Sewing again

My machine has finally come home.  It went into the shop when I ran into trouble with a charity quilt that experienced every disaster possible. The whole project was an exercise in frustration, and I was probably glad to have the break, but then became frustrated with not being able to work.

So, yesterday, as soon as the machine got home, I got down to work, and I finished the sucker.  "Tis done!  

It's about 40" square, and my husband thinks it's pretty, but it's not something I would wrap a baby in.  With the tension problems, and all the satin stitch on the back it's just not "cuddly".  But it might make a good "floor" quilt for a baby that's just starting to explore, so I think I'll donate it anyway.  I don't know what I would do with it otherwise, and I just want it gone!

I plan to link this with The Needle and Thread Network.

More frustration

It's now two weeks since my sewing machine went into the shop.  While I was told it would be ready by a week ago last Wednesday, I've heard nothing, and when I called was firmly told that they would let me know when it was ready, and there was no need to call again.  Add to this the fact that my computer crashed at the beginning of the month, and the old one I fired up, died completely about a week ago.  No "diversion therapy" there. But I got my good computer back quite late on Wednesday.  It was sent in under warrantee, because the latch that holds the battery in place had broken. So they replaced the hard drive.  Go figure!

This leaves me with the option of  doing hand work, which is painful, but still satisfies my soul--to a certain extent.  So when my copy of the latest Quilting Arts Magazine arrived this week, and I spotted an article on mini-prayer flags, I gave it a try.  For sure I had enough scrap fabric and embellishments to use! LOL

I ended up making  10 of them, and plan to give them to family, and share with my fibre art support group. I started with scraps of Duippionni (sp) silk, and re-cycled kimono silk.  The plain bits I stamped with fake writing and mandala-like symbols, before stitching.

 It proved to be an interesting experiment with mindful stitching, as it gave me a chance to consider the symbolism of various colours and embellishments, certainly the symbolism to my way of thinking.  I'm quite happy with how this went.  It filled a two whole days for me, and I have some lively reminders of the time spent.

I plan to link this with Lisa Marie Sayres Off the Wall Friday, as well as The Needle and Thread Network.

Changing focus

The past 3-4 weeks have been a frenzy of charity quilt making.  My family have convince me that I need to "de-stash", and this is one way of doing it.  I don't mind making simple, more traditional quilts--it can relax me--unless I get into tightly focused min set--which happened.   Then I started having problems with the most recent quilt, as I described in my previous post. I resolved the first couple of problems by tearing out and re-sewing.  This lead to a fear that I would run out of the beautiful tri-lobal polyester that I was using for my satin stitching. Going on-line to order more, I discovered that it's no longer available.  This resulted in a lot of frustration and bad words. I accepted the need to find an alternative, or two, or three, which I finally did, but this meant that there is different thread used in different sections of the quilt.  Okay, I can live with that.  Then the tension on the machine started to get "wonky", for the first time since I bought it 8 years ago.  More bad words, but I persevered and took extra care to check the tension every time I changed the bobbin.  

I just knew that as soon as the damn quilt was finished, (and I was close,) I would be taking the machine in for a long overdue general servicing.  Suddenly, a loud noise that sounded just like an important piece had broken inside the machine. 

I accepted that I was beat by the whole situation.  I stopped sewing immediately and got the machine ready to take into my dealer, which we did first thing this morning. 

Then my DH and I went for a drive in the country. Probably a very good decision.

When it's wrong, it's just wrong!

This month I took an excellent design based workshop from Bethany Garner, a well-respected quilter from Kingston, ON. ( I heartily recommend her)  I was left with a great deal to think about, and the germ of an idea for another project in my brain.  While that percolates, I've been making charity quilts.  Yes, I do make some traditional quilts for a good cause. ( Don't tell anyone)

My charity quilts are generally scrappy, and put together fairly quickly.  I would hope they are well put together, and I try to make them pleasing to the eye.  But after the first couple, now pieced, sandwiched and ready for machine quilting, I was looking for a little more of a challenge and I came up with a technique I learned many years ago from ecclesiastical fibre artist, Iris Rountree. I make a variation of her technique.  This can be scrappy or planned, but I've found it an excellent way to use up those cut squares that are left over after other projects.

You create a sandwich of a 4" square for backing, a 4" square of batting, and 4" square of cotton for the top, and then a 2 1/2" square for added visual interest.  The hexie  is my addition, as I had them and needed to use them up--somehow.  I make some of my hexies from cut circles rather than an English paper piecing method, as it gives them some surface interest from the folds. After stitching the 2 1/2" square through all the layers, they are stay-stitched around the edge, and joined together in rows with dense satin stitch. Before they are joined, Iris will cut some of them at an angles, and rejoin them in different colour combinations, but I haven't done that here. 

 Rather, thinking that it was a waste of time to cut up yardage for the backing squares ( this is a charity quilt, after all), I cut it in strips.  Then I layered the strip with a strip of batting, before starting to add the 4" squares, side-by-side. These are then topped with the 2 1/2" squares, and everything pinned into place

Once everything is pinned, the machine satin stitch is done through all layers.  Then the strips are joined, again with machine satin stitch.  I add the hexies here and there, just for surface interest, before the strips are joined. After ten strips are joined, the outside edge is just bound, as usual with a quilt.

 Sounds good doesn't it.  Well, the first couple of strips were joined, and then I checked the back of the satin stitch.  OMG! On both joins there were places where the backing hadn't been caught in the stitching.  What to do??  Well, I widened the setting for the satin stitch and re-stitched those areas.  It was okay, not great, but still bothered me.  There is a good chance that no-one would ever know who had actually made the quilt.  I could hand it in, and walk away.  I worried about it all night, and then forced myself to accept that to do so would be just wrong!  

So, this morning took on the daunting task of taking out both rows of satin stitch. Turned out that, after by running my seam ripper along the back, I could just pull on the upper thread and the whole thing came apart!  Bonus!  And thank Goodness for a good lint roller!  lol   (The backing is really a dark brown, not blue--trust me)

 I was then able to trim the edges, and stay stitch them, so that the satin stitch would cover and control everything.  I did have to widen the setting for the satin stitch, but by re-doing the whole length  of the join, everything looks fine--front and back. The entire job took less than an hour.

I plan to link this with Nina-Marie Sayre's Off the Wall Fridays, and The Needle and Thread Network.

Done

The beading is finished.  Looking at it, I realize that the design is poor, so this will never be exhibited, or sold.  However, as I was beading it, my mind was mulling over whether I could add a section on encrusted beading to the workshop I teach on "Beading for Quilters".  I've decided to prepare such a section in my hand outs and class notes, and offer it as an optional add-on for future classes.  This means that this piece can be finished as a simple hanging, and used only as a class sample.

Here's the finished product. full view and close-up.

Admitting defeat

Some time ago I posted about a hand stitching project using hexies to make a single bed size quilt.  I ran into problems with my arthritic hands and put the project on hold while they healed.  Feeling pretty confident, I tried again this week.  Not going to happen.  I've accepted that this is just not a good idea.  I had hoped to find some hand work I could do while watching tv.

I have put together a few of the lozenges, and basted most of the black hexies I would need--all by hand. Now I have to figure out whether to chuck the whole thing out, or spend some time experimenting with putting the rest together by machine.  This is what I have so far.  Each beige lozenge is 12" long and 7" wide.

The best thing would be to consider this a personal challenge, and dust off my machine piecing skills.  Oh My!  Old age is a b---h!

I plan to link this with The Needle and Thread Network.

Progress

The beading project is pretty well the only thing I've been doing over the past couple of weeks, and there is some progress. It's now about 2/3 done, but there has been about 14 hours of intense work gone into that.  I still have no idea how it's going to be finished, but I'm thinking about using a canvas wrapped frame.  If the piece is sewn to the canvas as well as being glued, it just might hold up.

I plan to link this with Nina-Marie Sayre's Off the Wall Fridays, as well as The Needle and Thread Network