Stardate 2016.203.1
Wow, has life been busy lately...
I don’t know where our summer is going, but it’s moving along very
quickly. The hot temperatures aren’t
helping much but the tomatoes growing in the backyard. I guess, though, I’ll take the thought of
fresh tomatoes coming on soon over a snowy, blizzardy day.
I have managed to get some quilting time in, and am making
some progress on a few items. Luckily,
the basement stays cooler and it’s a great place to hang out and work on
quilting while the sun is beating down on the outside world.
The quilting is all done on the columbine quilt! Hoo-rah!
I finally got the purple thread in that I was waiting for, and got the
purple medallions quilted. I love how
this came out! I think this really helps
set off the quilt and adds interest to the outer fringes of the quilt.
I did a lot of doodling to come up with the
design. I’m surprised how much doodling
helps you contain your thoughts and think about the sewing pattern to get what
you envision. Now to stitching on the
binding. I sew the top by machine, then
flip it to the back and stitch it by hand.
I know the faster way is to stitch by machine, but I’ve always liked
this method – tedious as it is – because it just results in a cleaner look. That’s
just my opinion. We all do what works
best for each of us, and that’s O.K.
I’ve made progress on my heart quilt. I am trying to get this done to send to the
Florida Modern Quilt Guild by their September 15th deadline.
I thought it’d be more fun to just do one
heart in each color and then let the colors stand out for themselves amongst
grays and whites. It took me a while to
figure out the math for the square blocks. Sure, I probably could have gone
somewhere on the internet and found a cheat sheet, but I wanted to try to
understand it for myself. I knew I wanted
a 12” finished square, but I wanted to create four triangles that would
comprise the square. Cut individually,
then sewn back together, I needed the piece to finish at 12”. So, off I went using Pythagorean’s Theorem
and figured out the hypotenuse of the triangle, and then figured out the
finished height of the strip set I’d be putting together to then cut the
triangles. After stewing on that for a
few days, I finally figured it out and off I went.
I like how the triangle blocks are interacting
with the heart blocks and I’m starting to get excited to see the quilt come
together. Still quite a bit of sewing to do, and trying to get the placement of the triangles right, but we all try to find even a precious few minutes to do some sewing or block rearranging. And, those 15
minutes start adding up in progress. Which
reminds me, I think it’s Victoria Findlay Wolfe who challenges all of us to
just spend 15 minutes free-piecing. I’ve
started to do that in order to get another quilt going made of scraps that I just can't decide to throw away. I’ll get some pictures and start sharing
that. Right now, though, the heart quilt
is taking priority.
I hope you’re all finding 15 minutes here and there to do
some quilting. Over even just a short
time, you can sure see your progress emerge.
