Tough to tackle

     I am not a restorer of quilts. I make new ones. Someone from church asked me to redo a quilt that an aunt had made her. I said no. They quilt came to me anyway in a plastic bag. My husband said immediately to put it in the garage. I did a post on its awfulness at that time. http://artinsearch.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-very-bad-quilt.html
     After washing and washing, I have moved it about 30 times and looked at it. It is made of upholstery fabric and a kind of polyester knit that was disintegrating and was tied. I had taken it all apart- batting, backings (more than one), binding (again sewn over), and tried to think how to fix it.
     Finally, in September, I made my mind up to get it done and out. It was not a good quilt when it was made, and it was not going to be attractive no matter what I did. I had to rip off the blue polyester strips holding the upholstery coins together- it could not be patched. 

Huge mess. I bought some bottom weight navy twill cotton for the strips and borders. Ripped it to length, sewed it to the coins. Added the bottom and top borders. It was a wobbly mess. Advice came in that I should have staystitched the upholstery fabric. Too late- it was going to get finished. 
    I put it on the long arm the long way across and basted it every 5" to keep it stable. Then I quilted it all in long lines along the longest direction. Ripped out all the basting. Put on a green plaid type binding. Bundled it all up and it went back to church on Sunday. I had thread/string crud everywhere with this beast- BUT- I finished it and it is gone. It literally sucked all the joy out sewing for me. It really did not look great- but it was clean, serviceable, and solidly sewn. I do not like the way it turned out, but did not know how else to restore and move it out. Trying to get it out of my mind.

A layout to sew and some pillowcase presents

     These diagonal variation blocks have sat in a plastic bag for a while. I think because I was going to make 2 comfort quilts out of them and have to add a lot of borders. The border fabric choices had me hung up. I put all of the blocks, but 4, on the wall, and I like the way it looks without any borders. It is a bit bigger than the comfort quilts I usually make, but that is ok, it looks good. This is easy block that I got from Liz at jellyrollfabric. It uses WOF strips, 2 1/2" colors and white WOF cut in half the long way. I sewed a fat, skinny, fat, skinny together using up all the jelly roll. Then, the strip sets are paired right sides together and sewn into a tube. The tube is cut at 45 degrees into triangles that open up into blocks. I marked the tops of the rows with painters tape and will sew them into a web first.

Blocks will finish at 7"

     My son in law, the other half of the chemistry professors duo, had a birthday last week and I did not get these done in time. They are finished now, and he will get them when they visit tomorrow.
     I can sew quilts and flat things pretty good, so pillowcases are up my alley. I take a lot of time and thinking to choose the body, sleeve and accent stripe, but sewing goes quick.

New Block Starts

       The fabric I bought in Ithaca with the flowers, I have cut into making One Block Wonder. A friend got me started because I forgot how to do it (it was over 1 1/2 years ago). I have all the triangles cut out and made some sample blocks.

Triangle sets

     I also had made some strip pairs for my mom to sew. I am now cutting them with a triangle to make double hourglass. 
     These blocks, just the first from the strips are just made from two contrasting WOF strips sewn the long way and then I used the Companion ruler (it makes a nice blunt point for matching ends) to cut triangles out of the strip. I sewed four matching triangles together for a block.

Batik strips and stagged white centers

      I have done a couple of quilts sewing the short ends of WOF strips- print to solid, so I have a tube. Usually, I have cut the solid color with the print ones in the center staggered. The black strip one was a recent one. This time, after my mom sewed the tubes, I cut the print, in this case, the batiks, and staggered the white in the center. It needs a good pressing and trimming before I get the backing ready.

The tubes

Had to hang outside to photo because of Tugger's refusal to move

Chief quilt tester

Red White Blue Five Stars out to serve!

On longarm

Front

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back

Back detail

Front detail

      I was able to get the 5 star quilt done, washed, label on, and delivered by my husband to our town supervisor as he covers from major heart surgery. I do want to make some more of this pattern. I kept the quilting to just straight lines  as I thought it fit the recipient's personality. 
      Done on my Nolting with Glide on the top and Omni on the bottom. No tension issues or breaking thread.

Small improv Lemoyne Star quilted. A Lot.

     I made a small lap quilt from made fabric for the Lemoyne Star, scavenged half square triangles and checkerboards discarded by others, and other fabric to tie the whole unit together. I finally loaded it on the longarm, and did lots of quilting on it. I am still pretty wobbly on the machine. I tried all sorts of patterns. I can do straight lines pretty well, but that is not what I really want to quilt.

Back

Details

The shadows come earlier now, will have to retake this soon.

Getting a clean(er) slate

     After a bunch of projects and rushing to finish the Red, White and Blue Stars, my sewing room was a big disaster. I spent an entire afternoon trying to put things away and simplify. I took before and after photos, and I am not sure if you can see the difference, but it certainly is so much more workable!

Tugger sees no problem with piles of fabric. More nests for him.

A bit overwhelming to start

Ready to sew. And make more mess.

I can see clear surfaces now.