Houses Flimsy

Today I was finally able to get back to my sewing machine and finish up the flimsy for my plaid houses. I've named it "Highlands Houses" in honour of the plaid.

The roofs turned out to be quite challenging when it came to matching the angled corners, even with the paper pieced units. They are not all up to our strict Ontario Building Code! The words "close enough" could be heard frequently around here last week.

I also want to show you how I paper pieced the chimney units. Since they are just a narrow strip, I decided to strip piece them on a paper foundation.

I drafted a foundation with solid sewing lines, and dotted cutting lines,

Sewed on my strips,

Trimmed up the block,

Cut along the dotted lines,

And voilà! Nine skinny units. Click any of the photos to see them larger.

After considerable debate about how to quilt it, I have decided that just a simple machine stipple will be best. There are already plenty of lines with the plaid going this way and that, so I think just a few subtle curves will be the best way to keep it balanced. I'm not sure when that's going to happen, though! I really need to get my machine serviced again.

Regular readers may have noticed that I am off to a terrible start with my New Year's resolution. This quilt was both a UFO and entirely machine sewn! My resolution was not at all intended to be reverse psychology, but it has proven to be much harder to decide to let my UFOs go than I expected. So I will still tie up a few more loose ends this month. But, I did manage to start a new hand embroidery project as well last week, so you'll see that soon too.

Here's a final photo to see you on your way!

Wrong Way

Previously on Lakeview Stitching....

Click here to catch up on the story so far.

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So, I had mistakenly drafted the patterns for my houses backwards! Argh!

"Well, does it really matter?" I thought.

"Finish it in one day," I thought.

"Just keep going," I thought, and I made a start on the roof pieces:

I had decided right away that I wasn't going to worry if the grain was straight in the pieces, because that way insanity lies, but I did want the plaid in the roofs to follow the angle. I made myself a cutting template for the roof pieces to get the angle right, and I was rather amazed at how well it worked.

But, while I was sewing the roofs, doubt crept in. I was hoping to hang the finished quilt in my bedroom, and I didn't want to look at it every morning and think, "that's wrong." That wouldn't be a good way to start the day. I packed it up.

Then I started to see other quilts made from shirts around the blogosphere. Isn't it funny how that happens? Diane at Butterfly Threads made a lovely keepsake quilt for her mother from her father's shirts. I met a new quilter in The Great Canadian Blogathon, Ilene, who showed a wonderful quilt made from blue shirtings and red hearts.

So, I decided to start over with a correct pattern. There was enough fabric left if I went with a straight binding rather than the bias binding that I had originally planned. I labelled all the roof pieces above as "wrong," but saved them just in case I needed the fabric. The four front pieces went in the bin, because there was no way to reuse them.

I made all nine side pieces in one batch:

I could have used the old foundations for these, because the sides are the same either way. "Hold on," I thought. "the sides are the same either way! I could use these with both the right houses and the wrong houses. Five right, four wrong, the quilt is done, and I won't even have to cut any more fabric!"

I fished the first set of fronts out of the bin, which fortunately had nothing else too bad in it. I still had to pack it up again for the Christmas break, but for the past three days now I've been sewing steadily. I can't believe I thought I could do it in one day! Smaller isn't necessarily faster, I'm realizing. But, it's like it was meant to be this way all along -- not one wasted stitch.

The wrong way...

...and the right way...

...soon (hopefully) to be joined as one. :)