Bow Tie quilts in progress

Yes, you are ready the title correctly. Quilts...plural...three in fact.

 This Kona Snow Bow Tie quilt was made entirely from a charm pack that was gifted to me by Tazzie. She is a quilt designer from Australia. I won a Mug Rug from her blog and she also sent other goodies. I can see this put on point with Kona Snow large triangles. Then I picture beautiful hand quilting in those as yet attached triangles. I bought a very fine point lead pencil. I have such issues with marking quilting lines. That is why I mostly quilt straight line quilting on my DSM.

 Here is the basket that the Kona Snow Bow Tie was born from. These fabrics are more diverse. I can say probably anything goes for this one. The cutting is done. The little squares are sitting on top of the larger squares. The Kona Snow squares are simply stacked there too. This set up is more Leader Ender friendly than my Cheddar Bow Tie project.

 And here is the Cheddar Bow Tie quilt. It is not sewn together. It is still a work in progress.

 This was the basket that I said was dusty on top. Shamefully, I had not used it as a Leader/Ender.

 I have the little colored squares on top of the two cheddar squares. The larger colored squares are directly underneath each cheddar square.

 The biggest reason I do not Leader Ender the Cheddar Bow Tie quilt is this spool of thread that matches the cheddar so well. The OCD me insists on using this thread on nothing else. Thus it is not a Leader Ender. The Kona Snow one is. Go Figure!

 This is my TV setup. I am now joining my DH in his familyroom and can still keep my hands busy. I found this pink cutting mat in the scrapbook section of a Walmart. I liked the color. That was the only reason I bought it. But after trying it I really like the features it has. 2" square markings all over the mat. Easy to lay a bonus triangle unit on it after trimming the dogears off. If it needs any other trimming I lay it to one side until I get a few and then clean them up.

Macy watching TV. Nat Geo Wild of course!

Slow progress...

I love all aspects of quilting with the single exception of row assembly. I have a wonderful design wall. The ironing board is handy. I have the assembly pattern to look at. But grrrrrrrrrrr!!!! I find this step so unfullfilling. Why? I do not know.
Below is my progress today. Not too much to show for all the work I feel I have done.

On the left side is my tiny BowTie with Kona Snow as the background. The "ties" are made from a charm pack that Tazzie sent to me. I am thinking of setting it on point. I did enjoy sewing this one together. Go figure......

Smith Mountain Morning Star points

I must apologize for retreating from all of you again.
I lost my oldest cat last week (September 10th) and on top of all the other deaths this year I feel "dumped on".
Hopefully I am back and will be better everyday!
I need all of you!

 I have all the star points sewn. But only got one picture to the camera. I also have all the corners made. After all the sewing I moved my sewing machine around to face the picture window. The summer sun is just too bright for my eyes. The angle of the sun I guess. I have been so very sensitive to light for the last few months. I rarely get headaches. But now I seem to get them when I get a flash of light from a reflection outside or even from my monitor. Guess I need to get a checkup...

 The Yahoo group "quiltvilleswap" has all been returned to the swappers. A few have posted that their packages arrived today! Hurray!!!
Now I need to decide what these swappers want to swap next...any ideas?

 I made myself a new ironing board cover. I get so excited and pleased by the smallest things. I could not wait to try it out. So I had to get up after going to bed and pressed some quilt units. Aren't I silly?

 Here is Bonnie Hunter's BowTie pattern done with Kona Snow as the background. The Cheddar one is coming along fine too.
How many quilts do I have going right now?

1. Cheddar BowTie (L&E)
2. Kona Snow BowTie (L&E)
3. A Face Book mystery all in Batiks (ready for assembly)
4. Smith Mountain Morning (still assembling units)
5. Jamestown Landing (all string blocks are made)
6. and I need to make and gift 5 quilts in the next 2 months and what I am working on is NOT them!

 So...how long do you think this 5000 yard spool of thread will last? I have been using it off and on for a year. I use it for paper-piecing. I use a 90/14 needle for PP and the thread flows through it great. It is a little coarse for my 80/12 piecing needles that I use all the time.

Memories...this was made for our Camp Mack retreat 2 years ago by Teri F. Our Bonnie Hunter was attending and teaching. What great memories...

 My oldest (and newly rediscovered) friend Victoria has in her possession a Crazy Quilt with the date of 1752. She calls it her "Susie Quilt". The fabrics are all very fragile. She is hoping to sell it.
Any ideas on what she should ask? It is a large twin size. There are no bad smells. But it is fragile.

Victoria's hand...a very talented hand too!

Kona snow Bowties and Batik bonanza

In addition to making the Cheddar Bow Tie quilt ala' Bonnie Hunter, I decided to also make a more traditional one with Kona Snow. I dug into my "charm" collection to begin this quilt. One 5" square is more than enough to make a Bow Tie unit with a nice rectangle left over. I will use the leftovers as a Piano Key border. WhoooHOOO!

 We swapped out all our old hollow wood doors inside the house to white 6 panel solid doors. What a difference it makes. Anyway...I had to move a large stack of plastic containers to allow DH to get to hinges. I came across 4 huge bags of Batik scraps. All wrinkled and smushed and unusable.

 I started pressing and sorting by size yesterday. The above is just the beginning. I soon had to switch to a larger plastic container to hold all the scraps. The teeny ones are in the small container for string piecing.

 Here is the end result. All pressed and sorted...but not sorted by color yet. But all pressed.

 I am in Batik heaven...what to make ...what to make...

 Batik envy anyone???

 I wore out my poor old ironing board cover. Sigh! I am so hard on irons and covers.

 I bet this weighs 20#'s...all deliciously clean and straight and all the same fabrics together. I am thinking of taking them all out and do a color sort while I am in the obsessive mood. There are times that being OCD is a blessing. This is one of those times......

Any suggestions? I have an urge to just make some Peaky and  Spike units and some 4-patches and some HST and some Pinwheels and some Ohio Stars....

Am I going crazy????

BTW...I am almost done with the repair of the Butteryfly quilt. Just a tiny bit of hand quilting. I am so very proud of getting it actually repaired when I had been dreading even starting the fix.

I am going to a Kaye England lecture this Friday. She is such an awesome speaker. Some of the LQS's are doing a Shop Hop that involves NO driving. All 20 shops will be under one roof. We can just go to booth to booth. I have been saving some money...It will be all gone before the end of the hop.

I am taking my old/new friend Victoria to meet Kaye. She is a tailor who has been bitten by the quilting bug via me!!!!!!!!! We have been apart for 30 years. We cannot remember why we stopped seeing each other. I guess life got in our way. We are tight again. I do love her so very much. It is like looking in a mirror sometimes. We are both Pisces...we are both the same age...we both played violin in school...we both crochet...we both sew clothes...we both love Laurel Burch designs...we both love cats.

There is a whole lot more of what we both have...but what we both have right now is each other!

I love you Victoria! 

Bow-Dacious is completed

Hubby just phoned me to say the actually saw an entire flock of robins a moment ago. He is sooooooooooo anxious for Spring weather.


I tried very hard to match Bonnie's color choices. Alas, I do not have Double Pinks in my stash. I did find a small piece of light pink gingham. I used that for the first sash. Then from the almost avalance of containers I picked the second sashing. The darker first border was an internet purchase I made years ago and was totally dissapointed with the fabric. But it has now made it into several of my quilts. I guess it was a wise purchase after all.
The final border was a nice piece of a teadye beige. It really calms down the interior. And DH likes it too.

Love, love, love this pattern by Bonnie Hunter. It is in her newest book called Aventures with Leaders & Enders. You can find it/her at http://www.quilteville.com/

Here it is. All done and now I can start to piece on something else without the guilt trip I was taking myself down. It measures roughly 62" square. Not nearly as big as Our Bonnie's quilt in the book. But satifying to me.

Yesterday I started on two other quilts from her book using the 1 1 /2" squares. I only sewed a short time but toally enjoyed the experience.

Progress on Bow-Dacious and Macy

Love, love, love this quilt pattern. Bonnie has given us many lovely quilts to copy. This one stole my heart when I saw it in her newest book, Adventures with Leaders & Enders. I now need to add two borders to call this one done. And I only made one extra block...for me that is cutting it real close!

Can you see the colorwash? My dear Hubby planned this out for me. I so love it when he plays with my blocks.

#1 reason is his participation.

#2 reason is he can reach the ENTIRE DESIGN WALL. That saves me from climbing up and down the ladder/stool.
Which I had to do this morning. The fabric I wanted for the second sashing was buried in the corner of the cutting room. You all would have laughed at how I managed to pull the container out from under 5 other containers piled to the ceiling. Also another hazard was the bolt shelf that butts up against this stack of containers. The containers are holding the bolts straight too.
I did it! And found a treasure of light to medium neutrals that were purchased in 2001. (I found the receipt in the container)
WHOOOHOOOO! I love fabric shopping in my stash.

This was my Valentine's present from DH. It smells so good. And the kitties do not seem to mind that it is in one of their catbeds. It is the best place to get the morning sun.

I know this picture is dark.

But I wanted you to see the cat beds I make and where the flower pot is placed.

Here is our Macy. She is basking in the heating blanket's warmth. She asks for it to be turned on. She sure has us trained.

She went to the vet for her yearly exam. She hates the drive and lets us know quite loudly. She becomes so very quiet after getting into the exam room. She has gained 1/2 a pound since her last visit. I am very pleased with that. She is 6 years old now.
We nearly lost her a year ago. She ate a wired fine ribbon and nearly died. Some super great vets saved her life. We had to force feed her afterwards as she had given up living. We baby her and praise her all day long now.

Well...I made you go through other pictures to get to my other picture of my progress on the Bow-Dacious.

Progress on Bow-Dacious

I now have 101 blocks made. And I think I will start the sashing process and then make more blocks if I need too. I am not planning on making my Bow-Dacious as big as Bonnie's. But then we never know where the quilt making journey will take us! I divided her block requirements in half. I plan on it being square. That much I am sure of. HA!
And wouldn't you know it, the fabric I want for the gold sashing is in a clear box I can see but cannot get to easily. I will need to get a ladder and unstack a whole corner. Oh well, I need to fondle that fabric anyway. It has been a long while since I touched these fabrics. I may find a treasure there!
The grouping on the left are my hubby's work staging them in a colorwash. I may keep that in mind when assembling the quilt. He vows to help me.

I did some tailoring 101 today. Hubby bought some pants that were too long for his 6'2" frame. They were really way too long. In my distant sewing past, I worked for a men's shop here in town doing alterations. Not a rewarding job but as I was a young mother it allowed me to work from home. Alas, the store is long gone. But I still have my tailoring skills.

My ironing board cover is as bad as Bonnie's. This is a little fold away board that I set up next to the sewing machine. All I have to do is spin my chair. This is so embarrassing. I will have to make a cover real soon folks!

What I wanted to show you all is my careful matching color methods. I pick 10 squares that read the same and keep the "buddies" all together throughout the assembly process. It slowed me down a bit but I was happy with the results.

I had counted out my background squares then added a few for cushion. When I had used them all up matching and layering them carefully, the sewing could start.

I did the pair sewing and the corner square sewing all one after the other. I clipped between and carefully pressed and stacked on the ironing board. I sewed all the blocks today between laundry and feeding hubby.