Design Wall Monday--10/22

On my design wall is a challenge project for Sewtopia.  My sister and I will be going to Boston in a few short weeks and need to turn our projects in on day one.  These are the fabrics provided for the Michael Miller Fabric Challenge.

The rules are short and sweet--we can make anything we want but can only use Michael Miller fabrics.  I found a quilt I wanted to make with these fabrics, Wavelength from American Patchwork & Quilting June 2017 issue, by Sharon McConnell.  Since I am trying to use stash, and don't have any Michael Miller fabrics I could identify, I decided to change the fabric I received.  I used Rit Color Remover.  First I had to buy a stainless steel pot to use specifically for the chemical change--and boy it happened fast.  Luckily I tried a scrap from my stash before adding the challenge fabric pieces one at a time.

My husband complained about the smell, but the method worked very well.  I barely dipped and stirred a time or two before fishing out the pieces and rinsing them.  The red turned to an orange, and the blue turned to green.  the advantage of the Rit remover is that it does not need a fixative--once rinsed, it is good to go.  I'm going to use the black and white fabric for the stitch and flip corners. Hopefully I will get about 10 blocks to play with.  

See more design walls on Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts.

Slow Sunday Stitching

I only managed to get a few stitches in a new project this Slow Sunday. It makes for a somewhat dull photo.

This will eventually say Jingle all the way and have a cute kitten next to it--a match to the Plaid Tidings to You puppy I finished last week.  The patterns are from Lizzie Kate Tiny Tidings X.  

Lori of Humble Quilts had a free quiltalong based on an antique quilt, which she named Sajou after a quilt shop in France.  She posted the third and final instructions last week.  I got the triangle border made and was going along quite well until I mentioned on FB how good it looked--immediately thereafter a screwup occurred. 

Merde.  Fortunately I was able to cut multiple new pieces to remake this chopped off corner. 

I decided to stop where Lori did, with a small quilt about 18" square.  I'll choose backing and binding from stash, as I have very little left of the gifted Dargate Treasury sample cuts I used.  

See more stitchers' Slow Sunday posts on Kathy's blog.

Works in Progress, Visitors, and New Toy

I'm continuing to work on some of the Three for September projects (my WIP busting effort working on one project every three days).  I spent a few hours quilting the Medallion Rescue quilt.  Lots of boring stippling around the star center, and then some custom work on the borders, all done on my Husqvarna sewing machine.  

The ribbon effect in the blue borders was done with a scallop stitch on my machine.  I like the way it turned out, however imperfect it is :)  Then I tried to come up with a way to quilt through the white sections of the chain blocks but somehow ended up with a more complex quilting design, simply by trying not to have to bury a ton of threads.  I used my Hera marker for all the lines.  I think the chains still stand out enough against the quilting.  Binding is ready to cut and sew, in the same blue dot fabric. I'd like to get that done this weekend and call this rescue complete. 

Another project on the Three for September list, Jewels in the Curio, still needed fabrics cut for the three borders.  I pulled out the GO! cutter and 2.5" strip die to make quick work of the rest of the necessary pieces.  It was very satisfying to have them all lined up, labeled, and ready to go when I want to piece.

Daughter Elaine texted last weekend hoping I had pumpkin carving tools.  The family stopped by on their walk and I was surprised by grandson Cove while I was digging around in boxes in the garage.  We had a short, fun visit, even though I didn't locate any tools.  

 Cove the Wizard grabbed some driftwood as a broom..

 ...Hunter the Thirsty rejected Mimi's first choice of a sippy cup with handles: "That's for Babies!"  He's rapidly turning into a little boy but his hands are still toddler chubby--love that.

And finally, the New Toy.  At our last guild meeting there was a raffle for a very special prize.  Many, many tickets were sold for this prize; I bought a few.  My sister bought quite a number of chances and ended up winning the prize!  At the end of the meeting she picked up her prize---and gave it to me as an early birthday present.  I was flabbergasted.  Here's a crappy photo of an impressive gift:

This is the Cricut Maker, with a rotary cutting tool specifically for fabric.  The prize package also included two of the large sticky fabric cutting mats, some other accessories and a fabric bundle.  I have watched a bunch of videos and seen some great projects on Instagram, but have not yet cut anything out. It's so hard to decide what to try first!  My sister and I are going to Sewtopia in a few weeks, and I'd like to use the Cricut Maker to do something fabulous with the Michael Miller Challenge fabric.  Wish me luck!

Finally Friday--Variety Post

Is it just me, or was it a long week?  We were pretty busy at work, two days this week I never even got a chance to sit down for the first three hours of the day, as I was catching up on my notes between the doctor's patients.  

 

Tonight I'm sitting down typing this as we have a rare lightning storm.  For the second time in  a week we found ourselves standing outside with our neighbors watching the sky; the first time was for the SpaceX rocket launch on Sunday.  We are about 80 miles south of Vandenburg Air Force Base, where the launch took place.  We all watched in wonder as the rocket soared.  I took these pics with my phone.

This is after the separation of the first part of the rocket. 

And this blurry shot is of the rocket returning to the Vandenburg.  My daughter described the perfect landing of the rocket back on the base as "like parking a car".  Very cool to be able to see this successful launch from our neighborhood. 

Lori of Humble Quilts blog is having another Fall sew-along which she is calling Sajou, after a fabric shop in France (I've linked to Part 1 on her blog).  Being preoccupied with the paper piecing earlier in the week, I caught up through Part 2 yesterday morning before work.

Here is my center before  stitching.  I mostly used fabrics from a swatch sample of Dargate Treasury a guild member gifted me several years ago.  It seemed the perfect time to cut into it for this small project.

I pulled some pieces from stash for variety, and a stripe for framing the center in Part 2.  Here's how it looks now, at about 13" square:

Since I started my version after Lori posted Part 2, I was able to orient my flower center so it is upright in the on-point setting.  Looking forward to Part 3 and the finale next week.  

There was fun mail this week when I received some needleminders I bought from the Spinster Stitcher.  I have been reading Coni's entertaining blog for several years after finding it through Carol's sidebar blog list (Polka Dot Chicken).  Coni is making and selling these needleminders to help pay for a kidney transplant.  Meanwhile, she is on dialysis three times a week and sometimes is able to stitch while she receives her treatment. 

I purchased the two cups and the witch's boots and received a free Stewey-minder, of her cherished pooch who had so many adventures before succumbing to cancer.   I put the green star travel cup to use immediately while I finished up the Lizzie Kate Tiny Tidings stitchery.  

It turned out pretty darn cute, if I may say so myself :)  Perhaps a plaid ribbon around the sides of the frame and adding a hanger are left to do. 

We have family in town this weekend for my Dad's birthday, so I'm not sure how much sewing room time I'll get.  There is a new toy in my sewing room I'll tell you about next time.  Happy Weekend!

Design Wall Monday--Abstractions Violet Craft

On my Design Wall is an FPP--a foundation paper-pieced project.  Our Ventura Modern Quilt Guild was graced with the talent and artistry of Violet Craft for a workshop over the weekend.  She graciously allowed any of her Abstraction patterns to be used in the class.  I chose Elevated Abstractions Mt. Hood and took my color inspiration from Mr. Domestic's version of Violet's quilt. 

My goal was to use only stash fabrics and I selected solids and prints.  I think I got in about 200 steps going back and forth from my fat quarter stash chest to the cutting table choosing and cutting fabrics, 200 more from the sink to the dryer to the ironing board prepping the fabrics, 200 more to load everything into the car, and 200 more for two trips from the car up to the meeting place, lol.

The design I chose has 46 templates, each template has a different number of pieces.  Violet demoed her method to our group, then walked around helping individually as needed.  We required a second group demo to fully grasp her method, some were newbies and others experienced but with a different method.  My sister was doing the Wolf Abstraction and piling up parts very quickly with her large templates, whereas I was much slower to get mine going.  Nevertheless, by day's end I had completed the first four template sections and sewed them together.  

At home, I sewed the top two mountain templates and when I laid them out for final assembly, I discovered a mistake.  The tan fabric on the bottom left template was the wrong color!  Thankfully it was an outside piece and easy to remove.  Violet advises not tearing out the paper templates until the quilt is completed, and that tip saved me tons of time, as I had the pattern and stitching lines to go by. 

A couple of hours later, all the sections had come together.

Yay!  All my seams matched up the way I wanted them to and I'm liking my colors and prints.  Only 39 more to go....:)

See more Design Walls on Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts. 

Slow Sunday Stitching--October 7

Slow Sunday Stitching is here again, linkup hosted by Kathy of Kathy's Quilts.  

I started a new cross-stitch project by accident.  I know, hard to believe!  When I was cleaning up my sewing room I came across a couple of framed Aida cloth blanks I'd bought recently at Hobby Lobby, and remembered the Lizzie Kate Tiny Tidings pattern I scored at the thrift shop last year (for 95 cents!)

The framed blanks are 14 ct and the pattern called for 32 count, so my stitchery will not be as tiny as the Tidings on the pattern, but fit perfectly in the frames.  Despite searching through both mine and my mother-in-law's floss boxes, I did not have all the recommended colors.  No matter, I started with the wording, of which I did have the proper red.

The green sections of the plaid I completed in a long session Saturday night, and was eager to start on the last element today.

This funny looking head will turn into a cute puppy face when I add the remaining stitches, nose and eyes.  The pattern came with a heart charm for the puppy's collar.  In reading the directions for attaching the charm, I learned that a chart symbol I had interpreted as another green color was actually an overstitch with off white floss to go over the muted green to create the plaid. Oops.  No matter, I like my three color plaid better anyway!  I will enjoy finishing this off and having it displayed for the holidays.