New gadget

This is my new gadget.  It is a Clover Yo yo maker. I  resist buying every special tool that comes out. I have a few specialty rulers but I usually figure out what I need to do to use the basic tools I have. I think early on I bought several duds and that kind of soured me on special tools. I LOVE this tool. I recently made yo yo flowers for my Diva quilt and I came to the  conclusion they were miserable  little things that I would be crazy to make again. I had seen this and considered it and decided that it probably wasn't worthwhile.I  was wrong! In light what I thought about it, I'm not sure why I bought one this week but I am glad it did. It has made making yo yos so fast and  easy that I even considered it fun.  Actually I bought 2 Yo yo makers this week the first one  was  too small  for the size i wanted for the 6 inch square but after trying it out I knew I wanted  a bigger one. The smaller yo yos  are really cute too.

 I decided to put yoyos in the dark 6 inch squares in my Warm Wishes quilt. I was going to do some FMQ but decided on the Yo yos instead. I am going to tie them on with yellow #7  crochet cotton. I just could not decide what to quilt in the squares and just tying seemed wrong for a flat batting. I thought about big  buttons but ruled  that out because I didn't want something hard. You can see the 4 yoyos in this photo. They are just laying on the squares, not tied on yet. I am going to put the red ones in the squares with the blue frames and the blue ones with the red frame. I think they show up more that way. I only have one red one  made  so far but all the blue ones  are done.

I decided  to  go with just a row of straight stitching in the border instead of something free motion. The reason is my binding is not so hot and I didn't want to draw attention to it. I stitched it to the back and turned it to the front and machine stitched it and  though I have done this many times and thought I pretty much had the technique mastered, this time my stitching was all over the  place and not right on the edge.(what's that about pride going before a fall)  I don't think it had anything to do with putting the binding on before I quilted the  border I  think  it was because I did not have my machine and tables set up the way I need them. I did this one before I got my second table. I used to have one attached to the  wall  that folded down when it wasn't in use but anything that is attached to the wall  limits what you can change around so we did not put it back up after we moved. Anyhow..............I thought it would  be OK because the quilt was small but it wasn't small enough and I should have known better. I got the table set up for the QAWM quilt and that went well. I am almost finished with that one and I  just have the binding to  put on. I  have to have a good look at my choices in the daylight before I decide what to use. I'll save that for another post.