Olympic Quilting Wrapup

I never know what to expect when I plan these heavy quilting times. All kinds of things can come up to thwart them, and that first week of the Olympics I ended up having a bunch of things to do that I didn't expect. In spite of that, I was able to get quite a bit of quilting done. Thankfully the second week was not as busy and that was a good way to end, had the busy week been second, I would have definitely felt that my Olympic quilting experience was tainted some.

I finished the shade on Thursday of the second week, which means I spent most of the Olympic days working on it. I'm really pleased with how it came out and, though I had hoped to finish it during the Olympics, I wasn't sure if it was really possible. Here is a closeup view.

Here is a view from a little further back. The next step is to turn it into a Roman Shade, something I'm still trying to figure out. I found what looks to be some good directions online and hope to get it strung and hung before too long. It will replace the blue checked curtains you can sit a bit of in this picture. I'm hoping that I can figure this out without too much trouble as I have one to make for our bedroom, too!

When I was nearing the end of the shade, I took some time out to baste the baby quilt that I made on my sewing night and I also basted the Oriental Roads. I started quilting on the baby quilt on Thursday and finished the quilting on Sunday. I don't think I've ever quilted a baby quilt that quickly. I put binding on both the shade and baby quilt a couple of days later.

I was still watching Olympic coverage when the quilting was finished on the baby quilt so I picked up the Oriental Roads and started quilting on that one. Here it is in the hoop, with a view of part of one of the Jacob's Ladder blocks.
Here is the center block. The middle and squaring up triangles have this feather motif, in red, with off white crosshatching. The rest of the quilting is in red.

This one will take at least a few weeks to quilt, and I will probably take days off to work on the Posies and Celtic so it is ready for the hoop when the Oriental Roads is finished.

Looking over my challenge list, I realized everything left (except for the sewing together of blocks) is hand work....hand piecing, hand applique and hand quilting. Though I prefer handwork, I actually do enjoy machine piecing when I'm in the mood for it and am thinking ahead for when my challenge year is over. I printed paper for the next strip quilt. I did one where the whole block was strips, one where half the block was strips and the other half background (the shade) so this one will have strips on both sides of the center line with a background triangle at each corner. The pages are printed and I played with the lines, now all 256 have to be marked like this one.

I'll be working on this project when I have a hankering for machine piecing, and on my late night sewing nights, which lend themselves better to machine work than handwork most of the time.

And finally, Ruthie. Here she is, bed head and all. It was around Christmas time and our oldest had just come back from the youth Christmas party (he is a leader) where they all brought white elephant gifts. He received a Barney video, which he gave to Ruthie when he got home. She had just woke up from a short nap and was THRILLED to get this video. She has since "bought" a couple more of them in the Awana store (where they trade earned shares for various trinkets.)

Hopefully this is a big quilting day for me. I have nowhere to go, a few daily household chores to do, but mostly a day that is wide open. I'll quilt on the Oriental Roads and if I need a break will work on drawing more lines on the strip quilt and/or cutting some more strips for scraps. With the successful mastering of the curved piecing foot, some Drunkard's Path pieces will also be cut from scrap and a new "when I feel like sewing" box will be started.

But nothing will happen if I don't scoot!

Happy Quilting!

Sue

Friday Night Sew-In Wrap Up

My Friday Night Sew-In was actually a Friday and Saturday Night Sew-In. Because of a committment on Saturday, I couldn't stay up as late as I normally would for something like this and at the end of my sewing time on Friday night I still had work to do.

I spent Friday afternoon with a friend, but before I left I set up my room for sewing. My sewing room has other functions, in addition to serving as a sewing studio/office for me, my family tends to hang out in there with me and we also use the room for a second dining area when there are more people to feed than our table holds.

I cleared the table and set up my sewing machine, a cutting mat and a design area.

I also set up my ironing board. I usually use a small table top one, but when I know I'll be doing more sewing I prefer a regular board. I also cleared off my design board so I had somewhere to put the finished blocks.

I spent the day Thursday choosing fabric, rotary cutting squares and using templates to mark curves and cut the pie shaped piece.

Several years back I started cutting binding when I cut the pieces for a quilt top so that later on I didn't accidentally use the fabric for something else. Once the cutting is finished, I sew the binding strips together and press them so it is ready when the quilting is done.

You can see a hanger full of binding behind the pink one I just made, that visible binding reminds me how much quilting I have yet to do!

The reason I was making the Drunkard's Path block is so that I could make friends with my curved piecing foot. I bought it several years back and tried it out, but never took the time to get proficient with it. When I found out a friend was having a baby, it gave me a deadline more pressing than the challenge deadline.

I sewed a couple of practice pieces without a hitch, then picked up the first pieces of the baby quilt. I was pretty happy! While the one side didn't match perfectly, it was close enough to go together well. It looked funny to me. There wasn't the contrast I expected when I picked the fabrics.

That was because one piece was facing the wrong way. OOPS. Thankfully I just had to see what the blocks looked like before sewing all 64 of them! I ripped those two out, and proceeded on.

I alternated sewing and pressing and pinned the finished blocks on my design board. The curved sewing foot meant sewing curves with NO PINNING. Really. No pinning at all. Those little Drunkard Path blocks went together in no time and will be a new addition to my scrap quilting projects.

I admired the blocks and tried a couple different placements of the green ones, but this is what I landed on.

By the end of the evening I had sewn together the top half of the quilt and by Saturday night, the top was together, borders and all. I was quite pleased with the result and and looking forward to basting in the next couple of days.

I continued marking on the Oriental Roads quilt once the baby top was done and am still working on that today, though I think I'm finally nearing the end. I have the backing sewn together and will baste both the Oriental Roads and the baby quilt as soon as the marking is finished. The shade is nearly done, it should be finished by the end of the week.

And, of course, Ruthie. A friend gave us some dress up clothing that her daughter had outgrown and Ruthie found this in the bag. Our little princess has her own crown now. She spent quite a bit of time admiring herself in the mirror.

My next several days of sewing are planned out and I'm very excited. We're enjoying the Olympics and it seems a lot has gotten done in the first week of them, I hope that I can be just as productive during the second!

Happy Quilting!

Sue