technique is called "disappearing nine-patch."
The pattern, however, did not lend itself to QAYG. Sashing would have completely disrupted the design. Because it was not a big quilt, I decided to try quilting the entire thing on my Janome. It was challenging, but I was fairly pleased with the outcome. Not my best work, but passable. I washed the quilt before I gave it away--which I have never done before--just to see how the quilting would look afterwards. Not bad! And I was so happy to give it to Linda as a keepsake from her mom.
The pattern, however, did not lend itself to QAYG. Sashing would have completely disrupted the design. Because it was not a big quilt, I decided to try quilting the entire thing on my Janome. It was challenging, but I was fairly pleased with the outcome. Not my best work, but passable. I washed the quilt before I gave it away--which I have never done before--just to see how the quilting would look afterwards. Not bad! And I was so happy to give it to Linda as a keepsake from her mom.
January 2023
Frankenbatting. What in the world is frankenbatting? It's a conglomeration of lots of small pieces of batting left over from previous projects. Using my Janome's zigzag stitch, I spent hours putting together all the decent-size pieces to make a large enough piece to use in my next 54 x 54 project. I know you're not supposed to mix cotton and polyester batting, but since my next few pieces are definitely going to be for practice, I didn't follow that rule. I used up ALL my leftovers and made a 60 x 60 piece.
A new way of layering. One of the marvelous teachers on Youtube explained how to tape down chopsticks or skewers to mark the center of a table to help place the back, batting, and front correctly before pinning them together. You can then find the exact right spot by feel. It's so SIMPLE! I can't believe I hadn't thought of that myself.
Expanding my horizons. Now that my piecing is so, so good with my Featherweight, I want to focus on my quilting skills. My next few pieces are going to be 50 x 50 or so, and I will quilt them as a whole rather than QAYG. I ordered another set of quilting safety pins (they differ from regular ones in that they're bent in the middle to make pinning easier) so I have enough to do the size projects I'm intending to make.
A new way of layering. One of the marvelous teachers on Youtube explained how to tape down chopsticks or skewers to mark the center of a table to help place the back, batting, and front correctly before pinning them together. You can then find the exact right spot by feel. It's so SIMPLE! I can't believe I hadn't thought of that myself.
Expanding my horizons. Now that my piecing is so, so good with my Featherweight, I want to focus on my quilting skills. My next few pieces are going to be 50 x 50 or so, and I will quilt them as a whole rather than QAYG. I ordered another set of quilting safety pins (they differ from regular ones in that they're bent in the middle to make pinning easier) so I have enough to do the size projects I'm intending to make.
Frankenbatting
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A BIG piece of frankenbatting!
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The first quilting project of the new year was to use the navy and white back that I had made for Linda's quilt that I ended up not using. The back presented a problem: I wanted to quilt the top, batting, and back at the same time rather than QAYG. However, I had made the back of wide alternating stripes of white and navy. I would be quilting with the front face-up and would not be able to control the back very well. I didn't want my quilting design--which would likely not be the thing of beauty that I really wanted it to be--to show up that boldly. If I used white thread on the bottom, it would be stark against the navy, and if I used navy thread, it would show up too well against the white. So for Linda's quilt, I made another back of just plain white fabric. I wanted to do something with this one, though. It was definitely going to be a practice piece.
I made a new blue and white front using an easy basket design, made a sandwich using the new technique for finding the center of all three pieces, and then was faced with a choice. Did I want to quilt it from the front or the back? I regretfully decided on the back, though I knew it would look better (at least to me) if I did it from the front. I wanted to follow all those straight lines presented by the basket design! But I decided to ignore them in favor of following the straight lines on the back, because otherwise they would undoubtedly end up wonky. Rats. So I turned the quilt back side up and quilted straight lines down all the white sections. Pretty good so far. After consideration, I decided to quilt the rest from the front so I could even out all the places that threatened to be a little off-kilter. I changed my bobbin thread to navy and spaced the lines two inches apart down the length of the piece. It's hard to explain, but it actually worked out okay. I had to redo a few places, but for a practice piece, it wasn't bad. I laundered this one as well. It came out pleasantly wrinkled.
I made a new blue and white front using an easy basket design, made a sandwich using the new technique for finding the center of all three pieces, and then was faced with a choice. Did I want to quilt it from the front or the back? I regretfully decided on the back, though I knew it would look better (at least to me) if I did it from the front. I wanted to follow all those straight lines presented by the basket design! But I decided to ignore them in favor of following the straight lines on the back, because otherwise they would undoubtedly end up wonky. Rats. So I turned the quilt back side up and quilted straight lines down all the white sections. Pretty good so far. After consideration, I decided to quilt the rest from the front so I could even out all the places that threatened to be a little off-kilter. I changed my bobbin thread to navy and spaced the lines two inches apart down the length of the piece. It's hard to explain, but it actually worked out okay. I had to redo a few places, but for a practice piece, it wasn't bad. I laundered this one as well. It came out pleasantly wrinkled.
February 2023
I feel like I'm losing the plot, as they say. It's almost the end of February, and I can't even remember everything I've made. Thank goodness for the photos I've taken along the way. Here's what those photos tell me: I made a small wall hanging for my mom's haircutter, Karol; a futon-sized quilt called "Catwalk" with an appliqued cat at the top; another, simplified version of Catwalk because I loved the colors so much; a heart-themed lap-sized quilt (or it could be a wall hanging); a mama bunny with three little bunnies wall hanging; two hot pads for a hostess gift; and a multi-colored, pastel futon-sized quilt from a pattern I found on a YouTube video. And, of course, I made memory pieces for each of the quilts. I'm in process on a small quilt that is the first of a series I think Linda and I are going to call "Cat in the Window." More on that in the details. And at the moment, I'm practicing free motion quilting. Again.
I also made some pee-pee teepees with Kelly (she wanted to make them for a friend's baby shower); finished a baby quilt that I received from my Buy Nothing group and gave it away to another member of the group; made a pocket for my robe; and made two pockets for a jacket. And I'm mentoring Kelly, who wants to learn to quilt.
Here's the wall hanging I made for Karol. All I had to go on was her declaration that her living room was navy, black, gray, and white. She wouldn't mind a pop of color, and she loves cats. I chose some fabric from my scraps, put them all together, and bound and quilted it. I appliqued a cat silhouette that I had drawn in the last century (I think it was 1996). I was totally winging it, but she loved it.
I also made some pee-pee teepees with Kelly (she wanted to make them for a friend's baby shower); finished a baby quilt that I received from my Buy Nothing group and gave it away to another member of the group; made a pocket for my robe; and made two pockets for a jacket. And I'm mentoring Kelly, who wants to learn to quilt.
Here's the wall hanging I made for Karol. All I had to go on was her declaration that her living room was navy, black, gray, and white. She wouldn't mind a pop of color, and she loves cats. I chose some fabric from my scraps, put them all together, and bound and quilted it. I appliqued a cat silhouette that I had drawn in the last century (I think it was 1996). I was totally winging it, but she loved it.
Catwalk 1. I loved this pattern and I found a whole bunch of fabrics in my stash that I thought would blend together just right. Since I didn't use the recommended fabrics (which would have required me to actually buy retail), I had to improvise a little when I eventually put the rows together. The tricky part was trying not to get too much of the same color or fabric too close together. It took some doing and redoing and more redoing. I had to abandon QAYG, because there were no actual blocks. I sewed the entire quilt top and did my usual wavy lines for the quilting. Then I cut out my own cat silhouette (rather than the one that came with the pattern) and appliqued it to the top.
Here's the sad thing. About a month later, I gave this quilt to my veterinarian and her partner as a thank you for being so kind as they euthanized my buddy, my Sammie cat. Sammie was the inspiration for Benny, who started me on my creative journey more than ten years ago. Without him, this website would not be here, because I don't know that I would have blossomed the way I did. You could say he was my inspiration for the way I live to this very day. I miss him.
Here's the sad thing. About a month later, I gave this quilt to my veterinarian and her partner as a thank you for being so kind as they euthanized my buddy, my Sammie cat. Sammie was the inspiration for Benny, who started me on my creative journey more than ten years ago. Without him, this website would not be here, because I don't know that I would have blossomed the way I did. You could say he was my inspiration for the way I live to this very day. I miss him.
Catwalk 2. Since I enjoyed the process of the Catwalk quilt so much, and since I had so much of the same fabric left over, I simplified the pattern and made a second one. The original pattern had many, many brick sizes. The second one had only two, which I alternated to make the wall look like a real brick wall. I used the same cat template for the applique. I did straight line quilting, along with some diagonals. to reflect the linearity of the bricks. I actually liked the wavy lines on the first one better. I made a small Catwalk as a memory piece.
Buy Nothing Baby Quilt. As I had done once before, I acquired a partly-finished quilt from the local Buy Nothing group. This one came in a bag of scraps. Someone had pretty much finished a small baby quilt top made of flannel squares. I had never worked with flannel before, so it was interesting to work on this. I added batting and a back to the top, bound it, and offered it first to the original giver, and then on BN. Someone who was expecting an unexpected second baby claimed it. Perfect!
Hearts. There's something about February that brings out the reds and pinks. And there are hearts everywhere you look. I found this heart template and designed a quilt. I wasn't crazy about it as I made it, and Mom couldn't even see the hearts...neither could Kelly. Can't say I'm surprised. For hearts, they're a little squarish. But by the time I quilted it and added the binding, it looked a lot better and more valentine-ish. I'm happy with the free-form quilting I did on the red blocks. Pretty nice, if I do say so myself.
I've switched back to my Janome as I work on quilting whole quilts instead of QAYG. It's becoming easier, especially since I'm staying with smaller quilts as I learn how to handle (or manhandle) the bulk.
I've switched back to my Janome as I work on quilting whole quilts instead of QAYG. It's becoming easier, especially since I'm staying with smaller quilts as I learn how to handle (or manhandle) the bulk.
Mentoring Kelly. After I helped Kelly cut and sew a pair of pajama pants and collaborated with her to make a baby shower gift (the aforementioned pee-pee teepees, which I will not describe further), she decided she wants to learn how to quilt! I'm very excited for her, and I've been mentoring her as she dives into the deep end. Art quilts are going to be her thing...quite different from what I'm doing, but it's going to take the same skills and understanding of sewing principles. It's SO much fun teaching her what I've learned in the past two years.
We took a road trip to Omaha to her parents' house to pick up her mom's sewing machine, and now she's happily collecting fabric, batting, thread and notions. I made a couple of hot pads as a hostess gift for her mom using blue and yellow scraps.
We took a road trip to Omaha to her parents' house to pick up her mom's sewing machine, and now she's happily collecting fabric, batting, thread and notions. I made a couple of hot pads as a hostess gift for her mom using blue and yellow scraps.
Bunnies! Kelly gave me this adorable print. I added borders to it until it was just right...then quilted it, added binding, and sewed rings to the back for hanging. Love it!
Garden Trellis Quilt. A quilter named Beth has a YouTube channel called My Sewing Room, in which she calmly and sweetly demonstrates different quilting projects as she makes them. As I was casting about for a new project, I watched one of her videos that seemed just perfect for using lots and lots of colors. It also challenged my precision in cutting, piecing, and aligning points. I used a blue flowered sheet for the back, and did straight line quilting over the entire piece horizontally, vertically, and diagonally. I loved every bit of the process for this one, and I love the resulting quilt. I'm keeping it!
Free Motion Quilting, Again. I've decided to give FMQ another try. I've made a dozen small quilt sandwiches and have begun practicing again. It's been SO difficult for me when I've tried it before, but I'm beginning to see improvement in my meandering. At last.
I'm giving credit to both Kelly and Mara for bolstering my new determination to finally learn FMQ. To Kelly, who jumps in with abandon, not knowing what she's getting into, but willing to do it anyway. To Mara, who has achieved a high level of skill as a pianist through years and years and years of practice. Sure, I spent months practicing...but so what if it takes longer than I thought it should? Practice is the key, so I'll keep practicing.
This time it seems like muscle memory is kicking in. It's easier to make smooth loops than it had been before. Unfortunately, even as this was happening, my machine began to fuss...the thread kept breaking, over and over again. I changed the needle, checked the tension, changed the pressure on the sandwich, used different thread. Same results. I changed to a different foot and stitched, and all was well, so I knew it was the FMQ process itself that was causing the problem. Eventually, I pulled out the Big Guns. I changed to the expensive Aurifil thread. Magically, the problem disappeared, and I was able to do two entire practice pieces of meandering without any problem. I did it! Now that I can meander and also quilt an entire quilt on my machine, I'm no longer constrained to straight lines and QAYG. My horizons are expanding!
I'm giving credit to both Kelly and Mara for bolstering my new determination to finally learn FMQ. To Kelly, who jumps in with abandon, not knowing what she's getting into, but willing to do it anyway. To Mara, who has achieved a high level of skill as a pianist through years and years and years of practice. Sure, I spent months practicing...but so what if it takes longer than I thought it should? Practice is the key, so I'll keep practicing.
This time it seems like muscle memory is kicking in. It's easier to make smooth loops than it had been before. Unfortunately, even as this was happening, my machine began to fuss...the thread kept breaking, over and over again. I changed the needle, checked the tension, changed the pressure on the sandwich, used different thread. Same results. I changed to a different foot and stitched, and all was well, so I knew it was the FMQ process itself that was causing the problem. Eventually, I pulled out the Big Guns. I changed to the expensive Aurifil thread. Magically, the problem disappeared, and I was able to do two entire practice pieces of meandering without any problem. I did it! Now that I can meander and also quilt an entire quilt on my machine, I'm no longer constrained to straight lines and QAYG. My horizons are expanding!
March 2023
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Cat in the Window - Spring. The day after I showed Linda my Catwalk quilts with the appliqued cats, she texted me some ideas she had been inspired to draw. Thus our collaboration was begun: her patterns and templates and my quilting.
The design was easy to put together, but it did take some figuring to determine the order of assembly. I started by stitching the green fabric to the blue (Linda gave me that perfect green garden fabric!) and then added the white vertical sashing...ha ha! literally sashing!). The borders came next, and then the horizontal sashing. I think I'll do it slightly differently the next time. This was my first opportunity to free motion quilt since I learned how to meander...and I did it on all nine panels. They came out just fine. I added straight-line quilting to the borders. For the binding, I chose a fabric with large light blue dots. Perfect! The last step was adding the three applique pieces--the cat and two birds--using fusible web and blanket stitching. I love how it came out! |
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Breakfast in Bed. When Mark brought me a beautiful round vintage lace tablecloth from the thrift store (unsellable because of a few stains), I immediately started pondering how I could restructure it as a quilt. I decided that the sacrifice of one of my fitted bottom sheets was in order (it was just the right color). It took some time and a LOT of manipulation, but I managed to create a full-size quilt. Kris named it Breakfast in Bed, which I thought was brilliant. I gave it to Mom, who, as quite often happens, admired my work and wanted it for her bed.
FMQ with Vintage Tea Towels. I played around with FMQ on various quilt sandwiches, some of which were made from tea towels Mark had given me.
March-April 2023
Mark's Sunflower Quilt. I had been wanting to make a quilt for Mark for quite a while. Knowing that he loves sunflowers, I realized I had just the thing. Linda had given me two brand new but vintage-looking Sunflower Feed bags. I cut them apart and created borders and more borders until it was futon-size. I quilted this one on my Featherweight. This was my first attempt at FMQ with an actual design...flowers, of course, to mimic the sunflower in the middle. I created templates, drew the shapes onto the quilt, and tentatively began drawing with my sewing machine. My original intent was to use thread for the sunflowers that matched the fabric (some would be brown and some would be cream color) so any mistakes wouldn't be quite so obvious. However, I inadvertently started with the brown thread on the cream fabric. Oops. So I just went with it. Pro tip: if you stray outside the lines on the first attempt, going over the design another time makes it look like you intended it to be sketchy all along. :) I practiced quite a bit as I went along, so the flowers on each successive border became better and better. I used a design called messy pebbles on the center portion of the sunflower. I LOVE how it came out! Mark did, too.
Darning My Socks. I love my Pendleton socks, both of which had developed holes. It gave me a good reason to try my skill at darning. I have no idea when I acquired the darning egg, but it was right there in a box in my sewing room when I looked for it.
Mending an Old Quilt. Mark brought me this raggedy old quilt that was in such rough shape it could easily have been discarded. I'm sorry I didn't take photos of its original state, but believe me, it looked like a dog had worked it over. I loved the colors and decided to mend it. I used random techniques, including embroidery and iron-on adhesive. It's big and heavy...so comfortable! I'm keeping it.
May 2023
Kelli's Quilt. Still working on the items Mark was bringing me, I used several vintage pieces--tablecloths, a toaster cover, and tea towels--to make this quilt. All of them featured an unusual color combination--kind of a bluish green and red. They looked like 1940s to me. The embroidered cherry tablecloth caught my eye first. After I had worked on the blocks (using a log cabin design), I realized I should repair the embroidery so the quilt would be sturdier. I loved doing that! I put extra batting in the middle of each block to accommodate the flimsy, puckered fabric of the cherry tablecloth. When I showed the quilt to Kelli, she exclaimed that those were her favorite colors, so I gave it to her.
June 2023
Bunny Love and Baby Bunny Love. My great-niece Addie graduated from high school in May. I wanted to make a quilt for her to take to college, but I wasn't sure she would want one. I was pleasantly surprised at her enthusiasm. She wanted her bunny, Junior, to be the centerpiece of the quilt, a request that I was happy to accommodate. She texted me her favorite photo of Junior, which I traced so I could embroider it into the quilt...sixteen times. She loves pastels, so I used a fabric I had found just the week before as the background for each of the bunny blocks. I originally made 30 blocks, thinking the quilt would be 5 x 6, but I had made each block so big that I reduced the number to 4 x 5. I created a template for a heart and alternated the bunny blocks with lavender/purple hearts. I appliqued the hearts to the blocks with fusible web, then used a blanket stitch around each heart. I quilted ovals around the bunnies and echoed the heart shape around each heart. I used the last of the blue flowered sheet for the back, along with another gray-blue sheet that I just happened to have. Addie was delighted with her quilt, and I was delighted to have a reason to embroider again.
There were enough blocks left over to make a second, baby-sized quilt, which I will send to my young friend Keri, who is expecting her first child soon. This one looks like a really big nine-patch block. I used different quilting on it, just for practice and for fun.
There were enough blocks left over to make a second, baby-sized quilt, which I will send to my young friend Keri, who is expecting her first child soon. This one looks like a really big nine-patch block. I used different quilting on it, just for practice and for fun.
Woven Quilt Hanging. To use some of the leftover strips from Addie's quilt and just to do something different, I followed the directions in a book called Woven Quilts to make a wall hanging. It's pretty, but it wasn't quite as much fun as I thought it would be, so I probably won't make another one. However, it involved a technique I enjoyed that created two borders with one set of stitching. I might use that again sometime in my quilting journey.
July 2023
Fibonacci's Cats. Oh, my, I am so proud of this one! Aaron, my math tutor nephew, asked me to make a quilt in red and blue involving his two passions--cats and math. Now THAT was a challenge. My knowledge of math beyond the basics is pretty limited, but I had heard of this number sequence called Fibonacci. It also had something to do with the golden ratio. I explored the internet seeking inspiration when it suddenly occurred to me that a diagram I had seen several times could be construed as a quilt block. So I used it. Without getting into formulas, I can say that each number in the sequence is the sum of the two previous numbers. I made square blocks of each of the following: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and 13. Alternating red and blue blocks, I added cats (using the templates Linda made for me several months ago) to the 13" squares. For the quilting, I created templates using spirals I had seen in my internet explorations. And there you have it...math and cats! (This quilt did involve multiple trips to Joann Fabric, because after I had bought enough purple fabric for the front sashing, I changed my mind and decided to go with blue. Then I needed fabric for the border on the back side and found the red dots. However, I decided to make the borders larger, and then found I hadn't bought enough red for the border plus the sashing on the back to match the border. Typical seat of my pants quilting! But it came out beautifully. And I never mind another trip to Joann.)
I do wish the colors of these photos showed up better. The reds are glaring, so you can't really see the details, especially the quilting on the borders, which is my best so far. And the closeups of the blues don't show well, either. The wide angle shots show the true colors.
Yay, templates! And yay, tailor's chalk! I discovered during this quilt that the magic eraser that is used for cleaning is also great at erasing tailor's chalk marks.
Another wonderful discovery as I made this quilt was printing on fabric using freezer paper and my ink jet printer. I'm apparently late getting the memo, but I've seen it now, and I'm going to be using this technique a LOT in the future.
When I gave the quilt to Aaron, both he and his cat, Leia, loved it. And of course, he saw the mathematical meaning right away. Score!
Changing T-shirt Crew Neck to V-Neck. My friend gave me an adorable t-shirt that inspired me to figure out how to change a crew neck, which is not very flattering on me, to a v-neck. I watched a couple of YouTube videos and used a couple of old t-shirts from my rag basket for practice. I learned how to do it, but then decided not to alter the shirt after all. But what a useful skill to know! (Mom wanted the Avon Running shirt, which is at least 40 years old. We both ran in those races back in the '70s.)
A few weeks ago, I finally broke through the barrier I had erected about working on knit fabrics. For some reason, I had decided that I couldn't sew on knits, which prevented me from shortening Mom's t-shirts. It suddenly occurred to me that I was telling myself this ridiculous story. If other people could sew knits on their home machines, why shouldn't I? So I watched two videos, and suddenly I was able to hem t-shirts. I immediately shortened four of Mom's t-shirts. And they lived happily ever after.
A few weeks ago, I finally broke through the barrier I had erected about working on knit fabrics. For some reason, I had decided that I couldn't sew on knits, which prevented me from shortening Mom's t-shirts. It suddenly occurred to me that I was telling myself this ridiculous story. If other people could sew knits on their home machines, why shouldn't I? So I watched two videos, and suddenly I was able to hem t-shirts. I immediately shortened four of Mom's t-shirts. And they lived happily ever after.
Donations. The quilt box Kris made for me was getting pretty full, and it occurred to me that I needed to give some of my quilts away. I asked my Facebook Buy Nothing group for names of organizations that might give them to their clients. I now have a list of about fifteen agencies to choose from. I gave four quilts to Children's Mercy Hospital for their kids, and I gave the pink cat face quilt to Great Plains SPCA for a silent auction in October. I still have a few that are destined for elsewhere. In the meantime, I had two huge pillowcases full of stuffing that I wanted to use up, so I made three dog beds, using denim from some jeans I had acquired at yard sales and repurposing the fabric from the old studio curtains as the inner bags. I gave them to Great Plains as well. My closets are now a little bit emptier, which makes me happy.
A Book! I'm not sure what prompted it, but I realized I'd like to have a physical book that documented my quilting journey. As I copied and pasted the first few pages of my website into a Word file, I realized that just telling the story of my first quilt would take 70 pages! So this book, which may not ever go outside of my house, is entitled Making My First Quilt. I've spent the past few days reformatting the entries and photos. I've had such fun reminiscing about how I learned what I now know.
One of the best parts was the first line of my quilting webpage: "I’m beginning to learn how to quilt using techniques I’m finding on YouTube....I don’t know if any of these pieces will end up in a quilt or not...so far I’m just practicing."
Since then, it's 34 quilts and counting...
I found the cut-off part of that original quilt that I could use as a cover for the book, but I don't like it nearly as much as the crumb quilting I did with some current scraps. Linda is going to help me make this hand-bound book. She has hand-bound many of her own books, and I can hardly wait to see how she does this one.
One of the best parts was the first line of my quilting webpage: "I’m beginning to learn how to quilt using techniques I’m finding on YouTube....I don’t know if any of these pieces will end up in a quilt or not...so far I’m just practicing."
Since then, it's 34 quilts and counting...
I found the cut-off part of that original quilt that I could use as a cover for the book, but I don't like it nearly as much as the crumb quilting I did with some current scraps. Linda is going to help me make this hand-bound book. She has hand-bound many of her own books, and I can hardly wait to see how she does this one.
Update: It didn't take long for Linda to put the book together. After I was finally satisfied with the many-times-edited version, I bought double-sided tape and 24-pound bright white paper for the project. I printed the pages double-sided on my color printer. Linda and I went on a fun shopping trip to buy the end paper (a beautiful blue), and I left it with her. Less than a week later, it was in my hands. I used the new-to-me technique for printing on fabric to create the title for the cover. I am so delighted to have this memento!
August 2023
Printing on Fabric. My friend asked if I could make a quilt with her cat, who is very old and will die soon, as the centerpiece. I began researching printing photos on fabric. I was vaguely aware this could be done, but I'd never looked into it. Similar to the way I learned to sew on knit fabrics, I watched a couple of videos, and now a whole new world has opened up to me. The technique is very simple: iron freezer paper onto the fabric, cut it to the correct size, and run it through an ink jet printer. Set the photo into the fabric using a hot iron and also soak the piece in Retayne (a chemical that sets the color) with very hot water. You now have a photo on fabric that you can use any way you like. I did a test piece of Odin, my friend's cat, and quilted it as a wall hanging. She was delighted, and so was I.
So much so, that I immediately made another piece to commemorate Sammie, my treasured buddy who died earlier this year.
I can use this technique to make labels for my quilts as well. In fact, I already have. I made a special label for the Baby Bunny Love quilt before I sent it to my friend Keri in Montana.
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The first bunny I embroidered on old pillowcase fabric as a test for Bunny Love was sitting there looking at me, wondering why I wasn't doing anything more with him. So I made him into a pillow and gave it to Mom.
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Mosiac. Oh, I was so attracted to this pattern! I could hardly wait to start playing with colors and choosing fabrics. Since the sashing was going to be dark gray, of course the fabrics had to be bright. It was great fun putting the blocks together...first by cutting out all 42 single-color blocks; then cutting them at a random angle by twos, switching the order, and recombining them to make two two-color blocks connected by sashing. The next step was to choose two different colored two-blocks, cutting them in two, and recombining them to make four four-color blocks.
The real challenge was deciding how to lay out the blocks to show off the colors to their best advantage. I did not want "pools" of color, but I did want complementary colors to be close to each other. After playing around with them until I got tired of it, I finally just decided the layout I had was good enough. The possibilities of combinations were literally endless. Something about permutations of 42. I think that would be 42 x 41 x 40 x 39, etc. Too many choices!
Karen Brown, who is a color theory expert, talked about changing photos to black and white to see the color values of the blocks. It was actually helpful to do this. In laying out the seven color blocks on the back of the quilt, I was able to determine the lightest to the darkest using this technique. I like how it turned out.
I love the topographic gray fabric that I used for both the sashing and the back of the quilt. And I love the multi-colored binding. In fact, I love pretty much everything about this quilt!
The real challenge was deciding how to lay out the blocks to show off the colors to their best advantage. I did not want "pools" of color, but I did want complementary colors to be close to each other. After playing around with them until I got tired of it, I finally just decided the layout I had was good enough. The possibilities of combinations were literally endless. Something about permutations of 42. I think that would be 42 x 41 x 40 x 39, etc. Too many choices!
Karen Brown, who is a color theory expert, talked about changing photos to black and white to see the color values of the blocks. It was actually helpful to do this. In laying out the seven color blocks on the back of the quilt, I was able to determine the lightest to the darkest using this technique. I like how it turned out.
I love the topographic gray fabric that I used for both the sashing and the back of the quilt. And I love the multi-colored binding. In fact, I love pretty much everything about this quilt!
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Spin Me Round. I saw a quilt on Facebook that really captured my interest. It was gorgeous. I could not find a pattern for this particular quilt, but I found a similar one in which the quilt was one large block rather than composed of smaller blocks that were joined. The pattern I found was called Spin Me Round, and it certainly did. I found it SO confusing to make, especially since the instructions seemed to have skipped a very important step. I also found a chart of cut sizes that seemed to correlate to this kind of block, although it's not clear that it actually does. Regardless of all that, I was so intrigued that I've made quilt after quilt with this pattern, as well as memento-size blocks. I think I made about five or six of them before I accurately followed the directions. What I love about this design is the first step--choosing the fabric colors. It's so challenging to find colors that go well together. And then to place them in the most eye-pleasing way...I find all of it just fascinating.
During this time, I found a stitch that I'm using over and over called serpentine stitch. It's built in to my machine. Using my walking foot, I just sew straight lines, and they come out beautifully curvy. I can adjust the length of the stitch and the width of the zigzag. So far I've made three 46" square quilts (crib size), two 9-patch quilts (futon size), and many single blocks, some of which will go into another quilt, and others that will serve as mementos. I'm not sure I will ever make a quilt like the one I originally saw...it depends on whether I find the actual pattern for it. It may end up being my unicorn. I will keep looking. (Or actually...I may just figure out how to do it without a pattern...) |
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I started with a small block to see how the pieces fit together. It was a mind-twister. It kept coming out backwards! I won't bore you with the details. I finally figured out how to make it work, even if it didn't follow the pattern precisely. I then went on to choose colors for my first one-block quilt. It came out amazingly well. I used the serpentine stitch and found the perfect bed sheet in my stash for the back.
Here's a quick peek at my current sewing room setup.
Here's the second Spin Me Round quilt. It's a 9-patch (3 blocks on each of 3 rows). I really don't like how this one came out, but I learned a lot from it. Although I liked each fabric I chose, I made the strips too wide, and it interfered with the overall design. Thinner strips would have been much better. I used the black and white feature of my camera again to determine the order of the strips, as I do with many of the quilts I'm making now. As much as I don't care for the design, I am totally in awe of what I've been able to do with the serpentine stitch. It's SO easy compared to FMQ! I like the back of this quilt better than the front. It's just a simple cotton bedsheet, but it's silky soft and shows the stitches very nicely.
The third quilt was also a 9-patch, which I like MUCH better. I fussy cut the flowers from a wonderful piece of pink fabric. I had enough for eight full flowers and had to piece the ninth one together. When I went to ScrapsKC to find just the right shade of pink fabric for the sashing, I found another small piece of the flowered fabric. Score! Of course, I didn't need it for this quilt, so it went into my stash. Again, I found the perfect dotted bedsheet in my stash for the back of this quilt.
The fourth Spin Me Around was shades of green, and it's another 46" crib size. It's not my favorite color, but I wanted to see how these colors would work together. Pretty well! I used the purple sheet again for the back.
A few more Spin Me Rounds...I'm making blocks at random, based on the colors I have in my stash. I don't know if they will end up in a quilt or not.
The answer was, Yes, they did end up in a quilt. I made these blocks into a quilt in a 9-patch pattern.
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I made a hot pad for Mom's friend, Sherry, for her birthday. She loves tie dye. I forgot to take a photo of the front and back, so asked her to send me one.
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My favorite gift to Mom, ever. Since I learned how to put photos on fabric, this has been in the back of my mind. Mara and I found an old photo of Grandma that I just adore. I printed it on white fabric (from a 100% cotton bedsheet), added an aqua border to match Mom's decor, and made it into a pillow. For the back side, I used some bird-themed fabric I found at ScrapsKC a couple of years ago that I've been intending to make into something for Mom. I gave it to her today, and she absolutely loves it. I do, too.
September 2023
Project DressAGirl2023. One day in early September a YouTube video from MariSewsForCurves popped up. Mari was talking about the third annual month-long project dedicated to making dresses for girls living in poverty. It's a campaign sponsored by Hope4Women, whose goal is to empower girls and women with self-respect, skills, and self-sufficiency. An additional goal of the dresses is protection. Each dress displays a tag, "Project DressAGirl" to show potential predators/traffickers that this girl is cared for. Sewers from the UK, US, and Canada were making dresses for girls from 2 to 12 years. Many of the recipients are in Africa (the non-profit originally focused on Uganda) and South America, and some are immigrants in the US and Canada. Wherever they are, they receive a dress--possibly the only one they've ever had--that was made with love for them.
I immediately knew I wanted to be part of this. Overnight my quilting room turned into a dress-making shop. My original goal for the remaining days of September was 20 dresses, but soon it turned into 30. It was a joyous time. The simple pattern I was using came from another YouTuber who had created it specifically for DAG. Because I made it over and over and over again, my skill level increased considerably as I learned to create bias tape (with an amazing little gadget!) and finesse it around armholes and necklines. By the time I was finished, I had made one reversible dress and a couple that could be worn with either side facing front, so the girl would have two looks in one dress. I learned to make flounces for one of them. I used the serpentine stitch for the hems, and for the first time ever in garment making, I finished my seams. For some reason, I had never done that before. This was one of the requirements, though, for these dresses, so I originally used my zigzag foot. Later I used the overcast foot, which I fell in love with.
A friend of a friend donated fabric to me so she could participate in DAG. We met in the parking lot at Joann Fabric to make the swap. I made three dresses from her donation.
To accomplish collection and distribution of the dresses from so many sewers, Hope4Women has what they call Ambassadors all over the US. There was no ambassador in Missouri, but there was one in Kansas. I emailed that person, hoping I wouldn't have to ship the dresses too far away and pay a lot of shipping. My jaw hit the floor when I found out that she not only lives in Overland Park, just a few miles away from me, but she lives in an apartment complex where Mom used to live. I pass by there twice a week when I visit Mom in her assisted living facility. I will be delivering the dresses to her on Saturday. I'll probably write an update then. She has told me that she has 25-30 people sewing dresses year-round. I want to be one of them. I've asked her a couple times if I could be part of her team, but she hasn't answered the question. I have a feeling she wants to see the quality of my dresses before she says yes.
I learned to use Instagram so I could report each dress and have it added to the count. That was so much fun that I decided to start posting my Bennies each day, too. That's a project that will go on for at least three months. I have A LOT of Bennies.
I'm having difficulty letting go of this...I decided to relearn to crochet (I hadn't crocheted for 50 years) so I could put a little heart in the pocket of each dress. That was harder to do than making the dresses! It involves making a magic circle. What's magic is being able to make one of those suckers at all. Anyway, I stuck with it until they were all made. I'm determined to get better at that. I haven't felt that awkward using my hands for a looooong time!
I immediately knew I wanted to be part of this. Overnight my quilting room turned into a dress-making shop. My original goal for the remaining days of September was 20 dresses, but soon it turned into 30. It was a joyous time. The simple pattern I was using came from another YouTuber who had created it specifically for DAG. Because I made it over and over and over again, my skill level increased considerably as I learned to create bias tape (with an amazing little gadget!) and finesse it around armholes and necklines. By the time I was finished, I had made one reversible dress and a couple that could be worn with either side facing front, so the girl would have two looks in one dress. I learned to make flounces for one of them. I used the serpentine stitch for the hems, and for the first time ever in garment making, I finished my seams. For some reason, I had never done that before. This was one of the requirements, though, for these dresses, so I originally used my zigzag foot. Later I used the overcast foot, which I fell in love with.
A friend of a friend donated fabric to me so she could participate in DAG. We met in the parking lot at Joann Fabric to make the swap. I made three dresses from her donation.
To accomplish collection and distribution of the dresses from so many sewers, Hope4Women has what they call Ambassadors all over the US. There was no ambassador in Missouri, but there was one in Kansas. I emailed that person, hoping I wouldn't have to ship the dresses too far away and pay a lot of shipping. My jaw hit the floor when I found out that she not only lives in Overland Park, just a few miles away from me, but she lives in an apartment complex where Mom used to live. I pass by there twice a week when I visit Mom in her assisted living facility. I will be delivering the dresses to her on Saturday. I'll probably write an update then. She has told me that she has 25-30 people sewing dresses year-round. I want to be one of them. I've asked her a couple times if I could be part of her team, but she hasn't answered the question. I have a feeling she wants to see the quality of my dresses before she says yes.
I learned to use Instagram so I could report each dress and have it added to the count. That was so much fun that I decided to start posting my Bennies each day, too. That's a project that will go on for at least three months. I have A LOT of Bennies.
I'm having difficulty letting go of this...I decided to relearn to crochet (I hadn't crocheted for 50 years) so I could put a little heart in the pocket of each dress. That was harder to do than making the dresses! It involves making a magic circle. What's magic is being able to make one of those suckers at all. Anyway, I stuck with it until they were all made. I'm determined to get better at that. I haven't felt that awkward using my hands for a looooong time!
October 2023
More Dresses. This is what happens when you (meaning I) get so caught up in a project...and then another one...and then another one...that you (meaning I) don't write about it until months afterward. It is now February 2024, and I'm just now continuing the dress making story. Long story short: I gave all 31 dresses to the local Hope4Women ambassador and also volunteered to crochet hearts and flowers for the dresses that others had made. I DID relearn how to crochet, made more than 100 hearts and flowers, and continued making dresses until I had made 25 more. I also crocheted a bunch of things, just for practice. More about that later. At that point I was itching to get back to quilting (at the same time also wondering if I would love quilting as much as ever when I got back to it), so I (temporarily) folded up and put away my dress making supplies for another day. I am waiting for Clarice's next "ingathering" so I can take her the ones I've made. I'm also eager to meet the other women who sew for her.
By the time I was finished with my (so far) total of 56 dresses, I had improved my skill in making French seams and in using bias tape. I used some of my orphan blocks to create pockets for a few of the dresses. I love those particularly!
By the time I was finished with my (so far) total of 56 dresses, I had improved my skill in making French seams and in using bias tape. I used some of my orphan blocks to create pockets for a few of the dresses. I love those particularly!
November 2023
Many Small Projects. I mostly focused on learning to crochet in November, but in looking over my photos, I see that I also tore apart my back-of-beyond storage space in order to make my yarn more accessible; I replaced and refilled Kelly's heating pad (which was truly on its last legs) with a new, snazzy fabric and new seeds (I forget what kind); made another dog bed for my friend on Buy Nothing; replaced the binding on an old quilt (I'm not even sure how or when I acquired that quilt, but I love it and use it); made two memory pieces for a couple of the spin me rounds; learned to crochet roses; made hot pads for my physical therapist and a friend who was turning 80; crocheted a hat that fit me perfectly; sewed some of the flowers onto that hat (for which I get many, many compliments every time I wear it); and had a complete misfire with another crochet hat pattern. That tiny hat ended up on one of my bears.
December 2023
More Small Projects. Some of Mom's washcloths and towels went missing in the laundry at her assisted living facility, so using my FMQ skills, I embroidered her name on some tags and sewed them onto her remaining cloths. I'm not especially proud of the effort, but she liked them. I continued on my crochet journey, making another hat for myself, since the pattern fit my head really well. Then Kris wanted a hat, and so did Kelly. Blue for him, purple for her. I explored patterns for a cloche and made several. The brown one went to Ruth, and I kept the blue one with a brim. I made several rectangular pieces to practice some crochet stitches and gave one of them to Mara as a washcloth. She loves it, but it's too small, so I'll be making another, larger one soon. Mom's friend gave her a couple of hangers with yarn wound around the shoulder pieces to keep blouses from sliding off. I thought that was a great idea, so I made another couple of them, this time winding the yarn around the horizontal piece to keep her slippery Chico's trousers from sliding off their hangers. I made two dog beds with some upholstery fabric given to me by my friend Kelli. Mom is having trouble with skin tears on her legs, so I made her several pairs of legwarmers to protect her legs.
Mara's Birthday Gift. Mara has kept every nightgown I've ever made for her, so I knew she didn't need yet another one. I came up with the PERFECT gift. I made a pillow with photos of her grandchildren on either side.
January 2024
Happy New Year. I did a few more small projects...hemmed a couple of pairs of jeans for Mara, mended a shirt for one of the PTs where I'm rehabbing my shoulder, and crocheted another hat for moi!
And I'm back to QUILTING! Water Lilies. Mara's husband asked me to make a quilt that would remind him of Monet's Water Lilies, as the wallpaper in his bathroom did. What a fun challenge! I pulled all my lavender, aqua, turquoise, pale green and blue fabrics and spent a long time mulling over which ones would make the cut. I used a beautiful deep lavender bedsheet from Savers for the back. Oddly enough, I didn't look at the painting...I just went with my intuition. I used a pattern I had made several times before--Basket Case--because it was such a simple design. Since this would be a queen size quilt, it would be another QAYG, but I wanted to make this one without sashing so the flow would not be interrupted. I found a no-sashing method on YouTube called 1 and 3 (or something like that). I assembled each row, quilted it (horizontal wavy lines to resemble water), and then attached the fronts of two rows together without sashing. That left the batting to be cut down to size, then the back folded over and hand-stitched. By the time I was sewing all four two-row pieces together, it was HEAVY! I added the perfect binding, and it was done. I don't know if I've EVER seen Tom smile so big!
February 2024
Another Quilt for Linda. When I was making all those dresses, I remember experiencing a little doubt about whether I would enjoy quilting again, or whether I would want to get back to it at all. Well, that doubt is extinguished. When I finished Tom's quilt, I immediately began planning my next one. I decided it was time to use up the remainder of the calico fabric Linda had given me. I would make her another quilt, which she could keep or give to another family member as a memento of her mom. I found a simple little pattern called Five and Dime (the blocks were made of 5-inch squares and two halves of 10-inch squares). I chose three main colors to alternate with lighter shades of the same colors, and I was off to the races.
I wasn't too concerned about size. I figured I would use as much of the fabric as I had, and when I ran out, that was the size of the quilt. For the first time, I used a coloring page to figure out how to space out the different colors, and then refined the design after I had laid out the blocks. Since the design would have been interrupted by using sashing, I used the same technique for non-sashing QAYG that I had used for Tom's quilt. It's a little clunky, but I managed. Again, I sewed entire rows together before quilting each one; then attached rows A and B; C and D; and E and F. As I sewed the rows together, I used batting tape (oh, boy! something new!) to secure the batting on the back side, then covered it with the backing and sewed it up by hand. Eventually I sewed each two-row piece to the next, and added a border to make the quilt a little wider and longer. I made the binding from fabric I found in my stash. Of course, it went perfectly. :) The backing was an old sheet that Linda had given me...so the entire piece was a circle of love from her mom to Linda to me, and back to Linda.
I wasn't too concerned about size. I figured I would use as much of the fabric as I had, and when I ran out, that was the size of the quilt. For the first time, I used a coloring page to figure out how to space out the different colors, and then refined the design after I had laid out the blocks. Since the design would have been interrupted by using sashing, I used the same technique for non-sashing QAYG that I had used for Tom's quilt. It's a little clunky, but I managed. Again, I sewed entire rows together before quilting each one; then attached rows A and B; C and D; and E and F. As I sewed the rows together, I used batting tape (oh, boy! something new!) to secure the batting on the back side, then covered it with the backing and sewed it up by hand. Eventually I sewed each two-row piece to the next, and added a border to make the quilt a little wider and longer. I made the binding from fabric I found in my stash. Of course, it went perfectly. :) The backing was an old sheet that Linda had given me...so the entire piece was a circle of love from her mom to Linda to me, and back to Linda.
New Kitchen Curtains. My curtains were looking a little tired. I don't know why--they were only 30-some years old. I still like the colors, but oh, boy, was it time for a change!
I consulted with Kris and bought blue and white fabric that we both liked. My fast and loose attitude about how much to buy got me into trouble this time. I was just a little short of what I needed...which I discovered after I had made three of the four pieces for the two windows. I had to scramble to find more. Of course, I had broken the rule about buying as much as you need for the project, because even if you find the fabric again, it's likely to be from a different dye lot and may not match entirely. And that's what happened. Shhhh. Don't tell.
I washed and ironed the old curtains and was able to find a new home for them through Buy Nothing. Yay!
I consulted with Kris and bought blue and white fabric that we both liked. My fast and loose attitude about how much to buy got me into trouble this time. I was just a little short of what I needed...which I discovered after I had made three of the four pieces for the two windows. I had to scramble to find more. Of course, I had broken the rule about buying as much as you need for the project, because even if you find the fabric again, it's likely to be from a different dye lot and may not match entirely. And that's what happened. Shhhh. Don't tell.
I washed and ironed the old curtains and was able to find a new home for them through Buy Nothing. Yay!
Quilting with Flannel. I hadn't made a quilt from flannel, although I had finished one for a friend. I realized I had a lot of leftover fabric from making Mara all those nightgowns and decided to see what I could do with it. My goal was to end up with no flannel left over. The design evolved into a 12-block 9-patch.
When I say evolved, I really mean evolved. I had no idea how this would go together when I started. It all depended on how much of each fabric was available. I love the process of figuring out how to make it work. After I had made the quilt, the memory piece, and another piece composed of 2-inch strips (which might turn into a pillow cover), the tiny bit of fabric left fits into a sandwich bag. Score!
And BONUS! I thought I would try my hand at FMQ again, for the umpteenth time. I had no expectations, but I put together some quilt sandwiches from some really ugly fabric that I keep around for just that purpose. I was amazed and delighted to discover that while I wasn't paying attention, my muscles had developed some memory. I am quite impressed with my meows!
When I say evolved, I really mean evolved. I had no idea how this would go together when I started. It all depended on how much of each fabric was available. I love the process of figuring out how to make it work. After I had made the quilt, the memory piece, and another piece composed of 2-inch strips (which might turn into a pillow cover), the tiny bit of fabric left fits into a sandwich bag. Score!
And BONUS! I thought I would try my hand at FMQ again, for the umpteenth time. I had no expectations, but I put together some quilt sandwiches from some really ugly fabric that I keep around for just that purpose. I was amazed and delighted to discover that while I wasn't paying attention, my muscles had developed some memory. I am quite impressed with my meows!
March 2024
The Rest of Linda's Mom's Fabric. I wanted to use up the rest of the fabric Linda had given me. I alternated colored 4-patches with white blocks to give the colors some breathing room. I used the serpentine stitch again for the quilting. These muted colors are not my favorites, but Mara liked the quilt, so I gave it to her. After making the memory piece, I offered the left over leftovers to the Buy Nothing group. Somebody snapped them up right away.
Kelly's Hat. I added a cute flower with leaves to the purple hat I had crocheted for Kelly.
Melanie's Quilt. When I spoke to the group at Village Shalom about quilting (to celebrate national quilting day), a resident asked me if she could pay me to make a quilt for her. I told her I would make her one in exchange for a donation to a charity. As she liked blue, and at the time I was working on a blue quilt made from the extra fabric from the kitchen curtains, I decided to give it to her. Using my newly-found skill at free motion letters, I wrote Melanie all over that quilt! It was fun.
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Another Dog Bed. I made this one from the upholstery samples given to me by Kelli. No one on Buy Nothing wanted it, so it's still on the futon in the sewing room. It's so pretty, but it's got a grommet right in the middle of it--on both sides!
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Purples. I found this charming pattern, Modern Layer Cake Square in a Square, online. It was so appealing that I wanted to make it right away. My color of choice was purple. I used a no-sash QAYG technique and serpentine quilting.
April 2024
DressAGirl Scraps Memory Quilt. This one was so much fun. In May, I was going to deliver the 25 dresses I had made since October, and I wanted to make a quilt from all the leftover scraps to show at that meeting. Another QAYG with colored blocks alternating with pastel blocks (I thought I was a genius for that idea!) to give some space to what could have been just a jumble of colors. I learned how to use cover strips for this one. It looks like each block is intersected by sashing, but only every other one is...the others have cover strips that cover the seams where I sewed two blocks together before quilting. I was delighted to realize I had made just the right number of each color of block (major color pink, major color blue, etc.) to make the design make sense when I placed them diagonally. I used the serpentine stich again and used a yellow striped bedsheet for the back. The more I look at this one, the more I love it. Each one of the center pieces is so dang cute!
Postage Stamp DAG Quilt. I ran across some photos of postage stamp quilts recently and thought they looked like way too much work to ever do. But then I thougt...I still had so many smaller scraps left from the DAG project. It would be a perfect way to use them. So I began cutting 2 1/2-inch squares from all the leftovers. The final count was 768. Forty-eight blocks of 16-patches, placed into blocks of four. Six blocks across and eight blocks down. Kelly and I were amazed at how much fun it was to construct each 16-patch. I had divided all the squares into color piles so it was easy for us to construct each block any way we wanted to. I tried yet another no-sashing QAYG technique on this one. I constructed each row of six blocks of just the top, leaving the batting and backing for later. I attached the middle two rows, added the batting and backing, and quilted across them with wavy lines. I then added the top two rows (which were attached to each other) to the front of the middle piece and the backing for those two rows to the back. I used the zigzag stitch to add the batting to the middle, and then quilted that piece. I did the same for the bottom two rows. It was a challenge to keep everything flat as I quilted, but it worked. I like this technique because there's no hand stitching on the back...all the stitching is done by machine. I'm simply tickled with the finished quilt.
And you know, I STILL have a bunch of squares left. I think I'll hang onto them until I've finished another batch of dresses. And then you KNOW what's going to happen after that!
And you know, I STILL have a bunch of squares left. I think I'll hang onto them until I've finished another batch of dresses. And then you KNOW what's going to happen after that!
May 2024
Batiks. I found a pattern I liked and decided to use as many of my batiks as possible--they had been languishing in a drawer until the right project came along. Each rectangular block was made up of three pieces. I enjoyed combining the colors, which wasn't difficult to do...they are all so beautiful! I made it using QAYG, but in a different way this time. Starting with one large block of three columns (I think...I'm writing this in August, and my memory is a little hazy), I added two large sections, one at a time. I used a bedsheet for the back and added leftover batik blocks to make the back large enough to fit. As usual, I didn't do a whole lot of advance planning. :)
June 2024
Finishing My One and Only UFO (Unfinished Object). A looooong time ago, I had started a blue and yellow quilt. I didn't know how to quilt a large piece at the time, but because I couldn't resist putting it all together, I did and then didn't know how to proceed. I put it away and didn't try to finish it. Ever so often I took it out and wondered if I was brave enough to tackle it. Now, finally, I decided to do something with it. I took it apart and reconfigured it into a nine-patch. I quilted each piece using QAYG. I was not thrilled with the finished quilt, but I was at least satisfied that I had finished it. And really, how can you not like a blue and yellow quilt? I gave this one to Children's Mercy Hospital.
Four Duckworth Quilts. A Duckworth quilt is made of scraps, built in a wonky log cabin design. Usually they are made with one major color and a second color in the middle of the block. Since I had never made one and wanted to use up a lot of my tired old scraps, I dived into making the first one. Which turned into two, which expanded into three, and finally, four. I can't decide if I enjoyed the process or not. Parts of it were fun, but it was a little frustrating because I felt like I was doing the same design over and over. It didn't feel especially creative. You can decide for yourself. Here they are: Magenta, Purple, Aqua, and Brown. I stopped before I tackled the blues and pinks. Maybe I'll get back to them later.
In case it's not perfectly obvious, a quilter's stash is constantly changing. I buy fabric that appeals to me whenever I come across it, and I usually have no idea what I'll be using it for. I rarely buy fabric for a particular project, unless I've painted myself into a corner and what I have in my stash absolutely won't work. The first two photos are scraps I was able to give away as I sorted through them for the Duckworth quilts. They were ones I was just tired of having around. Thanks for taking them off my hands, Shelley! The third one is the fabric I found at a great yard sale. As I said, it comes and it goes.
The Princess and the Pea. Scuti loves to lounge on the big pile of quilts at the end of my bed. If you look closely, you can see her biggest admirer in the mirror behind her.
July 2024
Yoga Cats. Oh, my gosh, what an ADORABLE fabric! Whoever designed it knows cats very well. And yoga equally well. I had originally thought about making each cat the center of another Duckworth, using my pink scraps around them. That just would not have done the cats justice. Each cat got their own well-deserved attention in the design I landed on. Mom hinted not so subtly that she wanted this one. So, of course, it's hers.
Dress A Girl. In early June, Clarice held a fabric give-away for the people who were going to make dresses in the upcoming months. I took some of the bright fabrics I knew I would enjoy making into dresses. Now that it was July and her August meeting was coming up, it was time to begin making them. Using most of the fabric I had gotten from her, along with some in my stash, I made 18 dresses. The requirements include no transparency, so the cotton needs to be fairly thick, which disqualifies much of my stash. Also, I recently found out she prefers the fabric to be unwashed, and I wash all of mine as soon as I bring it home. Still, I found some that fit the rules. And in the future, when I buy fabric for dresses, I won't wash it. I sure enjoy making these dresses!
August 2024
The Ugly Christmas Sweater Quilt. My friend Linda was downsizing her bursting-at-the-seams craft room. One of the items she was giving away was a bag of plaid fabric that she had purchased from ScrapsKC many years before. Some of the fabric had been cut into pieces, and a few blocks had already been assembled, but most of it was uncut fabric. She had planned to make a quilt from it, since it was obvious that the original owner had intended to do just that. However, since four or five years had passed since then, she realized that was never going to happen. She knew I would make a quilt at the drop of a hat, so she offered me the bag. Always up for a challenge that involved figuring out how to do something, I happily accepted. Added to the challenge of figuring out how to make the quilt was the plain truth that I HATED these colors: brown, tan, maroon, dark green, and blue, all in various types and styles of plaids. There was even a red, white, and blue plaid. Urgh. It's not easy to work for hours and hours with colors that--shall we say--don't inspire you.
Regardless, I took it on and laughingly called it my Ugly Christmas Sweater quilt, determining to use as much of the fabric as I could. I ended up with a queen-size, extra-long quilt with 9-1/2-inch blocks. Eight blocks in each row, 11 rows. I used QAYG, with simple straight lines for the quilting, evenly spaced. Linda had also given me quite a bit of cotton fabric in various muted tones. One greenish-gold piece was perfect for the sashing. I used two different bed sheets for the back (because I didn't have enough of either sheet, as usual)--one blue and one green. I still had many blocks left, so I made my memory piece larger than usual, 3 x 4. And I offered to make Linda something as well so she could have a remembrance. I'm just finishing up her potholders. The rest of the fabric (yes, there was still some left!) will go to someone on the Facebook Buy Nothing group. Surely someone in that group likes plaids.
When I showed the quilt to Mom over the weeks I worked on it, she never wavered from her conviction that it was indeed ugly. However, I can't say the same for myself. The more I worked with these colors, the prettier they became. Maybe it is actually the Ugly Duckling Quilt that became a Swan.
I'm giving this one to my friend Kelli, who loves fall colors.
Regardless, I took it on and laughingly called it my Ugly Christmas Sweater quilt, determining to use as much of the fabric as I could. I ended up with a queen-size, extra-long quilt with 9-1/2-inch blocks. Eight blocks in each row, 11 rows. I used QAYG, with simple straight lines for the quilting, evenly spaced. Linda had also given me quite a bit of cotton fabric in various muted tones. One greenish-gold piece was perfect for the sashing. I used two different bed sheets for the back (because I didn't have enough of either sheet, as usual)--one blue and one green. I still had many blocks left, so I made my memory piece larger than usual, 3 x 4. And I offered to make Linda something as well so she could have a remembrance. I'm just finishing up her potholders. The rest of the fabric (yes, there was still some left!) will go to someone on the Facebook Buy Nothing group. Surely someone in that group likes plaids.
When I showed the quilt to Mom over the weeks I worked on it, she never wavered from her conviction that it was indeed ugly. However, I can't say the same for myself. The more I worked with these colors, the prettier they became. Maybe it is actually the Ugly Duckling Quilt that became a Swan.
I'm giving this one to my friend Kelli, who loves fall colors.
September 2024
September is the Official DressAGirl Month! I once again transformed my sewing room into a dress factory. Using a combination of my own stash and some fabric I had picked up at Clarice's give-away in August, I made 12 more dresses for the project to bring the total to 30 including the ones I had made in July and August. I delivered them to Clarice on October 12.
October 2024
A Quilt for Michelle. My cousin Marian and her daughter visited Kansas City from Colorado. Realizing that I had not made a quilt for either of them, I made the offer. Michelle's favorite colors are pink and purple, and she loved the colors in Mom's Yoga Cats quilt. Marian's colors are blue, green, aqua, purple, and lavender. I texted them several design options. As soon as Michelle made her choice, I got busy. The front of the quilt was easy, but when I considered the back side, I couldn't land on the right thing. After several iterations, I found a hot pink bed sheet that did the trick. The blocks I had cut out and auditioned for the part are still sitting in my sewing room, waiting to be made into something else.
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Jewish Vocational Service Donation. Clarice invited the CEO of JVS to speak to us about the services they provide to immigrants in the Kansas City area. I was happy to discover that they not only can use the dresses we make, but my quilts are welcome, too. I gave them four of the Duckworth quilts. They were tickled with the bright colors, because many of their clients come from countries where bright colors are valued.
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November-December 2024
Marian's Quilt. As soon as I finished Michelle's quilt, I began figuring out colors for Marian's. She had selected one of the designs I had sent her, but it was so similar to the one I had just finished that I didn't want to make it. The one that developed was based on a log cabin design, and I just made it up as I went along. It was six blocks wide by seven blocks long, almost the right size for a queen size bed. I eventually added a border because it wasn't quite big enough. I used QAYG and the serpentine stitch again, as I had for Michelle's.
My Juki only does a straight stitch, so when I want to do the serpentine stitch for quilting, I need to get the Janome out and insert it into the sewing table. It's getting easier to switch between my two machines, even though I have to rearrange the table each time. I realize now that I never have talked about my new(er) machine, the Juki. One of these days I will elaborate on that most excellent purchase. I sing its praises frequently to Kristopher. He reminds me that I've mentioned it before.
Anyway, back to the quilt. I found a perfect-colored blue bed sheet for the back right in my stash. Funny how I always seem to have the right color sheet! Of course, I know why...I buy the colors I like to use when I see them, so they're there when the right quilt comes along. I'm very happy with this quilt. The colors, the design, the stitching, and the border--all really well done. My hand stitching is getting better and better.
My Juki only does a straight stitch, so when I want to do the serpentine stitch for quilting, I need to get the Janome out and insert it into the sewing table. It's getting easier to switch between my two machines, even though I have to rearrange the table each time. I realize now that I never have talked about my new(er) machine, the Juki. One of these days I will elaborate on that most excellent purchase. I sing its praises frequently to Kristopher. He reminds me that I've mentioned it before.
Anyway, back to the quilt. I found a perfect-colored blue bed sheet for the back right in my stash. Funny how I always seem to have the right color sheet! Of course, I know why...I buy the colors I like to use when I see them, so they're there when the right quilt comes along. I'm very happy with this quilt. The colors, the design, the stitching, and the border--all really well done. My hand stitching is getting better and better.
Mara's Birthday Face Cloths. A few months ago, when I was relearning to crochet, I had given Mara a sample piece that she was using as a washcloth. She liked it well enough that she asked for a larger one for her birthday. I had to learn again how to crochet one--how quickly I forget!--but I found a YouTube video showing me the bean stitch, which was pretty fun. Then I knitted one for her as well. Both were made of cotton yarn, both in shades of blue.
Three Dog Beds. I needed to deal with the huge amount of scraps and stuffing I had accumulated over the past months. Using upholstery samples that Kelli had given me for the covers, I made three dog beds (aka pillows) and gave them away on Buy Nothing. It made a small dent in the pile of stuffing, but not nearly big enough. I still have a huge king-size pillowcase full of it, plus another, smaller one. I need to find fabric that I don't want to use in quilts to make more dog beds.
January 2025
Martha's Vortex Quilt. I found a photo of a quilt like this somewhere on Facebook and downloaded it. I didn't have a pattern, but I figured out how to put it together. I didn't know when I made this quilt that it was going to be Martha's, but when it was almost done and I showed it to her, she loved the colors. It became hers. It was fun to make (I used muslin as a backing for each block), but it didn't come out how I envisioned it would. I therefore had to make another one. More on that later. This was the quilt I was working on when the meander stitch suddenly fell into place. After practicing it on and off for FOUR YEARS, my hands and feet (and my wonderful Juki sewing machine) all worked together, and I could do it! I love, love, love the feeling of accomplishment. I really wasn't sure I would ever be able to do true FMQ. And now I can!
Backing-turned-into-three-quilts. When I was making Michelle's quilt, I tried a bunch of different fabrics to create the backing, and it just was not working. I discarded that idea and went with a bedsheet. The blocks I had made just sat there for a while until I realized I could make three smaller quilts instead of one. One became a pink baby quilt for Stephanie's new baby; another was purple and yellow, and third was pink and purple. They were much better as separate quilts!
February 2025
The third of the three smaller quilts.
FMQ Practice. I had to reassure myself that I really had gotten the hang of FMQ, so I made a few small pieces just to practice. I gave the Fourth of July placemat to Mom because I knew she would love it. She did.
Big Fabric Haul. Back in November, having heard that Joann Fabric had declared bankruptcy, I saw the writing on the wall and began focusing on collecting as many remnants as I could. On Facebook Marketplace, I ran across an announcement of a huge fabric/estate sale being held by a woman for her friend, whose mother had been a dressmaker for forty years. I rearranged my plans to get there as early as possible, and I was not disappointed. There was so much fabric that she was selling it by the pound. I picked up as much as I could carry (all in the colors I love, of course), and then went back for a few more items. The total was about 15 pounds, at $5 or $6 per pound. I feel like I truly have FBLE now. Fabric Beyond Life Expectancy. Ahem. That doesn't mean I'll stop collecting it.
They say people who quilt actually have two hobbies: quilting and collecting fabric. It's true. Besides making pretty, useful things with it, there's just something about handling it, washing it, ironing it, folding it, and organizing it that gives me great joy. I love fabric and sewing!
They say people who quilt actually have two hobbies: quilting and collecting fabric. It's true. Besides making pretty, useful things with it, there's just something about handling it, washing it, ironing it, folding it, and organizing it that gives me great joy. I love fabric and sewing!
Another gift to Jewish Vocational Services. Along with the two recent purple quilts, I gave a couple of other quilts to JVS...the one made from batiks and one I made with leftovers from Dress A Girl dresses.
More Pillows. I've decided to stop calling them dog beds. The pillows I make from scraps are too nice for that. Even though they're made from two different fabrics and the sides don't match, each side is pretty enough that I'm going to call them pillows, which is what they have really always been. I used up a huge amount of scraps stuffing these. I gave them to the Metropolitan Lutheran Ministries, which holds a Christmas giveaway for families every December. They collect throughout the year, so Kris took these to their warehouse.
Binding Size Practice. Played around with different size binding as well as FMQ. Not sure what I learned. I may have to relearn whatever it was next time I want larger binding. I'm very comfortable with 2 1/4-inch, but if it's different than that, I'm not sure about either the process or how it's supposed to come together.
Stained Glass Quilt. I found another quilt photo online that I liked. The poster was kind enough to note the size pieces she used for each block, and from there I figured out how to make the quilt. I quilted this one by rows, QAYG. She called hers Floral Fusion, but this one obviously is more like stained glass. I loved it so much, I kept it. In fact, I made another one just like it in April for a friend.
Another Juki TL2010Q. Early in January, my Juki was driving me a little crazy because the automatic thread cutter was cutting the thread so short it pulled out of the needle about 10% of the time. It was also hiccupping when I did FMQ. Since I had the Janome as backup, I decided to bite the bullet and take the Juki back to Quilters HQ to see what they could do for me. I had to leave it there, which was not surprising. It took only about a week sewing with the Janome before I realized I wasn't going to make it. I needed my Juki back. Casually on a Sunday night, I roamed the internet looking for another Juki. Of course I found one. It was in Texas; I clicked the button and ordered it. Less than a week later, it was in my sewing room, all set up and ready to go. It took no time at all to rev my engine and press the pedal to the metal. So to speak. I'm so glad I did that...because they were waiting on a part, I didn't get my original Juki back until early April! They didn't charge me because it had taken so long. Truth to tell, it's now almost May, and I haven't sewn with my original machine yet. I just keep on truckin' with Number Two.
March 2025
Pastel Vortex. I mentioned that I wasn't enamored with the Vortex quilt I made, which didn't match my vision of it. I determined that the strips were too wide. On this one, I used skinnier strips...I think no more than 2 inches, and most of them were 1-1/4 or 1-1/2; some even skinnier. I started with all my pink and blue scraps. Those colors really don't go together all that well, so I added in pale green and pale yellow. I realized at that point that it was going to be a pastel quilt with pops of lavender. Late in the process, I borrowed Julie K's ping pong table to lay out the blocks. I'm getting better at creating the "random" look so there are no pools of color. Being random isn't just easy! I'm still experimenting with meandering and how large the block or row can be so that I can stitch it easily. On this quilt, I sewed the blocks into columns before stitching. The pieces were too big. Rows are narrower, so the pieces are not so big, and I'm more comfortable doing FMQ. I love how this quilt came out. So far it hasn't left my house. Some day it might.
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Another Pillow. Linda Flake had given me fabric for dresses. Among the pieces was this item already made into a pillow cover. I stuffed it with scraps, and it's ready to go to MLM.
A Doo-dad for Mom's Door. While I was playing around between quilts, I pulled out this circular block made from scraps from Mara's Charleston quilt. I quilted it and put it into a wrapped hoop. Mom liked it, so it's now hanging on her door.
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Pink and Purple Poodle Card Table Tablecloth Quilt. I was curious about making a quilt from a tablecloth (totally forgetting that I had actually made one years ago and it's on Mom's bed). I used this 1940s poodle tablecloth and was delighted to find that I had a poodle fabric with almost enough poodles to fussy cut for the centers of a nine-patch. I filled in with flowers that seemed to be of the same vintage. It was tricky trying to match the size of the wonky log cabin blocks I had made to the pieces of the tablecloth. I realized after I had finished it that I should have started by cutting the tablecloth into blocks first and then matched the blocks for the other side to them. Live and learn. I wanted to continue practicing the meander stitch, but that obviously would not have worked with the straight lines of the quilt. Using the walking foot with a guide, I quilted each block and then attached them with sashing on the log cabin side and without sashing on the tablecloth side. It came out pretty well, I thought, though no one else seems to find it as interesting as I do.
April 2025
My friend J's cancer had returned after 14 years. A terrible blow. What can I do for her? I thought. A split second later--duh--make her a quilt, of course. She loved the idea. I showed her a few design possibilities. She loved my Stained Glass quilt, both the design and the colors. I made her one. The special part was that I quilted her own words into the blocks (she's a wonderful writer, with a unique style). It took some practice, and I'm inordinately pleased with the result. Best part--she loves it and feels the love it embodies. She tells me when she spreads it on her bed each morning she looks for which word pops out to her.
May 2025
Clarice scheduled June 6 as a "shopping day" to give fabric to us sewers to make more dresses for Dress A Girl. I decided I wanted to give her 30 dresses on that day, so I declared May a DAG month. It takes some doing to re-design my sewing room as a dress factory. I have the following categories of fabric, which are organized and sorted into bins. In descending order by size: 1) fabric that's large enough that I can make a whole dress from it; 2) fabric from which I can make only a front and back, but not the side panels; 3) side panels only; 4) pockets only. I also have piles for pocket lining material and bias-cut fabric from which I make coordinating bias tape for the pockets, armholes, and neck. When I'm cutting out new dresses, I look at ALL of these piles/bins and figure out what goes with what. It's a lengthy process, and most enjoyable. Here are the thirty dresses I made in May and the first week of June.
June-July 2025
I took a lot of fabric at the shopping day, because I was on a roll, and I was planning to make thirty more dresses. It's such a big deal to restructure my sewing room back to quilting from dress making and then restructure it once again to make dresses, I figured it would be easier to just continue my dress-making. And I was just in the mood to do it. In the meantime, Mom's friend (and mine) Laurie gave me a bunch of fabric. It was wild! I was able to make thirteen dresses from that fabric alone. The photo of the little girl in the middle of all the dresses is her granddaughter, who chose a purple dress for her very own. Cute, cute, cute! I was so glad she modeled it for me. I realized that I needed to make the armholes bigger to accommodate an older child. She is just three and it's perfect for her...I intended to be making these for 4- and 5-year-olds. I have since recut the pattern to make the armholes larger. It's easier to attach the bias tape now, and I can make the dresses more quickly.
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Hearts for the Little Girls. From the dress scraps, I began making stuffed hearts to put inside the pockets. I hope they are able to transmit the message to each little girl that someone she doesn't even know is thinking about her and wishing her well.
In the beginning, I used polyester fiberfill from a bag I had bought long ago. Then it dawned on me that I had the perfect stuffing for these hearts somewhere--maybe in the basement?--a black garbage bag full of couch stuffing that a friend from the Buy Nothing group had given me four or five years before. I went on a search mission and found it in the back-of-beyond (behind my cutting table, in the tiny area where I keep seldom-used supplies) in my sewing room. It was a huge bag, and I decided to make as many hearts from it as I could. So far I've made 330, and I think there's enough for about 30 more. Clarice was delighted when I delivered them. |
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From the beginning, Mom has been a huge supporter of my work with Dress A Girl--she's always my biggest fan--and she had told me more than once that she wanted to do something to help. Her physical ability is so limited, it took a while to figure out how she could take part in the process. The hearts gave her the opportunity we were looking for. She has helped choose which fabrics to use for the two sides of the hearts, and she's helped me count them. It makes me happy that even with her diminished capacity, she's really good at both of those things.
The flannel baby blanket found a home. Serendipity...Mara told me one of Mom's aides was leaving to have her baby girl. She wondered if I had a spare quilt to give to her. I did! The one I had made from the flannel scraps from Mara's many, many nightgowns was still waiting to be given to someone. Win-win-win. I was able to give it away. Mom was able to give a gift. And the aide (whose name I never knew) received a pink baby blanket for her new baby. Mara was even visiting Mom at the same time I was there, so we were all present for the gift-giving.
Martha's Nephew's Baby Daughter's Quilt. A while ago I offered to make a quilt for the new addition to Martha's family. I asked her nephew to send me photos of family members that I would incorporate into the quilt. The design was a nine-patch--blue and pink. Martha helped me choose the fabrics and placement, and I added elements as I went. I love how it turned out!
A few weeks after I finished the quilt, as I was creating my memory piece, I realized I needed to make a way to hang the quilt. The photos would fade with washing, so the quilt is more for display than for daily use. I hand-stitched a rod pocket at the top to accommodate a dowel rod. NOW it's finished and ready to give to Martha, who will deliver it to her nephew when she visits him in India at Christmas.
A few weeks after I finished the quilt, as I was creating my memory piece, I realized I needed to make a way to hang the quilt. The photos would fade with washing, so the quilt is more for display than for daily use. I hand-stitched a rod pocket at the top to accommodate a dowel rod. NOW it's finished and ready to give to Martha, who will deliver it to her nephew when she visits him in India at Christmas.
At the June meeting, Clarice had asked someone to make some extra-small dresses. I volunteered, because it would allow me to make use of the smaller pieces of fabric that were too little for even the small dresses I had been making. I printed out the original pattern at 80%, made a sample, and delivered it to her for her feedback. She said it was perfect, so that's what I'm making now. From photos, you can't really tell the difference between the larger and the smaller, but you can take my word for it--they are ADORABLE! Almost doll-size.
August 2025
A New Path. In my usual way, I am following my nose wherever it leads me. It is now telling me to shift my main focus to making these dresses. When I accumulate enough scraps, I will use them to make quilts and donate them as well, either to JVS or another organization that can distribute them to people who need a bit of warmth and comfort.
I delivered 13 XS dresses and 200 hearts at the August meeting. During the meeting, Clarice explained once again the dual purpose of our dress making, which changed and clarified my path. These dresses are important. Not only do they provide a little bit of joy for the girls who receive them, they also provide at least a small amount of protection from predators who would steal these children in order to traffic them. The label on the front of the dress lets them know that the child would be missed if she were to suddenly disappear. It doesn't completely protect them, but it serves as a deterrent.
The message of the DAG meetings is clear. The problem is HUGE. Each of us who sews for this cause knows that we can't save the world...but we can do something. Making dresses is my contribution to healing the world.
I delivered 13 XS dresses and 200 hearts at the August meeting. During the meeting, Clarice explained once again the dual purpose of our dress making, which changed and clarified my path. These dresses are important. Not only do they provide a little bit of joy for the girls who receive them, they also provide at least a small amount of protection from predators who would steal these children in order to traffic them. The label on the front of the dress lets them know that the child would be missed if she were to suddenly disappear. It doesn't completely protect them, but it serves as a deterrent.
The message of the DAG meetings is clear. The problem is HUGE. Each of us who sews for this cause knows that we can't save the world...but we can do something. Making dresses is my contribution to healing the world.
A Bonus from the Meeting. Someone had given a big bag of quilt tops to Ruth, one of the DAG dress makers, to give away. I took a small one to finish and donate to Uzazi Village. I spent a lovely Saturday and Sunday deconstructing it, reworking it, quilting it, and adding a binding. The fabrics and colors are not at all ones I would have chosen to play with, but I like how it turned out. Because I took off one row and one column, I had enough to make a memory piece. :) I delivered the quilt to Clarice, who took it to Uzazi Village.
September 2025
More Dresses. I made and took thirty more XS dresses to Clarice on September 13.
Teaching Rosa. Kris showed photos of my dresses to a woman from the church next door, who expressed great enthusiasm for learning how to make dresses for DressAGirl. She has come to me for three sessions of teaching; the last time she brought a friend who also wants to learn. Besides being great fun, teaching them has shown me how much I've learned over the course of 190 dresses. I've developed techniques to make the process easier and more efficient. I hadn't realized quite how proficient I am until I began narrating and demonstrating the process to them. Makes me proud!
Three more quilts donated to JVS. I found three more quilts to donate: the small blue one that I had made very early on; the full size pink and red valentine quilt with a lot of hand applique; and the scrappy pastel futon-size "coin" design. I loved seeing their enthusiastic response when I brought them in.
Cross-stitch quilts. I periodically review all the items in my sewing room, just so I can keep track of what I have. I open drawers and bins to remind myself where everything is stored. As I was roaming around the sewing room one morning, I ran across a drawer full of cross-stitched pieces I had completed. It occurred to me that I should do something better with those pieces than letting them live out their lives in the drawer. I gathered them together, figured out what would go with what, and with some design help from Linda, came up with several groupings. The first group became a nine-patch quilt (plus a memory piece); the second and third are now wall hangings in my sewing room. I have yet to complete number four. In the process, I learned how to manage pieces of different sizes with sashing so they look symmetrical. For instance, the middle row of the cat quilt is taller than the first and third rows to accommodate the larger cross-stitch piece. The heart in the middle of the first row of the pink hanging required an additional piece of fabric to allow it to line up with the two adjacent pieces. I loved figuring out how to do this. I made labels to show when I had stitched the pieces and when I quilted them.
Another Cross-stitch Wall Hanging. The remaining pieces were flowers. I arranged and rearranged them several times, and, after trying out several fabrics, found a wonderful green one in my stash to use as the background. Unfortunately, I ran out of wall space, so guess where this wall hanging lives. It's in the closet. Dang.
Lisa's Shirt Pillow. I offered to make a quilt for my cousin Lisa. That's still in the works; however, she brought me a shirt that her brother had had made for her that she no longer wore. I made it into a pillow, complete with the cuffs so she can display her grandfather's cufflinks in them. Thank you to YouTube for showing me how to do it! I initially pointed the sleeves downward, as one would wear the shirt. Lisa asked me to reorient them up to the heart area. Such a good idea! Another good idea that I would not have thought of myself was to insert additional batting to eliminate wrinkles after the inside pillow was made. A couple of wrinkles at the top right corner were bothering me; I added a few pieces of batting, and voila! They disappeared.
October-November 2025
Five More Dresses. I hadn't had time to make many dresses, but I did manage to make five of them for Clarice's October meeting.
Lisa's Quilt Curtain. Lisa's brother, Scott, died about ten years ago. She had collected eight of his ties as mementos of him. I offered to make a quilt with them. She asked me to make a curtain to hang in the doorway between her bedroom and the adjacent room, which she used as a sitting room and closet. We collaborated on the design (along with a little assistance from ChatGPT on her part) and, after discarding the idea of a Fibonacci spiral because it was too complicated, came up with a scrappy block. I made three 15" blocks of various designs from my own stash, both to test possible designs and to give me some practice before I began working with the ties. I found a rose pattern I liked quite a bit. It's promoted as if it's SO simple to do, but actually, it takes some thought to make the pieces and parts look both random and symmetrical. Lisa said she liked that design best, so I made all three tie blocks with that design in mind.
I carefully deconstructed the ties, saving every little bit. Using a muslin backing, I began in the middle of the block with tiny pieces and built outward with larger pieces. I chose the colors at random...but really, it wasn't really as random as one might think. I wanted each block to have some symmetry. I was able to make three 15" blocks from the available fabric for the front of the curtain, with the three practice blocks on the back. My original thought was to have them alternate left-right-left, but Lisa and ChatGPT came up with the better idea of stacking them in a column with the adjacent set of blocks in the background fabric.
I used two navy blue bed sheets as the background material for both sides of the curtain. Using QAYG, I outlined each individual piece of each block with the walking foot. Then I let the quilt rest for a few days as I contemplated how to quilt the background pieces. One morning I woke up with the design...straight lines about one inch apart, but at angles to reflect the angles in the blocks. I loved the result.
Putting the blocks and rows together was a challenge, because it was so easy to get confused about how to attach the front and back of the sashing to which side of each piece. I redid several of the rows several times. (I'm not saying exactly how many times. That would be a little embarrassing.)
The next step entailed reminding myself how to write with free motion quilting. I really love doing this, because the result is so beautiful. Even so, it is still intimidating. It was a challenge to get the letters all slanting the same way, with appropriate spacing in between. I didn't want to stop and start the thread with each word, so I needed to figure out how to connect them inconspicuously. I accomplished this by bringing the thread down to the baseline and following it for the appropriate distance before starting the next word. And then there were the numerals, which are not connected at all in actual writing, but needed to be connected in FMQ. I solved the problem of the 5 in 2025 by writing it from the bottom to the top. That made me feel pretty smart. I practiced for an entire day and then finally wrote in cursive on the bottom three rows of the quilt:
Quilted for Lisa with love in memory of Scott.
May his memory be a blessing.
Julie 2025
I was liking the results, but the quilt still needed something to break up the huge expanses of blue. I added a border with splashes of color from the leftover bits of ties. For the binding, I found just the right fabric from my stash that incorporated the oranges of the ties. It must have been intended for the job...I had only about 20 inches of binding left over. I'm very happy with the curtain, and I hope Lisa is, too.
I carefully deconstructed the ties, saving every little bit. Using a muslin backing, I began in the middle of the block with tiny pieces and built outward with larger pieces. I chose the colors at random...but really, it wasn't really as random as one might think. I wanted each block to have some symmetry. I was able to make three 15" blocks from the available fabric for the front of the curtain, with the three practice blocks on the back. My original thought was to have them alternate left-right-left, but Lisa and ChatGPT came up with the better idea of stacking them in a column with the adjacent set of blocks in the background fabric.
I used two navy blue bed sheets as the background material for both sides of the curtain. Using QAYG, I outlined each individual piece of each block with the walking foot. Then I let the quilt rest for a few days as I contemplated how to quilt the background pieces. One morning I woke up with the design...straight lines about one inch apart, but at angles to reflect the angles in the blocks. I loved the result.
Putting the blocks and rows together was a challenge, because it was so easy to get confused about how to attach the front and back of the sashing to which side of each piece. I redid several of the rows several times. (I'm not saying exactly how many times. That would be a little embarrassing.)
The next step entailed reminding myself how to write with free motion quilting. I really love doing this, because the result is so beautiful. Even so, it is still intimidating. It was a challenge to get the letters all slanting the same way, with appropriate spacing in between. I didn't want to stop and start the thread with each word, so I needed to figure out how to connect them inconspicuously. I accomplished this by bringing the thread down to the baseline and following it for the appropriate distance before starting the next word. And then there were the numerals, which are not connected at all in actual writing, but needed to be connected in FMQ. I solved the problem of the 5 in 2025 by writing it from the bottom to the top. That made me feel pretty smart. I practiced for an entire day and then finally wrote in cursive on the bottom three rows of the quilt:
Quilted for Lisa with love in memory of Scott.
May his memory be a blessing.
Julie 2025
I was liking the results, but the quilt still needed something to break up the huge expanses of blue. I added a border with splashes of color from the leftover bits of ties. For the binding, I found just the right fabric from my stash that incorporated the oranges of the ties. It must have been intended for the job...I had only about 20 inches of binding left over. I'm very happy with the curtain, and I hope Lisa is, too.
A few little projects. I shortened some black pants for Mara and made a little stuffed heart for Linda's birthday. Mary Ellen gave me the idea to dye some old jeans to make them look almost new. I found some denim Rit dye in my stash, and two hours later, my jeans were refreshed and renewed.
And Back to Dresses! My goal was to make five more dresses before Clarice's November meeting to bring my total to 200. I met that goal, but I visited Linda instead of attending the meeting that morning, so I haven't delivered them yet. I will deliver 14 dresses to Clarice tomorrow, along with a couple copies of the Our Health Matters magazine in which my article about DressAGirl is published.
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Finding Meaning in a Messy World. One of my customers publishes a local magazine, "Our Health Matters." I edit and proofread the articles for her. When I told her about the dresses I make for DressAGirl, she asked if I would write an article about it, focusing on mental health. I was happy to do so. Here's the text of that article.
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December 2025
December was an interesting month. I ran out of steam on the dresses, immediately after I had written that I was going to keep making them into the indefinite future. I will get back to them at some point, but at the moment, I lost my motivation to make them and I wanted to clear off my horizontal spaces. Making dresses requires that baskets of fabric are out on the table so I can choose what I need. Sometimes I get tired of the visual clutter. As long as I was doing that, I decided to clear out and reorganize my sewing room. I focused on the back-of-beyond and closets and drawers. I put some fabric and tools that I was no longer using on Facebook Marketplace. I found some Kliban sheets that I had used as tablecloths when I was doing Benny events that I knew I would not use again--they went on Marketplace and were gone in a flash. I emptied out an over-the-door organizer that had been holding small balls of yarn and offered that on MP. With the large amount of stuffing from the closet, I made another large pillow (I'm now calling them floor pillows instead of dog pillows) and gave it away on Buy Nothing. I'm sure getting good at those pillows! I cleared out my mending basket by either doing the mending or repurposing the item. I dyed a white t-shirt purple. I cut up DAG scraps to more usable shapes and sizes and with the leftovers created a big bag of little pieces that went quickly on Buy Nothing. On Mara's birthday, I offered her a choice of potholders from my shoebox stash that had been loitering in the back-of-beyond. I mused about putting my loom together again and playing with textured yarn to weave art scarves.
Finally, I landed on a project that would take more time and focus. I had a great number of FMQ practice pieces that had ended up in a large basket. I could have cut them up to use as stuffing, but many of them seemed too well done for that ignominious end. I sorted through them to cull the ones that I could use and then cut up the rest. It took quite a bit of placing and then re-placing the different size blocks to make a cohesive piece. Since these blocks were already quilted, all I had to do was figure out how to connect them. I decided to simply sew them together with a quarter-inch seam and then make cover strips for the back side to cover up the splices. No sashing involved. For the cover strips, I deconstructed a house dress I had made before I learned how to make French seams--the inside of that dress was embarassingly terrible! Now it's gone. :)
I liked that quilt so much that I made a second one out of some of the remaining FMQ practice pieces.
I liked that quilt so much that I made a second one out of some of the remaining FMQ practice pieces.
January 2026
Kliban Cat Pillows. As I was lightening the load in the back of beyond, I found a bath towel and a smaller towel, both with the Kliban design, that I had used during my Benny days. I sold the larger one on MP, but because the smaller one had a hole in it, I cut it into three pieces and made small pillows--one with a heart to cover the hole. When I put them on Marketplace, one of my friends responded. She bought one for her son, and when she said she actually wanted it for herself and would take it if he did not want it, I gave her one of the others. So fun to give someone exactly what she wanted!
Bias-strip quilt. One of the only bags that was still hanging around contained many leftover bias strips that I had made for the DAG dresses. It's not customary to make a quilt with bias-cut strips (as far as I know), but that's what I had, so that's what I used. I made 9-inch blocks with very narrow (1" to 1 1/4" wide) strips on a muslin backing. The quilt was going to be as big as I could make with the strips I had. In order to make it come out even, though, I had to cut a few more strips from the fabrics I had left. Even so, the quilt was only going to be about 28" x 28". I made a border to make it into a crib size quilt.
I believe this is the largest piece I have ever done FMQ on. Although it's getting much easier, I still approach it with hesitation. I have to gear myself up to be brave. :) I used the meander stitch on the main piece, and then did the long border by itself before cutting it to the right four lengths. I'm happy with the result! My friend Nancy liked my first memory piece, so I gave it to her and made myself another.
I believe this is the largest piece I have ever done FMQ on. Although it's getting much easier, I still approach it with hesitation. I have to gear myself up to be brave. :) I used the meander stitch on the main piece, and then did the long border by itself before cutting it to the right four lengths. I'm happy with the result! My friend Nancy liked my first memory piece, so I gave it to her and made myself another.
Two Ironing Board Covers. My ironing board cover didn't last nearly as long as I thought it should. When I washed it, the middle part that had acquired so much burnt-on Mary Ellen's stuff that it disintegrated. Oh, well. I watched a YouTube video to see if I needed to do anything differently than I had before and then made two new ones out of the same fabric I had used for the first one, which is heavier than quilting cotton (originally they were lightweight canvas curtain panels). We'll see how this new one lasts. And then I'll move on to the next one.
Olo's Blue Jeans and Mary Ellen's Black Jeans. Mary Ellen told me Olo wasn't happy with the state of his blue jeans and wanted them dyed. Of course I said I'd do it. They look pretty snazzy now! And then I dyed ME's black jeans for good measure.
A Benny Show! As I took Mom around the art gallery at Village Shalom in December, it occurred to me that I might be able to show my Bennies at the gallery. A couple of phone calls later, it was set: On January 7, we would fill the three display cases at the Social Hall with my Bennies. Since it was still six weeks out, I began bringing several Bennies to Mom's apartment each time I came. By the time January 7 rolled around, I had brought 90 pieces, including hoops, framed Bennies, and framed prints to show in the cases. Some of them were for sale, and many were not, because I had already promised them to friends and family. I also brought numerous postcards and a few bookmarks I had made for other events that people could take for free.
We have since made arrangements for a reception on February 18. Dessert will be served in the Social Hall after lunch that day, and I will talk about the Bennies to any residents who attend. I have found some other items I can offer for free as well--magnets and some "Benny Fans" I made for an event held in 2017.
It was great fun to get organized for the show. Since all my pieces were already framed and ready to go, all I had to do was retrieve them from my office walls (or sewing room closet) and take them to Mom's place. Of course, to keep track of each piece, I also made a spreadsheet. Fun stuff!
We have since made arrangements for a reception on February 18. Dessert will be served in the Social Hall after lunch that day, and I will talk about the Bennies to any residents who attend. I have found some other items I can offer for free as well--magnets and some "Benny Fans" I made for an event held in 2017.
It was great fun to get organized for the show. Since all my pieces were already framed and ready to go, all I had to do was retrieve them from my office walls (or sewing room closet) and take them to Mom's place. Of course, to keep track of each piece, I also made a spreadsheet. Fun stuff!
Something has changed. As I'm working on my latest quilt, a Baby Duck Baby Quilt (more on that later), I realize that my quilting mindset has changed. I had acquired a lot of remnants to add to my stash before Joann Fabric closed last May. When the day finally came and I walked out of the store for the last time, I felt that I had enough fabric. Enough for what? Just enough. Quilters joke about having two hobbies: One is quilting and the other is collecting fabric. They have an acronym for this...FBLE. Fabric Beyond Life Expectancy. As I have been cleaning out my sewing room the past few months and passing along the tools I will no longer be using and fabric I don't want to work with, I have kept in mind Swedish Death Cleaning--dealing with items in your life now rather than letting someone else deal with the leftovers when you're gone.
I realized today with a kind of THUNK that I may not actually have FBLE. I have a stash, but it is not huge. It's enough to play with, with enough variety that I can usually find what I need to make the project I want. Recently I have been consciously using what I have and purposefully giving myself the limitation of using ONLY what I have--not purchasing anything extra. I like that. For example, I'm making the baby duck quilt because I had bought a vintage tablecloth several years ago at a yard sale with a row of cross-stitched little yellow ducks at the bottom. I remember thinking I would make something with it, but I had never gotten around to it. This week I decided to use it as the back of a quilt. I had a small amount of rubber ducky fabric in my stash that would work well for the front. I didn't have quite enough to make the 16 blocks I had envisioned (the size that the tablecloth would accommodate). Then I found another small piece of fabric whose colors were perfect to make the final four blocks. I searched my small red scraps to use for the sashing and binding. My stash includes five large bags of batting from Joann's. So there I had it--an adorable baby quilt made from the fabric and supplies in my stash.
If I ever do actually finish using my current fabric, I will figure out where to go from there. But for now, this is my goal: Make what I can with what I have.
I realized today with a kind of THUNK that I may not actually have FBLE. I have a stash, but it is not huge. It's enough to play with, with enough variety that I can usually find what I need to make the project I want. Recently I have been consciously using what I have and purposefully giving myself the limitation of using ONLY what I have--not purchasing anything extra. I like that. For example, I'm making the baby duck quilt because I had bought a vintage tablecloth several years ago at a yard sale with a row of cross-stitched little yellow ducks at the bottom. I remember thinking I would make something with it, but I had never gotten around to it. This week I decided to use it as the back of a quilt. I had a small amount of rubber ducky fabric in my stash that would work well for the front. I didn't have quite enough to make the 16 blocks I had envisioned (the size that the tablecloth would accommodate). Then I found another small piece of fabric whose colors were perfect to make the final four blocks. I searched my small red scraps to use for the sashing and binding. My stash includes five large bags of batting from Joann's. So there I had it--an adorable baby quilt made from the fabric and supplies in my stash.
If I ever do actually finish using my current fabric, I will figure out where to go from there. But for now, this is my goal: Make what I can with what I have.
