Chocolate Gems – ORL Mystery

Following along on the On Ringo Lake Mystery or as I call it ORL, this week we are combining our browns and turquoise.  I have named this half block the chocolate gem block as turquoise is a gem and my favorite color paired with decadent chocolate browns.

I sewed some chocolate gems Friday when I got home from work.  Yesterday I went to Dallas for some Christmas shopping.  What I noticed, traffic was light, but lines were long.  It looked like the masses were carpooling for Christmas shopping.

Last week, building my diamond blocks, I did not find completion.  So I am still sewing on clue number three.

Here I am with my scrappiness ready for some binge ironing.  Notice the one block.  Yes my ironing board has this turquoise fabric in the cover.  I ran out of the aluminized fabric and this is a simple strip on its rear end.

As a quilter, each week I also have oopses or blooper blocks.  How about you?

One of these is just sewn wrong.  One is actually cut wrong.  I have plenty of fabric.  I learn from it and go on.

Pressed and ready for the shoe box, which by the way is almost completely full.  My son is getting a pair of boots for Christmas so I am going to commandeer the box.

I had to add to my variety so I searched through my scraps and have a few more browns to add to this block.  I am not sure how old some of these fabrics are.  I acquired them earlier this year and am glad I did.  I keep pulling from this lot for ORL.

I am thinking they just don’t design fabric like they used to.  The quality of the prints are sew much more calico.

And introducing my sew steady table!   I bought this on Black Friday as it was bargain priced.  I am currently using it for piecing, but I really purchased it for free motion quilting.  I do have a quilt, all pin basted ready to go, but I am focusing on these chocolate gems.

Sadly my dual machine is acting up.  The touch screen will not work after the machine is on for a long period of time.  I can only assume there is a cooling fan that is not working as it works just fine when just turning on.  I am holding off purchasing new feed dogs for this machine.  So why did my feed dogs wear out?  Well, this machine is 20 years old now and yes I run over pins which contributes to wearing of the feed dogs, but the main reason why they have worn out is my 1/4 inch piecing foot is made with a black metal edge that is always cheese grating on one side of my feed dogs.   I cannot use the credit card short cut for 1/4 inch pieces as it would cover my drop in bobbin plate and my feed dogs themselves are too wide.  If anyone has a suggestion to get past this issue, I certainly welcome your comments.  I am probably going to start using this machine for FMQ only and will be on the look out for a featherweight.  Anyone willing to part with a featherweight….we should talk.

I am linking up with the Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt On Ringo Lake.  I highly recommend looking at everyone’s progress.  I find it mesmerizing looking at all the different color combinations and fabrics pulled for this mystery.  It is not too late to join!

I will be working most of this next week so I am uncertain if I will have a post before Christmas.  So if I don’t make another blog post, have a splendid holiday.  Enjoy food, family, and friends!  Merry Christmas!

 

 

 

FMQ for a while

I have knocked out a big stash of odds and ends in my sewing pile that needed to be completed.  Got those done and now moving on to something for myself.

Do you recall the Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt of last year?  Well, I am finally getting around to some free motion quilting on it.  I have chosen an orange peel design intersecting within each 3 1/2 inch block.  In the pink stars I will choose something else, and that is tbd (to be determined).

I only have a 6 1/2 inch throat space on my Janome and the center of this quilt is really difficult. I wonder if during my hobby of sewing I actually get a little yoga out of it with a bit of wrestling?

I have chosen lavender thread 30wt for the top and 50 wt for the bobbin. I see this picture captured a tad of what I am using for the backing.

This will be the big project for a while and I will be sneaking in some smaller projects as 4 people at work have announced baby goodness, so I will be making 4 crib quilts.  I am brainstorming on one right now and have picked through my stash and come up with an idea.  That will be the next interruption on my blog.

My last few posts have me buzzing about the hives.  Not the kind bees visit but the kind that ends up on the skin, itchy and inflamed.  Four doctor’s visits, and I still have them.  The medicine took the inflammation away, and the other medicine took the itch away, but they still flash themselves during the day without warning.  My breakouts on my hands have almost been eliminated.  The ones on my face still appear.  Due to another shot of steroids Friday leaving my appetite ravenous and a foul taste in my mouth, I discontinued using the prescriptions.  I want my body to start beating this on its own.  So no drugs Friday eve.  A few breakouts on the face as before.  No meds Sat, a larger breakout on my torso and itchy, but I didn’t feel the need to itch.  Today, I feel a lump in my throat as I did the first time I got a steroid shot almost like heart burn.  But I need to get off the roids!

If I have another flare up, I will place my tail between my legs and go back to the doctor and follow his orders this time.  I just wish I knew what was causing this.  There have been no introductions of new soaps, shampoos, or of the like.  No introduction of new foods.  I think it is the washing machine (front loads grow weird stuff) combination of the two soaps we use, but both we have used for a long time.  Hiving onward!

Mardi Gras Colored En Provence Mystery Quilt

The weekend time continuum has increased in speed.  Most weekends seem like that.  I have all my En Provence rows sewn.  I have the sashing for the outer border completed.  Now I need to sew the rows together, as well as piece the neutral border.  I feel like I accomplished something, but paid the price of precious weekend time.  There will always be next weekend or snippets during the week.  I am getting so close.

The colors in this almost correspond with Mardi Gras.  Would have been neat to finish with “fat tuesday”, since this is modeled after a french place.  Suitable to finish on a french holiday….ah well.  Here I have laid the strips of blocks on the bed.  I have started playing with the neutral pieces in the border.  Not many of those are sewn together.  This part will go relatively fast.  I am ready to move onto a UFO that is calling my name.  I have all these ideas and projects I want to start but I refrain, to keep on track.  I am afraid if I stray on En Provence, it will be a UFO for a long time.  Hopefully the next post of this, the top will be completed.

Pictures at last En Provence

Well, you can now actually see for yourself that I am sewing and making progress on En Provence Mystery quilt.  The change in color I made for the secondary stars is perfect with the current vintage pillow cases on the bed (my bed also performs as my design wall).  It also accents the yellow on my walls nicely.  I have sewn the 16 blocks together with the sashing in between for 4 rows total.  Now I need to go back and piece some more QST’s to make the sashing in between the 4 rows.  Oh my goodness it won’t be long and it will be complete!

And spring is in the air here.  My poor daffodils that have only bloomed once in the last 18 years due to frost, snow, drought, and other bad weather conditions.  They have survived and managed to show their lovely blooming colors.

One post a week :(

Computer maintenance is periodically done around here.  And for the last three weeks, I have limited access to photo editing programs that help me with my blog.  So here is my post for the week.

I am still trudging along with En Provence.  I need to do better with my quilting allocated time, but it is what it is.  I have 15 purple blocks sewn and went to put together the last block and realized either two fell behind the buffet, or I counted wrong.  So I am short two purple qsts.  I will leave that block to sew last.  I know I am several short for the yellow qsts because I never counted those.  So I will sew as many things together as possible and wait until I know exactly how many of each I need to sew.  So like I said I am still trudging along with en provence.

I did finish the laptop sack.  The client wanted an addition late in the game.  I added a pocket for a spiral notebook and ink pen.  It got washed and chenilled wonderfully soft.  It was settled upon the strap to use was black (not my choice) and similar to a boy scout belt in texture and size.

Now I am dreaming of having en provence done and the piecing behind me, but what about the quilting….hmmmm.  I have been brainstorming for a while.  I have purchased the backing fabric which is more neutral.  So I will probably go with a neutral thread or a lavender thread.  And since this was based on photos of lavender fields in France, I will probably do something in rows with some heavy FMQ involving feathers perhaps.  I am rather daunted by the task of quilting this as the space I have makes it hard on me to do this on my DSM.  My throat space sucks.  Additionally, before I start quilting anything I really need to take my machine in for service.  It is about 4 years past due.  No telling how many hours are on this machine but is probably above 5000.  I suspect there is an adjustment that needs to be made or a replacement needs to happen in the bobbin case area as the feed of my thread through the top sometimes jerks and causes a tension problem on the bottom with one stitch.

For eye candy for you quilters and readers I will post random pictures of the past.  Enjoy!

UFO #1

Life is good :)

Hello readers!  Due to circumstances out of my control, I have not posted anything because I have not sewn a stitch until yesterday.

The kick off of the new year has been odd.  Many events in my life have occurred in the last 3 weeks that have kind of rocked me to my core.

My mother became ill and had a stroke.  After her being in the hospital for a week and also having  surgery, she will make a full recovery.  Those kind of moments scare the bejesus out of me.  The matriarch of the family, when they get sick, it affects so much.  Because of all that stress and hospital living for my Mother, and Dad being right there at her side, it took a toll on him too.

My mother being in the quilting community had awesome support from her friends in the quilting realm.  Some cooked meals for her, and some came for visits at the hospital which helped break the boring monotony of just being in a hospital.  My Dad enjoyed those visits as well.  I imagine it kept his mind from the stress of my Mother’s illness.  So this is now behind us all.  I would like to send out thanks to all those people who made this whole process a little easier.  Thank you sew much!

Earlier this week I received my yearly review.  This year the company changed up their process and started rating you on the bell curve.  Do any of you remember the bell curve from high school?  You could miss one answer and get a 70% which is failing.  So, after receiving my review which I viewed as unsuccessful, time seems to make things better.  Many of my co-workers who are excellent at what they do also received scores, some below mine.  This was a learning lesson as the message of my review repeatedly said meets or exceeds but I still got a 70%.  Time has calmed the tears and the worries of not being above average like my last review of 94%.  I did agree somewhat with the 70 on one aspect as I do not know all to be known where I work.  This makes room for future growth for my skill set.  So, with those nerves settled, I know life goes on.  Big girl panties on!

And lastly Friday morning on my way to work, I hit a dog with my car.  I suspect I either killed the dog, or severely maimed him.  It broke the plastics on the front of the car and also tore the dirt guards on the underside and in the fender well.  I have paid for insurance on this car now for 5 years, now that policy will payout but the insurance company is still ahead.  Not worried about my car, as that will all work out.  I am just glad I maneuvered the car so as to not get the air bags deployed and not run over the dog with the tires.  Who knows, maybe the dog slowed me down that morning to get me in a better place and saved me from a more severe accident.  Any way, all I can say to that is whew!

So, who is ready for some sewing?  After all these expletives in life !@#$ I can say I am, and finally made that happen yesterday and today.  I started assembling the large En Provence Mystery Quilt Blocks.  They are going together quite fast and accurately too.  I have seven blocks sewn.  It felt so good to turn on the sewing machine and sew with no thought process or effort.  No struggles.  Nice and easy.  Life is good 🙂

I changed the block up a bit.  I like the stair-step symmetry of the light purples being in line no matter which way I turn the block.

Quilt Iron(y)

Happy New Year readers!  I rang in the new year sewing on my Mystery Quilt En Provence, which is not such a mystery anymore.  While sewing and ironing, I ran out of my Faultless spray starch.  Things had shifted the week before in the closet where I put the iron up, and by moving a photo album I uncovered more starch so I did not make a trip to the store.  I used starch in my stash (never thought I would say that).

I sprayed my blocks, and using my trusty Rowenta iron, started ironing as usual.  When the iron hits the starch it outgassed a fresh smell, and for some reason I kept smelling cinnamon.  I pressed on!  Then when I got out a large piece of fabric, the starch spit funny out of the can.  My iron started just dragging on the fabric.  I looked at the bottom of my iron, and it appeared all the starch was sticking to my iron and not staying on the cloth.  And the smell, look like cinnamon was caramelizing on the bottom of my iron.  My first thought, my almost 10 year old iron was crapping out (as it has taken a few tumbles off the iron board).  So I quit using starch and filled my reservoir and used steam instead.  I sprayed a spot on my ironing board to see what would happen on the cloth (not on my precious fabric but on the ironing board cover).  Believe it or not, somehow the starch had oxidized in the can and rusted in the can, so no telling how much rust I spewed onto the cloth I was working with.  The date on the can said 2008…ooops.  I was able to clean the bottom of my Rowenta with my scrub daddy and cold water (after it had cooled off), and the bottom looked brand new again.  However, I found there are spots on the iron that just are not getting hot enough to get the wrinkles out.  My iron is dying a slow death.

In the meantime, after seeing many quilters on youtube videos go back to the old fashioned irons, I thought I would be on the lookout for an oldie (they don’t make them like that anymore).  I found one on Ebay, and it arrived Tuesday.  I plugged it in and turned the setting to cotton, and with no effort it beautifully ironed my QST.  I walked out of the room to get more to iron (as there was a backlog) and when I came back into the room I noticed the iron was turned up (by my roommate who was intrigued by this old new iron) so I turned it back down to cotton (there is a higher temp setting than cotton…who knew).  But, because this iron is old and a huge heat sink, the cool off time is much longer.  I did not know it would not be instant, and I ironed one more block and it singed the neutral a bit.  See the picture below, the bottom center.  There is a hint of browning on the fabric.

After this, I shut the iron off and made a note to self, that I can actually burn fabric with this new old iron.  I must be vigilant and very careful from now on.  An hour later I went to go put the iron up and because this thing is one huge chunk of metal, it was still hot to the touch.  I had to wait two hours to put it in it’s safe place.  For those of you who have an iron that does not eliminate wrinkles from your fabric without the use of starch, it is time for a new iron.  I recommend buying new used.

I am very excited because I have a new, useful quilters toy—er I mean tool.  If you are looking into buying a new iron, don’t go with sunbeam, black and decker, etcetera.  I recommend spending a few dollars more and getting a Rowenta.  However, make sure the Rowenta you buy is made in Germany.  Big box stores including JoAnn’s have irons made in China and Mexico which usually leak and crap out after a couple of years.  The great iron debate to purchase a new one and pay the extra price tag, or buy a cheap one and replace it in a couple of years.  Either way it is about the same money.

En Provence clue 6?

So, I went to bed late around 12:30ish a.m., anxiously awaiting clue 6 from Bonnie Hunters Mystery Quilt.  I woke straight up out of bed and could not go back to sleep at 3:30 a.m.  I kept checking the website this morning until finally, when I checked just past 6 a.m., she posted a clue.  Due to lack of sleep, I am still wide awake but the critical thinking skills are starting to fade, hence the question mark behind 6.  Yup….verified….we are on clue 6.

So we get to retire the dark purples and start using the light purples again, along with some neutrals and the introductions of greens.  I chose a caribbean greenish blue for my quilt, it seems to work.  Here is the start of my clue 6.

I did not purchase Bonnie’s new essential triangle tool.  I am making do with the companion angle and easy angle.  Instead of having one tool I have 2, and they work.  I am really surprised how well this ruler system works.  I loathe cutting and to not have to square things up with the sliver trimming is very smart.  Work smarter not harder right?  Just snipping with a scissors the dog ears on the blocks :)~.  I am wondering if I should stop doing that because I am taking warmth out of the quilt?  That little piece does add a layer of thickness….ah well.  I will leave them from now and see if they get in the way later when it all comes together.

Yesterday I had an XXX quilting event.  No, not anything naked and showing skin.  It was more of an extreme, quilty, sport sort of a productive day.  The half hexi made with Moda’s fabric line Bee Creative, is pieced and quilted.  That accuquilt cutter is amazing and takes so much work out of the cutting aspect of the quilt.  I will hopefully have another finish before years end and bind this one in the next day or so to bump my final count to 14.  Be looking for that post soon.  Now, off to the QST races.  Oh, and don’t forget to read my other blog!  Thanks for stopping by!

Brrrrrrr to Blurrrrrrrr!

This past week started out COLD!  As the week progressed with the holiday, it became a blur.

The En Provence Mystery quilt clue was released a tad early which was very thoughtful of Bonnie (Click here to see how everyone is coming along with the link up).  Have any of you added up the pieces so far that are in this quilt?  I added up the blocks with all the parts in each one and we are now up to 2224 pieces!!!!  This quilt is off to an amazing start and will be the quilt with the most pieces that I have put together so far in my entire life, with more goodness to come.

I am currently working two other projects one with a deadline of ASAP (need thread for this one as I ran out)

This project above I have started quilting many layers.  The woven on the left is going to be the outside of a laptop case that I am making.  The outside layer of the chenille part will be the woven in the right picture.  There is one fabric not pictured which is the layer on the chenille side that will not be cut.  This one may be a few weeks away before I can get back to it as I have to order thread, my cone runneth dry.

Additionally I am also working a baby quilt for a co-worker.  He is a bee keeper on the side and was kind enough to give me beeswax at no charge.  And during the Thanksgiving sales at MSQC I was able to purchase 4 charm packs of Moda Bee Creative line for 10 bucks!  Wooohoo!  And in keeping with the theme of things used the accuquilt cutter die for the half hexi block and have started piecing them together.

I think I will call this quilt Honeycomb, not sure if it going to be a boy or a girl but it will work for either.

I have yet another quilt to start which the baby is due in Feb.  I have not quite figured what I am going to do for that one, but check back often for my updated posts.  Oh and don’t forget to take a look-see at my other cooking blog.

En Provence #4

Just playing around with the layout….

Funny how the batik took on a whole new shade of burgundy in my terrible lighting.

See how others are coming along in the Mystery Quilt Adventure here!