FMQ Woes and a Win

Normally when I'm getting ready to start quilting a quilt, I get ready the day before, choosing thread and winding bobbins. Since I was working on burp rags all weekend (halfway done those) I didn't do that this time. Well, I thought I had a cone of medium grey thread in 40 wt cotton. Surprise, I didn't. I've had issues with polyester thread on my Janome, but I figured surely I could conquer them, so yesterday I dug out a cone of poly in medium grey, and wound the bobbins. 

I quilted out the first motif, front looked great, checked the back and it looked pretty good. I tightened the tension just a smidge, stitched out a couple more motifs, checked the back, looked good. I them quilted for about 30 minutes before checking the back again. Uh-oh, eyelashes everywhere! Now, some of that was probably because I was going too fast, I have a tendency to just want to go as fast as I can. But, some of that was likely due to the Janome not doing well with poly thread. I can quilt that fast with cotton and not have all those issues. I'd still like to figure out how to get poly to behave with the Janome, but maybe with a quilt that doesn't have such an imminent deadline. I think I'm going to try a different type of needle next. If I quilt on my Bernina I can use any thread, it just sews like a champ with anything. 

I broke thread, dragged the quilt and a seam ripper upstairs, and proceeded to spend most of the day ripping out what I had quilted. The parts with the eyelashes were easy to rip out, but the parts that were quilted well took sooooo long. All I can say is thank God for same day Amazon delivery, because I ordered cotton thread before I started ripping, and had it in hand by dinner time. 

This morning it was time to try again. I wound bobbins of my cotton thread, and got to quilting. You better believe I was checking the back a LOT. All went well, I quilted for my usual hour, and now I'm blogging on my break. 

So, if that was my FMQ woe, what was my win? Well, for years now I've tried to find a design I can consistently stitch out large scale. Sometimes I don't want dense quilting on a quilt, and I've struggled to find something that works for me large scale without any marking. Oftentimes I resort to crosshatching with a walking foot if I want less dense quilting, but I don't always want straight quilting. Some of the designs I can easily stitch in medium or small scales, I just can't consistently stitch large scale. For example, if I'm stitching spirals, I can make tiny ones, and my usual has about a half inch between lines, but if I try for an inch between I just can't do it. Microstippling came easily to me, and I can meander with that same half inch scale, but I haven't been able to do larger scale, I always resort to getting smaller. When I'm quilting a king sized quilt, I felt like a larger design would work better, so all day Monday I was searching my FMQ resources for something new to try. 

I was doodling away while trying to find something I thought I had a shot at stitching larger scale. I find different quilting teachers better at teaching different things, and I knew my Patsy Thompson videos had some large scale designs. Fast and Free Volume 3 was just what I was looking for. I have a pretty tight deadline to get this quilt quilted, so I wanted something easy-ish, and larger scale so the quilt wasn't stiff, with the bonus of having less to quilt. 

I watched the chapters on the rotating axis family, which I've stitched out before, but not for quite a while. I think I'm going to use one of those for my next quilt. For this quilt I decided on something from the circling the element family. 

I guess the good thing about yesterday's fiasco is I got some practice in on the design I chose. 

This design kind of reminds me of peacocks. The win is that I've been able to stitch it large scale consistently! I keep up a mantra of "Slow down, stitch slowly" to keep myself from going too fast. It's far from perfect, but I've been FMQ long enough that I know as long as the quilting is consistent, when you step back and look at the quilt as a whole, it ends up looking fine. It doesn't have to be perfect. 

I finally got to give Mr. Z his cloak, and in exchange DD#1 brought me some duck eggs. 

It came out pretty good for starting as table runners and curtains! Now his younger brother wants one, but he's going to have to wait a bit. I'm actually going to have to buy fabric for his.

Basting Some Big Ones!

I basted three quilts this week, and all three of them are king sized. I thought one was closer to a queen, but when I dug it out and measured it's more like a queen sized bedspread, so would definitely fit a king easily. DH took photos of two of the three after helping me lay them out on the basting tables. 

This is the wedding quilt for one of my nephews. I was so worried I'd have a block wrong way around and have to rip, and I almost did have one. I was sewing the first quarter together, but I had already put the second quarter on the design wall. I was comparing the two as I was sewing, and I realized I had made a mistake in the first quarter, but thankfully, I noticed before I sewed that block onto the row. 

DH didn't take a photo of the second quilt I basted, but this is the third one.

I just finished basting this one today. I still have pins left, but I'm going to take the basting tables down anyway. I still have quilt tops that need basting, but I have five quilts basted now, three of which are king sized, and that will keep me busy for a while! I'll have to get back into my FMQ an hour a day routine. 

When I'm basting monster sized quilts like these, which takes me quite a while, I try to be nice to myself and not make any other quilting goals besides basting one quilt per day. I did get some sewing done each of those three basting days, but I only worked on whatever I wanted to. 

I got the border fabric sewn onto the Cartoon dog fabric. I think the paw print fabric is pretty cute on there. This quilt top is now hanging in the quilt closet. 

I finished sewing a bunch of units for another quilt, and once I get those all pressed, I can sew the units into blocks. I also sewed some 6" blocks into four patches to make 12" blocks. My sewing room is still a disaster, but I'm not really wanting to put away any of the projects I have out until they are quilt tops. The cartoon dog quilt hanging in the closet gives me a little less mess in the sewing room. If I can get a few more quilt tops assembled, I'll sew my way out of the mess.

Oh, I did get all the bowl cozies I was making finished last weekend! I think this weekend I'm going to tackle the stack of burp rags that have been sitting cut for months. 

The big fabric purchase I made has arrived.

These are three 102 yard bundles. Marshall Dry Goods tends to make bundles of 17 different six yard cuts. I've bought a bundle of neutral tone on tones from them before, but I was pleasantly surprised that only one print of this batch is the same as the last one I bought. 

The bundle of solids I got went heavy on the browns and greens, which was great because I'm low on those. The blenders were quite heavy on the blues.

Of the 17 blenders I received, seven of them were shades of blue. Considering I don't like blue, you might think I was disappointed by this, but honestly, I'm not. That light sky blue? I was completely out of that color in stash, because I use quite a bit of it in pictoral quilts like the tree house baby quilt I made last year. I was out of turquoise because I used the last I had in the last wedding quilt. I needed more turquoise for another quilt I want to make, and now I've got it. Actually, I think I'll be using blues 2-4 in that quilt. 

Even when I get a color I don't like much, I am still really happy, because those are the colors that teach you a lot. I don't really understand the quilters that only work in a certain color palette. It's probably because I give most of my quilts away, and I know not everyone likes the same colors I do, so I try to make quilts that fit the recipients taste. I find the colors I don't like teach me a lot more about color theory and balance than colors that naturally attract me.

I've made so many blue quilts, I don't hate it as much as I used to. I still have no desire to keep a blue quilt, but I've made a few I can honestly say I think are pretty, even if I don't want them in my house. 

I try to expand my color ideas, but some popular combinations I still can't stand. I love red, but hate turquoise. I will pair turquoise with black or purple, but turquoise and red I've never liked and you won't be seeing any quilts in that combination coming from me. I know some people love it, and think it's cool and retro. To me it's just an eyesore, but that's OK, because I know some color combinations I love aren't loved by others. I love doing Google image searches of a quilt pattern I want to make. Seeing what other people decided to combine always interests me, whether or not it's to my personal taste. 

I'm trying to fold a fabric a day and get it onto a mini-bolt. It's a lot to do in one day, so I'm happy spreading out that job. These six yards lengths aren't even folded in half like they are on a bolt, they came off a roll, so I have to do all the folding. I've already been into the fabrics though, and some of them I'm already cutting for projects. I've had several quilt patterns I've been wanting to try, and if one of the fabrics I'm folding works for a background of that quilt, I may as well cut it while I'm handling it. I need sashing cut for several quilts too, so again, if the new fabric works I may as well cut it while it's out. 

Basically, I'm all over the place as usual. I see progress being made, so it's a win, no matter how disorganized I seem to some. 

Trying Something New

 Hmmmm...something new. New technique? New hobby? New what? Actually, I'm trying out a new routine. 

I love quilting, maybe too much at times. No matter what else needs to be done, I'd usually rather be quilting. Now, I'm not talking about neglecting cooking or running the house, though to be honest my floors and windows could use more attention paid to them, but I'm talking about other things I want to do, but rarely make a priority to get done. Making the bowl cozies I've been asked for, making DH new scrub tops, making the grandkids new pillowcases, stuff like that. I want to make those things, but I like quilting more, so I keep putting them off. The thing is, when I actually get around to making those things, they never take as long to make as I thought they would. I am so used to working on a quilting project for weeks or months, that I over-estimate how long a non-quilting sewing project will take. 

Take the bowl cozies. Once I uncovered the Studio cutter and got out the die, I cut this stack of batting and fabric.

I wasn't counting as I cut, I just decided to cut as many as I had Wrap N Zap batting for, which ended up being 47 bowl cozies. I didn't have to count as I went along, because since one bowl cozy needs two pieces of fabric and two pieces of batting, I just cut enough for one bowl on every pass. I had taken out more fabric than I needed, so I simply put away whatever I didn't use. How long did cutting 47 bowl cozies take? Well, it took less time than I was talking to DD#2 on the phone, because I started and finished during the same conversation. Since I was doing two things at once, it seemed like it took no time at all. 

Cutting is one thing, how about actually sewing them up? After all, I have a huge pile of burp rags I cut out months ago and still haven't sewn up. That's where my new routine will hopefully help. 

DH switched to working in a clinic last November, and it took quite a while to get used to his new schedule. In the ER he worked evening shift, he got home very late at night, and we rarely got to bed before midnight. In the clinic, his day starts early, like "the alarm goes off at 4:20 AM early!" Just adjusting to the time schedule was hard. Then there was the days he works. In the ER he had no set schedule, and alternated between 3 twelve hour shifts one week and 4 twelve hour shifts the other weeks. Now he works 4 ten hour shifts a week, and has every weekend off unlike his ER schedule which always changed. 

His schedule change meant a lot of changes for me, some good, some not so much. I am NOT a morning person, but I get up with DH anyway, because I don't want to be on a completely different schedule than him. He's home for dinner now, and for years he was only home for dinner about half the time. That means I'm cooking a lot more, because just grabbing a sandwich or eating cheese and crackers for dinner doesn't seem right if he's home. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy him being home for dinner, it's just different, and means a big change to my schedule. 

His days off used to be random, so if my arm was bothering me, I knew he'd likely have a day off where I wouldn't get much or any sewing done, and my arm would have a break. Now I'm having to be a lot more mindful of how long I do anything, because he works four days in a row, and I can really overdo it in four consecutive days. 

Added to all that, DH also runs a local scooter club, and publishes a scooter magazine, so some of his days off are booked, and sometimes he wants to spend quality time with me, but I don't always know ahead of time which days are which. We also have family stuff, errands, and all the stuff everyone else has taking our time. 

Basically, I've learned I need to be flexible on his days off. Days like last Monday, we took a long drive and spent the day together. I didn't get anything done that was sewing related. On Sunday he had a club ride and I was alone most of the day. 

A lot of family stuff gets planned for weekends too, so I have to be super flexible on weekends. The thing is, on a day like Sunday, when I'm home alone, I have lots of time to get stuff done, which is where my new routine is coming into play. 

Here's my idea. On DH's days off, I'm not planning on doing anything quilt related, but I can work on non-quilty sewing projects if I have the time. This past weekend I started sewing up the bowl cozies.

I've got this stack done, plus the six I mailed off to my DDIL. I'm not quite halfway done the 47 I cut out, but I made some great progress! I should be able to finish the rest this coming weekend, because DH will be doing the final edits so he can get the Sept/Oct issue of the magazine to the printer. 

I still get interruptions just like everyone does. Sometimes I go running around with my sister, or like yesterday, I have a last minute request to babysit. 

Would you say no to hanging out with this cutie? Not me, he's such a happy baby!

I still have deadline projects, and the deadlines are looming. Still, I think the break from quilting on weekends is actually helping my attitude with that. By the time DH is back to work on Tuesday, I'm anxious to get back to my quilting project, and even the tedious tasks seem less so after a break. 

Today I finished getting the September wedding into rows, and I'll press those rows as soon as finish writing this post. I also got another quilt sewn into rows, and I've already pressed those.

The white fabric in this is Cartoon Network fabric with cartoon dogs on it. It's got Hong Kong Phooey, Scooby Doo, Dino, Astro and Deputy Dog. This fabric has been in my stash a long time, and I had a lot of it at one time. I've made several pairs of pajama pants from it, used the scraps from those in other quilts, but this pretty much busts all the yardage I had left. I'm sure I have random squares in the scrap user system, but I think I'm even out of any strips I had. I made the nine patches from stash fabrics, and sewed them all as leaders/enders while working on other projects. Assembling the quilt is actually the first time this quilt has been the main project, and even then, I'm assembling it as leaders/enders while assembling the wedding quilt, so is it really the main quilt even now? I've got a black fabric with white dog prints on it I'm going to be using as a border, and this will be a quilt top before I know it. There is so much black in the Cartoon Network fabric I think it will be a great border option. 

I got two quilts basted in the last week too, so I think shaking up my routine a bit has been a good thing so far. 

Dealing with the Mess

 I've mostly been working upstairs lately, and honestly, it probably because I let the sewing areas become a disaster! My disaster likely isn't as bad as some, because I have two fairly large rooms for sewing so it's more spread out, and I didn't have piles on the floor so there's that. Still, it was bad enough that I didn't enjoy working in those rooms, and that's enough! 

One of my DIL wants more bowl cozies, and her birthday is today. Obviously she isn't going to get them on time, but hopefully not too late. I have a die for bowl cozies, but I can't even get to my Studio cutter right now. Rather than just tossing everything aside, I decided to actually deal with the mess, and clear off surfaces by taking care of what was out. In my fabric room that means lots of cutting. 

I had piles and piles of fabric around for one project or another. I had the fabrics still out for the king sized wedding quilt, but all the blocks are finished, and I've counted them multiple times so I felt OK putting those fabrics away, even if I'm not done assembling it. I had a pile of fabrics I pulled just because I wanted to bust them in quilt backings, so I cut those all into large squares to piece into backings. I had the fabrics I pulled for a quilt, so I cut that quilt out. I had the fabrics I pulled for backgrounds to go with my disappearing rail fence blocks, and I cut those out too. I also processed most of the scraps I've uncovered so far. Oh, I also cut a bunch of 2.5" navy strips to go with a quilt for which I had already started sub-cutting the printed fabrics. So basically it's been lots and lots of cutting. Unfortunately, my Studio cutter is still buried, so I see more cutting in my future. I still haven't cut out DH's scrub tops, but that can wait a bit. What's actually on top of my Studio cutter at this point is two quilt tops, with backing fabrics and batting for at least one of those. I need to piece the backings, and I may just go ahead and do that tomorrow, though basting can wait until after I cut out the bowl cozies. 

When you are cutting, do you make good use of corners? (My studio cutter is buried in the corner under the window, you can see part of the flying geese quilt on top of it)

I was cutting yardage into 10.5" squares for the disappearing rail fence blocks. I had the yardage running the length of the table, and I'd cut the first cut from the long side of the table.

As I cut the 10.5" lengths off, I would move to the end of the table, and move the fabric just enough to sub-cut the other direction from the end. I could then easily pile my cut squares in the opposite corner. 

Some of what I was cutting was smaller squares, and by using the corner of the table like this, I could leave the fabric where it was after the vertical cuts, move myself to the end of the table, and then make all the horizontal cuts without moving the fabric. I would just pull the yardage away before doing the crosscuts. I know you can do the same type of things with a rotating mat, but my rotating mat isn't that big, and utilizing the corner of my my cutting table like this works just as well. I really love having a cutting table I can walk around. 

I'm not sure if you noticed or not, but you can see I have an ironing board set up in my cutting room. Yeah, that's not supposed to be there, but my ironing station in the sewing room is heaped high with projects, so yes, there's an ironing board in my cutting room temporarily. Am I the only quilter who has four ironing boards??? I have a big board type set up in my sewing room that DH and I made. I have this regular ironing board I use when I need to, sometimes I just use it to support a heavy quilt when quilting. I have another regular ironing board upstairs for when I'm sewing in the living room, and I have a small ironing board that fits on a TV tray for making a sewing/pressing nest when working on blocks like pineapple blocks that need frequent pressing while piecing. Four ironing boards is likely excessive, but you'd be amazed how often they all get used. If we didn't have a multiple story house, I'd easily get rid of one of the regular ironing boards. I'd probably still keep three though! 

Tucson got a record setting rainfall for the month of July. We got just over 8" which made it the wettest month ever recorded here. June is our hottest and one of the driest months, so everything is brown around here in June, but all the July rain has really made the desert green. DH and I went on a drive Monday to enjoy the desert in it's new green duds. 

^We saw a pronghorn hanging out

^and a pollinator busy at work. 

It was a fun drive.