Becky's quilt obsession

Don’t worry if you see few blogs from me. It is time to separate perennial flowers, especially iris and hostas.  I’m spending most of my energy outside when the weather cooperates.  Some of the plants were put in when we first moved here in 2005 – they are complaining about the tight quarters. I’ll check back in after the plants are happy in their new homes. I have some help, so I need to take advantage of it when it is available. Happy Quilting, Becky

The last two weekends it has been spring. No so in between. Yesterday I spotted these daffodils trying to bloom. I have been working in the yard (flower beds) during the good days. No sewing. Saturday my daughter came to help. It was a good thing. I was working in the sun, even though it was only in the 50s, and I managed to have one of those heat exhaustion things. I was taking rest breaks; I was drinking water. Evidently not enough. I will have to look up side effects of the new meds they gave me. Yesterday (Sunday) it was 82 degrees. I drank 4 times as much as the day before, only stayed out 2-3 hours, and did okay. Today is the above right picture. The rain has finally stopped, and a bit of blue is trying to come into view, but it is windy and 42. My muscles say it is a rest day. DGD#2 is here, with a cold, and wanting to go outside. No, nobody goes out today. Wednesday, the next she is here, it is supposed to be warm and sunny, so maybe I will be able to clean out these flowerbe...

                          My time this past week has been spent helping my friend JoAnne finish up this quilt for her new Granddaughter’s baby shower. The parents had lost so many pregnancies that they wanted to wait until the baby was safely here. The front is appliqued with fuzzy fabric, and the back is Minkee type fabric that little ones can’t help but touch. When we were taking the quilt off the machine Friday, there was a a scrap of backing left – 30” x 60”. I cut it in half, added a bit of light Dream poly, and quilted it with the same design that is on the big quilt. I finished the binding up right before the shower. I also gave her the rabbit quilt I finished last week. I think my friend is in love. Little one is also her namesake. How precious. Happy Quilting, Becky

These aren’t on my wall, because it was a quilting week, not a piecing week. You’ve seen these quilts before in various stages. Two are finished, one just needs binding. The “crayon” quilt that I thought I was finished with came back home with me and I’ve quilted it with the swirls templates. The guild president “forgot” about asking someone else to quilt it. It is ready for binding. It needs to be finished for the quilt show the first part of May. I guess I will bind it as well. I did make a label, so I will put it in with the binding, one of the triangle in a corner ones.     I bound the trip around the world quilt, and soaked it in Biz and Oxyclean until all the age spots came out. It lightened up, and the white border now matches the white binding. I love this quilt. Red is a favorite of mine, and I love that these are original 30’s fabrics. Many of them have been reproduced, especially the conversation prints.       I also finished binding this q...

I have had several requests for more information on the quoins DH made for my Nolting 24 Pro composite table (one of the new black ones, hence his name Black Bart). Today he made another set, and I took a few pictures. If you know someone with a table saw, these are easy to make.       First we found a piece of scrap 1/4” plywood. He set the fence at 2” and cut 3 strips about 18-20” long. These are for the piece in the lower part of first picture that holds the template stable 2” out on the table. I put one of these in the center of each section of the templates. I did sand these well so threads don’t catch on them. Then DH cut 3 rectangles 3-1/2” x 12”. Using a straight edge he drew out the diagonal line on all three of them.       He cut the diagonal freehand and handed the quoins to me. I’m the  “finisher”, so I used this small sander (any sander will work, including just your hand and sandpaper) to remove all the rough edges that occur...

This has been a week of quilting, not piecing. This is an eBay top that I purchased because of the red, and the original 30’s fabric. I quilted it with Baptist fans on Black Bart. The muslin binding is made, just needs to be applied, hopefully today. I will machine sew it all, as my grandmother did with all her quilts. She quilted by hand, but turned her backs to the front and machine stitched them down. This one was a challenge to keep somewhat square as the center was not as large as the borders. I’m trying to learn how to make adjustments, so it was a good practice quilt. We received the new Circle Lord templates this weekend, so I just had to use them. My friend’s baby is almost due, so I quilted this panel for her with the new template. I love how the back looks. It really doesn’t show much on the front of the quilt, which is just a panel with bunnies on it – the mom loves rabbits.   Please go to Judy’s site to see other design walls. Happy Quilting, Becky

I love my Nolting table – Black Bart. I really like using Circle Lord giant templates, but I really hate taking a lot of time placing them on my table. I tried rubbermaid shelf liner – and it worked fairly well, but I had to space the templates away from the Back channel, tape the ends, etc. I asked my engineer DH for some help. He tried to tell me about quions. I asked him to make some. We went down to the shop and cut some leftover nice plywood and made them. He did the cutting; I did the sanding. The two triangles are the quions, the other piece is a spacer that keeps the templates a set distance from the edge of the back channel so I don’t have to measure each time. These are all quite thin, so they don’t catch on the machine carriage as it passes over. The two left pictures show the template in place held by the quions – pronounced coins. I just use my fingers to push them together to hold tight. We squared-off some of the ends to give a “softer” place to push. This saves usi...