Hello all! There is a blush of green on the mountain sides sprinkled with the white blooms of the dogwood trees. I think Spring is trying to arrive. Our weather has gone from lovely to ugly and back again day after day. The big winds yesterday toppled a huge tree in the back, but fortunately it fell South to North and missed the house. There are others closer to the house, and we keep an eye on them. Anyhoo, the ugly days are good for work in the studio, and I have been busy.
Oh yes, I took a class at my Handi Quilter dealer and asked about the frequent "motor error" messages, which require a reboot and reposition every time. Other students agreed their machines also had this glitch, and were as frustrated as I am. We were told to download the Beta fix and install it, hopefully eliminating the problem. I did just that and opened a can of worms that has taken three days to rectify. The computer started having more problems and causing no end of frustration. (Reminiscent of the whole APQS debacle) Three separate calls to the tech support and hours of fiddling with the system made the machine run, but I am back to the frequent crashes with the taunting "motor error" box on the screen. This is the king size quilt it all happened on. I was so happy (after three days!) to get it done and off the table...
Beautiful and really large
Made with depression reproduction fabrics, the quilt is bright and cheerful. I pity the quilter who is going to tackle the bias binding on all those curved edges. I trimmed it as a rectangle, but the rings are at the true edges.
Maureen's flowers is the panto. I set it up over and over and over during the quilting.
Before the class, I did get some quilting done.
Another of my sister's quilts.
I like the colors of the fabrics here. I used the lilac color for the thread, and a sweet floral panto.
Here is a peek at the back.
This customer made a lovely table runner.
I used a leafy vine panto for the quilting.
Maybe you can see it better on the back.
I made this quilt a few weeks ago and finally got it finished. It will go to Family Connection.
The customer made this in a class and it will be a charity quilt.
Because of the cherry theme in the fabrics, I used Bush Berries panto for the quilting.
Isn't this dish fabric cute?!
This was a mystery quilt the customer made at a shop as a one day class.
She referred to it as her 'fugly' quilt. I said I would call it 'qugly' because it is a quilt! ha ha
Not the best fabric selection for the mystery kit...
Someone will like it. An exercise in piecing with a charitable ending.
For the class I took there was pre-class homework; making a small top to work on in class. We were trying to master quilting borders and corners. I'm still struggling with what I learned, but think I'll get it with practice. Here is my classwork.
It only took an hour to cut and piece this little quilt. It took two full days to get the quilting done!( lots of picking out and swearing) I am so bad at the computer stuff. I told Mr Wazoo I am on the downslope of my learning curve. So true.
I like the block quilting pattern. I turned it three different directions just for fun.
The border is as perfect as it can be because I did it in class. Once I got home with my cheat-sheet, I didn't do as well with the sashing. It is not properly centered and a bit wobbly.
Click the picture to see the quilting closer.
I took in a repair job a month ago and started on it yesterday. It is a monumental job, involving Sunbonnet Sue appliqué made from double-knit polyester fabrics on cotton backgrounds. These are the 'before' pictures. I have already patched the first two rows while watching (really, listening to) TV last night. I hope to get a couple more rows of patches prepped and sewn tonight.
Here is the overall view. Some patches are missing parts, and one is completely gone. There are loads of holes as well as stitching coming out and quilting that's missing. It has a back-to-front binding that I may replace with double fold binding...I haven't decided yet.
All the Sues are amputees, having no hand at the end of their sleeves. Some also don't have arms, feet or hats. Lots of fun ahead.
The shop up in Murphy, NC closed. She had a big sale at the end and I bought a couple of kits and 26 yards of pine cone fabrics for backing nursing home quilts for men. I put together the blocks for one of the kits over two days. The blocks are on the design wall and I just need to stitch them together. It will be a happy quilt for the Family Connection charity.
The kits were half price, and if you bought one, the second one was free! I bought two.
Enjoy your week and I'll be back next Sunday (unless something newsworthy happens) with more Newsbits. Happy quilting!
