QM Bitty Blocks--Catch Up

The last two days I've been actually sewing. I gave my Juki a break and pulled out the featherweight... I sure love that little machine!  I haven't been doing a lot of sewing lately, but at this point I am now only four months behind in making my Bitty Blocks.  That's progress.  I also sewed my finished blocks into strips so little by little it's getting closer to being a quilt top.


This layout is in order as each monthly pattern came out.


And the blocks all sewn together, moving around the strips.

For the layout that QM suggests for this size, it requires 14 rows of blocks. I don't think I'm going to do that. I have already made up the flying geese as suggested (3 rows of 60), and I think I've decided I'm going to add 2" strips of white between each row to add to the length and some white space.  I'm not sure what I am going to do for the outside border, but QM suggested a checkerboard border.

A Finish and Retreat Time!

I just got back from a quilt retreat and I had such a great time!  I love quilt retreats but they don't happen very often because of logistics with the kids.  But I have been able to sneak in at least one a year for the last few years now (actually, thinking about it... two a year!).

First, I finished Orca Bay!  I am so excited!  I had a goal to get it done so I could enter it into the fair this year, so for the last two weeks I have been working on my Juki after doodling some designs on my post-it notes (I like to have post-it notes around the house for all sorts of things, including if a design pops into my head or I see inspiration for a quilt).


A closer-up pic of the border and blocks:

The border inspiration are waves and whales spouting out water.

I was so surprised when I got to the retreat, my friend Julie had a gift for me and it was her contribution to Quiltmaker's Scrap Squad!  


To say I was so excited for this quilty gift is an understatement!  It even had a sleeve already on it, and now it is hanging up in my living room :)  I absolutely love it!!


And now the boys are trying out making ice cream.  I, on the hand, bought some Talenti gelato to try out instead (because some friends at the retreat were talking about how good it is).  I don't know if I'll share or not :)



I have two other projects that I finished the blocks on at this retreat too.  I started them at the retreat I went to in June, so it feels great to have those ready to be placed into a top.  One will be a gift, so I am going to wait to post about it, and maybe I will make up another blog post about the other.  Most of all, I am so happy to have my Orca Bay finished.  I absolutely love that quilt so much... I called it "Coffee Time at Orca Bay" since I used coffee fabrics for the browns, but today I was thinking that I should have named it "Kaffee Klastch at Orca Bay" since I started the quilt project at one retreat and finished it at another... there is a lot of talking and visiting at retreat, they are special times for sure.

And last but not least, my vine is finally blooming.  I have to search to find out what kind it is again, but I have been waiting two years for a bloom!  This was the year finally!

edit: It is some sort of hybrid of the trumpet vine campsis radicans, but it dies back in the winter so not so invasive as it would be in the south.  Also, I have one that is grafted to a stalk and the other is more of a creeping vine.  This one is from the creeping vine, but the other is starting to finally put on blooms too.
Happy August everyone!

WORLDWIDE Quilting Day

edit:  I had to change the title to worldwide instead of national. Oops! :)
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And I actually did some quilting!  I'm on a roll with sewing for three days in a row this week.

Today I worked on March's QM Bitty Blocks.  I'm really glad it was a simple block after the basket blocks, I was able to finish them within a couple of hours.  Before working on them, I went back to double check the various suggested layouts.  I think I am going to go with the 66x75" suggested size which means now I know for certain how many blocks to make.  At this point I have five extra basket blocks, but maybe I can work them in somewhere.


All ready to sew. I decided to do the no-waste method for flying geese. I think I prefer to do that on my Juki because I have an extended table, the blocks to be sewn can then lay flat while I am sewing. I'm glad to not have lost any placement squares in the process, they stuck pretty well.





I love the open toe 1/4" foot. I don't really like the regular 1/4" feet because I would have to change it more often when sewing pieces like the flying geese above (since the outside part of the foot hangs down). I just received the foot yesterday from April1930's, I have been looking forward to trying this foot for over a month but they were out of stock until this week.  (btw, yes, I did match up the edges after taking the picture :) ).  I am also planning to polish up the featherweight to get a nice shine.  Kevin laughs at me when I talk about it, I think it seems silly too, but the polished up machines look so nice :)


Finished. I should probably trim the dog ears...

Finally, last night I hemmed a couple of pairs of pants for Kevin. I knew the featherweight came with an adjustable hemmer, but I decided it would be best to practice first on something other than his pants. I hemmed them my normal two-step way on my Juki (rolled hem and then pinned and measured for the correct length to sew again). If I could figure out the adjustable hemmer, I could eliminate having to do a rolled hem first since it does it all together.

I had to pull up youtube to try to figure it out. The manual was ok with the instructions, but I am a visual learner. I couldn't get the edge to continue with the rolled hem, that tiny hook was pretty hit and miss. I took the foot off to see exactly how it looks when it is working as it should, which if I put it back on the machine with that slight start, I could keep it going for the most part. I think the rolled hook part should be longer or more pronounced in order for it to work better. I finally gave up after many attempts with strips of fabric. I'm really glad I didn't practice on Kevin's pants! Now, if I didn't mind an unfinished edge, it did make a nice and even hem. I think I am going to stick with my tried and true method with the Juki's foot.

I also pulled out the binding foot.  I think you are suppose to use pre-made bias binding, I had a hard time keeping it even with my strips.

Between the hemmer and the binding feet, I thought about the episode of the The Great British Sewing Bee when the contestants had to sew on featherweights.  I think only one of the contestants used the adjustable hemmer.  Kudos to him!  If the video doesn't show up on the blog post, here is a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CN3BOkfHixs  I'm not sure why the video is so small in the screen.  I wonder if it can be watched at the BBC site.

That's about it for today.  Next up is to watch a movie and sew another flower garden block.  I am down to only 11 more to go.  So close to my 75 GFG goal for this quilt!

February QM Bitty Blocks

Wow!  It's been a while.  Between life in general and a recurrence of illness, the last thing I have really wanted to do was.... anything.  It's been rough!  And I know a lot of people have had this same thing.  I think I am almost done shaking off the coughing and sinus infection, but now we are rounding into allergy season so telling the difference between the two isn't so easy--but I am feeling much better.  Hot water with lemon and honey is so soothing!  I am still drinking it daily but I need to cut back on it and just do straight water.  But it really helps when that tickle in the throat occurs.

Today I played catch up on my Bitty Blocks.  I already had all my half square triangles made, I just hadn't sewn any full blocks yet.  Today I decided to give the featherweight a go....




and now I have ten blocks finished (still had two on the machine as I was taking pics):



The little 4" blocks are very cute I will admit.  Now I wonder if I can get March's blocks finished before the 31st.  Since that one is an easier one, I may, plus now that I am feeling much better I have the desire to do something other than nothing :)

QM Bitty Blocks

I found out that Quiltmaker is doing a Bitty Blocks block of the month this year (January).  I decided this would be a great way to get comfortable with my featherweight.  This morning I whipped up the 16 blocks needed, bow ties.  I am thinking that this quilt is going to be a blue and white quilt, but I may change my mind as I go.  They will measure 3" when finished.



Playing with a couple of designs that are possible with the bow tie block...


I'm pretty sure that these need to be sewn into one row, but I'll wait to figure out which way I want them to go.

I think I decided that my FW should be named Josephine.  After all, her name is already on the case :)