Fancy Me A Rainbow

a fat eighth bundle of "Fancy" from my 23yo for Christmas + a little Wizard of Oz text fabric yardage + a fat quarter of gray floating in my stash. . . 

Throw in a little graph paper play, and you get delectable perfection for some Snow Day indulgence!

(**love** the words on this text fabric)

~~~

Linking up at Pink Doxie's Pet Project Show, Monday Makers, WIP Wednesday, Let's Bee Social, and WIPs Be Gone

January Reports & TIPS for quilting a king on a domestic

Here is my end-of-month wrap-up for January:


Something Old/Something New -

For my something old, See my comments below in my NewFO report about my long-time owned "Faceted Jewels" kit.

My something new: "25th, Baby!" Just yesterday I put in the last of the ditch work on my double wedding ring king-size anniversary quilt!! It took 22 hours and 5 minutes.  I'm keeping track of all that stuff on this one. 7 bobbins so far.

It was very new to me to work with such a gigantic quilt, as I only have a table-top domestic machine.  

Tips I've picked up from Leah Day and others about FMQ'ing about support for the entire quilt and puddling were ESSENTIAL.  You cannot work with any fine control at all if a quilt of this size is pulling down on the front, side, or back of the work surface, or sitting stretched out making dead weight along the table. I'm adding in the tip from two commenters to use your ironing board set to your table's height, set along your left side for temporary added tablespace - brilliant!

Do what you have to do to keep the quilt from flowing over the desk edges. I do have to let a wee bit hang just to my left, but I always shift things so that's only the furthest part from my working portion and it makes zero drag on my puddle. Also, at this size you really do want that large Supreme Glider underneath, or as I've seen others do, use a yard of slick clear vinyl.

That puddle will make or break your FMQ success!!  See how much I have it bunched forward in front of me so that you reach down in and frame a little portion of working space at the bottom of that lake bed?  This keeps your work space unimpeded by the weight and bulk of the quilt so you can get smooth stitches. It's a bit awkward, yes, so don't expect to do this for 3 hours at a stretch without good breaks!

Tips of my own that I will pass on:

1)  There is no way on earth that spray basting will be sufficient at this size or for the amount of squishy manipulation you have to do! Thread- or pin-baste.  I placed my pins just under 2" apart along each arc, one in the center of each connecting diamond, and then 4 inside each ring center "square" to support the curvy corners. That was perfect. Didn't get any slipping of the layers, so everything is perfectly flat without ripples. So embrace the process of this kind of basting and watch a movie (or two - it took three of us 2.5 hours to pin baste this sucker!~).  And use the curved quilter's safety pins along with the pin tool.

 

I had to use every pin I own on this quilt, and then move some center pins from outer rings to inner rings for about 11 sets as I worked. That bin weighs maybe 5 or 6 pounds!

2)  Don't be afraid of using a decent loft for a king size. I'm using Tuscany washable wool batt, and find it very malleable in this situation - it doesn't impede the squishing or moving at all. I don't know if I would want to work with a doubled batt at this size, such as wool on top of 80/20, but a cotton, 80/20, bamboo, or silk batt would be fine. I wouldn't want to work with a thicker poly batt, either - too little drape to squish and manipulate easily enough for the center work - but a super thin poly would likely work just fine.



3)  Order of work will help you!  To put the ditch work or stabilizing lines in, work from the outside moving inward in a spiral fashion. Start on one edge. Turn and do the second side, turn and do the third, turn and do the fourth - turn and start a second pass along the first, etc. (On a DWR, it worked perfectly to work in ring sets. On a "regular" quilt, I'd probably work in passes about a foot wide.)   This is so you can remove the pins as you get stretches finished and then all that extra bulk/weight will be out of your way as you squish more and more width into that little harp area.

(When you do the "real" quilting, work in the opposite direction, spiraling from the inside toward the outer edges - this is so you can avoid having to squish the less-drapable heavier-quilted parts into the harp.)


4). Specific to quilting a double wedding ring:

     *If you are using different thread colors, it works better to stabilize all the connecting diamonds first, and then do the stabilizing of the melons and centers.

Don't be afraid of quilting a very large quilt yourself! If I can do it, you can, too!  Just remember to puddle that baby and provide support for *all* the quilt's weight, and you won't be crying like little Navarre.  ;D   (Who actually was complaining that I wouldn't leave the quilt still for him to play with.)

 

 

For February, my something old will be a fat-quarter set of pinks that I've never touched in the 4 or so years that I've owned them. I want to work up a plan on how to use them and maybe get it cut out and kitted for later sewing. Something new - figuring out how to execute the intricate "real" quilting I want to do on this DWR!!

 

 

NewFO Report for January

 

 

Holy smokes! What a great month this was, and super unexpectedly - my thesis work leaves me one hour each morning for the DWR and maybe an hour in the later evening, a couple hours on Sat/Sun depending on family activities.   But I got THREE NewFO's on board!

First I put together my String of Pearls. I intend to use the quilting on this as a learning tool for a motif I want to use on my Dear Jane.

Then, a couple of Saturdays ago I whipped up this super-easy kit - my Bohemia quilt.  It's just a flimsy, pinned on another finished quilt so I could see it up there for a while. I wish I had more of the green and blue batiks on that back-quilt's outer border, because don't they look great as last borders on this flimsy?  ;D This won't be quilted for ages.

 

 

Love the animal panels

 

 

And, as a time-filler while I had to babysit cat meals so the senior gal and the kitten each ate their own food, I washed, ironed, and cut out the batik "Faceted Jewels" kit that's been in my storage for 4 or 5 years. The cutting is way less complicated than you'd think.  It'll look like this when it grows up, but for now it's in an Amazon box on my ready-to-sew shelf in deep storage.

We'll see what February brings - it's amazing what you can accomplish when you consistently put in wee bits of time (and when you can have work areas where you can leave things waiting for your return).

 

Let's Book It!  Report -

I am working my way slowly through my "Affairs of the Heart" book. I got three blocks finished up during our dinner-hour TV time!   

I don't think much will happen here next month, as that time has been shunted to tying and tucking ends on my DWR quilting work.  We'll see!



So, there are my January reports - go check the link-ups out for some great eye-candy, tips from other quilters, and very good support groups to help you get your work finished.

December NewFO

I love Barbara's NewFO parties each month, and they're really helping me get these kits pulled out of stone-cold status and on their way to becoming quilts before my youngest is out of high school.  ;D  Lots of other fun projects emerging, so take a fun  stroll through the other links!

December was a month of greatly-reduced production, but I knew it would be with the cruise and the holidays and all.  :D  So I won't be doing an end-of-month report. But I do have a NewFO to share.

Before the cruise, I pulled out an old Christmas quilt kit called "Martha's Holiday Spin" from 2007. I'd hoped to get the fabrics washed and ironed, but they just felt so nice in my hands that I went ahead and cut everything (except the borders' final lengths).

But once it was kitted up so nicely, I couldn't resist getting some of the sewing done on it before it has to go back into storage. I got all the main blocks made - 12 Martha Washington Stars on the left and 6 Spinning Shirleys on the right.

And I did up the 4 border cornerstones while I was at it since they're just the insides of the Martha Washington Star blocks. 

And now it's coming up to the New Year, when I have to cut back on quilting hours to really get down-and-dirty with my thesis until August. So this goes back on the Christmas Storage Shelf, probably not to see the light of day again until next year's holiday season. At least it's quite a good ways on its path to flimsyhood! The pattern has lots of open areas for awesome quilting, so I have high hopes for this quilt's final state.http://catpatches.blogspot.com/2013/12/december-newfo-linky-party-and-giveaway.html

NewFO Dreamings for 2014

(Today's BOMs Away Monday is here):    

 

 

 

 

Oh, goody!!  Barbara is running her NewFO program once again for 2014. She's having a giveaway this week for linking up your plans - however specific or vague they may be! 

 

I have found this "program" to be invaluable for pulling long-stored kits out of my stash closet and at least getting them started. 2013 saw several flimsies accomplished that way, but I figure any bit of work (even just washing/ironing/cutting) is a step closer to a finish eventually, so it's all good. And it gives me something new to look at once a month while my "real" quilt work of the moment focuses on the next finish-up.

Some folks would think my working style is frenetic, and honestly, my modus operandi will greatly change once I complete my crazy quest to finish every single kit on my insane NETY list. For now, this system pulls the greatest amount of productivity out of my attention span, so it's the way I roll.  ;D

Going through my storage, here is a game plan of projects to pull out and get started over the next year, with two "new" allowances so I don't go stark raving mad:

 

January

This first one is a newbie - a modern quilting kit I purchased for comfort when my Koko died in November. This is Christa's kit for the "String of Pearls" quilt, and I just love it. I intend to use its quilting as a means to get a certain kind of motif into my muscle memory before I attack my Rainbow Jane quilting.

February

Let's start "Batik1 - Simply Fun" - looks like decent colors to see that month.  :)
 

March

"Tulip Garden" - a flannel kit - would be nice this month, as it's still cooold here when I'm used to it being full-on spring back in Florida. . .

 

 

 

April

 

We need something DRAMATIC and COLORFUL on the year's lineup. Let's cave for the absolutely spectacular, hot and fiery, "Fiesta Mexico" by Karen Buckley. It'll be the other new kit for the year - everything else is ages (even eons) old.

 

  

May

How about "Coraline"?

June

By this point, I'm sure I'll be wanting to move back into more modern styles, so let's do something with the Bliss layer cake and accompanying yardage. Maybe a Swoon (which was flying around Blogland when I bought this bundle), or a modern Dresden? or a Twister? Or some other kick that comes along during the upcoming year...

 July

High time to say: "Let's Take Amy Clamming!"  (You'll see what's happening here - it's gonna be cool!)

August

Don't need a birthday shopping bash this year, as I'll get to stash-supplement at this time for Top Secret #2.  So let's try again with the Medieval Illumination quilt project. I'd wanted to pull it for one of last year's NewFOs, but half the stuff remains unlocated after our move here to Colorado. I'm thinking a complete overhaul of the storage room and making sure no quilt boxes are lurking in the garage shelving should do the trick!

September

Let's play with the "Valley of the Kings" fabric set!

October

This will be a great time of year for "Saltbox Harvest"

November 

Another retry due to moving glitches!  "That Bad Boy" ... the project with a story that I wanted to do up this past November, but I couldn't find the kit box.

December

  

Are there any holiday kits left back there?  Oh!  Let's do something with the Kate Spain "Flurry" pack:

~*~*~*~

 

That's my plan for allowing myself 2 brand new projects and jump-starting 10 long-stored kits that would otherwise languish away untouched for yet another year. . . Perhaps a few of them will actually make it to flimsy status before being re-stored!  These never get priority for the month's work - they're used as a breather from the projects I put my real push on, the ones I make a concerted drive to finish up, as well as my BOM work.  You kinda have to be around to understand how it all fits together and works in a marvelous way. It's been fun seeing my husband really enjoy the flow of change that trickles around the "real" finishing work, and then get enthusiastic about the next finish point and getting to help with the accompanying photo-op. Apparently he talks about my quilting at work, because he brings me back little suggestions or questions from patients and coworkers. And that makes me smile that he takes my work so seriously even though it's not a paid job.

End-of-Month Report for November and NewFO

November wasn't so great for me, with Koko's leaving us, but let's see what I accomplished. 

Thanks to the folks who host these parties that greatly boost my motivation in my quest to finish up every UFO and NETY in my closets.

Linking to:

 

UFO's: Two complete finishes

I'd planned on finishing up Koo Koo Puff and A Barbeque with the Squadron - both a big, fat NOPE!!

✓ But my third selection was Kelly's 1930s quilt, and YES, I finished it!   All the hand quilting is in there, and the scalloped border is all stitched down. Not a quick task at all. Still need photos and a write up.

✓ Then I threw in one of Kelly's Joseph Smith quilts for an unexpected UFO finish. I'm really happy with how the quilting turned out, and this is another write-up waiting to happen. The family loss and a Thanksgiving trip over the mountains to Grandfather's House have taken away blogging time lately.

(both of those are blogged here: Two November Finishes)

And my DECEMBER GOALS are posted here



WIPs:

✓ Double Wedding Ring has 73 rings complete, so I kept up with my goal on that. Less than 2 rows to finish.

Rainbow Jane - I know now how I will quilt it, but I did not get any guidelines put in.



✓ NewFO:

I love Barbara's NewFO parties each month, and they're really helping me get these kits pulled out of stone-cold status and on their way to becoming quilts before my youngest is out of high school.  ;D  Lots of other fun projects emerging, so take a fun  stroll through the other links!


I had the best time with this one. Braid quilts turned out so easy to put together that I got the entire flimsy constructed!!  LOVE THIS! And I'm calling it "Plums in November."  I went comfort shopping when Koko died and got the backing and binding for this at the local quilt shop. I also was bad and bought a kit for a modern quilt which will be my next NewFO.

Plums in November flimsy:  (something like 75 x 90)

 

The kit didn't include enough fabric for the end triangles, but I found some Stonehenge in my stash to use there. I think it worked fabulously.

 

 

The kit fabric was like the lightest marble near the center squares, so I'm actually happier with the effect of this substitute than the original would have yielded.

SUPER itchy to quilt this one!!!!

(The backing is a nice plum batik with a wee bit of perkiness and plummy shapes. The binding is a slightly less perky plum that pulls together perfectly with the darker shades in the border fabric on the front.)

 BOMs:  Not bad, just went off-roading with this category for the month.

I did not keep up with all four slots. I didn't feel like it, and Hello, Moon isn't out just yet. I did finish everything on both of Kelly's BOM tops, and then quilted one of them and finished it. I did do 4 sets of work on the Holiday Tidings BOM that I pulled into the active loop this month. Nothing on Ruffled Roses other than some basting of a few applique pieces. Fully expect to go "off-road" again for December. Who knows what will happen, because I'll choose as I feel each Sunday instead of looking at the "schedule."


 Community Sewing: Nope. I did not make those wheel-chair blocks.   Maybe next month.


So - altogether, not a power-house month, but not a bad month, either. http://catpatches.blogspot.com/2013/11/november-newfo-linky-party-and-giveaway.html

September NewFO Report - Climbing Lanterns

Looking for this week's BOM's Away?  Link is here  ~~> 

Love Barbara's NewFO parties each month, and they're really helping me get these kits pulled out of stone-cold status and on their way to becoming quilts before my youngest is out of high school.  ;D  Lots of other fun projects emerging, so take a fun breakfast stroll through the other links.







This was a fun Fall-ish project to pull out of deep storage NETYs (Never Even Touched Yet) and get into the mix.

"Climbing Lanterns" is a kit I'd bought who-knows-when at whatever sale that snagged me. The pattern is by Marinda Stewart, and it uses the Laura Gunn "Lantern Bloom" fabric collection.

 

The quilt is a background of nice earthy colors patched together in 6 inch patches with a woody print appliqued over in a tree form.  It has a fun 3-D component, which is what those pieces in the first photo are for. You make a couple folds and straight-stitch those, do some gathering stitches, put in some fiber-fill puffing, and stitch them down onto the quilt hanging from the branches. That will be fun to do.  :)

I'm seeing if I can successfully adapt the back-basting method I use for hand applique to machine applique. So far so good. I drew out the tree on the back of the background. Laid the tree fabric front-side-down on the floor, then laid the background front-side-down on top of that and pinned it well. I put my machine on the largest stitch it will do, lowered the tension significantly, and with the pinned layers upside-down so I could see my pencil lines, I stitched over those. Got some thread bloopies from the super-loosened tension, but that won't matter one bit.

I cut about 1/4" away from the stitching, and with the quilt top-side-up in the machine, I'll be taking out those basting stitches a stretch at a time, turning under the edge, and real-stitching the edge down. Maybe with the teeny-tiny blanket stitch I favor, or maybe I'll try that "invisible" machine stitching I remember seeing something about online if I can find that again. 

Not sure yet if I'll attach the 3D lantern blooms before or after I do the quilting. But this is a really nice little quilt (a good small sofa size) in real life.


Here's my backing fabric that I got at the time (glad I did, as the collection is too old to find anymore):

This is the binding fabric that came in the kit. I'm not digging it for this quilt. I'm relishing a knife-edge finish, instead. But won't this fabric be a great addition to my small-yardages stash?  :D  

I don't think I'm going to store this project away just yet - I'll keep it out in case I ever have sewing moments available in October after doing my daily anniversary quilt sewing.  :)



Oh!!!!!   And I want to journal this:

HAHAHA!~! Nothing like Nature and a kiddo to break your snarky mood. A little walking after dropping the girls off at the school, and a gorgeous fox dashes across the road 20 feet ahead. Around the corner, as I'm passing a mom with a toddler in a stroller, *another* fox sprints full-out across us not 10 feet ahead, chased by a madly screaming magpie. The kid has the most astonished look I've ever seen on her face, and in that stuttering way they have, yells out:

"Dat kitty.... Dat doggy.... Dat kitty......... Dat Kitty-Doggie is in touble! Dat birdie will SPANK him!" lolol