Claudia Finishes Her Three Charms Quilt

On Monday and Thursday of last week, Claudia was here to finish the machine quilting on her Three Charms quilt. She worked on her own machine on Monday, but I had her move to my newer Bernina towards the end of our Thursday session. I believe I have sold her on the idea of getting a newer machine. Her vintage 60s model Singer sews just fine, but for the quilting that she wants, and the ease of use, I think she agreed that the newer machine is preferrable.

While she finished quilting, I prepped her binding. The we trimmed up and after some weighing of pros and cons, I did the binding by machine and it was done! Take a look at her finish.

Here's our proud quilter, showing off her first official quilt finish. It has its imperfections, but all in all, it really does look awesome. And to think that Claudia is so new at this. She is really a trooper when it comes to jumping in and trying. Nothing intimidates her.

We are working out plans for future sessions, and I believe she has a friend who might tag along. Excellent!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Anatomy of a Scrap Bin

You know I've been tidying up the sewing room. You also know that I have had some remaining small tubs and bins that I needed to sort. Today I bring you the typical stuff I am finding when I pour out the contents of these bins.

 

I have labelled the significant finds. There are additional unlabelled things, but my picture could only hold so many labels. *wink*

Why is there such an odd assortment of things jumbled up in a tub? Maybe some of you are the organized sort of quilter. The type that puts things away when finished with a project. They type that subscribes to the "a place for everything and everything in its place" philosophy.

I would not be categorized as that type.

My method is to pile the leftover stuff from a project off to the side to make room for the next one. Then before long, I will have 4-5 more projects going and leftovers from all of them will get piled on top of the pile. When the pile has grown to the point that it topples over or in some way impedes my work on something, I find a tub/bin and scoop it all in to be forgotten for a lengthy time. Or maybe forever.

Case in point, the mystery bag found inside this particular bin. I have no recollection of this whatsoever. I've opened it, unfolded the contents, pressed the contents, photographed the contents. And still no recollection. I was probably just playing around.

Looks like something worth finishing. Some of it is machine stitched; some is hand stitched. I used these fabrics in another project that I actually DO remember, so this must have come after that one. Still, that doesn't really answer any questions as to WHY I made this block.

Oh well. No need to spend time figuring it out. I will put all of this stuff away - in its place - and move right on along to the next tub of scraps. Yes, there is more.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Sewing At Terry's

Tuesday was a fun and productive day of sewing at Terry's - not just for me, but the others who came as well. I'm going to jump right into it.

Jan brought her finished table runners. You may recall from previous posts that she was making 6 reversible table runners for her daughter. I'd shown progress on various posts and even the first finish last Friday. Today I can share the remaining finishes.

Since there were so many, I turned all the pictures into collages. I will say, then, that I don't know if I have correctly put fronts and backs together. And, you may notice, that I have an uneven number her. I believe that was the result of the very bottom table runner. It was made from some leftover jelly roll strips that match another gift Jan made earlier in the fall. Isn't Jan the most creative and energetic quilter ever??!! I continue to be both amazed and somewhat bewildered by her productivity.

Sheryll was machine appliqueing flowers and leaves onto quilts made of her late brother-in-law's work shirts. She is doing this for her sister who will give various family members a quilt. I think there will be 7 in all. More productivity, right? Amazing.

Terry had recently finished this beauty. I'm sure it has a name, but I've referred to it as Country Pastel. Terry definitely prefers country in just about all things, and even though this is made primarily with pastel colors, it still has a country vibe to it. I just love it and fear I will have to duplicate it!

I worked on place mats and some other things for the Christmas bazaar that I'll be doing coming up on November 7. I feel like I need to get quite a  lot more stuff pulled together in order to have a reasonable hope of success. I'm not a salesperson, so I hope I can pull it off.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Claudia Quilts!!

Isn't it fun introducing people to quilting? I had the opportunity to meet Claudia last March when she signed up for the hand-quilting class I offered at Spark! Creative Spaces in Greenfield. She was most enthusiastic, and had questions galore! Click here and here to read about the Spark! class.

Of the 5 students in that Spark! class, Claudia has remained steadfast in her interest. She was over about a month ago to make the Three Charms Quilt that I taught. Lo and behold, just a week or so ago, she contacted me about machine quilting it - and so we are!

Here is Claudia's quilt the day she made it - back in September some time. Click here to read about that day.

This is a long introduction just to show you pictures from Tuesday.

 I had some gripper gloves for Claudia to use, and for a time she used them, but ultimately ended up going without them.  You can see that her machine is an older  model; I was surprised at how easily she was able to get a walking foot for it.

We did just the center in the "stitch-in-the-ditch" fashion. She will be back today for finishing off the borders and binding and then we will start the Mondo Bag. Class will begin shortly, so I'd better get busy!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Forgotten Project

Years and years ago, I began working on this wall hanging.

 It has been hand pieced and hand quilted. I have a vague recollection of buying the background fabric on a trip to a quilt show in Grand Rapids, MI, with my friend Kay. That was ages ago - like maybe around 25 years! If it has been that long, you can see why my recollection is a bit fuzzy.

Toward the end of the quilting of this wall hanging, I was having a hard time seeing the chalk lines I'd drawn of the quilting design on the borders. Since I couldn't find the template to retrace it, I apparently just stuffed it in a bin and forgot about it.

This is the sort of thing one finds when one cleans a sewing room.

I probably could have located the template and retraced the missing part. I was so very close to being done! There was maybe 6-8 inches of stitching left to finish. I just "eye-balled" it instead. It's by no means perfect, but guess what? It's DONE!

I finished quilted it during the OSU-Maryland game on Saturday, trimmed and bound it on Sunday, and hand stitched the binding in the car on our way to the birthday bash at Max and Erma's Sunday evening.

Whoo-hoo!

I have had a full week of sewing and quilting fun. On Monday, Claudia, my faithful student was here for a quilting session, and yesterday I spent the day sewing at Terry's. I have all of that to share, too, so come on back tomorrow.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Mom's Place Mats

I was being a bit less than truthful in my recent posts about place mats. You see, my original intent was to make a set to give to my mother who recently celebrated her birthday. We had the big October birthday bash yesterday at Max and Erma's over at the Roberts Center near Wilmington. Mom now has her place mats, and I can come clean. (These little fibs - my conscience always gets the best of me!)

 Mom likes to garden.  She also likes pretty dishes. She also likes interesting foods. So the panel that combined all of these things seemed perfect for her. As I've done with all of these sets, I rummaged through my fat quarters to come up with suitable accent fabrics for the edges. I especially liked this combination.

 Here's a better shot of the center panel. I wish I'd taken a picture of the other motif. These place mat centers were all cut from one fat quarter panel; two look like this and the other two have a slightly different design. All very pretty.

Here are the set of 4, freshly pressed and waiting on gift-wrapping. And you can see in the background, I have the next set prepped for finishing.

This is my mom, Jeannie, with her new place mats. Photo bombing next to her is my youngest sibling, Carol. And in the background is Ann, my sister-in-law. We had a fantastic time at the birthday bash. Between Ann's family and ours, there are about 10 fall/October birthdays, so this was the reason for the bash at Max and Erma's - no one's house is big enough for all this crowd!!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Daring Venture

Friday morning was our regularly scheduled Frankfort Girls sewing, and this was my turn to hostess. After all the sewing room cleaning I'd been doing, my goal was to have it clean and orderly enough that I would take them up to see it.

And I did. Aren't I a daring gal?

Of course, everyone was very complimentary, as anyone would be, but I think they were entirely sincere. I know I still have things to address, piles to sort and labels to make - that sort of thing; but I really do find that I am more productive now that I have a clean space, so I am very proud of it.

On with our Friday morning projects. Terry and I were slugs - neither of us worked on sewing. She was going to have to leave early, and I sorted a stack of miscellaneous paper, patterns, notes, and whatnot.

For several of our last get-togethers, Jan has been working on a year's worth of table runners for her newly married daughter. There will be 6 reversible table runners. The two shown above are the two sides of the first one to be (nearly) completed. Fun, aren't they? She was stitching binding while we visited on Friday.

JoAnn was stitching binding as well. She had finished this panel for a boy to race cars and trucks on. She is looking quite smug behind that quilt, isn't she? Or ornery, perhaps?

Sheryll continues to applique this gorgeous table topper for her autumn table. My picture does not show the fine detail of her stitching; she is mostly done and now says she needs to focus on the stitching on the pumpkins. Such a lovely topper.

So that is all. We had a nice visit to see Kevin's dad; watched the Buckeyes with him and brother Mike and sister Kellie. I am continuing my work on place mats. Have a second set nearly finished.

I hope your Sunday is wonderful!
Happy Quilting, Friends!