Another flimsy - almost

It's amazing what you can get done when you wake up at 5 a.m. and can't get back to sleep!

Last night I worked on assembling the sashed blocks from the Davis exchange. I named this one Cool Jazz, because it was the only term I could think of relating to the cool colors when I was filling out my quilt show form.

This morning I hit the studio about 6 a.m. and finished sewing together the rows, then cut and attached the outside sashing. Next step is to cut some more purple for the inner border, and the green for the outer border, and then I'll be done.

After I got away from the sewing machine last night I finished sewing the sleeve on the quilt I had started the night before. One down, about a dozen to go, should keep me busy.

Lots more sewing to do today. More later.

Just stitching away

Well, it's a good thing I'm almost finished with the bow tie quilt, because I'm running out of things to say about it. I worked for a while on quilting the border last night, but decided to spend most of my time on other projects.

The main was was starting to attach sashing to the Davis exchange blocks. I'm sashing in white muslin, with no cornerstones, so the blocks will appear to float in the white. I got the sashing attached, top and side of each block, last night and the next step will be to sew together the blocks.

I love the colors in this one, rich tones of blue, purple and green, with a bleached muslin background. It's like having a handful of emeralds, sapphires and amethysts, and who could complain about that? The only issue is that the whites have slight variations in color. I don't think it will be too noticeable when everything is put together, though.

To finish the night off, I got started sewing hanging sleeves on one of the quilts while I watched Project Runway. I have about a dozen quilts that need sleeves for the quilt show, so I'll probably be working on them every night.

That's it for now, more later.

Heading to the finish line

Another good quilting session last night. The finish is getting close. I finished the feathered rows, following the rows of bow ties and there are no more pins in the body of the quilt – my gauge for how close I am to the finish. I still have to quilt the borders and have decided to do an outline, in off white, around each of the wreaths, as there's just a little too much space between the wreaths and the bow ties left unquilted. I think using an off white will fill the quilting, without reducing the impact of the wreaths.

I'm just having one regret about the quilting now. I used the same tan on the bobbin as I used on the front, and it doesn't show up at all on the tan/gold print I used for backing. I kind of wish I'd used a contrasting thread on the back, I think it would have looked fantastic. Oh, well, no going back.

A little progress on a couple of other things. I pulled out a bolt of coarse muslin and started cutting pieces for the quilt sleeves. I'll be seaming this into tubes and hand-stitching them to the backs of my quilts as hanging sleeves. With new television shows starting up over the next couple of weeks, this will be my handwork while I watch.

Speaking of television, today is a big Project Runway day. Today is the show at fashion week, and I understand all the remaining designers will show, so we don't know who are the finalists and who are decoys. I'll be following updates all afternoon on the Tom and Lorenzo blog.

And tonight's the show – right now I can't even remember what the challenge will be. I'm sure it will be interesting though.

Have a great day, more later.

A little bit of magic

My quilting friends say there are three ways to quilt, by hand, by machine, or by checkbook.

While I know there are many good reasons to have someone else quilt for you, I can't help feeling you must miss something.

Because, while I enjoy all (almost all) parts of making a quilt, there's a magic in the quilting, it's when a bundle of fabric is transformed into something completely new.

I love picking out fabric. So many colors, patterns and moods. Do I want something traditional, modern, wild and crazy, soothing and cheerful? What design am I going to use? A block that I will arrange to suit myself, or a quilt designed as a whole.

From there it's cutting the fabric and seeing how the colors start to mesh together, and seeing piles of strips, squares and triangles become blocks and sections, and a pattern starts to emerge.

Since I do a lot of block exchanges, arranging the blocks and assembling the top is creative, too. Which colors should be next to each other? If there are different block designs, like the one I'm laying out now, which designs should go where? Looking at it as a whole, does it balance and flow. And suddenly you have a quilt top, or flimsy.

I have to admit, I don't like pinning. It's a crucial part of the process, and can make the difference between a beautiful quilt and a hashed up mess, but it's physically tiring and tedious and I'm always glad when it's done.

And then, somewhere in the quilting process, there's a transformation. You start with this bundle of layered fabric and batting. It's stiff, it's unresponsive, it doesn't want to do what you want it to do.

At first I have to really think about the quilting, but as I go along, I find a flow. And with every tilt of the treadle, every stroke of the needle, I'm making my mark, literally, on every inch of the quilt. And somewhere about the middle of the quilting, the magic happens. I don't have a bundle of fabric anymore, I have a quilt. Suddenly it's a single unit that drapes instead of bunches, that moves smoothly and feels firm and soft at the same time, but no longer stiff and unresponsive.

Historically, alchemists tried to turn lead into gold. As a quilter, I get to turn a bunch of fabric into a quilt. I think I like my magic better.

As you might guess, I hit that magic point in my bow tie quilt last night. The quilting was going along smoothly and I suddenly realized it had made the transformation. It's always a thrill when it hits that point and I can envision the finished quilt.

Have a wonderful quilty day. More later!

A nine yard yellow snake

With polka dots!

That's what I ended up with after washing the fabric for backing my Triple Star quilt.

I knew I would need a lot of fabric, since the Triple Star is queen size, so I figured out what I needed – 8.5 yards – and checked to see how much I had on the bolt. I had enough, with about a yard to spare. So it's now cut, washed, folded and waiting for me to seam together to make the backing.

The Triple Star is from an exchange in 2004, and the top has been complete since 2005 or 2006. The backing fabric, on the right, has also been in my stash for a while, since the fabric store where I got it has been gone at least four years.

The big accomplishment for yesterday was finishing stitching all the wreaths on my bow tie quilt, and starting on the background stitching. It's slow work, as I needed to take frequent breaks, but I think it's coming along well.

I also finished going through the strings and have a big bin of strings to play with, as well as plenty of new strips in the strip and square drawers. And, it's one more thing moved off the hanging rack and out of the way of one of my sewing machines. Another baby step toward making my studio look less cluttered.

Speaking of clutter, what's the difference between having too much stuff and being a hoarder? There are now two shows on television about hoarding, and they have a scary fascination. On the one hand we look at them with relief, saying, no that's not me. I don't save trash and my stuff hasn't taken over the house. But on the other hand we know that we have things, like old cotton shirts, or the clear plastic containers some produce comes in, that we have a use for but others would consider trash.

As a quilter, fiber artist and collector of antique sewing machines, I know I have a lot of stuff. It's not just fabric, it's batting and yarn and beads and odd bits to use in art quilts and, yes, old cotton shirts to recycle into quilts. And rulers and scissors and spools of thread and on and on.

I guess the difference is being able to recognize if things are getting a little out of hand. We join Stashbusters for encouragement to use our fabric and finish our UFOs, instead of just accumulating it/them. We make up some things to donate to charity or contribute to our guild's sale. We haul old clothes to a favorite thrift store or hold a garage sale to get rid of some excess. And when we realize we have too much, we slow down on acquiring new stuff.

That's what I'm doing now, a little at a time. I like my stuff and will probably always have more than a person without hobbies would understand. But I want people to be able to come into my house without thinking I belong on one of those shows!

Some fortunate finds

Isn't it nice when you find just what you are looking for in your stash? And it's already cut to the right size?

One item on my list for yesterday was clearing out my project boxes. When I'm working on a set of blocks I keep them in project boxes (including pizza boxes and "cake takers" I found a couple of years ago). I usually leave the leftover fabric in the box until I send the blocks off for an exchange or put them together in a flimsy. So since my Boxy Stars flimsy is done, I sorted all the squares and strips into my scrap drawers, and went through the other boxes. In one I found leftover bleached muslin, including several two-inch strips. I was planning to use two-inch bleached muslin for the sashing of my next quilt, the Davis exchange, so put them with the Davis blocks, where I found more two-inch strips left over from making the blocks. I have enough for the sashing without having to cut anything.

Another "find" yesterday was a beautiful yellow with colorful dots on it. I had thought of it yesterday as the backing for my jewel tone quilt, and when I pulled it out I found it was perfect. This was a bolt I bought when a fabric store was going out of business several years ago. Since it's on the bolt it's among the few fabrics I haven't washed, so I guess today I'll figure how much I need for backing and get it washed and ready to piece.

My big project yesterday was continuing to work on the bow tie quilt. I got most of the loopy feather wreathes done, including the half and quarter ones on the sides and corners. There are just a few wreathes to go, then I'll start on the background quilting.

I worked on the organizing and sorting and finding during breaks from the quilting. One area I made pretty good progress was going through a big batch of strings from some scrap bags I got at Mary Jo's Cloth Store (in Gastonia, NC) this summer. A lot of the pieces are big enough to cut strips from, so I spent some time cutting strips from what I could, and putting the smaller pieces into my strings box. Or if I found something really special, into my applique bits box. I save batiks and other special fabrics there so I don't have to cut into yardage when I need just a bit.

I got through about half the strings and hope to finish them today. Then there are more organizing projects to get started. I love having lots of nice fabrics and other fun things to work with, but it's even better when they are organized and I can get to them.

Time to get sewing, more later!

A quilter's prerogative

Is to change her mind!

Yesterday was a non-sewing day. I had to go to Savannah for a work-related event, then made a quick stop at JoAnn's fabrics while I was in the neighborhood. I found some faux suede for a costume and the perfect color variegated thread for a project that's coming up.

This thread is the Signature Pixelles tri-lobal polyester in the Primaries colorway (on left). The colors are perfect for the next quilt, which is jewel tones on an unbleached muslin background. I don't usually use synthetics for quilting large quilts (I use them a lot on wall-hangings and smaller projects), but the colors are perfect. I've never used the Signature thread before, but I'll do test swatches and make sure I'm happy before I start the quilt. My backup is a YLI cotton in the Barrier Reef colorway (on right). It is beautiful, too, but the colors aren't quite as saturated as I want.

Back to changing my mind. I was too tired to work on the quilt, but wanted to get in the studio for a while, so I did yet another test swatch of the loopy wreath, this time on muslin. I did the wreath in the tan I've been using, then echo quilted just inside with a green variegated thread. And didn't like it. It looked too fussy and lost the clean, open look I like so much with the design. So for now I'm going to stick to the design as is, with just the tan thread.

I'm looking forward to a great day in the studio, so should have plenty to report tomorrow. More later!