Sunday - My Way

I've been trying to get back into the habit of walking*. It's good for me and it's good for the dogs. We also live in a great area for a neighborhood walk as we have many horseback riding trails within a half mile or less of our home, and the roads are very quiet. I put up this post about walking in the 'hood' in August. 

Today we actually crossed paths with a horseback rider. I would have taken a picture of the beautiful (and very calm) palomino, but the timing was all wrong. We had just come to a fence with two large German Shepard type dogs, running up and down the fence, barking at us and at the horse. Add to that, my two Corgis were barking back at the dogs, as well as barking at the horse, and pulling a bit to try to get closer to the horse. The activity did not lend itself to my taking out my phone and capturing a picture! Maybe next time!

I played a few games of Mahjong online with my BFF. We catch a few games with each other almost daily. It's a fun way to chat, do some sort of mindless hand work, and play a game that we love!

I made some progress on Step 6 of the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt. I posted about the beginning of this challenge in November. I only have 6 more blocks to make before I move on. (My progress was hampered by the surgery on my hand, which limited my ability to cut fabric)

I put our fake Christmas tree to bed, and watered the real tree that we recently planted. 

I put a few pieces in the jigsaw puzzle I received in my "Jenny Box". 

And, I completed a second quilted clock....wanting to make some improvements on the first! 

* I let myself slip out of the habitual daily walk for a number of reasons. In the summer it was simply too darn hot. Additionally, I have arthritis in the bones of the arch of my left foot and that makes walking very painful. I recently went to a new podiatrist. He recommended a different OTC orthotic, and by jove, they are making a difference! (How's that for an old saying?!)

Another Mystery...

 A mystery quilt, that is!

Every year a quilter named Bonnie Hunter leads a number of sewists on a merry quest to complete a quilt. Bonnie posts the colors (using paint chips, so folks can raid the paint store and know exactly what color Bonnie is referring to, and the yardage requirements. Then, on Black Friday she releases the first clue, telling participants what to do with which colors and how many are required, step by step. (This year, because of her schedule, the first clue was released a week early.) Each week another clue is published and over a period time, sometime in December or January, the bits and pieces made each week come together to make a quilt.

I have completed two of Bonnie's mystery quilts:

Allietare - 2015

En Provence - 2016

I always enjoyed the mystery aspect, but when I participated in the mysteries previously I had not been quilting for very long and didn't have a ready stash of scraps for Bonnie's scrappy style of quilting. If I needed to buy fabric to make a quilt I preferred to pick the colors and pattern so I knew what I was getting in advance. 

Flash forward 10 years. I have built up a stash of fabric...and I've collected many, many scraps. Participating in this sort of mystery quit will give me the opportunity to use some of them - and make room for more 😂

When I moved into the remodeled garage I put up this great storage center. More recently, following my surgery, I worked to organize my stash - anything from a quarter yard and larger is neatly folded and stacked in the cubbies. Smaller pieces are in the drawers below the long arm, on the right, grouped by color, and somewhat by size.

Now that I have a ready source of fabric scraps I decided to participate and quilt along with my bff. I rounded up scraps that worked with the colors that Bonnie suggested: neutrals, lupine deep blue/purple, icy blue and pinks. 

This year's mystery is called "Lupine & Laughter" and is inspired by the colors of lupine and the ice blue lakes Bonnie enjoyed on a trip to Iceland. 

Let the fun begin!

Under the Presser Foot

I have been sewing with other women at the crafts building, and I do some sewing on the motorhome.  This week I completed two projects. Hooray! Completed projects are always nice.

First, I finished a small quilt top with a pattern I bought over 2 years ago! Whenever I stop by a quilt shop I feel I must buy something. I like to support the small guy. So when we were in Ozark, AL on our way to or from Red Bay, AL for service on our coach I stopped by the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe. I picked up the Fancy Forest quilt pattern by Elizabeth Hartman and tucked it away. While packing for the move I came across the pattern and decided it would be a great gift for one or the other of my grand children. The pattern is deceiving. It was much easier to construct than I thought it would be. (Apologies for the lousy color. The lights in the craft building do funny things to colors.)

 In progress:

Completed:

I will be taking the quilt top to California when we go back so I can quilt it there. I'll have to do some thinking about how I want to quilt it!

I led a "Mystery Quilt" for ladies at our resort. For three weeks I gave out instructions for part of the quilt, which could be used to make two pillows or a table topper. This is my finished version:

As I completed the plans for the quilt I had reservations about the color of the sashing I was suggesting the ladies use. The sashing cuts the pillows into quarters, meeting at the middle. I used the same background color as I had used in the blocks. Once I assembled my pieces I rather liked the way it turned out. However, one of the ladies used a dark background and sashing and the effect was totally different.  I'm not so much of a fan of the way her pieces look. We decided that her design could be called the Dollar Sign pattern!! If I ever do this pattern again I will reconsider the colors for the sashing pieces!

Prest-O Change-O

This winter I participated in a mystery quilt while staying at RiverBend RV Resort. The instructor gave us fabric requirements a few weeks before the start of her 4-week class. I had fun shopping online and settled on some fun fabrics from Bear Creek Quilting and from the Missouri Star Quilt Company.

Each week the instructor gave us the instructions for one row of the quilt, and told us to use a light, a dark and medium fabric choices. These are images I found online of the first three rows presented to us.

I used various combinations of the lights, darks and mediums I had purchased and created the first 3 rows. The 4th row was completed when I was not at the resort. Although the instructor gave me the pattern, I wasn't thrilled with it. The fourth row had triangles and I liked that the other rows were all squares and rectangles. So I made a decision not to include row 4 in my finished quilt. 

Then, I looked at my rows, and made another decision. I didn't particularly care for the light fabric I had used in one of the rows. That's OK I said to myself. I'm accomplished enough to use my seam ripper and carefully remove, and then replace the squares I didn't care for. 

Here is the row in progress of the change:

And, Prest-O, Change-O

Here is the revised row.

Ta-daaaa!

I started puzzling about how to put the three rows together. I looked at them this way and that way. I tried them with sashing between the rows and without sashing. I then had a big "Ah Hah"! I decided to cut two of the smaller rows and piece them together, so the top of one would have the bottom of the other, and the top of the other would have the bottom of the first. Confusing?? Not really. I pulled the larger row apart and inserted a butterfly from the backing, and put butterflies in on the sides. 

I'm not totally a fan of how the quilt "balances", but it was fun to try something so totally different. I finished by quilting it on Bette, my 1955 222K. While in the process, she developed a terrible squeak with each stitch she made.

I stopped sewing and pulled out the oil. The squeak was coming from the head. I oiled everything. The squeak remained, whether I ran the machine or rocked the hand wheel manually. I just couldn't find it. The next morning the squeak was worse. I was seriously worried as Bette has always purred along quietly. I was concerned that I had done irreparable damage by making her work for hours as I quilted. I brought out the engine stethoscope Mr. Dreamy has, hoping to isolate the location of the squeak, and took off the embroidery foot for better access. The squeak was GONE! Doh! Bette is just fine (and well oiled) and now that the embroidery foot has had a smidge of oil, it has stopped squeaking!

I took my finished masterpiece that I named "Constructed. Deconstructed. Reconstructed." down to hang it on the fence in order to get a shot of it with a pretty background. The Percheron's came up to inspect it.

B: What is it?
D: Not sure. It has orange in it.
B: Yeah, but it doesn't smell like carrots.
D: It's made out of fabric.
B: Could it be a saddle blanket?
D: Not sure, but maybe we ought to leave, just in case!
B: Yeah, I don't want to do any work today!

On The Second Week of Allietare

I made it through week #2 of Bonnie Hunter's Allietare Mystery Quilt. I am really enjoying the process and the camaraderie to be found with other "Thread Warriors" as I've named them. There is an active FaceBook page called Quiltville's Open Studio. Quilters post pictures of their progress on this mystery quilt. They post pictures of completed quilts and "what's under the needle". They ask questions and answer questions. I have found the group to be so supportive and absolutely nonjudgmental. Here is a link to Bonnie's blog, Quiltville's Quips & Snips.

One part of the clue for this week required us to make 80 pieces that look like stretched out 'flying geese'.  Bonnie explained two different ways to make them, one using two special triangular rulers, the "Easy Angle" and the "Companion Angle".  The other method is sewing on the diagonals of two squares placed on either end of a rectangle. I chose to use the rulers.

For those of you who haven't quilted, The red triangles with gold triangular corners are flying geese. (This is not the mystery quilt. This is one block from a sampler quilt I finished last spring.)

Here are the 'stretched' out flying geese from the mystery quilt. All 80 of them!

Quite a few of my geese came out slightly misshapen. It shouldn't be a problem when I piece them in the quilt, as long as I measure each piece, and on the worst, draw seam lines. I think I worked a bit too quickly, and sewing on the bias can cause fabric to stretch, even on such small pieces. There were a lot of suggestions for avoiding this problem on the FaceBook page. Some folks suggested always pressing on flannel. The tooth of the flannel helps hold the cloth. We were reminded to 'press' - not twist with the iron. Some ladies mentioned spray starching the fabric before cutting and sewing. It was also mentioned that when one is sewing on the bias, the presser foot should be lifted, and put down at the point where you want to sew. You shouldn't let the pieces feed into the machine. All very interesting. All great pointers for the next time! I have already learned so much!

Bonnie suggested that the pieces might be headless geese! Many of the quilters in her group felt they really are little Santa's.

What do you think?!

To recap:

(sing along to the tune of the Twelve Days of Christmas)

On the first week of the mystery quilt 

Dear Bonnie gave to me,

Two hundred ninety-four HST's.

On the second week of the mystery quilt 

Dear Bonnie gave to me,

80 headless geese,

and

Two hundred ninety-four HST's!