Blog reading.

Well, since I found out about the Friday Night Sew In, it has put me in touch with a whole new world of quilting bloggers! I've spent hours (!) cruising through the blogs of fellow quilters.
I did manage to put in a couple of hours working on a practise quilt on the Inspira frame. The quilting's coming along ok, but I'm frustrated with the meagre 4" that I can quilt with my Janome QC 6260. It only has a 6 1/2" throat so that's pretty small. It has me questioning whether I'll be satisfied with the 9" throat on the Pfaff I ordered. I'm starting to wonder if I should talk to the shop about changing my order to the new Janome Horizon. It's a beautiful machine and comes with 11" of quilting space. Now that would be nice. Now, is it worth the extra $1500.00 ???
Why does everything have to come down to money? Decisions, decisions...

Friday Night Sew In

Tonight was my first time participating in the Friday Night Sew In, so do I pick something in my comfort zone? NO! I had this pattern from Mary Herschleb Designs sitting around since last winter and since I have never done paper piecing, I picked tonight to learn.

It is a bit of a learning curve - at least I remembered not to use my original paper pattern and make photocopies to work on. Somehow, I managed to reverse the picture left to right. But I still think it turned out pretty good for a first attempt. Only a few frog stitches, but not bad.

I still need to add the embroidery touches like bird's eyes, smaller twigs and berries on the twigs, but I'm bushed. I sewed for 5 hours today and that was before taking this project on. This took me 4 1/2 hours. Good night all!

Friday Night Sew In

Ok, I'm taking the plunge. The Friday Night Sew In. This will be my first, so let's see what happens. I'll post the pics tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Tote bag

When I gave my friend Linda her bag, she showed it to her sister. Well, here is her sister's tote bag, in blue as she requested. I started with the LazyGirl Design for the Summer Tote, but since I never follow a pattern exactly, I did some changes. I added french seams because I didn't want loose threads inside. I added fabric to the zipper tape to make it wider. The front outside pocket goes the entire width of the bag, so I added a tie-down just inside the pocket edge, and that of course necessitated the applique to cover the stitching for the ties. All in all, I'm pretty happy with the result. It was the first time I used heavy weight Pellon. That was, let's say, an "Interesting learning curve," and leave it at that.

Oh goodie, A contest!

I do love a good contest. And when you throw in the Janome Horizon Memory Craft 7700QCP as a prize, count me in bigtime!
Visit http://themodernquiltguild.com and have a look. They are starting the year long contest on September 1, 2010 and it will entail several "challenges" over the year. So start your engines girls (and guys).
You only have to enter to get your name in for the Horizon draw so jump on in!
Can you colour me "excited?"

Baby gift quilt. This one is a quickie!

Tomorrow I am going to a friend of a friend's baby shower. The last time she hung around with us she was 11 and my son was 4. Now she's a mom of a beautiful little girl. So, what to bring? A quilt of course. I admit I cheated, the fabric already had the sock monkeys arranged in squares, and I used some of my prequilted batting (the baby fabric that is prequilted that comes in those awful colours? I got a whole roll of it in a bonus box a few weeks ago so here's one place I could use it!) Add some backing from the same fabric line and presto! change-o! A quilt is born.

I did get to play with my new quilting frame, so this also counts as a practise quilt. I kept the pattern pretty easy, but by the end, it was getting easier. Can't wait to give it to her tomorrow.

Finally finished! Canadian Comfort and Remembrance Project Quilt

Ok. I think this one gets the prize for my longest project in process. My son's school principal bought my services to make a quilt in NOVEMBER 2008. Now, in my defence, it did take months to agree on what pattern to make, and then I asked if any Guild members would like to make a block and 17 did! But it took 4 months to get all the blocks back. So that takes 10 months off the completion time, Right? So now we're down to 11 months. Which is still embarrassing to me. But now it is done. And now this quilt will be donated by the school principal to the Canadian Comfort and Remembrance Project, which is part of the Quilt of Valour program. This particular pattern is reserved for giving to the family of a soldier lost in action.

I hope they will look at the time and love that has gone into it and know how grateful all Canadians are for the ultimate gift their soldier has given.

Winding Ways Quilt

Finally finished. I won't tell you how long it took me to complete this. I took this on for a customer who asked that it be completed in memory of her twin sister who loved to sew, and look for 4 leaf clovers. It arrived in a pile of scissor cut blocks and strips. The pattern was a page from a desk calendar. So after enlarging the pattern on the photocopier to exactly the right size, I cut out each 4 leaf clover by exacto knife because I wanted to be able to use both the positive and the negative, and I couldn't get the crisp corners with a scissor. The all the applique. Now, I'm not usually an applique lover, but I like the way this turned out. I ended up putting the blocks together and then doing the topstitching because otherwise the joins where the blocks meet at a topstitching point were too thick. I kept the quilting quite simple to show off the applique and because of the customer's preference. For the label I used the inkjet printer on cotton. Then made a tiny quilt block of scrap fabric and bound it. I put the label on it and attached it to the back. This way if she ever has to repair the quilt, she has some spare fabric and some spare binding! I sure hope she loves it!

Here are a few pics of the first quilts I ever made. The Twilight Star was my first quilt. I made it for my son. The Dazzling Diamonds was my next effort - wow, batiks. I love them, I wish I could afford to play with them more often. It went to my first great niece. The Baskets on Trellis went to my second niece. The Autumn Trellis, I made for my neighbour's wife. Her husband is our neighbourhood "Bob the Builder" and he cleans my driveway in the wintertime which is GREATLY appreciated, especially when it's like -25 degrees and he just plows it out in 35 seconds so I can get out and do groceries, or go see my parents, or go to church, or just get out of the house. Everyone should be so blessed to have a "Bob" for a neighbour. :)

Inspired by Inspira

This is a good day.. No, not because I have to replace the entire contents of my freezer, thanks to a power outage, but because my quilting frame arrived today.
My second hand Inspira quilting frame. It is in pristine condition. It even arrived in the original box, in the original packing material, with all the instructions and the video, and best of all - a real, live, person! She helped me put it together and between the two of us menopausal mommas, we had it together in two and a half hours. with no re-dos! Yeah for girl power!
My darling son asked if he could try it out. I had to explain that I didn't have a sewing machine on it yet, and even if I did, it would take me at least an hour to load a quilt on it for the first time. Oh, and by the way kid, it's an hour past your bedtime, go brush your teeth!
I wish I could try it out tonight too.