Away from the Sewing Machine on the Danube

My husband Gregg and I along with my cousin Pam and her husband Keith just spent two weeks travelling from Prague to Budapest.  Part of the trip was a river cruise on the Danube.  We had a great time!  Here are a few "quilty" pictures from our trip.

In Prague, there was a sewing store only a few blocks away from our hotel.  We saw it at night so it was closed.

This cobbled sidewalk could be very easily translated into a quilt pattern.

In Budapest, there was a sewing machine right inside the door of a restaurant we went to on a taste testing tour.

And the best sight of all, Saint Stephen's Cathedral in Budapest is roofed with hexagon flowers.

Now that we're home and mostly recovered from jet lag I should be posting more regularly....

Basket Quilt flimsy completed

I last posted about this quilt in May.  I had all the blocks made then and had since sewn all the rows together and had half of the quilt in one piece and the other half in four pieces.  I got it all together into one piece on Monday.

The instructions were to now add a thin border.  It's hard to see in the above picture, but the bottom and sides have about half an inch of background fabric beyond the corners of the baskets while the top has about 2.5 inches of background fabric above the basket handles.  I like symmetry, so I decided to add more background fabric to the three skimpy sides so they were all the same as the top and then put on my thin border.  I used the three black prints to make my 1 inch finished border and then added the same amount of background fabric all around again.  This is what the quilt looked like yesterday.

The next step was to add a 6.5 inch border of another fabric.  I did some calculations and figured I had enough fabric left that I could put on a 5.5 inch border made with squares from the rest of the fabrics the baskets were made with.  On the long sides, I had to have one block that was one inch larger and on the short sides I had to have one block that was half an inch smaller.  I probably could have sewn the seams of the blocks on the long sides a little narrower and the seams of the blocks on the short sides a little wider and the result would have been unnoticeable, but I think it turned out fine.  Once the quilt is finished, I won't be pointing it out.

I could only sew together enough black fabric for three of the corners so I looked through my scraps and found some other fabric for the fourth corner.  The black is a little darker but if you squint I think they coordinate well enough.  I won't be pointing this out on the finished quilt either.

The quilt is currently 81" x 90" so a nice size.  Now I just need backing and binding fabric....

Block of the Month for September

Mayflower Quilters Guild started up again last night and my friend Marilyn and I are responsible for Program this year.  We decided to do a Block of the Month each month with the blocks due at the next meeting to be used in Comfort Quilts.  I couldn't find a tutorial on line for this block so have made one up here:

Step One:  Fabric requirements

• three 2 1/2" x 6 1/2" strips of medium to dark fabrics in fall colours (yellow, gold, orange, rust, red or brown) (WOF  (width of fabric) strips will give you 5 or 6 blocks)
• two 4" squares of light fabric in off white/unbleached cotton colour for each block

Step Two:

• Sew three strips together.  I put the lightest one in the middle but that was just my preference.
• Press the seams to the dark.

Step Three:

• Press the squares in half on the diagonal (the pressed line will be your sew line and your corners will already be pressed open after you sew them, so you accomplish two things with one step)

Step four:

• It is important that your block is laid out with the strips running vertically up and down and not horizontally across.
• Lay an opened square on the upper left and the lower right of your block with the pressed lines being parallel to each other.
• Sew on the two pressed lines but do not trim off the corners.
• Sew another seam 1/2" away closer to the corner and flip back the corner.  (If you don't want to sew the second seam, we can do it.)
• When you hand in your blocks at the October meeting, we will trim the extra fabric off and use the bonus half square triangles to make another Comfort Quilt.  (Of course you are welcome to use this pattern for yourself as well in which case you can do whatever you want with your corners.)

Here is a sample of what the final quilt will look like:

Marilyn and I are looking forward to seeing all the blocks you donate at the October meeting!

Cat's Meow Mystery Quilt, Finished

I finished my quilt on Sunday, but couldn't post it until we had the quilt reveal and viewer's choice award at my guild which happened last night.

First of all, measure twice, cut once.  I cut a piece of batting several inches wider and several inches longer (so I thought) than my quilt top and proceeded to put everything on the frame only to discover I had cut the length using the measurement of the quilt before adding borders.  I decided to start quilting anyway and when I got to the point that I needed to add a strip of batting I whip stitched it on by hand.  The edge of the quilt is rolled back so you can see the 7 inch strip of extra batting I had to add on by hand. I emphasise by hand because I really try to avoid doing any sewing by hand....

I quilted this quilt by following a paper pantograph with a laser pointer on my machine.  Here's a picture showing how that works.  As you follow the line on the paper with the laser, the machine sews that same design onto the fabric.  I chose this design because I thought the flowers looked similar to the flowers in the fabric.

I didn't have quite enough of the flowered fabric for the backing, but I had some left over pieced strips and enough of the green to make do.  I used the rest of the green to make the binding.  I have only scraps of both fabrics left.

So here, finally, is what the finished quilt looks like.

Here's a picture of the winning quilt, courtesy of our guild photographer Lorna.  This quilt was made by Claudia.  (photo used with Claudia's permission) It was even nicer in person.

So now with two deadline quilts finished I can work on whatever I want!  I know Dear Jane will be one of them.

Double Wedding Ring / Metro Rings, My Daughter and Son-in-law Opening the Quilt

We had a wonderfully full long weekend with beautiful weather for the day of wedding prep, the actual wedding day and then a breakfast the morning after.  My husband also officially retired with his last day of work the Monday before the wedding and now we are into September when all the activities start back up, but we are both still in vacation mode.

Here is half of the quilt drying out on the line at home.  I decided to round the corners which made binding go really fast with no stopping to have to mitre the corners.  The curves were gentle enough that I got away without using bias binding.  I bound it with the background fabric which I don't think I have done before but suited this quilt well, I think.

And here are some pictures of it being opened at the post wedding breakfast.

Now I have to finish putting the blocks of a quilt together and get it quilted before our guild starts up.  I just checked the calendar and that is two weeks from today!  Yikes!  Heading to the sewing room.

Linking to Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday

Double Wedding Ring / Metro Rings, Quilting is Finished!

I completed quilting the wedding quilt for my daughter and her fiancé today.  All that's left now is the binding and a label.  I don't want to show the quilt here until they have seen it, so here is a picture of what the quilting looks like on the back of the quilt.

And a close up of one of the ovals.

I am very excited to finish it and give it to them.  My next blog post will likely be the reveal.

Double Wedding Ring / Metro Rings, Started Quilting Background

I finished quilting all the rings yesterday and started to think how I wanted to quilt the white background.  I had looked at pictures on line and was pretty sure how I wanted to quilt the oval shapes, but not totally sure for the other shape.  I decided to practise some designs without any thread in the machine which would just leave needle perforations.  It worked great and helped me decide what to do.

Here is a picture of the first full row of rings with the background completed which means one sixth of the quilt is finished.

And here's a close up of one of the rings.

I decided to use rulers to guide the background quilting too.  I think it would look funny if I switched the method on half of the quilt.  The only downside is I do have to mark some guide lines which takes a bit of time too.  Even if I only complete a row of rings a day and take a day to bind, I will be finished by next Wednesday and the wedding isn't until the following Sunday.  Loads of time!