Finally Done!

It's hard to believe

that it's been almost 2 years 

since I was able to travel to the

Netherlands with new friends

and, of course, meet more new friends.

One of our goals was to attend this show.

and see the beautiful quilts of both

Di Ford and Petra Prins.

It's there that I saw

Di's quilt called "Sutton Grange".

(Can you believe in all of my excitement I 

didn't even take a full photo of the quilt!)

But fast forward to April, 2018.

I knew I had waited long enough to begin 

working on this wonderful quilt

that included applique, broderie perse, curved piecing,

and lots of patience.

the center section

I actually had many of the same fabrics Di had used in my stash.

No sense reinventing the wheel right?

But did use one of her wonderful printed borders 

over and over again,

as the repeating border.

A couple of weeks ago I began the machine quilting process.

Lots of quilting in the ditch,

lots of feathers,

diagonal quilting

Again, I didn't really 

get too original in the quilting.

I pretty much followed what

the original machine quilter had done,

but modified to fit my limited machine quilting ability.

I used some leftover garage sale stickers

to quilt circles.

No, the quilt isn't for sale for $.50!

Here it is.

All done.

"Plymouth Grange"

70" x 70"

I changed the name to 

honor my grandmother,

Edith Luella Gale Elkington

(1896-1983)

who was always a member of the

local grange in Michigan.

Di's pattern are beautiful and

a labor of love.

Not a project to be quickly completed,

but it was well worth the time.

The question is...

Time to start another one?

Until Next Time-

Kyle

Good Intentions

This has been a week

filled with "good intentions".

The actual execution of

those "good intentions"

has been less than desirable.

Some days are like that, 

some weeks are like that,

some ....

I won't go further than that.

My intentions

included getting started

on machine quilting my

version of Di Ford's Suttton Grange.

I had acquisitioned the dining room table

for space and good lighting,

Running Man has been off

on a business trip all week,

no meals to prepare, etc,

nothing to stop the flow of sewing.

Well, I'm not sure what totally

got in the way, other than 

cold cloudy wintery Colorado days or

a dead car battery at 7 a.m.

Maybe, 

my heart just wasn't in it this week.

So instead,

I went to Trader Joe's 

and bought a couple of bunches of daffodils

and then decided to bake.

Lemon Snowball Cookies

Oh, if you remember these

as Russian Tea Cakes or Mexican Wedding Cookies,

think again. 

Melt in your mouth lemony goodness.

The recipe is from a local business,

Poeme Macarons.

Check out her website and also her

delicious enticing macarons.  

I haven't tried those yet,

but it's definitely on my list of things to do.

Maybe now I can focus on the quilt.

Until Next Time-

Kyle

Bubbling With Excitement

Last week was bubbly good.

I've had time to sew

and I've got some travel plans.

I was able to machine applique 

the final border of my Sutton Grange.

Again, I used the 100wt poly Invisafil by Wonderfil.

The thread is so thin that it disappears right into

the weave of the fabric.

I used a tiny Overlock stitch, which is

stitch, stitch, stitch, zig-zag.  

The straight stitches

go right along the side of the applique and

the zig-zag holds it to the background.

I use the mirror image feature on my Bernina,
which makes it easier for me to stitch
along the right side of the applique piece.

The whole top is now together.

It's a beautiful design by Di Ford.

The next step is to figure out the machine quilting.

I'm going to work on it myself...eventually.

But in order to do that I need inspiration.

And what better place to get that, 

than to head to Houston

and 

Besides doing lots of shopping, there will plenty of 

quilts to admire and study.  I'll be excited to

enjoy the beautiful quilts of many of my

blogging friends, Wendy, Janet, Karen, Barb,

and my Virginia Quilting Friends and 

I'm sure a few more.

Let me know if I've missed you.

And some of those friends will be there in person.

That will be extra treat!

It will be a whirlwind trip,
but a much needed one.
Running Man is coming to carry
the packages.
Isn't he a sweetheart!

Wish you were all coming too.

Until Next Time-

Kyle

Oh, I Could Do It This Way!

How many times has a task

felt insurmountable.  

Just the idea of getting from here to there.

What if you just let your mind dance on air.

Possibly you'd find a

new idea that would work. 

That's just what I did when it 

came to tackling the next border 

of Di Ford's Sutton Grange pattern.

Can you believe this is the only photo I took of Di's quilt

when I saw it in person!!!

Oh, well.  (sigh)

Remember, I had those 320 tiny drunkard path blocks to make.

I couldn't get past the idea of prepping and then 

appliqueing each one individually.

I started thinking of each little block

as a quarter of a circle that was appliqued on a square.

I did some experimenting.

I had to figure out the size of the squares and circles 

including the extra seam allowances.

I finally did it and

it was going to work!

So rather than prepping 320 quarter circles

it was down to 80 full circles.

I decided to go with the freezer paper method

and was so happy how quickly it went especially

using Missie's Fingertip Stiletto

from Traditional Primitive from Missie Carpenter.

It works as a fingertip stylus allowing you to get

very close the iron to gently fold the seam allowance into place. 

Next I had to decide how to

applique 80 circles in a reasonable amount of time.

I recalled Angie, whose blog is

Quilting on the Crescent,

reviewed some different threads for machine appliqueing

and it reminded me of Wonderfil's Invisafil thread.

I even had a spool and gave it a try.

It's a 100 ply poly thread that is soft, comes in lots of colors

and has a matte finish.

I think I had my solution.

I ordered a few spools from 

Red Rock Threads.

They had a good prices and also had the smaller spools.

I was in business.

I used the overlock stitch flipped and crunched way down.

It's hard to even see the stitches!

Once the 80 circles were appliqued, I quartered them, 

and finally, sewed them into blocks.

I was pretty pleased.  The edges matched up

as well as if I had done it by hand.

Plus it was done in record time.

My nanny Nana duties are resuming this week

for these two Lovelies, as my daughter heads back to the classroom.

So, my sewing time will be spent in

a different way.

Finding some time efficient methods

 is essential.

Keep in mind, the

next time you're stuck on a project,

let your mind do an air dance 

and see what you come up with.

Until Next Time-

Kyle