Sometimes the snow comes down in June

What is up with this snow that we are getting? I can't remember the last time it snowed this late in March. This weather reminds me of a line from the song Save the Best For Last - "Sometimes the snow comes down in June". I am hoping it's not snowing in June, but again, who knows.

I am a lover of rulers. If it will make my quilting easier then I am all for it. Some patterns call for you to cut your own templates out of plastic, but somehow my pieces are always off, therefore I try to use an acrylic ruler. I found a pattern called Hollyhock Garden by Darlene Zimmerman and it called for a 60 degree triangle. I'm going to make this quilt using a jelly roll from Moda maybe using the Urban Couture that I own or buy the new Neptune roll.



Book that I am reading (listing to):

The Cross-Country Quilters by Jennifer Chiaverini. Five women meet at quilt camp and embark upon an ambitious project together. I love the character Nana who is a witty and fun loving. I wish I had someone like her in my life. This is a fun read as most of Chiaverini books are. Maybe that is why I like them so much.


Update:

Remember me telling you about the Amy Butler fabric I got and the quilt that I'm going to make a few post back? Well, it's turning out to be my quilt from hell. The pieces were not lining up right so I thought if I re cut them all they would line up. Wrong. I guess I don't understand how they are to line up. So now instead of them being one big piece, they have a seam down the middle. I am o.k. with that. I just have a few more pieces to line up and iron open the middle seam so they lay flat. You know how I hate to iron open my seams, but this is a must or it would be so thick that it could never be quilted. I hope to get to sewing on this today. I have just a few more to re-cut.

The Whirlygiggle quilt is quilted and it looks awesome. The quilting made the quilt. I laid it out and stood back and just gazed at it for 5 minutes. I am impressed with how it turned out. I have only the binding and quilt label to place on. It's going to be real hard to give this quilt up. I am in love with it.

Charlie

You Give Me Fever!

The calender says it's spring, but the temperature outside does not say the same. There were a few days when it was up in the low 70's, but not now because it's 54 with a chance of snow on Saturday. Ugh. I wish spring weather would get here and stay. I am sick of this winter.

Like most of you, I think I have spring fever and am in the mood for a change. I have been thinking about what change I want. Since I spend most of my time in the quilt room I'm going to move it around. Just moving items around can give you a sense of fresh and new. I wish that I had the money to get a new sewing table like this one from Arrow called Bertha Oak. Don't you just love the name?
Her measurements are 84x40x35.5". Now that's a big girl. Does anyone else out there know about or own an arrow cabinet? How can they sell theirs cheaper than other company's? I wish we had a place in town I could go see this set up. It does come with a one year warranty though.

Here are some before pictures of my quilting room. I have not taken the time to clean it. You are seeing MESS, dust and all. Click on any picture for a larger view.
Here is my FQ stash. I think the TV and filling cabinet are going to go. They're taking up space that I could use for something else. Would you look at all the bits of thread on that floor. Someone needs to run a vacuum in this room. Maybe that someone is me.


This item used to be the center island for my kitchen, but since I never spend anytime in there I moved it into the quilt room and use it as my cutting table. It's just the right height and size for a large cutting mat. I love it. Just have to clean the piles of junk out from under it.

My old style teachers desk that I found at a junk store for $20 that I use as my sewing table. I wish it was bigger like Bertha. This way I would not have to move the sewing machine out to the dinning room table to quilt my tops. The ironing board is the super large size I found at Wal-mart. I was just not happy with the smaller size ones. You'll also find the thread holder my father made sitting on the desk. There is that thread I was looking for right there on the floor! Now how did that get there?


Seeing how there was no other spot in the apartment for this 150 year old dresser that once belonged to my great grandmother and that my father restored, it just had to go in the quilt room. I now store fabric in it. The fabric chicken is one my grandmother made that I would carry around as a child. I have a picture of me and the chicken at the age of 4 that I will scan and share with you at a later date.

My computer desk that I found along the side of the road. It's top was split in two, but that was easy to fix and then painted it red. I think it use to be a vanity table. Yes, there are even FQ in the pull out drawers. Was just looking at the FQ in there and found an orange that I could have used in the OP quilt and some old bloom fabric.

I think I am going to arrange the room in a u-shape with the computer and sewing machine across from each other and the ironing board at one end. I am also thinking of adding on to the teachers desk with an extension leaf that will fold down when not in use.

I hope to get this done on my next couple of days off. I will post "after" pictures.

Charlie

Gazebo

Happy 2nd day of Spring!

Gazebo from Miss Rosie Quilt Co. using Fresh Squeezed from Sandy Gervais. This was the quilt I won from Carrie during the OP weekend

Off to quilt the Whirlygiggle quilt while I still have the bug. Oh, it's turning out to be a great day here in Kansas City. High of 70.

Charlie

Grand Reveal

Woot! It's Done, Whew!

Charlie

Free

In the last post I told you about the Foolproof Machine Quilting book. I am trying some of the techniques out on my Whirlygiggle quilt. Here soon I will have it done and will post a picture, but it's going to be a bit. I'm just getting into quilting all three layers. Piecing and designing quilts are still my thing.

I did take the plunge and I dropped my feed dog and tried free motion quilting. It's not as bad as I thought it might be. I have tried it before with little luck. I lack the luck because I did not stick with it. When in reality it's just mind over matter. I just need to get in there and do it. Practice, practice, practice that is the key. A book that has helped me out is Learn To Machine Quilt with Pat Sloan.

Here is what I've been doing. It's working for me. I take some fabric that I no longer like. The kind you say why in the hell did I ever end up with this. I know you have some. If not get some cheap cheap fabric to play with. I take batting and fabric and make approximately 18" squares. I do not baste this with pins, but with spray glue. Remember we do not care what it looks like. We're not going to show it to anyone. I used a fabric marker - the kind that will disappear with water or light. You could even use a sharpie, it's only for practice. Never use a sharpie on your real quilt it will not come out! Draw some lines, curves, loops, swirls, a simple picture or any design of your choosing. Now start free-motion quilting. No, it won't be perfect the first, second, third, fourth even fifth time you try it, but over time it will get better. Yes, over time it will get better and easier. Here is my first time.

Click on picture for close up

I found that I can use the same 18" square over again by putting new top and backing fabric on the first practice piece. Saves on batting too.

I am going to practice 3 times a week and before you know it I will get dang good at this free motion thing!

Wish me luck,

Charlie

Grand Reveal coming tomorrow.

FQ + Book

It's seems like it been forever since my last post, but it's only been a a little over a week. Just when I think spring might be here we go and get another cold snap. I had to turn the heat back on this morning. It's 21 degrees out there right now. I am keeping my butt inside where it's warm. I wish I could take a picture of how cold it is outside, but I can't unless you want to see the highway or the back of Quik Trip. My view is not the best and it's too cold to go out looking for that perfect picture like everyone else has on their blog showing you it's still cold.

If I could ever pull myself off facebook and the internet maybe I could get some quilting done, but don't hold your breath. I am still working on my OP quilt. I should be done with that by now. Once the top is done I will post a picture. Make sure you check out my Facebook page for OP pictures. I have some pictures of the backing, maybe the binding and extra just for fun stuff.

I'm one of them quilters that try to avoid free motion quilting. I am willing to try and learn, but have not put in the hours/weeks/months it takes to learn it. I've been sending the quilts out or leaving them unquilted. I've tried quilting a few myself, with just straight line using my walking foot, but wanted a little more than that. I found Foolproof Machine Quilting by Mary Mashuta and it has inspired me to look at using my walking foot in a whole new way. I never thought to incorporate the use of decorative stitches or even knew my machine had some of the stitches Mary talks about in her book. With the help of this great book I am learning that a walking foot could be used for more than just straight lines. This book will be one I look at again and again.

I thought I would show you the FQ's that I got from Viv from Highway Cottage. She was my partner in the "Wishing it was Spring" swap. She sent me two FQ's with native flower of New Zealand and some fine chocolate from a local shop along with a quilted credit card holder.

Charlie

2 Be Square - Part 2

After all the hard work I had put into this quilt. All I could think of when I was looking at was "it looks like a Halloween quilt".


Not the look I was looking for at all. What was I to do? My heart started to beat faster and I was getting knots in my stomach. Really, getting worked up over nothing after I thought about it. I thought I would return to my local quilt shop tomorrow and tell them I had a quilting emergency and need help stat! I wanted this problem fixed sooner than that. I sat down to the computer and started to play with EQ6. It turned out not to be not much help because I did not know what I wanted to do. Then I got to thinking, do I want to throw more money at the problem? Easy answer, no. Then I started to think, how do I make this work. I remembered that Carrie of Miss Rosie's Quilts loves to make scrappy borders. Just having gotten one of her patterns I took a look at it and there was my answer. Thank you Carrie! A scrappy rectangle border. Just like the one I used on my Whirlygiggle quilt. Problem solved. So off to bed I went.

Funny side note, because of all this work up. I had a dream during the night and I don't recall what all that happened , but for some reason I was pissed at my BH in the dream. When I woke up I yelled out "NO" and punched my BH and fell back to sleep. When I woke up he asked me why I hit him during the night. Then I told him what I remembered about the dream and about the OP tragedy and how I solved it. You see doing these kinds of things are normal for me. Sometime I will scream or yell out female names in my sleep and never know why I do it.

I set out to cutting and sewing my scrappy border and I must say it looks darn good. Ya! After my ordeal I can toot my own horn on this one.

This is where I am on my OP quilt. As you can see the road has been rocky along the way, but I have over come it and am pushing on. Keep checking here or my facebook page for more updates on the OP quilt and one day soon we will see a finished quilt top. Whoot!

Charlie

2 Be Square - Part 1

Caution: this post is long and therefore needed to be broken into 2 parts.

Did you see Pat's blog post today about her OP Quilt? If not, check it out.

Wow, what a weekend the OP was. I was on a natural high the whole weekend. I picked out fabric from my stash and played with them. I knew right from the start this was going to be a great stash quilt and I wanted it to be scrappy. Laid my fabrics out in 7 groups of 3. To make a total of 21 blocks. Only needed/wanted 20, but the extra could be used on the back. No problem. Everything is working out great. Seams for the most part all lined up. Only had to resew 3 or so. Not bad. They all came out 12". Wow, that's a first for me. Knew I did not want to sew them side by side because of all the seams. Sashing with corner stones was a must. I did not have any fabric for that. I only buy FQ's. Went to my local quilt store and showed the owner what I was doing and 45 minutes later we had fabric and thread picked for my OP quilt.

Black was the only fabric that would work with all the blocks. Everything else just did not look right. Found a nice orange for the corner stones that would not fight with all the other oranges in the quilt. I thought I would do a 4 patch border on the quilt. It would add a little something. I get tired of just plain fabric for the borders. I come home and start working on cutting and sewing everything together. Yesterday, as I am sewing my sashing to the blocks I notice the center sashing is not lining up with their neighbor. It's off 1/4". I email Pat to see if she had this same problem and what I might do to solve it. Long story short I did not square up my blocks before I cut them into 4th and any little issue is magnified. I should have known this, but I HATE TO SQUARE UP. Call it a lesson learned. ALWAYS SQUARE UP YOUR BLOCKS. I did find ways to make my blocks work so they did not look off, but some of them will just be off, like me.
Here is Pat's answer to my question: "well this is not about matching blocks... so if anyone asks you just say you were doing a Pat Sloan creativity workshop and this is the way they are supposed to be as that is the truth!!"

I got two groups of four all sewn with the sashing and was getting antsy to see what the 4 patch border would look like I tried it next to the sewn blocks. This is when HORROR sets in for me.

Tune in tomorrow to find out about my horror.

Charlie