Sunday Slow Stitching and Stash report.

Today on her Sunday Stitching post, Kathy talked about hand stitching as being a way to relieve stress, and that we who love it should not feel guilty for taking the time to do it. Not only that, but it’s an essential part of relieving the stress of life. She is so right! It isn’t a big thing in the overall scheme of things, but yesterday I was so stressed. It was time for some maintenance on my long arm machine. She was doing some pretty weird things with the stitch regulator. I had some new parts here, so yesterday was the day we decided to install them. APQS, the maker of my machine always sends out very detailed and easy to follow instructions on how to install new parts when necessary. We had to take it apart, and this is how the insides look..... very scary! We went step by step through the process, in this case installing new circuit boards, following the instructions exactly as written and the pictures as shown. Once we got to the part of the instructions that said to turn the machine on and test the needle up/down speed, We did that....... zero, zip, nada happened. The machine turned on but not a move did she make. Have I mentioned before that there are times, not many thankfully, that I would cheerfully throw this thing out the window, assuming that I could lift it? Well, yesterday was one of them. By the end of the day I’d calmed down. Going to church to worship helped immensely. And today, I’m doing what Kathy suggests is necessary to my sanity and my health. I’m slowly hand stitching on La Passacaglia. The third side of the border is almost done. I should be able to get the fourth border pinned in place and started today. I’ve had a very loose mental goal of getting this finished by the end of April. If it continues this way, I just might make it.
Between the fabric for these borders, and making a backing for Northern Tree Line, I’ve had some stash used progress.

Used last 2 weeks:                             7.7 yards
Used this year:                                 17.85 yards
Added last 2 weeks:                              0 yards
Added this year:                                  5.5 yards
Net stash busted:                               12.35 yards

I’m linking up with Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching, Judy’s Stash Report and Angie’s WIPs Be Gone. I think I’ll take some time for a cup of tea and a browse through some of those links, and then it will be back to more stitching.

Stash report Week 6

I did a lot of sewing, and quilting, and even more unquilting, this past week. The good news is, my longarm is mostly fixed, due to a lovely man on the APQS forums, who sent me instructions on what the problem was, how to diagnose it, and then how to fix it. With my wonderful husband's help, we managed to take apart the back of the machine where the "mag collar"lives, and adjust it. Considering I had no idea there was such a thing as a mag collar, let alone where it was and what it did, it was very scary stuff. But, it's done, and 90% better than it was. It's still occasionally catching the thread in the bobbin assembly and breaking it, but I know how to prevent that form happening, until I can get instructions on how to completely fix it. But, in the meantime, I won't be using any of the thin polyester threads in the top layer of the quilt. King Tut it is, for now, at least.

Stash report:

Used this week:        9.2 yards
Used year to date:     28.9 yards
Added this week:      3 yards
Added year to date:   91.5 yards
Balance:                    +62.6 yards

Yikes, that's a huge added number, but I should be done with purchasing for quite a while now, so the balance number should start to go down over the next few months. I don't have a particular goal in mind, and I don't have a no more purchasing policy. This is more a curiosity thing, keeping track like this, just to see how much fabric actually does come and go around here in the course of a year.  

You know you're a Quilter when........

You know you're a Quilter, capital "Q" Quilter when, your longarm machine is giving so much trouble that you could cheerfully throw it out the window, assuming you could lift it and it would fit through the window. That's how I was feeling last night, and most of today. I think we have a diagnosis now, and am just waiting for the instructions to fix it. But, back to the subject at hand, do you:

go out for a walk? ................. nope
grab a stiff drink? .................. nope, unless Champanade counts
take a long,hot bath? .............. nope
find a good book? .................. well, yes, if it's on audio disk.

What you do if you are a capital "Q" Quilter is............... pull lovely, brand new fabric off the shelf, and start a brand new quilt. Especially if the brand new fabric is wonderfully cute fabric for a soon to be grandson. The pattern is from the Feb/March 2011 Quilt magazine, which was in my Christmas stocking from Noel and Laurie. It's called "Raspberry Swirl" There are still 2 borders to go on it, yet. A narrow cream, like the sashing, and then a wide light blue and cream plaid sort of check like fabric. Sock monkeys, and cartoon puppies........ so cute.

What's wrong with this picture?

My love-hate relationship with my long arm has raised it's ugly head, once again. The quilting on Shakespeare in the park was going along beautifully, I thought, until I started hearing this weird clinking kind of sound, coming from the bobbin area. I checked the back, and this is what I found........
the top thread dragged to the backing into tangled knots. And, where it isn't tangled knots, it's pulled through in great big loops, but only at the places where the machine changes direction. The rest of the time the tension is fine. The frustrating thing, is that I checked the tension before I started, and everything was perfect, then, suddenly it wasn't. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr. So, now there will be some major unsewing going on, and then I have to figure out what went wrong. (sigh)

I love/hate my longarm

Well, I achieved all my goals for yesterday, and beyond. I got the quilt not only loaded, but 2/3 quilted. It was going along great when, for no apparent reason, the tension went wonkey. And, of course, I didn't notice until I advanced to the next row. So, now I'm going to have to do some ripping. Grrrrrr. I'm going to finish it up. but then leave it on the machine, and unroll it to the section that needs fixing. I'm hoping it is only small sections, in which case I can just take out the section that needs fixing, redo it, and bury the knots. If there is a lot to fix, though, I'll end up having to rip out the whole row. Once again, I say, grrrrrrr. Becca called a couple of days ago and said that their wedding photos would be ready for pick up today, so, I'll take Scott to work this afternoon, pick up Becca and go get them. We'll probably throw a mother/daughter dinner in there as well. Maybe take home dinner, so we can eat and look at the pictures at the same time. The photographer at the wedding was just fabulous, so I'm really excited to see these pictures. So, I'm off for a second cup of coffee, the good stuff I picked up yesterday, and some more work on this quilt.