Friday, January 13, 2017

I didn’t think it would take long to finish the ruler quilting today, and I was right. The Cranberry Hall’s President was coming over at eleven for a quick meeting about the insurance for the Hall. I was almost finished by the time he got here, and had all the ruler work done by lunch.

The afternoon didn’t go as quickly. First, I had to deal with the back of the quilt. Using the scissor option on my machine leaves about a half inch length of thread on the back and each one of them had to be snipped off. Then I had to deal with the clumps of thread that got caught in the quilting. I managed to clear them up enough that I’m not ashamed of my work and, if necessary, I’ll cover the worst of them with a felt marker (around the Guild they suggest we should use a gel pen). Even when all that was done I felt like the quilt was still lacking something.

I used a scallop-looking stitch along both sides of the sashing and all the way around the outer edge. It was just good luck that the start and the finish of the scallop on the edge more or less joined up! There is quite an investment in thread on this quilt.

Tomorrow I will trim the quilt, cut the binding and attach it to the quilt. I’m not sure if I’ll sit and hand stitch the binding right away – I feel like the quilt and I need a break!

Thursday, January 12, 2017

I think I only have one more day of quilting left but Thursday has always been my day for paperwork so that’s where I started. This week I decided, as I climbed over and around boxes and bins, that whatever time was left in the day after paperwork on Thursdays would be dedicated to cleaning up and some of my paper projects.

With that in mind I had a few photos for scanning set aside on my desktop. In addition, I also had a pile of recipes sitting on my desktop that needed to be added to my recipe program. Yesterday, when the keyboard tray of my desk fell apart, all of these moved to my In Basket. For the moment I’ve cleared my desktop and have both my keyboard and mouse sitting on it. There isn’t room for much else so perhaps this will prevent me from stacking it up again.

Anyway, back to paperwork. It was almost noon before my physical In Basket had been cleared and Pat’s accounting had been done. After lunch I worked on my e-mail, Cranberry Hall and Guild business.

There is very little time left in my afternoon, but I’m going to get busy at some of the piles I have scattered around the room.

Wednesday, January 11, 2017

I’m back at my ruler quilting; I hoped to be finished today but I don’t think that is going to happen. I am making progress though and I’m getting a bit quicker. There are still a few things I’m not happy with – actually more than a few – and I may ask the advice of my Guild members as to whether or not the project is suitable even as a donation quilt.

Without getting into too much technical jargon (and I wouldn’t even know the technical terms to use) I have changed my method today. I was having trouble with the back stitching at the beginning of a run because the bobbin thread was bunching up on the back. So today I went back to one of the first things I learned about free-motion quilting and that was to pull the bobbin thread to the top before starting. That worked well but the scissors leave a particularly short bit of bobbin thread for the next start and I was constantly having to remove my gloves in order to grab the small bit and pull the thread longer.

After a few glove-off glove-on moments I decided I didn’t need the hand that holds the ruler to be gloved. So I keep the glove on my right hand (to pull the fabric) and that leaves my gloveless left hand to pull the bobbin thread to the top; the ruler stays in place equally as well with or without the glove.

I’ll get back to in now and see how far I can get before the day runs out.

Tuesday, January 10, 2017

Last night I finished cutting the fabric for my next block in the Celtic Crystals series and I had everything packed up for the bee before I went to bed. During the night it struck me that I should take along my power bar as there are limited plugs at the clubhouse; since I don’t usually do anything but hand stitch the power bar isn’t always packed with my gear. While I was picking up the power bar I also threw in the small iron I purchased in Portland this fall, along with the table-top ironing board I purchased at a yard sale this summer; there is only one iron and ironing board at the clubhouse.

I purchased the iron with the intent to use it at home for my paper piecing but it worked very well for the today’s project. I was working with small pieces (most were only one and a half inches wide) and therefore the small seams were easy to press on the board. The iron doesn’t have a steam function but I took my spray bottle with me just in case I felt I needed it; the iron got sufficiently hot that the spray wasn’t necessary. Now that I’ve used the tools I can see that I’ll use them more often in the future.

Today was a miniature day and I had nothing to show. I had hoped to have made a start on my new project but that didn’t happen – maybe next month. Even though I didn’t show anything I was the lucky winner of the draw. I picked a kit to make a Heart Keeper – the package says you can you it to store jewelry, sewing supplies or you can use it as an evening bag. Personally I think they have oversold it but it should be a quick finish and perhaps something for the boutique at the quilt show.

I finished up the triangular scarf last night and tonight I’ll go back to the toque I was making; actually I have two toques on the go. I was looking in my stash for a contrast colour for one of them and I found a whole bag of odds and ends yarn. I think these skeins are multiplying when I’m not looking!