Hand Stitching Report

I have not blogged about my Frank Lloyd Wright cross stitch picture for the last couple of weeks but I have still been working on the metallic gold outlining.  The end is in sight...just a bit in the top section left to do. We took a car trip last weekend and I did quite a bit of stitching as my husband drove. 

Finn is staying with us for 5 weeks as my daughter is really busy at work right now. We are going for a couple of walks each day.  He keeps us on our toes...

Finn is also helping with my sewing projects...He approves of the whale fabric for the back of the baby quilt I made last week. You can see my quilt top in my next post. 

I have also been doing some hand appliqué stars for my Sarah Fielke Coming Home BOM.  I am just about finished the 2nd month's blocks and will soon be moving on to month 3, which has already been posted. Here are my stars...two are done and I am working on the third one.

Once again, Finn provided moral support while I stitched.

The magenta fabric will be cut into circles and then appliquéd onto some green fabric. I will post pictures when I finish month two.   There is more appliqué for month three as well. The block book I made for this project is coming in very handy.

I am still in the black as far as stash reduction goes for this year so far.

Fabric added in March 2019:   1.95 yards
Fabric added in 2019:  42.65 yards
Fabric out in March 2019:  15.65 yards 
Fabric out in 2019: 55.75 yards
Net fabric out in 2019:  13.1 yards

I will be linking up with Kathy and the other slow stitchers on Sunday morning. 

Slow Stitching and a Finish!

My Frank Lloyd Wright cross stitch picture is coming along...I have added more outlining this week in the evenings.  There is still more to do in the middle section at the bottom. I will work on that part tomorrow for Slow Sunday Stitching with Kathy.   My daughter has also been working on her Prague cityscape under the close supervision of Finn.

He likes to inspect her stitches and occasionally steel any thread left lying within his reach...

I quilted my "Just Sew" wall hanging over the last couple of days.

I outlined the sewing machine and did quilted circles in the knobs. I used a couple of pieces of masking tape stuck beside each other and traced a spool to make the circle.  Then, I cut out the circle and placed it on the dark teal parts of the machine.  I then used my walking foot to slowly sew around each circle.  This method worked quite well. I'm not good at free motion quilting.

The needle of the machine is embroidered with grey thread. 

I finished off the quilting this morning and then made and machine sewed the binding to the top of the quilt just in time to leave for the London Modern Quilt Guild meeting this afternoon.  I took along a needle, thread and my thimble so that I could work on it during the meeting, hopefully completing it before show and tell.  Alas, show and tell time came up faster than I could sew and only half of the binding was sewn down before I held up my quilt for everyone to see.  

The backing fabric came from my stash and was a relatively recent purchase.  The binding fabric was purchased specifically for this quilt...I bought extra so I can use it in future projects as well.  I used turquoise thread for the quilting.

I will be adding a hanging sleeve and displaying this quilt in my sewing room. The pattern for the sewing machine and letters came from Lori Holt's book, "Spelling Bee".

I have another quilt almost done--it just needs side borders and then it can be quilted.  This will be tonight's project.

I forgot to do my stash report for February so here it is...  not too bad considering I purchased a lot of fabric at Mad About Patchwork and at QuiltCon in February!

Fabric added in Feb 2019:   27.25 yards
Fabric added in 2019:  38.75 yards
Fabric out in Feb 2019:  23.0 yards (much of this was destashed, Marie Kondo style)
Fabric out in 2019: 40.1 yards
Net fabric out in 2019:  1.35 yards

I will be focussing on finishing a bunch of UFO's this month so the fabric out should be well ahead of fabric in by the end of the month.

Catching Up

Wow..it has been over two weeks since I last blogged!  Life has been busy and I have not had much sewing time lately so there was nothing to blog about...

Today was the Janiary meeting of the London Modern Quilt Guild.  In the morning, after the announcements, one of our members taught English paper piecing.  We were each given some paper hexagons and a needle.  I brought along a couple of 2.5" charm packs to use.  

I made a flower this morning and started another one tonight when I got home.  I'm not sure what I will make with these but I will keep making them until I run out of the gray and black fabrics In the charm pack.  

After lunch, another member of the guild taught us how to make zipper pouches.  I used some camera fabric that has been in my stash for at least a year and some leftover fabric from my daughter's graduation quilt to make my pouch.  I had the zipper as well. By the end of the day, my pouch was done! 

The pouch pattern came from the  Noodlehead blog and now that I know how to make it, I may try making some more in different sizes!  

I am late to the party, but I decided to make this year's Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt.  So far, I have the neutral four patches from step one just about done.  

I'm not in a rush to get this quilt done, but will work away on it as I have time.  I have fabrics chosen out for all of the other blocks in the quilt and they are set aside.  

Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts is having a Christmas quilt sew along so I decided to jump in and make a new Christmas quilt.  It is only one block every two weeks so I hope to be able to stay caught up.  I made my first block tonight...Christmas stockings! 

I hope to get Elephant Parade back on the rails soon too.  It was put aside in favour of sewing Christmas gifts.  

Here is my final stash report for 2016...better late than never!  

Fabric used since my last stash report: 61.35yards
Total fabric used  in 2016: 122.45 yards
Fabric added to the stash since my last report: 44.5 yards.
Total fabric added in 2016: 112.25 yards
Net fabric used in 2016:  10.2 yards

At least I landed in the black!

I will link up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers tomorrow.

Stormy Afternoon

It is pouring rain outside this afternoon so I am inside working on a sewing project.  I don't mind the rain at all...my garden and grass were thirsty and I needed some "me" time! I am going to link up to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching--something I have not done in a while.  I hope hand basting a wall hanging before machine quilting it counts for slow stitching!

 I worked on this project at the Modern Quilt Guild retreat back in April and now that I have figured out how to use the walking foot on my new sewing machine, I am ready to quilt it!  I am using the pin fabric for the backing.

The new machine is working well!  I have a plan for quilting this wall hanging with circles and curves, echoing the edges of the paper pieced arcs.

I am using the edge of the walking foot as my guide.  I took a class on quilting with my walking foot with Jacquie Gering in April too so I am putting my new skills to work on this quilt.

I did 5 rows of stitching around the centre circle and now I am working on the outside 3/4 circles. I will show a picture of the completed project later this week.  It should not take too long to finish quilting it.  I will have to decide on binding too--Do I use a bright colour or just more of the background fabric??? Time will tell.

I have not done a stash report in ages...

Fabric used since my last stash report: 22.6yards
Total fabric used this year: 61.1 yards
Fabric added to the stash since my last report: 21.5 yards.
Total fabric added this year: 67.75 yards
Net fabric added this year:  6.65 yards
Slow improvement in the numbers...

I have more quilt backs to make so this should continue to get closer to being in the black soon.

This peony is blooming in my garden.  This plant once belonged to my husband's grandmother. 

Have a good week.

Preparing...

This week, Christine and I are going to a two day workshop with Jacquie Gering:  "Machine quilting with your Walking Foot".  This weekend, I am preparing my quilt sandwiches to use in the class.  I have everything cut out and I am in the process of hand basting all of the sandwiches. I am using up all of the spools of thread in my stash that just have a little bit of thread left...so far I have emptied 5 spools! There are 11 sandwiches in various sizes to make.  This is using up lots of stash fabric and lots of my batting scraps as well. I am using fusible tape to piece the batting.

I have taken two classes with Jacquie before.  In April 2014, she was the speaker at the London Friendship Quilter's guild and did a workshop called Stitch and Flip.  Here is a picture of my project:

 

(I have still not finished this project but plan on taking it with me to the retreat next weekend so I can work on it.)

 

 

The second class was Improvisational Piecing and took place at Black Creek Pioneer Village in July 2014.

 

 



I finished this project and quilted it with a spiral using my walking foot.

 



I plan on taking this quilt with me this week to show Jacquie. 

I am really looking forward to the workshop this week.  I am fairly proficient at "organic quilting" with my walking foot and feel confident with spiral quilting but would love to have more "tools in my toolbox" for machine quilting my own quilts. 

 

 



We are each supposed to bring a quilt top that we have made and part of the class with be discussing quilting possibilities for each of our quilts. I am taking my "Modern Wedge" quilt with me.  I have the backing ready and hope to quilt it next weekend at the retreat after getting some quilting ideas at the class.



Jacquie is an excellent teacher...if she is ever teaching a class in your neck of the woods, you should go!!!  I am so excited about seeing Jacquie again and learning all I can from her this week!!!

I am linking up to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching.

Here is my stash report...lots of fabric out this report for my daughter's quilt and those quilt sandwiches!

Fabric used since my last stash report: 10.25yards
Total fabric used this year: 38.5 yards
Fabric added to the stash since my last report: 3 yards.
Total fabric added this year: 46.25 yards
Net fabric added this year:  7.75 yards

I am digging myself out of the red hole...

Also linking up to Patchwork Times...

Sewing Day at Home

I have had a whole day to myself today and spent most of the day down in my sewing room. I worked on my daughter`s quilt most of the day. Some cutting, some sewing, some pressing and more sewing...all while listening to CBC podcasts.  Blissful!

 

I managed to make 10 rows today.  The top 10 rows were finished and sewn together earlier this week, so today, I doubled the size!

 I still have to sew the bottom 10 rows together and then join them to the top section. This represents a third of the quilt top.  As you can see, my design wall is full, floor to ceiling!   I need to do some more cutting before starting to sew the next set of rows for this quilt.

Tonight, I did some hand stitching while watching the Brier--the men`s national curling championship for Canada.  We are all big curling fans in our family.

I`m working on my pillow.  I need lots of pins for hand sewing this curved seam.

I am hand sewing the small quarter circles to the paper pieced arcs.

I will machine sew the outer gray section to each arc. Four done...only 12 to go.  Good thing the curling will be on for another couple of hours!!!

I will be linking up to Kathy`s Slow Sunday Stitching.  

Here is my stash report as well:

Fabric used since my last stash report: 20.65 yards
Total fabric used this year: 28.25 yards
Fabric added to the stash since my last report: 41.25 yards.
Total fabric added this year: 43.25 yards
Net fabric added this year:  15 yards

I have plans for much of the fabric that I have purchased recently so it will soon be in the ``used`` column!

Slow Stitching

I spent the morning cleaning up my fabric storage area...I should say that this is a work in progress that is no where near being done.  Today, I went through all of my books and the flannel bin to sort out what was useful and worthy of being kept and what was to be put in to the donation pile for next month's London Friendship Quilters' Guild yard sale.  I have a large bag of donations gathered so far and the flannel scraps have been tamed.  I also put away some new fabrics that were purchased recently. The clean up of the fabric storage area is a long term project!

This afternoon, I did some hand quilting on my wool applique Bertie block.  I am still outlining all of the wool applique and then plan on doing a cross hatch in the background. 

My husband made a pot of chili for supper--it is now simmering away in the crock pot.  He made me a cup of tea to enjoy while I stitch.

The tea is lemon blueberry herbal tea --my favourite--from Santa.

I have a pillow form which will fit this project or I may just make it into a wall hanging.  I will decide later, when I get near the end of the hand quilting.

My friend, Cathy, made me some cozy socks for Christmas and I am wearing them today--perfect for a chilly day.

I might as well do my first stash report for 2016:

Fabric used since my last stash report: 7.6 yards
Total fabric used this year: 7.6 yards
Fabric added to the stash since my last report:  2.0 yards.
Total fabric added this year: 2.0 yards
Net fabric used this year:  5.6 yards

At least I am in the black so far...

Quilts for a Syrian Refugee Family and a Stash Report

Like many people, I have been moved by the plight of the thousands of Syrian refugees who have had to leave their country in search of a safe place to live and raise their children.  Several local Presbyterian churches, including my church, are sponsoring two families to come to Canada. A few weeks ago, I spoke to the representative of my church that is on the organizing committee and offered to arrange for quilts for the members of the two families.  I asked our London Friendship Quilters' Guild president what she thought of this idea and she jumped right in and made some quilts for the first family who should be arriving sometime in January. I had a quilt top in my stash that needed to be quilted and it will be given to the youngest child--a girl.

I am still in the process of quilting it and it should be done soon. Once this quilt is done, we will have 5 quilts ready for this family--2 parents and 4 young children. 

We do not know much about the second family yet but I decided to get started on a quilt for the parents using fabric from my stash.  My friend, Christine, found a pattern in a magazine that was simple and quick to make. 

I cut out the large squares a couple of weeks ago and found the sashing fabric in my stash.  I don't have quite enough of it but found a solid yellow colour that is very close to the sashing fabric to use as well. 

Christine and I made most of the star blocks last week when we got together to sew and I finished up the last few stars on Monday this week. 

I started sewing the blocks together on Monday as well.  It is coming together nicely and I hope to have the top completed soon so that it can be taken to the long arm quilter for quilting. 

Several members of the guild have offered to help make quilts for the second refugee family as well. We may do a sewing day to put a few more tops together once we find out more about the children's ages, etc.

I encourage others reading this post to make quilts for refugee families who may be making your community their new home. A quilt is a wonderful gift to welcome newcomers to our country.

I have not done a stash report for ages.  I am ending up in the red this year.  There has not been enough sewing time this year for many reasons and I hope to return to the black for 2016.

Fabric used since my last stash report: 42.3 yards
Total fabric used this year: 62.9 yards
Fabric added to the stash since my last report:  31.5 yards.
Total fabric added this year: 70.75 yards
Net fabric added this year:  7.85 yards