Baton Rouge Square with built in sashing

I have made no UFO progress this week. To see what others have done hop over to Susan's blog, Blackberry Creek Home Arts.

I did make progress on other things though. Yesterday I made my donation block for my guild's annual donation quilt to one of our local charities, La Puente. This block finishes at 14". The instructions call for the following fabrics: black solid, white solid, light greens (several fabrics), dark green, and medium blues (several fabrics). It is an interesting block since it includes sashing as well as the actual block.

Here is the block part of it.

And here is the block with sashing.

Just Playing

I needed something to sew but I only have a few minutes at a time right now so I can't do anything complicated. I got out my Gwen Marston book to look for inspiration.

I decided to try the square in a square blocks.

Above it what I've done so far. I'm just using scraps. I may add another round of triangles to these to make them larger and I may not. Right now it's just something easy to sew when I don't have much time to sew. They measure between 5" and 6" squarish at this point.

Sew Silly Sisters Scrap Blocks

My art group met today. We brought our quilted scrap blocks and discussed how we are going to attach them to our quilted background. Check out the quilting on the black background! Click the image to enlarge it.

I'm going to put the binding on the black quilted background and the sleeve. I brought home five of the six blocks. The sixth is still being worked on. Here is a taste of what it will look like. Again, click to enlarge.

I will take closeup images of each block later when I can show you all six along with the names of the makers. Here is mine though.

And since you can't really see the quilting from the front, here is the back.

I quilted this Monday on Hattie. I learned that I need to slow her speed way down, like 10%, in order to stitch in the ditch with Hattie. I purchased a 12" by 3" long arm ruler recently for sewing straight lines with Hattie. I haven't even opened it yet though. I was sewing so slowly and following the seam lines that I didn't worry about using the ruler. I think it turned out as well or better than it would have with the ruler.

Wonky Cross Quilt

I decided to go ahead and finish quilting the Wonky Cross quilt on Hattie. Now that it is done, I don't think I could even tell you which part I quilted on which machine.

I did an all over swirl pattern. You will probably need to click on the photos to enlarge them to see the quilting. I really like the back of this one too.

I'm not sure what I will do with this one. I took a few more pictures trying to practice and improve my photography and staging skills.

Sunday afternoon the boy caught a dragonfly. He was keeping it in a plastic bug jar until I convinced him that it was cruel to keep it too long.

I took a picture so that he could "always remember his pet dragonfly, Golden."

Practicing

I quilted a charity quilt with my new HQ Sweet 16 this weekend.

It went well but I need to quilt a few more projects on it before I get the hang of the new setup.

I got the extension table on yesterday morning, all by myself. The hardest part is removing the machine from the table and flipping the table over and then putting everything back. Both the machine and table are heavy. The instructions for installing the extension table are very clear, with pictures, and I had no trouble doing it myself.

After doing one project on my new machine I discovered two main differences between quilting on Lily, my regular machine, and on my new one. By the way, I have named her Hattie or Chatty Hattie. Have you seen the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang? Hattie has a rhythmic sound like the car in that movie, like she is talking to me as we work. Anyway, on to the differences.

(1) Hattie's speed is set by her computer (the little screen above the needle arm in the first photo of Hattie above). When I step on the pedal she is almost instantly going at full speed and easing back on the pedal has little or no affect on her speed. On Lily, the speed is controlled by the pedal, like a car. I have obviously learned how to adjust the speed of the machine to my hand speed when quilting on Lily. I'm going to have to work on maintaining a constant hand speed on Hattie. I also need to play around with the stitching speed to figure out what works best for me.

(2) With Hattie the main body of the machine is directly in front of me at the back of the table. On Lily the main body of the machine is to my right. So the ways that I have been controlling the part of the quilt that is not under the needle is going to have to change. This is just going to require practice and trial and error to figure out what works best for me.

I've got a couple more charity tops ready to be basted and quilted to practice with Hattie. School begins next week for our whole family. (My husband also teaches at Adams State College) It will take a little time for my routine to adjust and solidify. Then I hope to get into a quilting/work/family rhythm again.

One more picture of the quilt. Goldie had to see what the heck her momma was doing at 7:15 am out front with her camera this morning.

UFO Bust Report - Week 32

Well ... I wouldn't really call this "progress," but I found another UFO during my recent sewing room remodel. This is from a hand applique class I took some time around 1999.

Ugh! This is soooo not my taste anymore! I never did really like hand applique either. I thought that maybe I would like it more if I learned how to do it properly. Nope. The instructor didn't help either. It bothered her that I appliqued in what she called "the left-handed manner" even though I am right-handed and sew right-handed. I tried to do it her way but was just miserable. I probably could have relearned how to do it the way she wanted me to, but what I was doing was working for me and you can't tell which "way" the pieces are sewn down. I finished the whole class but above you can see that I didn't finish the project.

Since taking this class I have adopted the policy that class projects do not require finishing, unless I want to finish them. For me, the purpose of a class is to learn a technique, not complete a project. I did learn how to hand applique, even if I don't like it and don't do it well. So this project has served it's purpose.

I'm not sure what I want to do with this block at this point. It's pretty big, about 16" square. I just have to finish up the center. I'm tempted to finish it with machine applique and maybe put some borders around it until it's big enough for a baby quilt. I could also take it to guild and put it on the in-house raffle table for someone else to finish. Or I could just throw it away. I don't know, I need to think about it for a little while longer.

Hop on over to Blackberry Creek Home Arts to see what the other UFO Busters have accomplished this week.

Summer Camp - Glamp!

I finished my Glamp earlier this week. It was really fun to make and pretty easy.

Here it is.

lit

and

unlit

I chose to just do a simple one - great fabric and some fun trim on the bottom. You might recognize the fabric from the birthday purse I made for my niece. I had to hang it from the ceiling fan for the photos because I don't have a way to hang it yet where I want it. I hope it will hang above my cutting table. I could really use some overhead light above the cutting table!

The son likes it too. He thought it made a nice hat!

Head over to Amanda's at the Quilted Fish to see the other Summer Camp Glamps. And if you are so inclined, please vote for me.