Quilting Bibliophagist

7 Quick Takes - Nifty Tips Edition

2012-01-27T00:31:00.000-08:00

Usually, when I do "7 Quick Takes," I'm posting on my book blog, Catholic Bibliophagist. But this time I'm sharing seven sewing tips here at Quilting Bibliophagist.

1. I've just discovered a nifty tool to remove the little wire fasteners that hold new buttons onto their cards -- an ordinary staple remover.

2. When fusing interfacing to pattern pieces, trim off 1/8 - 1/4 inch off all of the edges. That way you'll never get fusible gunk on your ironing board. You don't have to be precise about this because the seam allowances are probably going to be graded (trimmed) anyway.

3. I like to serge the cut edges of my fabric before I preshrink it so that I don't end up with tangled shredded clumps in the washing machine. I usually serge right along the edge because I'm trying not to cut off any of my precious fabric. One day I was doing this while strong sunlight was pouring through the window and noticed that a very fine fabric dust was rising from the serger blade. And I realized that I was breathing in this stuff. So now I practice "safe serging" and wear one of these inexpensive painter's dust masks whenever I prepare a lot of fabric for the washer.

4. I used to hate ripping out seams -- "hate" as in I'd rather have my tonsils taken out with a rusty spoon. But now I know the magic method. Using a seam ripper, cut every fourth stitch. Then flip the seam over and pull the long end of the thread. It will pull out in one long piece. Then I flip the seam over again and use blue painter's tape to pull out all of the little cut bits of thread remaining on that side.

5. When I reorganized my sewing room I came across a stray pattern piece that had been floating around for years. It was a facing from Simplicity 7184 -- but I had no idea which pattern that might be. I've got so many patterns that it would be very tedious to search through them all -- especially since they're not filed by number. Suddenly it occurred to me to run a Google search on the pattern brand and number. In almost no time I was able to find a photo of the pattern envelope which I recognized as one in my collection. (N.B. The major pattern companies reuse their pattern numbers at widely spaced intervals, but by including "Girls" as a search term, I was able to narrow things down a bit. (Yes, you're probably rolling your eyes and saying, "Duh!" But I'm still not a fully fledged citizen of the Internet Age.)

6. Okay, this is only a tip if you're as dumb as I am. I've had trouble with my polyester bobbins getting mixed up with my cotton bobbins. (I like to use cotton on my quilts and polyester for garment sewing.) I've been sewing for decades, but it only just now ocurred to me that I can burn test thread just as I do for fabric. Cotton leaves a soft ash; polyester kind of melts into a hard bead.

7. If you have to alter the length or width of a stitch, for heaven's sake write down the new setting if your machine is a computerized one which reverts to the default option whenever you turn it off. Because you will surely get interrupted and have to go away for a bit, and you will probably have forgotten your altered setting by the time you return. (Now that I'm middle-aged, I definitely consider Post-it notes to be a sewing notion.)

For more Quick Takes please visit Jennifer at Conversion Diary.

Crumb Quilt-Along #6

2011-10-17T13:08:00.000-07:00

Last night I began working on Log Cabin blocks for the Crumb Quilt-Along sponsored by Jo's Country Junction. Here's what I learned from this phase of the project.

You can put more than one of your Log Cabin units face down on a single strip to quickly add the same fabric to all of the units at the same time. (You probably can't see the long strip very well in this photo because it's white -- just like the table.)

As your block approaches its finished size, it's a good idea to use really wide strips. Had the red heart fabric been 3/8 of an inch wider, this block would have been ready to trim.

Instead, I had to add another light strip and then off-set the ruler so that the final light strip would be triangular rather than an impossibly skinny rectangle.

Here are two other finished blocks. A fourth one is almost done, but I need to post before leaving for work.

As Jo suggested, I'm going to use these blocks for the corners of the quilt. My colors for these are quite a bit darker than the previous blocks. Log Cabins always scream, "Contrast! Contrast! Contrast!" while I'm sewing them. So what can I do but obey?

Crumb Quilt-Along #5

2011-10-15T19:29:00.000-07:00

Due to circumstances beyond my control (a.k.a. "real life"), I'm a week behind on Jo's Crumb Quilt-Along. So this week I've been working on liberated blocks made with triangles. When I rummaged through my drawer of white scraps, I discovered that I had a lot of small, white triangles.

I paired them with rectangles like this and sewed down the hypotenuse of each triangle using an approximate 1/4 inch seam.

Then I cut away the excess colored fabric . . .

. . . and pressed open the resultant square.

I found that I could also pair single white triangles with any colored scrap of approximately the same size.

Here are some of the 1/2 square triangles I made:

And here are the three blocks I finished:

I like these blocks, but even though I did them without any measuring, they don't look very wonky. I suppose that's because I started out with the precut white triangles.

I look forward to doing some Log Cabin style blocks next, and hope to be caught up to everyone else by the end of the week.

A Quick & Easy Sewing Machine Cover

2011-10-04T00:01:00.000-07:00

My mom has decided to convert her second bedroom into a sewing and craft room so that she can leave her sewing machine set up all the time.

When I visited yesterday, I noticed her new sewing machine cover. It isn't pretty, but it keeps her Singer 500 dust free.

She made it by cutting across a tee shirt just under the sleeves and then sewing the cut edges shut. That's just one seam since the body of the shirt is a tube and there's already a hem on the bottom. Of course, that mostly cuts off any cute logo the shirt might have had since those are usually positioned on the upper chest.

I suppose you could preserve the logo by making your cut just under the neck. But then you'd have to cut down the sides in order to make a symmetrical shape. And you'd have to cut off some of the bottom because it would now be too long. And then you'd have to hem it. Too much work!

I have some pre-quilted fabric which I bought a couple of years ago in order to make a cover for my Bernina. It's still sitting in my closet because I'd much rather be quilting than sewing a machine cover. But I think even I could spare the time to make one of these.

Actually, my mom didn't spend any time at all making hers because it's a repurposed icon cover. She makes these tee shirt bags to protect her icons when she's transporting them to and from her painting class. (An icon is a religious picture painted on a wooden board.) The one in the photo, Our Lady of Sorrows, is still in progress. If you're interested, here's a link to Sacred Image Icons, the website of her teacher. (Warning: it plays music.)

Crumb Quilt-Along #4

2011-10-03T07:33:00.000-07:00

This week we are doing Nine Patches and Four Patches. (You can see all of the steps here at Jo's Country Junction.) Usually, I can't get to my crumb project until Friday, my day off. This week I had to work on Friday, so I didn't actually sit down at the sewing machine until Sunday evening.

Fortunately, I had quite a few trimmings left from previous projects which I thought would give me a head start on this week's blocks. Unfortunately, I was half asleep.

I'm not very satisfied with this little Nine Patch. I surrounded it with precut half-square triangles. It just looks blah. I think that the value of the inner triangles is too close to the value of the outer ones.

This little four patch is even more disappointing. Not enough contrast, I think. I put the pink half-border on in an effort to perk it up a bit. I think I'll have to make a few more Four and Nine Patch based blocks just to prove to myself that I can do it

The Bad Before, Continued...

2011-09-27T00:01:00.000-07:00

The reorganization of the sewing room is still in progress. Here a second set of pictures pictures which I meant to post soon after The Bad Before. This is my so-called living room. It's really an annex of the sewing room because the only living I do in here is quilt making. I don't even own a couch.

This buffet holds my Singer 401 on the left side; my serger is normally on the right. The drawers in the middle hold cutting and sewing supplies. The plastic boxes hold projects in progress. They're 14 inches square and are meant to be used by scrapbookers. I like using them for quilting projects because 12 inch blocks fit easily inside them. They are also useful for corralling quilt block units, such as the three hundred half square tringles I needed to make for "Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll." (I have even more of these boxes stacked in my bedroom. Eek!)

I consider fireplaces to be a waste of wall space. I never use them. Right now I've got this little cabinet on the hearth. It holds Fiona, my Singer Featherweight.

My cutting table occupies the middle of the room. You can drop the leaves, but I never do. There are a couple of bins underneath it with fabric set aside for a particular project. Just off screen to the right are two bookcases and an easy chair that I seldom sit in because it makes me slump. I should probably get rid of it.

Here's the matching foot stool. The binders hold part of my collection of Quilter's Newsletter Magazine. They don't fit in the sewing room any more, and I'm not sure where to put them. (The yellow Post-it notes mark the pages which have quilts I'd like to make. I don't think I'll live long enough.)

(Actually, the living room looks worse than this right now because, since taking these photos, I've pulled so much stuff out of the sewing room and just dumped it here.)

Well, now that you've seen the bad "before" pictures, I look forward to finishing my reorganization so that I can show off the amazing "after" pictures. (I hope!)

Crumb Quilt Inspiration: The Case of the Teeny Tiny Triangles

2011-09-24T18:24:00.000-07:00

"The true economy of housekeeping is simply the art of gathering up all the fragments, so that nothing be lost. I mean the fragments of time, as well as materials. Nothing should be thrown away so long as it is possible to make any use of it, however trifling that use may be..." Lydia Marie Child, The American Frugal Housewife, 1832.

When I read this quotation, crumb quilting immediately leapt to mind as it makes use of my smallest bits of fabric. Though I probably waste too much time rooting through my scrap drawer in search of the right color or perfect sized bit for those cute little flying geese units or star points.

Which also reminds me . . .

Years ago I bought a grab bag of scraps at my guild's Trash & Treasures meeting. The contents included a Ziploc bag of tiny right triangles. But how could I use them? I always work with preshrunk fabrics, but obviously I couldn't toss these little guys into the washer -- not even in a lingerie bag. They'd turn into a tangled mass of threads. So they remained in my stash all these years. And though I considered them unusable, I couldn't bring myself to throw them away.

Yesterday, when I was making my Wonky Star blocks, it occurred to me that these little triangles might be useful as star points. Perhaps I could preshrink them by spraying them with water and then ironing them dry. I put a piece of muslin on my ironing board and gave it a try.

Eek! The color from the triangles leached into the muslin. So much for that idea.

But what if I sewed them into something that would never be washed -- such as a pin cushion?

I'm having a go at that tonight. If it doesn't work out (and I have real doubts about what will happen when all those points meet in the middle) maybe I really had better toss them in the trash. After all, Ms. Child mentions advocates the wise usage of "fragments of time, as well as materials."

Crumb Quilt-Along #3: Hearts and Stars

2011-09-23T16:35:00.000-07:00

I worked more hours than usual this week, so Friday was my first opportunity to sit down with step 3 of "Crumb Along With Me" from Jo's Country Junction. Jo provided her own tutorial and also linked to Bonnie Hunter's instructions for making Maverick Stars. I decided to follow Bonnie's method, but I used 2 inch squares for the background blocks instead of 2.5." Then I added some leftover strips from my scrap drawer to bring the block up to 6 inches unfinished.

I was very pleased with the way this one came out. Small is always cute.

I had a little more trouble with the heart. I was using Bonnie's method for that too, which calls for piecing each half of the star separately and then joining them with a seam down the middle. My first mistake was making two left sides for the heart. But I just made a new right side out of a different fabric, and I now think that the heart looks better than if it had been all the same color.

However, I think I will go back and try out Jo's instructions now. Because you can't have two many piecing techniques under your belt -- right?

By the way, I am charmed to discover that that Chicky Quilts used the same pink kitty fabric for her heart that I did. And if you scroll down to the close up view of her block, that green ivy print in the corner is also in my stash!

Unexpected Pattern Bonus

2011-09-22T23:30:00.000-07:00

Last week I was rooting through my collection of apron patterns hoping to find one that would fit this bookish fabric I found at a local quilt store's "yard sale." I've got two one-yard pieces.

As a library aide, I am required to keep a walkie-talkie on my person so that I can be easily summoned when one of the library clerks needs a shelf check. I also need to carry my computer glasses with me. They're perfect for shelving. (If I use my regular glasses, which have progressive lenses, it's impossible to read the spine labels of the books on the bottom shelves without contorting my neck and eyeballs into strange and painful positions.) And during the month of September, the entire staff is required to keep a detailed, daily log of our activities. So I also carry around pencil and a small pad of paper.

That's a lot of stuff to shove into the nice flat pockets of my Crescent Skirt. So I thought I would make myself an apron with ample pockets. I was thinking of using view 2 of Simplicity 8563, a vintage pattern from 1969. (That's the yellow one.)

I found this pattern at a thrift store. In fact, I found five copies of it: two adult sizes and three children's sizes. And I bought them all. (Why not at at 25 cents each?) I couldn't help wondering about their history. Was it a Brownie or Girl Scout troop for which these were originally bought? Or a church group, perhaps? Or just an extended family's special event?

Only view 1, the red apron with the heart shaped pocket, has been cut out and used. (If you click on the photo to enlarge it, you can see that the pattern comes with an iron-on transfer for appliqueing the word "Love" onto the pocket in a groovy style of lettering.)

I was expecting to use the adult size 8-10. But because patterns were sized differently in 1969, it's actually too small for me. I didn't have the 12-14, so I opened up the 16-18 to see if it would be too hopelessly large. And tucked inside the envelope was 4 1/8 yards of vintage, jumbo rick-rack -- the exact amount needed for this size. It felt like a special link with that group of unknown girls and women who had made these aprons back in the '60s.

Crumb Quilt-Along #2

2011-09-16T22:10:00.000-07:00

Today I finally got to sit down and do my free-hand flying geese blocks for the crumb block sew-along at Jo's Country Junction. These were fun, but very slow to make. I'm trimming them with my six inch ruler which means that they'll finish at five and a half inches.

Here's a picture of the first one before trimming. I wasn't thrilled with it and resolved to attempt some smaller geese.

These geese are smaller and cuter.

Here's another photo taken after the blocks were trimmed.

I like them, especially the one with the smaller geese, but I find that I'm using more strips than crumbs. I read on Bonnie Hunter's website that she makes three and a half inch blocks. I think that would probably make it easier to use up more of the tiny scraps. Not to mention being unbearably cute. But you'd probably have to be really crazy to attempt a whole quilt made with such tiny blocks.

I was trying to explain crumb blocks to a friend when I suddenly remembered that this is not the first time I've worked on a crumb-like project. Years ago I was working on a "Mile-A-Minute" quilt, inspired by an article by Carol A. Coski in the Winter 2000 issue of American Quilter. Ms. Coski speeds up the process of crumb piecing by sewing her small scraps to a long strip of fabric and then cutting them apart to make little two patches. These "twosies"are then rotated and sewed to another long strip and then cut apart to make "threesies. And so on and so on. Basically, you are making crazy patchwork fabric. (I tried, unsuccessfully, to find a website by the author which might explain this process in more detail. However, here's a link by another blogger giving a short tutorial for it.)

Here's a picture of the quilt top I pieced using this technique:

Here's a close-up of one corner:

The basic unit looked like this:

The sashing and cornerstones helped to stabilize the bias edges which some of the blocks had after cutting. Then I joined them into rows.

I never finished it because I decided that I'd rather have a lap quilt than a wall hanging. I even cut more sashing and cornerstones, but in all the bustle of moving (four years ago), I never got back to it. I'm thinking that perhaps I will sash the special crumb blocks that Jo is teaching us to make and add them to this quilt.

And after that, who knows? My mind keeps returning to the thought of those three and a half inch blocks. Maybe I am that crazy!

Ta Da!

2011-09-14T18:53:00.000-07:00

During the past week I finished the blocks for my donation quilt and assembled them into a top. I'm trying to decide if it should have borders or not. It's only 36 inches square which is rather small even for a baby quilt. I have a dark blue for the binding. Perhaps I should make a border of the same fabric. What do you think? I need to finish by the end of October, so I can't afford to dawdle over my decision.

A Crumby Temptation

2011-09-11T00:01:00.000-07:00

Oh, dear! So little time -- so many enticing projects.

I just found out about the "crumb-along" which is being hosted at Jo's Country Junction. Every Tuesday for the next ten weeks, Jo will be posting "...ideas on fabric requirements, block construction, layouts and the like. You'll have a week to make 2-10 blocks a week depending on your preference and your schedule." Her goal is to make 36 six-inch blocks for a baby quilt, though participants can make larger or smaller projects as they prefer.

While re-organizing my sewing room I've become aware of just how many crumbs I have. So I'm very tempted to dive into this sew-along. (Actually, I have two other crumb drawers as well as a couple of plastic bags so the situation is dire!)

I think I might try making 3 1/2 inch blocks a la Bonnie Hunter so that I can use up my tiniest crumbs. (See her crumb tutorial here.) Then I could save the bigger crumbs for the project on yesterday's post.

Scrappy Inspiration

2011-09-10T14:52:00.000-07:00

I was visiting my daughter in Seattle over Labor Day weekend and, much to my delight, our trip to Bainbridge Island included a visit to Esther's Fabrics where we saw this quilt. As far as I could see, it wasn't from a pattern they were selling, so I took the liberty of snapping a photo. With its wonky construction technique, this looks like a good way to use up random scraps.

Sewing Room Makeover: The Bad Before

2011-09-07T01:48:00.000-07:00

Sooner or later it comes: the day when your sewing room is so crowded and so messy that you can no longer sew in it. My sewing room has reached that stage, and I have been working to reorganize it. Here are the "before" pictures.

My stash is housed in stacking baskets in an alcove which used to be a closet. (The previous owner of this house removed the sliding doors.) It doesn't look that bad because you can't see the bags of fabric on the floor in front of the baskets.

As I step backwards you can see the other stuff that is in front.

Here is its true awfulness revealed. The plastic drawers have casters and can be rolled about. Theoretically, I should be able to move them for easy access to what's behind them. But it doesn't work out that way because there is so much other stuff on the floor.

Now I begin to pan the camera around the room. As you can see, this is also my library annex. The bookcases fill the entire north wall. Most of these books are children's literature, but you'll also find hardcover science fiction, some science books that didn't fit in the library proper, tall picture books, and a few homeschooling materials. On the top of the bookcase is a bolt of batting, some packaged batting and poly fiber-fill, a pillowcase filled with felted wool, and a box of photos. You can also see two of my sewing machines and my serger.

Here's the east wall. There's a six foot banquet table set up in front of the blinds. My Bernina 1530 is in a SewEzi table set at right angles to it, and there's a four foot table behind the SewEzi. I've got some short Ikea bookshelves on the south wall with a bunch of random stuff on them.

The bottom shelves of those bookcases are firmly anchored by the Encyclopedia Britannica and the Catholic Encyclopedia. The other shelves hold my sewing notions, patterns, boxes with works in progress, and some bolts of fabric I got at an amazing sale.

Here's the edge of that bookcase with my hoop, quilting templates, and rulers hanging on the wall. More stuff is piled in the corner. The French doors lead into the living room. (Why is that random chair here?)

Believe it or not, my sewing room spills over into the next room. But this is enough mess for one post, so I'll show you that tomorrow.

Back to Quilting

2011-09-05T12:00:00.000-07:00

Lately, most of my blogposts seem to be about vintage patterns or garment sewing. But I'm primarily a quilter even though I haven't been writing about it lately. To prove it, here is a picture of my current project.

I'm not really thrilled about the fabrics, but I didn't choose them. They're from a kit put together by my former quilt guild. They were sponsoring a quiltathon during which members would spend the entire day together sewing quilts for charity. I couldn't attend, but I took one of the kits home intending to work on it in my free time. But alas! As often happens, I had less free time than I expected. This was back in 2005 when I was a caregiver for my husband who had cancer.

In 2007, when I was packing to move to another city, I discovered the still unused kit. Guiltily, I contacted the guild. They told me not to bother returning it, merely asking that whenever I did get around to sewing it that I donate the quilt to some deserving charity.

Fast forward four years.

In my new town I have frequently been invited to attend a women's group which gathers every month to do crafts, chat, pray, and listen to an inspiring talk on CD. I almost never attend because I'm usually working on the date they meet. But the time before last I was able to make it and wondered what sort of project to bring. Most of the other ladies were making items for the annual fund-raising boutique held by a nearby Carmelite convent. So I decided to sew this long overdue charity quilt as my donation.

And here is the machine I am sewing it on: my sweet little Featherweight, whom I've christened Fiona.

She doesn't get much use because I seldom sew away from home. And normally, I'd rather use my Bernina.

Yes, I know that quilters are supposed to have a mystical love for the Singer 221, but the Bernina and I are so closely bonded that it functions as an extension of my brain much the way my keyboard does. (Here imagine an android voice droning, "We are one . . . we are one . . .") In fact, it had been so long since I'd last used poor Fiona that it took an embarrassing amount of time and concentration before we could manage an accurate 1/4 inch seam.

If I'm to finish this project in time for the November boutique, I'm going to have to work on it outside of the regular meetings. Since I like to use the same sewing machine, from start to finish, when I make a quilt I guess Fiona and I will be getting much better acquainted.

In the Queue

2011-08-17T01:34:00.000-07:00

Oh, dear! I've bought another vintage pattern, Simplicity 2313, a jumper and blouse from the 1940s. I bought it from New Vintage Lady's Etsy shop. She sells her own vintage-inspired patterns in plus sizes -- very cute, but out of my size range. She also sells vintage patterns in a variety of sizes. This one, a vintage size 14 has a 32 inch bust. (Vintage sizes run smaller than modern ones.) So I'm hoping it will fit without too much alteration.

On her blog, New Vintage Lady is hosting The Plain Pattern Project, a sew-along in which she challenges her readers to make one of the most plain and basic patterns in their collections at least three times by December 31, 2011. "One of the three garments should be made as close to the original designs as possible." The other two will offer more scope for the imagination.

This pattern would qualify, so I'm very tempted. But I'm probably being overly optimistic to even imagine I could make three versions of it by the end of the year.

I also want to try the 1950s Walkaway Dress sew-along hosted by the Eidelweiss Patterns blog. Originally issued in 1952, this Butterick pattern was wildly popular. Now reissued as Butterick 4790, many people have been lured into buying it by the perky and charming cover illo from the original pattern. But people who have actually made the dress give it very mixed reviews. Most complain about the fit. Interestingly, as revealed on the Eidelweiss Patterns blog, the modern version does not exactly reproduce the original pattern. The author of the sew-along shows how she restored the lines of the original bodice here, and is showing a more step-by-step version of the alterations during the sew-along.

I bought the pattern some time ago, but have hesitated to actually cut it out after reading the bad reviews of it and actually seeing a woman wearing this dress last Halloween. (Very sad!) I think I'd really like to have a go at the alterations, especially since I already have some inexpensive fabric in my stash which I could afford to devote to it. (This pattern takes nearly five yards!)

Oh, dear! For a quilting blog I've had way too many garment posts lately. Okay, the next couple of posts will be about quilting.

Finished the Crescent Skirt!

2011-08-16T02:45:00.000-07:00

This is just a quickie post to report that I've finished the Crescent Skirt sew-along hosted by Sewaholic. This is not the best picture in the world because it was taken late at night by Fillius who had never used my camera before. In the original I looked like the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Thank goodness for iPhoto which also allowed me to cut off my head. (Fillius snapped the shutter while I was trying to give him instructions, so my mouth looked really weird. I mean really weird, as if an alien from outer space had taken over my body.)

While I was sewing it, I referred to this pattern as The Skirt of Doom because I kept making so many stupid mistakes. I hasten to assure you that it was not the fault of the designer. This pattern is very well designed and the instructions are clearly written. And the well-photographed sew-along was amazingly helpful.

I like the way the skirt turned out. The original is a good deal shorter. I lengthened mine because I wanted to wear it to work where I need to be able to squat down modestly to reach the lower bookshelves. The pockets were easy to put in and lie nicely flat. My fabric choice was unfortunate. I like the print, but you can't see the lovely stitching detail on the waistband. And in this photo you probably can't even see that the waistband goes down into a point. I was worried how this would look on me because I have a middle-aged tummy. Surprisingly, the waistband disguises it. And I think this skirt looks good even though I made it from a quilting cotton. It goes nicely with a tucked in T-shirt or blouse. And I've successfully worn it with with blouses designed to be worn untucked. I'm glad about that because I have quite a few of those left from my pants-wearing days.

(Just so you know: I'm not one of those women who refuses to wear pants for religious reasons. I've switched to skirts because I now have to wear support hose, and they're just too hot to wear under trousers -- even with air conditioning!)

I will definitely make this again, but not in such a busy print. I want the curved seams on the waist band to show up. Perhaps a nice, lightweight denim?

The Joy of Buttons (Vintage)

2011-08-08T03:05:00.000-07:00

I have an embarrassingly large button stash: five metal cookie tins and a gallon Ziploc bag -- all stuffed with buttons. Most of them were inherited from my mother-in-law who was quite a seamstress in her day. She used to boast that she could come home from work in the evening and sew an entire outfit in time for her sister to wear it the next morning -- all on her trusty little Featherweight. Her button collection continued to grow even after she left off sewing because she was a bit of a pack rat who could never pass up a bargain.

My mother, who sewed a lot of dresses when we girls were young, also had an ample supply of buttons. She gave them to me during her downsizing frenzy, though she reserves the right to drop by any time she needs some.

Since my mother is 80 and my mother-in-law would have been 100, some of my buttons now qualify as vintage. Those which are still attached to their cards have such charming artwork that I doubt I could bear to use them.

My favorites are the baby buttons.

These are so tiny that I can't imagine making buttonholes for them -- at least not by machine. I suppose one might have made hand worked buttonholes that small.

Or would thread loops have been used? (They used make those by working a hand buttonhole stitch over several strands of thread.)

Here's a sultry beauty.

This must be her clean-cut boy friend.

I love the cut-out leaf design on these.

And how about these glass buttons imported from Western Germany? "Guaranteed to wash and iron." The way the color flows from pink to blue is amazing. The photo doesn't do them justice.

And here are a few loose buttons whose shapes or color I found interesting. I don't know if you can see the emblem very well, but the dark green button on the lower left is an official Girl Scout button. It must have survived my brief membership. (All I remember about the meetings was that the dues were ten cents and that we met in a room with a piano where all the other girls played Chopsticks or some other dreary two-fingered tune that went, "Bomp, bomp, bomp! Da-bomp, da-bah, da-bomp!")

More Vintage Patterns

2011-06-11T21:35:00.000-07:00

Once again I've succumbed to the lure of vintage patterns. I've bought not one, but two of them -- which just goes to show that a woman with a credit card should not be browsing the Internet late at night.

The first is Advance 4158 from the 1940s. I fell in love with it after seeing View 1 on Vintage Girl's blog. I love the details on this pattern, those little slits on the top of the sleeve, those cute buttoned pockets, the bound button holes. (Vintage Girl added piping to her version which looks darling.) The dress has a side zipper, but I wonder if you could do without it since there are also buttons down the front.

This is an unprinted pattern, something I've never worked with before. Unlike modern patterns, the unprinted ones came precut. And they had perforations to mark the darts, seam allowances, etc. rather than printed lines and dots.

The second pattern is Simplicity 1668 from 1946. The scallops in View 1 captured my heart.

This pattern seems to be a hybrid. It's printed, but like its unprinted brethren from this period, has perforations to mark construction details.

I read the pattern sheet today and discovered that it's supposed to have triangular shoulder pads. (Boo!) But at least it also includes rudimentary instructions on how to construct them. However, I think I'll wait to see how the dress looks without them. View 1 has a side zipper, something I've never attempted. View 2 has a back zipper which should be relatively easy to insert.

Both of these will need size adjustments which will be another new challenge. In the meantime, off they go to my pattern drawer to until I've finished my current projects. If only I didn't have to work! Think how much more time I'd have for sewing. But then, how little money I'd have for supplies. Oh, well.

Crescent Skirt 1 (And Agonized Shopping)

2011-06-10T00:43:00.000-07:00

Things have been busy this month. We lost one of our library aides, so the rest of us have been working increased hours until she can be replaced. Summer is our busiest season, thanks to our summer reading program, and I often come home too exhausted to do much of anything except vegging out with a book or a DVD. Nevertheless, I've been trying to progress at least a little each day on my new Crescent Skirt.

Sewaholic's patterns are well designed and have very clearly written instructions. In addition, she has recently hosted a sew-along for the Crescent Skirt which walks you through the entire process from choosing your fabric and notions, to sewing and fitting a muslin, and then constructing the finished skirt out of fashion fabric which includes an amazing new technique for inserting the zipper. Each step is well illustrated with photos and almost any question you can think of has already been answered in the com box.

I began tracing the pattern on May 30th. The only difficulty I had was trying to keep track of which line I was tracing. There are so many sizes included in the pattern that in certain spots the lines seem to smudge together into an indecipherable haze of dots. I did the best I could while trying to reassure myself that with a 5/8 inch seam allowance (which appears simply huge to a quilter) there is less need to worry about a possible 16th of an inch variance. Still, I couldn't help worrying just a little because the waistband has so many curved seams.

Sometimes I have a tendency to overthink my projects and become a little obsessive-compulsive about accuracy. So I forced myself to just finish the tracing and then began pinning the pattern to the muslin. That's when I remembered that I'd planned to buy new glass headed pins with a 20% off coupon valid for any one item at the local quilt store during the month of May. Since the next day was already completely booked, today would be my last chance. So I jumped into the car, zoomed down to the shop, and bought my pins. Then I remembered that I was also eligible for a 15% discount because May is my birthday month. So I decided to also buy some extra-fine patchwork pins.

I love to use these for piecing because they are so thin -- only 0.4 mm -- and super sharp so they won't distort your 1/4 inch seam allowance.

Then, just as I took them to the counter, I noticed a sample quilt that I madly fell in love with. It was a dinosaur quilt, beautifully designed, and perfect for a little grandson. I loved the colors, the pattern, and clever use it made of a color co-ordinated border print. The shop had been selling kits for this quilt and there was only one left. I grabbed it, thinking of my 15% discount and my two year old grandson, and then stood there and agonized for about 20 minutes.

I loved the quilt. I wanted to make it for my grandson. But it was a kit! I never make things from kits. But the colors were perfect! I couldn't have chosen better myself. But, I told myself, you already have dinosaur fabric in your stash, albeit in a very different style. And you've been planning to make the grandson a quilt from it for ages. And at this point in your life you need to use your stash not add to it. And if you're not designing the quilt yourself, or choosing the colors yourself, then there won't be much creativity involved in this project. And you will be bored, bored, bored by this project and you Will Not Finish It.

But I want this quilt, I protested. I did not dignify that argument with a reply. (I hate it when I give myself the silent treatment.)

Finally, reluctantly, I put the kit back down onto the display, and another woman, who had been hovering nearby, snatched it up. With a sigh for what might have been, I paid for my second packet of pins and hurried home.

Then I pinned and cut my muslin. My only mistake so far: I traced a second copy of pattern piece #10 and forgot to trace piece #9. Luckily, I noticed before I finished cutting.

And you know what? I haven't felt a moment's regret about not having bought that kit. Funny how important it seemed at the time.

Give-Away at St. Gemma's Art & Needlework

2011-05-15T13:58:00.000-07:00

Rebekah, the talented young woman who taught me how to alter the neckline of my granddaughter's First Communion dress when I discovered that the bodice would not close in back, is holding a Give-Away at her sewing and crafting blog, St. Gemma's Art and Needlework. (Actually, it's a joint Give-Away with her also-talented sister Catherine.)

There will be two winners and two sets of prizes. (My favorites are the crocheted roses.)

Check it out here. It's very easy to enter.

And here's a lovely video about the contest which Catherine made.

My personal favorites are the crocheted roses.

May-Every-Day: Update

2011-05-14T13:15:00.000-07:00

I'm not doing very well at meeting my self-imposed challenge to blog every day during the month of May.* Part of the blame may be attributed to Blogger which has been doing Weird Things to its clientele. And now my modem is malfunctioning. Verizon says that the modem is communicating with them but ignoring my computer. They promised to ship me a new modem, but in the meantime I no longer have Internet access at home.

Yesterday I dragged my laptop to the public library so that I could use their free Wi-Fi to read my backlog of email. Today I brought my computer to Borders (while Fillius spends his gift card) in hopes that I could do a little blogging.

Administrative Details: Since I'm dating my posts as if they were written consecutively, this one is dated May 14th even though it's actually May 24th. And my daily blog posts are split between my two blogs, this one and Catholic Bibliophagist.

====

Marking and Making Tucks: A Tutorial

2011-05-12T20:59:00.000-07:00

One of the things I had to figure out for the First Communion dress was how to mark and make the tucks on the sleeves and bodice. Usually, when sewing tucks, the pattern will have you mark each tuck with two parallel lines. After transfering these lines to the fabric, you're supposed to bring the two lines together and then sew along the lines.

But it's actually much easier to sew a tuck if you only mark a single line representing the center fold of the tuck. So my first step was to trace the pattern piece substituting a single solid line exactly midway between each of those dotted lines which you see above.

But how would I transfer the lines to my fabric? Naturally, I didn't want to use pencil, chalk or dressmaker's carbon paper on white satin. So I decided to mark my tucks with thread.

First I traced the position of the tucks onto a piece of pattern paper. Using blue painter's tape, I attached the paper onto my cutting table. Then I taped a piece of fabric, large enough to cut out the sleeve, over the paper template. I was able to see the black template lines through the fabric. (In the photo I'm using a piece of bleached muslin, but I was able to see through the satin equally well.) I sewed a line of running stitches over the marked lines being careful to sew only through the fabric and not the paper underneath it.

After thread tracing the tuck lines, I removed the fabric. I pinned the sleeve pattern piece onto the fabric, lining up the tuck lines on the pattern with the lines I had marked on the fabric in blue thread.

To make the tucks, I folded along the first blue thread line and ironed it down.

Then I sewed a seam that was half as wide as the distance between the two tuck lines on the original pattern. (Rather than do any complicated math to figure this out, you can take your original pattern piece, bring those dotted tuck lines together, and then put the pattern piece under your presser foot just as if you were going to sew a seam along the tuck line on the pattern. Sink your needle into the sewing line and see which guideline the fold falls along. Or, if your machine allows you to shift your needle position, you can put the fold against the nearest guideline and then move your needle left or right until it's in the right spot to sink into the sewing line.)

In my case, putting the folded edge at the 1/4 inch guideline on the needle plate and moving the needle to the right just one click proved perfect. To keep from forgetting the proper setting, I wrote it down in pencil on my sample sleeve.

After sewing the tuck, I pulled both threads to the wrong side of the fabric, knotted them by hand, and clipped the thread tails.

Here are the finished tucks. Once they were all done, I removed the the blue thread. No marks were left behind.

I followed this procedure with the satin, and was able to easily mark and sew the tucks without having to worry about about having to remove any markings from the fabric.

Here's a picture of the completed satin sleeve.

An Unexpected Sewing Aid

2011-05-10T21:28:00.000-07:00

My new favorite tool in the sewing room is the humble Post-it note. When making the First Communion dress, I did a lot of samples to figure out what stitch settings or seam allowances would work best for various parts of the dress. In this case, I had to experiment with the blind stitch on my machine in order to get the most invisible hem possible.

But now that I'm middle aged, I have a brain like a sieve. So I carefully wrote the settings on a Post-it and stuck it to a corner of my sewing machine table so that when I finally got to the hem, I'd remember the stitch width that had worked best.

(By the way, the little pin cup in the corner is a feature of the Sew-Ezi table which I bought last January. I'm always careful not to sew over pins, and I find it so handy to drop the pins into that little indentation. It's much easier than trying to shove them into a pincushion.

Next In the Queue

2011-05-08T23:47:00.000-07:00

The closer I get to the end of a sewing project, the more I find myself thinking about what I'll work on next. Sewing the First Communion dress took so long that I'm eager to get back to quilting with its precise 1/4 inch seams and its soothing two-dimensional construction.

But my wardrobe is so scanty right now that I think I'll have to take the time to make myself a skirt I can wear to work. I'm going to try the Cresent Skirt by Sewaholic. (Tasia, the designer, is hosting a sew-along here.)

I hope this pattern won't be too young for me. I'll be making it a bit longer than the photos on the website.

Two things in particular attracted me to this pattern. The first is that it has pockets! I really need pockets when I'm at work. The second is that it is supposed to be suitable for quilting cottons -- something which I've got an awful lot of.

Last year a local quilt shop was flooded due to a plumbing problem. Bolts of fabric which were lined up on the floor acted as wicks, sucking up water until they were soaked. The owner had the fabric dried and sold it off cheaply by weight. I bought a lot of it figuring that I could use it for quilt backs if nothing else. (I washed it, of course.) I'm also using it to try out new patterns since it was cheaper than unbleached muslin and can actually be worn if the pattern turns out well.

At first I was considering the floral at the top of this post. But I regretfully concluded that the print is just too large. My second choice is this abstract print which would probably look okay with my black or white short sleeved tops. And the scale of the print is much more suitable.

First Communion Dress -- Finished!

2011-05-07T22:59:00.000-07:00

Yes, the dress was finished on time . . .

so that Granddaughter #2 could wear it on her very special day.

Here's a close up of the bodice:

(I had hoped that you'd be able to click on the photo to see the lace between the two groups of tucks, but Blogger doesn't want to co-operate.)

My favorite part of her outfit was the veil, something for which I can claim no credit whatsoever. It was made by a family friend for Granddaughter #1 who wore it the year before. Isn't that fabric gorgeous? My daughter-in-law says that her friend, who also makes vestments, mail ordered it. How I'd love to see the catalog!

And now it's time to confess. This is not the dress as I originally envisioned it. After buying 5 yards of white silk dupioni, after discovering new techniques for sewing with it, after learning how to alter the pattern for a custom fit, and especially after struggling with the washing and ironing issues, it became apparent that the learning curve was too steep for the time allotted. And this was one project that had to be finished on time.

So I ditched the silk and bought polyester satin at (blush!) JoAnn's.

Then the dress went together fairly quickly. I simplified the sleeve cuffs but otherwise left the pattern the way I'd planned. I wish, however, that I had made one other change. When I'd been planning to use the silk, I changed the skirt from a slightly gathered four-gore skirt with a curved hem to a dirndl with a deep, straight hem. I now think that the original A-line skirt would have been better suited to the fabric because the polyester satin was a bit too "springy" to be so tightly gathered.

The satin had its own problems, of course. For one thing, it had a tendency to fray even more than the silk. I used a serger to finish most of the seams and a product called Seams Great to finish the armhole. So everything was nice and clean inside.

My first invisible zipper went in without a hitch, thanks to Bernina's #35 foot. I think I'll use them more frequently from now on. They really are easier than regular zippers. No top stitching!

The dress had only two really visible problems. For some reason the sash kept riding up above the waistline despite the thread loops. The instructions said to place one end of the loops at the waist seam and the other 1 1/2" above it. Perhaps the one end of the loop should have been above the waist seam and the other below it. And, possibly due to the springiness of the fabric, the collar had a tendency to flip up a bit.

But my granddaughter seemed to like it which, as I reminded myself, is what was really important.

Making this dress has taught me a lot -- and not just about sewing. I realize now why having to switch my plans from stunning, heirloom frock to ordinary, nice dress upset me so much.

Although I do take a lot of pleasure in sewing for its own sake, I fear I'm also motivated by the show-off factor. The need to astonish others with my expertise and to inspire their admiration had begun to outweigh my original desire to please my granddaughter and to praise God with the work of my hands. Next time, I will aim for little less pride and a little more humility.

Funny, You Don't Look Catholic!

2011-05-05T19:50:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, the Change Oil light in my car lit up. Because it was a weekend, the place where I usually take it to was closed. So I went to Jiffy-Lube. The nice young man who checked my car (and tried to sell me additional services and products) seemed unusually nice and friendly. I probably would have thought it a bit odd if I hadn't been so eager to get back to the waiting room which had free Wi-Fi. So when he asked, "Do you go to Such-and-Such Apostolic Church?" I was caught off-guard.

"Excuse me?"

He repeated the name, adding, "It's Pentecostal."

"Um, no. I'm afraid I've never heard of it."

"Oh. I thought you might go there. I noticed the way you were dressed..." No wonder he'd seemed so friendly. He was probably a nice boy from that church and had mistaken me for one of the older ladies in his congregation.

"Actually," I said, "I'm Catholic," which is a sure-fire conversation stopper in so many situations.

As he printed out a copy of the work order for me, I looked down at my clothing. I was wearing a blue denim jumper made from Kwik Sew 2671, view A. I had omitted the bird house appliques, but it was otherwise just like the picture on the pattern envelope. I was wearing it with a black T-shirt, a pair of black stockings, and black shoes. Why did this mark me as Pentecostal? Is it the color of my outfit? The length? Its plainness?

I prefer quilting to garment sewing, but I am woefully in need of new clothes that I can wear to work. Most of my previous clothes either don't fit any more or are too shabby to wear in public. I have a part-time job as a library aide, so I need clothing in which I can stoop, squat, and reach up to the upper shelves both easily and modestly. I prefer skirts or dresses because I have to wear support hose, and they are much too hot to wear under trousers. And I need pockets!

I was planning to make another jumper -- same pattern, but in a lavender, fine wale corduroy. I hope it will look less Protestant. Maybe it will also help if I wear a crucifix or my medal of Our Lady of Guadalupe. (I don't want to be accused of false advertising!)

May-Every-Day: A Month's Worth of Posts

2011-05-04T01:49:00.000-07:00

The post for May 4th is on my other blog.

Silk or Not?

2011-05-03T11:24:00.000-07:00

The fact that I'm having so much trouble ironing my fabric has really puzzled some of the sewing ladies I've consulted online. Silk dupioni should wash and iron like a dream, at least that's been their experience. One person wondered if perhaps I'd been sold a blend instead of 100% silk and suggested I do a burn test.

I'm familiar with testing for cotton, but had never tried silk. All of the sources I consulted seem to agree that silk "usually burns readily, not necessarily with a steady flame, and smells like burning hair. The ash is easily crumbled."

So I set up my tin foil lined pie pan and, using tongs, held a small piece of my fabric over the burner of stove. It did not catch fire very easily. In fact, it just seemed to char and then bubble up into a lump. Finally, it flamed. But when I dropped it into the pan, the flame went out. I expected the bubbly black mass to be hard and solid. But it was crunchy and easily crushed. But did it smell like burnt hair? How should I know? I mentioned my difficulty to Fillius, and he assured me that it definitely did.

"How do you know?" I asked. "When did you ever smell burning hair?"

"Well..."

There are some things that mothers never find out until their children are grown.

"I once burnt some hair when I was little. Just to see what would happen." I recalled then that he used to love playing with magnifying glasses when he was young.

"And, um, I accidentally burnt some of my hair by bending too close to the stove burner one time."

"Ah," I said and asked no more. Sometimes it's better not to know any details.

It's a Learning Process: Right Side or Wrong?

2011-05-02T00:01:00.000-07:00

Last night a friend called to ask the dreaded question, "Is it done?" She was speaking, of course, of the First Communion Dress which I've been working on since February and which I'm supposed to be taking with me to Ohio this Thursday.

"Yes," I said. "It's done." As a matter of fact, I had put the last few stitches in it just moments ago. (I'd thought I had finished it a couple of days ago but had just realized that I'd forgotten to blind stitch the opening in the sash and the thread loops to hold it in place.)

"And was it fun?" she asked eagerly. I wasn't quite sure how to reply. This project has had more twist and turns, more set-backs than any other I've done in a long time.

"Well," I said carefully, "I learned a lot from it." That was certainly true, and I suppose it was all worthwhile -- even though many of the things I learned didn't end up being used in the final dress. Originally, I had hoped to document my progress, but ended up sewing too fast and furiously to be able to write about it. So I thought I'd do a few posts about the process and what I learned from it, now that I've had a chance to catch my breath.

Here is a picture of my beautiful silk dupioni on its way through my Bernina 1530. The more observant among you are probably wondering why I'm using a spool of green thread to sew white silk.

Well, I am marking the right side of my fabric. Never having worked with silk before, I realized that I had no idea which was the right side of the fabric. I could see a slight difference between them; I just wasn't sure which one was supposed to be on the outside of the garment.

So I took it to my heirloom sewing teacher, and she marked it for me with a pin in the selvage. When we were sewing our Heirloom Linen Shirts, she'd had us mark the right side with a few pins which we moved down the length of the yardage as we cut out the panels for various parts of the shirt. I couldn't quite see myself doing this with five yards of silk. (Especially since I wasn't planning to cut out all the pieces of the dress at one time.) But then I was struck with the idea of sewing the selvage edge with green thread on top and white in the bobbin. Then I would always know that the side with the green stitching was the right side. A minuscule brainwave, but mine own -- and an idea I'll use again the next time I have a fabric for which it would be easy to confuse the right side with the wrong.

May Every Day -- A Month's Worth of Posts

2011-05-01T23:30:00.000-07:00

I've decided to imitate Rebekah at St. Gemma's Art & Needlework: I have recklessly resolved to post every day in May. In her April 30th post Rebekah writes,

So far I've been one spontaneous blogger, posting maybe once or twice a week. Finding things to post about has never been a problem for me; searching and finding the time is where the trouble lies. But I am going to give it my best shot anyway and I have a long list of topics I will be covering.

I wish I could say that I'd been only posting once or twice a week -- or that I had a long list of topics to write about. As my blogging has become more and more sporadic, that portion of my brain that governs writing has become increasingly wizened. I think I need to exercise that mental muscle before it becomes completely atrophied.

The Rules:

1) Because I have two blogs, I'm allowing a post to either one of them to "count" as my post for the day. If you have never visited it, Catholic Bibliophagist is where I write about books, libraries, and reading.

2) Because I've started a couple of days late, I'm allowing myself to play catch-up. (So I'm actually posting this May 1st post on the 2nd.) But I'm not going to beat myself up if I miss a couple of posts this weekend because I'm flying east this weekend for a granddaughter's First Communion.

It's a Learning Process: Gathering Silk

2011-04-14T10:41:00.000-07:00

Wherein Quilting Bibliophagist works on a First Communion dress for her Granddaughter and records her trials and tribulation as she learns new skills, new techniques, and boldly goes where no quilter has gone before. (Cue theme music.)

Never having worked with silk before, I've been very careful to test everything, everything, on a sample before working on the actual dress.

Take gathering, for instance. Who would have thought that there would be so much difference between having the gathering line on the straight or crosswise grain of the fabric?

The sample in the upper part of the photo has the gathering line parallel with the selvage of the fabric. See how nice it looks? The bottom one has the gathers parallel with the crosswise grain. Lumpy-bumpy! I think it does that because this silk has tiny cord-like lines running through it in an east-west direction. Unless you're up close, you can't really see the lines because it's such a fine silk. But they're there and they stubbornly resist the gathering stitches. But when gathered in the other direction, they line up sweetly. To achieve this effect, I'm going to have to lay out my skirt pieces on the crosswise grain, rather than the straight grain. I'll feel like an anarchist if I do, but it just might save my sanity.

N.B. Posts do not reflect QB's current progress.

Why I Haven't Been Blogging Lately

2011-04-10T21:12:00.000-07:00

Well, I've been making a First Communion dress for my second granddaughter.

I started at the end of February, thinking that it would be a simple and quickly completed project. Little did I know...

I wanted an elegant dress that would incorporate some of the heirloom techniques that I'd learned while making the my Heirloom Blouse, but simpler -- no lace shaping, for instance. McCall's 5792, a pattern from 1977 seemed perfect. It included tucks, which I think are darling on little girls, and would allow me to throw in a couple other heirloom flourishes. I was envisioning a dress sewn in white linen. But the teacher who taught the heirloom sewing class insisted that what I really wanted to use was silk dupioni. Well, what grandmother could resist the allure of sewing her granddaughter a silk dress? Plus, she offered to take me to the garment district on her next fabric shopping trip where we'd be able to find some at a reasonable price. (That trip was amazing and deserves its own post!)

So after buying the fabric, I blithely stitched up a muslin and mailed it off to my daughter-in-law, Mrs. Darwin. I'd had to draft a new bodice, because Darwinette #2 is longer waisted than the size 6 pattern which otherwise perfectly matches her measurements. That took a while because I'd never done alterations before. But it was fun to learn a new skill, and I looked forward to cutting out the silk and barreling ahead.

Alas! The muslin did not fit properly. The neck was too tight and the back would not close.

Panic ensued as I scoured eBay for another copy of my pattern, but in a larger size. In the meantime, I received reassuring emails from Rebekah of St. Gemma's Art and Needlework who had recently volunteered to be my online sewing buddy. (Rebekah is a talented young woman who has far more experience sewing clothes than I do. I'm just a simple quilter who is easily confused by 3-D garment sewing.) She assured me that my pattern wasn't the wrong size; it merely needed to be fitted to my granddaughter's personal measurements.

From the photos which Mrs. Darwin sent me, Rebekah surmised that the neckline was too high. And luckily, she knew how to fix that. She sent me photos and clear explanations which allowed Mrs. Darwin to mark a new neckline on the muslin.

Once I received it (yay, Priority Mail!), I was able to draft a new neckline for the bodice pattern and new facings. And of course a new collar -- because any time you alter a seam, you have to alter anything that's sewn to it. I found Gertie's Peter Pan collar tutorial to be invaluable. Not having a French curve, I had a little trouble getting the shape right, but at last it was finished.

I also had to alter the sleeve and cuff after I discovered that Miss D's upper arm measures 8.5" and the cuff was only 8.25. So I added an additional inch and hope it won't be too wide now.

So finally it was time to preshrink and iron the silk. Being a cautious seamstress, I cut off an 8 inch strip of fabric from the five yards that I'd bought. Then I cut it into two pieces and serged the edges. I soaked them in cold water and then hung one on a towel rack to drip dry. The other I tossed into the dryer on low. When the first piece was merely damp, I pressed it dry using the "Silk" setting on my iron and a piece of silk organza* as a press cloth.

It looked awful! And for the first time I noticed that my beautiful white fabric had tiny black flecks in it.

I felt devastated. Another paralyzing panic attack! Obviously I'd bought the wrong fabric. Gloomily I began to look through Martha Pullen's catalog. Maybe I'd better order some linen. Handkerchief or dress weight? Would her Victorian Batiste be too thin? What about her Classic Cotton?

(The piece that had been put into the dryer looked worse, even after ironing. But I didn't feel quite so bad about that piece, because the sewing teacher had told me not to put silk in the dryer, but I was just curious to see what would happen if I did.)

Luckily, the teacher was now back from her vacation, so I dropped by the shop with my questions. She said that I'd probably ironed the silk at too high a temperature. When I got home I re-wet the fabric and tried pressing at the "Synthetic" setting. Much better. She also told me that dark flecks were normal for this kind of silk. (I suppose the flecks wouldn't really be noticeable on a colored silk; they just show up more on white.) I still felt a little uncertain though. After all, this was a First Communion dress, with the white symbolizing purity.

Another thing I'd been worried about was where the two ends of the cuff overlap. As you can see from the pictures below, the pattern calls for clipping to the seam line at the bottom of the sleeve and then folding up the fabric between the two clips to make a narrow hem.

When the cuff is attached, the little corner near the end of the collar is actually a raw edge. This is a quickie technique that you sometimes see in children's patterns, and when used with something firmly woven, like a quilting cotton for instance, I suppose it's appropriate technology. But I was worried that the silk would fray. And it seemed a cheapish sort of technique to use with on a formal dress.

My teacher agreed and suggested that I put in a continuous placket (I think that's what it's called) which means another pattern alteration.

Right now I'm wondering if maybe a plain band cuff (no placket, no overlapping, and no buttonhole) might not be a better plan. But that brings up its own problems -- such as how to attach the lace.

And I still have qualms about the fabric. It looks like it will be very difficult to iron. And the dress will have to be hand washed (or machine washed on gentle), air dried until damp, and then ironed with a press cloth. Will it be too much of a hassle for my daughter-in-law? I'll include a piece of silk organza for a press cloth, but will she curse my name for not having chosen fabric that can be run through the washer and dryer?

Well, I guess it's time for me to stop hyper-ventillating and get back to work. But that's why I haven't been blogging.

============

*By the way, silk organza is amazing stuff! It's so thin that it's transparent. And though it looks extremely fragile, it can withstand very high heat.

Update From the Madhouse

2011-02-20T15:04:00.000-08:00

I need a sewing buddy, someone who can commiserate with me when I suddenly realize that I should have sewed on the patch pockets before sewing the bodice darts in the infamous pink checked dress. My confidence in the pattern instructions is now shaken because they told me to do the darts first. And now I notice that they don't call for interfacing along the front opening where the buttonholes will be. And no interfacing on the collar. Was that negligence on their part, or a deliberate decision? A bug or a feature?

I try to think back to the last time I made dresses for the granddaughters. My middle-aged memory seems to have gone on holiday. To interface or not to interface: that is the question. I hate improvisation when sewing clothes. That's because I don't have the same confidence as I do when I'm quilting.

I need a sewing buddy who knows more than I do -- someone who, after a quick judicial glance, can tell me what I really need to do so that I won't sit around dithering. Well, this is why I like to have so many projects going at the same time. Time to leave off with the pink dress for a bit and get back to work on the Heirloom Blouse.

Back to Heirloom Sewing -- And Checked Dress Update

2011-02-17T01:28:00.000-08:00

I guess I haven't yet mentioned that my long awaited heirloom sewing class has finally begun. I took the prerequisite technique class way back in September, but the sewing class itself was delayed until February. We are working on a linen shirt which showcases various heirloom techniques. So far: lace shaping, wedding tucks, hemstitching, puffs, and machine embroidery.

I'm the only one in the class who doesn't own an embroidery machine, so the teacher did the embroidery for my shirt on one of the shop's machines. (The class is held at a local quilt store which is also a Janome dealer.) The white embroidery on white linen is very elegant. I wish I could post a picture, but my digital camera has gone senile. (That or it's mortally offended my laptop because the computer refuses to recognize it.)

While I was there last Friday, I confided to the other members of the class my problems with the pink checked fabric. The teacher took a look at it and suggested that I lay out the skirt of the dress on the crosswise grain so that the hem will fall near the selvage where the check is least distorted. I've managed to lay out the rest of the pattern pieces in such a way that the checks should look relatively straight. Luckily, the dress has kimono sleeves, and the front and back bodice pieces are joined with a bias insert which obviates the need to match the checks. I also received helpful advice from the Vintage Sewing topic on the message boards at PatternReview.com. (Click on the message board tab, then choose the Vintage Sewing topic. My thread is Child's Vintage Dress.

So I'm not only struggling with the pink checked dress, I'm also trying to keep up with the other students in the Heirloom Blouse class which is not easy because I'm the slowest seamstress in the world. But oh, I do love working with linen! In fact, working on this blouse has inspired me to try making a First Communion dress for one of my granddaughter. Just what I need -- another project. And one with a deadline! How is it that I keep adding stress to my life?

Sewing Detour!

2011-02-09T18:03:00.000-08:00

Is quilter's ADD a bona fide affliction? It must be -- why else do so many quilters have so many unfinished projects stashed in their Closets of Shame? I try to put a good face on my own case by talking about how much I like to focus on the process rather than the finished end result. But the bald truth is that it doesn't take much for me to exclaim "Oooo -- shiny!" and jump into a different project.

Just now all of my ongoing quilting projects have been moved to the back burner (Eeek! A very flammable metaphor for a seamstress.) while I try to whip up Simplicity 2210 for Granddaughter J.

I cannot resist the cuteness of View 2 -- especially since I already have some pink and white checked quilter's cotton. So on Sunday I nipped over to the LQS for some compatible, reads-like-a-solid pink for the collar and sash. (Yay, Superbowl Sale -- 25% off!) It's a very subtle tone-on-tone floral. A perfect combination!

J's measurements exactly fit the pattern's except for length. I'll have to add 5 inches to the skirt. (According to the picture, little girls wore their skirts very short in the '50s.) And I may alter the sash a little. The pattern calls for a single layer of fabric, narrow hemmed all the way around. I'm thinking that a double layer sewn right sides together and then turned right sides out would have a nicer, more finished look.

So, having having preshrunk and ironed my fabric, I began to lay out my pattern pieces. Oh, no! The checks are not printed on the straight grain of the fabric! (I know, because I tore the fabric along the crosswise grain.)

Okay, I'll just match the pattern's grainlines to the printed checks. Urrrgh! The printed checks are not really straight. The bottom of the skirt is going to look as though I sewed the dress crookedly. Now I remember why I hate checks and plaids. "A pox on directional fabrics," I say, "A pox!" What, I wonder, am I going to do?

Suddenly, everything begins to look shiny. I can feel my quilter's ADD beginning to take hold...

Gosh, maybe I should go put the borders on my Bricks & Stepping Stones quilt. And I've been meaning to sort my stash of 3.5 inch squares according to color. Or wouldn't this be a good time to start cutting those 600 half square triangle units for my Cotton Boll quilt?

No, no! I must focus. One can properly take years to finish a quilt, but a granddaughter's dress pattern will be quickly outgrown. I'm not sure yet how I will solve The Case of the Off-Grain Check, but I do know that next time I attempt something like this I'll make sure to buy a true gingham. (Real gingham has the check pattern woven into the fabric rather than just printed on it.)

Simplicity 2210

2011-02-05T19:29:00.000-08:00

Here's something else I bought at Road to California: Simplicity 2210. One of the vendors had a few vintage patterns at the back of her booth, and this one caught my eye from across the aisle. The kimono sleeves have an interesting bias under-arm inset which I'm looking forward to making.

It's a perfect fit for one of my granddaughters -- except I'll have to lengthen the skirt a bit.

I'm wondering how to make the skirt poof out like those in the picture. (Well, I know the picture is probably a bit exaggerated -- artistic license, don't ya know. But I'd like the skirt to stick out just a bit.) An underskirt, perhaps? If so, what should I make it out of? The dress would be cotton, so any underskirt must be washable.

Any suggestions?

Road to California 2011

2011-01-21T20:53:00.000-08:00

Having a major quilt show in one's own backyard is a treat for a driving wimp like me. I didn't learn to drive a car until late in life, and I'm still not comfortable behind the wheel. This is awkward in Southern California where practically everything requires freeway driving. So I look forward to "Road to California" all year long because I can get there on surface streets. And I always buy the multi-day pass because it's just too large to see all in one day.

Yesterday, I had to work. But this morning I was up bright and early, hoping to be at the show as soon as the doors opened. Unfortunately, I was halfway there before I realized that I'd left the house without my multi-day pass which I'd bought at a local quilt store weeks earlier. So I had to turn around and go home for it. But even so, I was able to pull into the extra parking lot on Guasti at around 9:30, just in time to board the shuttle to the Ontario Convention Center. (Yeah, I could have walked there, but I prefer to do my power walking in air conditioned comfort. I am so not into sweating!)

First I looked at all the quilts in both halls. I'll be talking more about those later, after I've had my second look on Sunday.

Then I hit the vendors. I'd decided that this was the year in which I'd buy a SewEzi table for my sewing machine. The Costco banquet table I currently use is too long, too high, and vibrates when I sew fast. I'd also decided to investigate long arm quilting machines. Maybe this is just an unrealistic dream. Maybe I'm too old or too weak to handle one of these. (I had back problems this past year.) But what the hey -- looking is free. Right?

I was rather intrigued by the Innova Quilting System. It seemed very smooth and easy to move. I liked that the handles, both in front and in back, were adjustable which I think would help the individual user to avoid strain. The delivery and set-up comes with some preliminary training, but the sales price includes three days of intensive training which seems to cover just about anything you'd need to know. (The downside is that the training is in Utah, so that "free" training would really cost you in travel and lodging expenses.) But they also have 24/7 customer phone support and claim that they can talk you through most problems. And I appreciated the extra info they included with their brochures showing how much room space you need to set up their various sized models and how large a quilt you could do on each one.

I spent some time looking at the Handi Quilter. They also have a sit down model, the HQ Sweet Sixteen, which has no stitch regulator but which takes up a whole lot less space than a long arm frame. You face the head of the machine and move the quilt with your hands just as you would with a domestic sewing machine. But the throat is much larger, and it has very good lighting in the stitch area. The table is only 30" by 36", but you can expand it with optional 18" extensions, and it's also height adjustable. I liked it better than I expected. The down side is that you're expected to take the head in every couple of years for servicing. I can't imagine lifting it.

I tried the Tin Lizzie, but I really wasn't sure about that wooden frame and the comfort of the handles.

I also tried the Nolting Fun Quilter which did not seem quite as easy to move about as the Innova. I think they have one of these at one of the local quilt stores. You can rent time on it, and that would probably be the best way for me to learn its pros and cons.

I skipped the really huge professional machines (with price tags to match) and didn't bother to pick up brochures for anything that made my back feel strained. I look forward to sitting down and looking up the websites for the various models, but I can tell that if I ever do purchase one of these it will only be after a whole lot of research. One of the dealers suggested I look at mqresource.com and the ABM longarmer's group on Yahoo.

I didn't buy anything except the SewEzi, but I enjoyed window shopping at all the booths. Rainbow Resource had a lot of fabrics with interesting motifs printed on various colored or batiked backgrounds. I really liked their dragon flies. One little bin of fat quarters had a small sign on it saying that sales of this particular fabric would be donated to prostate cancer research. But I couldn't figure out what the print was supposed to represent. I guess it's really hard to recognize something that you're not expecting to see. Then, suddenly, something clicked, and I realized that it was a scattered pattern of little, um . . . yes . . . that's what it was. Had I been a couple of decades younger, I would have been very embarrassed. But being a widow, and late middle aged, I was merely, "Eeeeeuw! Not a fabric I'd want." I suppose the designer meant well.

It was also at that booth that I heard about a run which the proprietor had with a customer on a motorized scooter. Although strollers and wheeled carts were not allowed, there were lots of scooters for attendees who were either disabled or just not up to a lot of walking. But one of the ladies lost control of her scooter and rammed into the side of the booth, first bringing down the overhead display onto the proprietor's head and then knocking over a pile of bolts onto the poor woman. Who knew that vending could be so hazardous?

At around 4:30 I slipped upstairs to the classroom where Bonnie Hunter was teaching. The class had just ended, and as I peeked inside I saw Bonnie who graciously invited me into the classroom to see a design wall where one of the students had been arranging her blocks. I introduced my self and, pointing to my homemade name tag which featured the Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll logo, told her that I was working on her current mystery quilt and that I would have loved to have signed up for one of her classes had they not been already full by the time I found out that she was teaching at Road. (I really wish I'd been able to attend her Scrap Saver's lecture the night before, but I had the late shift at the library on Thursday and could not have gotten there on time.) Bonnie recognized my screen name, and even remembered that C.B. stands for Catholic Bibliophagist. So did the person who was with her (whose name I did not catch), and who even admitted to having read my blog. So I suppose I've had my 15 seconds of fame.

I'm looking forward to going back to the show on Sunday when I'll have my mother in tow. Road to California has become our yearly mother-daughter ritual. Although she's not a quilter, she loves seeing the amazing quilts on display -- though she marvels how anyone could possibly have the patience to finish a quilt. (I notice that the most common question non-quilters ask is "How long did it take you to make that?") I can hardly wait to show her Bonnie's quilt in the faculty exhibit. "Rectangle Wrangle" is sort of a bargello quilt made with rectangles -- mainly plaids of course -- with strong diagonals in black. I love its border of stars. My mom will faint when she sees all those tiny pieces!

A Very Merry Christmas

2010-12-25T23:17:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas, to all my quilting and sewing friends! I had a very lovely day though I didn't have any time for quilting or sewing. However, I received some very appropriate gifts.

Sister #1 surprised me with two quilt-related gifts.

The first was a Christmas stocking made out of a Double Wedding Ring cutter quilt. The woman she bought it from told her that it needn't be used only on Christmas Eve. For example, she herself had hung one, filled with long kitchen implements, in her kitchen as an object d'art. (Personally, I would never display textile art in a kitchen unless it was highly washable since it would be exposed to both moisture and grease.) I plan to hang mine in my sewing room. The second gift, which you can also see in the picture, was a framed, vintage quilt block. I believe this pattern is called Oak Leaf & Reel. I might hang this one in my living room -- just so visitors will know that a quilter lives here. (Though I suppose that the cutting table in the living room would also be a clue.)

As you know, I've become very interested in vintage patterns, so I was also delighted with the apron which Sister #2 made for me from McCall's 1713. She sent me this picture a couple of weeks ago asking if I thought our mom would like it as a Christmas gift. I replied so enthusiastically that she also made one for me and another for Sister #1. (Different colors, of course.)

Maybe I'll wear mine tomorrow when I sit down to sew. (I've yet to start my half-square triangles for RRCB.)

Bagging Bears

2010-12-15T00:01:00.000-08:00

I'm taking a break from the mystery quilt right now while I pack the Christmas presents for Fillius Major and his family who live on the other side of the country.

None of the grandchildren are getting handmade gifts this year, but I'm making fabric gift bags for two of them because Teddy Bears are very hard to wrap.

Miss Strawberry Bear has just tried on her bag for size. She finds it very comfy. Master Blue Bear clutches his light saber somewhat anxiously. He's worried about whether the chili pepper fabric is masculine enough for a Jedi-bear's traveling bag. (Isn't that light saber cute?)

I'm not the sort to waste good quilting fabric on a project like this. These are Walmart fabrics which I bought at least a year ago intending to make aprons. But after I'd prewashed them, I discovered that they were too thin and too prone to wrinkle for almost anything I'd like to make.

But they're certainly good enough to make "green" Christmas wrapping. I'm just happy they're leaving my stash, and who knows -- perhaps my gift bags will be reused and passed around among family members and friends. Hmm... I've got a 20% off your entire purchase coupon for Jo-Ann's, and the Christmas fabric is probably marked way down. If I wanted to go green with gift bags next year, now would be the time to stock up.

(Oops! Didn't mean for that to sound like an advertisement. Just thinking aloud.)

Ugly Fabric Update

2010-12-09T10:46:00.000-08:00

Okay, I concede the title of "Queen of the Uglies" to Lisa at Inspired Quilter for her house fly fabric. The house flies on it win for their more detailed legs and abdomens. Plus, her fabric has stripes! Congratulations, Lisa. Do go over to her blog and take a look.

Repulsive Fabric

2010-12-07T23:20:00.000-08:00

Bonnie Hunter has been urging us not to confine ourselves to bland and safe fabric choices as we string piece our Step 3 blocks. As long as a fabric has a white, cream, or even beige background, it counts as a neutral.

And to encourage us to loosen up, she suggested that we post our weirdest neutrals. I figured mine were too mundane to post -- until tonight. What was I thinking when I bought this? Eeeeeuw!

I hate house flies.

So I lost no time in attacking them with a rotary cutter, and now those little vermin are in 1.5 inch strips. I hope they won't make my quilt look too unsavory, but at least they're out of my stash.

I Was Right!

2010-12-03T08:33:00.000-08:00

My hunch was correct! We're string piecing the neutrals into 8.5" blocks. This should be fun and easy, especially in the evenings when my middle-aged eyes don't see very well.

Bonnie recommends using old phone book pages for our paper foundations. But I worry about the ink transferring when they're ironed. So I'm going to cut my squares from pattern-tracing tissue paper. I've got a whole roll of the stuff. (I also do garment sewing.) It's thin and is easy to tear away after stitching.

In my first paper piecing project (which was about eight years ago), I made the mistake of using 20 lb. printer paper. Well, they say there's no teacher like experience, and it's true. I'll never do that again. That stuff was not only hard to rip out, little bits of it were left inside the stitches and I had to pull them out with tweezers. It turned me off from paper piecing for a long time and made what was supposed to have been a fun, quick project into tedious drudgery.

When I cut out my paper foundations, I plan to use my quilting rulers and an old rotary cutter with a dull blade. It's good enough for paper and much quicker than scissors!

Jury Duty -- Reprieved!

2010-12-01T10:49:00.000-08:00

I was supposed to be on jury duty today. But when I called in last night, their automated system informed me that I am not needed. So I've got a free day which I plan to devote to Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt, "Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll."

Here is a photo of some of my Step One units. (Note the cotton boll fabric!)

What's interesting is that even when I'm not sure how well certain fabrics will look together, once they've been sliced into Step One Units I just love them -- they look so cute!

I'm going with Bonnie's color scheme: pink, green, and chocolate brown. My browns are mostly Civil War repros. The pinks are all over the map. I've got some Civil War double pinks, some mauves which I bought back in the '80s or '90s, some perky pinks from my '30s repros and some very modern pinks. Ditto with my greens, most of which are from the yellowish side of the color wheel. But I've also included a few medium or forest greens as a relish.

[Well, there was supposed to be a photo of my fabrics here, but the digital camera is not co-operating. Instead, it's giving me a picture of a spaghetti squash which my son split open. He discovered that one of the seeds inside had sprouted. Why is it green? Don't plants need sunlight to do their little chlorophyll thingy? It's pretty dark inside a squash.]

By the way, I was rereading Bonnie's yardage requirements for this quilt. She calls for "assorted neutral scraps from strings, to strips, to scraps, to FQs to yardage" and the more variety the better. The mention of strings and strips really piqued my curiosity. I wonder if there is going to be some string piecing in this pattern?

Black Friday at the Quilt Store

2010-11-27T09:52:00.000-08:00

Well, yesterday was the 25% off Early Bird Sale at our local quilt store. Clutching my $25.00 gift certificate, I was there bright and early at 7:45 AM, the lone car in the parking lot. Where, I wondered, were all the shoppers?

I never go shopping the day after Thanksgiving because I don't want to face the frenzied madness, the crazed crowds in full berserker mode. Surely no consumer goods could be worth visiting the mall on that day. Besides, the malls don't hold anything I want to buy. My wants are few: books, fabric, and maybe a few sewing notions such as needles or thread. (Okay, if Santa wanted to bring me a long-arm quilting machine or a cabinet for my Bernina, I would not say him nay. Heck, he's even welcome to magically enlarge my sewing room. (Oooo! Wouldn't it be great to have a tardis sewing room, bigger on the inside than on the outside?) But alas! I think I'm too old to expect a visit from him.

However, I am sewing Bonnie Hunter's new mystery quilt, "Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll," and my stash is a bit lacking in certain colors and shades. Money is tight, but perhaps by braving the Black Friday crowds, I could make it stretch a bit further.

Only one other person had joined me when the doors opened at 8:00. I made a bee line for the corner with the Civil War fabrics and started grabbing chocolate browns and double pinks. I was hoping for fat quarters in order to maximize the number of prints for my money. But there weren't that many, so I began to pull bolts while I considered whether I'd better buy quarter yards or half yards. Quarter yards would give me more prints for my buck, but as the Mystery progressed, I might find myself regretting the limitation of having only 9 inches on the straight grain. As I was mentally dithering over my tower of bolts at the counter, the clerk asked, "Do you want fat quarters from these?" My jaw dropped.

"But, but . . . you don't cut fat quarters from the bolt do you?"

"Sure we do. If it's not too busy." By this time some nice yellow-toned greens had joined my pinks and browns, and I'd planned to weed through the pile of of bolts before having anything cut. But I was now so exhilarated by their cutting policy that I recklessly cried, "A fat quarter of everything!"

While cutting my fabric, the clerk inquired about the quilt I was making, and I'd just begun to describe Bonnie's mystery quilts when a voice behind me exclaimed, "So this is where all the browns are! And the pinks -- I need some of those pinks!" Yep, she was working on Bonnie's quilt too. Together we told the clerks at the cutting counter about Bonnie Hunter, the free patterns on her website, and her wonderful mystery quilts.

My new-found quilt sister ended up buying the fat quarters left over from cutting mine which made the shop very happy. I spent a bit more than I'd intended to (a few neutrals from the fat quarter bin joined the stack because you can never have too many of those, right?), but with the discount and my gift certificate I saved quite a bit. And now I'll have an amazingly scrappy selection for my quilt.

So after a quick preshrinking session, I'm looking forward to cutting and sewing Clue #2.

My goodness, Black Friday wasn't so hard after all!

My Quick and Dirty Quilt Repair

2010-11-21T00:01:00.000-08:00

While I was cleaning up my sewing room last week I found some old quilt photos.

The handsome young man on the left is my eldest, Fillius Major, when he was about eleven or twelve. The figure on the right is my 20 years younger self. Together, we are holding up our first and only joint sewing project, a quilt which we made for Grandpa Jack. After suffering many strokes, he had just entered a nursing home.

Grandpa Jack was my husband's father, and our kids were very close to him. So this was a sad change for all of them, but particularly for Fillius Major who could remember when his grandfather had been active and vigorous. I thought that making a quilt for Grandpa would not only be a useful gift, but a tangible way for us to express our love for him.

Fillius Major chose the fabrics, and I sliced them into squares with my rotary cutter. He sewed together some of the patches; I did the rest and attached the borders. A beginning quilter, I couldn't decide whether to tie or quilt this project -- so I did both, running diagonal lines of machine quilting through half of the squares and putting yarn ties in the middle of the others. Fillius M. made a presentation block for the lower right hand corner which he decorated with permanent fabric markers.

The gift was a great success and saw much hard use -- first in the nursing home home, and later by Fillius Major's kids. (The quilt passed to F.M. after the death of both grandparents.) Through the years it would come back to me for minor repairs and I would cover small holes with applique. (Hearts are easy! And that circle on the blue square is a planet I cut out of a piece of astronomical fabric.)

But the poor Grandpa Quilt (as the grandchildren call it) is now on its last elbows. One of the squares had simply shredded away. Another was beginning to shred. There was a rip along the edge of another block. (I must say that it's been interesting to see which fabrics have held up and which haven't. Both of the prints that shredded were fabrics that I gotten from Grandma's stash, so they were older to start with. Maybe that's why they didn't hold up.)

This quilt was woefully under-quilted which I think accounts for the stress the fabric suffered as a result of so many washings. Some of the lines of quilting had broken over the years, and the yarn ties had shriveled up and pulled through the fabric.

And here's the reason we should always use double binding on our quilts:

As you can see, the outer layer of the binding wore out, but the inner layer is still intact. (Yeah, I did a pretty crummy job of attaching the binding by machine. But it was the first one I'd ever done.

I decided that given the quilt's poor condition, a quick and dirty repair would be appropriate technology. The first thing I did was to replace the disintegrated patch. I still had some of the same fabric in my stash. Though old, I was sure it would last at least as long as the rest of the quilt. I just slid the square under the edges of the other patches and machine stitched it down.

I did the same for the other shredded patch. The block with a rip at the seamline was mended with a line of zig-zag stitches. And then, hoping to stabilize the poor quilt, I ran lines of machine quilting through the blocks that had originally been tied. Yay, walking foot! (I didn't have one of those when I originally made the quilt.) The minimal quilting I'd done in the border was broken here and there. So I echoed the original line of stitching and then bundled the quilt into one of those nylon Priority Mail envelopes, sending it off to Ohio for the grandkids to love and play with again. This is probably its last repair.

Someday it will be laid to rest in pieces, but I won't feel sad. It's been interesting to see how well (or how poorly) different quiltmaking techniques have stood the test of time and hard use. I am happy that the quilt has been so well loved, and given the improvement of my skills since then, I feel confident that my current quilts will last longer and hold up better.

In Search of Pink

2010-11-18T23:46:00.000-08:00

Bonnie Hunter just posted the first clue for her new mystery quilt: Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll. Since she's on the east coast and I'm on the west, I got to read it "early." (It was around 10:30 Pacific Time when it occurred to me to check her blog.)

I love sewing Bonnie's mystery quilts, but this time I had pretty much resigned myself to watching the fun from the sidelines because I didn't have any double pinks. I've got a good selection of chocolate browns, and a lot of great greens, oodles of neutrals, but very few pinks of any sort. (Yeah, I know we can substitute other another color scheme, but I didn't feel confident choosing one until I could actually see what the quilt was going to look like.) And running out to buy new fabric right now is not an option.

I briefly flirted with the idea of using my '30s fabrics because most of my pinks fall into that catagory. But I think they'd look odd with the chocolate browns I have. Then I remembered my Ohio Star stash.

Ages ago I decided that I wanted to make an old-fashioned looking Ohio Star quilt and set aside a bunch of fabrics for it. Well, I never got around to making that quilt, so I forced myself to raid that drawer and scored a few more pinks. (Also some more really cool greens and browns.) Then I pulled out all the pinks from the rest of my stash and tried to decide which of them would play nicely together. A couple of the '30s reproduction prints might work. And wouldn't it be cool to include this cotton boll fabric? The rest are mostly from the '80s and '90s and some of them read more burgandy than pink.

And then it struck me: I have a $25.00 gift certificate for the local quilt store! Last month seven stores held a Halloween Shop Hop. And every store you visited entered you into a drawing for a gift certificate. I'm a freeway wimp, so I was only able to visit two of the nearest shops. I didn't buy anything; I just looked about, soaking in the inspiration and fondling the bolts of fabric. So you can imagine how flabbergasted I was when I was notified that I'd won the drawing. Yes -- I'm buying me some more pinks! (If there's a patron saint of quilters, I definitely owe her a candle.)

Update: I just realized that I should also search through my two bins of fabrics that have not yet been preshrunk. Maybe I'll find some pinks in there. (It's not stored with the rest of my stash, so I forgot about it.

Star of Wonder

2010-11-15T09:17:00.000-08:00

I just got an email from Zazzle that they are having a one day sale on greeting cards: 50% off and free shipping! Fillius, my son, is selling his Christmas card there. He did the artwork on his computer and the verse inside is from G.K. Chesterton's The House of Christmas. I think they're rather nice, but I'm his mother so I may be just a teensy bit biased. Here's the link, and the discount code is ZAZZLECARD50. The sale ends at 11:59 PM (Pacific Time) tonight. (Of course, you can still buy them after the sale is over, but they won't be as cheap.)

Other news: I've decided to do Bonnie Hunter's latest mystery quilt, Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll, but I won't be starting it on November 19th when everyone else does because I can't figure out what colors to use. Usually I'm happy to imitate Bonnie's colors -- her taste is so like my own. But I don't really have many pinks right now and I can't afford to buy any new ones. So I'm going to wait until I know what the quilt will look like in hopes that the finished design will inspire my color muse.

In the meantime, I'm cleaning up my sewing room so as to have room to swing my cat once inspiration strikes. And I am finding the most amazing things! I'm looking forward to taking photos of a few of them this evening which I'll be posting here on the blog.

Hexagons: Bonnie Shows All!

2010-10-26T13:29:00.000-07:00

If you don't already follow Bonnie Hunter's blog, you've simply got to click over to her tutorial on paper piecing hexagons. It's the best one I've ever seen. Bonnie has a real knack for combining words and photos into easily understood instructions. I already use the same basting method she does (where you sew only through the fabric, but not through the paper pieces). However, Bonnie has an interesting way of basting a hexagon and then adding it to the project without ending the thread. And I really appreciated seeing the order in which she adds new pieces and how and when she ends her threads. I think I may revise my modus operandi a bit.

By the way, even if you're not interested in paper piecing as such, you should look at her tutorial just to see her incredible hexagon project. It will knock your socks off. I wish I could show it to you, but I'm afraid it wouldn't be kosher to repost her photo here.

Work on my own long-term hexagon project has been picking up lately. Fillius and I have gotten back into the rhythm of reading aloud every evening. So I hand stitch while he reads to me. He's just finished reading They All Laughed by Ira Flatow, a collection of the stories behind some of the great inventions that have changed the way we live today. Would you believe that the very first fax machine was invented in the early 19th century by an Italian priest? (But it didn't catch on.) And you wouldn't believe how many artificial sweeteners were accidentally discovered when early chemists tasted unknown substances!)

Unexpected Bargains!

2010-10-13T22:17:00.000-07:00

For various reasons, I've been on a Do Not Buy Anything program for the past few weeks and I've successfully resisted all kinds of shopping temptations. But every now and then you stumble upon a bargain that you really can't afford to pass up.

The first one was at our church's yearly festival last Sunday. At the White Elephant booth I found a brand new plastic scrapbooking case for only a dollar. (They're usually $8.00 or $9.00 in the local stores.) I use them for storing sewing and quilting projects. As they are 14 inches square, 12-inch blocks, such as my string-pieced eight-pointed stars, fit perfectly in them. They're also handy for keeping together all of the sub-units of a particular quilting project, such as all of the 3 inch Nine Patches and Rail Fence blocks I've made for my Carolina Crossroads quilt. These cases also come in handy for garment sewing. They're perfect for keeping together the pattern, notions, thread and fabric for each project.

I found the second too-good-to-be-missed bargain when I was tagging along with my mum on one of her thrift store expeditions: an Ott-Lite floor lamp for only $10.00! For anyone in the quilting world who doesn't already know this, Ott-Lites are amazingly expensive lamps which shine full spectrum light upon your work. Not only is this handy when trying to choose colors, but it helps my poor, middle-aged eyes to see what they're doing when I stitch. Now I can sew in the evenings as easily as when morning sunlight is streaming through my window. Yay!

I Meant What I Said . . .

2010-09-28T00:53:00.000-07:00

Here is proof positive that I meant what I said on Saturday. Conquering the demon of Procrastination, I unsewed the defective four-patch.

Then I replaced it with a new one and closed up the wound I'd made in the already finished row of blocks. Whew! I feel so much better now, and I'm eager to assemble the remaining rows and get this quilt completed in time for cold weather. (Which, here in Southern California, will not be soon. We're having another heatwave; the high today was 111˚!

Speaking of cold weather, my son and his family have just moved to Ohio where the nights are already chilly. Having just come from Texas, they are seriously understocked with blankets. What an incentive for Grandmama to make more quilts! (Though at the rate I work they probably wouldn't be ready until next winter.)

Featherweight Memories

2010-09-27T00:01:00.000-07:00

I love getting packages in the mail -- especially when the contents are quilt related!

Fillius Major (my oldest son) sent me a box of shirts he was weeding out of his wardrobe. He and his family are moving from Texas to Ohio for a new job. But in the midst of packing, preparing his house for sale, and getting ready to fly with five children, a wife, and two cats, he thought of his Aged Parent and her Make-a-Quilt-From-Seven Shirts project.

Fillius Major has always been a good quilter's son. When he was still a teen, he helped me find a Singer Featherweight. The whole family was in the car at the time, my husband at the wheel. I was slumped in the front seat, and though I can't remember the circumstances, I do recall that I was in a black mood.

"Uh, Mom . . ." Fillius M.'s voice broke through my emotional fog. "Do you still want one of those little black sewing machines?"

"Why?"

"That yard sale we just passed -- they had one." Yard sale? I'd been so sunk in gloom I hadn't even noticed it!

Without a word, my Excellent Husband executed a masterful U-turn, and we were back at the yard sale while I was still trying to collect my wits. And there it was: a Singer 221, a.k.a. The Perfect Portable. It had no carrying case or attachments, and the bobbin case was missing. But the foot pedal was still attached. The machine appeared to have been much used, but not abused.

Hesitantly, I approached the woman who appeared to be in charge of the sale. She looked like a burnt-out refugee from a hippie commune and spoke in a vague, disjointed manner. The Featherweight, she said, had belonged to an elderly relative. It was obvious that her descendant didn't know much about sewing machines. When I pointed out that the bobbin case was missing, she helpfully went indoors and brought out another one from a different brand of machine. Since she seemed determined to shove it in somehow, despite her lack of hand-eye coordination, I waved her away and offered to buy the machine "as is," hoping that she wouldn't ask more than I could afford.

She was firm about the price: $25.00.

I paid it gladly, even though I could not be sure that the little guy would even work when it was plugged in. Then I hustled my new baby into the car before she could change her mind.

My spirits were high as my husband deftly wove his way back into the late afternoon traffic. Thanks to the Internet, I was able to replace the missing bobbin case (though it cost me more than the machine itself). And the local quilt store was able to direct me to a good sewing machine tech who specialized in old Singers. Eventually, I even bought a stitch plate with seam markings to replace the unmarked original.

In a way, I guess that Fillius Major was my Featherweight's godparent. Perhaps, in his honor, I should stitch the Seven-Shirts-Quilt on the Featherweight.

Dang! Spiritual Battles in the Sewing Room

2010-09-26T00:01:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I was sewing on the Bricks & Stepping Stones quilt, connecting the completed rows of block. And as I was pressing the seams to one side, I discovered that one of the small black squares had a hole in it. I have no idea how it got there. Itinerant moths? Most likely that tiny hole was already in my fabric strip when I cut it into squares. But the thought of having to rip that unit out of a quilt so near completion is disheartening. I just rolled it up and went off to procrastinate with my laptop.

I love quilting, but in every project I seem to reach a point where it's hard to go on. Either I've got to correct a mistake, or I've got to trudge through a boring stage of the project, or there's a "hard part" that I'll love having done, but I dread actually doing it. There's nothing for it but the virtue of perseverance, a virtue which is in short supply in my sewing room. (It's not something that you can stock up on when you've got a 50%-off coupon from Jo-Ann's.) I know I need to just pick up my seam ripper and have at it! But like St. Paul, I do neither what I want nor what I ought. Instead, I spent much of the evening just clicking around the Internet. What a waste!

I guess my spiritual muscles are as weak as my physical muscles -- and both from lack of exercise! Okay, tomorrow after Mass I will square my shoulders and march back to the sewing machine, invoking St. Michael as I pick up my seam ripper. I will think of it as a tiny little sword. Who knew that a quilter's sewing room might actually be a training ground for larger battles in the greater world?

I Dabble in Heirloom Sewing

2010-09-17T23:22:00.000-07:00

The new stitch plate for the 1130 came in time for my heirloom sewing class today. And as it turned out, I needed those inch markings for the class, so I was glad it arrived in such a timely manner. (I'll also try using the new stitch plate on the B&SS quilt tomorrow to see if I can get the same seam allowance as the 1530 was giving me.)

Although I prefer quilt making to garment sewing, I adore learning new sewing techniques. So I had a lot of fun today at the Heirloom Technique workshop held at The Fabric Patch today. It's a prerequisite for the Heirloom Blouse class which I also intend to take. Both classes are taught by Donna Lasky, a fantastic teacher who really knew her stuff. (She was trained my Martha Pullen.) She kept us hard at it, but I enjoyed myself so much that, when we were done, I was surprised to find that we'd run two hours over the allotted class time.

As we worked through the different techniques, we assembled our samples into a notebook, recording our own customized sewing machine settings for each one. (BTW, the samples pictured above are still unfinished. I need to take the basting stitches out of the blue one and I still need to do entredeux stitches around the shaped lace circle.)

Some of the women in the class were wishing they had granddaughters to sew for. I have four granddaughters, and I love to sew for them. But I don't think I'd make them heirloom dresses. For one thing, I can remember how boring it was to wear fancy clothes when I was young -- dresses that were "too good" (and often too uncomfortable) to play in. I'd rather make them things they can have fun wearing. But for another, I'd rather sew them dresses that will not engender regret on my part no matter what happens to them.

For my darling granddaughters (A.K.A. "The Wild Girls") are probably not as docile and inhibited as I was about taking care of a Special Occasion dress though they do love wearing pretty dresses in which one can dance and twirl. But sometimes princesses just gotta climb trees!

When I was at Upland Vac & Sew, where I bought some supplies for this class, one of the staff told me about a customer who had made her granddaughter a very fancy heirloom dress for Easter which represented 100 hours of painstaking work. The little girl wore it on Easter morning while riding the brand new Big Wheel which her father had just given her. The skirt of the dress got caught and ripped, wrapping itself around the axle as she merrily continued to pedal. The child was not fazed in the least. "Don't worry. Grandma can fix it!" I find her confidence heartwarming, though I can't help wondering if Grandma's heart didn't stop for a moment.

But wouldn't it be fun to make a christening gown? Or a bridal nightgown? Or an old fashioned, romantic blouse? And I look forward to occasionally using some of these techniques to embellish fun-to-wear but relatively sturdy dresses for my beloved Wild Girls.

Bernina Woe!

2010-09-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

I was zipping through the Bricks & Stepping Stones quilt when I noticed something odd: the straight stitch on my Bernina 1530 had metamorphosed. It was still a straight stitch, but instead of the usual 12 stitches per inch, it was churning out about 24!

When I tested the other stitches, the machine behaved very erratically. Sometimes they were sewn out properly. Other times the machine attempted to sew them backwards. And frequently it stitches nothing but gibberish. Since it's a computerized machine, I assume it's a problem with the board. Woe!

When my beloved 1090 suffered a disaster two years ago, I could not afford to get it fixed. Now that the 1530 has Alzheimer's (which is sure to be a pricey repair), I've fallen back on the 1130 which my sister gave me when she was cleaning out her garage. I'm scheduled to take a class in heirloom sewing techniques this Friday, so I've been trying to familiarize myself with the 1130 and making sure that all the stitches work properly.

Unfortunately, the guide lines on the stitch plate seem to be metric so I can't get an accurate 1/4" seam.* Though I've discovered that by adjusting the needle position one click to the left, I can approximate a 5/8" seam. I called in an order for an American stitch plate (relatively inexpensive), but until it's delivered I'll have to content myself with garment sewing.

----------------

*Yes, I do have a #37 foot, but I get better results by using the guidelines on the stitch plate.

All Bonnets and Aprons Finished

2010-07-16T12:50:00.000-07:00

An unexpected visit to Texas allowed me to hand deliver the bonnets and aprons to my granddaughters. Here are the girls posing in front of their playhouse. They adore dress-up games, and were so eager to play "Laura & Mary" (from Laura Ingalls Wilder's "Little House" books) that, despite the heat and humidity, they donned long-sleeved dresses for a more authentic look . Of course there was a bit of a tussle between the two older ones over who would get to portray Laura. (They compromised on being Laura and Laura's friend; poor Mary was sent off to college.) Fortunately, the youngest girl was quite content to be Carrie.

Their baby brother was heart broken that he did not receive a bonnet -- he likes to do everything the older ones do. But he seemed to have recovered his equanimity by the time we took the photograph.

The next time I want to make pioneer headgear, I think I'll try the Slatted Sunbonnet pattern posted by Elizabeth Stewart Clark. It's a PDF file which includes a chart for drafting sizes that will fit infants, toddlers, girls and women. The reason I didn't use her pattern this time was that you have to take the slats out when you wash the bonnet. (The slats are usually card stock or pasteboard and serve to stiffen the brim.) I thought that might be a bit of a hassle for their mum, though on another website it was suggested that if the slats were made of thin plastic (perhaps quilter's template plastic?) that it could stay inside the bonnet and survive going through the wash. Personally, I wonder if the sewn-in plastic wouldn't stress the fabric and cause it to tear while in the washing machine. And you wouldn't be able to iron the bonnet afterwards for fear of melting the plastic.

But I guess it will be a bit of a while before I do bonnets again.

Next up on the sewing agenda:

1) Finish the Bricks and Stepping Stones quilt.

2) Sew something I can wear to work as most of my stuff is either worn out or doesn't fit any more. (Monday will be my first day back on the job since the foot surgery.)

A Lucky Find

2010-06-30T23:32:00.000-07:00

No, this is not my dirty laundry even though I do plan to wash it. My mum and I went thrifting today, and I finally hit the jackpot.

We had stopped by the Assistance League Thrift Shop on our way home from someplace else, and while my mother worked her way through the racks of clothing, I idly flipped through the sewing patterns and pawed through the fabrics and linens. Nothing really exciting. However, I bought two mildly vintage patterns, McCall's 8335, which was published in 1966, and Butterick 6037, which is probably from the mid-seventies. I already have plenty of patterns, but lately, whenever I find a vintage pattern, I react the same way Huck Finn's father did whenever he encountered a chicken.

Pap always said, take a chicken when you get a chance, because if you don't want him yourself you can easy find somebody that does, and a good deed ain't ever forgot. I never see pap when he didn't want the chicken himself, but that is what he used to say, anyway.

Except that I always pay for my chickens -- er, patterns -- before I take them home. (They were only 25 cents apiece!)

Then I saw the sign -- "Fourth of July Sale." All clothes and shoes and were marked down to $1.00. Hooray!

How often I've read with envy those posts on Quiltville Chat from ladies whose local thrift stores sell men's shirts for a song. Some even sell them by the pound. But the shops in our area often want as much as $5.00 per shirt.

I've been wanting to make this thrifty quilt for quite some time. Now if I can just find a couple of light shirts at a yard sale, I'll be good to go.

=================

By the way, the feline blur is our tabby, Priscilla, who takes her job as a fabric inspector very seriously.

Apron and Bonnet Progress -- Or Lack of It!

2010-06-29T23:37:00.000-07:00

I thought I was going to be finished with the second of the prairie aprons and sunbonnets today, but I made an annoying mistake on the inside of the brim which is going to call for some "frog-sewing." (Rip-it, rip-it!)

My problem is that I tried to modify the lining of the bonnet brim, and now it doesn't fit. Sigh! I think I have trouble altering garments because I find it so difficult to visualize in three dimensions. Quilts, being two dimensional, are so much easier to design, sew, or modify.

(The purple and lavender floral to the right of the apron is the print I'll be using for the next one. It looks rather washed out on this photo; it's really brighter than it appears.)

Since reverse sewing always makes me downcast, I decided to take a break and do the hand work on the inside of the apron's waistband.

Hand Piecing

2010-06-18T00:01:00.000-07:00

Here's the other hand piecing project I worked on while I was recovering from foot surgery. It's called Bride's Pride, and I got it from the June 1978 issue of Quilter's Newsletter Magazine. This issue was published back in the Precambrian Period which means that the templates were printed without seam allowances. Yes, boys and girls, I traced them onto translucent template plastic and carefully inked the match points with a fine-tipped Sharpie marker. Then I traced around each template on the wrong side of my fabric with a pencil, added a 1/4 inch seam allowance, cut out each patch with scissors, and stitched them together by hand.

Why, you may ask, would any quilter-- here in the technological vastness of the future -- go to so much trouble? Personally, I always thought I'd be one of those "life is too short for hand piecing" kinda gals until I discovered this little secret: piecing curves is far easier by hand than by machine. Hand piecing is also portable and can be easily done in bed (or other locations where a sewing machine would be inconvenient). And there is something inherently satisfying about making things "from scratch."

But if I'm going to invest the time to piece by hand, the project has got to have some sort of "wow" factor such as curves. That's why once these blocks are finished, I'm thinking of joining them by machine. (Straight seams -- ho, hum.) But I'll definitely do the quilting by hand. And when it's finished this quilt will go on my bed. (That's why I'm leaving out the hearts that are supposed to be appliqued in the white space where four adjoining blocks meet. No bridal motifs for this widow's bed!)

By the way, making templates is my least favorite part of the process. I recommend the nice metal templates made by Ardco. I wish they'd had this particular pattern.

Would Captain Picard Choose a Bernina?

2010-06-17T11:49:00.000-07:00

Had it not been for Doug at Savage Chickens, I would not have known that yesterday was Captain Picard Day.

(I would so love to have this on my sewing room wall!)

And it brought back memories of my one visit to L.A.'s garment district way, way back in the '70s. I was in college at the time, and a friend of mine had entered a costume designing contest connected with Equicon. She designed a dress uniform for Uhura, something which the television show had neglected to do. She won -- and was taken to the garment district (along with some other winning entrants) by Bjo Trimble to buy fabric and patterns for their costumes. My friend invited me to tag along, and I had the most amazing time of my young life, despite the fact that I was so shy I probably never opened my mouth once during the whole trip. I'd never in such close proximity to Star Trek fandom before, and I had certainly never seen such an amazing fabric selection. I was impressed at the way our hostess could unerringly pluck a suitable pattern to be adapted for a particular costume out of a whole bin full of patterns.

As time goes by, memory fades. I can't remember if I ever saw a picture of my friend's costume after it was sewn up. I know I didn't see it at the convention because I didn't go. Equicon was always held during Easter weekend when I was busy with -- um -- a different Fandom.

The First Apron and Bonnet Are Done!

2010-06-16T08:06:00.000-07:00

The first of the prairie girl outfits is finished. I sewed a size 3-4 for the youngest granddaughter using a piece of pale yellow calico from my stash. The bonnet is trimmed with a bit of lilac ribbon to match the floral print and it looks very sweet. I started on Sunday and would have finished sooner if I hadn't had to interrupt myself so often to elevate and ice my foot.

Here are my tips for sewing this pattern:

1) When fusing interfacing onto the apron waistband, put some kind of mark on one side of your damp pressing cloth so that when you go to fuse the bonnet brim, the same side of the pressing cloth will be facing down and there won't be any chance of getting stray bits of fusible onto your iron. (Don't ask me how I know!) Bonus Tip 1-a) Don't let your sewing room get so messy that you can't find the iron cleaner you bought at the last quilt show.

2)When sewing the long ties on the apron and sun bonnet, use a large wooden dowel to iron the seams open before turning the ties right side out. I just slide the dowel into the sewn fabric tube and then press the sewn end of the tube by pressing a dry iron against the end of the dowel. Then I lay the whole thing down on the ironing board and and press the long seam open. The dowel functions as a long narrow ironing board. (Don't use steam -- your fingers will thank you.) Then turn the tube right side out and do the final ironing; which will be much easier and neater than you'd expect.

3) And to turn those ties right side out, nothing beats this handy little gadget: the Dritz Quick Turn Fabric Tube Turners. This is one gadget that is definitely worth the money even if you don't get it at Joann's using one of their 50% off coupons. There's a quick illustrated tutorial on how to use it over at Sew Little Time.

4) There's a bias tape casing on the wrong side of the back of the bonnet. You're supposed to insert 1/4 inch ribbon through it which will come out through button holes in the middle of the right side of the back. Don't even try threading it through with a tiny safety pin. Use one of those double sided needles that are meant for threading serger tails back into a serged seam. Just fold the end of the ribbon in order to make it narrow enough to fit into the eye.

5) You're supposed to make two buttonholes in the back of the bonnet, and the instructions tell you to baste two one-inch squares of fabric underneath the buttonhole markings so you'll have enough thickness for a machine made buttonhole. That just sounded kind of dumb to me, so instead I cut a one inch by two inch piece of fusible interfacing as a stabilizer. Worked fine.

6) Unfortunately, as mentioned in some of the online reviews, the bonnet is runs large. The pattern I bought contains sizes 3-4 and 5-6. But there's only one bonnet pattern for that whole range of sizes! Supposedly you can fine tune the fit a bit with the drawstring ribbons in the back, but it still looks huge. I tried this bonnet on my mom who has a 21 inch head (the same size as my eight year old granddaughter). It fit her easily. Oh, well. I guess I'll just return the size 7-14 pattern I bought for the older girls. I can just use the younger girl's bonnet pattern for them. (I won't need a pattern to make their aprons!)

P.S. That's my upright vacuum cleaner posing as a dressmaker's dummy.

Grandmother's Eternal Flower Garden

2010-06-11T09:13:00.000-07:00

Ideally, I would have prepared some handwork for my convalescence. But I was too rushed to do the machine work for the binding of my baby quilt in progress. Otherwise hand stitching the back side of that binding would have been the perfect project for my recovery period. And finishing the redwork for the other baby quilt in progress would have been a good choice too. But my sewing room is such a mess right now that I just couldn't find it!

Fortunately, I also have some long term hand sewing projects that I've been working on forever. Like Jane Austen, they never let me down because they are always at hand and ready to go when I need to take something with me to keep my hands busy.

The first is my Grandmother's Flower Garden. I started it early in my quilting career. I was at the Glendale quilt show when I fell in love with an antique GFG in a vendor's booth. It was beautifully pieced and quilted, and I instantly fell in love with '30s prints and Nile Green. Alas, the price was more than I could afford even had I been willing to fling caution to the wind. But then I said to myself, "I may not be able to buy this quilt, but I am a quilter -- albeit a new one. I ought to be able to make this quilt."

Being an omnivorous reader, I already knew that English paper piecing was the easiest way to make a GFG, and that the only skill required was the ability to sew a fine whip stitch, something I'd been able to do since childhood. As yet, I had no '30s reproduction prints in my stash, a lack I immediately set out to remedy.*

Having a specific project in mind is a wonderful justification for indulging the hunter-gatherer instincts inherited from our ancient foremothers. (I think that's why we women enjoy shopping so much!) And in the course of digging through fat quarters in quilt shops and vendors' booths, I discovered that I could also buy my hexagons ready made -- and die-cut from card stock for accuracy. And I learned that by basting through only the fabric layers at the corners, it was possible to pop out the hexagons to reuse them -- not to mention quicker and easier on the hands. I also committed myself to buying '30s repros for several years. After all, I wouldn't be able to get the proper degree of scrappiness merely by buying what was on the shelves that season!

My first flowers consisted of just a single ring of pieces around a central white hexagon. I used two contrasting modern fabrics for each unit. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to do with them, but every now and then I get them out and flip them over so that I can admire what tiny whipstitches I used to be able to make when my eyes were less -- ahem -- mature than they are now. Fortunately, I'm a quilter who is in love with the process rather than focussed on finishing the project.

The picture at the top shows some of the twenty-one Grandmother's Flower Garden blocks which I someday intend to set with white background hexagons and a Nile green "path." My mother keeps asking me who it's for and when it will be finished. (She's a "project" person.) Well, this quilt is for me, and it will be finished when it's finished.

==========

*I wonder if I've spent more on '30s style fabrics than it would have cost to sew the original antique quilt? No matter! I'll have the left over fabric which can go into countless other quilts.

Vintage Sewing Machines and Buttonholes

2010-06-09T00:01:00.000-07:00

Susan at Spare Time has been writing a series of posts about Using a Vintage Sewing Machine. Currently she's demonstrating the various specialty feet. But if you keep clicking on "Show Older Posts" you'll eventually get back to the first one, Preparing where she outlines what she'll be covering.

Although I love my two, lightly-computerized Berninas, I learned to sew on older mechanicals. My mom had a Singer 500, a.k.a the Rocketeer. And the sewing machines we had in my junior high home-ec class were old Singers very much like the one Susan is writing about. (Her descriptions of needles, threading, and tension on her 15-91 triggered a lot of forgotten memories!)

I own three vintage sewing machines right now. The first is a Singer 401A. I bought it on e-Bay because it looked so much like my mom's 501. It has cams for making special stitches and I managed to find a box of attachments. I also have a buttonholer for this machine, though I have to admit that I haven't tried using it yet. It comes in a pink plastic box shaped like a football.

I also have two Featherweights:* one which I inherited from my mother-in-law, and one which I discovered at a yardsale. I've got a box of attachments for both of them, including a buttonholer. I haven't yet tried out the buttonholers for any of these machines, but Susan has just posted a detailed (and well illustrated) tutorial that will finally will finally give me the courage to attempt it. Even if you don't own one of these, check it out. It's fascinating!

================

*Um, not a picture of one of my own machines, just a link to show you what a Featherweight looks like.

My New Pin Cushion

2010-06-08T00:01:00.000-07:00

When did the red tomato pin cushion become iconic?

At left is a photo of my new, felted wool pin cushion. I balanced it on edge so you could read its cute little label, but when sitting on its bottom, it's actually egg-shaped and looks rather like a short-haired Tribble.

At one time these were commonly found at quilt shows. I longed for one but when I finally decided I could afford it, they were no longer to be found. It finally occurred to me to search online and I bought this one on eBay from this eBay seller. It's so cute, and the lanolin in the wool is supposed to be good for your pins. I haven't had a pin cushion in years. When my previous red tomato wore out I bought a new one at JoAnne's, but the glue holding on its leafy green top was so thick that I couldn't poke a pin through it. So it was essentially useless. My pins slide into this wool one as if into butter.

Instructions for making your own are here, but there's no way I'd ever actually do it. And although I bought mine on eBay, I've since discovered that they are also available at Brush Hollow Studio. (Caveat: I've never ordered anything from them, so consider this as information rather than an endorsement.)

Back to Blogging

2010-06-07T10:15:00.000-07:00

Hello! I'm finally feeling well enough to sit up and use my laptop.

One of the awkward things about foot surgery is that you spend most of the following two weeks lying down with your foot elevated -- which really doesn't leave much lap for your laptop. But now I can sit in an easy chair (with my foot propped up) and read quilting blogs. At least I can feed my sewing urge vicariously, because I have no idea how soon I'll be able to sit at a sewing machine. Using the foot pedal is not a problem. The surgery was on my right foot, and I'm already used to using the left foot when I sew. The problem is that I'm not supposed to let the right foot dangle down for any length of time. Bad for the circulation, I guess, and makes it feel prickly and swollen.

But as soon as I'm able to sew, I'm going to make McCalls 4547 (pictured above). While lying on my bed of pain, I heard from my daughter-in-law about how the three little granddaughters have been reading through the Little House on the Prairie books. Recently, they made ginger water from the Laura Ingalls Wilder Cookbook which I remember my own kids doing back in our homeschooling days. So I thought it would be fun to make sun bonnets and aprons for the girls so they could play at being pioneer girls in the back yard. (I figured that girls with lively imaginations wouldn't need dresses or pantalettes to play on the banks of Plum Creek or battle their way through the Long Winter.)

If I were making the dresses I'd be concerned about some of the construction details. For instance, the dresses are gathered at the neckline by putting a ribbon through a casing. That's all right, I suppose, for a costume which is only being worn for one night. But I can imagine that those ribbons would soon slide out of the casing or, worse yet, get pulled inside.

Tra La!

2010-05-02T16:54:00.000-07:00

I think that St. Anne is supposed to be the patron saint of seamstresses. If so, I owe her one. For today I was in the depths of despair and now, to quote Scrooge, "I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as a schoolboy, I am as giddy as a drunken man."

I did hardly any sewing last month so the Bricks & Cornerstones quilt, which was to be completed in May, is nowhere near done. But a few days ago I began sewing again hoping to at least finish all the blocks before packing up my machine for the next five to eight weeks. (I'm having foot surgery this Wednesday.) I was joining my matchstick units last night and finished about half before going to bed. This morning, after family duties were out of the way, I sat down to do the rest.

I hurriedly began stitching and then, noticing that I hadn't engaged the needle down function. I clicked on what I thought was the right button. Oops! The machine was now stitching backwards. Hastily, I cancelled the reverse function and jabbed on what I thought was the needle down button. Wrong again. The machine was now sewing a basting stitch which means that the needle only goes down to pierce the fabric every three or four stitches. Dang! I hastily canceled the the basting stitch and then found that the needle was now stuck in the up position. No matter what stitch I selected, the needle would not go down. And then it struck me -- I had been cursed by the Basting Stitch of Doom!

I don't know if the current Berninas have this quirk, but both my 1090 and my 1530 suffer from it. They have a lovely basting stitch, but if you don't use it regularly the needle will freeze in the up position. So it behooves you to do some basting at least once a month. That's easy for a garment sewer. But I'm primarily a quilter, so this preventive maintenance is all too easy to forget.

The last time this happened to me, I lived near an excellent Bernina technician who showed me a little trick for unsticking it. Unfortunately, I had forgotten it. All I could remember was that the tech's tip had something to do with gently pressing the needle clamp. Research on the Web turned up nothing except for the suggestion to run the machine for a while without a needle or thread -- which didn't work.

I am not the sort of person who enjoys experimentation. I want the security of detailed instructions that will tell me the Absolutely Right Way to do things. But finally, I screwed up my courage and began cautiously pressing different parts of the needle clamp.

Reader, it worked! (I will tell you what I did, but I must caution you that if you follow these directions, you do so at your own risk. I accept no responsibility for what might happen to anyone else's machine.)

Okay. You know that little screw that you must turn when you are changing a needle? (It's at the end of a little bar.) Place your finger on top of the bar and very gently press down. The needle assembly will lower very slightly. Have your machine set for a basting stitch and run the machine at a slow speed. The needle may or may not go down into a normal stitch. Stop and gently press the needle bar down again and then attempt to stitch. Repeat as needed. Eventually the needle will go down on its own. Remember, it's set for a basting stitch so it's only supposed to go down every fourth stitch. If it only goes down once and then gets stuck again, stop the machine, gently press the bar down, and then continue to stitch. After a while I switched to a regular straight stitch and found that the machine was sewing normally.

Hooray! I'm going to finish my blocks and any other stitching I need to do before Wednesday. Then I'll take the risk of trying the basting stitch again. Then I'll pack up the machine and put it away until I'm able to set foot to the floor again. (And I must kit up some hand sewing projects to work on during my convalescence.)

A Vintage Apron

2010-04-04T21:54:00.000-07:00

I'd meant to come back the next day and show you my other thrift store find, a vintage apron made of aqua gingham. It's trimmed with matching rickrack and embellished with cross stitch. Not only is it hand-embroidered, but it's also completely stitched by hand. (Click on the photos for a closer view.) I like the way the maker used the checked pattern of the fabric to evenly cut out the stair-stepped scallops on the sides. And it struck me that I could use the same method to duplicate this apron. It fits me perfectly, but I don't want to subject its delicate hand stitching to everyday laundering. I'd love to display this apron in my sewing room, and make a copy of it to wear in the kitchen.

I've been very interested in aprons ever since I saw EllynAnne Geisel's exhibit of vintage aprons at Road to California in 2009. Geisel is the author of The Apron Book which, unfortunately, I do not have a copy of. But I may try to hunt it down through inter-library loan because its mix of patterns, pictures, and anecdotes sounds like a fun read.

However, I do have a copy of Aprons of the Mid-20th Century by Judy Florence which I found at the local library's used book sale for $1.00. Ms. Florence's focus is on collecting and classifying aprons. She has a background in quilting, and it was the aprons' fabrics which first drew her into collecting them. Later, she became interested in aprons for their own sakes. I love paging through her book which is profusely illustrated and includes a whole section on embroidered gingham aprons. (But none of them have the kind of scalloped edges which mine does -- tra la!)

Not surprisingly, most of the aprons in in her book are "company" aprons which were donned only when serving a special meal to guests -- a plainer "work" apron having been used for actual protection while cooking. Company aprons, elaborately decorated and often made of such impractical fabrics as organdy, were more likely to survive their humbler, more hard-working cousins.

Ms. Florence wrote another book I'd also like to read, Gingham Aprons of the '40s & '50s: A Checkered Past. Alas! There are no cheap used copies on Amazon. Worse yet, according to Worldcat, the closest library with a copy is 220 miles away! I don't think I can get this one through interlibrary loan. Oh, well.

In the meantime, I briefly wore my new apron during Easter dinner.

Thrift Store Patterns

2010-03-07T21:59:00.000-08:00

A couple days ago my mom and I visited a new thrift store. I was on the look-out for vintage patterns but did not find any in my size. (I don't know how to grade patterns from one size to another. I envy people who do.) But I did buy three patterns from the '80s and '90s. (No, I don't consider those vintage. Good heaven's, I feel funny when other online pattern collectors refer to patterns from the '70s as vintage! After all, I was an adult then!)

The first was McCall's 7910 from the big-shouldered '80s. But that's okay because a size 12 would be way too big for me on top, so I have no plans to make the jacket. However, the skirt would probably fit, and that's the part I'm interested in. I like those soft pleats and it has side seam pockets, a waistband, and a side opening. (Women's clothing suffers from a lack of pockets.)

The second was Simplicity 8071 which is a multi-sized (6, 8, & 10) dress or jumper. I'd like some work dresses for around the house: something simple, durable, and easy to wear. This one doesn't have any darts so it might look kind of baggy on me. But I thought it might be kind of fun to experiment with it. And since these patterns were only ten cents apiece, I'm willing to take a chance. (Last time I had a 50% off coupon at JoAnn's I bought a bolt of muslin just for trying out and fitting patterns.)

The third was a children's robe pattern, Simplicity 8090, which will probably fit one of my grandchildren. I have some pink chenille-like fabric which was given to me and I think it might make a nice robe. And if it doesn't, well, I won't have lost anything but my time. Ditto for the other two patterns; I have stash fabric that would suit them too.

Now to find the time for garment sewing! And I mustn't neglect Bricks & Stepping Stones. Fillius's birthday is coming up in May.

The Lure of Scraps

2010-03-03T23:59:00.000-08:00

I got an email last week from an old friend whom I hadn't heard from in at least a year. Was I still quilting, she wanted to know? Because if so, she had a box of scraps free for the taking. "Oh, yes," I assured her. "I am most definitely still quilting."

Is there anything more exciting than free fabric? I think not.

Even though I have a healthy stash, I'm always pleased to give it a transfusion. Prints and colors that I didn't choose, and in some cases wouldn't even dream of choosing, are frequently those fabrics that inject an unexpected sparkle in my scrap quilts, breaking up the homogeneity which I've allowed to creep into my stash.

(There were some lovely plaids buried near the bottom of the box which may be finding their way into my Carolina Christmas quilt.)

Scrappy Neutrals

2010-03-02T20:50:00.000-08:00

Not much to report on the quilting front. I'm doggedly making black and "white" four-patches for my Bricks & Stepping Stones, but as you can see, I have a pretty elastic definition of which neutrals qualify as white. (Click on the picture for a closer view.) I love the one with the chickens and their little red and white eggs. I'm hoping that prints like these will add some sparkle to the quilt since most of my whites are actually pretty sedate.

Ugly Fabric (and Photoshop)

2010-02-21T23:59:00.000-08:00

The more I work on Bricks and Stepping Stones, the more I love this pattern. I've been using some wild and crazy prints for the bricks. Among them were wild horses racing on a green background, cowboy paraphernalia on blue, and gray manatees swimming in a turquoise sea among schools of golden fish.

The very last brick was cut from this ugly paisley, a fabric that is near and dear to my heart. It's been in my stash since the '90s when I was an active member of the Genie Online Quilter's Guild. I bought it for the annual Ugly Fabric Swap, an event which I looked forward to all year long. Sign-ups began on April 1st (April Fool's Day). Each of us pledged ourselves to send a 10 inch, pre-washed square of the ugliest fabric we could find to all the other swap members. The deadline was April 15th (Income Tax Day).

Then we would wait by our mailboxes in fearful anticipation. What monstrosities, what abominations of the textile industry had our sister quilters found? As the envelopes began to arrive, each bearing a fabric more appalling than the last, every quilter would describe her reactions online, casting her vote for the Most Appalling Fabric (often with uncontrollable giggles).

Yet truly is it said, "De gustibus non disputatum est." ("There is no accounting for taste.") Almost every fabric, no matter how clashing its color -- how hideous its print, had at least one fan whose piteous cry, "I like that fabric!" proved that beauty really is in the eye of the beholder.

Then the real challenge began: to make a really great quilt out of that year's collection of Uglies. (The secret is cutting the fabrics into small enough pieces!) Some of the quilts were stunning, and I remember at least one whose photo ended up in a major quilt magazine.

I always took part in the swap, but only once managed to finish a quilt. Most of my Ugly collections are still intact. And I'm thinking that Bricks and Stepping Stones would be the perfect pattern to display these, um, unique fabrics.

But getting back to the paisley shown at the beginning of this blog: I wanted to post a picture of it, but my digital camera is so old and creaky that it's a real pain to shoot and upload photos. So I decided to try taking its picture using the Photo Booth application on my Mac. Unfortunately, the fabric's color wasn't accurate because of the way that light shines through it.

"I can fix that!" Fillius announced. "I'll Photo Shop it on my computer."

"Oh, no," I said. "That sounds like too much work. I'll drag out the camera."

"It's really easy," he assured me. And it was. In just moments he had perfectly adjusted the color.

"Super! Email it to me." I pasted it into my blog, and while I was still typing up the text I heard Fillius calling from the other room."

"Hey, Mom! Want a picture of your fabric lying flat?"

"Kewel! But can you make it into an elephant?"

Before I finished writing my post I had his answer:

How I Spent President's Day

2010-02-16T00:59:00.000-08:00

I usually feel very grumpy about Monday holidays. I object on principle to moving holidays to the nearest Monday just so people can have a three weekend. It seems a tawdry manipulation of the calendar. Monday is also one of my regular work days, so nearly every holiday I miss out on a day's pay. I only work three days a week, so that's one third of my weekly paycheck.

But this year I didn't mind staying home on President's Day because I've had a dreadful cold the last few days and felt too sick to go to work anyway. So of course I sat in front of my sewing machine and completed four more Chunky Churn Dash blocks. These are really cute, finishing at six inches. They will be set with hour glass blocks as shown on Bonnie Hunter's website. I'm not sure yet how large a quilt I'll make out of these.

Here's a close up of the block on the upper left. I was able to fussy cut a fabric scrap with a rubber stamped image of myself peering out of the screen of our first Macintosh computer. I drew the picture and had the rubber stamp made ages ago when I was a member of an online quilting guild on Podigy. We were exchanging small stamped squares, one of the many swaps that made the group such fun to belong to.

Working on Chunky Churn Dash was a nice break from Bricks and Stepping Stones. Earlier this week I finished about half of the units needed for that quilt. I need to cut some more black and white strips for that one, as well as 35 more bricks. It really does go together quickly! I wonder if I can really complete it in time for Fillius's birthday. I'm sure I can get the top done. But can I quilt and bind it?

Tension Update

2010-02-14T22:24:00.000-08:00

Well, after a thorough cleaning and a good deal of experimenting with the thread tension knob, I'm getting a better (though not yet perfect) stitch and almost no curving of my strips.

I was checking Harriet Hargrave's book, Heirloom Machine Quilting (4th edition), to remind myself whether knots on the bottom meant I needed to tighten or loosen my thread tension. It turns out that the little thread dots on the bottom mean either that the top tension is too loose or that the bobbin tension is too tight. So how are you supposed to know which to adjust?

Fortunately, on page 37, she includes a sewing machine mechanic's tip for testing tension when sewing regular seams. If you don't have her book, I found similar information in this online article about adjusting sewing machine tension. So I am happily sewing again.

My Tension Is a Source Of Tension

2010-02-09T22:02:00.000-08:00

I've been having so much fun this week working simultaneously on three different quilts. But suddenly I'm having a tension problem with my machine. At least, I think it's a tension problem. For all of these quilts I am sewing strips together, and I've noticed that after I've ironed them open, one edge curves a bit. And I can't accurately subcut the two patch units if both sides of the joined strips aren't parallel.

The reason I think that it may be a tension problem is that I've also noticed tiny bumps or loops on the underside of my stitching. (I don't think it's an ironing problem because I'm always very careful to use a dry iron and to press up and down rather than from side to side.

I guess I need to pull out my sewing machine manual to figure out what sort of adjustment I need to make. It's so unusual for my Bernina to have any sort of tension problem that I can't remember whether bumps on the bottom indicate a problem with the thread tension or the bobbin tension.

(And yes, I changed the needle.)

Quilter's Newsletter And Me

2010-02-06T13:17:00.000-08:00

(This post is reprinted from my other blog, Catholic Bibliophagist which is about books, reading, and my library, a collection which takes up most of the available wall space in my house. It was originally posted in 2007 when I had just moved into my current home.)

Quilting is my other passion, and it's reflected in my library. Yesterday I was unpacking my collection of Quilter's Newsletter Magazine. I have issues going back to 1970. Though I've been fascinated by quilts ever since I was very young, I was not a subscriber in those days. In fact, I had never even heard of QNM.

I discovered the magazine in the early 1990s. At that time, in response to an unhappy family event, I took one of my earlier abortive attempts at quiltmaking out of my cedar chest and sewed it together. At about the same time I discovered an online quilting community, the Online Quilters, through Prodigy, an early Internet Service Provider. It was a heady experience not unlike my previous discovery of fantasy and science fiction fandom. Despite the strictures of an online environment, we Online Quilters used Prodigy's bulletin boards (and the US Postal Service) to swap quilt blocks and fabric squares; to place group orders for specialized tools; to give lessons and hold workshops; and to participate in co-operative projects such as group quilts and round robins.

Outsiders wondered how we could become such close friends of people we'd never met face to face. Actually, we did occasionally meet at quilt shows. We wore blue fabric stars (based on Prodigy's logo) to identify ourselves and held "show & tell" (a traditional quilt guild activity) in the parking lots outside the shows.

(Later, due to conflicts with Prodigy's restrictions on content and its erratic deletion of bulletin board messages, most of us migrated to GEnie where we merrily continued our online quilt life.)

A lot of my basic knowledge of quilting came originally from the Online Quilters, including the merits of Quilter's Newsletter.

The first issue of QNM was published in September, 1969. At that time there were few quilting books available, no quilt stores, and none of the specialized tools quilters now take for granted. One hundred per cent cotton was difficult to find having been replaced with polyester-cotton blends. It was the age of bonded double knits. (Shudder!) Bonnie Leman began publishing QNM just ahead of the explosion of renewed interest in quilting which began in the early '70s and has continued unabated to the present day.

I acquired most of my back issues in the mid '90s when my local quilt guilt decided to sell off its collection at the annual Trash 'n Treasures meeting.

And what a treasure it was! I managed to snag over ten year's worth. Paging through the early issues was a time-traveling journey back to a day when hand piecing was still dominant and templates did not include seam allowances. Rotary cutters had yet to be invented and it was still rather daring to assert that machine quilting could be a legitimate option. Wall hangings, (i.e. small quilts that are hung up for decoration) were looked down upon by a certain faction of quiltdom who felt that a quilt wasn't really a quilt unless it covered a bed.

Paging through my collection, I've watched the rise and fall of various techniques and styles of quiltmaking. (I recall at least two articles on how to make quilts from scraps of bonded polyester knit!) I've read early articles by people who are now big names in the field. Through the pages of QNM I've watched the quilting community grow from scattered, isolated people swapping copies of patterns published in the 1930s by newspapers like the Kansas City Star, to a large, diverse group of individuals ranging from those who consider themselves to be mere crafters to those who see themselves as serious artists. And they are supported by an enormous industry selling fabrics and tools that were undreamed of in 1969.

And occasionally the world of the Online Quilters and the world of QNM intersected. In the April '91 issue, p. 37, is a picture of Diane Rode Schneck's quilt, "Ugly Tie Contest." She made it with fabrics from our annual Ugly Fabric Swap. I can see the fabric I contributed, right there! The peach colored one with the little black locomotives.

Thanks to the Internet (and a current subscription), I now have a fairly complete collection of Quilters Newsletter. But I'm still missing quite a few issues between 1969 and 1972. If anyone out there has some that need a loving home, let me know.

Quilts Are Like Potato Chips

2010-01-31T23:39:00.000-08:00

"Betcha can't eat just one!"

That was what they used to say about potato chips when I was a kid. Now that I'm an adult, my quilts are like potato chips. I love quilting, and I can never work on just one project at a time.

As I wrote previously, earlier this month I started Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt, Carolina Christmas. And I decided that I would really focus on it. I would be disciplined. I would get it done!

So there I was, merrily cutting out 2.5 inch strips from one of my neutral fat quarters. But when I got near the end of that piece of fabric, it was too narrow for another strip, yet too wide to be tossed into the string box. Then I remembered that Bonnie's Bricks and Stepping Stones uses 2 inch neutral strips. It's supposed to be a very quick to make quilt. And Fillius needs a quilt, poor thing. So I cut a 2 incher. And after that it just made sense to cut a few 2 inch strips from every neutral I was using for Carolina Christmas.

But sometimes that last bit of a fabric would be a bit too narrow even for a 2 inch strip. So I'd cut a 1.5 inch strip and set it aside. But what to do with them? Ah! Bonnie's Chunky Churn Dash pattern calls for 1.5 inch neutral strips. It also uses 2.5 inch neutrals squares which I'm already cutting for Carolina Christmas. My goodness! This quilt would practically cut itself out without my noticing.

Before I knew it, I was pulling colored scraps out of my bins for the strips and squares and bricks I needed for these two other quilts. The chunky Churn Dash blocks finish at 6 inches, so you really can use up rather small scraps for them. And the bricks in Bricks and Stepping Stones finish at 3 inches by 6 inches, making them perfect for large prints which I often find difficult to use because they don't "read" as any one color.

So that's how I've come to be cutting (and sewing) three quilts at once. I love working this way because I'm process (rather than project) oriented. That is, I love the process of quilt making so much that it almost doesn't matter whether I actually finish the project. I also like the variety of working on more than one quilt at a time. Whether I feel like cutting, piecing, quilting, or binding, there's always a step at hand to suit my mood. (And as soon as I choose a pattern for my dino quilt, I'll have four going at once.)

The Road Goes Ever On and On -- To California

2010-01-29T22:42:00.000-08:00

I forgot to mention that I finally made it to Road to California on Sunday, the last day of the show. And I had only four hours in which to see all of the quilts.

As usual, it was a fantastic show. My favorite quilt was "Tribute To Tolkien" by Sue McCarty. This picture doesn't do justice to it. (You can see a somewhat larger and more detailed one here. And if you click on it, you'll get an even closer view. ) The designs were drawn freehand on the black background fabric, and the metallic and polyester thread painting is stunning. In the photo you can just make out the Black Riders galloping across the bottom border. But what you can't see is Gollum clambering up the rocky slope to the left. On the left side of the quilt you can probably make out a golden eagle about to land on a tree. But in person you will notice (though not immediately) that the tree has a subtle face -- it's actually an Ent. How I wish my Mythie friends could have seen this. It was breathtaking!

I didn't expect to have time to shop the vendors, but at the last minute I bought some fat quarters: purples, blacks and neutrals. They were marked down to $1.50 each and can be used in all three of my current projects.

Yes, I am currently working on three quilts. More on that next time.

Scary Fabric

2010-01-26T18:25:00.000-08:00

Every quilter has a fabric like this in her stash.

Well, maybe not exactly like it. Dinosaurs in boxer shorts with a background of clubs is a mite unusual. (And if you click on it for a closer look, you'll notice that the boxer shorts have a pattern of doggie bones on them. Wooo!)

What I really meant was that every quilter has fabric which engenders the same response in everyone who sees it: "Why did you buy that? What were you thinking?"

I bought this fabric many years ago from a vendor at a quilt show. The reason? It was so appalling that I just had to have some. And it's lain in my stash ever since.

Until now.

I have an eighteen month-old grandson, and it occurred to me that I could make a quilt for him from this fabric. He is the first male grandchild in the family and has three older, and very forceful, sisters. I think he needs a quilt that screams, "I'm a guy!"

I have less than a yard and a half of this stuff, so I can't simply use it as a backing for otherwise conventional little boy's quilt. What pattern could I use that would display these dinos in all their glory. I turned to my quilting sisters on the Quiltville Chat, a Yahoo Group of ladies who love making scrappy quilts from Bonnie Hunter's patterns. I've gotten some cool suggestions, but if you have have one too, please let me know in the comments box. Fabric this awesome only comes along once in a lifetime.

P.S. My son, Fillius, was just reading over my shoulder and said, "Mom, some fish need to be thrown back into the think thank."

Jedi Quilting

2010-01-21T01:41:00.000-08:00

I saw a picture of this "Soothing Eye Pillow" in the current Connecting Threads catalogue. (It was on the same page as the ergonomic seam ripper.) And what popped into my head was an image of young Jedi Quilters practicing their sightless rotary cutter technique under the supervision of Jedi Masters. ("You've taken your first step into a larger world with fewer fingers!")

In Which Using Up Scraps Leads to Buying More Fabric

2010-01-16T00:01:00.000-08:00

I always love Bonnie's color combinations so much that I want to make my Bonnie-quilts exactly like hers.

Carolina Crossroads: red, white, and blue? Perfect! (Besides, I have so many of them.) Hand me that rotary cutter.

Double Delight: indigo, chocolate, double pink, and cheddar? Bonnie, you are channeling my inner color sense! (Or maybe I'm channeling yours.) Hand me that rotary cutter.

Carolina Christmas: red, green, and gold? I love Christmas colors. And I'll bust so much stash making this quilt because I have so much of these colors. Except the gold, of course. I'll have to buy some gold. (I told you about my quest for gold in a previous post.)

So I bought and preshrunk my gold. And then I began to think, "I'm not being very creative. I always use the exact same colors Bonnie does." I commanded my dormant individuality to arise and assert itself.

"Purple!" I said. "I have lots of purple. And I like purple and green together. They are complementary colors (just like red and green), and they look good with gold. And I will call my quilt, 'California Advent' since purple is the liturgical color for the weeks proceeding Christmas."

So I pulled my neutrals from my stash. Hmmmm. Not as many as I thought. Making scrap quilts has really put a dent in them. So I bought more neutrals. Anyway, you can never have too many of those. And when Bonnie posted an update on the amount of background fabric we'd need, I felt vindicated. My shopping conscience was bathed in a glow of justification.

I had plenty of greens, so that was fine. But what happened to all my purples? Yikes! Didn't I have a huge number of those? Oh, yeah. I like purple. Funny how that leads to using them up. Maybe I should buy more. But that's adding to the stash, not using it up. More indecision. Should I go back to red?

At this rate I'll never get my quilt done. There's only one thing to do. Pick up that rotary cutter and start slicing the golds and neutrals for step one. Like Scarlett O'Hara, I'll postpone thinking about the rest of my quilt for another day.

I feel a little giddy, but scrappy quilters have to get used to living on the edge.

Update: As you can see from the picture at the top of this post, I ended up buying more purple. No wonder stashes never get any smaller.

The Quest for Gold

2010-01-15T00:01:00.000-08:00

(In an effort to bring my blog up to date, I'm posting the following, a version of which was previously posted on the Quiltvillechat group at Yahoo where those of us who are working on Bonnie Hunter's current mystery quilt share our progress.)

Okay, so I made a last minute decision to join in on the Carolina Christmas mystery. True, my sewing room and my cutting table is a bit of a mess right now. True, I haven't pulled any fabric yet. But I have lots of greens and purples and plenty of neutrals. All I have to do is buy two yards of a nice gold.

So yesterday* I headed out to Local Quilt Shop #1. My mom asked to tag along because she needed some fabric for a new valence for her kitchen. She's got a great eye for color, so I always enjoy shopping with her.

Problem #1: "I'm looking for a nice gold," I announce as we enter the shop. I pull out a few bolts of solids." Something like this, only I'd like it to be a print."

"Those aren't gold," she counters. "This is gold." The bolt she's holding up is too pale. And it's not what I think of as gold. It reminds me of boring, upholstered furniture. Or very old kitchen appliances.

"Well," I concede, "maybe 'gold' isn't the best word to describe the color I have in mind."

We wander separately through the store, each on our own fabric quest. I find a couple of possibilities, but nothing that screams, "Buy me! I'm perfect!"

My mom finds a possibility for her valence, but it too is not quite perfect. "But isn't that the special green you use in your kitchen?" I ask.

"No," she replies, "there's a bit too much yellow in it." I don't argue because she has an amazing visual memory for colors. Me, I'd have to bring a swatch. We decide to visit Local Quilt Shop #2.

Here my mom finds a black and white fabric which she thinks will work. She pairs it with some giant rick-rack. I'm still auditioning golds. She watches as I hold a bolt of gold up to a shelf filled with purples. "What do you think?" I ask.

"It doesn't go with those purples," she replies with a shake of her head. "But you could use it with that purple over there." I check, and she is right. That purple is gorgeous with that particular gold.

"But, Mom, I'm going to be using this gold with lots of purples. I'm just trying to get an idea of whether it goes with purple in general."

"But which purples?"

"Well, I'm not buying any of these purples. It's a scrappy quilt. I'm using purples I have at home."

"Then shouldn't you have brought them with you?" (She knows I can't carry colors in my head.)

"I'm just trying to find a gold that looks good with lots of greens and lots of purples."

My mom's brow wrinkles as she tries to visualize this. "Is this supposed to be an ugly quilt?" she asks hesitantly.

"No, it's supposed to be scrappy."

"I think," she says deliberately, "You should choose this fabric by yourself."

And so I did.

I got two yards of Blush Texture Marigold by Benartex.

"What are you going to use this for?" asked the clerk as she unrolled the bolt preparatory to measuring and cutting.

"A scrappy quilt with greens and purples."

"Then this will be perfect for it," she said emphatically. Just salesmanship? Or was it quilters seeing eye to eye, sharing a common vision that escapes those who sew fashion and home dec?

By the way, I was so enamored with my new gold that I bought a fat-quarter stack of some of the other colors in that line. Aren't they rich and luscious?

========

*"Yesterday" as in the day before I originally wrote this.

Road to California -- I hope!

2010-01-14T22:10:00.000-08:00

Perhaps you've noticed the "Carolina Christmas" button that has recently appeared on the sidebar. I put it there because I made a tardy decision last month to sew Bonnie Hunter's newest mystery quilt. I'll be wearing a real life version of this button when I go to Road to California some time this weekend.

I bought a multi-day pass to this show and was looking forward to being there on three out of the four days. Unfortunately, due to family problems, I'll probably only get to attend on Sunday which seems hardly enough time to see all the quilts, much less browse through all the vendors. But this year being what it is, I suppose I should just feel grateful that I can go at all.

Anyway, if any of you other Quiltville fans should spot me and my badge, please say hello!

P.S. I haven't been able to chronicle my progress on "Carolina Christmas" so far, but plan to bring the blog up to date on it very soon.

Christmas Quilting With TJR and Others

2009-12-07T04:55:00.000-08:00

There's nothing I love more during Advent than working on Christmas projects. (Not for me the mere prudence and foresight of piecing Christmas stockings in July so they'll be ready to display in December.) That's why I'm so excited that Bonnie Hunter is sponsoring a new mystery quilt right now. It's called, "Carolina Christmas," and it's a scrappy quilt made in reds, greens, golds, with neutrals ranging from cream to tan as the background.

I made a last minute decision to join the online quilting frenzy, and I'm really looking forward to stitching cozily while listening to Christmas music. Every year I try to get a new Christmas CD, and this year's is The TJR Christmas Card featuring my brother TJR who plays and sings neo-classic rock. I'm a Medieval/Renaissance girl myself, but I confess to being impressed by the virtuoso fingering my brother displays in these instrumental interpretations of eight traditional Christmas carols. And I was particularly charmed by his original song, "Christmas in California." It's Southern California's reply to "White Christmas," and hearing it will stir feelings of nostalgia in any Californian transplanted to the frigid Midwest or East Coast. The CD is packaged in a cardboard case which doubles as a Christmas card. And if you buy five or more of them from his website they're only $5.00 apiece, making them a reasonably priced and easily mailed gift. Single copies of the disk will soon be available from CD Baby. For now you can download the complete album or individual songs. (By the way, that little snowman at the beginning of my post was done by my son Filius for the cover of the CD.)

Just to show that my musical taste is not formed solely by nepotism, I thought I'd list some of the other CDs I'll be listening to during this project. Sir Christmas: Songs of the Season is by Broceliande, a Celtic and Early Music ensemble which I first heard at Mythcon 38 where they were playing songs related to JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. This CD is the first of four volumes celebrating the seasons of the year. The songs, sung in French, Latin, English, Medieval Spanish and Middle English, are not your run of the mill Christmas carols. In origin they range from the 13th century to the 20th. Their rendition of Guadete is possibly my favorite. Click to hear samples. (Scroll down a bit to find Sir Christmas.)

Sing We Noel is a collection of Christmas music from England and early America. It includes the 15th century carol, "Nova, nova: Aue fitt ex Eva," which is the story of the Annunciation in Middle English with a Latin chorus. That's been a family favorite since our children were small. (Yes, we started brain washing them early!) "The Midnight Cry" from 19th century America recounts the story of the wise and foolish virgins, a seemingly odd choice for a Christmas CD, but a pretty good one for the season of Advent which emphasizes both the coming of Christ at Christmas and His seconding coming at the end of time. Other favorites on this disk are "Mervele Nought, Josep" and "Syng We to This Mery Cumpane." Brief samples can be heard here if you scroll down a bit.

Last year I couldn't find my copy of Diciembre en México by Donna Peña. But it turned up during the summer, and I'm looking forward to playing it again this year. It has lovely songs in Spanish celebrating both Christmas and the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe which falls on December 12th. Mmmmm, I could go for some pan dulce and some Mexican hot chocolate!

And finally, just to prove that I am not without links to popular culture, I've always been fond of Perry Como Sings Merry Christmas Music which I heard over and over again when I was a child. (It was one of three Christmas records which my parents owned.) It's a mixture of traditional carols, such as "The Twelve Days of Christmas" and more modern songs such as "White Christmas."

The copy which Amazon sells has a different cover, so I dug up the picture at left from elsewhere on the Web. That's the copy my parents had, one of only three Christmas records which they owned. We kids heard it over and over and over again. Every little intonation of Perry's voice is engraved on my memory. That's why this album triggers "Christmas!" in my brain, and that's why, when I found a CD copy at the super market many years ago, I had to buy it. But it doesn't sound quite right. My parents' record had a scratch which caused the phonograph needle bounce and skip, repeating one phrase in "Christmas Song" over and over again. ("And every mother's child -- and every mother's child -- and every . . . ") Amazon has sound samples here. Just scroll down a bit.

What Christmas music do you like to listen to while sewing a Christmas quilt?

The Wedding Dress

2009-12-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

And here's a picture of my mom's wedding dress which was made into the christening gown I wrote about in my previous post. My mother was married in 1951. Isn't that dress gorgeous? (Click on the picture for a somewhat closer view.) It was custom made. The materials cost about $50.00. She drew a picture of what she wanted, and a friend of hers designed the pattern and sewed the dress for $10.00! The headpiece for the veil is made of artificial orange blossoms composed of some sort of pearlized material. I wore the same headpiece with my own wedding veil, and it currently resides in my cedar chest.

Instant Heirloom

2009-11-28T18:17:00.000-08:00

(This post was begun in October but left unfinished because Life has been too eventful for blogging. )

Whew! Still no quilting.

In July my dad followed up with another stroke, and my mum and I were very busy trying to take care of him at home. After an exhausting week we discovered that his insurance would cover in-patient therapy at Casa Colina, a facility about which I cannot say enough good things. My dad is an out-patient now; we schelp him over there twice a week for therapy. Since I live next door to my parents, I'm over there many times a day to help my mother with my dad: bathing, dressing, supervising (since he's not supposed to walk alone), and making sure he does his daily exercises.

However, I did complete one sewing project: making a christening gown from my mother's wedding dress. It was a fun, albeit nerve-wracking, project. The first difficulty was simply squeezing out the time to work on it. (Taking care of my dad is like having another part-time job.) The second was the stress of Great Expectations. My mother and sister are firmly convinced that I am an amazing seamstress, an assessment which I do not completely share.

The gown was being made for my sister's first granddaughter. Her son and daughter-in-law have been married for about 10 years and hitherto have been without offspring. My poor sister, who definitely has the adoring grandmother gene, has been forced to confine her affections to chihuahuas. But now she is being presented with not one, but two grandchildren -- twins, a boy and a girl. Well, it doesn't get much better than that!

The only problem was that they had but one christening gown, the gown which my sister's son wore when he was baptized. That was also the same gown which my father wore when he was an infant, so it was 82 years old -- definitely a family heirloom. Anyway, that gown could be used by the boy, but what to do about the girl?

Rather hesitantly my sister approached my mom and me and asked if we'd be willing to make my mom's wedding dress (which had long been in my sister's keeping) into a gown for the girl twin. Voila, instant heirloom! My mom thought it was a splendid idea and, grabbing her seam ripper, immediately reduced the gown to yardage.

My mother's gown was designed and made by a friend back in the early 1950s and featured a layer of taffeta covered by a sheer fabric with a floral lace edge. I wanted the baby girl's dress to show off the fabric to advantage and yet echo the look of her brother's antique gown. I used a pattern from the late '70s, Simplicity 8971, as a basis for the dress and hat.

I lengthened the gown a bit and dispensed with the horitzontal tucks. Instead of the gathered sleeves, I made loose straight sleeves out of the floral lace. The pattern's hat is made out of wide eyelet lace. My hat was made and lined out of the taffeta with an overlay of the sheer floral lace. (Click on the picture of the hat at the beginning of the post to get a better look at the lace.)

Instead of pintucks on the bodice, I put lace beading threaded with pink ribbon. (The antique boy's gown had lace beading with blue ribbon.) At this point I felt the dress was finished, but my mom felt it needed a bit more, so she added the two vertical rows of lace beading and pink ribbon on the skirt. As it had to be added by hand, it was rather finicky work.

The last picture gives a close up view of the floral lace which I used as the bottom edge of the overskirt. (The under layers of the bodice and skirt are made of the taffeta.)

Both dresses were presented to my sister's daughter-on-law at her baby shower, and I can definitely say that all of the stress and anxiety that went into the making of this dress were as nought when weighed against the expression on her face when she opened the packages. Definitely worth it.

Time Out For Garment Sewing

2009-06-18T08:05:00.000-07:00

Not much time for sewing these days as I've been busy grading end of the semester papers for my students and also helping to take care of elderly relations. This past month my aunt, the one with Alzheimer's whom I previously wrote about here, fell down and broke her hip. Then my father had a mini-stroke, and as soon as he got out of the hospital, my mum came down a bad case of stomach flu.

So my sewing impulse has been confined to the vicarious thrill of browsing sewing blogs, particularly those devoted to vintage patterns. Though I feel a little dinosaur-like when reading about vintage patterns from the '70s. Hey, I was alive then! Anyway, I finally succumbed. I bought Simplicity 8667 from 1978. It looks like a nice basic dress (with pockets -- yay!) which is something I could really use right now for work. I hope it's not too young looking for me. Currently my wardrobe consists of a few extremely worn denim dresses and some skirts that have become too big in the waist thanks to back-elastic that has become limp with age.

My only problem with the pattern is that I I bought a size 11/12 Young Jr. Teen based on what I thought was my bust measurement which falls between the 9/10 and 11/12. But due to an inadvertent weight loss, my bust is now smaller than I thought. (At my last doctor's visit I was down to 113 -- yikes!) And in fact, I used to wear a 9/10 back in the '70s. I just thought that after four pregnancies my shape had changed enough that I'd need the larger size. Now I'm not so sure.

I've consulted with the folks at PatternReview.com, and I think there's nothing for it but to make a muslin. Dang!

By the way, I bought the pattern from Ditzy Prints and I was very pleased with the transaction.

So, Sew Retro!

2009-05-16T12:00:00.000-07:00

I was at the Scripps College reunion a couple weeks ago and, looking up from my lonely enjoyment of the excellent hors d'oeuvres at the president's reception, caught sight of a young woman from the class of 2004 who was wearing a beautifully retro dress with a tight fitting bodice and a full, gathered skirt.

"I love your dress -- it's so retro!" I don't find it very easy to talk to strangers, but now and then circumstances will move me to burst forth before I've a chance to think. In order to excuse my intrusion, I mentioned that lately I'd been looking at a lot of vintage patterns online. And as it turned out, we both sewed (though she hadn't made the dress she was wearing), quilted, and had been involved in homeschooling. (I'm a retired homeschooling mom; she grew up as a homeschooling student.) So it turned out to be one of the most interesting interactions I had during the whole weekend.

I've always thought that clothes from the past were more interesting than contemporary fasion, but until I started poking around the Internet, I had no idea there were so many people sewing vintage patterns. One of my favorite sites is Sew Retro, a blog to which many sewing bloggers contribute, often linking back to their own blogs for additional pictures and sewing details about a particular project. I love seeing how they've solved various sewing problems, and seeing how their fabric and color choices can totally change the "look and feel" of a vintage garment design. However, I sometimes feel a little odd when one of the bloggers is raving about having scored a fantastic vintage pattern from the 1970s on eBay. Vintage? Um, I think I have some of those in the bottom of my pattern bin. (And as far as I'm concerned they can stay there. The '70s were an ugly decade.)

Another site I've just begun exploring is the Vintage Sewing Patterns Wiki. Each entry features a picture of the pattern envelope and, if available, links to reviews of or blog posts about the pattern, and a gallery into which members can upload photos of the garments they've made from the pattern. Patterns are catagorized not only by brand name and number, but also by type of garment (i.e. dress, jacket, etc.) and even design features such as full skirt, scallops, or shawl collar. A few entries even have a bit of history, such as Butterick 6015 which was a run-away best seller in the '50s. (It's currently been re-issued as Butterick 4790.)

Well, if I can just stop hitting their "View Random Page" link, maybe I'll dig out some of those old patterns and upload them.

2009-05-14T16:22:00.000-07:00

This Spinning Star from Come Quilt With Me caught my eye during Jo-Ann's "50% off quilting supplies" sale. Normally, I'm a template-free, rotary cutting girl, but curved piecing is another story. I love curved piecing, especially since discovering that it's easy-peasy, lemon-squeezy when you do it by hand. But I hate making my own templates, so I thought I'd give this one a try.

Previously I've had very good experiences with Ardco templates. Their metal window-templates are the best ever if you don't mind tracing with a pencil and cutting out with sissors. (They say you can use their templates (which also come in non-window versions) for rotary cutting, but the mere thought gives me the willies.) Since the Come Quilt With Me templates are thick acrylic, I decided I'd try rotary cutting with it and -- gasp! -- machine piecing the block. The little slots should make it easy to mark and join the pieces accurately.

As for fabrics, I haven't decided yet whether to go for modern brights or '30s pastels.

Poetry Quilts

2009-05-11T14:34:00.001-07:00

Winter Lights: A Season in Poems & Quilts by Anna Grossnickle Hines.

One of the the perks of my job as a library aide is discovering unusual picture books. This one caught my eye because the author-illustrator is a quilter.

Winter, and special lights and holidays which brighten the darkest days of the year, is the theme of this book of poems. The author's subjects range from Hanukkah to the Winter Solstice to the fireworks of the Chinese New Year to the farolitos which light the way for Mary and Joseph during Christmas celebrations in the Southwest.

I must admit that I preferred the illustrations to the text because my taste in poetry is rather hobbitish and traditional. But I love these quilts! They simply glow with light thanks to the author's judicious use dark fabrics, as in the Christmas tree quilt on the cover. (See above.)

And the piecing techniques which she has chosen for each quilt are also well suited to the subject of each poem. For example, the twisted log cabin blocks which Hines uses to illustrate "Fireplace" and "One Little Candle" bring unexpected movement to her representation of flickering, dancing flames. The aurora borealis is appropriately suggested by the bargello quilt illustrating "A Sight to See." And there is a happy marriage of both color and technique in the author's use of hand-dyes in her appliqued quilt, "Protest," which illustrates the glow of the setting sun in the winter sky and the soft snowy hills.

I would love to show you what I mean by by posting pictures of the quilts I've just referred to, but I am scrupulously respecting Hines's copyright. Fortunately, you can see what I mean by visiting her website, here. Click on the link, "For Quilters" and then scroll down and click on the third book, Winter Lights, to see how she designed and made each quilt. (Unfortunately, the design of the website prevents me from giving you a direct link to the quilts.) Now that I know that she has two other quilt-illustrated books, I plan to look them up at my library.

By the way, one poem in particular resonated in my book lover's soul. It dealt with a furtive pleasure with which I am sure all readers can sympathize.

Lights Out

I pull the covers
over my head
and let out a few snores
for good measure . . .
then snap on my flashlight
and open my book.
Now this is
reading for pleasure!

Be sure to look at the accompanying quilt on her website!

Got My Fabric

2009-03-26T00:01:00.000-07:00

None of the quilt stores around here carry much in the way of Civil War prints, so when I went back to my old stomping grounds see my tax guy, I stopped in at the Quilt Emporium in Woodland Hills. They have a good selection of repro prints, and I was finally able to get the rest of the fabric I need for my Double Delight quilt. The two browns and the cheddar which I bought are in the lower left hand corner of the photo. The shirting prints are from my stash. So are the blues -- which are not authentic, but I'm going to try them out in an effort to bust some stash.

I see that I haven't posted in over a month. What is that in blog-years? A century? Unfortunately, fast and furious quilting has not been the reason for my absence. In fact, I've accomplished almost nothing creative except for some sporadic work on my string pieced stars. (I'm still trying to work out the best way to construct these. I used a Jo-Ann's coupon to buy an EZ 45° Diamond and I'm going back to Harriet Hargrave's construction method.)

Back From the Dead!

2009-03-25T00:49:00.000-07:00

I see that I haven't posted in over a month. What is that in blog-years? A century?

Fast and furious quilting has not been the reason for my absence. In fact, I've accomplished almost nothing creative except for some sporadic work on my string pieced stars. (I'm still trying to work out the best way to construct them. Recently, I used a Jo-Ann's coupon to buy an EZ 45° Diamond, and I'm going back to Harriet Hargrave's construction method.)

Unfortunately, my elbow still bothers me off and on. The physical therapist says it probably won't be completely healed until June. Every now and then I feel a sharp burning pain in it similar to what I felt in original injury, though not quite as intense. Then I have to take care how I move, apply cold or heat, and take plenty of Advil. The most recent incident was this past Saturday and Sunday. Sigh!

What else have I been doing? Working at the library, grading student papers, helping my mom who just had minor surgery, making a daily visit to my aunt who has Alzheimer's Disease, and hanging out on the American Diabetes Association's forum for adults with Type 2 diabetes.

Yes, the shoe has finally dropped. Diabetes runs in my dad's family, so this is not a total surprise. Fortunately, I seem to be in the early stages and hope that a proactive approach will delay or prevent the complications that frequently go with the Big D.

Quilting Weather

2009-02-16T12:02:00.000-08:00

This morning I awoke to the sound of pounding rain. Thank goodness the library is closed for President's Day! Mondays are my scheduled day to empty the book drop which is a real pain when it rains. We have a drive-through book drop in the parking lot which was not well designed for bad weather. (Not normally an issue in Southern California!)

Fortunately, I don't have to go to work today. This seems like lovely quilting weather, so I plan to continue with my string-pieced stars. Here's a picture of the first completely assembled one. I love the red ring which I plan to repeat in each of them.

I did not love picking out the bits of foundation paper, though my bad arm may have been a factor in how difficult I found it. I do have to admit that the paper I'm using for this project is better than some I'm tried. It's the left-over scraps of pattern tissue paper which I used to trace the different sizes I needed for the Wild Girls' Christmas Dresses. Bonnie Hunter suggests that a size 14 (90) needle helps, so that's what I'm going to try today.