Kyle's Quilttop is together

Kyle's top has been put together finally. I had a devil of a time getting those corners to match up and in some cases, they are way off and it's not the type of ooboo that you can quilt out. I'm rather disappointed, but it's not even close to as bad as it was before I squared the blocks. His border is going to hopefully pull away from the crooked diamonds. His border should make up really fast. I'm thinking of maybe doing scrappy yellow blocks surrounded by blue or red. I need to make the middle border wider than I normally would to make sure that it's going to be wide enough for his bed. It'll prolly end up beingalmost 5" wide - I normally do 3" wide middle border with a 1 - 2" inner border. I have to make sure that I leave enough room at the edge of the diamonds to compensate for the binding ..I do not want to cover up the corners of it. Heh .. more math ;)

For reg's quilt I still have to change the logos to outlines and print it on paper then cut them out. Won't take long .. being a graphic artist has many advantages ;) Especially since I have the programs I need to do that very quickly without having to do a lot of tracing and erasing. I'm not sure what border I'm going to do for reg's quilt - maybe a 9 patch in the corners.

I did some hand qulting today on my Spats WC quilt. One more butterfly to do on the top, then the borders and voila .. I'm done. I'm just picking away at that one - no hurry for that - it's waited this long.

Still thinking of my Sunny Stars in the back of my mind .. they are all yellow lemoyne stars on a blue background (no inset seams) I have this in rotary cutting instructions and paper piecing - if interested drop me a line and I'll shoot them over to you .. i have them in pdf. I arranged a swap where I traded stars with other ladies from all over the world .. i have blocks from Australia, South American, South Africa and of course the US and Canada .. I'm really looking forward to making this up .. I would like to do this on point with alternating light and dark backgrounds .. I think that it might look really nice!

Okay, I'm blethering .. I think that i'm stalling from doing border designs LOL

Reverse Stitch Champion

I swear I am the world's best reverse stitcher - I'm starting to break speed records :S .. Somehow I managed to put the wrong edges together again .. even AFTER taking it apart and putting it all together right, I have no clue how I did it. But it's done and i opted to veer slightly away from the original design as Reg didn't really like the "blank" hole in the middle .. so this way I don't have to figure out what to put there .. with him coaching a Snr Boys Basketball team at one of the local high schools, I'm sure I could have figured it out tho LOL ...

After laying the top on the floor when it was finally pieced the 'right' way, I the dark blue and the dark red near the lighter green plus signs really popped out at me .. so i'm going to use those fabrics for the border. I was almost thinking of a 9 or 4 patch border .. I might even have a 3x irish chain kicking around here, but a more than likely a boxed border in the middle will be the way I will go. Still mulling that one over.. (until I get the backing for this quilt and kyle's) it won't go to much beyond the logos in the middle of the blocks, borders and marking. So I have a wee bit of time to figure it out.

Hmmm .. i think I'm going to try and incorporate reverse or backup in the name LOL!! Any suggestions???

Squaring the blocks for both quilts went amazingly well considering all the backing up i've had to do lately ... I was getting worried that I would make a serious oops and have a boo boo block.

I'm going to pull out my Singer 15-91 and put the top together for kyle's quilt. I've done all the piecing so far on my featherweight and the quilting was done on a singer 248 - Just have to oil it and wait a wee bit and I should be ready to go .. maybe tomorrow to finish kyle's top as i want to watch the pats go 15-0 -a perfect season :D :D .. Gots handquilting ready to go for this.

I did have some excitement .. one of my cats (Pixel) decided he was going to bring a mouse he found int the basement in my office to play with :| .. I'm like .. you're kidding me .. he drops it, the mouse takes off, pixel gets the mouse again, THEN the dog decides she wants into the act .. I'm like .. ENOUGH .. Pixel grabs the mouse and heads downstairs - LOL he was actually ready to defend his catch against Orion (She's a 65lb lab .. and a total suck too - she likes to think that she's a lapdog) ROLFMBO .. that is just to funny .. when he went to the basement he must of dropped the mouse again and the brat lost it again .. this time he couldn't find it .. complained about it for a good hour too!! Ah well .. we have 2 cats and will have mouse traps tomorrow .. I'm not worried about it

Kyle's quilt is going to have a seminole / harlequin type border as he has the diamonds in his .. I think that will accent the quilt very nicely!

Bits N Pieces .. Pieces N Bits

Today I perfected reverse stitching :S. I had the 1^st two rows sewn together and had added the 3^rd. I really wish that I had checked the block BEFORE I finished all 16 of them .. bah .. I had them together backwards .. I'm sure that makes no sense, but when you think of the squared colours going on the diagonal .. that makes perfect sense .. i had row 3 for row 4 and row 4 for row 3. So I perfected my reverse stitching technique :D. Got them all back together again and now his blocks are all going the right way .. I laid them out and am actually liking this. I wasn't to sure on the background fabric - I still think that I should have reversed it so it was more understated; but Reg doesn't care and all laid out it looked pretty good. I just have to square the blocks now and will do Kyle's at the same time.

I also got together the package that needs to go to Ruth; got her fabric together to ship with the attic windows quilt. I'm really excited about sending this to her ... I'm just happy that this quilt finally has a home :D

Hmmm .. I have my kitty quilt percolated in the back of my mind and may start a drawing of it to see how it looks ..

My To Do for tomorrow is:

square and piece reg's quilt top

square and piece kyle's quilt top

I actually managed to find **some** of my handquilting thread and will work on my various hand quilting wallhangings while watching football on Sunday .. I'm really looking forward to that .. especially the WC wallhanging that I call my Spats Kitty .. I managed to find a cat fabric where the cat looked very very very simliar to my Spats and with him not being with us anymore, I'm really looking forward to finishing it and getting it up on the wall ..

It's nice to have some projects crossed off my To Do list since I've liberated my quilting stuff.

Charity Attic Windows is finished!

I was right, this did take me about an hour to finish. Well technically it's not quite finished yet; the label still needs to go on, and I need to wash it. BUT it's finally out of the "I've got to get this done" pile into the "one more thing to do" pile. I'll do the label while watching a movie with Reg. I'm so happy that I find out a home for this to go to. Myself, and 5 other ladies did the blocks wayyy back in 2000 or so - shortly after thatcircumstances, forced me to pack up my quilting stuff and let it languish in purgatory for several years before it's recent liberation ;)

I've shown Reg what his quilt will look like and he was seriously impressed! He goes, it's gonna look like that?? I said for the most part. Then I explained that my version of Quilt Pro is so old that with the new OS, it won't accept fabric imports, so these aren't the actual fabrics, but the tones and hues are the same. I did a paste up of little swatches and he seemed to be good with it. Didn't even care that it was floral fabric in some cases. Just that it will be done soon. I'll be cutting out his fabrics tonite me thinks.

After that I'll be squaring Kyle's blocks and reputting the top back together.

needless to say, I've have a couple of busy days quilt-wise and am loving it!

Thursday is for Quilting ;)

Tomorrow is going to be a great day quilt wise :D.

1. 
   The attic windows charity quilt has a home with Ruth in Georgia - I just have some diagonal quilting to do as the 90% of it is already done and it'll be time to put the label on and close up the top where I did the quilt birthing. I'll be sending this quilt along with some fabric and boo-boo blocks. It is my goal to have this quilt finished tomorrow. God willing
   
   
2. Reg's Quilt has finally resolved itself in my mind .. i'm going to do a variation of double irish chain. Since my quilt pro is so outdated, it won't accept new fabric images from me .. so, this is a close representation of the fabric that I'm going to use. The background isn't country but is off-white in colour and has flowers and 'foilage' that pulls most of the colours that are represented together; the greens, reds and blue are pretty close in tone and hue. This quilt is all strip piecing then cutting, so this shouldn't take me all that long to do. it was fun getting all these colours to work together .. The colours I ended up with are not the colours that I started with for the most part. Reg's quilt should go very quickly for me. Cut strips, piece, cut and resew ;) .. voila .. gotta love quick quilts. And he will prolly only use it for the winter to keep his feet and legs warm, so this one needs to get soon!
   
   
3. 
   Kyle's quilt is finally back in blocks - I finished that this afternoon. I'll press the blocks then square them up. Then sew them all back together :S .. I hate it when I'm a twit! Hopefully that will teach me .. prolly not tho. I'm going to finish up Kyle's top after I get reg's fabric cut out. I still need to get some backing for this quilt so there isn't that much of a hurry to get this all together until I have the backing fabric.
   

I'm going to have a busy day tomorrow me thinks .. wonder how much I will get done .. it will be GREAT to cross off items on this very old list .. But Lordy is it GREAT to be back sewing again!!! WOOO HOOOO **kittyhappydance

Our New Component Cabinet - What a Deal

Took advantage of the wonderful boxing day sales to pick up a component cabinet for a super great price!! normally $200 we got this for like $44 .. not to shabby me thinks .. discovered why when I was searching for an image of it, it's discontinued by the manufacturer, but i'm not going to complain .. it's exactly what we need .. poor Shadow is going to be hard pressed to keep warm on the satellite box now LOL .. poor kitty ;)

Best thing is currently the dvd, xbox and satellite are all stacked on top of each other .. this will give it nice placement and get that table down stairs now :D .. we have wayyy to many end and occassional tables ..

Update on the pier cabinet .. hellasigh .. i got to step 4 and realized that i didn't have the correct parts for this. for the 4 legs; i need 2 C and 2 D .. I have 3 D and 1 C .. I called the store where i purchased it, they couldn't help me b/c their customer care department is closed (holiday here), I was spuing steam out my ears at that point and called the manufacturer .. no questions asked, sending me out the parts i need to finish this ..

I'm so bloody ticked about the company .. they can be open to take my money, but not take care of issues from the products GRRRRRRRR. I even suggested to her, why can't i just bring this back, I just purchased it less than an hour ago and exchange it. Oh ma'am, that also needs to be taken care of through our customer care department .. HOLYBIBLEBATMAN are you kidding ME!?!?!?!?!?!?!? Needless to say, I'll not shop at that store again. Not the first time I've had an issue with for any sort of reason .. GRRRRRR

I'matwit - Kyle's quilttop

Well last nite I finished piecing the top for kyle's quilt. Needless to say I am very disappointed in myself. I don't know if it was me wanting to get it done to surprise him in the am, or not feeling good - but twit for brains here .. did NOT square the blocks :'(. I took a few pics, but the batteries are dead in my camera right now and I'll fuss with that tomorrow - to tired tonite. My corners don't meet, the lines are all off and i have a SUPER friendly quilt top that is waving like mad .. hellasigh .. part of the problem is the yellow fabric, it's got a lower thread count I think and doesn't have the heft and weight of the rest of the fabrics I used. So there is a LOT of distortion and stretching in the yellow no matter how careful I was .. it's just a stretchy type of material and is in the corners of each block .. tell me that's not fun :S

Needless to say, I've spent tonite while watching Pirates and some sports programs, reverse stitching the top, bout a 1/3 of the way done and will finish it tomorrow. Part of the problem is my square cutter is 12 1/2" and these blocks are 14 1/2" - so instead of putting my mind to it (which I had to do BEFORE I got the block square cutter, was do it the long way .. so now, I have to unsew the quilt top - have about 6 blocks done out of 20, then square them up and do it again.

Worst of all (not sure if it's because of cmas or not) but kyle didn't notice that I was ripping his quilt top apart .. oh and this am he mentioned the lack of golf fabric in this quilt .. i reminded to him that he told me it would be fine that i used the old fabric and just made the pattern larger .. BOYS!!! Ilovemyson Ilovemyson Ilovemyson .. hellasigh ..

I'm going to put it down to excitement from cmas that he didn't notice .. but feelings are still hurt ..

I need to post those pics tomorrow.

On a good note tho, i did find one of my missing quilt tops - bad part of this, my little hip pack that has all my hand quilting supplies is still MIA along with my fabric dyes. I'm sure that it would turn up .. but i have 3 projects which i could finish in no time if I found those quilting thread!

I'm actually quilting!!!!

I can't believe it .. after all this time - I'm finally sewing again ..

oiled and readjusted the tensions on my featherweight and off i went .. actually pressed blocks, and cut fabric and sewed it together ...

**sigh** total bliss ..

Of course I didn't check the tension BEFORE i started, so I even got reverse stitching in - but what quilting wouldn't have that in it I wonder??

Sharpened my rotary blades. Actually found another bag of scraps :D .. to bad I'm still missing a box or two. Reg and I started shifting stuff around in the basement today to see if we could find them. Found a few other things, but not the box I'm thinking of specifically .. the one with all my betweens, favourite thimbles, pooh bear stamps, green pigma pens, miscellaneous supplies and gadgets - and i think I'm missing another WIP - oh actually it's not a WIP, it was finished .. so were did that wall hanging go .. I've not seen it since about 2001 (that's when all my sewing stuff had to be packed up for storage etc)

Ah well .. the bookcases are in place in the basement now, so now I can start sifting through boxes as I unpack my books .. hmmm .. still missing some kitty patterns too .. I'm going to guess I'm missing 2 - 3 boxes of various notions and sundries ..

Wish me luck on THAT part of it

I actually remembered another quilt that i need to work on. The Ladybug Court pattern I was developing .. it got tested by other quilters, just didn't finish my quilt up yet for it for the picture and whatnot . .I did find all the cut pieces soooooo that will be added to quilty things to do list :D

Fabric's been traded - Thank you!

These fabrics have all gone to their new homes .. thank you for looking :)

During the liberation of my fabrics from their imprisonment in boxes, I've come across fabric that I purchase for Kyle. Needless to say these prints are no longer age appropriate. What I would like to do is trade fabric for them. I'm looking for more masculine / sports type fabrics. Plaids would be good as well. I've various yardages all are 100% cotton and 45" wide.











This is a smoke-free home, but does have pets - cats and a dog. Would be more than willing to rewash fabric and package up right afterwards. I would like to get same size pieces if at all possible. I do apologize for the quality of the scans, but i had to blur them a bit in order to tone down the grain showing up in the scans.

Kyle's quilt

This was a quilt I started for Kyle oh back in 98 :|. I was actually 'test driving' a pattern for a fellow quilter and for whatever reason; school, illness etc, I was unable to finish it. What kills me is that the top was just about done. I mean all I have to do is piece the blocks together and voila, top ready for sandwich and quilting. I'm such a twit sometimes. Back in 98 Kyle would have been 3 years old, now he's 12 1/2 :O (Where does the bloody time go) and the fabrics themselves are almost too young for him, but still borderline .. there are trucks (cartoonish), and fabric with dots, green fabric with yellow pooh bear type honey bees and just a yellow streaked one. I tried to import the fabric but quiltpro is being a pita about it so I approximated. Here's the best I could do.

The next issue is the size. Kyle recently moved up to a double sized bed due to the fact that his room is large enough for now. Now I have enough of the blue and red to do wide borders to increase the size as well as add another border on. OR I could do one more row of blocks and use 1 less border. It's all going to have to come down to math. What ever I have the fabric for, he gets. I'm thinking that the wider quilt (blocks are 14/5" unfinished) so that should more than compensate for it not fitting his bed.

The fabric isn't all that bad .. granted the trucks and the honeybees could be worse, but it's not as babyish as i feared. He has actually said, i don't care mum .. i think that he just wants another quilt by mum .. been a while since he's gotten one.

Reg's Quilt

This quilt is going to be 'interesting' to actually make .. designing it was 'interesting' as well .. reg is totally uneducated when it comes to anything quilt related - he still calls them comforters ;) .. that will change, he's a quick learner.

His favourite teams are the Detroit Lions, Detroit Pistons, Detroit Tigers and MSU (Michigan State University), and his favourite colour is green. Needless to say the colours in this layout aren't even the correct ones but the team logos.

what i'm going to do is print them out on paper then iron it onto the right fabric ... or even do an outline .. i'm sure with my graphic knowlege i can find the easiest way to print on the fabric .. and since this ink is water soluable, it will come right out when it's washed. I'm having a devil of a time finding some sports related blocks, but i'm sure that something will occur to me. I'm more worried about having to do applique for the logos. I'm not the world's best at it and would rather 'cheat' with my machine. I was thinking of using Carrie Nation or jacob's Ladder blocks; they would 'encircle' the middle sports blocks and not necessarily make them the focus of the quilt - which are the team logos. This might even be a scrappy type quilt with the rest on WOW or COW .. not to sure yet. But this is my starting point and I'm sure flying by my tail will work in this case ;)

Quilt Quandry - what to do first?!?!?!?

For various reasons, i've not been able to quilt for roughly 5 - 6 years. for 4 - 5 of that time, my beloved fabric and sewing machines have been packed away in boxes. With the new house I gots a room that is shared with the computer (but of course ;)) that's for MY QUILTING :D :D :D>

As i'm unpacking my fabric, i'm getting all excited - it was like i was getting together with long lost friends. All my kitty fabrics, reproductions, watercolour fabrics, UFOs that are now WIPs ;) (amazing how not having something stare at you in the face for several years changes it's status!) ... then the quandry sets in - what to do first.

Kyle needs a new quilt since he's moved up to a double bed in the new house (but i've one in the works from a few years ago that might be big enough). Other quandry on this, the prints are almost to young for him; trucks and honey bees (pooh bear type honey bees), the other two fabrics should be fine.

Lap quilt for reg - his will be with his favourite sports teams logos on it and sports related blocks.

my kitty quilt - only been plotting this one for about 10 years - still plotting

sunny stars swap i did a few years ago

2 quilts for our bed; one winter one summer

finish quilting a charity quilt for sunshine i that is 1 hour from being finished note to self - find out where to send it

so essentially; 3 bed quilts (2 king and 1 double), 2 lap quilts, 1 charity quilt and other various WIPs (hand quilted kitty wall hanging, doll quilt (selling this item), Charity Attic Windows, kyle's bed quilt from a few years ago, sunny star swap blocks .. i think that i have them all ..