Category — WIP Progress Reports

While I was living with my mom, I knew there was never a chance that I could set up my hand quilting frame for the length of time it would take me to hand quilt something. My mom would never go for the living room being in “disarray” for that length of time. As a result, when I was looking for something to do by hand, I decided to get started on a Grandmother’s Flower Garden quilt top that I’d been collecting fabrics for. Actually, I decided first to try my hand with a smaller project to see if I enjoyed it enough to hold my interest long enough to *complete* the GFG quilt top. I went to Walmart and purchased some inexpensive fabric for a smaller starter project. I’m making a table topper that’s basically a GFG flower of GFG flowers. (Make sense?)

I’m glad I started on the practice piece first as I’ve discovered a couple of things that will be helpful when for when I’m working on the GFG quilt top. Originally, I printed out templates on yellow cardstock and cut them out. Basically, I played around in MSWord with the hexagon shape until it was the size that I wanted — 3/4 inch. Then duplicated it as many times as I could on the page before I printed it out.  You can cut them out while you’re sitting in front of the TV.  Here’s what they look like.

3/4″ Hexagons. Yeah, they’re small. I like small.

I have all of the fabric hexagons I need for the table topper basted to the cardstock and one flower started.

Sorry about the graininess. ( I don’t know why that happens when I resize some photos of fabric & not others.  I’m no photographer. If you click on the photos, you can view a larger version that’s not so grainy.)

Here is the backside. You can remove the templates once your hexagon is completely surrounded. The three hexagons in the center have the templates removed.

Here’s a picture with the fabric I’m using for the next go-around.

Okay, so I’ve learned that the problem with basting *through* the paper or cardstock templates is that you have to *remove* all your basting stitches in order to remove the templates.  Not fun.  I found Sunshine Creations Tutorial on English Paper Piecing on the web and discovered there is a way to baste that doesn’t require you to remove the basting in order to remove the template because you don’t sew through the template.

One thing that I do differently is I don’t precut the fabric into a hexagon shape with the rotary cutter.  Too much fussing for me.  I think it’s easier to cut your fabric into a square and then just snip the fabric with scissors about 1/4″ away from the template once you have it pinned to your fabric.  Feel free to do what works for you.  *smile*  Also some people go all the way around the hexagon back to the starting point with their basting which is what I will probably do when I start basting for the quilt top.

One last thing. . . many of the die cut cardboard and plastic hexagon templates that you buy have a hole punched in the center for easier removal of the template.  I’ve now hole-punched all of my yellow cardstock templates.  I’ve also purchased some plastic templates but I’ll tell you more about them in a later post.

This is the last one of these for a while. *smile* This weekend is the wedding in CA and then Sunday I fly to OK for a week. When I get back, I’m finishing up Nathan & Koren’s wedding quilt top to drop off to be quilted, I’m finishing up the top for the musical scrappy, and I’m sewing the valance for my room. Then I’m done machine piecing for a while. (I’ll post pics as I complete them.)

I’ve left out some hand sewing projects to keep me busy. I’m a little bummed that I didn’t get the wedding quilt top done, but all in all I’m happy with what I have accomplished since I started the push to get some of these things off my list before packing in earnest to move.

1. Valance - my room (HSY)
2. Musical Scrappy - 76 blocks completed/23 more to go
3. Scrappy #2 - I’m packing up the pieces for this one to finish up at another time
4. DWR - I ended up putting this away also. When I get it out again, at least I’ll be happy to have all the arcs done.
5. Nathan & Koren’s Wedding Quilt - 12 blocks completed/30 more to go

1. Valance - my room (HSY)
2. Musical Scrappy - 76 blocks completed
3. Scrappy #2 - still squaring up half square triangles for this one
4. Goose on the Loose - DONE
5. DWR - 5 of 40 melons completed
6. Nathan & Koren’s Wedding Quilt - 12 blocks completed
7. Oklahoma Backroads - Cutting and organizing scraps

I finished Goose on the Loose although I wasn’t paying close enough attention and sewed on all my small flying geese units going in the wrong direction. (Not that anyone would notice necessarily, I suppose, unless you were really familiar with the pattern.) I will probably add borders at a later date even though the pattern doesn’t call for them because it’s a small quilt without them (36″ x 48″). I packed this up with the rest of my “set aside” projects. I have worked on blocks for Nathan & Koren’s quilt. I thought I’d have the top whipped out in no time (like a day), but I was surprised at how long each block is taking. It takes about 30 minutes from start of sewing to ironing for each block and there’s 42 of them; so when I did the math, I realized that’s about 21 HOURS worth of sewing time. [sheepish grin] So I’m plugging away at them a few a day.

I should have more accomplished than I do but haven’t been feeling up to par nor sleeping very well because my sinuses are all clogged up. I finally started taking some colloidal silver and this morning I can feel my sinuses starting to drain. Hopefully I’ll get some energy back soon. My mother is [impatiently] waiting on me to finish up a few machine quilting projects before I take down my machine so she can put the house on the market. I need to get a move on. . . [sigh]

1. Valance - my room (HSY)
2. Backing - mom’s cabin quilt for summer - DONE & so is the quilting!!
3. Musical Scrappy - I did 20 more of these so 76 of 99 blocks completed
4. Scrappy #2 - about 360 more half square triangles to square up
5. Goose on the Loose - blocks need squaring up
6. DWR - 5 of 40 melons completed
7. Nathan & Koren’s Wedding Quilt - 4 of 42 FQ cut for blocks
8. Oklahoma Backroads - Cutting and organizing fabric scraps for this one.

I’ve also finished a customer quilt and put a second one of her’s on the frame. I really like this one. Very girlie and swirly.

Stacy’s Pink & Yellow Pinwheel

Quilting Detail

I’m also patting myself on the back (yes, that’s right) for not succumbing to Bonnie’s Super Bowl Bargello. I almost did! I resisted the Carolina Crossroads mystery, but started cutting up strips for this one. I finally got a hold of myself. . . I mean, I have a wedding quilt to finish and the quilt studio to pack up! Who am I kidding thinking I’m going to squeeze in another project here?! I am *not* Bonnie. [sigh]

1. Valance - my room (HSY)
2. Backing - mom’s cabin quilt for summer (HSY)
3. 9 patch leader/ender - 128 blocks completed
4. Musical Scrappy - 56 of 99 blocks completed
5. Scrappy #2 - about 360 more half square triangles to square up
6. Goose on the Loose - blocks need squaring up
7. DWR - 5 of 40 melons completed
8. Nathan & Koren’s Wedding Quilt - 4 of 42 FQ cut for blocks
9. Oklahoma Backroads - Cutting and organizing fabric scraps for this one.

I decided to just finish up all the 9 patch blocks that I was working on as leader/enders to get that out of the way. So that project is all bagged up and ready to be packed away. Today I’m going to work on squaring up the rest of the half square triangles for the second scrappy quilt and Goose on the Loose. If there’s time, I’m going to finish ironing and cutting the fabric for Nathan and Koren’s quilt.