Mary Huey's Teaser YouTube Video

My quilt teacher, Mary Huey, has created a teaser video for her set in seams DVD.

Not Quite a Quilt....

I haven't worked on any of my  quilting projects lately, but that doesn't mean I haven't done anything on my sewing machine.

On my January retreat one of the ladies who attends collects the fabric scraps to use to make dog beds and gives them to the local animal shelter; however, this year she has stopped this project and didn't want scraps at our January retreat. Therefore, I had a few bags of fabric scraps sitting in the basement with nowhere to go except the trash, but I couldn't quite bring myself to throw them out. Enter the dog we're watching for a few weeks. My son (bless his little heart) thought the dog needed a bed so he threw down a sleeping bag for him and I said, oh no, I have a much better idea. So James and I went down in the basement, I found a crib sheet that we don't need anymore, cut the elastic out, sewed it up, added the scraps, I sewed the seam closed, embroidered Bolt's name on it with my new sewing machine, and we made the dog a bed. We are, however, despite my husband's wishes, not keeping the dog.

Almost Finish #1 for 2014 and Piecing Batting

My new to me Bernina is up and running and the knee lift has been acquired from the original ebay seller. I spent this weekend finishing the piecing for the Bernstein Bears quilt and I got it basted Sunday afternoon. I need to decide how to quilt it, and whether or not to try to do it on the new Bernina, or the "new" Singer 15-91.

I do, however, now covet an extension table for the Bernina; the one that came with the machine is, shall we say, lacking. I don't miss much about my Elna Supermatic, but I do miss the large table that the case provided. I am considering ordering an after market extension table for my birthday.

Also, for the quilt I needed to piece some of the batting, and wow, did the Bernina do a beautiful job with it. I ended up using stitch 8, which is the fifth stitch in on the bottom row here. I was very pleased, it made me want to take all of the batting I have in a box and piece it together.

I'm hoping to get that quilt quilted and put binding on this week, and perhaps finish the quilting and binding of the Nautical quilt, another one that's begging to be complete and out of the quilting room.



New Machine = New Project

Well, my new to me Bernina Activa 240 is up and running in the sewing area. I'm enjoying her immensely. However, she's missing a knee lift, I'm hoping to get it from the ebay seller, otherwise I'll need to head to my local Bernina who does have them in stock. It's interesting to me how different sewing machines are, they all sew just a little bit differently. One of the things I noticed about the Bernina is that the foot pedal lets you do just one stitch at a time and especially for more finicky projects I'm sure that will come in handy.

In other news, I decided that a new sewing machine deserved a new project (I needed to start another project like I needed another hole in the head...) and I started working on a Bernstein Bears quilt from a charm pack. The only trick to this is that the sashing needs to be 2.75 inches instead of 2.5, of course I discovered this after cutting up a yard of white into 2.5 inch strips; however, I'm sure I'll use them in future projects. For this quilt the charms are all pieced together and I just need to add the sashing, I hope to have the top finished this weekend and then return to some of the projects I started at the retreat.

Nothing Sews Like a Bernina

Nothing sews like a Bernina, or so they say. Well, I'm about to test out that theory.

I've been having machine feature envy ever since I borrowed my mom's Pfaff and fell in love with the needle down and knee lift. I almost bought a Brother 8500 embroidery machine last week when I had my elna's in for repair but I held off. I took my Elna to the quilt retreat and she was back to her old tricks of not sewing over seams without tugging and I (thankfully) had also brought my featherweight and switched to that machine for the remainder of my sewing. Since the hotel had internet I ended up spending some time surfing ebay and found a Bernina Activa 240 from ebay, the seller happened to be local and was not interested in shipping the machine. As I was sewing with a number of ladies who all had more machine experience than I did I was able to get their opinions, and even try out my friend's Activa 230, and it sewed beautifully. Another quilter there had a 240 and raved about it and I was sold. I'm supposed to be picking the machine up tomorrow and am excited to work on finishing some of the projects I started over the weekend. I'm planning on cleaning out my sewing room tonight and making room for my new toy.

Retreat Packing and Planning

I had this great post planned about packing and planning for a retreat. I think I'll revise it based on my experiences this week and what NOT do to.

Don't:

1. Get sick
2. Try to finish your first quilt show entry quilt the week before/day before it's due, necessitating more than one night of staying up past midnight and therefore contributing to the cold.
3. Plan a family weekend away the same weekend
4. Take your sewing machine in for servicing, fall in love with the idea of a new machine, and then spend the entire week with machine envy and obsessing over what you should and shouldn't buy.
5. Decide to take a day off to get everything done at home, and then not take it, you'll waste the weekend before the trip and put yourself even further behind.
6. Decide at the last minute to care about the cleanliness of your house, that's a recipe for disaster.
7. Have your husband have work problems such that you end up teaching Youth Group on a Tuesday night and doing the running around and planning associated with such an event.

Despite my week before the retreat issues I went and had a wonderful time. I can't say it was the most productive weekend ever, but it was a needed break and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to get away with friends and quilt.

Lake Farmpark Quilt Entry

Ever since Mom and I started quilting we've gone to the Lake Farmpark Quilt Show, preferably over vendors weekend so I can indulge my love of fabric and notions and see the quilts at the same time. Every year I say I am a quilter and I should get something done and enter it in a show. I make a number of quilts every year (11 for 2013) but they often aren't "show worthy" or I give them away and they're not available to hang in a room for six weeks. This year I decided it would be different. After a flurry of activity which included deciding I'd finish a project, to deciding to finish another project, to starting a completely new project, basting project number two, and then quilting project number three, and then back to deciding to go with number one I finally got it bordered, basted, quilted, and bound and off to the Farmpark yesterday. I'm  not expecting to win any prizes (I know where all of the mistakes are), but I am happy it's done and I'm excited to see it hanging in the show.

The pattern is Vintage Holiday by Camille Roskelley, and the fabric is a combination of Countdown to Christmas by Sweetwater

and Christmas Countdown by Deb Strain for Moda.