Working on Posting What I'm Sewing

I finished my bed quilt - look, Siobhan, no borders!

As usual, Susan Caldwell at Quilting Around the Block did an awesome job with the pantograph. I can't remember what it is called, but here is a shot of the muslim backing show the pantograph: I love it! Here is a shot of the front:

This quilt ended up finishing at 88 inches x 88 inches and I thought this was a perfect time to try Judy's binding video tutorial and sew the binding on completely by machine. The whole purpose of this quilt was to make it simply and get it on the bed because I loved the fabrics so much and they matched perfectly with my bedroom decor (which I can't take credit for - the woman who owned the house before me picked the wall paper, the drapes, and the carpeting and she did a masterful job!).

Judy's tutorial is great, and she makes it look easy. She does stress that the success of this method lies in using really sharp pins. I used the sharpest I had which were silk pins. They were key to making sure the binding did not move while sewing it down from the front. I didn't quite get the nice corners Judy did:

Although my corners look fine from the front:

I sewed one side and one corner at a time, so I had four chances to improve. At first, I folded the binding over a little too much and this resulted in a little "lip" on the back:

But then I improved:

And I admit that her method looks awesome from the front! In most places you would never know from the front that the binding was sewn by machine and not by hand:

Now my stitching isn't perfect, but this is my quilt to go on my bed, so there will be no quilt police entering my house to inspect the quality of my work. I'm so pleased with this because doing it this way probably only took me one-third of the time if I had done it by hand. I'm not a big fan of handwork, and sewing bindings down by hand was really the only handwork I ever did - but all that has changed now. I will probably use this method from now on, unless the quilt is an extra-special one.

Then I did something I have never done to a quilt that I have made (except for my first one) - I washed it. I decided that it would have to be washed at some time in the future, and there was no time like the present. VickiW assured me that she simply puts it in the washer and then in the dryer, no problem. And she was right; it came out soft and crinkly. I immediately put it on the bed and I'm laying under it now as I type!

One thing I did want to mention: when I was initially sewing the binding onto the front of the quilt, I tried Judy's method of moving the needle all the way to the right needle position and using the edge of the walking foot as my guide. The advantage to this was that way more of the quilt was under the walking foot and thus, the quilt was pulled along under the foot with a lot more force, making the whole process much easier. Wish I had been doing this all along.

Parting Shot: Two more blocks of the Double Wedding Ring Quilt got done this weekend. Fourteen done, six more to go!

Some Progress on This Year's Goals

I had a few goals this year, as set forth in this post. One of which was to make a Double Wedding Ring Quilt (still working on this - halfway done with the blocks), but the other was to make a quilt for my bed. I chose a simple pattern of Kaffe Fassett's and quickly had all the blocks made, but I had no room to lay them all out. But after the cruise, Mother helped me move the table and chairs out of the dining room so I could arrange the blocks as I liked: It's the only room in the house that's big enough - this quilt will measure 88 x 88 inches when finished. With all the different fabrics, there really is no way to lay it out wrong, and I was able to finally get it together this weekend. Here's a photo of the top in my bedroom. I chose these fabrics precisely because they so matched the bedroom:

So this is off to the machine quilter's tomorrow or Friday, depending on when she can see me. With such a simple block pattern, this quilt is going to need some interesting quilting. I love me a lot of quilting on a quilt!

And in a real burst of efficiency, I was able to get some binding made for Eileen for her Irish Chain quilt I posted about here. It is currently winding its way via post to Boston, Mass for Eileen even as I write:

I'm certain Miss Eileen is perfectly content with me making her bindings, but I'm thinking of doing a binding tutorial in the future, so she can refer to it at will, thus empowering her to make binding too. But somehow, I don't think that it is part of her master plan of her "learning by doing" philosophy!

Parting Shot: A photo I took in the Dominican Republic on the beach. I don't know what this guy was about, but he sure was a character!

Progress is Being Made

I haven't posted about the Double Wedding Ring Quilt lately, but progress is being made; I have finished half of the blocks. Woo-hoo! Here are 5 "A" blocks and and 5 "B" blocks:
I photographed them on my kitchen floor due to gusty winds outside on this beautiful day. Which seems to always be the case, except when it is raining. When I started blogging, I had no idea how many days of the year are unsuitable for outside photography of my sewing projects. But I know now. Thus, the inside photography. But you can see the nearest right block is still experiencing wind: that is from the refrigerator kicking on and blowing on it!

Having completed half the blocks needed for the DWRQ, I decided to take a break and work on my other goal for the year: a quilt for my bed. I already had a bunch of fat quarters, mostly from the "Freshcut" collection by Heather Bailey from Free Spirit fabrics that perfectly matched my bedroom decor. I wanted a pattern that was easy, fast, but not so simple that I would become bored. I search high and low at the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Show, and I considered using the Strip Gift Quilt Pattern, but in the end I used a Kaffe Fassett design from one of his books, which I believe was this one.

Kaffe Fassett's designs are good for fabric collections because they usually don't rely on contrast, so this was perfect. I can't remember the name of this quilt he designed as the pattern was so simple, I didn't even buy the book. (Sorry, Mr. Fassett.) Here are some of the blocks laid out, again, on the kitchen floor:


They aren't sewn together yet, and these aren't all the blocks. I need a bigger surface to lay them all out to make sure I have them arranged the way I like. The finished quilt will end up 88 x 88 inches, so I may have to lay down a sheet in the driveway tomorrow (if the wind would quit blowing) and arrange the blocks on it. I have no floor space in my house big enough for this quilt.

I did modify the quilt a bit so as to use fat quarters to make this quilt. For example, the middle block was supposed to be 19 1/2 inches square with a 2 inch border. My fat quarter couldn't be 19 1/2 inches square, so I cut it 17 1/2 inches and added a 3 inch border.


I also discovered that one fat quarter can make two blocks: 1 "A" block and 1 "B" block (the ones with the border). So I needed 31 fat quarters to make this quilt, plus some yardage for the border for the big block, which I will also use for the binding. Good news about this quilt top: no big borders! Just the big block, the "A" blocks, and the "B" blocks. All I have left to do is arrange the blocks, sew them into rows, sew the rows together, and get it to the machine quilter. I plan on asking for heavy quilting on this quilt: the pattern is so easy and basic that you need interesting quilting to make it attractive. Can't wait to get this on the bed!

Parting Shot: Darned refrigerator kept blowing on my blocks!