The next quilting chapter

I hope all of you had a wonderful time with famiily and friends if you were celebrating thanksgiving!  We will be living on left overs reinvented for a few days.

*sigh* what a relief, I have made it to the thanksgiving break all in one piece.  I was so needing this time off.  It is so great to get up when I want, nap when I want, eat when I want.  The clock does not harras me as time is a bit more precious when you are craming in all the things in a 4 hour night.

To update you on my quilting progress, I have met my goals!!!!!!!!

I have a pieced top.

And it has rained the last two days, so not photo opportunity presented itself.  I set it on point and added sashing between the blocks.  The outer perimeter ended up being just plain ole muslin.  I am very happy how this turned out!  I could have stood to edit the layer cake just a bit more and remove more lighter fabrics.  Looking at this through the camera lense, I see bald spots!  LOL, no color in places.  To the naked eye, it does not look like that.

I will probably panto this with my spoon foot.  Not sure when I will get to quilting of it, but I put all of my mess away and cleaned off my cutting table as well as my sewing table.  I am enrolled in Frolic, the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt.  I am all in.  All the fabrics are starched pressed, and waiting for their assignments.  I am anxious to get started, because the clock is not part of my routine.  No harrassing clock, equals luxurious sewing time with not a care in the world!

And I have finished quilting Stars Upon Thars!  This was a feat!  I recall starting this in October when it was still in the 90s, and too hot to quilt.  Then I got the flu, then I had a car accident.  It always seemed like something was preventing me from stitching.  Is it perfect?  Nope.  But it was wonderful practice, getting acquainted with my rulers.  I have learned the smaller the ruler, the more you can palm it, the better for you and the machine.  My 8 inch ruler is still too short, but when you are stitching and you are holding one end, and it comes off the platform, you run the risk of not stopping fast enough and hitting your ruler, because it comes upward, and very near the needle.  I will take that into consideration for any future ruler work.

Here is the last row, just completed.  Each row was taking about 2 1/2 hours.  Ruler work is very precise, but time consuming.  I assume as I get more rehersed with the movements, my time will speed up.  No telling how many hours I have in this.

Here is my most favorite block, which I placed in the center.

That blue just makes this look like shirting and vintage old.  That fabric might be about 8 years old.  But its placement makes it look like it might be from days gone by.  The 81 patches are indeed made from vintage fabrics.  These were originaly 49 patches.  They were wonky, handsewn, and needed help.  During the quilting of this, I noticed all the vintage fabrics.  There was silk, polyester double knit, cotton, shirtings, and even barkcloth.  I tried to add my modern day stash of fabrics to pull on the vintage charm of these postage blocks.

And again, raining, so I could not lay it out and snap a good photo.  This one is ready to bind!

I used muslin for the backing.  Very pleased with that as well.  The back of this looks like a whole cloth quilt.  A reversable quilt!!!!

So currently I have no project to work.  The Next Quilting Chapter!  Idle hands……that is hard.  But the start of Frolic is just hours away.  I will just wait patiently.

Well I am off to Frolic sometime today!  Those of you who are getting out to shop, be safe.  We know this is kick off season of holiday shopping.  Watch out for the crazy drivers, or crazy shoppers.  Be kind because they are probably fighting a hard battle.

Thanks for coming buy and reading my blog!

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M8DPB

Magic 8 and the disappearing pinwheel basket block.

Many moons ago, I made the disappearing churn dash from the M*QC video tutorial.  I was in love with how easy it was.  At that time I had never made anything with triangles.  I always wanted to make those HSTs but deemed them too hard with out the right tools.

Many moons ago, I saw the video tutorial of the disappearing baskets put out there by M*QC and notated it on my bucket list of quilts.

The upside to these wonderful quilt blocks, easy, fast, and no special tools.  A beginner block for all skill levels.  The only down side, the dreaded bias edges on every block.

I am currently making the magic 8, which is two squares sewn right sides together all the way around their edge.  You then slice it diagonally twice.  Then you sew those together making the pinwheel block.  I chose a new step between these steps and making mine random scrappy with the fabric line I am using.  It works well.

Then I proceed to make the disappearing block using the video.  I do a small variation to mine which makes them look more old fashioned.  I truly love how this traditional looking block is so modernly easy.

See for yourself.

Here are my scrappy ones.  I have oodles of these made, just a few more to sew.  I will be adding a sashing to help the bias edges.  And will probably place mine on point.

I aim to be very close to done with this by the time black friday gets here and the Frolic Mystery starts.

In the Frolic mystery colors, I have changed my mind on one of my colors.  I am opting out of turquoise, and opting in for white.  I think my light blues are just too close in hue to my turquoise.  Or my turquoise is actually darker than my lt blue, and she made it clear they must contrast.  I think this is a wise decision.  We will see.

I am off to press more blocks this evening, and perhaps sew a few more blocks.  They are quick, and easy for a work week night.  Ahhhhh, just the thought of my machine humming makes me relax.

I have managed to quilt a few more hours on the Stars Upon Thars.  Time change is a bugger, it has really messed with my quilting time.  Perhaps this weekend I will be able to focus solely on that.  We shall see.

I will probably not post again until after the Thanksgiving holiday.  Not much to share until then.

You will be hearing from me then, thanks for stopping by and reading my blog!  Have a great Thanksgiving Holiday!

Terrarium

I finished binding the Terrarium Jelly Roll Race quilt.  Terrarium is a fabric line by Elizabeth Hartman.  Lush greens, teals, turquoise, with a tad of gray and purple.  Love this color blend.  It now resides in a pillow case awaiting it’s future.  What does it’s future hold?  Unknown.  I like it enough to keep it.  Too small for me to use, perfectly suited for the children’s beds.  But right now I have quilts I have not used yet.  Perhaps this will display nicely at the QuiltHop.  Is there anything really spectacular about it?  No, not really.  It is just in the done pile, a simple completion.  Who knows, maybe someone will decide to have a baby, and this would be perfectly suited for a boy or a girl.

 

 

 

Have I been working on my string quilt?  No….tsk tsk tsk!  Shame on me.  My sewing mood was just not standing the strings right now.  Perhaps when I am off for the Thanksgiving break, I will string again.

 

 

I have switched my gears and moved to my layer cake stash.  I picked out a layer cake line called Farmhouse by Moda Fabrics.  Lovely blend of perfectly matched fabrics which paired nicely with muslin.  Disappearing pinwheel baskets are forming.  I have two blocks complete.  I have all the HSTs done.  I have about 10 HST pinwheel blocks sewn/pressed ready for the subcut to get to the basket making of the block.

In reflection, after making some lovely scrap quilts through the past couple of years, I have realized that the stagnation of these fabric designs for a fabric line are indeed beautiful, but something has changed inside my brain.  Even though they are beautiful, they seem cookie cutter to me.  It is kind of like bying a house on the block that looks like all the other houses, with very little difference amongst the houses.  They may have a color difference, but their roof pitch, the porch, their footprint and floor plans are all the same.  You may have 5 black fabrics all the EXACT same color, with flowers on one, and checkerboard on another.  And yet one of the other colors in that fabric family line, has the same flowers, and same checkerboards, very cookie cutter.

I have never been much of a cookie cutter kind of person.  I prefer unique, eclectic, odd things in life.  That is just me.  This has always been me and how I gravitate.  In quilting, and experimenting with the craft, as much as I really like beautiful fabrics and fabric lines, it is kind of stale.  If you would have asked me about the fabric lines 5 years ago, I did not know at that time my inner being was on a mission to debunk what I deem as pretty.  Pretty now, is still pretty, but not to the same degree.

Zebras all may look alike, but their stripes are like fingerprints.  No two are exactly the same.  Photo by Jean van der Meulen on Pexels.com

 

I now have so much more respect for scrappy quilts.  There is so much variety in fabrics.  Ugly fabric cut small enough, is no longer ugly.  It can pair with white or off white, or even orange.

I am so glad during my quilting journey that I have saved my scraps.  They have taught me lessons.  Lessons on contrast.  Lessons in quilt budgets.  Scrap quilts are really free remnants that come together into something to be admired and utilized, gifted and cherrished.  Lessons much like a penny saved is a penny earned.  Waste not Want not….yup that is a good theory of scraps, you will never be in need of scraps if you have some.  They never seem to dwindle.  Your supply never runs out.

Photo by JESHOOTS.com on Pexels.com

Imagine a world where you would never have to buy fabric again?!  Unlimited fabric!  That is what my scraps have taught me.  You save them, they sew into miles and miles of new patterns and blocks.  They never let you down, the bin stays full.  And you sew them, and you sew them, and you keep sewing them.  Scraps are pure sewing bliss!

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

If you have never made a scrap quilt, you are missing out.  There is a learning curve to scrap quilting.  If you pay attention close enough to the things on the internet, it will teach you a thing or two about them.  How to store scraps, how to plan with scraps, how to pair them, how to pattern and block with them, and how to make them work for you.  Amazing little snippets in a quilter’s life.  A bag of scraps to a quilter, carries all her past memories and her future dreams and good intentions.  My what a wonderful world!

A wonderful world full of much color!  Color is chicken soup for the quilters soul!

 

I became a statistic

I have been commuting to the same job for 18 years.  Every year the time changes twice, and every year I drive by a nasty accident, and I also am afraid of becoming a statistic.  I am always very careful the days following a time change because STUPID people are amoung us!

Years ago when the internet was new, I recall reading a statistic about daylight savings.  It involved a statistic for the insurance companies.  Their claim rates go up signifigantly when the time changes.  There are more accidents follinwg the time change than any other days on the calendar.  More heart attacks and strokes occur too, that one hour plays havoc with the mind and body!

Your body clock is a very perfectly tunned/timed device, you throw a wrench into the works by not eating at the same time, not sleeping at the same time, and not having the same amount of daylight at the same time.  And there is no cure.  You are forced to this schedule.

I think most american’s would agree that daylight savings should go.  It was invented to save candle wax, we are far more advanced that using candle wax, c’mon people we can use phones that can light the way in the dark.  Or better yet we just flip a switch to have light.

On Monday Novemeber 4th, benefits enrollment opened up at work.  And this year there were no paper mailers, this year it is all online.  So I stayed late at work to accomplish my next year elections.  I was running about 30 minutes late.  The 30 minutes late would then place my leaving at the peak of everyone else leaving.  I work with over 6000 people, and only 2 out holes, so you can imagine this “realeasing of the hounds” follows you all through the city and is minor traffic congestion where ever you go.  That was such a mistake, I regret leaving, If only I’d left at normal time, or stayed just a few more minutes.

Back in July I finally bought a new car.  Said new car has 7800 miles on it already,  My commute is long, my car is new, and I enjoy every minute I spend, as compared to my other car which was a 2008 and had manual locks and manual roll up windows.  I feel very lucky to drive this wonderful new car.

Exited work at about 4 ish.  Got caught at the first redlight.  The person in fornt of me was not paying attention wich caused me to break harder than I wanted.  But all was well.

Got caught at the next light.  I was about 7 cars back from the actual light.  The light had just changed green, and I just took my foot off the brake to give some gas.  Then I heard the crash behind me, and then I felt the tap.  Because I was already moving the tap was not as bad as it could have been if I was not moving.  I put the car in park and got out too see how bad it was.  A three car incident.  And the car that caused all of it was BAAAADDDD!

The speed limit on this road is 50.  Lots and lots of people like to travel this at 60 or faster.  Obvisouly when work gets out, travel is with the flow of traffic.  I estimate the woman that caused the accident was traveling around 55 or 60, and apparently had a bad case of distracted driver syndrome.  My guess is she was on her phone, more about that later.

So I ran back to the worst car, to see if she was still alive.  She was.  She could not talk, she could not breath (the wind was knocked out of her).  She was bleeding from her eyes.  All she could do was open her door, and lean her seat back to try to start breathing right again.  She just kept moaning probably because the wind was knocked out of her.

I looked back to see who was behind to make sure my safety was ok.  There was someone in the turning lane who came up on the accident (after the fact), and I motioned for her to call 911.

We both observed this 32 year old named Kelly in the crashed up car, that she hit the windshield.  No seatbelt.  She had purple hair.  Did not look like she lives by rules.  When she finally was able to speak, she asked if everyone was ok, I said yes we were fine.  She appolgized and said she was so sorry she did not mean too.  I told her it is ok, that is why it is called an accident.  You didn’t mean too.  She then asked me again if everyone was ok.  At this point I am thinking she is not thinking right and probably is seriously got something bad going on in her brain because it was not 5 seconds ago she had just asked the same question.  I answered her question the same.

The lady I asked to call 911 was done with the call and asked the 32 year old if she could call anyone for her.  She asked to speak to her mom.  She could not remember her moms number.  We asked for her phone.  We asked where her phone was, she said it was on her lap (yeah she was probably texting at the time of the accident).  We got her phone and got through to her mom.

At this point, we are only a block away from the fire dept.  They got there first, and then the police rolled in.  I gave my statement.  The officer collected his data.

There was also another man in between the worst and the best of the crash.  His name is Larry and I work with him.  That poor guy.  He was just back to work his first day after being off for medical leave.  He had his appendix out 2 weeks before.  He said he side was hurting but refused ambulance service and said he thought he might just drive and get his own assistance.  That man tried so hard not to hit me.

The impact from this girl hitting him caused his truck rear end to travel up then sideways.  That motion caused his cattle gaurd on his truck to hit my bumper at an angle, not straight on.  There looked to be no damage to his front end.  But the back end of the pick up was a nasty sight.  He said he was pushing hard on his break trying not to hit me.  I know he tried HAAAAAARRRRRDDDD!  I walked away uninjured.  I don’t think I can say the same for the others.  The girl was backboarded by the paramedics.  They were probably trying to keep her neck and back from moving.  The girl could not move.  But I witnessed her open her own car door and move her seat back, but perhaps she could not move her legs.

The reason she had the wind knocked out of her was becasue she was not wearing her seat belt.  The impact into the truck caused the truck to downforce on the car, which propelled her up.  She hit at the top of the windshield.  So the airbag deploy was right to the chest.

I travel this road every day, and every day have to be reminded by bleeding eyes that there was a wreck and that someone is very hurt.  This bother’s me.  I am now faced with an insurance claim on my new car, which will never be the same.  I cannot open my rear door anymore as it affected it that much.  I cannot use the car for what it was intended, to get groceries.  The damage and all the sensors and electronics is a worry for what will crap out now before it is time because it is unknown.

Our insurance company said if they pay for the claim that my rates will go up because I have a no acccident discount.  In the past chain reaction wrecks are usually paid by the insurance company of the car who hit you.  Again I feel sorry for the guy I work with in the truck as his insurance will be impacted.

What I would really like to do is take the girl to civil court for damages and make her pay my lawyer and get money that way for pain and suffering.  If I wanted to see someone bleeding from their eyes, I would have became a doctor.  I am not a doctor and never planned on ever seeing this sight.  I did not like what I saw, and I have a flash back every time I drive by that spot in my commute.

I am placing those photos at the very bottom of the post so they do not show up in wordpress feed.  Scroll to the bottom.  My car is the silver one.  You will figure out the other two.

My plans for quilting on Monday were canceled.  The wreck ate up 45 minutes and the extra 30 minutes I left late, nope, not enough time.  No quilting happened this week.  The daylight savings crunch has affected my quitling habit too.

I did have a finish this week.  My Kaffe Periwinkles is now complete.

I did some quilting it do death areas, QITD.  Some doodling, and then a pattern imerged that I really liked and stayed with it.

I am currently binding  Terrarium (by Elizabeth Hartman)  jelly roll race quilt.  That will be my next finish.

I have started pressing my neutrals for the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt called frolic.

I still am getting over my cough, damn thing won’t leave, but yesterday I hardly coughed at all, and today is even better.

I am not making plans for the upcoming week, as there have been too many things flung in my direction lately to try to keep up.  I hope to have a post by weeks end with another finish.

Did you catch my apple crisp recipe?  If you didn’t you can click here to get it.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog!

 

 

Weekend Edition Nov 2, 2019

Happy Saturday readers!  Yet another week down the tube.  I have been a busy beaver trying to play catch up from the flu, and getting in some valuable stitching time today too.

I cut some muslin 10 inch blocks, and I will be pairing it with this fabric.  I hope to do a disappearing something with it.

Whilst cutting those pieces of muslin I was sadly disappointed in my bolt of muslin.  I purchased a 50 yard bolt.  I figure I am about 8 yards or so into it and then I see this.

Not sure if this is grease pencil or actual pencil.  And rolling the bolt out a bit further to wack this piece off, I came across this:

Not COOL!  When one purchases a full bolt of muslin they expect it to be one uninterupted long piece with out ink, writing or someone elses stitches!  I supposed that is what I get for going through amazon and paying less than $2 per yard.

I also cut muslin for the foundation of my dresden scrap fans.  I stitch them on and then use chenille that I purchased at the thrift store to finish the edge.

I have since sewed 4 quadrants with paper removed to make circles and those will be my next row to advance to in this scrappy quilt.  I will also chenille those edges.  I have also played with the idea of a squiggle on the next row.  This is going to be a very sampler like row quilt made from the same pattern just laid out differently.

I managed to quit a bit on the Stars on Thars quilt, I only have one more visit to the longarm and it will be done.

And I snapped a few photos of the quilt my Mom made for me.  This was a quilt kit that was made years ago.  I inheritted it from a gracious co-workers grandmother.  I passed it on to Mom, and she snatched it up.  Appliqued the pieces, and then hand quilted it.  She was very near being done, but then broke her shoulder which slowed her way down.  It is done, and it is mine and I don’t want to use it is soooooo pretty.

Because of the enormity and color, I did not want to take it outside.  It also does not fit right on the bed that is pushed to the corner.  So I snapped a quadrant or two of it.  One of these days when the weather is perfectly cooperative, I will capture it’s essence.

I am also binding the kaffe periwinkle quilt.

I have decided to do that one by hand.  I have another quilt, jelly roll race, that I would like to bind sometime this week.

I have done my fabric pull for the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt. I will be working on starching/pressing those fabrics, getting them ready for Black Friday.  I am really liking this new tradition of mine and can’t wait for the Holidays to get underway.  They will be here before you know it!  And the stitch campaign will reign another year!

Made some apple crisp today.  Easy and delicious.  I will try to get that uploaded to my other blog thecookbookproject.wordpress.com .   No Pictures though because it was too damn good, and did not last long enough for a picture.

The dishes are caught up in the kitchen.  Tomorrow I will tackle oodles of laundry and vacuuming.  I am feeling better and that feels good!  Enjoy the rest of your weekend and thanks for reading my blog!