Triple Rail Quilt, Class 140 continued.

I am addicted to gadgets and tools (my scrapbook supplies are taking over the house and the quilting items are threatening to catch up).

However, I do wish that I had purchased Quilter's Academy before I went ruler and notion shopping as I'd have saved myself some money.  For more expensive items, I do spend some time researching them and I'll buy the best that I can afford. Case in point - my favored rotary cutter is by Gingher - and I did find a good deal on one of the designer sets which came with a seam ripper - and it is wonderful.  I like the balance of both tools in my hand.  I also have three different brands of rulers and of cutting mats. I've got a couple brands of pins too, and I like the IBC silk pins better than the yellow tipped quilters pins.  I also like some of the flat head pins.  I do pin the strips because I don't yet feel confident that the strips won't slip apart.

So after finishing cutting and squaring the 99 blocks for this quilt, I unfolded my design wall and laid it across the bed.  And reduced some of the need to bend by working on the layout in sections and then walking around the bed to pull it across. Both Corgis gave their seal of approval by jumping up and landing on the layout.  Monkey landed so gently she barely moved the blocks. Dash landed like an elephant and dislodged quite a few.  He is now sleeping on my foot so has forgiven me shoving him off the bed.

I photographed the layout from directions to see how it would look upside down.

I like it both ways.

The blocks are now nicely stacked on my handy dandy tray and ready for me to start sewing.

Triple Rail Fence part 1 - Class 140

So, what does a hockey mom do at the ice rink, when she really wants to work on quilt projects?  Well let's see - three months ago, I tied no sew fleece blankets while sitting in the penalty box and later snipped rag quilts effectively spreading lint from two quilts liberally around the Triangle ice houses. Then two weeks ago, I was drafting the layout of the dragon quilt.  I drew the grid and then carefully colored in 32 little squares (about 1/4 inch square) and sat shifting them around on my clipboard.  A couple thoughts on that process... first, I needed to make the grid bigger - there were too many tiny scraps of paper and second, I needed to color the scraps darker as the purple, orange and red were too similar to make much of an impact.  After getting home, I spread the cut dragons out as described in an earlier post.  Sunday morning, I spread out a fleece blanket which worked nicely as a design wall, and started mocking up the triple rail fence.  Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera along, so no pictures of that process.

From left to right - Moda Natures Notebook Floral, MNN Yellow, Delft Blue
MNN Light Blue, Hoffman Gypsy Princess Paisely, MNN Dark Blue

I knew that the Hoffman Gypsy Princess paisley would be rail 1 and the blue & white delft would be rail 5 and needed to find a good balance. This decision was made after I couldn't find additional paisley fabric.  As you may recall, I somehow ended up cutting six fabrics - the two above and four from Moda Natures Notebook line - yellow, light blue, dark blue and a floral on yellow. I started off with two sets and laid out a 3 by 4 set of rail fence blocks.  Then I started switching colors - was the dark blue better on the inside or the outside?  Would the sixth fabric work as the first border?  The end result took me a little by surprise.  I had assumed that I would leave out the Moda floral as it would be too busy with the delft.  However, I ended up feeling like the Moda yellow was too much of a contrast.  So that one has been put aside for another project.  I will likely use the dark blue as the inner boarder and binding as I like how it framed the mock-up better than the others.

 Sunday evening I stitched and starched the 12 sets of strips. Tuesday evening, I spent cutting and squaring rail fence blocks. As I type, I have the 50 blocks from set 1 cut and squared.  And I'm relieved that I sewed all six sets of the second combination.  In each block, there are two or even three manufacturers - and the width of each fabric differs - the delft is the shortest - so I've been able to get 9 4.25 inch blocks from each strip - and definitely need the 6th strip. If each fabric allowed for 42 inches between the selvages, then I could get away with just 5 strips.  The second thing I learned - which led to a trip back for more fabric - is that the yardages given can be fairly close to exactly what one needs - so it pays to do the math before shopping and be certain to add in a few inches for evening the fabric and in case of cutting mistakes.

The lessons in Class 140 center around setting up one's sewing space. We haven't had the energy or the desire to start moving furniture around - with heat indexes approaching 100 over the past few weeks the thought of carrying stuff out of the house to storage has been daunting - so I don't have my sewing room yet.  And it looks like I'll be in the bedroom a few more months as I have a ridiculous amount of personal and professional travel in the next two months. But I digress.

Lighting - our house in general does not have great lighting and I'm set up in the corner of the room farthest from the window.  Gus and I changed all the burnt out lightbulbs in the lamps and even with all of them turned on, the lighting isn't great. At Home Depot a few weeks ago, I found an Ottlite floor lamp - for around 1/3 the price of a comparable one from JoAnne's.  I may go back for another - but don't currently have a place to put it.  Just adding this one lamp has vastly improved the lighting.

Sewing table - my craigslist find is working quite well and I'm very pleased with it.  Eventually it would be nice to have some expanded space for maneuvering a quilt, but for now, in the piecing stage, it is great. I do need to ask my neighbor to help cut a new insert as the one it came with doesn't fit around the Bernina. Again, not a problem until I start quilting rather than piecing.

Chair - I'm borrowing Gus's desk chair (which he rarely uses) until I can find one that I really like. I need to head out to the University surplus warehouse some Friday to see what is available and try some out.  For some reason, the nine year old believes that ownership allows one to lower Mom's chair seat WHILE mom is sitting in said seat. This has encouraged me to try out different positions - and I also experimented tonight with raising it while I cut - and will lower again to sew.

Ironing and Cutting table - I currently have "space envy" as we just don't have space to dedicate to a cutting table.  I am making notes on what will work well - and once I get "my" room, will be able to create a more dedicated space.  At the moment, my cutting is done on my sewing table in a seated position or standing at the dining room table - neither are ideal. Especially for someone with back issues like me. Unfortunately, the snack bar is too tall - though maybe I should stand on a box and do it there.

I appreciate the careful advice given in the Quilter's Academy regarding setting up space and materials. A definitely plus in the book.

Finishing the Dragon Quilt

The Gus approved layout

A few days later, I unrolled my design wall, and let Gus look over the dragon pattern. He approved so I started stacking squares.

Partway - with my reverse order squares
before figuring out I was pressing
everything in the same direction

My intent was to sew the rows first so that when it came time to sew the rows together they would be shorter (7 squares wide versus 9).  However....  my logical mind failed me.  I now know that I needed to have 9 piles not 7. Rather than lay everthing back out, I decided to suffer through the longer columns. So - I chain stitched the first pair of columns.  Then, when it came time to add the next column, I realized that I was going to end up with a lot of quilt to the right of the needle - and since there is a distinct pattern to the dragon arrangement this could be a problem.  Ever resourceful, I simply turned my tray of squares upside down and chained 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 instead of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.  It worked.

Monkey found a new way to
be helpful.  I think I like it better
when she just rests her head on
the cut fabric...

Over a period of two evenings, I chain stitched the columns and sewed the first three together. Two thirds of the way through the columns, I realized that I had been pressing all the seams in the same direction - which would create problems in the joining step - so I had to go back and redo the block pressing. Glad I figured it out then, instead of when I reached the step. Because some of the dragons were bias cut, I had to be very careful while stitching and pressing to not pull them off square.  A gentle touch can be a very good thing.


On Sunday Gus decided it was time for him to learn to sew - so together we made him a tuck-away tote bag. Several months ago he picked out a rose/skull fabric with a red contrast fabric. Later I found a FQ of white skulls on black.  Thinking I'd be able to use my old machine, and so that I didn't have to rethread my Bernina and wind another bobbin, I got him set up.  And I confirmed my wisdom in purchasing the Bernina. Both Gus and I fought the feed dogs on the Singer to sew a straight stitch.  For the strap, I set up parallel tape guides which did help as that was a 120+ inch seam.  We took turns, and there are several "imperfect" seams - but overall both Gus and I are pleased.  I learned how to sew French Seams and really like the effect as these are unlined bags.  He did protest me ripping out a few of his seams for him to redo - but not too loudly.  On Tuesday, we went back to Thimble Pleasures so we could purchase the next set of fabrics - and webbing for the handle (my forefinger and thumb are still tingly and painful from turning a 120+ inch tube with a pair of tweezers - before I do one of those again, I'll get a tube turner - probably would have taken much less time too).  This weekend, I'll let Gus use the Bernina.  And I'll also keep an eye out for good sales on fabrics to make gifts that won't break the bank account.

Dash has decided he will get
more attention if he sleeps on or
at least in front of the pedal.  He was
showing a great deal of interest in the
area near my fabric stash, and I was
worried there might be a mouse. Nope
just a stray grape (thanks Gus).
Fortunately I found it before Dash.

So back to the quilt. Tuesday night, I completed the top and then starched it a few times prior to storing until I reach the borders & bindings lessons.  Gus is very happy.

I did notice something in the pictures, which I downloaded AFTER all of the columns were pieced. If you look carefully at the red dragons, there are several that have great swirls behind them. Unfortunately, I didn't space them apart, so they are a bit clustered together.  The contrast didn't show up in the room lighting. Oh well. Now I know to check the pictures during the process.

The Dragon Quilt - Part 1

Compared to some of the help I've received
this is looking good...

As as aside, I'm not sure why I stress about having everything ready and all the pictures uploaded before I start writing a post.

Over the past two weeks, I've been hard at work on the second quilt top - the Dragons - which is based on Carrie's Cowboy Corral.  In an earlier post, I described the process of selecting fabric for the rails to go along with these wonderful dragons. The dragons take up roughly 6 to 7 inches of space depending on how you frame them.  I decided to reduce the quilt to 7 blocks by 9 blocks as compared to the original 9 by 11 in Carrie's as the quilt would be proportionally larger - and I'm not confident in my ability to quilt something too large just yet.

I sewed the strips for the rails in one evening, and spent two more leisurely cutting the blocks. I did take the time to ensure that the blocks were properly squared this time, so there would be less lopsidedness. For the last three blocks, one side was mysteriously narrow - so I stuck a pin in the narrow strip to remind myself to adjust the seam allowance and that worked.

It did take me some time to get started on the dragons, as I fretted some about fussy cutting the dragons.To add to this, I only had two yards of the dragon fabric, and Thimble Pleasures sold out - though it is still available online.  As it turns out, 2 yards yielded exactly 32 usable dragons.  It might have yielded more if I'd been a little more methodical in the cutting, rather than trying to get certain colors first, and I was very worried that I'd be short a dragon or two as I already knew the fabric was gone.

The end result was 8 green, 7 purple, 7 red, 6 blue and 4 orange dragons.  I have now made a strong note to myself to never again use 5 colors when the yield is not divisible by 5.  I suppose I could have skipped using the orange ones (as I detest the color orange), and tried to cut 8 of the other four colors - but the orange dragon is cool - and adds a bit of brightness.

Once everything was cut, the next challenge was to lay it out and decide on the color pattern.  I used the 2 yard flannel backed vinyl that I got a JoAnne's recently - and laid it on the bed. I'm looking forward to having the wall space to hang it as the bed has the hazard of plucking Corgis off of it and involves too much stretching and bending.

My initial goal was to create a random scattering of the dragons with a few simple rules:  1. Orange cannot be next to blue; 2. Orange cannot be along an outside edge because it would be next to the blue border (I'm a FSU Seminoles fan - nuff said); 3. Purple dragons should not be in the purple frames and red dragons should not be in the red frames; 4. Same color dragons should not be side by side or above/below in relation to one another and if possible also not on the diagonal. 5. Avoid too much red & purple together as the colors are of similar intensity.

So - an hour or two later, every time I thought I had the dragons organized, I would find a patch of three of one color in one of the corners - and switching dragons would just switch the cluster to a different color in a different corner.  At this point I started looking at placing the colors on the diagonals and still tried to keep the orange and blue apart...  Eventually, I settled on this one. And then called Mike in for his opinion. And yes, I did have to drop some of my restrictions on where the orange dragons could be placed.  This might have been easier in the 9 by 11 layout - or might have been even more frustrating. I ended the evening by rolling up the design wall and heading to bed.

First Quilt Top Completed

I got a chance to use my new board tonight as I finished pinning together and pressing the final rows of the quilt.  When the time comes to add the borders, I'll use the red as the first border and then the blue flowers as the wide border. I think I'd like to bind it in the red, but I'm not sure that I have enough of the fabric.

Productively mixed weekend.

By Thursday night, I had all 11 sets of blocks sewn together into strips.  I found that I could neatly stack them by accordion folding as they were mostly attached due to the chain piecing.  There were a few times along the way that I ripped out a seam and redid it as I didn't feel like it was lined up well enough. And as I work through sewing the rows together, I realize that there are several other spots that would have benefited from that level of critical attention - and also from SQUARING the blocks. A step I skipped because I didn't want to hassle with the ruler. A step I WON'T skip again.

Friday we took Gus to see The A-Team, which for those of us who grew up watching 80s TV it was a fun blast of nostalgia - HEAVY on the BLASTING.  Gus loved it, and having never seen the TV show had no idea why Mike and I were laughing so hard a parts. They did a really good job casting and also incorporating running gags from the show.

Dash has found a new way to be
helpful. Must watch feet carefully!

After we came home, I started to sew the rows together.  Easier said than done...  It wasn't until I started trying to pin things together that I realized how far off kilter some of the squares were. Overall I'm happy enough with this to go on so I won't rip all of the seams out and re-square the blocks.  I will chalk this up as a lesson learned. At this point, I have six of the rows sewn together and the seventh is pinned on waiting to be stitched.  I chose to go for matching corners versus perfect 3 inch squares, so while there is a little wonkiness in some areas, more of my corners match than not.  The row I added where only the first two matched up in spite of pinning on both sides of the seam was taken back off and started over. I started to think about how to quilt this when it is done, and have thought about the idea of tying and using buttons, especially in the yellow squares for added color. However, with 49 yellow squares, that could end up being quite an investment in buttons so I'm putting that idea on the back burner for now.

Now for my other triumph of the weekend...

From the first time I saw a description of the "Big Board" ironing board cover, I have wanted one. But I'm frugal (okay CHEAP) and couldn't imagine paying $120 + shipping. So, after googling for directions, I set off on a shopping trip on Saturday morning. First stop was the Army Surplus store for a wool blanket. Next was JoAnn Fabrics to pick up batting (Warm & Natural was on sale), as well as flannel backed vinyl (for a portable design wall), pellon (for a project with Gus) and the "silver cloth" that is used as ironing board covering. Then on to the hardware store for plywood and 1x2s.  Screws would have been a good thing to pick up - had to get those at Walmart on Sunday.

The board before the final side rails
were added with my shoeless assistant

I had the very helpful young man at Lowes cut my plywood into three pieces - 2' x 5.5' and a 2.5' x 4' as well as cut my 1" x 2" strips down to size so that I had one less thing to worry about at home.  I then had to head over to my neighbor's house to cut 8 inches off the big board as I overshrank my wool blanket in the wash.  If I were to do this again, I would search for a thinner blanket. The one Dad has from his Army days back in the 50s is thinner and I think would work better doubled up. The one I got from Surplus Sid's was from England and already fairly thick - and after shrinking not wide enough to double up (not that the staples would have held at that point.  Using my trusty quilting rulers, I centered the ironing board on the board and drew the lines where I wanted to place the rails. I marked the boards where I wanted to drill the holes for the screws and also the rails where I would drill the starter holes.  Gus came outside with me to help drill the starter holes (which as it turns out in pine isn't strictly necessary.  After all the holes were drilled, we took turns screwing the rails onto the board - which also served to straighten the warp (I went with a 3/8" thick board so that I'd be able to lift it myself).
Back inside to staple the blanket on to the board. Gus helped me stretch the blanket over the edges. Unfortunately he wasn't strong enough (or perhaps heavy enough) to get the staples in far enough to hold the blanket on.  After the blanket, I wrapped the board in the silver cloth. One set of instructions seems to indicate that you could forgo that step and iron directly on the blanket - but this particular blanket was still shedding after two trips through the washer & dryer - so it will be forever covered.

The finished project - I am quite pleased. Mike's first question was how was I going to store this as he thought I had bolted it to the ironing board. Thankfully this is a less permanent solution and should make pressing a bit easier. I do have to set it higher than before as I need it to overlap the bed somewhat if I want to reach my sewing machine.

All in all, a very productive weekend!

Floral version of Winter Wonderland

Last night I finished cutting the pieces for Carrie's Winter Wonderland quilt - in a floral version (I do think this would look wonderful with the Christmas themed woodsy fabrics as well, but there is a limit to the amount of fabric I can buy at one time...).

Then, remembering my gaffe of the sampler, carefully laid them following the pattern directions in the book. I think I'll use the red again for the small inner border and possibly the binding and the blue floral for the large border.

A close up of the fabrics as laid out on the bed. Something in my posture must have blocked the Corgis from hopping up on the bed. Dash settled in on the ottoman until the coast was clear. Monkey made herself scarce.

I then stacked the rows, looked at the book and realized the instructions said columns but by then I wasn't going to change my stacks. I just have to remember that I'm working vertically instead of horizontally.

I don't have a lot of room to the right of my machine, something I hope to remedy when we move the rooms around later this year. So I headed to the kitchen to get a tray, covered it with a pillow case (the tray was REALLY dusty) and pinned my number tags onto the pillowcase so that I wouldn't get my piles mixed up.  I'm using a bobbin as my marker and finding that it really makes a difference when you are using 11 piles. It seemed rather silly with the three piles for the sampler.

I lowered the ironing board to the same level as my bed and sewing desk and placed the tray to my side. I've borrowed Gus's desk chair until I decide on one of my own, and thankfully it swivels!  I was also able to do some quick pressing without getting up.

So - what did I learn last night?

• Always, always, always check which side of the ruler you are using.  I ended up cutting one of the strips at 3 inches instead of 3.5 because I had turned the ruler around.  Fortunately I figured it out after the first cut and had torn my fabric strips wide enough to make one additional square.
• There is a reason the Bernina manual tells you to open the little handle on the bobbin case...  I had a devil of a time getting the bobbin to thread correctly last night after breaking the thread. Turns out there is a little mechanism that holds the bobbin in place - you can't just stuff the bobbin in the slot. I took advantage of having my machine open to go ahead and clean & oil it. Unfortunately I probably spent 45 minutes trying to get the thing to work before I figured out the mechanism.

By half past midnight I had sewn the first three rows and pressed them. The pressing of row 1/row 2 was easy to manage to get the seams folded under the square because I could just flip the squares to the side I needed. One the third row was added I really slowed down on the pressing and spent some time trying to figure out how to organize the fabric to get it pressed in the right direction. I suppose I could just walk around the ironing board but my brain had already fallen asleep. Overall I pleased with the way this is coming together.  I'm not sure what I'll do with this one as the size is a bit small for my taste - I purposefully did not enlarge it because I need to figure out how to quilt with my machine in a few weeks time and don't need the extra bulk.