Hello again motivated do'ers. Welcome to another
Tuesday To Do party hosted by Quilt Schmilt.
How is your month shaping up so far!?
I'd like to kick off by checking in on what I
accomplished since we met last Tuesday:
Week 9
* * My Priority! * *
Finish blog hop quilt top and post
I worked like the dickens to get this quilt top
finished by Sunday afternoon for pictures.
Autumn Color Cascade...or a different name?
Even with my fast 'n furious stitching, I had to pause
before the last border was on to take advantage
of the last bit of daylight outside for a photo.
Here is a good portion of it hanging on the design wall
later but at 81x94, it doesn't fit so still not a great pic.
But it was done, and so I set about finishing my post
to get it out in time...right until our power went out.
LOL. The obstacles just kept coming up! See #2 below, too.
(Our transformer by the street went bad). But let no one say
that I failed to bring my hop post to the table!
I set a hotspot with my phone and, by candle light, finished
it up late at night, in time for Monday/Day One of the hop.
Huzzah.
If you missed my post, please check it out here!
Kudos to the electric company for being here within
an hour and at 12:30am, it popped back on!
2) Work with Quilt Path
I finally started playing with it--yay!--but, and this
is the the short story, after a lot of texting, phone calls,
emails and Facetimes, we've decided that my
thread [break] detector is defective.
A new one arrived just yesterday but in the meantime,
mine decided to work sporadically, and when it didn't,
I just over-rode the error message.
Here are the things I've been learning on:
1) Two small mini's
These were my first to play on--and they look it. LOL
I was more intent on playing than choosing a great design.
Plus, I hadn't found them all at that point.
2) A wall hanging for my sis (no pic)
3) A charity quilt for the guild (no pic)
4) Ring Around the Rosey--72x72
This quilt is a beautiful candidate for some specific block
quilting so it killed me to just do E2E--although I think this
modern design looks just fine. Soon I'll learn to work with
all the bells and whistles. I have lots of videos to watch!
5) Ohio Meadow--92x104
Sorry about the sun shining in and if you so the odd,
mismatched fabric along the edges, stay tuned...
Another quickly chosen design. I'm really looking forward
perusing the designs, and adding more to my collection.
(I might get out of hand there!)
In the past if I had done all of that in less than a week
my back and shoulders would be screaming at me.
But now that I'm-so-behind stress that I've had is
slowly diminishing. For months I have wished there were
two of me, or if only I could somehow get an assistant.
If I could just get caught up!
But, oh ho! My Assistant is now here and you should see the
pile of finishes I have looking at me, waiting on binding!
A few other things I have been able to accomplish
while my assistant worked away on my quilts:
Took care of the chickens
Did dishes
Gotten hours (HOURS!) of computer work done
Finished my Cascade quilt top (above)
Ate meals
Headed off to Mass (as she worked the last row!)
Tidied my studio
In short, she is the miracle I have prayed for.
3) Create a new Quilt Worksheet form
This has been a process of trial and error
but I think I'm there.
4) Start on next shop quilts
I won't have time for weeks but I'm just thinking ahead.
I really haven't decided yet but perhaps my next
West Point quilt--if I have all the fabrics.
Okay, now about that odd fabric on the back of Ohio Meadow.
As you know, when you plan to quilt by longarm, your backing
needs to have a good 4-5" of overhang on all edges. When I
made the backing for this quilt, I was cutting it very short but,
in doing pantographs by hand, I'd always been able to
work carefully with this. When I went to load Meadow, I
quickly saw there was a problem. Going digital means you
really can't fudge that space much.
Now I'm an impatient quilter and I didn't want to mess with
cutting some sort of extension strips out and all that but what
popped into my mind was to use scrap jelly roll strips. I threw
those together and sewed them on in no time at all.
If you look closely again at my pulling-it-off-the-frame pic
you'll see it did the trick nicely. And I used scraps that I
have no problem tossing into the trash. Anyhoo, if you
you just need a couple more inches on each side, this
an do the trick nicely and quickly.
That's my helpful tip for the day!
It really has been a most productive week, even if it did
have its share of frustrations. My happiness and relief with
Ms. Assistant has outshone the bumps along the way.
So what's in store for Week 10?
I'm afraid it's a bit busy with appointments and such
but I'm still hoping to accomplish the following:
* * My Priority! * *
Bind, label and finish both Meadow and Rosey. I made
the bindings weeks ago so there's a jump on this task.
2) Bind, label and finish the 2 minis
3) Make a form to receive quilts for quilting jobs
I have a sample already so it shouldn't take long.
4) Start on next quilt
Happy quilting!
Comments