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Archive for February, 2007

Highlights of a finishing race

Posted by jackie blue on February 25th, 2007

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A binding being sewn

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A neck being knit

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An old project resurrected

Which one will win?

The Girl Reaction Intensive 2 Day Quilting Course

Posted by jackie blue on February 14th, 2007

A.K.A. The Sweatshop - Day 2

In an effort to ignore Valentine’s Day, and because I’m a day late with this anyway, I give you Part 2 of our Quilting Weekend.

We had considerably less time to work on this on Sunday, due to actually leaving the apartment for our meals. So after getting back from brunch - I sewed the border on the top, and then we were ready to go with our quilting. Carolyn showed me how to make the sandwich with the backing and batting, and we spent a good amount of time safety pinning to baste it. Then the lessons began. Carolyn brought some extra batting and muslin to show me (and Stephanie, who came to observe) how to pin, cut and sew the binding, and use the walking foot, etc. She also showed us the darning foot for free form quilting. I practiced a bit on the sample and then moved to start my stabilizing seams. A bit of a glitch happened with my first seams - I kept the machine on a slow speed so I was sure to stay in the ditch but it was too slow and my stitches came out really tiny. After speeding it up and a bit more practice, I was on a roll.

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Pinning and sewing the border
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Carolyn pins the sandwich
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Doesn’t it look pretty?
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What, you mean I can’t just use it like this?
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Ty was really bored through the whole thing and hid in his carrier

All in all it was such a fun time and I’m so grateful to Carolyn for the help and also for the company. I’d never work that hard on it all at once if alone. Now I have to quilt the rest of it, and it’s a busy week so far but I hope to have it finished this weekend.

Block Detail

Posted by jackie blue on February 13th, 2007
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Corner block with border, pinned and only one quilting seam 

The Girl Reaction Intensive 2 Day Quilting Course

Posted by jackie blue on February 12th, 2007

A.K.A. The Sweatshop - Day 1

So Carolyn arrived on Friday but quilt making commenced Saturday morning. After breakfast we whipped out the ironing and cutting boards and piecing began. I had already washed the fabric the day before. C oversaw all my cutting of many strips (we used Make a Log Cabin in a Day which she most generously had sent to my apartment that day along with a few tools, like a stilletto and Kwip Clip for safety pins) and then the piecing. I ended up sewing, ironing and cutting for 12 hours, with breaks for a quick lunch, an ordered-in dinner, and a dog walk. Quilt in a DAY? This is just a baby sized, I can’t even imagine finishing a queen in a day, unless you have 6 people working on it. At the end of the day, I had the top finished minus a border. Carolyn is a great teacher - it was so much fun and I love how the top came out. Details on the next day tomorrow!

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Piecing the beginning of the blocks.
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Cutting apart the strips.
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Sewing the last color on the blocks.
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The carnage after all that piecing.
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A nearly finished quilt top!