A quilting solution for the skinny inner stop border...

I like using skinny stop borders but I am usually clueless as to how to hand quilt them.

I was recently doodling a palm tree...probably wishful thinking with the winter we have been having in southeast lower Michigan.  I always draw a certain pattern to represent the bark of a palm tree's trunk. Then it hit me...eureka!  

It is something I can do without any thought, measuring, or marking...my favorite sort of quilting pattern.

Here it is sort of crudely drawn out on paper, not exactly what is quilted but enough for you to see what I am doing.  It is very random, and I vary the length of each segment before changing the direction of the slant.  That comes in very handy when approaching a corner.

Now that the skinny border is done, it is time to finish outline quilting the last 3 of 16 blocks.

I'm so close now I can taste the end!  Maybe I can get the binding on soon...

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)

Shhh! Secret deadline...

I mailed off an original block to the Quiltmaker Magazine folks this morning for consideration in one of their "100 Blocks" publications. I wish I could show you the finished block...it is so cool!!... but I have to sit on my hands until it is (hopefully) accepted and published in the upcoming issue.

All I can tell you is that it is an applique block (duh!) and that I used the following fabrics on my crisp, white background.

Meanwhile, the hand quilting continues.  I have finished the outer border...believe me, there was much rejoicing and happy dancing going on for a while in my family room.

Now, I am doing the outline quilting on the remaining blocks.  I worked on the French horn block while watching Olympic Skating yesterday.  

Before outline quilting...

During and after outline quilting...

I know...it is very subtle, but I will know it is done, and I like the way it makes some motifs "pop" and some just "sizzle" in the background. There are some bigger pieces, like the French horn bell, that really need the quilting to keep them from poofing out. 

It is difficult quilting because there are many layers, but it is satisfying.  At this time, I'm glad I chose to cut the background fabric away from under the larger applique motifs.  Also, due to going around little pieces, I can usually only get one stitch on the needle at a time.

But it is fun to re-visit each design close up as I hum along.  You should hear the crap that runs through my head while working:

1)  "#@%$& - what possessed me to draw this tiny flower blossom so small?!?"

2)  "Oh, I really should have put another leaf here..."

3)  "Yikes - not enough French knots in the center of this flower."

4)  "Ooooo - I really like that fabric..."

5)  "Ahhh - I like to run my hand over the surface of the hand quilting..."

6)  "I wonder if I can talk Steve into making dinner?!?"

7)  "Squirrel!!"

We are our own worst critics, aren't we?

Happy stitching,
Teresa  :o)

ENOUGH ALREADY!!!

ENOUGH ALREADY is an understatement!  We got another messy 6 inches of snow yesterday.  We are running out of places to shovel it!  Our raised gazebo and front porch are now even with the landscape.

The sun came out, innocently, yesterday afternoon when the worst had blown through.  The roads were terrible, and since the heaviest snow came after kids were going to school, we all had to get out in it to get them home.  Southeast lower Michigan has gotten wave after wave of storms this year.  I wish we could give some of it to southern California!

This misplaced southern girl has had enough!

Stay safe out there!

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)

Now you see 'em, now you don't...

I love the delayed gratification of removing two things from the quilts that I hand quilt...the quilting marking lines and the basting thread.

I have finally started trusting the blue, washable Clover marking pens.  I had a bad experience 20 years ago with the first pens of this kind.  This one seems fine...I just spread the quilted area on my plastic table, spray/flood liberally with water, and dab/rub gently with a clean hand towel or paper towels.

I draw the very faintest of lines so this method of removal works for me.  I know a lot of people just wash the whole quilt, but I didn't want to do that.  All of my fabrics are pre-washed, so I don't worry about the fabric bleeding.

And since I am so cheap and work in sections as I go, would you believe I try to dry and reuse the paper towels?  Our house is so darn dry this winter, it takes no time to dry them out and every little bit of moisture I can get into our home air is a good thing...

I was so eager to take these pictures that I didn't wait for the wet areas to dry, so my pressed border pieced seams look a little dark and visible.  It freaked me out at first...just breathe, Teresa.

The quilted heart at the point of the green stop border is not connected to the adjacent 3-leaf motif, it just looks that way from my bad pictures.

I now have seven laurel/note swags to quilt on the last side along with three corners.  I have not outline quilted all of the sixteen center blocks yet, and I will probably come up with something to quilt in the skinny stop border.

The excitement is rising in me every time I sit down to put some stitches in this quilt!  I really am going to get it done...and soon.  I am looking forward to THAT happy dance...it will be EPIC and LOUD!

After adding a sleeve, I will need to address my new problem...getting a very good photo of this quilt.  There is nowhere, no floor, wall or bed, in my house to do this properly.

Sometimes I hang them in my backyard gazebo for photography, but the light and the wind have to be perfect...not easy in the Midwest where there is rarely a still day, and there is a lot of snow and related mess between the house and the gazebo right now (and actually IN the gazebo...sigh...).

Sometimes I spread them on the floor of the carpeted sanctuary of the church where I work and hang over the balcony wall to get a picture...it is not optimal, either.  One day, someone will unlock the church and find me in a heap on a quilt, suspecting suicide...hmmm...not good.

Oh well...it gives me something to think about as I quilt...

Another favorite delayed gratification item for me is removing the basting thread after hand quilting.  I am starting to do that now, and it is fun to see the clean quilt without all the orange basting thread.

Why orange thread?  

Well, my mother used to unwisely keep her sewing thread in an antique, clear glass, pickle jar on a shelf next to a sunny window. When she passed away, I was going to just chuck the spools of her homemade, now naturally variegated thread.  I decided to bring it home and use it as basting thread.  Oh the joys of being the offspring of depression parents...I can't throw anything away if I can squeeze some drop of usefulness out of it.

When I do counted cross stitch, I wait until the end to do all the outline stitching...another one of my delayed gratification "ticks."  I just love it when the finished projects "pop!"

So, I have been raving and raving about "Downton Abbey," but has anyone been watching Masterpiece Mystery Theater's "Sherlock" this season???  OMG!  The third and final episode of this third season was after "Downton" last Sunday night...all three have been WAY too fabulous to sew or quilt though...too much to miss if those eyeballs aren't glued to the screen!

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)

And the "Downton" winner is...

The results are in - we have a winner!  Season 4 of "Downton Abbey," part 4, was watched by millions tonight.  I can imagine that was difficult and stressful in houses with one TV and the Super Bowl on!

All of your ideas for cliffhangers were amazing!  I agree with many of you - Thomas needs to be revealed as the snake he is!  I can't believe that he still works there, after what happened in Season 2!

Anyway, using a random number generator on the list of willing participants, Dar of Dar's Patchwork Garden is the big winner. Congratulations!

Thank you to everyone who played along.  I love this show! 

Granted, the first time I see an episode I don't get much stitching done...too busy looking at clothes, characters and locations.  But then as I watch again (and again and again...), I can just listen, looking up occasionally, and get quilting done.

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)

A "Downton Abbey" giveaway as the snow and quilting continue...

I LOVE "Downton Abbey," and I always order the current season on DVD as soon as it is available so I don't have to wait to see the rest of the season.

Well, I ordered 2 copies so I would have one to give away to my blog readers.  Leave a comment and tell us what YOU would think would make a fake/funny/serious season cliffhanger.  Be creative, and do it by midnight Sunday night, EST.  I will post the winner Monday morning.

We are having yet another winter storm today, but it is warmer this time, right around the freezing mark.  When I was out shoveling, I heard something I had not heard this whole frozen winter...bird song!

The birds have come out from where they are surviving the cold, so I put out a dish of birdseed.  The birds have been excitedly visiting and eating until...

...dunh, dunh, DUNHHH (dramatic music inserted here)...

...I guess they see Mr. Weasley through the glass.  Little do the birds know, he can't get to them and he is a BIG CHICKEN. He wouldn't know what to do with a bird (except maybe wet himself...).  

 Still quilting...sigh.

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)

Dreaming of Cinderella (while the paint is drying)...

Remember the "Cinderella" TV movie/musical that used to come on every year?  (Yes, I am DEFINITELY dating myself now...)

It first aired in 1965 and starred Lesley Ann Warren as Cinderella. I used to LOVE watching that thing every year!  Remember those song lyrics, "In my own little corner, in my own little room, I can be whatever I want to be?"

Well, today I am Cinderella, established in the corner of the family room by the window, working away on hand quilting the outer border of my "Baltimore Rhapsody" quilt.

It is snowing like crazy outside as I work, and the wind-tossed snowflakes make me feel like I am lost in a magic spell.

Maybe I am hoping my Fairy Godmother will come and finish my hand quilting chores so I can get on with more applique...

Part of my inability to finish the hand quilting was due to being stumped on what to quilt above the outer border swags.  I sort wanted something musical, but not something so busy that it would draw the eye away from the hand applique too much.

I have gone through so much waxed paper, doing overlay drawings, trying to come up with something.  I finally settled on a simple leafy swag with a single eighth note in the middle.  Eighth notes are not symmetrical, which really bugs me...it is centered over the swag, but due to its irregular shape, it just looks funny to me...

I made my own little set of crude templates (I'll show you below...) and got busy with the 28 repeats of the motif required.

I am using a hoop for this, but took it off trying to get a decent picture...I think the picture would have been better if I had left the hoop on!

Once I got a side done (seven repeats), I still wasn't completely satisfied...something was missing.  Since I had already appliqued little hearts in the outer border corners, I decided to quilt little hearts between the leafy swag motifs.

The quilt is all bunched up on my little table so the picture is not good (when the quilt is touching the floor, Mr. Weasley is ALL OVER this puppy!!), but I think you can get the idea.  The following picture is before I removed the blue marking pen.

For continuity, I decided to do leaves in the corners as well, and more hearts.

Here is a shot after I spray-flooded the area with water to remove the blue pen...my house is so darn dry from the constantly-running furnace, that it took only minutes to dry (except for a couple of spots on the left...).

OK...don't laugh...here is how I made my template...templates, actually.  I don't have one of those fancy stencil cutters, so sometimes I make the motif in stages on different pieces of template plastic (pay no attention to the quilt underneath...the stencil does not match up at the moment).

I figured out the length of my swag...not from leaf TIP to leaf TIP, but from leaf VEIN to leaf VEIN.  I made a curved line on my piece of template plastic with a skinny Sharpie marker, then used tiny, very pointy, curved scissors to "cut out the line."  (I think the scissors are actually delicate toenail scissors...I do NOT have delicate toenails, so they are in my sewing scissor drawer, LOL!).  

To "cut out the line," I just cut to the outside of my line all the way around.  As you can see, the channel is ULTRA skinny...I only need the point of my blue marker to fit down in the channel that I cut.

The two lines, one above and the curved one below, are just crudely drawn to help me line up my "line template" in the right place.  Then I carefully, and LIGHTLY draw my curved line.

On my second, separate template, I cut out the note and the leaves after drawing them around my initial curved line (the drawn curved line helps me to place this template in just the right spot on my quilt.  

I could have done all this on one piece of template plastic, but there would have been so much cut away that it would have been floppy and hard to stabilize while using.  Commercial stencils leave little chunks in the design line, but I don't have the patience to be that precise with my homemade pieces.

The leaf tips on either end will extend BEYOND my drawn line (the ends of my drawn line represent the ends of the leaf VEINS, not the leaf TIPS).  I just eyeball the veins in the other leaves while I am quilting.

Then I carefully trace around the inside of each cut-out...

...when I quilt, I stitch to the OUTSIDE of my drawn line (this also makes it easier to remove the blue pen because it is not underneath the stitches, hiding from the water spray!).

I loaded up the corner template with additional different sized hearts in case I needed them, so I have to move the template around to trace what I need...the spacing between the hearts and the branch are not the correct spacing.

When the correct side of the template is not clear, I label the template or at least write "this side" on the plastic.  Once I didn't do that and some of my motifs were backwards when finished, which I didn't notice until I saw the quilt hanging in a show, ha-ha!  Oh well!!

Will it ever stop snowing in Michigan...or get back to normal winter temperatures??  

I have two borders, fourteen of the twenty-eight repeats, done.  I am going to hunker down with a cup of tea and work on more of them after shoveling a little snow...

I hope you are warm and cozy somewhere, doing a little stitching!

In stitches,  

Teresa  :o)