Friday night sew in

Last night was the sew in. I managed to stay in. With the Olympics going on I seemed glued to the TV. Speaking of which, we got a new one. Couple of years ago ours went out. Instead of getting a new one we have been using my sons, since he is living here why let it go to waste. Well he is moving back out in a couple of weeks so we had to go invest. Well anyway back to the sew in. I worked on some hand work so I could watch TV too. I also spent a lot of time on the phone with a friend I hadn't talked to in months. I pinned a quilt on the machine, and worked on some swap blocks. I will post pics later but for now I want to get back to work on the swap blocks before my 'get up in go, goes!'

Ok See How Horrible I was

My last post got me to thinking, 'How far have I come in my quilting?' So I went to searching for one of my earlier pieces. Most had been given away but I still had this one. This is one of my first quilts I quilted. When my machine was delivered I had  the normal show me how to do it and then he was off. I finished up on that piece and then I thought I want to do something, not practice. So I grabed off the pile of tops I had and went to town. This was probably done within the first two weeks of owning my machine. These were swapped Tulip blocks off of some yahoo group. Looks good from a distance. It looks good close up if you are not a quilter.

Look at those stitches. Small, medium, large and extra large. Can you tell I have no stitch regulator! And look at the overall quilt you can see where I clamped it. It bows out. Gosh I hope I still don't have those tell tell signs. And I sure hope that my stitch length has improved. Now that I have this quilt out, I think I am going to give this to a friend of mine that was just diagnosed with lung cancer that has spread to her brain. She needs a comfort quilt and these spring tulips should bring some joy to her room. Yep this is going to Maria. She won't care about my ugly stitches. I think these flowers will be better off with her then packed away with me.  

Another Week

Well it has passed by so quickly! My Saints won the super bowl, I was so glad that the hubby was in bed so we didn't have any fights going on. Once again I was rooting for the 'wrong' team as most other Hooiser's would say. I was even Boo'ed at work. Well I am used to controversy.
I am working 9 hours at work and even overtime on Sat. Yes I am thankful that I have a job but gosh it sure doesn't leave much time for sewing, knitting or much of anything else. I did manage to get 2 quilts quilted this week.

This first quilt is Mary M's, she is over 90 years young. She was my first ever quilting customer. I thought with her first quilt that I would give up quilting for others. Her piecing was well lets just say not the best.She had just started piecing and I had just started long arming. What a pair we were! But now years later she has improved so much. She gets her points to come out the majority of the time. Her fold and tuck method is down to a minium. It has been such a pleasure to watch her grow as a quilter. As I look at her pic right now, I see one of her pieces is turned. Oh well still a quilt to be proud of. I know she is giving this to her son in law so she just wanted a the simple meander on it, nothing girlie. Great Job Mary!

This quilt is one of mine. Yes I am trying real hard this year to get one done a month. This was done with the Simple Stack the  Deck method.  I did a demo for this at my local club and I pulle dfabrics from my stash to make it. I had all the simple blocks done and wanted to use something to set them. I found this cheap ole black and white plka dot. It had been folded the same way for so long that it has fade lines in it. But I used it anyway. I mean my quilts are for using not for shows. I wanted to border it with what I had so... more pulling from the stash. You can see in the bottom right corner there is a large block, there is also one in the opposite diagonal corner. I didn't have enough of anything on hand that matched to make wide enough borders (I don't like small quilts) to make it a big quilt that I had to go with something a bit unusual. 

But I think it all turned out ok. I have a 71x83 quilt that I will give to my Granddaughter this next Christmas. Now onto the binding. But speaking of bindings. I didn't like the leather thimbles.  I know I need to learn to push with the middle finger but sometimes I still do with the thumb. Practice Practice Practice. The leather thimble did no good on the thumb I couldn't even grasp the needle. (yes I know that is why I need to learn to push with the middle finger) So the leather thimble on the middle finger was to far down on the finger that I still had the raw spot on the tip. So will try something different next time.

Sundays News

It's Super Bowl time. Go Saints! I picked the Saints the first of the season so even tho they are playing the colts I am sticking with them. It's halftime so I thought I would get some puter time in. While watching the game I am doing needle turn applique. I only have one and half more little animals to applique on and the baby quilt will be ready for quilting.

I do have my first finish of the year. It is a Christmas log cabin. The center 4" blocks were lottery blocks I won from a yahoo group. I won them in 2004, but I never knew what to do with them. In 2007 I joined a bag challenge off another group and then the top was made for me by a friend in this bag challenge. This top was made in 2007, so 2010 I will get to actually put it out on the bed for the Holiday. I was so happy to have the top made I rushed out and got the borders but then everything stopped. It got shuffled to the side and lost in the pile of UFO's. I finally got it back out NOV of 2008 and got those borders on but once again it sat. I wanted to do something special on the quilting. I thought feathers all in the red part of the logs. Nice big feathers scrolling from one side to the next but then what in the green. HMMMM so back to thinking. I had this cute panto of Jingle Bell with bow and holly leaves and I kept thinking somehow I needed to use it. So I ended up doing the panto in the center and a loopy in the gold border with meander in the green/red border and in the red outer border I did scroll feathers  to the center with a jingle bell with bow in the center. I really like how it turned out nice but not to fu fu but yet not to plain.

The son and his car and suspended license has been a riot. I couldn't feel to sorry for him for if he would have changed his address to where he is currently living none of this would have happened. But then that would have made sense. I hope he has learned something from all of this.

Well I guess it time to get the snacks ready for the second half.