Showing posts with label Spring Planting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Spring Planting. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

18 in 2018

Ok, so yes, just a couple of days ago I remarked that resolutions about UFOs have not historically been successful for me. But, I know several people had great success with 17 in 2017 last year. And, having now read the "rules," I see that 18 doesn't mean 18 different projects, it could be 18 milestones in one project. So that sounds reasonable! And since I'm sewing anyway, I may as well join in. Click here to read all about it!

It's been quite difficult to whittle down the list, actually. I did have to add some "bonus" goals. In any case, these are the projects I will be happiest to get finished. The biggest challenge will be the projects that need quilting. There are also a few easy wins and old stinkers that I'm ready to see the back of! So, in no particular order as far as scheduling goes...


1. Bind Homegrown placemats. Yes, I still haven't bound these dratted things, and I think they qualify as both an easy win and a very old stinker.


2. Finish quilting and bind Picnic. This quilt has been occupying the "chair of shame" beside my sewing table for at least six months. I'm keen to start looking at something else!

3. Under Picnic on the chair of shame is my old yoyo project, Spring Planting. It's half sewn, and getting it to the flimsy stage is its first milestone.

4. Quilting and binding Spring Planting will be the second milestone on that project!

5. Quilt and bind Sunshine.

6. Quilt and bind Nettie.

7. Quilt and bind Daydream Baskets.

8. Quilt and bind Circa 1998.

9. Sew borders on Allietare to finish the flimsy.

10. Finish sewing together my Technicolor Turkey flimsy

Bonus -- Quilt and bind Technicolor Turkey. (That's definitely a "stretch" goal!)

11. Finish the Aunt Millie fused applique, piece the alternate blocks, and assemble the centre.

12. Piece, applique and attach the Aunt Millie border to finish the flimsy.


13. Finish the Moth in the Window blocks.

Bonus 1 -- Cut the sashing, lay out, and assemble the centre
Bonus 2 -- Design, make and attach an applique border



14. Make a final decision on the border, then piece and attach it to finish the Hanami flimsy.

15. Finish the 49 Cheddar Broken Dishes blocks.

16. Cut the sashing, lay out, and assemble the flimsy.


17. Finish the Rose Boll sawtooth blocks


18. Finish the alternate string blocks for Rose Boll and assemble the centre.

Bonus -- Piece and attach the Rose Boll border to finish the flimsy!



I didn't put links in for all the projects, you can click the labels at the bottom of this post to find more information on any of them. My New Year's resolution to make four new, small wall quilts is still the top priority. But, I would certainly like to make progress on all of these. And also a few that didn't make the list!


Tuesday, May 20, 2014

New Machine!!

I've had my eye on this sewing machine since another Ontario quilter whose work I admire recommended it to me. A couple weeks ago I finally had the chance to drive up to That Sewing Place in Newmarket and give it a good trial. Needless to say, it came home with me after that! Isn't it beautiful?


You can see that my sewing table had a previous incarnation as a paint studio. But never mind, the machine is the Brother 1500S, which is a single stitch, high speed sewing machine. It has everything I want, including a needle down function and lots of workspace, and nothing I don't want, like a bunch of fancy stitches I'll never use. My old Janome still works well for those times I'll need the zig zag stitch. Although I am starting to think that will not be too often!

I was very lucky that the owner of the store, Jaret, who is an expert on this machine, was there to give me a complete lesson. Once I got home I was able to get it all threaded and set up without even cracking open the manual. It also comes with an extension table and a knee lift, which are not shown in the photo.

LOL!

So far I've used it to piece the flannel parts of my snowmen blocks, I've done a little free motion quilting on the Homegrown placemats, and I've done some straight line quilting with the walking foot on Edward's quilt. It is really nice. When you get the free motion up to speed, the fabric positively glides under the needle. And the humongous walking foot is making easy work of Edward's wretched quilt. Plus, the machine will hold a full sized thread cone, which I really love.

So, no more excuses! I have a back log of projects that need quilting. Some are so old and long forgotten that I thought I'd post some photos with my to do list:

Homegrown kitchen set -- a little more FMQ in the centres and these will be ready for binding.
Edward's quilt -- long, long, long overdue, the straight line quilting on this quilt has been an ongoing nightmare. I used a new flannel sheet for the backing and the fluff goes everywhere, and it just keeps getting hung up for no apparent reason on my old machine. But the new machine copes beautifully!
It's Warm Inside -- I have some FMQ and an experimental quilting in sections technique to try on this one.
Hen Party -- I almost sent this out for quilting, but I had my own ideas that I wanted to try too. Now I can!
Highlands Houses -- my latest idea is to quilt this all over in a small clamshell pattern. I hope I can pull it off. :)
Spring Planting (aka the yoyo quilt) -- I think I finally have a way to quilt this monster. The yoyos make it very fat!

Since my WIP list has grown again, it seems appropriate to link up to WIP Wednesday at The Needle and Thread Network. Here's to a decent list of finishes in 2014!

Monday, March 12, 2012

Yoyoing Right Along

I may not have been blogging for the past few days, but I've still been sewing!  I'm down to the last 19 yoyos on the yoyo quilt from the cover of the June 2011 issue of American Patchwork and Quilting.  I started with 38 strips appliqued with 10 or 11 yoyos each.  Now I've joined them into 19 long strips, and all that's left is to applique the last yoyos over the join and sew the strips together:


I am trying to be as random as possible.  It really is an act of willpower not to organize the colours!  My only rule as I was appliquing the yoyos was to not put two of the same fabric right beside each other.  Actually, though, I am a little sorry I did that now, because a truly random sample would have given clusters of fabrics that would have added interest.  Too late now.  But, for the rest I am going to allow the random universe full reign!

I have a couple more observations on the construction of the quilt to share.  First, for the background fabric, the pattern suggests a batik with a small repeat.  The need for a small repeat is obvious, but I am also glad that I went with a batik rather than a print.  These strips are handled a lot as you are appliquing the yoyos, but because the batik has such a high thread count there has been very little fraying.  So I would say that a batik is a necessity here.  Because the yoyos are so lumpy, there is no way that you could cut the strips wide and trim them down later.

The second thing to watch out for is how you deal with the thread tails from the yoyos.  In the allpeoplequilt.com demo video, which seems to be gone from the site now, they suggested that you just bring the thread tails down through the centre and to the back of the yoyo.  This turned out to be poor advice.  This is what has happened to several of my early yoyos:


The stiff hand quilting thread has a tendency to pop up out of the yoyo.  Later on I started to pull the thread tails back down inside the fabric on the same side as the knot, and there has not been any problem with those tails.  I will have to get myself a self-threading needle to fix the threads that have come loose.  Fortunately, it is not a big disaster, just an annoyance.

Hopefully it will not be too much longer before this one is ready for quilting too!


Related posts:

December 2011 - first post - Yoyo Alchemy



December 2011 - yoyos finished - 409 Yoyos!




February 2012 - Return of the Yoyos



Wednesday, February 29, 2012

All Yoyos, All the Time

They were predicting a big storm for us this morning, but when we woke up it was all clear.  A few hours later, though, it looks like this:

Last gasp of winter - hopefully!

No lake view today!  But wet snow like this is pretty photogenic, I think:




For me, it doesn't matter what the weather is like, because it's all yoyos inside:


This is all I've been doing for days.  I don't know why these are so obsessive, but I finally realized that if I ever want to do anything else I'm going to have to finish these first.  There are 38 strips, and I only have 6 or 7 left.

My plan now is to get this flimsy done, and the nine patch, in addition to Edward's quilt which is already ready for quilting, so that I can set up my sewing area for quilting and do all three at once.

Before I finish the nine patch, though, I really am going to get started on Sedona Star.  It's been on my calendar twice already, but then something else comes up and I end up sewing yoyos again.  I've printed the Month 1 templates on the Ricky Tims' Stable Stuff.  They look ok, but printing them one page at a time, as the instructions recommend, was a big pain in the neck.  I don't anticipate any problem with the piecing though, so I think that once I get started they will go quickly.  Month 1 will, anyway, I am a little concerned about Month 2, but one step at a time!

Monday, February 20, 2012

Return of the Yoyos

Those of you who have been reading since the beginning may have wondered whatever happened to those 409 yoyos?  Well, I had a few challenges to sort out with them, but now they are back on track:


I spent a couple of weeks waiting for the new binding fabric, because I wanted to make some yoyos from it as well.  Then it took me a while to cut the background strips, and a while longer to make the template and mark the yoyo positions.  But the biggest challenge was figuring out the best way to sew the yoyos down.

I made five samples before I was happy with my method.  I really wanted to preserve the nice pleats that the Clover yoyo maker produces, and I didn't want to flatten the edges too much.  But they also needed to be relatively firmly attached.  The instructions called for a running stitch around the edge.  The method that worked best for me was to take a very short tack stitch inside each groove of the yoyo, quite close to the edge:



This is a surprisingly strong way to sew them down, and with the short stitches on the front the thread will not be exposed to much wear.  And, it is going very quickly now!  I am 1/4 of the way done with only a few days of work.  I am choosing the yoyos completely randomly by closing my eyes and sticking my hand in the box.  So it is fun and very motivating to see which one will be next.  The only time I throw one back is if I get two consecutive ones in the same fabric.  Otherwise, anything goes!

In the end, though, I don't think this will be the most practical quilt.  The yoyos are quite lumpy, so if you were making a bed quilt for a young person it would not be very comfortable to sit or play on.  Mine will probably be a sofa throw.  I have a feeling that it will spend most of its time folded at one end of the sofa, and only used if I am cold.  But it certainly is a fun project!

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

409 Yoyos!

Here they are, all 409 completed yoyos!  I am actually a little sad that this part of the project is over.  It's been fun catching up on my tv shows while making them.


The next step will be cutting the background fabric into long strips and sewing them down.  Here is a better photo of the background, a brown batik:


The pattern suggests that the yoyos be sewn down with a running stitch and strong hand quilting thread, rather than an applique stitch.  I have tested this and I like it.  If I take the stitches between the gathers I can preserve the dimensionality of the yoyos, which will be nice.  I'm really hoping that this next stage will be easy enough to do in front of the tv as well!

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Yoyo Alchemy

There are a few quilts in the running to see which one will be the first one that makes it all the way to completion.  You would think that since I am making them, I would know which one will win, but I really don't.  Smart money, perhaps, would be on this yoyo quilt I am making, the one from the cover of American Patchwork & Quilting last spring:


I was immediately enamoured of it when the magazine came out, but with many other projects to do I did not start making yoyos until a few weeks ago.  They are completely addictive!  I am using the Clover extra large (60 mm) yoyo maker, which makes them super easy and beautifully even.  The magazine has a great video tutorial on how to use it here.

It is fun to see how all your more dubious fabrics are magically transformed when you make them into yoyos.  I managed to use up a few duds from my stash, but I will admit that I have been buying nicer fabrics as well to feed the yoyo monster.  The quilt calls for 409!  These two Farmer John's Market fabrics are good examples of the amazing transformations of the yoyo maker:



And it's hard to go wrong with these fabrics from Brandon Mably and Kaffe Fassett:




Don't worry, not all the yoyos are red!  In fact, too few were red, so I am sticking to red at the end here.  Right now, I only have 40 left to do.  I am hoping that sewing them to the background will be equally compelling.  Happy stitching!
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