I Quilt, Therefore I Am

2012-03-07T16:45:00.005+11:00

There are three kinds of stores that I simply can't go into without buying something: plant stores, fabric stores, and book stores. I dropped into the Belgrave Book Barn to see how my book was selling, and of course ended up walking out with a book - on this occasion, a quilting book.

"Patchwork: 200 Q&A" by Jake Finch (a man wrote a quilting book?) is just about perfect for me at this stage of my development as a quilter.

It's arranged in colour-coded sections, each section covering a different aspect of quilting. There are illustrations showing of a nice selection of block types - but not so many as to be overwhelming. I'm especially pleased that so many of the blocks shown in the book use straight lines (I'm not into curvy stuff just yet). In addition to showing sample blocks, illustrations are included to show their assembly. The narrative is well written, but quite a bit can be gleaned just from glancing at the pictures.

There are sections on colour selection, labelling, machine vs hand quilting, binding techniques, computer design software, and so on. Although it's not an exhaustive "everything you need to know" book, it certainly does cover the topic well.

A beginner could use this book to learn basic techniques, but should be warned that the book isn't arranged to show the sequence of steps someone might go through. The information is there, just not in "step-by-step from beginning-to-end" form. It's really more for someone like me, who's done a couple of quilts and now wants to learn a bit more.

The ringed binding makes the book lie flat, which is EXACTLY what you want if you are going to try to use the book while you are working.

Fabric=Yes/Design=No -"Hawaiian Bird of Paradise"

2012-02-29T01:59:00.000+11:00

I'm pleased with the way this photo turned out. It gives you a fair idea of this Hawaiian print (purchased on Maui). The bird of paradise flowers take up a space roughly 5" square. The big leaves are massive.

I saw this in the shop and fell for it instantly. The fabric is a polyester/cotton blend and has a very silky feel to it. It also wrinkles easily, so I'm thinking it might have to be quilted carefully to avoid large areas where creases would show up.

The drama of this print is just glorious. Perhaps the best thing to do with this one is make a bedspread using this print, uncut, as the center, and surround it with bands of coordinating colour.

Quilt 10: What Happened to My Momentum?

2012-02-24T15:39:00.012+11:00

(My desktop PC is working again - so I'm no longer depending on hubby's laptop - which I was starting to think was possessed!!!! Back to regular posting...)

Last year I bought a quilt kit which has Japanese prints in it - "Forbidden Palace". I started working on it, but somehow lost momentum through the winter. Now it's nearly a year since I bought the kit (got it in April) and I'm just short of half-way through the quilting on it. It's true that I have woven other projects around it - but even so, this project should have been done months and months ago.

Here it is draped over the stairwell:

So OK... I'm back in the saddle and ready to ride. I picked it up again week before last and have started in on it. I'm determined, DETERMINED to get this thing finished and bound before the one-year anniversary of the day I bought the kit.

The quilting on this one is a lot slower-going than other projects, and that's due directly to the template I'm using. I wanted to use a pattern that would look nice on the back, but not be obtrusive on the front. Definitely found what I was looking for with my swirly template - but, as I said, it's slow going.

That's because the template has you stitching one long stitch line, turning the quilt this way and that as you go. Although Quilt 10 isn't huge, it's big enough so that doing that turning, especially on the blocks near the center, is, well, fiddly. Here's a photo of the back, you can see the swirls (the backing is solid black, although with the reflection in the camera flash it looks grey, and is stitched in silvery grey).

Each of the rectangular "snowball blocks" on the front has 2 swirls in it, and when you think about the fact that there's 160 blocks in the quilt, well, I rotate the top by 360 degrees twice for each block. Yup... fiddly.

But worth it!

The Bain of all Bloggers...

2012-02-22T18:25:00.004+11:00

Computer problems.

I'm on a clumsy laptop using wifi and pulling my hair out. I'm using some pretty choice language right now... with this machine... I think it's possessed... It's taken 30 mins to type this much. I'll get to the bottom of this (or beat this laptop with a hammer...) and put something worth reading up in a day or so.

Apologeeeeez......

An Anniversary (Life After Breast Cancer)

2012-02-15T01:30:00.014+11:00

One year ago today, I underwent the final surgery to reconstruct my breasts after a bilateral ("double") mastectomy. One year ago today.

Living with artificial body parts has required some adjustment, but... ...in the 18 months before my cancer was found, I had eleven biopsies, some of which were pretty darned uncomfortable and frightening. Nobody has been after me for "tests" since August of 2010 - and I call this a good "trade". I'll take these implants, over the pain and anxiety I was living with, any day.

I'm marking this anniversary and noting a few things about how this has all affected me.

To start with, I have some trouble thinking of myself as a "cancer survivor" - even though I am one. I can relate to the term "Mastectomy Survivor", but cancer? It doesn't seem completely real, somehow. Perhaps that's because I didn't have to undergo any treatments beyond the surgery. They caught my cancer so early that chemo and radiation were deemed unnecessary after the mastectomy. As my beloved cousin Beth (who did undergo chemo with her breast cancer) observed - I lost my breasts but got to keep my hair. If I'd had to deal with additional treatment after the mastectomy, maybe the cancer would seem more real. Or perhaps my feeling about it isn't all that unusual - I do remember Toni (Beth's mom - who also has survived breast cancer) expressing the thought "why are they doing all this to me when I don't even feel SICK?!?!?!"

In many respects, I feel more energetic, more in control of my life. I'm also finding myself doing things I've never done before - such as writing and self-publishing my book, appearing on a radio program to promote the book (I've certainly never done anything like THAT before!), and pushing myself a little harder to confront some fears I've harboured which hold me back. Facing down those demons - and even admitting they exist - is drawing my focus now, and I often think about a provocative challenge I once heard:

"What dream might you attempt today if you could be 100% sure of success?"

I love that question because often the dream to pursue isn't as far from our grasp as we think it is. Often it's just silly, irrational fears that hold us back - fears which dissolve the moment we look at them in the clear light of day.

One of my favorite books is "Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway" by Dr. Susan Jeffers. In her book, Jeffers offers the notion that running away from what we fear isn't really a good anxiety-management technique. She proposes that nobody gets a fear-free life; we all are going to be afraid of some things. But what we can accomplish is living boldly enough so that the things that scare us are things like, say, "climbing Mount Everest" and not "driving to the post office." Fears we don't face down can develop the power to cause our world to contract. If we fail to push outward against our fears, the world of the "scary" will push us inward. I look around me and can see many examples of how this is true. I'll bet you can, too.

And so today I am celebrating. A little of that is "where I've been", but mostly I'm celebrating "where I'm going".

Fabric=Yes/Design=No - "Blue Hawaii"

2012-02-08T01:00:00.000+11:00

Is there such a thing as "too much fabric"? (No... don't answer that question...)

Here are three prints from Maui. I found this one first - a large print with diagonal white and blue lei bands:

This green compliments the green in the first one beautifully:

And then I found this one (my favorite of the three):

I also bought some solid turquoise for backing. When taking each of these photos, I took care to hold my camera the same distance from each fabric, so you can get an apples-to-apples comparison of the relative size of the prints on each piece. The largest of the green flowers (in the middle piece) are 3/4" across.

As you can see from the photos, the fabrics are very prone to wrinkling and don't lay neatly. The bolts weren't marked, but I'm pretty sure all three are 100% polyester. I love the colours and the silky feel - but suspect that when the time comes to quilt, I'm going to be pulling my hair out; I doubt that needles will pass through the fabric as easily as they do 100% cotton. We'll see...

Lead me not into temptation...

2012-02-01T01:00:00.003+11:00

It's called "The Fabric Frolic", and from what my friend and quilting guru Pauline tells me, it's an annual event.

You start out with a "passport" and visit the seven different participating quilt shops. After purchasing a meter or more of fabric, your passport will be stamped, bringing you closer to being eligible for the prize drawings at the end of the "frolic" period. If you manage to get a completed passport (ie: stamps from all seven shops), you're in!

Last year, when Pauline told me about it, I bowed out with some lame excuse (can't remember now what the excuse was). This year, however, I was honest and told her the truth: I'm AFRAID of this thing. I've already got heaps of fabric brought back from the US (I haven't even finished telling you about it here on the blog!) and, well, OK... I DID walk through Spotlight last week without buying any fabric - but that was last week. Folks, I'm just not strong enough to resist the gravitational pull of a Fabric Frolic.

So in the interest of my credit card balance - and knowing my own devils... I'm abstaining again this year.

Well, I was, until I drove by Foothills Fabric and Threads (in Tecoma) today and saw the "Fabric Frolic" banner waving enticingly above their shop window... ....no, no, no... I will not give in. I will be strong....

Incredible Self-Discipline!

2012-01-25T01:00:00.002+11:00

(Or am I coming down with something?")

I was in Spotlight today, and walked back to the fabric section. I was looking for something in particular (fabric to make a pair of lightweight summer slacks) - but didn't find what I wanted, so I walked out of the fabric department WITHOUT BUYING ANYTHING.

Yup. I know. Incredible. But it's true.

Fabric=Yes/Design=No - "Surfboards and Ukeleles"

2012-01-18T01:00:00.002+11:00

I found this 100% cotton print in a fabric shop on Maui, and bought 3 yards. To give you and idea of scale the surfboards are about 3 inches long (top to bottom).

Originally, the fabric was intended to be made into a luau shirt for my husband. But he bought a couple of shirts while we were on the islands, so perhaps this should just become a quilt.

Quilt 12: Finally Finished!

2012-01-11T01:00:00.002+11:00

My "sister/friend" Janelle married her Prince Charming in August. At the time, I sent arranged for them to have a fabulous wine and goodies basket from Wyandotte Winery (which is owned and operated by friends in Ohio). But I wanted to give her something more personal, so I started working on placemat quilts using Egyptian-style prints (Janelle is an ancient Egypt fan).

I finally finished the project on December 28. At least I can say that it got done in the same YEAR as they married (insert sheepish, blushing grin here).

Because of a SNAFU along the way, I ended up with a bazillion little off-cuts of fabric, which I stitched together in a long strip.

I used the strip to bind the edge of dinner napkins made of unbleached muslin. It all turned out pretty well, and here's a photo of the four placemats with the napkins:

I also used the off-cut strips to piece together a little "trivet" table cover (something to put hot dishes on):

So it's done! Finally. Now to post this to Janelle and see if she's pleased. At least I got it done before their 6-month anniversary....

The Post-Christmas Fabric Sales

2012-01-04T01:00:00.005+11:00

The Thursday before Christmas (2 days after I'd bought our Christmas turkey), our refrigerator carked it. Great. Very expensive turkey tossed in the rubbish bin and lots of other things joining it in the name of "food safety" practices. We had our Christmas celebration at our house in the city (which has a working fridge), so all was well as long as we were there. Eventually, though, we did have to come home and face the music.

We decided to try our luck with the after-Christmas appliance sales. Guess what! We found a good fridge at a reasonable price plus %15 off. I had to celebrate, and as the appliance store is right next to a Spotlight store, well... ...I celebrated our good fortune by running in to see what might be left in the way of Christmas fat quarters (still advertised to be still at 50% off, as they had been before).

I came away with 4 quarters of this red and gold calico. It will blend in well with the "cockatoo prints" bits I picked up a couple of weeks ago (at a different Spotlight store). I'm glad to have found this, as I realized after pre-washing and looking at what I'd gotten a couple of weeks ago, that I didn't have quite enough dark red to put in with the light cockatoo calico. With these 4 fat quarters, I should have more than enough to come out with a decent design.

There wasn't much else that really appealed to me in the regular "fat quarters" selection, but next to the quarter bins there were a few packages of Christmas print quarters that were bundled together. Whoever came up with the packaging certainly knows my weakness for attractively tied bundles:

Isn't it adorable? Five fat quarters folded into triangles and then tied together with red ribbon to make a Christmas star.

Simply irresistible.

I bought 2 packages of this, so there's plenty to play with. As far as what to use it for, well, quilting guru Pauline pointed out how lovely quilted cushions for the couch could be, and Christmas pillow/cushion covers would be perfect!

I'm thinking of doing a design that has four blocks per cushion, and do different kinds of blocks. It would be a good way for me to experiment with some block designs that I haven't tried before. Maybe a "Windmill" block pillow, "Dutchman's Puzzle", or "Spools". And there's a block design I recently became aware of and fascinated with: Card Trick. Hmm... lots of possibilities and lots of fabric to play with.

And pillow-cover quilts will be relatively quick projects that will give me a sense of accomplishment, plus a break from large bedspread-size quilts.

My Big Fat (Quarters) Christmas

2011-12-28T01:00:00.007+11:00

Last week I told you about the cockatoo "Santa" print. Well, you just KNEW that I didn't get out of Spotlight with only one Christmas-print project, and you were right.

I might have been able to resist - except for the way this one was packaged. Have a look: just 5 fat quarters neatly tied with a ribbon. I have to admit that I was totally aware the whole time that the ribbon is what did me in. It just looked so CUTE sitting there in the display basket. Lordy, but I'm a sucker for good packaging...

Untying the bundle, here's what I got:

Green background with toys:

Blue background with Christmas ball ornaments:

Cream background with small ornaments:

Red background with Christmas lights:

And red-on-red Christmas ornament silhouettes:

Hm.. as you can see, the 2 red background fabrics pretty much clash - so the design will have to keep them separated.

And I'm thinking "table runner".

Cockatoo Christmas Print

2011-12-21T01:00:00.004+11:00

Who could possibly resist?
Certainly not ME!

I knew I shouldn't have gone to the fabric department at Spotlight when I was there the other day - but I went anyway. They'd advertised Christmas prints were half-off, and so I went to see what there was.

Check this out: Cockatoo Santas! Yup. I couldn't resist. Didn't even try.

They are "fat quarters". I bought 3 of the red, two of the cream/white, and four of the green cockatoo print. What will I do with them? Uh... don't know. I was thinking "Christmas placemats" when I bought the fabric, but hm... no. If I made placemats, you just KNOW there'd be a glass of red wine dumped on that fresh green bird-print calico. I think I'll make a small "throw" instead - there's enough here to do that.

The cuts are all washed and drying on the banister in the upstairs hallway. I admit to being a teeny bit nervous about whether the red fabric would bleed - but it's fine.

Jingle Jingle Jingle!

A very Merry Christmas to YOU!

The Siren Call of Pre-Christmas Calico Sales

2011-12-14T01:00:00.001+11:00

Oh, dear...

I'm meeting a friend for coffee this morning at a spot right next to Spotlight - a large store that carries linens, housewares, and fabric. I've got a 20% off coupon in my pocket and I KNOW they've got a special on fat quarters (including Christmas prints) running right now.

How much willpower do I have? I'm wanting to make some Christmas placemats. Can I resist the gravitational pull generated by a fat-quarter sale?

My credit card is twitching already...

Quilt 7: Deja Vu All Over Again

2011-12-07T12:39:00.003+11:00

Quilt 7 - the baby quilt using koala print - has been in my UFO closet for months! The sandwiching was done so long ago I don't even quite recall how long it's been (hmm... maybe a year?)

Anway... here's a closeup of the print:

And here's the quilt top finished:

I'm heading to quilting guru Pauline's today to visit and quilt, and need a smallish project to take with me. This one will do nicely. It's good to always have a project that is easily portable for days like this.

So quilt 7 is out of the closet and ready to go!

Ten Things I'd Want on My Desert Island

2011-11-30T01:00:00.003+11:00

(yeah, yeah, I know: food, water, shelter, internet access. Let's assume those, OK? After all, it's a desert island - not a DESERTED desert island...)

"binding buddy" lucite template (2.5" x 30")
quilting sharps (needles)
plain, no-frills, old-fashioned metal thimble
big (24" x 36") one-sided cutting mat
a good pair of "snips" (clipper scissors)
rotary cutter
my laptop, with "Quilt Wizard" software installed
300 really big safety pins
all the fabric (and batting) in my UFO closet
my hubby (The kind of man who patiently waits while I'm going nuts in a Maui fabric shop isn't the kind of guy you leave behind. No - he's coming with me.)

Yup - that'd keep me pretty much happy for about, oh, ten years or so...

Move Over, "The Julie/Julia Project" (well, maybe not)

2011-11-23T01:00:00.002+11:00

(nobody here but us servantless Australian quilters)

It started innocently enough. It was November 12, 2011 - the 5-year anniversary of the day I stepped off the airplane at Melbourne's Tullamarine airport as a newly-arrived immigrant. Hubby Stephen and I planned to have a nice celebration at home and we'd stopped at the Dan Murphy's in Boronia and ... well... I'm rambling a bit, but here's the thing: There's a quilt shop there! "Lilly Patches"!

I saw quilting guru Pauline a couple of days later and mentioned it to her. Of course she already knew about it, and said she likes the shop quite a lot. She also mentioned a half-dozen other quilt shops, some of which sound simply fabulous.

So I get online and do quick search - and came up with a website that claims there are 180 quilt shops in the state - and has an online list (complete with addresses)!

My head is spinning.

So.... I'm sitting here looking at this list and remembering the great blog "The Julie/Julia Project" and thinking... hm... 180 quilt shops, 365 days... and...

NAH! I can't afford to do what I'm thinking. I have NO self-control in a quilt shop. It's against my RELIGION to go into a quilt shop and come out with less than a meter of something.

So I'm not going to do it. No. No. No.

(Incidentally, I see that the original "The Julie/Julia Project" blog is gone. I'm truly sorry, as it's existence was such an inspiration to me. Julie Powell, the author, has a new blog now.)

Fabric=Yes/Design=No: "Cocoa and Coffee"

2011-11-16T01:59:00.000+11:00

The photo on this group doesn't do it justice. I guess you'll have to trust me on this; the fabrics really do go well together, even though they don't look like it here.

I spotted the second fabric from the left (a fat quarter) first. Grabbed it and the other fat quarter the store had, then worked from there to come up with the other four selections. The colours are rich chocolate-and-coffee (except for the center one, of course, but it coordinates well with the others).

In terms of quantities, numbering the pieces from left to right, here's what I bought:
Fabric 1: 2 yards
Fabric 2: 2 "fat quarters"
Fabric 3: 2 yards
Fabric 4: 2 "fat quarters"
Fabric 5: 4 yards

So fabrics 2 and 4 will have to be used sparingly. Of course, I could get other coordinating prints here in Australia (I've seen Fabric 1 and 3 in one of my favorite shops here) - but I like the idea of trying to work something out from what I bought.

Friend and guru Pauline says I should try applique. Maybe I'll do that with this project - the fat quarters could be cut into leaves, maybe? Then sewn onto blocks with Fabrics 3 and 5 for contrast?

Hm......

"Hubby of the Year"

2011-11-09T01:00:00.001+11:00

So - on the way home to Australia (after visiting the U.S. earlier this year), Stephen and I stopped for a few days in Hawaii. We visited the islands of Maui and Oahu, did some sight-seeing and just generally relaxed.

While on Maui, I discovered a fabric store not far from the airport. Well, of course I had to go in!

Beloved hubby Stephen accompanied me. I'm sure it wasn't his idea of the perfect afternoon, but he never once breathed a sigh of irritation or gave me any indication he was bored. I hurried and tried to make my decisions quickly, but even so, I'm sure we were in that store for nearly 90 minutes. As I wandered back and forth admiring bolt after bolt of fabulous colour, he occupied himself amiably, never once complaining or rolling his eyes.

There should be some kind of award for this, there really should be.

Fabric=Yes/Design=No - "Ohio Cardinals"

2011-11-02T01:30:00.001+11:00

In the same shop where I found the crossword print, I found a really sweet cardinal print (shown below with 2 solids, one green and one peachy/pink that matches the lighter feathers on the cardinals).

My friend Penny was with me and boy, did we ever struggle to find something to compliment the print. I was in a hurry, so opted to grab a couple of solids (the peach and green shown above), but I think I should be able to find a tan or green print to coordinate with the birds. To tell the truth, the green isn't really an ideal match, as you can probably see in this photo. I'll use the green for the backing (or for a Christmas project at a later date).

Now, for a design... boy I'm drawing a "blank" on this one. All I can think of is plain blocks (the cardinal print) framed with solids or coordinating prints. Workable, I guess, but not terribly exciting.

What's Black and White and Re[a]d All Over?

2011-10-26T01:30:00.014+11:00

My book - I HOPE!

OK... going "off topic" this week - I want to tell you about my new book, which was launched last week and is now available on Amazon.com!

Flying Over the Rainbow is a collection of stories about my experiences in moving to Australia and living in the middle of a temperate rainforest. I've been here since 2006 and have found it to be an amazing experience. We have kookaburras, koalas, magpies, and a host of other fascinating wild animals that live in the forest surrounding our home. Wild parrots, which have lost much of their fear of humans, visit our home on a daily basis. In addition to the native wildlife, there's a certain amount of "wildlife" inside the house, too! Our pet birds (a Blue and Gold Macaw, Green Cheeked Conures, Eclectus Parrot, and a canary) keep me in stitches, and I've included a couple of stories about their exploits.

So whether it's wildlife, birds and parrots, or Australia that excites your imagination, you'll enjoy this book.
Click the cover (above) to go to the book's page on Amazon.com - and if you'd like to see some excerpts from the book, click here.

Fabric=Yes/Design=No - "Crosswords"

2011-10-19T02:01:00.002+11:00

I KNOW I'm not the only one who buys fabric occasionally without actually having a design in mind. Earlier this year, my husband and I made a trip back to the U.S. to visit friends and family. While there, I did a fair bit of shopping and, of course, trips to fabric stores were included. In Ohio I found calico identical to prints I see here in Australia, but for roughly 1/3 the cost. So of course I went nuts and bought a LOT of fabric. I figured I'd be able to come up with designs later.

Here's one of the prints I picked up. I bought 2 yards. I've no idea what I'm going to use it for - any suggestions? I'm not really a crossword fan, but this one, with quilting words and terms makes me smile every time I see it.

The photo makes the vertical and horizontal bars look a little "off", but that's just the photo; the print itself is pretty much even with the grain.

So.. hm... should I just make the quilt as a solid panel with this fabric, and then border it with solid borders of white, black and/or red? Or should I do a "crossword" quilt - using small white and black squares, applique or embroider a letter inside each white square - and then using this print as the border (and then bind in red)?

Hm....

Quilt 12: Finally Moving Again

2011-10-12T01:00:00.001+11:00

FINALLY! I've finally gotten back on track with this project. My poor newlywed friend may actually see her "wedding gift" BEFORE her first anniversary (but I'm not making any promises about getting it to her before Christmas...)

Some time ago, I bought a package of pre-cut batting for a double-size bedspread. I don't know WHAT I was thinking. I mean, really... I have no need for a bedspread that size, nor does anybody I know. So... I've decided to cannibalize that batting for other "small" projects, starting with my set of placemats (Quilt 12).

So here we go - I've got one top spread on top of a corner of the batting.

And here we go - just cutting a nice bit of "extra edging" all around the top (you NEVER want your batting/backing to be the same size or - God forbid - smaller than the top).

And here I am, pinning the sandwiches...

And, finally, selecting threads. I've got a boatload of "gold" (not sparkly, but gold-ish) thread left over from my 2nd quilt (the Ohio Star). There's more than enough thread to quilt the four placemats and the "trivet" mat, too.

The Rose Quilt

2011-10-05T01:32:00.005+11:00

In 1975 I was 19 and still living with my parents. I had a job F&R Lazarus & Co, a local department store, working in the "music" department (where we sold LP's - this was long before CD's came into vogue) and occasionally assigned to the "notions" department. "Notions" was a section of the store that sold miscellaneous goods that didn't quite fit into other departments, including small makeup bags, knitting needles, and embroidery kits. One of the kits caught my eye: a stamped embroidery kit to make a bedspread. Greatly underestimating the work involved, I bought the kit, which contained a dozen square panels for the top and side panels for the border.

I embroidered one "ring of roses" panel (possibly the one below) before growing weary of the project. Then I stuffed the lot into a bag and shoved it into a closet, forgetting about it completely.

Nearly fifteen years later, my mother discovered her own "quilting gene" and started churning out quilt after quilt. She came across my long-discarded project and decided to finish it. She embroidered the remaining panels,including this rose bouquet:

And then the rose garland border:

She spent a year on it, finishing the embroidery, joining the panels, and then finally hand quilting, following the elaborate design stamped on the panels. She says she nearly went blind doing it, and I can easily imagine that. Her stitches are fine, even, absolutely perfect: exactly 5 stitches to the inch, and each stitch is identical to the other.

The quilt is exquisite, a work of art. The top is stunning, but even the reverse side is beautiful. On the reverse the incredibly delicate stitches are shown to their best advantage:

When she was done, she gave it to me as part of my Christmas present. I will never forget the moment I unwrapped it; I was flabbergasted. Even now, so many decades later, I am still in awe of my mother's talent and patience.

The Eyes Have It (or Have Had It?)

2011-09-28T17:24:00.002+10:00

In recent weeks I've been experiencing some difficulty with focusing my eyes. At first I thought it was dizziness, but when I close my eyes I don't feel off balance at all. No - it's something with my vision.

So I went to the optometrist today. She checked me over and said that what I'm experiencing is age-related, but also probably due to sitting in front of a computer screen as much as I do. She said my eyeball muscles are out of condition and prescribed exercises.

OK.

So now I've got flabby eyeball muscles. -sigh-

My exercise consists of holding a pen about a foot from my face, looking at the tip, and then looking past it to a point several feet away. The idea is to get those short-distance/long-distance eyeball muscles used to adjusting. I'm to do 20 repetitions of this exercise 3 x's a day.

As I confessed last week, I haven't been quilting much in recent weeks. Instead I've been sitting here a slave to my computer and my upcoming book. I guess it serves me right. I should'a been quiltin'!

Quilt 12: In a "Holding Pattern"

2011-09-21T01:30:00.003+10:00

I haven't mentioned the placemats I started in August, have I? Uh, uh, uh, (embarrassed stalling tactics). Well, that's because there hasn't been anything to say. They are still here. Folded neatly on my desk. The tops all done and ready to be sandwiched.

The fact is, I've been quite distracted most of the winter with another project. I'm writing a book about living in Australia, and have spent most of my time the last three months on that. It's nearly ready to be released, so I'm devoting every waking hour to either the book -or- to learning about self-publishing.

And so my quilting, quite frankly, has suffered as a direct result.

But I'll get back to it, soon. I'll get those darned placemats done and in the mail to my friend (they're a wedding gift...) and then I'll get back to the Japanese print quilt, the "trees" quilt, and all the other projects in my UFO closet.

I promise.

Playing with a new design: Lattice

2011-09-14T01:30:00.000+10:00

A couple of weeks ago, I went with my friend Poh Choo to the Carribean Market. We had a ball shopping, and while we were there I came across a vendor who sells used magazines. She had quilting magazines as part of her stock, and I snatched up 2 that I'd never seen before: "Amazing Rotary-Cut Quilts" and "Patchwork Favorites".

It was a semi-dangerous thing to do, because I found a couple of quilts in those magazines that got me inspired.

I found one in particular that captured my imagination - a lattice-work design made up of nine-patches and snowball blocks. Here's my version:

I'm not completely happy with the edging and border, but at least you can see the way the nine-patch and snowball blocks are joined to make the lattice pattern. Will I make this (or a version of it)? Oh... yeah... probably...

More Marking Options: Chalk Pencils

2011-09-07T01:30:00.003+10:00

When I was in the U.S. earlier this year, I picked up these chalk pencils in a fabric store:

I'd not seen a set quite like them here in Australia. Of course, now that I've got them, I'll probably see them all over the place. No matter.

The set has several different coloured chalks, plus white ones. In all honesty, I really like the pink vanishing-ink pen I talked about last week better than chalk. Chalk is, well, messy. But the pink pen just doesn't show up on dark prints, so these chalk markers will do well. I'm using a white one now on the Japanese print quilt I started earlier this year. It works well with the template; the tips are small and don't rub on the template edges.

The chalk hangs on a bit afterward, but it does brush off pretty well, and can be removed with a damp cloth if brushing doesn't do the trick.

My Favorite Marking Pen

2011-08-31T01:30:00.007+10:00

I love this pen. It's a pink "air erasable" pen I'm using with my quilting templates. It's fabulous.

It makes a clear, bright line on the fabric, and after a while the color fades away on it's own. I started out with chalky-pencils, but those are a bit of a pain; the tips don't fit neatly in the slots of my templates and end up wearing down strangely. Not this tidy little pen! In the photo below, I've drawn a line on some turquoise fabric. Look at how clear the line is!

Of course, it doesn't really work on dark fabrics, but you can't have everything (where would you put it? Hahahaha).

The line I drew for the photo was still visible for about 40 minutes, but then faded. The temperature of the room can make a difference in how long it takes for the ink to fade. In winter, I quilt sitting in front of a wood-burning stove. The ink vanishes pretty fast under those conditions.

I first used the pen on Quilt 2 (the Ohio Star quilt). That was over a year ago, and only now is it running out of "juice"!

Quilt 13: Design - Julie's Table Runner

2011-08-24T01:30:00.002+10:00

Dear friend Julie's birthday is coming up. I want to give her something very special. She's mad about Japanese prints and so... well... I hit the fat quarter table hard today and came away with these bits:

The leftmost fabric has Japanese characters drawn on a cream background. This will be used for the backing of the piece as well as the outer border (strip just inside the binding) on the front. The solid blue is for the binding. It doesn't perfectly match the chrysanthemum print next to it, but it was the closest I could find. The other fabrics, which are cream and gold, do match the colours perfectly. I think that as long as that blue and the chrysanthemum is seperated by the other fabrics, it should work out OK.

I've got 2 fat quarters of the chrysanthemum and one each of the three cream/gold fabrics on the right. That's not a lot of material, so this will have to be a small project.

No worries... I'll make a table runner! Here's the design I've come up with:

The finished size will be 13" x 56" - should be just about perfect for Julie's kitchen table!

And here's a closeup:

My quilt design software doesn't have exactly matching fabrics, so I've had to substitute a little as I played with the design. That's OK. I just selected 4 cream/gold "fabrics" from the software and then grabbed this cream/blue flower print you see above to represent the chrysthanthemum. It's not perfect, but it worked well enough to get the proportions of the different pieces set up and check (using the software's yardage estimator) that I haven't designed for more cream/gold than I've actually got.

Oh, and yes... if you happen to have noted the fiasco with Quilt 12, yes I am definitely NOT turning my back on the fabric estimator or the "rotary cutting instructions" function.

Quilt 12: and Julie sez...

2011-08-17T01:00:00.006+10:00

Had lunch with Julie today, and took along the placemats to show her. She loved the design and colours, but observed that the first person to spill red wine or beetroot on them is probably going to die a horrible death.

She's right, of course. Julie is always right...

Quilt 12: Oh, NoooOOOo!!!!

2011-08-10T01:11:00.012+10:00

When I started Quilt 12 - the placemats - I pulled up my quilt design software and used it to come up with an overall design for the mats. Once I had a basic design, I went to the "rotary cutting instructions" function and noted that each of the nine-patch squares should be 2.5" square.

"Well!" I thought - "That's the easiest-possible scenario, because I can use my binding template to cut the squares!" I had those 2.5" x 2.5" squares cut out in no time!

Now... Okay... I should have realized that 6 nine-patch blocks, with the 9 squares in each block being 2" across (the missing half inch accounts for seam allowances of 1/4") would be, well, way too big. But my brain was shut off. I trust this stupid software way too much.

I cut out the squares, assembled the blocks and then... realized... oh, groan...

These placemats are going to be HUGE!

What went wrong? Well... when you start a new quilt project in the software, you tell it how big you want the blocks to be - in inches. I'd specified 4-inch blocks. All goes well until you look at the fabric estimator and the "rotary cutting instructions" - if you go to those functions and don't AGAIN specify 4-inch blocks, you get fabric estimates and cutting instructions assuming 6-inch blocks.

Do the math with me here...:

3 blocks across (6" each) = 18".
2 blocks down (6") = 12"
Add sashing (bands of fabric between the blocks) 2" wide, one on top, one on the bottom, one between the block rows, 1 each between the horizontal blocks. That gets us to 6" vertically, 8" horizontally.
Add half an inch for binding on all sides (which means an inch horizontal and an inch vertical).

Results So Far:

Horizontal: 27"

Vertical: 19"

No, no, NO! I wanted placemats of 16" x 13". What I've got happening here, however, would be big enough for King Kong.

Time go get creative.

I can take an 1.25 inches off each side. That's better.. And, actually... the nine-patch blocks look a little more interesting with the different squares no longer being perfectly "square".

I took all those cutaway side pieces and stitched them into a long strip, which I'll use as a kind of "binding" around the coordinating knapkins:

At this point I also realized that I had enough of the blue fabric to make a small lattice between the nine-patch blocks. I just plain monkeyed around with the design and changed it completely on the fly. I'm delighted with the results:

I've got more than enough of the patchwork stripping for the knapkin binding, so I decided to stitch together the other leftovers into a single large mat - which my friend can use as a table trivet:

Hah!

It was another painful lesson, but in the end I think the placemat design I've got now is better than the original.

Quilt 12: Design for Egyptian Placemats

2011-08-03T01:00:00.001+10:00

Sister/Friend Janelle is about to marry her "Prince Charming". She's a wonderful woman who deserved her happily-ever-after and I couldn't be more delighted. I want to give her something special as a wedding present.

On a recent trip to one of my favorite stores, I saw some fat quarters with prints inspired by ancient Egyptian colours and designs. Knowing Janelle is mad for anything connected with ancient Egypt, I grabbed those quarters and enough coordinating bits to make a set of four placemats and napkins.

Here are the prints:

The blue-with-stars (on top) and the Egyptian-inspired stripes were the ones that first caught my eye. The three fabrics to the right coordinate with the colours in the stripe. The fabric underneath the quarters (the reddish-brown) will be used for binding and for the knapkins.

I pulled out my quilt design software and came up with this:

This will be my first nine-patch quilt project.

Anytime you buy fabric before you have a design (and measurements) it's a risk. Naturally I found that I came up short on 3 of the fat-quarters. There's plenty of the strip, plenty of the turquoise, but after I cut out the squares I found I needed 24 more squares (8 each of the gold and two maroon fabrics). Not a problem! I cut 24 squares from my binding/knapkin fabric and have worked them into the design. The placemats won't match each other perfectly, but a little bit of individuality won't hurt.

To keep it all straight, I've stacked the squares for each placemat separately:
All set! I'll get the blocks put together and will cut the "lattice" strips afterward.

These are the times that try men's souls

2011-07-27T01:02:00.003+10:00

Women's souls, too.

After five years of service, hubby and I decided to retire our old desktop PCs and upgrade to something a little faster. Now... I say "a little faster". Well, it wouldn't take much to be faster than the PC's we've been using.

My machine has been taking 25-30 minutes to boot up. And even once it's up and running, it's sluggish. Much of this is simply due to this equation:

old PC hardware + required software upgrades* = Degraded response time

* You can't ignore "fixes" and whatnot for the operating system, browser, firewall, virus scanner and such. Failure to download and install those would be stupid beyond words.

So, Okay, time to get new machines - and we did. We got them last week: lovely new PCs with lots of processing power. We were thrilled. The new machines boot up and are ready to rock-and-roll within 20 seconds.

Then my world came crashing down. I was working away on a client's website when BLAM... my screen went all blue...

and then it went black:

The computer technician came and looked it over. The problem is almost certainly a hardware failure. -sigh-

In the meantime, hubby's PC has also started "coughing". He got a black screen, too, then had to reboot his machine. When it was back up and running he was missing about half the little shortcut icons on his desktop.

Oh dear...

So the my PC is now on it's way back to the factory. Hubby is still using his, but backing EVERYTHING up to a memory stick as he goes along.

I'm back to using "Old Bessy" - and just very thankful that I've got her to fall back on.

Yeah... I know this had NOTHING to do with quilting...

Quilt 5: Binding

2011-07-20T01:30:00.016+10:00

They tell you to make sure that the batting and backing fabric is wider/longer than the quilt top. When you look at what happens at binding time, it makes a lot of sense.

My binding fabric for this quilt is made by cutting 2.5 inch strips, sewing them together into one long strip, then pressing it in half (wrong side in). Then I stitch the binding to the quilt, matching the cut edge of the binding to the edge of the top like this:

As you can see in the photo above and in the one below, this is fiddly work. The double-folded binding strip makes a good, strong binding. Sewing it on is pretty easy, and the work goes fast, especially since I only have to worry about the edge of the quilt top; the batting and backing are sandwiched to it, and I'll trim the excess off after the binding is on.

If the batting and binding had been cut BEFORE putting the binding on, it would be a serious pain to get the binding on and be sure that the stitches were going through all the layers of fabric (and not leaving gaps on the back because I couldn't see them when I was working).

The binding is on and I can trim. Below is a photo of the edges after I trimmed. I've left approx half an inch of batting/backing hanging over. I'll wrap the binding around that to give the edge some bulk.

I've flipped the quilt over so you can see the back, with the seam holding the binding to the quilt. As you can see, there's plenty of binding (a full inch, double thickness) to wrap around that extra bulk to the left of the stitch line.

Below I've folded the binding over that bulky edging, and holding it as I will when I sew the binding on the back. I'll just slip-stitch the binding along the seam line.

And when I'm done, the front and back will each show 1/2 inch of navy blue binding!

Easy stuff! And NOW quilt number 5 is finally DONE!

A Working Lunch - Of Sorts

2011-07-13T01:30:00.004+10:00

Oh, the joy of having quilt design software on the laptop! That translates to "portable design studio!"

While visiting the US recently I talked to friend Val about the possibility of making a quilt for her. I told her that if we could agree on a design - and if she were willing to pay for the materials - I'd do the work. We'd arranged to have lunch near the end of my visit in Ohio, and I brought along the laptop. The wait staff very kindly allowed us to park ourselves at a large table so we had plenty of room for the PC.

Here's what we came up with:

I was pleased that Val is interested in a log-cabin quilt. Those are pretty easy to put together and can be truly lovely. On the top of the quilt we extended the border a bit so that the border would be over the pillows on the bed, with the log-cabin blocks laying on the bed itself below the pillows. She may change her mind about that - but if she does it won't be a problem. The borders can easily be reduced and another row of log-cabin blocks can be put at the top to keep the overall size big enough to cover the pillows on the bed.

Val wanted blue and so that's what we set up in the design. The photo above, however, has a teal border. That wasn't Val's idea - it was my experiment. At about the time we had a look at it, she needed to head back to the office.

I kept the design and later developed the variations below (starting with removing the teal border):

The one above still uses green centers for the log cabin blocks, but the border now repeats the main medium blue. But would it look better if the border is lighter? Let's see...

Interesting. But with this version there seems to be too much of the white-and-blue polka dot in the center blocks. So I tweeked it a bit, taking a darker blue and spreading it more heavily around the center inside the log-cabin blocks:

It was a complete hoot to play "designer" over lunch - and to so easily involve Val in the creative process.

We've set the project aside for now. Val's daughter was planning a "wedding cruise" and every available dime was needed for Val and her hubby to attend (she had an absolute blast, the wedding was spectacular - and how many parents get to tag along for a cruise honeymoon?). We may pick it up later on or not. Either way, we had a good time dreaming together.

Quilting Toys - Souveniers from the US

2011-07-06T01:30:00.003+10:00

What did I bring back from the US as a souvenier? Quilting callico? Sure! More about that later.

While we were in the fabric store I wandered through the "gadgets", too, and found these stitching templates. They were so inexpensive (compared to what I pay for templates in Australia) that I couldn't resist!

Stitching templates are fabulous. They help you to make a quilt more interesting, especially if there are large spaces of plain fabric. The designs add interest.

But, with some of them, there's a price to pay.

I was delighted to find the leafy vine one and the one shown in the middle here excites my imagination, too. But... I have to admit that of these 3 there's only one that I'm likely to truly enjoy using, and that's the bottom one.

Why?

Because with the bottom one, you can see there are clearly continuous lines, and no "switchbacks" in the design. With both of the upper 2 templates there will be only a few stitches and then a complete stop - or - a point where the stitching will have to turn and head in the other direction.

I'm still working on my Japanese print quilt (Quilt 10) - and on that one I've chosen to have a swirling-pattern template (shown below). The results look stunning but the going is sloooooow. I have to keep turning the darned thing everytime I come to a place where the swirl turns around. It looks lovely, but frankly is a bit of a pain.

... and then Pauline said...

2011-06-29T16:28:00.003+10:00

"I noticed that you haven't put up a post this week on your blog."

WHAT!?!?!

She's right! Oh dear. Well... it IS still Wednesday, so here's my post for the week. I hang my head in shame - but promise to do better next week. :-(

Celebrating an Anniversary of a kind

2011-06-22T01:30:00.002+10:00

It's been a year now. It's been a year since they found my breast cancer.

And what a year it's been. Up, down, sideways.

Just last week I went to see the lovely "permanent makeup artist" woman who reserves space in her busy work schedule to complete the reconstruction process for mastectomy patients who, like me, want to have as normal and natural a look as possible. Sandy's business involves using a form of tattoo to give women permanent lip liner, eye liner, and so on. And because of her unique skills and knowledge, she's also able to tattoo colour onto reconstructed nipples (which are made with grafted tissue). As the owner of a set of recon nipples, I can tell you that I'm pleased to have them - but without Sandy's touch, they would be pale - matching the surrounding breast tissue (not at all like real nipples).

And so I made an appointment with Sandy and inside an hour she applied tattoo'd colour to my nipples and the surrounding areola.

It's magic, simply magic.

The colour this early on is a bit bright - but Sandy assures me that it will fade. Even if it didn't though, well... it just looks so much better. My fading scars no longer draw your eye (or more correctly... my eye or my husband's). Instead there's this rather "real" looking bit of tissue - with colour that makes sense.

Sandy charges very little for the service. As a matter of fact, she charged me only for the cost of the materials. Her time and considerable talent is her gift to me; it's something she does as a kindness to women who have been ravaged by cancer and the radical surgery that some of us need in order to be safe.

I'm so grateful. I'm so blessed.

So happy anniversary to me. I pray that one day the doctors will find a way to prevent breast cancer. Not just cure it - but prevent it.

Nobody should have to go through this.

Quilt 10: Goes International

2011-06-15T01:00:00.003+10:00

I'm heading to the US. Going to visit family and friends there. This is going to be a momentous trip - my first time back as an Australian citizen. And, of course... I have to take something to quilt with me - so it will be quilt 10 - the Japanese print one. I've folded it up neatly to see how much room it will take up in my bag.

Hmm... well.. it's big, but it's gotta come with me. Can't wait to show it off.

I'm going to be visiting my cousin Toni in Florida (who is an avid quilter) and, of course Mom who is the one that passed on the quilting gene. I hope my fat, sloppy stitches won't embarrass them. Well... at least I can show them a really unique quilt design (which I can claim no credit for whatsoever - the design is the genius of someone at Patchwork With Gail B - one of my 2 favorite quilt supply stores).

Quilt 10: Using a "swirly" template

2011-06-08T01:00:00.007+10:00

Oh, I adore this quilt. Here it is just before "sandwiching" (as you may have noted, I've developed something of a "tradition" here of draping a newly pieced top over my stairwell rail and taking a photo just before sandwiching....) I adore this quilt.

But... what colour thread to use for the quilting? And how should I quilt it?

The colour problem was solved instantly by my friend and quilting guru Pauline. "Grey," she advised.

"Of COURSE," I exclaimed. "How perfect!"

But now for the quilting pattern. Up to now I've more or less just followed the shapes of the blocks. Not much imagination there. This quilt demands more. So I selected this template:

In choosing this template, my thought was to avoid too much "squareness" in the quilting. The shapes of the blocks are so regular that it just seems to need some softness. And this template is perfect because the swirls fit neatly inside the individual rectangle blocks.

In the picture below you can see how I've placed them: 2 swirls per block.

And on the back (which is solid black fabric), the result is terrific - lines of swirls darting through the black backing (the camera here reflected the fabric, making it look medium grey - but trust me... it's black, not grey):

And so away I go.

This template's results are great, but I have to admit that it's a step up the ladder for me in terms of challenges. The switch-back on the points inside the swirls and the sharp curve of the swirls themselves make it hard to move very fast. Still... it's gorgeous, eh?

Quilt 11: "Trees" Design

2011-06-01T01:38:00.005+10:00

Time to get a little more adventurous. I'm not ready for applique just yet, and certainly not ready to try anything with rounded edges. I'm also still intimidated by Quilt 4 (the on-point Christmas quilt). And I want something different - maybe something that is a "picture" instead of just patterns.

Staring out the window of my office, it didn't take long to come up with the inspiration. It was right in front of me - the forest that surrounds my house and the 200-300 foot gum trees we live under!

OK... out comes my Quilt Wizard software and I start looking around the block types there. Found a lovely "leaf" block and then combined that with simple strip blocks and came up with this:

To be honest, I'm really quite proud of this one! It's a step beyond what I've done before - and totally original! To the purists here in Oz, let me acknowledge that the trees here are definitely NOT gum trees. Any Aussie would take one look and get that (gum tree leaves are narrow and long, gracefully draping downward in clusters... GORGEOUS!) But still... I'm calling this design "Trees", not "Gum Trees". And I promise: once I get over my fear of applique, there will be a "gum tree" quilt. There will.

I moved fast. Within 24 hours of the inspiration, I'd completed the design and even made a run out to my favorite quilt store and bought the fabric.

Now that I'm ready to get going on this one, it occurred to me that a small design tweek is needed. Have a look at the original design (above), especially the leaves high up between the 2 trunks. 4 of those blocks have "branches" that aren't quite completely connected to the tree. The easiest ones to spot are the 2 leaf blocks that are closest to the top center of the quilt. So below I've corrected that. You might have to squint a little bit - but the difference is that I've put in more of the brown diagonal bits in order to connect the leaf stems back to the tree trunks.

The small "leaf stem" bits will be done by applique, using the darkest brown of the 5 tree trunk fabrics. As I mentioned at the start of this post, I'm not ready to do much with applique just yet, but those little bits shouldn't be too much of a headache.

This is going to be a large quilt - queen bedspread size. But I'm not planning on using as a bedspread. Instead, I'm going to use it as a wall hanging in the dining room!

Quilt 10: Assembling the Top

2011-05-25T01:59:00.001+10:00

Last month I got the pieces for the "Forbidden Palace" quilt cut out and assembled the first block. I was worried it was going to take me forever to get the little rectangle "snowball" blocks pressed - and we won't even talk about how pulling the little black corners back with my fingers left me vulnerable to getting my fingers singed!

I needn't have worried - because once I started pressing, I realized that I could move very fast indeed and needn't expose my fingertips. All I had to do was lay out the blocks in a row on my ironing board. Then, with the iron heated, I pressed the top of the iron firmly into the fabric just below the little black wedges that I wanted to flip and press.

Pressing down firmly, the iron's edge caught the black corners and VOILA!

The corners on top flipped up beautifully and it only took half a second! So all I had to do was flip the "top" of each block, then quickly turn them upside down and repeat the process on the bottoms.

Bang! Those blockes were pressed and ready in less than 40 minutes. Now for the task of deciding which blocks will sit next to which blocks.

The quilt has 16 columns (across) and 10 rows (down). I carefully selected the blocks for the first row... really took my time. Satisfied, I did row 2, again going slowly and carefully considering each one. It took about half an hour to get that far.

Let's do the math... 30 minutes for 2 rows, need to do 8 more rows.

At this pace I'd be at it another 2 hours. So I decided to stop being quite so careful and instead just randomly throw down the blocks to see what would happen. The picture below was taken 15 minutes later:

There were maybe half a dozen blocks that, when randomly tossed in, landed next to something that really CLASHED - but for the most part, just tossing the blocks randomly worked out just fine.

Now for the trickiest bit of all: picking up the pieces and keeping them in order as I'm stitching. Not only that... but many of the prints were "one way" designs with a definite top and bottom. I had to be sure that I didn't inadvertently flip one of those blocks and sew it on upside down.

Daunting!

But I came up with a method to keep me straight.

I began by stacking up the blocks from the bottom row - with the rightmost block on the top. As long as I worked down thru the stack in order, I was able to get the blocks assembled into a strip. I did the same thing with the row second from the bottom - but on that one I put 2 safety pins near the bottom. This helped not only to identify the which end was "down".. but helped me to keep straight which strip was the bottom and which was 2nd from the bottom.

When both strips were done, I stitched them together, careful to mind where the pins were. Then I went to the next 2 rows (heading up the quilt) and used the same approach.

Fiddly? Yeah... but the top is assembled now and all the blocks are in the same order that I laid them on the floor.

Quilt X: The One That Got Away

2011-05-18T01:30:00.001+10:00

My good friend Julie is fond of quilts and last year I was happy to surprise her with the "throw" sized "Faded Memories" quilt - a kit from "Patchwork With Gail B." We'd agreed before then that at some stage I'd make her a queen size quilt for her bed, so long as we could find a design she liked and was within my rather limited range of ability.

We had lunch a while back and I took along the newly pieces top for the "Forbidden Palace" quilt - a quilt made up of Japanese prints (Quilt 10). Julie is mad for Japanese prints, so naturally she went wild for it. She doesn't really want another throw size - but felt that if this kit could be expanded to make a queen spread, she'd really love to have it.

So out comes my Quilt Wizard software. First I "built" a quilt the same dimensions as my throw-sized project, but added 3 rows and 3 columns to extend it so that the "stained glass" panels would cover the entire top of a queen bed. Then I added borders (Julie is fond of pinks/mauves, hence the colour choice below).

Not half bad! I figured we could get another kit from the shop and I could pick up fat quarters to extend the fabric. The pink/mauve border is a bit overwelming - and so we were looking at using more neutral colours.

Unfortunately we've had to shelve the project, as the funds that might have gone into the materials were badly needed elsewhere.

Oh, well.... maybe next year?

My Loyalty as a Customer

2011-05-11T01:30:00.000+10:00

I started out buying the fabric for my first quilt at Spotlight (giant chain store selling housewares, linens, craft supplies and fabric). I was happy enough with the fabric that I bought. For the most part it wasn't terribly expensive and for my first project, well, paying $12-14 per meter for most of the fabric certainly seemed more sensible than diving in at the $22-26 per meter end of the pool.

I did have one very unhappy experience there, however. I'd bought some cheap red cotton at $5.99 a meter. Prewashed that with the white-and-black prints that went into Quilt 1 and had no trouble. But then I decided that I wanted that same inexpensive red for the backing fabric. Thank heavens I also bought half a meter of the white-and-black. I prewashed this second lot of cheap red and threw the half meter of white-and-black in with it.

Well... the white and black came out of the wash PINK and black! And I was seeing red for sure.

The gals at Spotlight - up against company policy - could not do much. I was livid. In the end a manager agreed to replace the half meter of white-and-black, but I was stuck with umpteen meters of bleeding red that continued to bleed after a 2nd and 3rd wash (can you say "Bleedin' USELESS FABRIC"?). It was an eye opener.

I've been sewing for over 40 years and never had a "washable" fabric bought at a fabric store bleed like that. NEVER. And I was disillusioned about 'cheap fabric' at that point - you can bet that "prewash with something white thrown in" will be standard practice from here out.

For project 2, Spotlight just didn't have the colours I wanted, so I went to "Foothills Fabric and Threads" - a small quilting shop not far from my home. I was delighted there with the selection of fabric, the quality, and the truly lovely ladies who own and staff the shop. I do not recall the name of the woman (one of the owners) who helped me that day - but I can tell you I've rarely had such a charming "retail experience." She was supportive, helped pick out the fabric (she's got a fantastic eye for colour and pattern, almost as good as friend Pauline), and gave me just the right mix of encouragement and advice. By the time I left the shop I felt more like I'd spent an hour or so with a good friend than like I'd been shopping with a stranger. Everytime I go in that shop I have the same experience. Even when there are other customers in the store they make me feel so welcome and so important.

Their store became my favorite.

Later on in my adventures, friend Pauline (the same one mentioned above) introduced me to "Patchwork With Gail B" - a quilting superstore. One look at the thousands on thousands of bolts to choose from (and fat quarter table bigger than my kitchen) and well, "...Gail B" became my favorite.

And now?

Well.. hm... I've gotten "sophisticated."

If I want cheap backing fabric - Spotlight. And they do have a few very pretty prints. As long as I'm wanting to keep costs down and am willing to risk the possibility of "bleedin red" again - they do just fine.

"...Gail B" wins the prize for variety. Holy cow - you could go nuts in a place like that... so MANY fabrics! But if you want something in particular, it's the place where you're going to find it. And they have a nice selection of "oriental" prints, too - which you don't find in abundance at the other two stores. Their staff is lovely, too - helpful if you ask questions and certainly knowledgeable.

But "Foothills Fabric and Threads", well... I love that store. Was there today and "Sandra" waited on me. And you know what?!?! She REMEMBERED ME! How charming is that?!? OK... my American accent is a giveaway - but still. It's sweet to do business with a small business owner who actually remembers who you are. And so that shop has a real grip on my loyalty as a customer.

And - because of how lovely Sandra was today... I'm probably never going to buy batting anywhere else.

Becoming Australian

2011-05-04T01:20:00.004+10:00

Today is a very important day in my life. Today I will become an Australian citizen.

I will retain my American citizenship; both countries permit dual citizenship. My decision to become an Australian citizen has nothing to do with my feelings about the United States. My feelings about the country of my birth are not diminished.

I am doing this because I love Australia and her people. Australia is my home now - and becoming a citizen solidifies and legalizes the commitment that I feel to this country. It is an important step, a deeply emotional one. It is a step that fills me at once with strong feelings of pride, belonging, and community.

And so today I will make the Pledge of Commitment:

From this time forward, under God, I pledge my loyalty to Australia and its people, whose democratic beliefs I share, whose rights and liberties I respect, and whose laws I will uphold and obey.

Choosing Batting - More Questions Than Answers

2011-04-27T06:01:00.002+10:00

Up until now I've been pretty consistently using polyester batting for my quilts. I felt that I was making a "safe" choice (I want my quilts to be washable). I almost - ALMOST - bought wool batting, but my friend Dianne told me about a quilt that she made with wool batting that was completely ruined when her daughter threw it into the washing machine - and then the dryer.

She showed me a photo and, well, heartbreaking.

So I've steered away from wool.

Looking at the other choices available in the shop where I've been buying my batting ("Spotlight"), it seemed it's pretty much wool, cotton, or polyester. Polyester is the cheapest of the 3, so there you go.

I went this afternoon to pick up batting for Quilt 10 (a Japanese print quilt kit). I decided to stop in at the quilting shop in Tecoma ("Foothills Fabric and Threads") and see what they offer. The woman who waited on me - Sandra - is a brilliant quilter, and very experienced. Talking to her I found there's yet a 4th choice: Batting that is a blend of cotton and bamboo.

You read that right... bamboo batting.

Weird. Really weird.

I wasn't sure at all about it, but Sandra showed me a quilt she's working on now - and I love how the batting sits between the layers. She said that she's finding this batting is just fabulous for hand quilting - the needle just slides through effortlessly.

OK. I'm sold.

It wasn't the cheapest - $22 a meter - but if it's easier to work, then it's worth it for that alone. And, again, looking at her quilt I was amazed at how light and lovely the feel was.

Quilt 10: "Forbidden Palace" Quilt Kit

2011-04-20T01:09:00.005+10:00

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned quilt 10 - the "Forbidden Palace" kit that I got at the store "Patchwork With Gail B". Well, the time has finally come to launch that project.

The kit comes with 80 squares of glorious Japanese prints (each square a different print). It also comes with a length of plain black cotton. First you cut out 640 1.5 inch squares out of the black (there's a good bit of black cotton left over after this - that will be used later for the border and binding). Next you cut the squares in half to product rectangles.

In the photo below I've gotten that far - it took me about 3 hours of work (well, maybe 2.5 hours?):

Next you stitch the black squares on the corners of the triangles (as shown below):

Here we are - 160 rectangles with the 640 squares sewn on. I think I spent about 5 hours on this step:

Now we clip the corners of each block:

and then press the block so that the little black squares make a triangle in the corner of each block:

And here's the result after pressing the corners out (back side):

and front side:

The result is a rectangular "snowball" block. Now to finish the remaining 159 blocks. I estimate it will take about 2-3 hours.

With this quilt design, the effect of the black corners on each block is to create a kind of "stained glass window" effect with the various prints. It's stunning!

I've done snowballs twice before - my first and third quilts used this type of block. The third quilt (like this one) was a kit from the same store - and it's overall design was VERY similar (a mix of blocks, each with a different print). I remember with that third quilt that it took quite a bit of time and thought to decide which blocks to put next to each other. This one will take a bit of time, too (not really sure how much, but we'll see).

The Blind Quilter

2011-04-13T01:05:00.002+10:00

This woman is amazing:

Click here to see the Video

Just amazing.

Quilt 5: Learning to Love Your Mistakes

2011-04-06T01:00:00.000+10:00

Last September I told you about my "disasterous" design for Quilt 5 - a blue/green log cabin. Well.. I'm getting close to finishing this beast - finally - and can report now that I'm starting to feel better about the goof.

The problem I had with this quilt is that I dove in without completely calculating the required yardages - and even starting piecing the top! I had lovely log cabin blocks which I stitched together with a lattice-like border between each. Looked lovely but suddenly I found that the overall top was going to be much, much smaller than I wanted it to be. And so - I adjusted by making the outer border much wider.

Oh dear... it just looks awkward.

But I'm getting over it - and have even found a new "spin" on this one and am starting to actually LIKE it.

Here's a photo:

The thing I've been wrestling with is all that busy block stuff happening inside a "sea" of teal blue border. But you know what? Hm... well.. this quilt reminds me a little of photos of galaxies. So I've decided to name it "Cosmos" and love it as it is.

Here's a closeup of the border fabric:

I love the teal blue with flecks of yellow, navy, and green. Like stars in the heavens. And my log cabins are like orderly galaxies swirling in the middle.

Not bad!

:-)

The Good, The Bad, The Incomplete (the year in review)

2011-03-30T01:00:00.000+11:00

I started quilting in January 2010 and this blog is now almost a year old, too. Time to step back and have a look at my projects so far. We'll ignore the not-yet-started "UFO" closet and concentrate only on the ones that I've actually begun working on.

Quilt 1: Snowball and plain blocks
Size: Queen Sized Bedspread
Description: I got into this one not because I wanted to quilt, but because I wanted a bedspred to compliment the wall hanging my mother had made me (and which hangs above the bed in this photo). I didn't expect to like quilting. Actually figured I'd hate it, but got into because I wanted the bedspread... and the rest (as the say) is history.
Status: Finished and now being used

Quilt 2: Ohio Star
Size: King Sized Bedspread
Description: The fabric is all civil war reproduction prints. Priced at about $25 a meter, this was a pretty expensive project - but it turned out beautifully. Now I look at it and can't quite believe I actually made it, but I did. I worked on it throughout the summer months - sitting in 35+C temperatures... was I NUTS? Uh... yeah...
Status: Finished and now being used

Quilt 3: Snowball block kit "Faded Memories"
Size: Medium Sized Throw
Description: Made as a gift for a good friend, this was a kit from "Patchwork With Gail B" - my favorite quilting store. It seemed so TINY after the 2 big quilts. I took this one with me on vacation - worked on it continually and finished it before the 2nd quilt was done. And I will never forget the look on friend Julie's face when I gave it to her (she was delighted).
Status: Finished and now being used

Quilt 4: On Point Lattice Christmas Quilt
Size: Double or Queen Sized Bedspread (haven't decided yet)
Description: I'm surprised at myself, in a way, for not getting this one at least cut out, but there you are. Breast cancer reared it's ugly head about the time I would have started this quilt and so I set it aside in favor of other, smaller projects that I could better handle during the recovery from my surgeries.
Status: Fabric is still in the closet, uncut. But I think about this so much and have studied On Point assembly (which, frankly, has me intimidated) that I'm counting this one as "having been started" just because of the mental work I've done on it.

Quilt 5: Log Cabin
Size: Medium Sized Throw
Description: - This project grew out of the inevitable attack of "fat quarteritis" - a disease which I suppose you really can't avoid once you get into quilting. I found the Teal, navy, green and gold prints at a small quilting shop that was going out of business. I bought the fabric without having a pattern (or yardages worked out) so you just have to know I was heading for trouble. But I managed to work through it all and learned a valuable lesson about not diving in without a firm design and being SURE I've got the required fabric. I also figured out after doing about half the blocks that cutting out the little log cabin bits wasn't smart at all - there's a better, easier way to go.
Status: In progress - Should be finished by the end of this month.

Quilt 6: Log Cabin
Size: Medium Sized Throw
Description: - I love the brilliant sunset colours. With this project (which I started after number 5 but completed long before number 5 was even close to being done) I figured out that the "logs" are easier to do if you use long strips and then just trim (instead of cutting out each little rectangle and THEN stitching). This quilt top went together in a flash.
Status: Finished and now being used

Quilt 7: Simple "framed" blocks
Size: Baby Quilt
Description: The center blocks are a soft pastel Koala print, just adorable. The brown border is an aboriginal-style bark pattern and the grey is much like swirling clouds. I picked up the koala print on the same shopping trip as quilt number 5, and didn't actually have quite enough, but the store "Patchwork With Gail B." had a bolt of the fabric, so I was able to get enough to make this design plausible. I originally intended this for a friend in Ohio but may have some trouble parting with it because it is "that cute."
Status: Top is assembled, awaiting the "sandwiching", quilting and finishing

Quilt 8: My disaster quilt
Size: Double bedspread
Description: Oh dear... this was so painful. I thought the bright, fresh clean prints were so pretty and they COULD have gone together beautifully - but only if I'd had a decent design, which I didn't. The big mistake I made was cutting very small triangles out of the 2 leftmost prints. The 2 prints are just too far apart in texture and visual "weight." They need to be seperated by the dark one on the right - but once I realized this it was too late and I didn't have enough of the dark print.
Status: Stuffed disgracefully in a plastic bag and shoved to the back of my UFO closet. Awaiting inspiration to rehabilitate this one.

Quilt 9: single panel
Size: Small throw-sized window panel
Description: The room where I have my first quilt project gets way to bright and light way too early in the morning. I wanted a drape of some kind to block out light as much as possible, so I put this single panel together. It works beautifully as a light screen. At some stage I'm going to add small bars and pulls and transform it into something of a roman shade (so that it can be lifted when we want the room well lit). But I'm happy with it for now. Quite functional and compliments the bedspread and wall hanging on the opposite wall.
Status: Finished and now being used

Quilt 10: Modified Snowball Kit - "Forbidden Temple"
Size: Medium Sized Throw
Description: Another kit from "Patchwork With Gail B." The photo above isn't too good - but you can get an idea of the overall design. It's just rectangles with little corners of black (snowball blocks made with rectangles instead of squares). The fabric is all Japanese prints - lively and colourful. The effect overall is like an asian stained glass window - just gorgeous. And I adore Japanese prints.
Status: pieces cut out and the top is currently being assembled

SO THERE YOU ARE! One year, 10 projects.

Of course there's quite a bit of uncut fabric still in the closet, and I'm starting to feel the siren call of the quilt shops in my area, so I imagine I'll be going shopping for more fabric soon.

Quilt 9: Faster than a Speeding Bullet

2011-03-23T01:00:00.000+11:00

My first quilt was a queen-sized bedspread that I made to go with a decorative wall-hanging quilt that my mother gave me years ago. That first project turned out quite well, but there were quite a few good size scraps left (I'm horrible at calculating required yardage). I decided to make curtains for the room (using quilt material will work in this situation, as the window in the room faces into an internal hallway, and therefore never gets direct sunlight).

So today I finally pulled out those scraps and got to work.

Zip zip zip! Just about 5 hours of work and it's almost done - a "window blind" panel meant to simply hang over the window (and keep the room quite dark). Later on I'll add some loops and cording and make it a kind of "roman blind".

Here's the bedspread (and decorative quilt):

And here's the new window blind made with scraps:

Even the batting inside is made up of scraps from other projects! I'm kind-of proud of that.

I added an extra layer inside, on top of the batting. I put a layer of black quilting cotton inside in order to block as much light as possible - so the blind, when it's down, will keep the room quite dark.

My Evil Friend Pauline

2011-03-16T01:32:00.007+11:00

So there I was - pretty much under control. The household budget has been safe for a while because I've been unable to drive during my recovery from surgery. Unable to drive means unable to get to the quilt shop. And that means unable to spend money on fabric.

Just when you thought it was safe...

...here comes an email from Pauline (my friend and quilting guru).

She's found a quilt shop in Beaumaris that specializes in Japanese and Australian prints. Now... Japanese and Australian prints are my current passion - I'm mad for both. This is bad - really bad - but because Beaumaris is about an hour's drive from here, I should be safe. My surgeon has approved me for driving "short distances" - but a trip to Beaumaris is out of the question at the moment.

So I'm safe.

Or am I?

Wait... no... UH OH.....

This store has a website - you can order fabric. The online fabric stores I've seen are so horribly designed that it's just about impossible to really "shop". Usually the pages load slowly and are so badly organized that you can't really find things.

Not this one. It's incredible. With one click you can see their fabrics - everything on a single page. And that's not all - you can have the assortment organized by colour, by "culture", by manufacturer and design. And... (oh, this is BRILLIANT) whoever photographed the fabric swatches had the brains to put a 50 cent coin in each picture - so you have a way of seeing the scale of the prints.

Curious? Have a look: Chandler's Cottage

Pauline - where ever you are right now... God bless 'ya, evil girlfriend!

(I feel my credit card a twitchin'...)

May I Please Have "Happily Ever After" Now?

2011-03-09T01:00:00.004+11:00

When I was filling out the paperwork for hospital admittance before my recent breast surgery I came across a question that threw me a bit. The question on the form asked if I'd ever been diagnosed with cancer. For the first time in my life I had to answer "yes" to this question. It was not a fun moment. I'm grateful, of course, that we apparently have beaten the cancer and that I'm now cancer free. But still, now I've stepped over a line.

When you have to say "yes" to "Have you been diagnosed with cancer" you end up having to answer a whole lot of other questions (when? where? and so on). I've never felt unhappy about divulging my medical history, but the cancer questions seemed, well, violating somehow. I felt like pulling the person who made up the form aside and yelling "I'm not coming to you for cancer - this is none of your damned business!"

It was not a fun moment.

"So Big"

2011-03-02T01:00:00.010+11:00

(... with apologies to Edna Ferber...)

It's been 2 weeks since my "exchange" surgery (removing the temporary breast expanders and replacing them with cohesive silicon gel implants). So far, so good.

The first week I was pretty uncomfortable. Not horribly, but, well, a little. The prescribed pain medication (Endone - and Australian version of Percocet) pretty much took the edge off, but pain medication has it's own problems (feeling woozy and "out of it") so I was glad when I was finally able to keep myself more-or-less OK with just over-the-counter Panadol.

I opted to stay with the larger cup size - and now have "D" cup size breasts. The gel implants have a MUCH nicer shape than the expanders did, so I'm quite pleased. My breasts project upward a little more normal, but the surgeon assures me that they will eventual drop just a bit into a more natural profile. For the moment it's not a bother - I laugh a bit because I have what can reasonably be called "Barbie doll boobs".

My surgeon expressed some concern that I might find this size too large - but happily, that hasn't turned out to be the case. I don't look unnaturally large or overly "buxom" - to the contrary, I think I look kind-of ordinary. And I'm pleased.

Big enough is big enough.

So I'm now 2 weeks post op and feeling better. I'm still not allowed to do much - no heavy lifting, no driving, no lifting my arms above my head (thank heavens the local salon offers hair washing for only about $10 a pop) and so on. Tomorrow I head back to the plastic surgeon and expect to have some of the stitches removed. And hopefully at least the driving prohibition will be lifted.

Pick Yer Poison (more on reconstruction)

2011-02-23T01:00:00.001+11:00

Now I won't kid you - this breast cancer, mastectomy, and breast reconstruction "cha-cha" has not been fun. No sirreee.

But... as woman who has always had a small chest (never more than a small "B" cup, even when I was at my heaviest weight) I can tell you that there is one "silver lining" here - and that is the little word:

UPGRADE!

Yes - since I'm doing this breast-expanders thing anyway, why not go for something a little more, uh, bodacious?

SURE!

So Dr. Gillian inflated me up to a lovely, curvy "C" cup. Oh.. how divine, especially since I found that the more "full" the expanders were, the more comfortable they were. But why stop at "C"? Why not go all the way?

WHY NOT?

So I Did.

I went to the max - "D" cups. Oh... mymymymymymy.... I love it. Can't resist checking myself out anytime I'm near a reflective surface. Oo la la! And... when I look down... I can't see my feet anymore. Why? There's considerable acreage in the way (no, not FAT... Brrrrrreasts!)

To be honest, Dr. Gillian warned me that this size might be too much. I've been way overweight, you see, and have been steadily (although slowly) losing weight for some time. Today I'm a dress size 18 (well, the lower end of 18... approaching 16 now). "D" cups at size 18 are pretty big. Hubby says I've got enough saline in me to make me responsive to the phases of the moon (smart arse that he is...). Anyway... these lovely "size 18 D cup" breasts will never get smaller, no matter how much weight I loose.

I did my research. The same "D" cups at size 18 (if they don't shrink - and mine won't) become "DD" size once you hit size 14 and lower.

OOps.

Too big? Have I gone too far?

NAH!

I love the curves - and if I end up voluptuous, well, eat yer heart out!

It's been a week now since my surgery. How did it go? I'll tell you more next week.

Quilting vs Breast Reconstruction

2011-02-16T01:00:00.010+11:00

It wasn't "unexpected". I knew it was coming. But now it's almost here and, darn. Another period of "no quilting" coming for me in the near future.

Last June I discovered I had breast cancer. The kind of cancer it was plus my high-risk status caused my doctors to decide to do surgery - lots of surgery. So I had my remaining ovary removed in late July and three weeks later a bilateral ("double") mastectomy. I opted to go ahead and start reconstruction - and for the last six months have been living with "expanders" in my chest.

Expanders are interesting contraptions. They are sort-of "temporary" breast implants. They have a special port (made partially of metal, I'm told) through which saline solution can be injected - thus "inflating" the bags. The reason we inflate this way is that breast implants are actually positioned under the pectoral muscles (sounds impossible, doesn't it?). Just ramming the implants in would cause considerable pain and possible damage to the muscle. There's also the issue of mastectomies (like the one done on me) where the nipples and areola are removed as well as the "inside" breast tissue. These days there is such a thing as "nipple sparing mastectomies" - but with nasty breast cancer already found, well, nipples/areola are "breast tissue" and therefore subject to possible future breast cancer. So they went. This meant removing quite a lot of skin - and so the expanders are needed to stretch the remaining skin as well as the pectoral.

I've never actually seen one, but I can tell you what they feel like. They feel like partially inflated beach balls. A hideous feeling. At first they were darned uncomfortable. As the inflation process happened, they became less uncomfortable. Now, 6 months out, they still bug me. They don't wake me up at night, they don't ache - but I'm almost always aware of them.

As a matter of fact, I estimate that approximately 20% of my brain is ALWAYS focused on my "breasts" and the expanders inside them.

And if you're wondering what I look like "nekkid" these, well, Uh... not so hot. But that's OK... changes are in the works.

Anyway... as I said above, the expanders are temporary. And now, at long last, it's time for the "exchange surgery" - an operation during which my plastic surgeon (the fabulous Dr. Gillian) will remove these beach balls and replace them with lovely silicon implants (which we will call "permanent" implants although the truth is that they'll have to be taken out and replaced in 10-15 years). Dr. Gillian is, at the same time, going to grab some skin from "somewhere" (I don't know where yet) on me and construct nipples for me using skin grafting techniques.

So... soon, very soon, I'll be heading to hospital and Dr. Gillian will do her best to make me her masterpiece. As much as I hate the surgery, I'm soooooo excited to be getting through this next stage.

However... well... as I learned last year, you can't quilt with an IV drip in your hand - AND... even once I'm out of hospital... I'll have quite a few restrictions on what I can and cannot do with my arms (most noteably, not lifting anything that ways much more than a couple of pounds). That pretty much rules out quilting for a while.

How long?

Anybody's guess.

Quilt 5: Quilting the Border Panels and Using A Template

2011-02-09T04:59:00.001+11:00

I'm working away on Quilt 5 (which I think I last mentioned in September 2010). It's coming along nicely - and although January in Australia doesn't seem to be the best month for quilting (it's summer here), I'm enjoying finally getting back to stitching after my little break over the holidays.

Because of the squirly design I ended up with for this quilt (again - the subject of the September posting), I've got an unusually wide border on this quilt. The width of it pretty much demands some kind of fancy stitching, not just endless rows of quilting. So... I'm using my most-complicated (to date) stitching template.

Here's the template:

And here's the resulting stitching (on the back of the quilt):

As you can see, I've opted to go with a greatly contrasting thread on this one - I really wanted to see the stitches on the back (they're almost invisible on the front of the quilt). I like the pattern and am gradually getting more comfortable with the template. As I did with an earlier template, I've threaded multiple needles and have (5 in this case) and have them all going in the quilt at the same time. Of course, this leads to multiple stab wounds because I've got all 5 needles in the same general area - but I'm getting better. And the dark fabric doesn't show the blood.

One thing that is driving me nuts is the marking pencil I'm using.

Up till now I've been quilting on light coloured fabrics, so I've been able to use my fabulous "disappearing ink" marking pen. But the ink is a medium pink colour (before it fades) and doesn't show up at all on dark fabrics. So I've had to use something else. I have a white pencil (which doesn't fade automatically, but can be brushed/wiped away after you're done) and although it marks well enough, the pencil itself is wearing down weirdly.

Here's a photo of the tip:

As you can see, the template is cutting into the "lead" of the pencil. The problem with this is that it wears the tip out quickly - the tips keep breaking off in chunks and then I have to keep resharpening. At this rate, this little pencil isn't going to be marking many quilts.

I've tried to mark with a "light hand" (ie: not pressing so hard) but it doesn't really help.

Boring but Pleasant

2011-02-02T01:48:00.000+11:00

At the end of 2010 I sat down and thought about what I wanted for 2011, and I made a list. Not a list of "New Year's Resolutions" (that time honored thing we do and then chuck the first time we don't feel like the 'whatevers' we said we'd do - or not do). No... this was a list of things that I want to do.

That I really WANT to do.

Such as "see 1 movie a month" and "read 1 book a month." See? Fun things. OK, I've got one or two "challenges" on the list, but mostly my plan for the year involves learning to relax and enjoy life a little more. After the endless rounds of doctors and surgeries last year, not to mention the agony of watching my beloved mother-in-law pass away, well... let's just say that 2010 involved practicing how to roll with the punches. So, OK. I did that. Now I'm ready to rediscover joy and peace in my life.

Looking over my list I decided that the things I'm planning for the year are "boring but pleasant" - and so this has become my theme and mantra for the year:

Boring but pleasant.
Boring but pleasant.
Boring but pleasant.

I had "exciting" last year and didn't care for it much.

So now I'm well into 2011 and although not everything I'm touching turns to gold, I can assure you that I am following the theme.

And - now well into February, I've finally picked up my quilting again. I'm still working on the small teal-and-navy "throw" that I started well before my first surgery, but it's coming along splendidly. I'm quilting the border panels now - and working with my most-challenging-to-date stitch template.

I'll tell you more about that next week.

Until then, I'll still be working on:

Boring but pleasant.
Boring but pleasant.
Boring but pleasant.

Advance Australia Fair

2011-01-26T01:00:00.005+11:00

It's Australia Day - a day set aside when we contemplate and celebrate all the things that make this country great. It's a lovely holiday.

I'd hoped that today would be extra special for me - that I'd actually become an Australian citizen today - but it was not to be. The shire I live in apparently is not having a citizenship ceremony today - and I have to wait until the shire schedules one.

A slight disappointment, but it's OK. I'm still so happy to be here, so happy knowing that my application for citizenship is approved and all we have to do is wait. Eventually I'll get that letter from the shire telling me when the ceremony is.

And in the meantime -
Aussie Aussie Aussie!

Quilts as Sound Absorbers

2011-01-19T17:44:00.002+11:00

My beloved mother-in-law, Judith, passed away last November. My husband, her only child, has inherited her lovely Edwardian era home in downtown Melbourne. If we sold it, it would fetch a quite a price, but for many reasons we have opted not to do that. Instead we've decided to put some time, energy, and considerable money into fixing it up. We'll use it as a second residence.

When we go there for overnight stays, we take our companion birds with us: Blue (a red-factor male canary), George (a male eclectus), and Laka (a blue and gold macaw). We do this often enough to justify getting a couple of inexpensive cages to house them in. The cages are situated near the back of the house where there is an easy-to-clean polished brick floor and where a series of internal doors allow us to keep most of the noise contained.

The walls of this hallway are composed of brick, with windows high up and sky-lights above. It's quite bright, but all that brick tends to make the screeching reverberate - almost like an amplifier, really. It can be quite unbearable - deafening - to be in that hallway when either George or Laka cut loose (which they do frequently).

Amoung Judith's things is a lovely double-size quilt that my mother made for her some years ago. Rather than use that quilt on a bed, I've decided to hang it in the hallway next to the cages. It makes a huge difference, absorbing instead of reflecting and amplifying the sound. It works so well that I also hung a Christmas quilt (something I gave Judith a long time ago) on another wall.

I'm now considering the possibility of making some decorative hangings to go in that hallway - quilts, of course - to cover even more of the brick and dampen the volume. Yet another excuse for heading to the quilt shop!

A Break From Quilting

2011-01-12T06:05:00.005+11:00

Ok. My New Year's Resolution (announced last week) is: "to quilt"

Maybe I should've explained that.

You see, I've actually not been doing any quilting since mid-December. Why not? Well, I don't know. It just somehow fell off my radar.

I was chatting with quilt-a-holic friend and mentor Pauline - and she tells me that she's not been doing any quilting either - and more or less in the same timeframe as me.

What is wrong with us?

Don't know. I think I'll blame climate change.

My New Year's Resolution

2011-01-05T17:41:00.000+11:00

I hereby resolve to.....

QUILT!

Yah-haha!

(what were you expecting me to say? That I'd exercise some discipline in the quilt shops? Get real...)

Time for a Break

2010-12-15T17:08:00.001+11:00

Christmas looms.

I'm having a ball, but simply finding it too difficult to spend time here at the moment - so I'm going to take a break now and will be back on the first Wednesday of 2011 with fresh material.

Until then - Merry Christmas - and may you have a happy, quilty New Year!

The Australian Citizenship Test (Test Anxiety)

2010-12-07T17:41:00.007+11:00

Four years ago I came to Australia (from the US) as an immigrant. I was granted permanent residence and on November 12th (the anniversary of my arrival as an immigrant) I became eligible to apply for citizenship.

In the months leading up to this I have reflected many times about what citizenship means, what I feel for my native country and what I feel for Australia. At the end of the day I find that taking this step is the most natural thing in the world. It's time for me to stop talking about Australians as "they" and start saying "us" instead.

Becoming a citizen involves three steps:

Submitting an application (and documentation to prove identity and legal residence)

Passing a "citizenship test"

Participating in a formal citizenship ceremony

The first step I completed on November 12. Easy to do that, really, as much of it involves answering a few simple questions about yourself and getting certified copies of birth/divorce/marriage documents (for identification purposes).

The third step will be an absolute delight. I understand that the ceremonies are lovely and meaningful.

But that second step... oh my...

Let me say right now that I have never had trouble with "test anxiety." I graduated from high school, attended universities (and graduated with a bachelors degree and an MBA). I don't recall ever being freaked out over an exam before. But this is different.

The Australian government makes it pretty easy for you to prepare for this. There is a pre-test study guide available which covers all the information required. I downloaded a copy and started a regime of reading bits of it every day. At first I was OK with it all, but starting about two weeks ago the anxiety started building. What if I flunked the test? It happens, I understand. Not a lot, but sometimes. Oh heavens... what if I flunked?

I received a letter from the citizenship office informing me that December 7th would be my testing date. That was y'day (for those of you confused about how December 7th could be yesterday... well... this blog is hosted in the US and I'm in Australia... so a post set to publish on Dec 7th posts on Dec. 8th in Australia... we're 16 hours ahead of the US).

I arrived at the building about 10 minutes ahead of the scheduled time. The letter I had received instructed me to go to the testing office on the 2nd floor. Entering the ground floor of the large office complex I saw the very well-marked reception area for "Immigrant and Citizenship Reception." There was a huge line of people in the "reception line" just inside the doors, so I got my place in line and waited. The line was moving very slowly. I started looking around and began to wonder if I was in the right place. My letter had specifically said to go the the 2nd floor - this was the ground floor. Getting more nervous, I pulled my cellphone out and rang the citizenship office and asked them about the exact location. The woman who answered my call confessed she had no idea because she is in Sydney - but her coworker (who had worked in the Melbourne office) might know... so I waited as she asked the coworker. Sure enough the coworker confirmed that I should find "the elevator" and go to the 2nd floor.

OK. I get out of the line and walk past the reception area - looking for an elevator. No elevator. Luckily there was a woman at a desk who was not engaged with a client, so I asked her for directions. She told me to go back out to the street and go into the building via a completely different door. I did as she told me, found the elevators, and headed to the 2nd floor. When I stepped off the elevator I saw lighted professional signs for professional offices, but nothing saying "citizenship". I was sure I was in the wrong place again, so I turned to go back to the elevator. That is when I spotted an 8x10 paper "sign" (looked like it had been made on someone's home computer) taped to the wall beside one of the elevators saying "Citizenship" and pointing down the hall.

Greatly relieved, I headed in the direction of the arrow and found the office I was looking for.

There was one rather young-looking man working the reception desk. He was helping someone else, so I stood behind him. After 15 minutes there was a line of 6 other people behind me also waiting. Finally a second assistant came up and said "I'll help whoever is next". She asked me the reason for my visit, looked at my letter, checked on the computer to verify I had an appointment, and gave me a slip of paper with "T033" printed on it and said I should have a seat.

It took a while, but as I sat there waiting I became more and more calm about it all. (Now... I have to laugh... there was a TV in the waiting area showing an old rerun of "Gilligans Island." Very, VERY weird and surreal feeling to be waiting to be interviewed for Australian citizenship and watching Gilligan and the Skipper arguing.) By the time I was called to be "interviewed", I felt like I had both feet on the ground. The woman who took my papers and processed them was very pleasant - we chatted amiably and I started to feel really good.

Then the moment came - she took me into the testing room, sat me down in front of a computer terminal and started the test for me. I'd have 45 minutes to finish. No worries. I was done in 7 minutes.

The questions I was so worried about were, well, not so bad. I did miss one question - but because I'd studied so hard the others were a breeze.

And so there you are. I'm done with the test. Now I have to wait for the gov't authority to contact me and let me know which citizenship ceremony I will be scheduled to participate in.

Can't wait!

And I'm hoping it will happen on Australia Day.

(Side note: I've talked about this for years, told all my friends. I'm so surprised at how many of my US friends think I have to give up my US citizenship to do this. No... I don't. I will have dual citizenship, which is legally allowed by both Australia and the US.)

Quilt 8: Disaster City

2010-12-01T01:00:00.005+11:00

What was I thinking?

I found these 3 adorable green-and-white prints and thought they looked fabulous together:

I played around with my quilt design software and came up with this design:

And gleefully went about cutting the bits and pieces out. I pieced together the first block for the top and... oh... disasterous. That center print (the swirls and flowers) looks just awful in the design. The print is too large for the small triangles that go on the outside of the dark green blocks. The overall design disappears and looks like a blob.

Well... I could show you a photo, I guess, but it's too depressing. It really looks horrid.

Had I done a simple strip quilt it would have been OK. And I think it would have been OK if I'd had that center fabric surrounded by the dark green. But sandwiching it between the dark and light prints - AND making the bits so small, well... awful.

What I'll need to do is find something else - a much smaller print - to replace the blocks for those triangles.

For the moment, though, I'm just depressed about this and have shoved all the pieces into a plastic bag and pushed them to the back of my UFO closet.

Quilt 7: Design and Piecing the Top

2010-11-24T05:12:00.001+11:00

Quilt 6 is done, Quilt 5 is well on it's way, time to get some more of my UFO's put together so that I don't end up with a bad case of NTQ (Nuthin Ta Quilt). So here we go, Quilt 7! This one will be a baby quilt, made up using a sweet koala print. Here's the design:

It's a very simple design, just 20 main blocks with a bit of sashing around them. The green-and-brown squares will be where the koala print goes. Each koala square will have a half-inch "frame" of grey:

I cut out several one-inch strips of grey and sewed them on the sides of the koala blocks:

Then I stitched strips to the tops and bottoms, completing the "frames" for the koalas.

The koala "frame" blocks will be seperated by 2 inch "sashing" - and I'm for that I'm using an interesting aboriginal style print. I sew a strip of this sashing on the bottom of each koala block. Just as I did with my log cabin (Quilt 6), I'm not bothering to cut the sashing until AFTER I've sewn it to the block:

That makes it all go a lot faster.

The sashing fabric is a brown aboriginal print. It's very attractive, perfectly compliments the colours in the koala fabric, and looks a bit like bark - so I'm going to make sure that the lines in the sashing fabric run vertically (to maximize the bark-like effect).

and then put the sets together to form a strip of koala blocks. It's important that the koala's are all going in the same direction (a one-way print). By sewing the horizontal sashing only on the bottom of the koala blocks, I eliminated the chance that I'd get them turned to the side or upside down.

...and now the vertical strips are done.

Now ready for the vertical sashing. And as a last step, added a 2-inch border of grey:

Done! From start to finish, it took just 5 hours to get this much done.

I would have liked the grey border to be wider, but if I'd done that, it would have been too wide for the special "baby quilt batting" that I bought. The batting is 45x60 (inches), so I was somewhat limited by that. Still - it's a good size for the purpose.

All ready to make up the "sandwich" and then the quilting can begin.

Advance Australia Fair

2010-11-17T01:00:00.001+11:00

Going "off topic" again for a moment...

I came to Australia 4 years ago as an immigrant. I'm so glad I had this opportunity and am very grateful to the many wonderful people who have been so kind, helping me along the way. I'd like to name them all here, but there are too many to name. And not just my beautiful Australian family and friends, but those back in Ohio who supported my decision (even though they didn't really understand).

And - as of November 12, I became eligible to apply for citizenship. I took that step on the day. There's a citizenship test I have to pass (and I'm studying hard) and then waiting to be notified when and where I will participate in a citizenship ceremony.

And so, one day in 2011, I will stand with other immigrants, recite the words:

"From this time forward, under God,
I pledge my loyalty to Australia and its people,
whose democratic beliefs I share,
whose rights and liberties I respect, and
whose laws I will uphold and obey."

and sing our anthem:

"Australians all let us rejoice
For we are young and free..."

(As a side note - my love for Australia in no way diminishes my love of the United States. In becoming an Australian citizen, I will retain my American citizenship, which I am able to do legally under the laws of both countries.)

Guilty Quilty Secrets - Part 2

2010-11-10T00:55:00.002+11:00

True confessions...

Last week I let you have a little look inside my UFO closet. And I admitted to you then that there was more. Well... here we go:

I love these fresh white-and-green "Irish" prints. There's enough here for a baby quilt. Very bright and cheery.

The Craft Connection was a lovely store in Ferntree Gully that has, unfortunately, closed (the owner retired). My first trip there was my last, sadly. But when I was there I found this sweet koala print and bought enough for a baby quilt:

And here's a dangerous bit of madness: a single "fat quarter" of a gorgeous gum tree print:

It's madness because there was only this fat quarter, nothing that really went with it. It's dangerous because you can BET that I'll find something to go with it... ...and the hunt for that coordinating fabric will, of course, lead to other bits that will attract me.

Oh, I'm just a moth drawn to the flame...

Guilty Quilty Secrets - Part 1

2010-11-03T06:32:00.025+11:00

OK. I've been holding out on you. I'd apologize but I'm sure you'd know that I'm not really sorry, just feeling a little guilty.

I've been teasing friend Pauline about her huge stack of UFO's. But the truth is that I don't have much room to talk. My stash is growing, too. As a matter of fact, I've cleared out a large space in my linen closet just to store the batting and uncut fabric for projects that may not see daylight for some time.

And, just so those UFO's don't get lonely, I've been shopping again and picked up a few new bits:

First - I found the cutest koala print at my favorite quitling store - and a couple of bits (the grey and brown on the left) to go with it. This will be another medium-sized throw quilt:

And while I was in the store, saw a quilt kit that I fell in love with - "Forbidden Palace":

The picture (above) isn't terribly good. Have a look here at the picture on the "Patchwork with Gail B" website. The design is gorgeous - simple rectangular "snowball" blocks. Each rectangular block has a small triangle of black on the corner which frames the block and creates a stained-glass window effect. The simple black cotton runs around the edge, with matching binding. It's very dramatic.

I just love the Japanese prints that make up the blocks. Here's a few of the prints that come with the kit (there are 80 different prints in this quilt... EIGHTY! ):

Gorgeous!

And right next to the sample quilt, I found this Asian print:

The photo doesn't show it well, but the dragons have sparkly gold on their feet, heads, and spine. The colours are just so rich. I bought a meter of this, not wanting to wait and then go back only to find that the fabric has sold out. I'm sure I'll be able to find bits later that match and coordinate. In the meantime I'll see what kind of design I can come up with to maximize those glorious dragons.

And there's this bit (below):

This print I've had for a little over a year. I bought 3 meters, thinking I'd make a summer garment for myself, but just never got around to it. Then a couple of weeks ago my friend Karleen showed me a small decorative quilt she'd bought - her quilt had some of this fabric in it! She said she wanted to make some pillows to go with it, and I offered her a meter of this (her pillows look simply gorgeous covered in this - really sets off the quilt!). So I've still got 2 meters, certainly plenty to for a quilt.

So... is that all? (sheepish grin here...) Uh... No... There's more...

(I'll tell you about that next week)

....Taking a Break

2010-10-27T11:59:00.001+11:00

I'm afraid the time got away from me this week and I didn't prepare a blog post for this week. But I've been busy - got a few things to tell you about. I'll do that next week. See you then.

:-)

Quilt 6: Design

2010-10-20T01:00:00.001+11:00

Well.. as I've actually nearly finished quilt 6 - plus talked about it in my previous post, I guess I should introduce the design. (I'm sure you've realized by now that I am just not doing these projects in sequence...)

So here it is: the design for Quilt 6:

And here's the top after it was pieced together:

And here's the detail of the top:

This top went together in a FLASH. I think I spent about 5 hours total on it!

This one went with me to the hospital when I had my mastectomy and first step of reconstruction. I really had expected to be able to work on it - but, well, that didn't go as planned.

No matter. I've been working on it since. The quilting is done, the binding has been tacked on, the edges trimmed, and now I'm stitching the binding down - will probably finish it tonight!

Log Cabin Lesson

2010-10-13T01:00:00.006+11:00

When I cut out my first log cabin project (Quilt Number 5), I found it really complicated. Cutting all those little pieces, each with varying lengths, and having to be careful not to cut the pieces too small, matching the colors carefully and so on.

But then it hit me: For the log cabin blocks I was doing, the width of the blocks was the same, only the length was different! Why bother to cut the different lengths? Why not just cut strips of the appropriate width, sew the bits and then trim?

OF COURSE!

So I started Quilt Number 6 by cutting out the first 2 blocks (both were 2x2) and stitched them together like this:

Then I opened them up and placed them (right side down) onto a strip and sewed them to the strip like this:

Then I cut the strip:

Then opened up the beginning of the block:

The orange square is the center of the block - so next I will pick up a strip of the color I want on the right side and sew along that edge.

Simple, easy, and FAST!

I didn't even bother to press the seams before going on to the next strip.

I'm delighted with the result. The blocks are perfectly uniform and even lay more flat after pressing than the ones in Quilt 5 do.

Breast Cancer: 2 - Quilting Hoop: 4

2010-10-06T00:51:00.008+11:00

They caught my cancer early, really early. In opting to have a bilateral mastectomy, I not only was able to deal with that cancer but pretty much stomp on my risk of a repeat. My risk for recurrance is now something less than 5%. All this without chemo or radiation therapy. So my cancer is gone and, as my beloved cousin Beth (who went through this 3 years ago - but had to have chemo) points out: I get to keep my hair.

I'm healing well from my surgeries, but have been terrifically uncomfortable. At the time of my mastectomy, my plastic surgeon installed "expanders" under my pectoral muscles. The purpose of these devices is to gradually stretch my muscle and skin, making way for a full-sized permanent silicone gel implant later on. The expanders are, well, uncomfortable. At times VERY uncomfortable. But just the other day my surgeon put in more saline in them (causing me to inflate a bit) and now they don't bug me quite as much.

And I've gone from being a smallish "B" cup to a "very full C." Feeling pretty good, so I think it's time for therapy.

Not chemo therapy.
Not radiation therapy.
Not psychotherapy.

Retail Therapy!

I've been steadily working on my "recouperation projects" and am getting to the place where I need to set up something to work on when they are done. Yup. Time to get the design software out and then do some shopping.

I haven't been in my favorite quilting store since July. I know they've missed me....

Quilt 5: Design Error + Awkward Solution

2010-09-29T01:04:00.003+10:00

Quilt 5 is my first "fat quarter" project. I bought the fabric without having a design in mind - and (more importantly) without having measurements in-hand.

I found a lovely calico of a teal background with splashes of yellow, green, and navy. Just luscous. There was only a couple of meters on the bolt, so I bought it all, figuring any scraps would surely come in handy some day. Then I selected fat quarters (and fat eighths) to compliment it. Came home, whipped up a log cabin design - but quickly realized that the quarters/eighths I'd bought were not really going to give me large (or even medium) log cabin blocks.

Here are the quarters as they looked before cutting (and the background fabric).

Hm...

I want a quilt "throw" for the lounge - something large enough to tuck under my feet and still pull up to my chin. Not a bedspread certainly, but a quilt large enough to curl up under at night.

(OK... Now let's get REAL here... I'm NEVER going to curl up under this quilt... because I'm ALWAYS going to have another quilt on my lap - one that I'm actively quilting...).

Anyway... once I got the logcabin blocks together I realized that the overall size of the quilt was going to be smaller than desired.

How to add inches to it? Well... of course... I did it wrong. Oh, Pauline, where were you when I needed you? (Pauline is a good friend and my quilting guru, so naturally I'm going to blame my mistakes on her).

Here's the original design:

Here's what I did with it:

What I SHOULD have done is make the sashing between the blocks bigger than originally planned. That would have spaced the blocks more, but it would have looked better than what I actually did.

I made the outer border panel bigger - a LOT bigger.

Yes, I did model it first with my quilting software (as you can see above). It looked, well, OK there. But the actual quilt just looks awkward - the huge border overwhelming the much smaller log cabin blocks.

As I've said before: "I'm not a perfectionist."

Pauline (being the artist she is) would probably pull this apart and fix it properly. Me? Nah. FULL SPEED AHEAD!

Breast Cancer: 2 - Quilting Hoop: 2

2010-09-22T05:33:00.003+10:00

This past week has brought some improvements. I'm now 8 weeks out from the abdominal surgery, 5 weeks out from the mastectomy/recon surgery - still terribly sore and pretty dogonned frustrated with it all.

But, finally, I'm finding that I'm able to do a little quilting. Finally.

It's lovely. Evenings in the loungeroom now include some TV (or more often, a DVD), a nice fire in the wood burner, bright lights and my quilt project.

So I'm giving the quilting hoop 2 points. It deserves them. It has been patient, even though I have been less so.

Breast Cancer: 2 - Quilting Hoop: 0

2010-09-15T17:58:00.001+10:00

OK. Another week has gone by and although I can tell the swelling under my arms is starting to go down, it's still not possible to sit and quilt comfortably. I've tried various sitting/reclining positions and so on.

Nope.

No good.

How long can this go on? Grrrrrrrrrrr!

Breast Cancer: 1 - Quilting Hoop: 0

2010-09-08T01:45:00.006+10:00

This is not going to go down as one of the more "fun" periods of my life. That said, it's also not the worst, either, not even close. But it's been unpleasant enough.

As part of my preparation for my bilateral ("double") mastectomy I pieced and pinned a couple of smallish projects, thinking it would be nice to have something I could quilt during recovery.

Well... it was a nice thought.

With surgery number one I found that I couldn't quilt because of the IV drip in my left hand. Once that was out, however, I was able to get back to it. Before going in for the breast surgery I asked how long the IV would be in. "24 hours" was the answer I got. HEY! HURRAY! Good news, that! I'd be in the hospital for a total of 5 days - but no problem, folks... only the first 24 hours would see me wired up with an IV. So I packed a quilt project in my hospital bag.

What I hadn't counted on was the swelling under my armpits. My cousin Beth (who went through this 3 years ago) mentioned the swelling at one point - but I didn't realize how uncomfortable that was going to make me. The swelling isn't actually tender anymore (it was at first) but it DOES prevent me from positioning my arms comfortably.

So here I sit - unable to quilt - at least for now.

Fat Quarters - The Devil Made Me Do It...

2010-09-01T01:00:00.000+10:00

In a previous post I explained the technical idea of "fat quarters." Now I'll describe the deviously planned impact these little innocent-looking bits have.

It's brilliant marketing. Brilliant.

Quilting calico runs between $15 to $25 a meter. The cost of a quilt, therefore, is just astronomical. When you lay out a new design and think "yardage", you reel at the hit your pocketbook is going to take. When you go into the store to look for, say 2 meters of something, you pick up a heavy bolt. You then have to wander around with this massive roll of fabric and look for something to coordinate with it. You are aware of the weight. You are aware of the cost.

Fat quarters, however, are small - easy to pick up, easy to pair up with other little fat quarters, and much less expensive. Once you figure out that you can grab a few "fat quarters" (at $4 to $7 a pop) and make something, well... you get suckered in.

The quilt shops all put their fat quarters right in the center of the store. It's the same devilry that causes grocery stores to position the lollies directly across from the breakfast cereals. They know they have you. You'll walk in with every intention of picking up that inexpensive meter from the "clearance table" - but you have to walk past the fat quarter table to get there.

Yeah... they know what they are doing.

You walk up to the table (no... you are pulled... it's a magnetic force... BEWARE). You spot the edge of something pretty - something unusual. Orange and gold dragonflies on a field of navy (no! impossible! how can it be so pretty?!?!?!) You extract it from the mass of neatly tucked-in folds of similar size. You look at it and think "oh! I wonder what I might use this for..." And you can't help but look to see what might coordinate. The next thing you know, you're designing (mentally) a work of art large enough to cover the Vatican.

I watched friend Pauline hit the FQ table the first time she took me to what is now my favorite quilting shop. She walked around the perimiter, of course, first looking at the bolts of fabric. She found some lovely lavender calico and bought enough for a single-sized coverlet. She thought that would save her. Wrong! The overpowering tractor beam of the FQ table pulled her in. And after about half an hour she was caught - a moth to the flame. I watched as she sorted through hundreds - literally HUNDREDS of fabric swatches. Matching, discarding this, picking up that. Pauline is an artist. She has a fabulous eye for finding interesting coordinating bits. In about 40 minutes she assembled a stack of quarters - browns and burnished coppers - that looked as if the good Lord Himself must've intended those bits to be together in a harmonious rhapsody of color and pattern. Delicious. But I saw how MANY of these quarters she had. Most were over $5 a unit - and she had something like 20 units.

And of course, being a good friend, I did what any other girlfriend would do. "GO FOR IT!" I said "Gorgeous! Yeah! Do it, Pauline!"

Sorry. No self-restraint possible in a quilting store.

I escaped the magnetism of the evil FQ table that day. But only about 4 weeks later I found myself in another quilt shop - one that was closing down and had excellent "everything must go" prices. I'd intended - yes actually intended - to buy some quarters to make a quilt. I did that. But also came out with enough bits (totally different color/pattern) to make a 2nd quilt top.

As I write this I am planning another trip to the quilt shop. I want to pick out some fabric to use in making table runners and other smallish projects that I can work on while I recover from my upcoming cancer surgeries. I know that the fat quarter table is a good place to start. Logically it should turn out well. But... will I be able to walk out with only the items I plan to?

Doubt it.

Fat Quarters - It's Not About Dieting

2010-08-25T01:40:00.000+10:00

I'd seen these cutesy little folds of fabric in the store. Clearly just a little fabric - neatly folded and labeled "fat quarter." I looked at these snips and wondered about it. I looked at the prices of these bits and just couldn't imagine why anybody would pay so much for so little.

I didn't understand - but I get it now.

If you buy fabric from a bolt, you always tell the clerk how much you want (yards or meters). If you say "I'd like a quarter meter of this", the clerk will measure 1/4 meter along the edge of the fabric and cut from there. You get a longish strip that is quite narrow.

With a "fat quarter", however, what they do is cut a half meter from the bolt and then slice down the middle of that so that you end up with a wider piece (as opposed to a thin strip).

The diagram below shows 2 ways of cutting a piece into fourths. The top one shows the thin 1/4 strips. The second one shows the cutting layout of a "fat quarter." The area of each cut is the same - but with fat quarters you have more options, especially if you happen to be working with a fabric that has a large print.

To further illustrate, have a look at this bit of fabric that I found on a "clearance" table at one of my favorite fabric stores:

As you can see, if a quarter meter (or yard) of this were cut straight across, you'd surely not get any of the full blocks of roses in the piece. But with a "fat quarter", you'd get a good bit of the design, probably 4 or more of the rose groupings.

So much for the technical explanation. In my next post I will share with you the madness that gets into your blood once you understand the idea behind "fat quarters" (and "fat eighths", for that matter).

Stitching Templates

2010-08-18T01:34:00.000+10:00

For my first project my quilt stitches were very simple - they just followed the stitching lines for the blocks. Now I'm well into my 2nd project - and so far I've done the same - just stitching about a half inch or so from the seams - straight lines and squares.

Time to branch out a little and try something new.

I wanted to have a slightly "swirly" stitching design on my second quilt, so I decided to try using a stitching template. Here's the one I chose:

The template gives for continuous lines - 2 of them weaving back and forth together with the other (outer) 2 forming a straight border. The pen shown with it draws a thin pink line - which disappears after about 24 hours (sooner if the air is very dry).

And here's what the stitches look like (the back of Quilt 2: Ohio Star):
I'm very pleased with the results. The stitching goes quickly because you don't have to stop and start - it's just 4 continuous lines (which, of course, I did using 4 different needles so I could do them all at once).

You Can't Quilt with an IV Drip in Your Hand

2010-08-11T01:30:00.002+10:00

Dr. Jane (gynaecological oncologist) and Dr. Suzanne (breast oncologist) put their heads together and decided that my remaining ovary should be taken out as a precaution. Having passed the great threshold of menopause a couple of years ago, I figured this was a pretty good idea - that ovary wasn't doing me any good and had, in fact, become trouble waiting to happen (esp. with the kind of sneaky "silent" breast cancer I've got). Dr. Jane figured she could get it via laparoscopy, so the surgery was scheduled for a Friday afternoon and away I went - expecting almost inconsequential incisions, only an overnight stay in hospital, and a speedy recovery period (like 2 weeks). I was pleased with all this, knowing that pesky ovary would be gone and it could all be done without impacting my mastectomy/reconstruction surgery dates.

It all sounded good on paper, anyway.

When I awoke in post-op I learned that they'd been unable to complete the planned ovary removal with a simple laparoscopy. They'd quickly discovered a nasty problem - adhesions (scar tissue) had made a twisted mess of my lower abdomen, looping around my digestive tract, basically a nasty, complex bowel-obstruction-in-the-making. The laparoscopy was scrapped and instead a much more involved operation was performed.

It was disappointing, of course, but I have to say that I felt pretty darned lucky. Had they not found this problem now, it would certainly have caused big trouble somewhere down the line.

So instead of an overnight stay, I was told to expect 5-7 days in hospital. I hadn't expected it, or prepared for it, but I DID have a smallish quilting project to work on (and a newly started crochet project), so I figured I'd at least be able to make good use of the time.

The first 36 hours or so, I had a self-administered morphine injector wired into one of the 3 IV taps attached to my left arm. Even in my drug-enduced euphoria I was aware that morphine and quilting would probably not make good bed-fellows, so I waited until I didn't need the heavy drugs anymore before trying anything.

Once the drug fog cleared, I pulled out the crochet project to see how that would go, figuring it would be easier to work on that the quilt would be. I made an attempt - but quickly realized that the IV in the back of my hand just wasn't "happy" if I tried to do much that required moving fingers a bit - that plus I kept bumping it - even with just crochet (which is easier to manipulate than a quilt).

I finally gave up.

The IV drips stayed in until the day before I was released. I was bummed - thinking about how I'd be returning in a few weeks time for the mastectomy, knowing in advance that I'd be unable to use my hands at all again. But, fortunately, I talked to one of the night nurses about my worries about that upcoming surgery. The nurse (a lovely woman whose name I don't now recall) sat down with me for about a half hour and explained in great detail what would happen in hospital after the mastectomy/reconstruction. I was THRILLED to learn that they take the IV drip out in about 24 hours after the surgery.

So there you are... come the next round of hospital-time, I have hope that I'll be able to quilt a little, or at least crochet.

YAY!

Quilt 5: Design

2010-08-04T01:08:00.007+10:00

Ok...Ok.. you are right... I just finished quilt 3 - now starting quilt 5. What happened to number 4? Well...

Number 4 is a bedspread sized quilt. Don't worry. We'll get to it. In the short-term, however, I need smaller projects that won't be too demanding on my arms and pectoral muscles as I am recovering from the mastectomy/reconstruction surgery. Quilt 5 is a small quilt - similar in size to number 3.

Here's the design:

It's a log cabin design using navy, turquoise, green, yellow. The backing will be solid teal cotton and the binding will be solid navy.

This project is different because instead of starting with the design first (safest way to go) I opted to start with the fabric. You see... there was a quilting shop in Ferntree Gully that closed down - and they had a "closing down" clearance sale. I stopped in to see what bits I might find. I fell in love with the speckled fabric (shown in the photo below, under the stack of folded fabric) and picked up "fat quarters" (the folded fabrics) that coordinate with it. Then I came home and played with my quilt-design software to come up with a design that would suit the bits I picked up.

This is, of course, my first log cabin quilt. I'm surprised at how complex log cabins actually are to put together. They sure look simple. Seems you should be able to just zip together strips without any measuring...

WRONG!

You really have to be on your toes when you cut out the pieces for log cabins - they are all the same width, but there are 5 different lengths in the simple block shown below:

It would be incredibly easy to mess it up.

Ok... let's do the math:

30 log cabin blocks x 9 pieces per block: 270 pieces

between-block borders: 29 pieces

outer borders: 4 pieces

303 pieces! (this doesn't include the binding and backing)

Somehow it didn't seem like that many pieces as I was cutting it out and sewing it.

Quilting as a Cure for Cancer

2010-07-28T01:33:00.001+10:00

I got lucky. They caught my cancer early.

It could easily have gone un-noticed. But Dr. Suzanne, my surgeon, found it and so now we're preparing for multiple rounds of surgery. Because of my history of developing cysts, my age, and the kind of cancer they found ("silent cancer" - a type that can be seen only with an MRI or in tissue removed by a surgical biopsy), we are opting for a double mastectomy and the removal of my remaining ovary for the safety and peace of mind these procedures will give me. This seems a bit radical until you understand that I've had 11 biopsies in about a year (new cysts developing continually) and since they can't explain why this is happening, there's no way to stop it. And you really can't afford to ignore cysts - especially since I have developed this sneaky bastard "Silent Cancer." So it's either get a mastectomy or move in with Dr. Suzanne and get an MRI done about every other week.

She tells me that the cancer is small, early. With a mastectomy at this stage, no chemo or radiation will be necessary. So, yes, I'm counting my blessings.

My mother found breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy last year - at the age of 80. Her cancer was much more advanced than mine and she had to endure chemo - and losing her hair. Just try and imagine that. At the age of 80. Lordy. She decided against reconstruction, having recently been widowed and wanting so much to put it all behind her. I remember her telling me how she'd worried about pain only to be pleasantly surprised at how much better she felt than anticipated. I've heard the same story from other cancer survivors who opted to skip reconstruction.

With reconstruction, however, the stories are a bit different. My beloved Cousin Beth (who went through this 3 years ago) tells me that she found it pretty darned uncomfortable, but not "unbearable." Knowing her experience is comforting because what I'm reading about the experiences of other women, well... it's unsettling.

But I'm only 54. And I'm happily married to a man whom I often describe (with much justification) as "a prince." I want to have breasts, even if they aren't "real" like the ones I was born with. So, OK. It's gonna hurt for a while. But I want breasts.

I'm preparing for a post-operative experience which may include periods when moving my arms and lifting even light things is difficult.

Still.. must quilt... must quilt...

I look at my stash of projects and calculate. I'll need some small projects. Table runners, maybe placemats, maybe a baby quilt or two. Things that don't demand a lot from my arms and pectoral muscles.

I don't know what kind of discomfort I'm going to face with my reconstruction but I do know this: I have simply GOT to be able to continue quilting.

I must have my "drug of choice" (a sandwich of fabric and batting, needle and thread).

So off I go now - back to the fabric stores and quilting shops. Looking at fat quarters, tossing together some designs, and so on. I'll be a busy girl for a couple of weeks as I await my surgery date. I'm busy now designing, buying, cutting, piecing, and sandwiching. My goal is to have at least 4 smallish projects ready for stitching when I enter the hospital, maybe a couple of medium-sized ones for the days when I'm stronger but still not really able to drive.

No, quilting will not cure cancer. But it might just keep me from dying of boredom.

So me and my quilting hoop - we're gonna kick cancer's BUTT!

Quilt 3: FINISHED!

2010-07-21T00:44:00.003+10:00

What's that you say? How could I possibly have finished another quilt in only a week? Well... I started the 3rd quilt some time ago and have been alternately working on number 2 and number 3.

Here's quilt 3:

This one is not my own design - it's a kit that I bought at "Patchwork With Gail B." It's a small "throw" size quilt, not a bedspread. I had a ball putting it together and making it up - especially since I intended from the start to give it to my very dear friend Julie B. as a special birthday present.

Let's do the math:

99 "snowball" blocks made up of 5 pieces each: 495 pieces
boarder: 4 pieces

499 pieces! (Not including the binding and backing.)

I learned a couple of things as a result of this quilt:

I really enjoy having projects of different sizes - and although this wasn't as challenging as a larger quilt, it was great to have something small enough to be really "portable." I took this one with me on the plane when hubby and I visited Aunt Sheila in Ballina. It fitted neatly into the suitcase and gave me a relaxing "something to do" in the hotel before going to bed.

This is the second quilt that I've tried doing a patterned border stitch on. I found that with fabric prints this "busy" the fancier stitches can be waste of time. Simple straight lines would've made more sense. I quilted this with a cream cotton thread - and the stitches just don't show up much. The swirling pattern on the green border going around this quilt is virtually invisible.

Quilt 2: FINISHED!!!!

2010-07-14T05:13:00.007+10:00

It's done! It's done! (insert trumpet fanfare - Tahn-tah-dah!)

Here's the back (not much to look at, I agree):

And a closeup of the back stitching along the edge:

And the top. I'm thrilled to pieces. The bed is a queensize, but I made the quilt much larger than a queen (nearly king size) because I wanted the stars to hang over the sides and the drop to be a lot longer than you might usually have. That's because the mattress is one of those "latex" mattresses and it's very deep.

Here's another view - our bedroom is quite small but the floor-to-ceiling windows which make up the north-facing wall bring in a lot of light and the spectacular view of our Mountain Ash forest.

As you can see in these pictures, the "bed skirt" isn't long enough. I'm going to have to construct a new one with the appropriate length. I've not decided yet whether to make the skirt maroon/wine or gold.

It Was Bound To Happen

2010-07-07T01:01:00.001+10:00

I'm close - really close - to being done with quilt number 2. Very exciting!

I decided to take a couple of photos of the soon-to-be-bound project and write a little blurb here about it. So I grabbed my camera and headed to the loungeroom, where my huge quilt project lay sprawling over the couch.

I took the photo - and just after doing that, realized I had a problem.

Here's the photo:

What's the problem? Well... just above my hand you can see the thread that I'm currently stitching into the quilt, right? Right. Can you see the needle? Hmmmmmmm?

When I finish stitching for the night, I weave the needle into the quilt so that it's held nice and tight - and will be easy to find the next day. But last night? Obviously I messed up - and the needle, left to it's own devices, has obviously chosen to go wandering.

I searched and searched through the folds of the top - feeling around, looking closely. No needle. My heart sank.

Maybe it was on the floor? Oh, no. It would be MOST unpleasant to find that needle with my feet (worse... what if I don't find it and hubby steps on it - YIKES!). Then I lifted the edge of the quilt and looked down at the seat. BINGO.

BIG sigh of relief!!!!

Crazy Little Thing Called....

2010-06-30T14:03:00.002+10:00

...breast cancer.

OK. Have to confess I've been pre-occupied lately and although I've been quilting, haven't had the brain power to write about it. So no quilt talk today. Sorry.

Mom had it last year. Cousin Beth battled it 3 years ago. Cousin Toni - 5 years ago. Now it's my turn. This is a club I never wanted to join.

I have to admit that it's scary. Sometimes it overwhelms me. But, as wiser people than I have said: "Cancer is a word, not a sentence."

You Should See My Thumb

2010-06-23T13:01:00.000+10:00

well... no you shouldn't.

It looks awful. Really awful.

I've got a metal thimble for my middle finger on my right (dominant) hand and I use that to push the needle through - but I keep pushing with my thumb, too, and it's unprotected. It's a little bit sore, too. I guess eventually my thumb will form a nice callous - but that probably won't look much better.

Yuck.

Quilt 4: Christmas Quilt - Design

2010-06-16T13:01:00.001+10:00

First project (queen sized bedspread) is done. Second project (king-sized Ohio Star bedspread) is well on it's way. Third project ("lap quilt") is also well on it's way. And now...

(drumroll, please)

The fouth project - another bedspread, and this time a Christmas quilt! Here's the fabric:

I got the cream background fabric last January from Spotlight's clearance table. Something like $6 a meter - who could resist? The red and green fabrics came from "Patchwork With Gail B" and cost more, but certainly are worth the expense.

Here's the design:

As you see, I'm going to try my hand at a lattice "on point" - but... I'm not actually doing those center blocks on the bias. No - they'll be cut with the grain, thus saving a lot of aggravation that comes from stitching on the bias (just about impossible not to stretch things out when piecing by machine).

I used "Quilt Design Wizard" computer software for the design but I know there is a "glitch" in the yardage calculations... so I did a second design for the middle lattice section using just plain blocks (not on point) so my yardage for the lattice isn't ridiculous.

Fingers crossed and away I go!

Color Matching Tip From Pauline

2010-06-09T13:01:00.001+10:00

My friend Pauline is a quilting genius!

She helped me select the colours for what will be my 4th project (a Christmas quilt). When we were at the store we looked and looked until my eyes were just wearing out. It was really hard to check the reds and greens - until Pauline told me about her little trick.

You see... I was trying to match a calico print that I'd already bought. I held up my roll of material to the bolts in the store and strained to see if the dyes matched well enough. Pauline pointed out the dye marks that fabric manufacturers put on the selvage (as you see above)

I was trying to find a match for the darkest green (the "number 2" colour dot). It was very hard to do from the design because the dark green on the print is so small. But the colour dot was a good size. It's a lot easier to match using those dots than trying to match the colours in the center of the fabric's design.

Thanks, Pauline!

Slowing Down Now - Priorities!

2010-06-06T10:30:00.000+10:00

I started this blog back in April - posted nearly every day for a while. Then I cut back to twice weekly. But I'm finding that even twice weekly is a bit much, so I'm going to cut back again and just publish on Wednesdays. I'm enjoying writing this, but writing is cutting into my quilting time - and we can't have that! :-)

Quilt 3: Making the Sandwich

2010-06-02T18:07:00.005+10:00

Here it is - the completed quilt top (plus border). I've spread it out on the floor so that I can lay the backing fabric over it to see if the backing is wide enough.

For tihs quilt I've chosen a printed calico as the backing (below) - cream and mossy green.

In the photo below I've spread the backing over the quilt top. As you can see on either side, the backing isn't quite wide enough. I'll have to add 3 inches to each side, and will do that by cutting from the excess backing material at the bottom.

In the photo below I've placed the backing face down, the batting on top of that, and the quilt top last, facing up. Now I'm ready to pin. Notice the mass of fabric on the left. That's excess batting. I bought this batting from a roll and there's enough excess there to do another quilt this size! YAY! (project number 4?)

And here we are.. pinnned and ready for stitching

This one is small enough to squeeze into my suitcase when we go to visit Aunt Sheila.

Have small quilt; can travel.

Quilt 3: Piecing the Top

2010-05-30T17:16:00.002+10:00

I have to admit to being a real quilting junkie. I can't bear the thought of not having my "fix" of hand-quilting in the evenings. I decided to put divert my energy into getting my small "kit" quilt put together so I can take it with me when we go to visit with Aunt Sheila.

Got all 99 "snowflake" blocks made. Then I pressed them "open" so they are ready to stitch together.

The quilt design has 50 blocks with pink corners and 49 with green corners. You are supposed to alternate pink and green. In addition, it takes a little thought when deciding which blocks to put toegether.

Now you can see some of my "method". First I separated the pink-edged blocks from the green ones. Then I made separate stacks for each center color (all the yellow-centered blocks with green edges are in a stack, all the yellow-centered blocks with pink edges are in another stack and so on...). The stacks are sitting in front of my sewing machine and computer keyboard.

Next I selected the 9 blocks to form the first row - and those are placed in a row on my desktop (photo above). I started on the left side and stitched the blocks together, working from left to right until the entire row was stiched (going slowly to avoid accidentally getting the blocks out of sequence).

Once I had that strip done, I placed it face-up on my desktop and then selected the blocks for the next strip, matching up and down and side to side. Once the next strip's blocks were selected, I stitched them together and then joined the strips. The photo below shows the quilt top after the first 2 rows have been sewn, and the 3rd row blocks just before stitching.

And here it is (below) - all done except for the border fabric!

I didn't precisely time the work on this - but I think I spent roughly 5 hours stitching the top. I did manage to mess up a couple of times: accidentally putting two pink-cornered blocks together instead of alternating. But for the most part I kept it straight.

Now to make the "sandwich."

A Tisket, A Tasket...

2010-05-26T00:01:00.002+10:00

The second project (king-sized bedspread) is well underway. As a result, if someone happens to drop by, they'll be greeted by a huge wad of "quilting" that is forever thrown over the lounge:

What a mess.

And if I want to take this quilt with me anyplace, well, toting it around is pretty awkward. I should say it was awkward. Problem solved! Spotlight (one of my favorite homewares and craft stores) got in a shipment of really big rafia baskets. They are sturdy and the larger sized one is perfect to stuff my quilt into (even the hoop fits in it!).

No need to try and neatly fold it. I can just grab it all and plop it down in the basket. I just have to be sure and keep the parrots away from it (or they'll have it shredded in no time...).

The UFO in my Closet (Quilt 3)

2010-05-23T00:01:00.009+10:00

When I finished my first quilt I was so excited - but I didn't have another project in the "works" and ready to go. I hadn't realized how much I would miss having something in the "hand quilting" stage. I'd gotten used to sitting every evening and blissfully stitching away - and when I suddenly was without a project, well... I went through quilting withdrawal.

It took quite a bit of time to decide on my second project, get the design done and the materials bought. And because it's a big project it took several days to get the quilt top pieced together and ready for quilting.

NEVER AGAIN!

I am determined to make sure from here out that I have a UFO (Un-Finished Object) in my closet from here out so that as each project is completed I'll have another ready to pounce on.

And here it is - project number 3 - a quilt "kit" I purchased from "Patchwork With Gail B."

I don't have a photo of the design (and I don't own the copyright to the photo that came with the quilt, so I can't post that here), but I can give you something of an idea of what this one will be like. It's a small quilt (not a big bedspread) and is made up of 99 "snowball blocks" with a simple one-fabric border.

The quilt kit comes with 2 packs of 50 "pre-cut" squares (each square becomes a snowball block). The other pieces you have to cut out yourself.

Here's how you assemble a snowball block:

First you cut out about a bazillion little 2-inch squares (there are 99 snowball blocks, each one needs 4 of the 2-inch squares).

This part (cutting the 2-inch squares) actually went pretty fast. I only needed about 20 minutes to get it done.

You take a 5-inch block and lay a small 2-inch block square on the corner (right sides together).

Then stitch across the end from corner to corner (as shown below).

Then clip the point off (leaving about 1/4" seam allowance)

Flip the corner over and press.

And here's one completed "snowball" block.

One down, 98 to go...

Friends Who Are A Bad Influence On Me

2010-05-19T00:01:00.004+10:00

Friend Pauline C. took me shopping at her favorite quilting supply store y'day. Along for the fun was her friend Becky, who I liked instantly. Becky's a budding quilter like me. Pauline is a seasoned quilt-a-holic with a lot of projects and an amazingly keen eye for matching colours and patterns.

We had a ball. We, uh, got a little out of control...

When we got to the store, Pauline ran ahead of me and then turned around quickly to face me as I walked in. She said she wanted to catch the look on my face. I guess I didn't disappoint her because I instantly developed a case of "trout mouth." This shop has an unbelievable assortment on display. Looks like there are thousands - THOUSANDS of bolts of quilt fabrics and an immense display of "fat quarters". Yup. It's jaw-dropping.

I took some Christmas fabric I wanted to match with something. Pauline and Becky helped me wade through the overwhelming selection range and found the PERFECT fabric for my Christmas quilt. After that Pauline went to the fat quarter table and began to browse. Becky found a handbag pattern that she liked and she hunted down prints for her project.

I continued to wander the rows and rows of calico - marveling at the colours and patterns. I was having a great time, but was starting to wonder if I was holding my friends up. I was feeling mesmerized by this store and realized I could spend HOURS. My friends might not be feeling the same. I needn't have worried. After about an hour or so Pauline and Becky hunted me down and asked me if I wanted to go. I answered "Oh heck, no! I'm having a ball. I don't care if we EVER leave!" They giggled at my reply but then I added "...but it's fine with me if you are ready to leave now." They said (almost in unison) "Oh... no...! Let's keep shopping!" and they promptly scattered to browse and dream over this and that.

Inspired by Becky's handbag, I decided I'd like to have a quilted tote - something to replace an old canvas tote that I've been using as a purse for several years. I was drawn to the "Oriental" section and found this gorgeous print:

I considered it for quite a while. Kept saying "I really shouldn't... I should WAIT" but Pauline and Becky were quick to say "oh, no... don't WAIT! Get it now!"

Don't you just love shopping with girlfriends who egg you on?

I got that oriental print. I HAD to. Really I did.

The shop owner has lovely quilt samples hanging all around - for inspiration, of course, but more than that. Each of these example quilts had a little sign pinned to it announcing that the quilt you were looking at could be had as a kit with the quilt pattern, instructions, and all the fabric needed to complete the top (batting and backing would have to be purchased separately). I fell instantly in love with 2 of these kits and agonized over whether or not to indulge my inclination.

Naturally my shopping buddies were quick to encourage me - and Pauline pointed out that the kits were limited in quantity (and once the shop ran out there would be no more of that design).

I stood there for a while reasoning with myself. At this point I had a king-sized bedspread that I'd just started quilting. I had the fabric for the Christmas quilt. I had the fabric for my shopping tote bag. That was more than enough.

By now you are probably realizing I have no self-control in a fabric store (I have the same problem at plant nurseries). I selected one of those 2 kits and then found Pauline and said "GET ME OUT OF HERE!"

Pauline was in deeper that I was. She'd originally come looking for fat quarters in shades of brown. But somewhere along the line she stumbled across something in lilac. Which led her to a complimentary print, which led her to... well...

We were there almost 3 hours. If Pauline and Becky hadn't needed to pick up their children at school we'd probably still be there...

Multitasking on the Border

2010-05-16T00:01:00.004+10:00

My current project has 3 narrow bands running around the edges. I'm not wanting anything fancy in the way of quilting here, just a row of stitches along each band (about 1/2 inch from the seams).

I'm quilting using a hoop - and quickly realized as I stitch each row that it takes too much time to keep moving the hoop as I go along, esp. since I'm going to do this 3 times. So I hit on the idea of threading 3 needles and stitching all 3 rows at once - and THEN moving the hoop along. So far it's working out really well. The thread (quilting cotton) is thick enough that it doesn't really tangle easily and so there's no worry about getting all knotted up as I go.

I'm sure I'm not the first person to come up with this idea, but I thought I'd share it anyway. It's making this part of the quilting go by very quickly.

Quoting Pioneer Women

2010-05-12T00:01:00.000+10:00

When I was in high school (that would be, well, over 35 years ago) I remember a teacher talking about the quilts that pioneer women made - and she gave us this quote from history:

"We made them warm so our families wouldn't freeze, and we made them beautiful so our hearts wouldn’t break."

Quilt 2: Making the "Sandwich"

2010-05-08T17:35:00.003+10:00

The top has been pieced together and the backing (shown below) is ready!

My quilt is going to be quite large - nearly a king-sized bedspread. The bed I'll use it on is actually a queen bed, but it's got a very deep mattress, so I've opted to make the quilt larger so that it will hang well down the side of the bed.

The backing is made of 2 44" panels of solid cream quilting cotton - and a smaller panel placed between them to widen the backing enough to cover the full width of the quilt top. The batting (white fabric shown in a fold above) is a king-sized batting panel. Both the backing and the batting are a couple of inches bigger on each side than the top is.

This is done on purpose. When the quilt is finished and ready to be bound I'll cut away the excess. But for now, having the excess hang over will help to stabilize the edge in my hoop while I'm working on it.

I have an audience as I'm working. The lounge room area in front of our parrots' cages is the only place large enough to spread this project out (without having to move furniture). So as I'm working, George (male eclectus) and Laka (B&G Macaw) keep a close eye on me. Thank heavens they didn't decide to throw their lunch (fruit pieces) on my project...

After spreading the backing and batting, I placed the top over them and carefully smoothed it out, starting in the middle and moving outward toward the edges.

When I did this I found to my horror that one of my little triangles hadn't been sewn properly - and there was a HOLE in the quilt top!

I'm so glad I found it. If I hadn't, that hole would have worn larger and larger each time the quilt is washed... what a nightmare. I grabbed a needle and thread and fixed that on the spot. And I spent a little more time and carefully checked each and every seam in the quilt to see if there were any other goofs (there weren't). Unfortunately the correction causes the top to bunch up a little where the repair was made. I'm just sick about it, but I'm not about to pull the whole thing apart for that one goof. The patching will hold find when it's washed. And, in all honesty, I have to say that it's unlikely that anyone but me will ever look closely enough to notice it.

And here we go.. the first of 200 safety pins placed at intervals.

My quilt "sandwich" is done... ready now to STITCH!