A finish...and a start!

After squaring up Gail's quilt, I then pieced some backing and put it all up on the quilting frame.  I thought a neutral thread would work but when I put the thread across the quilt top I thought it was a bit stark and what I really wanted was a pink or something which I didn't have.  Then I found the variegated red that came as a gift with my machine and it was perfect.

 

After that I had to set up the automation.  Judy chose the design because I asked her what would be quick and simple because the quilting wouldn't show much on that busy top so I didn't want anything intricate.

Then I started quilting!

While the machine was doing it's thing I started tracing some shapes onto appliqué paper but more on that later...

I had a tall table set up right next to the frame so I could keep an eye on what was happening.

The quilt top was trimmed so that it looked straight and not measured straight so there was a fair bit of easing in and I did lots of basting.  Whilst easing I managed to sew my finger.  Ouch!  The needle went right through the nail!  I was too busy to cry!

After all the easing and basting I was happy with how "straight" the top ended up.  There's about a half inch difference from one side of the bottom to the other side but I'd had a horrible feeling it was going to be a lot worse so I was happy with it.

Here it is on my design floor with all the basting stitches removed and threads buried.  The picture doesn't do it justice.

So, how about this close up?  Lovely isn't it?!  I think Gail will be pleased.

So, what have I started?  In the last post I made I mentioned making a new baby quilt for my niece and I couldn't resist this one from The red boot quilt company  This is the third pattern I've bought from here so I have a good idea of the amount of work that'll be involved in the making of it.

My family is going to the UK in June and will be taking it with them so I'd better get cracking!

 

A bit of this and a bit of that

I sewed all of Gail's quilt together and it was still difficult to trim so I stuck it up onto my design wall and used masking tape to mark where I thought the quilt should be trimmed.  I then stay stitched around the markings and cut off 1/8 of an inch past that stitching.

It's as straight as even as I can get it.  I think once it's quilted you won't notice the wobbly edges.

I go to a social crochet class once a fortnight and one of the ladies made this summer poncho in red.  It's a free pattern on the Bendigo woollen mills website. I needed a new project to take along to the classes and I stupidly thought it would be quick because of how holey it is.  

It is not quick!  It would be far quicker if I stopped making so many mistakes!  I'm over making it already and I've only done about 3/4 of the front.  The soul destroying this is that I have to make it all over again for the back!  I did laugh when I was highlighting my size on the pattern because I noticed that the hole for your head changed depending on how big you are.  Because we all know that people living in larger packaging have huuuggge heads!

I'm also busy getting my bedroom ready to be decorated.  I still haven't finished my curtains but that's a minor detail ha ha!  I bought new to me bedside cabinets from Facebook marketplace and they are the inspiration for my new room.  I've decided that the walls will be the same colour as the curtains.  It's pretty dark!  I'm hoping it'll be cosy not depressing.

So I needed fabrics to make new quilts to match my room!  I had some vouchers so I bought these fabrics.

And these!  I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do with them yet!

You may remember this sheep quilt I made for my niece's baby.  Well, it's time to make another!  I need ideas for a second quilt.  Do I do a sheep theme?  Do a similar quilt with a different animal?  Go in a different direction altogether?  I think I'll be sewing it when I go to retreat in March so I have a bit of time to think about it.

 

I haven't touched my Christmas quilt unless you count shifting it off the cutting table.  My studio is so messy I don't want to even go in there, let alone sew.  Perhaps my next task should be to sort that out?  But that's no fun!

Progress and regress

I've made quite a few half square triangles now.

There's lots of mess!  My mother in law will be pleased to see I didn't just swipe these trimmings onto the floor!

Gail asked me to trim and then quilt her Kaffe diamond quilt top.  For some reason my camera doesn't take a great picture of it because the design is fabulous!

I struggled to work out where to trim the edges and when I looked closely I discovered the culprit.  It's quite difficult matching points in seams when you're sewing diamonds and Gail's points are not working which is probably the reason why the edges aren't in line for me to trim correctly.

I spoke to Gail and she gave me permission to fix the quilt.  I could quilt it and trim it as is but it would be hard work for me and the result wouldn't be great which would be a terrible shame.  So I unpicked the rows!

Wellington rather likes the quilt like this.  Ssh! Don't tell Gail!

I've pressed all the rows with some iron aid so they're all nice and flat and ready to sew back together.  I did notice that a few of the end blocks need to be unpicked and repositioned but I'll do those as I start sewing it all together.  Hopefully it'll be a quick fix and the top will be up on the frame in no time.

 

I'm overthinking this!

I want to make a few Christmas quilts.  Maybe they will be done in time for next year???  I thought simple half square triangles would be good so I gathered my Christmassy fabric and started cutting HSTs.  Having made two different sized ones I then wondered what I was going to actually do with them!

So out came the graph paper and the coloured pencils!  Using the size HSTs I'd made I came up with this.  It's ok.  It'll probably look fine in the Christmas fabric to be honest but it's a bit...blah.

Then I drew more lines on my pattern and liked the look.  But, of course, it's exactly the same as the first one but with lines so that's no good.

I added more HSTs in some of the white space.  It's ok but not what I was looking for AND do I really want to make all those HSTs??

I changed the colours seeing if that would help.  This reminds me a bit of a Hunter's Star quilt.  I'm not sure though but I do like how it changes the design so it definitely doesn't look like two blocks just plonked down next to each other.  This design is probably more effective if I used the same fabrics throughout and I intend on using a mixture of fabrics although they are the same colour so would that work?

My pencils were blunt by now and my patience was stretched very thin so I've put it on the back burner for now.  This is how I left it. Next Christmas it may still look like this ha ha!

Phew! Just made it!

My son and his fiancée enjoyed their engagement party so all the hard work was worth it!  The rain held off and we were able to have the picnic themed party in the garden as planned and on the day I had a lot of helpers and it looked better than I had imagined it would!

Here is the picnic blanket scene I thought of and one of my helpers put together for me while I buttered a pile of bread slices for sandwiches!

So now that the party is over I started decorating the house ready for Christmas.  I started with hanging the stockings by the fireplace.  My youngest son thinks he's so funny messing with my HO HO HO!

My sons' partners both had different family plans for Christmas day with one of them going home for lunch and the other going home for dinner so for a while I thought we wouldn't get to meet up on the actual day.  My husband and sons have been shift workers for a long time so it wouldn't have been the first year we've celebrated on a different day.  As long as we do it it doesn't matter when it is!  I attempted to persuade Jim to take me away for the season but he wasn't keen and then we were all invited to Bree's house to celebrate with her family!

That meant I had to make gifts! And I decided to make stockings.  I went to Spotlight and, of course, the Christmas fabrics were depleted and they didn't have what I had in mind so I bought homespun.

I used a paper template to cut out my eight stockings.

Then I cut out cuffs.

I made toes and heels.

Then cut out eight stocking linings and stitched them together.  Eight lined stockings essentially means you're making 16 stockings!  Did I tell you it was now ten days until Christmas?!

I found batting that was just the right size for my stockings.

I used masking tape to mark where I was going to quilt them.

The masking tape was easy to follow and it helped stick the stockings to the batting so that I didn't need pins.  The tape was reusable too although it was getting very fluffy towards the end!

This is my design wall.  I'd used it to display engagement phots during the party and I haven't taken it down yet.

So I had to use my design dog floor.

I quilted all the stockings stitched the toes and heels on with a fancy decorative stitch and sewed the stockings together.

Then I went on a five day holiday to Cairns!  No pressure!  I was embroidering the family's names on the cuffs while I was away.  Do you like my messy bed?

This was my view!  It was a lovely trip.

We arrived home on Tuesday evening and I was too tired to even think about sewing so the next day, Christmas Eve, was a very busy one!  I had to sew strips for hanging loops, sew them and the cuffs to the tops of the stockings and then sew the linings to the whole thing.  I pinned the linings whilst watching TV!

They came together pretty quickly and I sewed up the hole for turning before giving them all a good press.  

Ta da!  Even though I couldn't find the fabric I wanted I think they turned out quite nicely.  I filled the human ones with chocolates and the doggy ones with treats.

We had a lovely lunch at Bree's family Christmas and after we'd gone home the family posed with their stockings!  How lovely!

My family are coming here tomorrow and we're having the beautifully laid Christmas table with gorgeous Thai takeaway!  This has been the easiest Christmas ever!  The only downfall is that there are no leftovers!  What's Christmas without leftovers!

I have no idea what I'm going to work one next but I think putting my sewing room back together after the party is first on the list!

I'm on a roll!

I finished the Christmas bunting! The engagement party is rapidly approaching and I've finished most of the to do list.  There are a lot of things on the list that will need to be done on the morning of the party but I have plenty of volunteers on that day so I'm not going to panic.  One of the biggest considerations is the weather as we're having an outdoor party.  If it's raining we'll have to move the outdoor picnic themed party indoors and it won't be quite as effective!  Not only that but I have to clean the house just in case!  Yikes!  I need a magic cleaning fairy! 

That also means that I can't decorate for Christmas because the Christmas theme doesn't go with the picnic theme!  Therefore once the party is over I need quick and easy Christmas decorations so I'm not exhausted and cursing whilst putting up the decorations.  With that in mind, I decided the Merry Christmas bunting would be perfect.  It hangs in seconds and looks very effective.  Almost as though I've made an effort!

After blanket stitching all around the letters I then stitched them into rectangular flags.  I also prepped my string.  It was at this point I could see that an 1/8th of an inch stitch around the edges of the flags would finish them off nicely.  I did my best to ignore that little voice telling me to sew it.

And then I gave in.

I used my design floor to work out the gaps between the letters.

I glued, pressed and pinned them all in place.  That magic cleaning fairy needs to come and dust my fireplace! It was at this point I shifted my bunting and knocked everything off the ironing board and, of course, the pins flew everywhere!

Sewing the string onto the flags was quick and easy after doing all of that prep and I was happy with how nice and flat everything lay.  I'd learned my lesson after the willy nilly way I sewed, unpicked then sewed my Happy Birthday bunting!

Ta da!  I'm very happy with the result!  And looks like the magic cleaning fairy didn't do to bad a job on the kitchen either.  Well, as long as you don't zoom in that is...

I also added to my Christmas stockings.  Bree joins us this year.  She's Alex's girlfriend and a very welcome addition to our family.