Tedium Awaits

 I knew quilting the Alphabet panel would be tedious but I think I underestimated just how much that would be.  I have stabilized the borders and quilted the pinwheels in the top and bottom borders. I decided to quilt around one or two of the animal sections to see how it was going to work.

This photo is the somewhat unorganized pin basting. I had pinned all over the panel to flatten out any bubbles and wrinkles. I knew I would do a little more pinning when I started to quilt.

This is the one section I quilted. I knew right away that the safety pins were gong to be a problem. Using the walking foot requires  lot of turning and repositioning of the quilt and the safety pins kept getting hung up on the foot. I had already ruled out free motion quilting. A little might be OK but not this much and not   so close around the various small elements. I need to have more control than my fingers can manage.

This is my solution. As I start on each new letter, with all the little bits around the animal, I will replace the safety pins with 1/2 inch applique pins. I was able to work around the pins without taking them out and there wasn't any problem with getting stabbed by the little pins.

This is not going to be fast and stitching a few stitches and turning and repositioning the quilt is gong o be tiresome. I think I can manage two letters/animals a day. I will work on the rest of the pinwheels as I go along. Small pinwheels have gotten pretty tiresome too. 

I like this quilt enough to stick with it. Maybe I can get it finished in a month. 

         We'll see!

2020 Almost Gone

 Well 2020 is almost gone and it is almost time to take down the Christmas tree and put away all of the Christmas quilts and various Christmas items.

in November, I started a post  when I got out all the Quilts and  table toppers, Christmas linens, dishes and all the things that I have from years past. But life got in the way and I never finished it.

 I usually get a few new Christmas items each year but I tend to keep everything and get it all out and use it.  Jack and I both like to look at the tree and remember who gave us each ornament and where or why we bought things.  Of course there are homemade items from our children, grandchildren great grandchildren and friends. This year we got a new artificial tree, much smaller than our last one but much fuller and with more lights. I won't show all my Christmas quilts and table toppers etc but this is the tree with many of the things that bring back good memories.

We have enjoyed looking at it but we will enjoy the unobstructed view of the birds that come to the feeder outside our window and the squirrels who come for peanuts on the window sill.

We will still have this  amaryllis to look at for a short time. This is the first time I have ever had an amaryllis so I  don't know how long the blossoms last but it has been fun watching it grow each day. I plan on taking care of it according to the instructions and having it next year. We'll see!

My little Christmas cactus did not fare so well. It had a lot of blossoms and buds ready to open and one by one they fell off. Each leaf had little red/pink pinheads that I assume were buds but they never materialized.

This is the second time I have had a nice Christmas cactus that didn't do well for me.

This one still looks health and I will try to keep it. We'll see about that too!

On the quilting front. I have made progress on the alphabet quilt. I finished the back and layered the quilt and have started quilting it.

I quilted in the ditch around the outside of the inner border and between the blocks all around the border. On the bottom border I quilted the pinwheels. This is as far as I got. 

I started with the borders because I didn't know what I wanted to do for the alphabet panel.

I asked a friend how she quilted her panel and I think I will do what she did. She replied  that she did "a very erratic loose stipple and went  around each letter and outlined each animal figure. It seemed to make the letters and the animals pop out! "  That sounds good to me. I will do it with my walking foot as it is hard for me to do much free motion quilting. My old hands have a hard time moving the quilt for free motion.  It won't be fast but I will get it done.

I am ready to say goodbye to 2020 it has certainly been a challenge. I am feeling cautiously optimistic and praying for healing for our country and for our planet. I am trusting that God is in control.

Happy New Year

A Flimsey

 

The Alphabet Animal quilt is a Flimsy.  

It feels good to have this top finished. It has taken me a while to get it finished due to interruptions. However, there was another reason it took so long. I didn't have a solid plan for this quilt. I changed my mind more than once as I went along and all along the way I had to make decisions about what to do. When I bought the fabric I was going to use the striped fabric for the borders and the music note background for the back, very simple. By the time I got home I had already decided I would make a few pinwheels with the solid fabric. The solids stash has turned into a pretty hearty supply after my purchases for the Framed 9 patch and this was a good way to use some of it. I think I went back to the shop and bought more of the music fabric a few days later.

My few pinwheels turned into 40 pinwheel blocks for the side borders. This is a 6 inch pinwheel block and 7 blocks fit perfectly for the side borders, after I fixed my mistake with the inner border.

All the time I was working on the border blocks my mind was working on the top and bottom borders. It was like a program running in the background. 

I made four corner blocks with the striped striped fabric pinwheels on point and worked out the size to cut the corner triangles to make the blocks six inches.  All the while I was taking care of other things that I had to do and this was running around in my mind. I was running out of background and I knew if I made a mistake in estimating the size to cut for what I had in mind I would not have enough. I called the shop and they still had some of the fabric. I picked it up the yesterday and knowing I would have enough fabric even if I changed my mind or made a mistake, I forged ahead.

I decided to make the borders with the striped pinwheels on the ends and a 9 inch section, with one 6 inch block and one 3 inch half pinwheel block, on each side of a center striped on point pinwheel block. I measured every thing and made the center blocks with oversize triangles then cut the block 6 high by eight inches wide and it fit. I breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Because the side borders are 7 blocks the corners were different. You can see here what I did, On the top I had the small pinwheels cornerwise or turning the corner. On the bottom I had the background squares turning the corners. To me it makes sense.

I have made a few quilts with panels and if the borders are simple it is easy. If you make blocks and the panel doesn't give you any excess fabric to trim away without trimming away something you want to keep, there is math involved. This panel had a row of blue scallops at the top and bottom that I trimmed away. That made the sides easy but I had to work to get the top and bottom right. In the end it wasn't hard and I'm happy with it.  There is also a little something fun to hunt for. Three of the pinwheels seem to have caught the wind from a different direction. It must have been those high winds we had last week.

Alphabet Panel

The last time I went to the quilt shop for more green fabric to finish the second Framed 9 Patch quilt, I bought an Alphabet animals panel and some fabric to go with it.  That kept me on track to finish the F9P so I could start the alphabet quilt. There have been delays and interruptions but I have made some progress. However those interruptions frequently lead to problems. When I am undecided about how to proceed I usually have more than one idea about what to do next. When I come back to the project after the interruption I somethings pick up on an idea that I have discarded and go ahead with it.

These photos are the top and the bottom of  the panel with the 2 side inner and outer pinwheel borders. This is an example of  what happens when I am interrupted. I meant to sew on all 4 inner borders before the pinwheel borders. There was a strip of blue scallops on the top like the one on the bottom. After I added the pinwheel borders to the sides I was in a quandary over what to do next. after looking at it for a while I realized the I had meant to cut off the scalloped strips. I undid the stitches for a few inches where the inner borders were stitched to the panel and cut away the strip, added the inner border strip and re-stitched the inner borders to the panel.  At the top left, you can see where I have not yet stitched the end of the inner border to the panel. It wasn't hard to do and it was a lot easier to do than anything I might had done if I had proceeded without fixing my mistake.

This is the panel with the 4 inner borders and the pinwheel side borders.

I need to decide what to do for the top and bottom borders .Each border block is a 6 inch four patch with 2 pinwheels and 2 background squares. The space between the corner block is 25 inches. I will figure it out so it looks OK.

The corner blocks will be 6 inches pinwheels on point (or pinwheels in a square) I need to add the corner triangles of background  corner triangles after I figure what size I need o cut. The corner pinwheels are the same striped fabric as the inner border. that stripe will also be the binding.

So this is where I am now. I am going to make more of the 4 patch pinwheel blocks and I am not sure what I will do next. I may not get back to this for a few days. I want to do it when I know I can work without interruptions. That may be a while.

I feel slightly over whelmed with everything. I have an appointment Friday to get our healthcare squared away. That is almost finished but I need to make sure that Jack's pharmacy  insurance will cover all his meds. 

My curbside grocery pickup order drives me crazy every time I place an order. The website keeps changing, They seem to be doing something every single time to make something "better". It is never better.

As if I didn't have enough to confuse me, I got a new "smart" phone. I have really lagged behind on technology. I thought all I ever wanted to do with my phone was make and receive calls. Then I was pushed into texting so I could get in touch with my grandchildren. For all the curbside pickups, I found I needed apps to make it easy. My old phone was so out of date I couldn't download apps. I ordered my phone and managed to get it set up. With the the help of some You Tube tutorials, I am learning. I connected my phone to Bluetooth in my car and downloaded some apps.  Yesterday and today I had video phone calls with my grandson and 18 month old great grandson. I said Hi to Elijah and his Dad told him  to say "Hi to Gigi" and he did.  That was special; it makes all the fuss of learning to use my new phone worth the effort.

A Finish

I have finished the second Framed 9 Patch. This one is smaller than the first one by 2 blocks in each direction. F9P 1 is 9 x11 blocks and F9P 2 is 7 x 9 blocks.  This one was a little easier to handle physically. 

This is the back of the quilt and I was happy to see that the pattern of the floral stripes worked out the way I planned. The pattern is symmetrical and straight along the sides and where the quilted sections are joined. It was quite an effort to get it layered up straight. After the first section I gave up trying to do it in my sewing room on the plastic top Lifetime tables and put another leaf in my dining table and put my big cutting mat on the table and used my bulldog clams on the ends to get the backing taut and smooth and I used masking tape along the sides to tape it where the sections were too narrow to reach the sides of the table. I could move my cutting mat to protect the table under the whole layered section when I was pinning. It was frustrating but it was worth the effort to make the floral strips work. 

I cut the inner border fabric 2 1/2 inches wide so it finished 2 inches and I like the 1 1/2 inch better on the first quilt. It seems to me the narrower looks better when the quilting is in the ditch. I made 5 inch Nine Patch blocks for the corners using the green from the inner border and four of the prints that have a white/light background.  

I thought I made all the corner blocks the same. I had cut the strips at the same time even though I didn't make them all at the same time. I never notice there was anything wrong when I layered up the borders. I had concentrated on having the length of the piano keys exactly the right length because the corner blocks had to line up with end of the inner border to which I added a 2 1/2 inch wide strip which would appear to be part of the side border. I measured and measured again and then again before adding the piano keys to the inner border. It all looked good and I proceeded to layer it up and quilt it. The first end border was good. The second end border had a block the was a half inch too big.

Here are the two corners on the second border. I just trimmed it square so it fit and sewed the binding on. Because the border was already quilted and sewn on to the quilt, I decided I can live with it.

I like this quilt and I am keeping it. I don't mind that there are similar solid colors close together.  I didn't pay much attention to that aspect. I laid it out  alternating light and dark blocks. That checkerboard pattern is not so apparent because the value range is somewhat narrow. There is not any really high contrast.

For the most part I relied on contrast between size and density of the prints for contrast.

This shows two of the darkest blocks and they do not really appear dark except in the photo.

The areas where similar colors are close or lumped together don't bother me. I did spend some time arranging the blocks but I didn't agonize over each decision. I only wanted each block, in some way, to related to the adjacent block. 

I wanted light, bright and cheerful and that is what it looks like to me. There are a few other issues, like that corner block, and the binding is folded over a little too wide on the back in a couple of places. Overall the workmanship is good and I make no apologies for the things that didn't turn or quite right.

As I was nearing completion of this quilt I knew it would be the last large quilt I would ever make.  I had to push myself to work on it. From now on, I will not make anything larger than a baby quilt. I will make only things that do not require moving furniture to accommodate each step of the process. 

I am scaling back on the amount to supplies I need to keep on hand. I am still paring down my scrap stash. After all, you have to make sure the people who receive your scraps will use them well. As I write this I am laughing at myself.  I have never given a second thought to what has happened to what I have given away. I love seeing how someone has used my leftovers but I never worry or wonder about them once they are no longer mine.

I do have something in the works now. I needed thread and I went to the quilt shop and saw an alphabet panel and some coordinating fabrics and they came home with me. I almost walked out of the shop without my thread. So I will still be quilting for a while but only the small stuff and only when I feel excited to make it.

What happened to September?

Here it is October and I'm still here but something seems to have happened to September. I'm not sure how I missed a whole month without posting.  Well, I suppose it is because there was no quilting to post about. I did get all three sections layered up and quilted. There were a few roadblocks along the way. I didn't have the color thread I wanted to use for the quilting and I had to order it from Superior Threads. It really wasn't a long wait till it arrived but it was an interruption and I didn't get started on the quilting right away. When I got started it did not go smoothly. My foot pedal quit working on and off. My sweet cat, Lucy, had chewed the cord a couple of years ago ( I did forgive her because she was a sweet cat). Jack had spliced the wires together  and it worked well for a long time. Several months ago the pedal quit working and I tackled the job of fixing it because Jack can't see well enough now to do it. It took me a few tries to get it right. The foot pedal worked well until I started quilting the FNP. It worked on and off but then it quit. I could see there were other places that looked like Lucy had chewed and I could see cracks in the covering. Probably with the foot pedal moving all over the place the wires cracked. I ordered a new foot pedal and all was well ......... until my tension was a problem. I cleaned the machine and changed the needle and it was OK on and off. I changed the needle again but the stich balance was still not really OK. I went to the quilt shop and  got different thread. Finally, everything was good to go.

I trimmed up the edges where the sections joined and I sewed the three sections together.

This is the back where I sewed 2 sections together. After I stitched the front together I turned it over and made sure the batting butted together along the whole length of the seam.  I carefully pinned the backing edge over the stitching line on the back and pressed it then removed the pins and fused the back edge down with 3/8 inch fusible web. You can see the seam here where I have stitched in the ditch from the front. I don't sew by hand anymore because my hands are too arthritic.

This is the same section form a different angle. I had planned to have the sections joined in the wider stripes where it would not be so noticeable if they were not perfectly aligned. I am happy with that decision. Getting the front and back lined up was a pain in the neck but it was worth the effort.

These next 2 photos are shots from different angles of the quilt thrown across my bed. I didn't worry too much about the center nine patch color placement. The blocks a light and dark checkerboard. That is not so apparent because there is not high value contrast. I wanted this quilt to be light and bright.

 I am starting to sew the piano key borders for the top and bottom. I was going to use foundation paper piecing and when I finally fund my Carol Doak paper I found that the whole package of paper had blocks printed on it.  I have no idea why I printed those blocks; they don't look like anything I remember planning to sew. Anyway I cut them into 5 inch wide x  11 inches and used them as foundations without lines and stitched on the front and it works fine to make the 5 inch width I want. I hope I can finish this quilt this week.

I wonder if there is anyone who is happy with the changes in Blogger. 

 

Slowly Moving Along

 I have finally arrived at the layering up stage but it is going very very slow. I am quilting this in sections and it is usually easier to layer up sections than the whole quilt, but not this time. I ordered wide backing because I didn't have anything I wanted to piece  together for these backing sections and I didn't want to spend time figuring out the backing.

When I ordered the fabric I saw a 6 inch square and I did no know that this is what a 24 inch wide  section would look like.  Oh well, that should not be a problem. Well, it was! working with a 108 inches x 72 inches piece of fabric was not easy in my user unfriendly space. To start with, I wasn't sure how to handle the "stripes".  I wanted to avid having to match any thing across the backing so  I decided on the pattern running lengthwise. I decided to center the pattern so the seam would be in the wide stripes where I would  not have to think about matching anything. Because the sections will be quilted when they are joined  the backing seam will be what ever it is after matching the block seams on the front.

I moved chairs and other stuff that has landed in my sewing room to my bed room. I needed to move my two 24 x 48 inch tables together to layer up the sections. the Lifetime tables are slippery and it was one frustration after another to finally get the fabric cut and get all the layers smoothed out and pinned together. I have one section done. The next 2 sections should be a little easier because at least I won't be dealing with 108 inches of width. Second thought, it probably won't be easier

Jack wondered if we were going to be able to go to bed but I did manage to get everything back in my sewing room. It looks like a tornado came through the sewing room but the bedroom is in neat and clean. We slept well.

When I took a break from frustration yesterday, I wandered over to a new post on Annie's blog, freezeframe03.blogspot.com/, She made piano key borders for a wall hanging and she used paper piecing.  💡 Why have I not thought of that ?  I can do that, I can draw the foundation blocks in EQ, I can print them in my computer, I have the paper for it somewhere. 

This is what I printed on a sheet of printer paper. I will play with it little more before I print them on piecing paper but now I know I can print and paper piece 5 inch x 10 inch sections.  I can work on a few at a time and decide on the order for putting  them together. I still have the two end borders to make and I am looking forward to trying paper piecing again.  I never thought I would say that.

A little Progress

I seem to be busy doing all the daily things that need to be done but never find the time to get any sewing squeezed in. A big part of the problem is that I still have not managed to make my sewing space more used friendly.  I have made a little progress in passing along some things but I am still hanging on to too many things I am never going to get around to using.  Oh well.....................

I did make a trip to the local quilt shop where I found another yard of the fabric I used for my last Framed 9 Patch inner border and binding. I have used a green monochromatic print for narrow inner borders on many quilts with piano key borders. Green always works well with multi fabric quilts especially if there a lot of floral prints. This green fits these two F9P quilts particularly well.  I also ordered some batting and fabric the backing. So I am set to move ahead. 

Today I sewed on piano key border to the green inner border and sewed it the outside edge of the right side quilt section.

This is the entire right section of the quilt, ready to layer up for quilting.

This is a closeup of a section of the piano key border showing where I used a 2 inch left over piece of a strip set after I cut 2 - 5 inch sections. I didn't intend to put it right next to the 5 inch strip but when I realized that was where I placed it I saw it as a good example of how I can use up all the little pieces.

It is also a good example of how things you didn't plan happen when you are interrupted and don't get back to something for a while.

This is the first time I am using the new blogger format after having gone back to the old format for a while. I don't really like it and I guess that is just "too bad".  So..... it's  "get used to it" or move on.  I'll see how it goes.

Update on Nothing Much Going On

I have begun the process of making the piano key borders for the second Framed 9 Patch and it has been a very slow process. There have been many interruptions  and more things to do all the time due to everyday life changes because of the corona virus. I am thankful that I am able to do them but it gobbles up my time for sewing. I have been spoiled  because for many years I had all the time I wanted to "do my own thing".

I find that I have to learn some new things. I have to download apps to my phone to make life easier when I use curbside pickup. I haveto work out how I can get our on line church services from my computer tour. our 'Smart" TV. (If it is so smart why do I have to figure it out?)I have to download and set up Zoom. All of our doctor appointments  turned into phone visits. They were all follow up visits or routine scheduled wellness visits. By the time our next appointments come around I will have our laptop set up for Zoom. I have 2 in person appointments coming up, a bone density test and a mammogram. I wish the mammogram could be a virtual visit. I feel reasonably safe about keeping both appointments after having gone in for routine lab work before my phone appointment. 

We don't see our family as often but we've had outdoor visits. Seeing the little ones is always special because they are changing so fast as they begin to walk and talk and add new skills. 

Not as much  fun as seeing the great grand children but the biggest distraction for us was a feline visitor for week,  His people had to go to an out of state funeral. Here he is on the cedar chest which is under my cutting table. Because of his coloring,  he looks a little like our last kitty, Lucy, but he is a much bigger cat. It is not easy to measure a cat but I measured 24 inches from his nose up to his tail and his tail is at least a foot long.
He spent most of the daytime hours way under our bed where he couldn't be reached. He came out to eat and use the litter box about 7 or 8 in the  evening and stayed out from under the bed until around 7 AM. H woke me up to feed him again him again. He ate, used the litter box and disappeared under the bed until evening. He is not a lap cat but he was always very friendly and he purred all the time when he was out.  The last day he was with us he stayed out from under the bed all day and he explored everywhere. He would stand at a closet door and meow until  I opened  the door and he went in and poked his nose in every corner and then went on to the next door. I am easily conditioned to be of service to felines companions. By the end of the last day, before he was picked up by his people, he had me trained to pull the curtains aside when he wanted to jump up on the window sill. 

This is what I am doing now and  where I am pretty much stalled. I have 2 sections of the lengthwise sections of the F9P  pinned across my wall. They are overlapping so I can work on both of the piano key  borders at once. It is really a slow process; working with random scraps is always slow because of all the decisions involved . It doesn't help that there are many interruptions and the mess made when working with scraps  doesn't help either.

I am making strip sets of 5 to 7 fabrics that look good together. I make them with strips that are 10+ inches to 15+ inches. I cut them into 5 inch sections and I add 5 inch scrap strips to separate them.

This is one of the 5 inch sections that I had cut from a strip set that was about 11 inches long.



Here it is with some audition strips and just below it is the other 5 inch section flipped to look different. There are some audition strips next to them. Some of my strips are longer that 5 inches but shorter than 10 inches.  If there is at least 1 3/4 left on a strip set I trim it and add it to a section turned the other way instead of a plain strip. Making longer strip sets makes the process go faster but it is still time consuming. However, there is no time limit on this quilt.

From time to time I get frustrated with the mess and start going through my fabric stash. Deciding what I want to give away makes it own kind of mess but when I am finished some of the mess will be gone and the rest should be more manageable. If I can keep focused this week on setting apart what I really want to keep, I should be able to pass on some of this on very soon. My immediate goal is to reclaim a large part of my sewing room closet.

So there is not much happening here, just like it is for a lot if other people.
Take care and be safe.

Life just got easier

I got a package in the mail today and my life just got a little bit easier. Last Friday I spent an hour looking for my keys. I was finally convinced I lost them outside when I went back for the rest of my grocery order.  Jack found them in about 30 seconds after I quit looking. They were right in the dining room under a silicone hot pad.  Let me say, I did not put them under the hot pad but I must have moved the hot pad for some reason and placed it on top of the keys.

Searching for my keys, among other things, is a regular occurrence and I have been this way  all my life. I don't pay attention to what I am doing so of course there is nothing to remember.

After my keys were found, I went right to my computer and ordered a set of fobs and a remote. They came today and I am impressed. There was a little remote and six fobs along with 6 lithium batteries for the fobs and  6 rings  to attach them. There were also little sticky labels with pictures to put on the remote to identify which button work for which item and some sticky foam pads to attach them to other things that people might misplace, like phones and remotes.  I did have to use my own AAA batteries.

The sound is loud enough to hear if the object for which you are searching is in a purse or under something like a couch cushion.  I should have done this years ago.

Now all I have to do is keep track of the remote..

New Solids

I ordered 9 solid color fat quarters last Friday to fill in some gaps in my solid fabric stash. they arrived late yesterday; they are Moda Bella and I am quite please with them. I would usually rather choose solid fabrics in person but these are not usual times. The colors are very close
to what I expected.










I only need 10 inches x 2 inches for the Framed 9 patches so I will have a good amount left for some other kind of blocks using prints and solids.

I probably won't post each set of F9P blocks as I finish them but will wait until I get the top to the flimsy or maybe finished stage. Maybe by the time I get that finish some of the wrinkles in Blogger will be ironed out.

Blocks

    I was so frustrated with problems posting yesterday I forgot the main reason I wanted to post. I had made six new blocks.

These six blocks are made with 3 of the new fabrics.

These are the 3 blocks I finished today. The 2 with the same print are the new fabric that I had mislaid when I photographed the fat quarters. The other block is older fabric; I found it all cut and ready to sew. It was most likely misplaced when I was sewing blocks for the first Framed 9 patch.

Today I reverted to "Legacy Blogger"
because of problems I was having  setting photographs.  I am pretty sure that I won't be able to continue using the old interface and I am considering just giving up.
We'll see!