Oh man..

It's been a long time since I wrote in my blog.  In my last post I mentioned I was going on vacation.  Carl and I went to Las Vegas.  We did a lot of walking.  We saw the Terry Fator show. We got to see my 3 brothers and mom. We also went to my nephews graduation.  We were in Vegas for a week and we stayed at the Bellagio.  We had a good time but by the time the week was over, we were ready to come home.

When we got home from Vegas, I only had 11 days before my guild's quilt show.  The show was very successful.  It was our first time at that particular venue and I think that helped make the show a success. 

Now that the show is over, I promised I would make a quilt for an ex co-workers granddaughter.  When we first discussed this quilt 3 years ago, he couldn't make up his mind for a theme, so I didn't pursue it.  In April he finally told me that he would like a quilt with dinosaurs on it.  So while I was at MQX show I found the perfect fabric.  But, because of our upcoming show I didn't have a chance to make it until the beginning of July.  Unfortunately, I didn't get it made before my co-workers wife passed away.  Sad, I know.   I wanted to have this quilt made so she could give it to her granddaughter.  I did get the quilt done and mailed this weekend.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of it quilted, but here it is.  I did the same pattern as I did for the other kids quilt because it was fast and easy.  I also made a pillowcase to match.  I hope that Katie likes it.

After finishing the above quilt I was hired to make these things called drones.  These drones are for bagpipes.  I had a problem with my serger even before I got this project started.  Once I got the serger going it took me 8 hours to figure out how to sew the ends.  I was just about to give up when I finally figured it out.  This morning I serged the edges and then this afternoon I finished them off.  I am so happy this job is completed.  I am not a sewer of any other kind than for quilts, so when I get these kinds of jobs, I am happy when I can complete them. 

They are not perfect but I think they are good enough.

My next project is to complete my mystery quilt that has been put on, taken off, put on and taken off the frame.  I am bound and determined to get this quilt done.  I also have a quilt in mind that I am going to make next.  I need to work with EQ6 to get the design and pieces figured out. 

Until the next time....



Wow...I am on a roll

I am just moving right along here. I set a goal at the beginning of the year and I have almost reached that goal.  Of course having a quilt show scheduled in less than a month certainly helps with finishing these tops.  I am going on vacation in a week, so that kind of pushes me along as well.

I finished two more quilts this past week. One of them was my "under the sea" quilt. These blocks were made from members of a program called Friendship blocks within my guild. There were 14 members and we each chose something that we wanted to have blocks made of. These 14 members would work on each other's blocks. I chose to have the members make me a block from something under the sea. I asked each member to use embellishments, whether it be beads, yarns, buttons, anything they felt would work for an under the sea theme.  I also requested they use batik fabrics.  This quilt will go into my bathroom where I have a fake aquarium above my shower.

 

After finishing my fish quilt I decided to quilt my quilt that is called Shadow Play.  I made this quilt back in 2008.  Wow, how time flies between making quilts.  I put this to the side not knowing how I was going to quilt it.  I put it on my frame know that I wanted to quilt it with a feather meandering design.  I got this quilt quilted in almost a day.  I loaded this quilt the long way on the frame and because the panto design was so big I only had to advance this quilt 4 full times and a fifth with about 6 inches to do.  I like it and I think it came out pretty good.

I guess I have to load my mystery quilt from 2009-2010 guild year.  I had this quilt loaded once but had to take it off and remove the quilting because the tension was horrible.  Hopefully I can get this quilted nicely and looking good for the show.  

Finished...the mystery

I finished the mystery quilt.  I ended up taking out all the stitches from that quilt, I skinned it, as they call it.  I couldn't just let it go.  The stitches looked terrible.  I posted a picture of the backing in the previous post. Once I got the stitches removed, I changed my bobbin thread, tested it on the side of the quilt and VOILA, the stitches look great, the backing looks so much better.  I am back in business.  I used the new thread from Superior Thread, called Omni, and I was impressed by it.  I used it on the top and bottom.  I used the Warm and White batting.

I decided to do a pantograph on this quilt.  I wanted to do more of a custom job, but time is really short.  I have to get 2 more quilts quilted before vacation.  So I went the easy way with this quilt.  I decided to give this quilt to my friend Kathy for her birthday.  She does have a quilt from me, but that quilt is a memory quilt and she really can't use it like a quilt should be used.  From the beginning, Kathy has liked the fabric that I used, so I decided this was her quilt.  Today is Kathy's birthday.  I gave it to her, but took it back as I have to still need to put the binding on and I am putting it in my guild quilt show in June.  What an indian giver, I giveth and I taketh away.  Geez, what kind of friend am I?

Mother's Day was a good day until around 5:00, when I discovered that my washer broke on me.  I am glad that it broke at the end of the wash cycle.  I ended up getting a new front loading washer.  I hope I like it.  I read several reviews and hopefully they aren't true.  I don't like the reviews I read.  Errr!!  I guess I can't believe everything I read.

Back to quilting, that is much more fun.  I have 2 quilt tops to finish before going on vacation:  my fish quilt and last year's mystery quilt.  I am going to put last years mystery next on the frame.  Hopefully I will have a better beginning with that one than I did with the one I just finished. 

Oh, last Thursday I was on the phone with the insurance company discussing my minor fender bender, I got rear-ended again.  Anyways, we had a some sun, we had some rain, then we had some sun again and then we had this.  This was a great way to end a bad day.

I am not sure if you can see the double rainbow, but the second one is to the right of the one you can see.  This rainbow was practically in my back yard.  Wish the pot of gold was there too.   :)

12 Days of Christmas......

Well, this is the quilt that got peed on and is now finished and smelling good.  There is no foul smell, no dirty stains and it is looking good. 

I used Superior MonoPoly thread on the top and So Fine on the bottom.  I outlined the machine appliques with the invisible thread and quilted two straight lines all the way around in the last border.  Simple, but effective. 

I am elated that this quilt came out ok. 

Now I am working on my mystery quilt and I am a tad bit frustrated.  I have Warm and White as batting.  This is the first time I am getting pokies.  Well at least I think they are pokies.  I can't tell if the tension is bad, if it is pokies or if the backing is just bad fabric.  I've changed my needle 3 times.  I've changed the top thread.  I am using Masterpiece on the top and So Fine on the bottom.   I've never had this problem and I'm not sure how to fix it. 

Any ideas?

Started out as a bad weekend, but..

It finished pretty good.  On Friday, I went to work as usual and got home at the regular time.  We have two dogs and they are in the house all day (about 10 1/2 hours) without going to the bathroom.  I know, I know it is a long time, but they usually do pretty good without any messes.  Well, my DH got home before I did and he didn't let them out right away, so my boy dog lost control and peed in the house.

This went unnoticed for a little while until I went downstairs to continue quilting on my 12 days of Christmas quilt.  My quilt was soaked, with yup, you guessed it, pee!  ERRRRR!  The only good thing is that my machine was not in the line of fire.  So, of course I was mad, I was worried that my quilt wouldn't be salvageable, my quilt would smell, and well, just plain mad.

Now mind you, the quilt was only partially quilted and I had to take it off the frame to try to save it.  I soaked the quilt in laundry detergent, vinegar and water all night.  Then in the morning I rolled the quilt to ring out the water.  I didn't want to twist it too much because I couldn't iron it even if I wanted to because I used invisible thread.  I hung it up in the shower to drip as much water off as I could, then I laid it flat to dry.  Today the quilt is still drying but it is looking and smelling pretty good.  I did notice that a block has come undone so I will have to try to fix that.  These blocks are machine appliqued, so it appears that when it was sewn, it was sewn too close to the edge of the fabric.  I have to figure out how to fix this.  Any ideas?

This turned out to be a huge set back for me, I was planning on finishing this quilt so that I could move onto the next one.  Well, I did move onto the next one, but before I finished this one.  Hopefully tomorrow I can put the 12 days of Christmas back on the frame to finally finish it.  I did put my friendship blocks from 2009 together.  And, if I do say so myself, it came out awesome.  It is so pretty, thanks to my guild members who made the blocks.  I will take a picture of the quilt once it is quilted.  Don't want to ruin the surprise.

I still owe you a picture of the 12 days of Christmas, but that isn't completely quilted either, so that will have to be a surprise as well. 

Today was a good day to finish off the weekend with the Easter holiday, the kids coming over for an egg hunt and beautiful weather.  Until the next time.  Hopefully I'll have the 12 Days of Christmas finished the next time I visit this blog.

What I am doing now..

Yesterday I went to MQX (Machine Quilter's Expo) in Providence, RI.  What a great show and the vendors, as always, are great too.   I bought this new system to load my quilts, no longer using pins, called Leader Grips.  I think I will like it once I make an extension to my zippers.  I hope I like it anyways because it was kind of expensive.  I enjoy pinning the quilts on the frame, but if this will take me less time to get started then it will be well worth the cost.

Today, I loaded my 12 Days of Christmas wall hanging.  The extra canvas on my leaders will have to wait until after June.  We have a quilt show in June, so my focus is getting the quilts done for this show before putting those extra leaders on. 

I am usng Superior Invisible Monopoly thread on this wall hanging.  I haven't used this type of thread before so it should be interesting.  I haven't had any breaks yet, knock on wood.  The backing is looking ok too.  So off to quilting again.  See ya soon.

Productive day...

Today was a very productive day for me.  It was beautiful outside today, but I was bound and determined to get this quilt done today so that my friend Phyllis can put the binding on for me.  Tomorrow will be a day for working outside.

I was able to finally get the custom quilting done on that quilt from the previous post.  I learned a lot from doing that quilt.  I learned that I definitely need more practice.  I was able to get my feathers to look pretty good.  The egg and darts came out pretty good.  I had to rip out the first set of egg and darts because when I started going down the side borders, I realized they weren't going to fit correctly.  I also had to rip out some of the feathers on the right side because they were going the wrong way and they just didn't look good. 

Here are some pics of the finished 1st custom quilt.

I took a break this morning from working on this quilt and decided to make some pillow cases for my granddaughter. These came out really cute but it took me about 3 1/2 hours to make all three of them. I hope that she'll like them.

Tomorow, I will start another UFO quilt.