Into the Drawer With You!

After my procedure this week to laser off some fuzz/debris inside my eye, I can put away my readers.  Don't need them anymore. I am back to Super Vision and how sweet it is.

Not tossing them of course.  There may be a time when I need the pair with the lights!

Becoming One With The iPad

We've turned a corner, the iPad and me.  A lot of it has to do with the UPS delivery today.  The easel and the rubber tipped styluses help the iPad be what I want it to be.

If I wasn't using the iPad to take the picture, you would see it sitting on the easel.  Oh so easy to follow a quilting tutorial while it is sitting right there on the machine. Oh how perfect to use a stylus to tap on the "keyboard".  It's fairly shocking how fast that can be.  And hallelujah that there are six styluses to a package.  A very good thing.

Next up is an adjustable arm mounted under a cabinet in the kitchen to facilitate following a recipe on a screen rather than a piece of paper.

Happy day!

Sewing With My Elbow

I was lucky to spend 10 days in Washington over the holidays and as I was there before the gift giving days, I carried out about six yards of fabric and yards and yards of ribbon so we could make reusable gift wrapping.

 

We were working on the kitchen counter, Amy was cutting and I was sewing.  Given that this is a bar type arrangement, putting the pedal on the floor meant I could not sit and sew.  Hence, the elbow method as I cannot stand and sew successfully.  (Hence...hahahaha)

 We ended up with quite a stack of flat fold wrappers and tie bags of several sizes.  One yard makes one big flat fold wrapper, two book size bags, and one teeny bag.  Too bad we forgot to get an exact count but only two gifts were wrapped in tissue paper and that was rewarding as well as just lovely!

And there were lots of packages!

The making part did not take much time as edges were just pinked and the wrapping part took almost no time at all!  One of the fun parts of this was after The Opening.  We had dinner, of course, re-examined everything and then re-used some of the wrapping for another round of gift giving when Caslyn and Cameron came by that evening.  Cameron could not stop talking about the wrapping.  That was very nice.

QOTD

"If you smile, no one will look at your feet."

-Helga Campbell

Contributed by Janie who was wearing one brown and one black shoe today.  They were the same style shoe though. :-) 

Warm-Up Curve

It's been a long time since I have pieced any Drunkard's Path blocks and in an effort to "Sew the Library", I cut out a new quilt on Friday.  Not a big quilt, should be 48" square finished but a good one to get back to curved piecing.

The practice block went amazingly well even though I remembered the piecing differently.  It looks like there is a tiny tuck in the lower left of the picture but it is really just a crease as I was so pleased when I finished this, I grabbed the camera before the iron.

Hope to finish the piecing tomorrow.

(The convex curved piece is from a fat quarter that did not sing to me and could not even save itself as a cloth napkin.)

The Fat Quarter Solution

They. Are. Everywhere.  In every room but the bathroom, on shelves, in a big plastic Rubbermaid box under the bed, other totes, grouped in Ziplock bags, just everywhere.

For those that aren't familiar with quilting lingo, a fat quarter is a yard of fabric cut in quarters which are approximately 18 x  22 inches.  This differs from a regular quarter of a yard cut from the end of a bolt which is a long piece 9 x 44 inches. A fat quarter is a more usable piece for quilters.

So yesterday I was inspired with a plan for the little guys.

Anytime I run across a stray fat quarter that does not sing* to me anymore, I will make a cloth napkin.  I can start with an 18 inch square and end up with a 16 inch square reusable napkin and seven 2.5 inch squares to be added to the scrap jar.

Woohoo!

*Since I know someone will ask, they sing; "you love me, I know you love me, you love me..." ala Sandra Bullock in Miss Congeniality.
 

A Wonder-ful Finish

Wonder Clips at work

This morning was my third try at machine binding, front and back.  Usually I attach the binding to the top with the machine, fold it over to the back and stitch it down by hand.  I enjoy the hand stitching in a Zen kind of way.  Since my second attempt and less than satisfactory practice piece with the machine, I have started using Wonder Clips for holding the binding in place as I hand stitch.  Stitchers rave about them and I finally understand why.  The clips have been thoughtfully designed with gripping "teeth", marks to help line things up, a clear side and a red side, and they are very strong.

So last night I sewed the binding to the top on the machine and placed the clips.  This morning I sewed from the top.

The top looks very nice and the back is not too bad and I say acceptable.  I had to go back and sew over a couple of spots that missed the binding on the back but all in all I am amazed and quite happy with it. Next time I use this method I will sew the binding to the back and then fold it over to the front and see how I like the end results.

32 x 39 inches, 100% cotton batting

MSCarol asked me to quilt and finish this top for her.  When I was looking through my stash for backing and binding fabric, I asked her if she could give me an approximate date for the top.  1992.
How amazing, and I am being sarcastic here, that the piece I put on the back had 1987 on the selvedge and the binding fabric had 1992 on the selvedge.

So what we have here folks is a Vintage Baby Quilt.  It's a good thing the sun came out today because that sentence is somewhat disturbing.

QOTD

"It's hard to finish a project you're not working on."

Marianne Fons

2015 Word

My friend Torey asked me what word I had chosen to focus on in 2015 and it caught me by surprise because it hadn't even crossed my mind.  For a little while I considered just keeping the one from last year but I knew as good as that word was, reusing it would not be about learning new things.  It really did not take me long to come up with "DO" and that's just how it should be, in capital letters.

I finished this mini (6x11 inches) today but have not found the perfect spot for it yet.

It certainly brings to mind the quote from Yoda: "Do or do not - there is no try." and thinking of that I had to revise The Plan once again and now v.1.2:

• One small quilt - a baby quilt, a wall hanging, a table runner
• One large piecing project
• An ongoing piecing project
• Quilt a top - try to alternate one UFO with one new top
• One ABAQ (Anything But A Quilt) project - zip bags, project bags, a purse, self binding receiving blankets, pillow cases, potential gift projects.
• More projects with solids!
• Keep the Stash Spreadsheet in the negative!!  

 The good news is that week two still shows the stash spreadsheet in the negative.

11 this morning, haze so thick the mountains disappeared.

First Finish and a Revision

 

A top finished when Gaye and I both were home one summer then it went into the To Be Quilted stack.  Since I had so much fun quilting Tristan's quilt I am fired up for a full attack on TBQs.

This baby quilt is the snowball pattern, one of my favorites. I used 6 fat quarters and some yardage I had on hand. Love that!  It measures 37 x 45.

As I was laying awake one morning waiting for 5am, I realized there was a flaw with the 2015 stitching plan.  I drafted that plan thinking of January and February when inside time abounds.  It's not that way in the warmer months!

The Monthly Plan for 2015 v.1.1:

• One small quilt - a baby quilt, a wall hanging, a table runner
• One large piecing project
• An ongoing piecing project
• Quilt a top - try to alternate one UFO with one new top
• One ABAQ (Anything But A Quilt) project - zip bags, project bags, a purse, self binding receiving blankets, pillow cases, potential gift projects.
• More projects with solids!
• Keep the Stash Spreadsheet in the negative!!

I think this will be more doable and most likely the ongoing piecing project will be a large one.

Okay then... onward!

Ink

Several weeks ago I emailed my friend Sheila with my plan for 2015 letting her know it was still in "pencil".  She requested I let her know when I was going to ink.  That made me laugh but well, here it is still not exactly in ink but finalized nonetheless.

2014 was a dismal year for quilting finishes.  I had a lot of fun helping my friend Carol with her quilting and she is enthusiastic and dedicated to finishing.  You would have thought that might have rubbed off or maybe even shamed me into finishing my own quilts. Nope. Not last year.

I've known for years that a plan is going to make all the difference but like most other important things in life, it needs to become a habit.  For me some plans need more detail and quilting is one of them, so here is my monthly plan for 2015:

• One small quilt - a baby quilt, a wall hanging, a table runner
• One large piecing project
• An ongoing piecing project
• Quilt a top - try to alternate one UFO with one new top
• One ABAQ (Anything But A Quilt) project - zip bags, project bags, a purse, self binding receiving blankets, pillow cases, potential gift projects.
• More projects with solids! 
• Keep the Stash Spreadsheet in the negative!!

 My real goal here is to proceed with the same kind of obsession enthusiasm that I had for last year's August purge.  That was so much fun!   

Word of the Day

querent: one who seeks or an inquirer

I had never heard this word before but found it in this hilarious as well as thoughtful article forwarded by my sister: Well, since you asked...

The above shows the status of the Three Skeins, Three Hats project and it's the second time I am this far along. These are my three skeins, Amy has an orange, turquoise, and charcoal combination.  Not sure she is any farther along.  My one finished knit project got left behind in Olympia and is en route.

In and Out

Photo taken leaning over the 2nd floor railing of the lobby at Novell.

The final finish for 2014 and gifted to Tristan.  The quilt finished about 55x64 and I wish I had a close up picture that shows the lines and lines of quilting.  That was a bit of a challenge because I started the quilt on a different machine and the quilting was what made me put the whole thing away for quite a while.  Interestingly, and possibly because I had a better attitude, finishing it up was a pleasure.  Never mind that the feet from different machines do not have the same marking guides, if any.  Never mind that I was clueless as to what quilting plan I started with.  I just sat down and made it work and I was very happy with the end result.  Is it perfect?  Not at all but it was a great learning experience and when I was finished I could hardly wait to start the next straight line quilting project.

The 2014 Stash Spreadsheet shows 55.47 fewer yards of fabric in the house than at the beginning of the year.  Much better than 2013 when I ended up with more fabric, at least 22 yards more, than when I started.  I will continue to be diligent about this and have already started the 2015 Stash Spreadsheet.

Mailed home from WA on Monday

My sister thanked me for supporting the economy in Washington last weekend.  We did have fun though!