Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Purple is the colour of the month over at the Rainbow Challenge. I don't think I use a lot of purple in my quilts, but I sure do seem to have a lot of purple scraps kicking around here!

I've had a fun time sewing purple spool blocks as leader/enders, and so far this month have finished 36 spools. I am sewing them together in sets of 4, so I have 9 purple blocks to add to my growing collection.

And speaking of collections, I thought I should add a couple of purple Carrie Nation blocks to that block collection. 

I must admit to getting bored with these blocks, but I will keep making a few here and there in order to make the quilt larger. Here are the blocks on the design wall. 

Hmmm... I don't know why I skipped pink month with these blocks? I think it does need some pink and some orange, and maybe a bit more green. What do you think?

Hop over to SoScrappy to see more purple projects. 

FNSI and Mid Month UFO Report

TGIF! It's Friday Night Sew In... are you sewing tonight?!?! I plan to sew until I can't keep my eyes open. I might even make more progress on this month's UFO, which is Countdown to Christmas by Temecula Quilts.  I must admit that it does seem quite odd to be working on a Christmas quilt on Easter weekend!

However, the machine quilting is coming along well and I am actually ahead of schedule for a finish this month! That's a first!
It has been a perfect size to quilt and it has been very relaxing just stitching straight lines.
Next up is making a binding and a label!

What is Your Superpower?

Welcome to the Superpower Blog Hop! It's my day to share my Superpowers!
I bet you didn't know I have Superpowers! Well, I do! But I only made a quilt about one of them! LOL
Guess which one?!?
I SURVIVED BRACES!

Getting a full set of railroad tracks put on my teeth when in my 50's was not a good idea. It was agony at times, and the rest of the time it was just plain miserable. My mouth was full of sores and my teeth constantly ached from being poked, twisted, and shoved around.
But I survived having braces and lived to make a quilt about it!
Now...more about my quilt...

The stitchery was done with variegated   DMC floss. I added some metallic thread to the word 'braces' but it doesn't show up well enough to make it worth the trouble of struggling with it!




The machine quilting is a combination of some walking foot straight lines, and some free motion quilting.



The centre block is a paper pieced mystery block from Paper Panache. This is one of my favorite websites, and you can buy this block and many more here.
Did you see the braces attached onto Ms. Sunshine?!? This is the real piece of hardware that was attached to my bottom teeth for 2 years. And now it is stitched onto my Superpower quilt!  

What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger!
A big thanks to Madame Samm and Pauline for giving us another fun blog hop celebrating the Superpowers of our blog friends. You can visit the blogs of the day by clicking on the links below and discover what their superpowers are:

Kathy's Quilts (that's me!)
Made by Me in Red
life, quilts and a cat too
Val Spiers Sews
Quilt Doodle Doodles...
Quilting My Way-5th Generation Quilters Blog

And as a little giveaway for the Superpower blog hop readers, I made a couple of little scrappy mug mats. If you'd like to win one, leave me a comment about what your superpower is, and I will draw two winners from the comments.

Treadling on Tuesday - Max the Treadle Dog

Yesterday I auditioned some scrap strips on my design wall, and here are my newest strips of treadled scraps. They are just sitting on the cutting board waiting to get trimmed up.  I think I need more yellow to throw in there to brighten them up a bit...they are getting a little on the dark side.
I sure am enjoying my treadle project, but it is very challenging to treadle when little Max is around.

My Granddog Max has finished his puppy training course, and he thinks he's pretty smart. But he's definitely not smart enough to learn to treadle! He is fascinated by the treadle and loves to get right in there to see how everything works!

Max - you are not helping at all. Get out of there you crazy treadling dog! 
I should try to get him on video... he could be a Youtube sensation with quilters!

Design Wall Monday - Scraps

I have my treadled scraps on the design wall today. I have been working on this project since I got my Treadle machine, and am piecing the scraps onto adding machine tape.
I found a nice black fabric called "Moda Weave" to use for the sashing. Now I can't decide how wide to cut those black spacer strips.



Should the block sashing strips be the same size as the pieced strips like in the photo on the left? Or more narrow sashing strips as on the right?
















What are your thoughts? Which do you think looks better?
To see more design walls, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Slow Stitching Grunt Work

In slow stitching land, all stitching is not created equal :)
Some stitching is what you might call "grunt" work....work that is menial, thankless, repetitious, and boring. Grunt stitching (for me) is thread basting a quilt, or doing a lot of stitching that is boring (quilting with a dark thread on a dark fabric where you can't see your progress or the texture as easily), or searching for and measuring hunks of batting or adding boring borders. 

Attaching the binding on Journey of a Quilter

I know a lot of people who would say that finishing a binding is grunt work, but I love hand stitching a binding. And this week, I have done a lot of binding, without one bit of grunting! 

Binding ready for Celtic Solstice

Maybe preparing a binding might be considered grunt work - cutting strips, joining strips end to end, and pressing all the strips in half. Although it is sometimes boring, I don't mind this task either. I like to remind myself that a bad day spent grunt stitching is still better than almost any other day!! LOL

Since finishing my Journey of a Quilter last week, I had been trying to decide on another project to hand quilt. I finally decided on Always Home, and finished the pin basting with a little bit of grunting.



I plan to start the quilting today while watching the 59th Masters Golf Tournament. It's total enjoyment of the first signs of spring - all that green grass, and beautiful flowers, and birds singing. Oh yah, and the golf is enjoyable to watch too! 

What is grunt work for you? Do you dislike cutting, or basting, or tracing patterns, or binding? 
Link up your hand stitching blog post below and share your progress (or grunting) with us. 

Scrappy Rainbow Challenge - Purple Month

We are clearing out the purple scraps this month over at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. 
Here are my first 9 Alamo Star blocks with some purplish scraps, and they are cute, cute, cute! I have more blocks cut and ready to use as leader/enders over the next two weeks.





I also started making a few of these scrappy star blocks just for fun. I just used the scraps that were sitting around, and am not sure if I will continue making more of these or not. Bonnie Hunter calls them Maverick Stars - to see the pattern click here.
To see more purple scraps being sewn this week, hop over to the linky party hosted by Angela.

Fantastic Friday Finish!

After 7 years of stitching, my "Journey of a Quilter" is finally finished! It was a long journey and I loved every stitch!

The pattern is by Leanne Beasley with some slight liberties taken along the way in changing some of the stitching.

The finished size of the quilt is 50" square. The piecing of all those little scraps was done by machine, and the embroidery and quilting was done by hand. 

I am delighted that this quilt is finished, but also admit to feeling somewhat sad. As my son used to say "it's a happy sad". This quilt has travelled a lot of miles with me over the last 7 years - to the lake, to the farm, to parks to camp, and to the hospital. I will miss hauling it around with me everywhere I go just in case I have some time for hand stitching. It was kind of like my security blanket at times. I guess I'll need to get another quilt prepped so I'll have something else to drag around with me! 
I am linking up my finish at "Finish it up Friday" at Crazy Mom Quilts.

Sewing Machine Collector's Tip

If you collect sewing machines, one of the issues you may have discovered is that each machine has it's own unique way of doing things. My machines cover a wide range of production years, and are made by many different companies that have completely different mechanics. 

It is challenging to remember how to wind each type of bobbin and then correctly place the bobbin into the bobbin casing or into the machine if there is no case. Each of my machines take a different kind of bobbin and here are four different ones from the machines I use regularly. The long bobbin is from my Singer treadle (vibrating shuttle), below that is the Featherweight bobbin and case, bottom left is the Brother bobbins, and top left are the Janome Gem bobbins which don't need a case and drop right into the machine.
Each machine uses a different bobbin winding procedure, and the bobbin is placed with the thread coming off the bobbin in either a clockwise or counterclockwise fashion. The machine will not sew if you don't do all of this the proper way!
This is how I deal with the technical confusion...
I photocopy the page from the owner's manual that tells me what I need to remember. Then I laminated these instructions and cut it to the approximate size of a playing card. I keep the card with the machine it belongs to. Here is my Blue White (Japanese Clone) instruction card telling me how to insert the bobbin into the case. I can always remember on this machine how to wind the bobbin because it's visible and easy. But I can never remember which way the thread should come off the bobbin before I put it into the bobbin case. 

Here is my Sweet Baby Jayne Featherweight card telling me how to correctly insert the bobbin (which is opposite to the Blue White).
I always have the information handy when I need to rewind the bobbin, without having to search for the manual and try to locate the information within the manual.  
Easy peasy and you're ready to sew on any machine at any time! A person could also solve this problem by only having one machine, but what fun would that be?!?!

UFO Update - Quilting Started

My UFO to finish this month is Countdown to Christmas. 
2 of the 3 B's are done - Backing is pieced (two big hunks of fabric, nothing creative) and pin Basting is  done. 
Next up is the quilting. 
Because this quilt is made of many small blocks and has billions of seams, I decided to machine quilt this one. I am stitching diagonal lines again (like on the tablerunner) only this time I'm not marking the lines, just eyeballing it. That's "living on the edge" for me! LOL
I'm using beige thread through the beige blocks and red thread on the red chains.
And of course, I have the walking foot on. It's amazing how many stitches this walking foot has sewn and how long it has lasted (over 15 years of regular use). I sure got my money's worth out of that purchase!

Treadling on Tuesday

From Quiltville

Last time I wrote about my treadle (click here), I had brought her out of hiding/storage hoping that I would get more treadle time in.
And it worked!
I have been more tempted to sit down at the machine and do some treadling than I was before. 

I am piecing random scraps onto an old adding machine tape, and using both pieces of the tape (remember the yellow carbon copy??) You can see the rest of the roll of tape on the machine bed, and see that I don't have much more to use up. When the tape is all covered in fabric, the quilt will be ready to assemble. How big will that quilt be? I have no idea yet!

Did you happen to notice my scrappy mug mat which was a  lovely gift from Julie??  I adore it...thank you so much!

Design Wall Monday

There has not been much change on my design wall project since last Monday's post. I'm still working away on putting together my Quilt Square Quilt Along blocks that I machine quilted last month. I have worked on the horizontal sashings but don't have much to show for that effort yet.
Maybe next week!?!
To see more design wall posts, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Slow Stitching Productivity

Working on a hand stitched project is a little like raising

teenagers. You put in a ton of effort, pouring your life and energy into the task, but don't see much progress on a daily basis. You are constantly being critical of yourself because it rarely seems to be going well.  You are frequently problem-solving issues that you don't feel you have the experience or knowledge to deal with, and you pray a lot about how it's all going to turn out. Nothing goes the way you thought it would, and it's a way more challenging task than you signed up for in your hopeful and naive state at the beginning. And at some point you wonder why you ever thought this would be a good idea!
And then one day (hopefully) you realize you've turned a corner, and feel some relief to know that maybe you've actually done a good job and everything is going to be okay.   It gradually starts to be less challenging, and there are some delightful and fun moments from time to time. And you maybe even start to feel proud of your accomplishment and eventually wonder if perhaps you've created a masterpiece!?!
Well, today is that day for me - for the quilt, not the teenagers!

This week I finished hand quilting my Journey of a Quilter (pattern by Leanne Beasley)! The finished size is 50" square.
I loved quilting the border cable and am now looking for other quilts that I could cable!
This quilt has been 7 years in the making and the quilt binding will be made today! 
These are the green scraps that will make up the binding. I thought I was going to make a pink and red scrappy binding, but it just drew too much attention to itself, and the green was much more complimentary for this busy quilt.
I plan to enjoy some wonderful slow stitching this afternoon as I start to bind the quilt, and revisit the memories that have been stitched into this Journey quilt. 
No matter where you are in your slow stitching (or

parenting) journey, I hope you can enjoy some quiet moments for yourself today. Eventually all those bits of effort add up to something special! Link up your blog post below and share your efforts.

Scrappy Saturday - Purple

It's a mess in my sewing room. I don't even want to go in there. There are purple scraps as far as the eye can see (maybe that's an exaggeration?!) 
The first week of each month is spent getting organizing for the new colour of the month over at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. It's a good practice to keep, and really helps me to keep the bits and pieces organized for the various scrappy projects I have on the go.
We haven't played in the purple bin for over a year, and the scraps are out of control. It seems as fast as you clear out them out, they just multiply and fill up the bins again! 
If you were sitting at my sewing machine, and you stood up and peeked over the top of the machine, this is what you would see. I am strip piecing 1" purple and neutral scraps to make 9 patch blocks for Omigosh. 
So cute!
To see what how other quilters are dealing with their purple scraps, hop over to SoScrappy.

Friday Finish!

The robins have returned to town. Finally.

Usually I post about their return in mid March, but today was the first day I saw one in the yard and ran to get the camera. It's always a good sign that we all made it through the winter!

Another good sign...I already have finished a project his month!
I finished hand stitching the binding on the spring tablerunner in time to give it to my Mom for her birthday!

Here is the runner on her table with the potted tulips we gave her. I thought it was such a clever "springy" gift, but found that other people had exactly the same idea!
We must all be feeling a little desperate for spring to arrive!

Here is a portion of the flowers she received! Now Mom has a whole flower garden to remind her that she is loved and that spring is on the way!

April UFO

I know this is kind of a weird choice for April, but I'm picking a Christmas quilt to finish for my UFO this month. It's not that I am in the Christmas mood, I just feel like finishing my "Countdown to Christmas"  because I know exactly how I want to quilt it. It's not even a very old UFO since I finished piecing the top in December. The first step is to start collecting supplies for the "3 B's" ... Backing, Batting and Binding.
To see more UFO promises for April, hop over to A Lovely Year of Finishes.

Machine Quilting - Part 2

First of all, did you see the great video Alex Anderson posted? Click here to view it if you missed it. I'm planning on trying her "Fantastic Folded Quilting" technique next week!
And now... back to our regularly scheduled blog post... part 2 of machine quilting my spring tablerunner.

After quilting the diagonal grid on the inner panel, I stitched in the ditch around the narrow inner pink border, and then made a 1/4" line of stitching beside the edge of the pinwheel blocks.

Then I quilted straight through the pinwheel blocks all around the border...
And finally quilted a 1/4" line on the outside side of the pinwheel blocks.
I was shocked at how flat it was laying after the quilting, because I really had to wrestle that pinwheel border to fit the sides, and the whole tablerunner had been somewhat wavy before quilting. My wonderful blog readers reassured me (in their supportive comments on this post) that the waves would quilt out, and they were right! 


This is the tablerunner backing that was pieced from 2 leftover pinwheel blocks, the rest of the charm pack and the kit fabric, and a few scraps from my stash. The colour is off in the photo, but it shows how it was pieced together. It's not the prettiest backing you ever saw, but it does tickle me to use up all that fabric and have no pieces left from that kit to deal with!
If you would like to make your own version of this spring tablerunner called "Dogwood Trail", the pattern is available free from United Notions - click here.

Machine Quilting - Part 1

I have been enjoying some machine quilting on my spring tablerunner.

Using the walking foot, I quilted straight diagonal lines  on the center panel, and used the green painters tape as my guide. 
It worked well, even though there are lots of starts and stops. Everything was laying flat, but I thought it needed more quilting, so I reduced the space between the lines by half.
That meant there would be twice as much quilting to do on the center panel, but I think it's worth it. I started liking it much better! 
I found I could use a piece of tape to quilt 3 or 4 lines before it lost it's adhesiveness.
Next up is quilting the outside borders.