Finish it Friday...

It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to do a Friday finish post. A very long time. But I have one now...... Woohoo, Yippee and happy dance! Sisters Across the Miles is finished. Here she is in all her wonderfulness. She was originally started way back in November of 2014. I didn’t really know where it was going, other than as a project to use up hundreds of two inch four patches I had left over from making a triple four patch quilt. I’d spent a year doing the Rainbow scrap challenge, and my project was the triple four patches. See that one here. It has yet to be quilted.
This quilt design occupied a lot of hours in the Electric Quilt software. I tried out a lot of alternate arrangements before coming up with what I think is the perfect choice. I love quilts with strong graphic lines and also quilts where the definition between the blocks blur and it becomes hard to tell where the individual blocks actually are. I also love borders..... lots of borders. The finishing touch is a diagonal striped binding with orange faux piping. 
I am so happy and thrilled with this finish. This will eventually be released as a pattern. It is about halfway written. I am still pondering which vehicle on the internet to use for the actual selling part. As soon as all that is done, there will definitely be an announcement here.
I’m linking up to a couple of celebration parties. One at Crazy Mom Quilts and another at Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?

Work in Progress Wednesday

I’m finally back at sewing on my own projects. The backlog of customer quilts that accumulated while my machine was out being repaired are almost all caught up. I think there might be four left that have been here over 3 months. That feels so good to have all of those quilts done. I’m not sure how many there were, and I don’t think I want to know, either.
I’ve been working on Sisters Across the Miles. The centre section of the top is now all sewn together.
 There are a lot of seams in there to match up and then press. Today I started cutting and piecing the borders. The top and bottom border units are done. It’s a blurry picture but it will have to do, for now. I’m taking a break for supper, and then I’ll head back up and finish off the side borders. All that will remain are the corner blocks and then sewing all the borders on. It is so close to being done, which is so very exciting! I’m hoping to get it quilted up within the month, get my son to do some professional photos of it, and then it will be ready for its publishing debut as a pattern!
I’m linking up to The Canadian Needle and Thread Network and to Lorna’s Let’s Bee Social.

Design Wall Monday, June 6, 2016

I haven’t done a design wall Monday post in ages. For some strange reason, Monday’s seem to fly by and it’s Wednesday before I even realize that Monday has happened. I’ve put my Sisters Across the Miles quilt back up on the wall. I’m wanting to put a push on to get this one finished. All of the alternate squares containing those blue quarter square triangles are done. There are 7 more of the Sister’s Choice blocks left, and then this can begin to be sewn together. I’m hoping to start releasing some of my quilt designs for sale as patterns, and there’s a good chance some of the quilts occupying space here could go up for sale as well. I’m hoping to either get a website going, or to somehow get a shopping cart/paypal hooked up to the blog. Our son’s girlfriend knows how to do this and has offered to help with it. She’s not available;e until July. It would be nice to have this quilt finished and the pattern written up by then.
In the meantime, I’ve been steadily working away at the pile of customer quilts that are here. I’m currently working on Charlene’s La Passacaglia. It should be done by the end of tomorrow afternoon. There’s a charity quilt that needs to go on after this one. Slowly but steadily working the pile down. I’m linking up to Judy’s Design Wall Monday. Then I think it might be time for some relaxing knitting.

Works in Progress....

Life here continues to go on at the speed of light. It seems like there simply are not enough hours in a day to do everything. I know for sure that I’m not the only one with this problem. I have been meaning to write up a blog post since last Friday. But every time I think of it, something else comes up, and before I know it, the day is finished, so I think to myself, I’ll do it tomorrow. and of course the same thing happens. Now this past weekend, there was a good reason for it. Our little grandson Avery was here for a visit. Except that he’s not so little any more. He is full of energy, that boy. This os the only good picture of him that I managed to catch. Of all the pictures I took, although there weren’t that many since  I was too busy enjoying having him around, they were all blurry because he was moving so fast. He left to go home Sunday afternoon. I was going to do up a Sunday stash and stitching report that day, and for the life of me, I can’t remember even what I did for the rest of the day. Oh right, now I remember, I spent quite a bit of it talking to friends on Facebook chat. Monday, I spent quietly stitching and trying to get my breath back after the weekend. I’d planned on doing the stash and stitching post that day...... didn’t happen. Tuesday I spent up in the sewing room, working on one of my own projects, interspersed with emails back and forth to APQS regarding the state of my long arm machine. Preliminary diagnosis is that it needs a new motor. I haven’t heard anything since Tuesday when they were planning on putting in the motor, so I’m wondering if they’ve come across the other weird things the machine was doing before I sent it in. I think this is the fourth week without it now, which means I am four weeks behind in all the customer quilts I have waiting here. If you are one of those, I profoundly apologize, but there is nothing I can do, at the moment. When I do get it back, the focus will be on getting all those quilts done.
This is the project I was working on Tuesday. It’s one of my own designs, done up in EQ7. It’s a variation of the Sister’s Choice block. I’ve decided that I’m naming it “Sisters Across the Miles” in honour of my friend Susan in Alberta. I’m seriously contemplating publishing some patterns. I have 5 or 6 that are my own designs that I could write up. The hows and whens are details yet to be figured out. Our son is a fabulous photographer who has offered to do up pictures of the quilts and his girl friend is a web designer. I’m not sure at the moment whether I’ll add them to this blog, or actually do up a website. These are excitingly scary thoughts. At the moment, the trick is going to be finding the time to get the patterns written up.
So, this take me up to yesterday which was also partially spent sewing in the studio, working on the sampler quilt that I’ve designed as a free project for the guild’s blog. The picture here is a bit washed out.I’m trying to stay as far ahead of the publishing dates as I can. It would really be great for this to be done in time for the quilt show in October so that everyone can see what their finished quilt can look like. The instructions for it, should you be interested, can be found on the London Friendship Quilters’ Guild blog. And of course, in amongst all this has been lots and lots of visits and hugs and snuggles with our precious grand daughter Abrielle. She is 4 months old today. How that went by so fast is totally beyond me. Here they are, our daughter Becca and grand daughter Abrielle. So now, after catching up here,  I am going to link up to Lorna’s Let’s Bee Social and then go get some more work done on that blog sampler.

Work in Progress Wednesday.

My poor long arm continues to be in need of repair. This is how she currently looks. The tech people at
 APQS are fabulous. Amy has spent many hours in the past couple of days, via FaceTime on our phones, trying to track down the problem. So far no success. She’s sending me out a new part that might be the culprit, which will be here, according to the UPS people, on Friday. If that doesn’t work, the machine will be going for a trip to its birthplace in Iowa for further diagnostics and repair. I wish I had Geordie LaForge here to do a level four diagnostic and repair. Ah well...... In between playing with all the frighteningly small pieces in that machine, I’ve been getting some of my own projects finished.Northern Tree Line now has its blocks turned the correct way and sewn back in place. It also has a backing made and a label on said backing. I’ve pulled out a UFO, which was started way back in November of 2014. It’s a Sister’s Choice variation. I put it up on the wall to study and to figure out exactly where it was and what needed to be done. There are 18 of the main blocks done. I need 32.

This is the main block. It’s using up the four patches that were left over from my Rainbow Scrap Challenge  quilt. The triangles in each block are the same fabric, but those fabrics change from block to block, in an attempt to use up 2 1/2 inch scraps.
This will be the alternate block. I’m not quite sure yet what colour those green triangles will end up. I really like the contrast the provide in the quilt, but I don’t have enough green like that in my stash, which could be good excuse for some stash enhancement.
And this is the finished layout. This whole thing was designed in Electric Quilt 7 software. It has yet to tell me whether it wants borders or not. The blocks finish at 10 inches. The quilt, as it is now, will be 70x90.
In addition to all this, all of the white pentagons, excepting the corners are stitched onto the blue borders for La Passacaglia. The corners of the blue borders have been mitred and sewn. All that is left is to sew the white pentagons to the corners of the border fabric and it is done! That will happen over the course of the next couple of Slow Stitching Sundays.
I’m linking up to Lorna’s Let’s Be Social and also to The Needle and Thread Network. After that, I’m going to go play with some Sister’s Choice blocks and do some homework for a workshop I’m taking on Friday.

WIP Wednesday

I haven't done a Work in Progress Wednesday post for a while now, mostly because my projects were stalled. But I've finally managed some sewing time upstairs, because the temperature warmed up enough for my feet to stay warm. I'm back to working on Texas Chain. I'm almost to the point where I can start laying out the rest of the rows. Another day of sewing up there should get me to the new rows...... maybe tomorrow...

And I'm continuing to make up blocks for my Sister's Choice Variation project. I need 32 of these blocks. I have 11 done, so I'm 30% of the way there. The colours in real life are a bit brighter.
                                                              
                                                                                       
                                                                               I''m going to link this up to the Canadian Needle and Thread Network and also to WIP Wednesday. And then, I think I'll make up a few more Sister's Choice blocks and also do a little more on La Passacaglia.

Design Wall Monday, March 2, 2015

There is still nothing much new on my wall. The same old Texas Chain is still there. The temperature forecast for this coming week is for warmer temperatures, comparatively speaking, so I should be able to spend more time up there and maybe get it further towards done. In the meantime, I've been playing with some scraps, a bit. I started  Sister's Choice variation last year, and have slowly been working on making the blocks......... very slowly. I have six done. After finishing last year's Triple Four Patch quilt for the rainbow scrap challenge, I had all kinds of little 2 inch finished four patches left over. This is what they look like, so far. They are a bit brighter in real life. These will use up those 2 inch four patches, as well as a lot of 2 1/2 inch strips for making the triangle squares and the  2 1/2 inch orange squares. I went on an orange fabric kick a while back when I was making Meteor Shower, and now I have all kinds of it left over. So each block is going to have the orange squares in it. I played around in Electric Quilt, and have come up with a setting that I really like.
It has the added bonus that it will use up 1 1/2 inch strips for the setting squares. It will be a while before I get that far, though. I haven't figured out borders for it, if any, as of yet. But, there's lots of time before I get that far. I'm linking up to Judy's Design Wall Monday, and then I have some Disappearing Four Patches to make for swapping. I'm several days late. Although, If February wasn't a short month, I'd still be on time....... just. Good thing they go together fast. I'm hoping to get them done tonight, and in the mail tomorrow.

Scrappy Saturday, sew-in day 2

What a wonderful couple of days, so much fun, and I got so much done!! My triple four patch that I started last November for the Scrappy Saturday Rainbow Colour Challenge, is a finished top. And I love it!! There's something wrong with the right hand border.... the end units are turned the wrong way, somehow, but I don't care. It's staying in it's imperfection.


After I finished the triple four patch quilt, I started on these squares. I have a whole bag full of these little four patches, so I'm going to make them up into these Sister's Choice variation blocks. They'll use up those four patches, and some more yardage and also some 2 1/2 inch scrap strips for the triangles. The plan right now, is to use orange in the same place in all the blocks. I'm not sure if I have enough bright bold oranges, but I'll use up what I have and go from there. I have enough triangles made up to do three more blocks. But I think I'm done sewing for the next day or two.... I've kinda over dosed a bit, but it sure was fun. I'm going to link this up to Soscrappy for the rainbow challenge saturday post. This month's colour was actually light blue, which I didn't get anything done with. But the finish of the quilt from last year is rather exciting. After I post this, I think I'm going to just sit quietly and knit.