Ties That Bind

Last Saturday I put the final stitch into the binding of this,

Roughly 70" x 92"

wrote and ironed the label,

then flang it into the washer (hot water) then dryer (high heat) (I abuse the quilts before the owners get a chance, so I can assure them it's already gone through worse than they'll ever do to it). If I timed it right, I could get it delivered before my son went to bed (I had no idea what Jesse's schedule was, but I could see with my own eyes that Carl was still awake because he was streaming on Twitch).

Rather than try to fit everything into a label, I wrote my thoughts in a card. Lots more room to really describe what went into the decision to gift this.

Countdown to Completion

Sweltering through another day indoors, where at least the temperatures don't get above 86ºF. The A/C repairman is due tomorrow around noon. Fingers crossed it's a quick fix!

10 June edit: It was (new capacitor installed). In addition, the day has been relatively cool and breezy--all the windows in the house are open so we can enjoy this unexpected nice weather.
 

Today I'm working on the borders of Jesse's quilt, free-motioning this Feather Chain pattern. It might turn out to be my new favorite! The yellow AURifil thread blends well on this fabric, but the pattern itself is easy enough to eyeball and doesn't really need the extra 'help' of a busy pattern to hide my ham-handed efforts. Feather patterns tend to break my brain, but this one is so simple that I can execute it smoothly and consistently.

An empty bobbin called the end of today's quilting. Just 2 sides of the yellow border to quilt, then the final black&white border. I just remembered, however, that I've got to create a label and get it sewn to one of the unquilted corners! Then I can finish the quilting on this and get it bound, washed, and delivered.

Jesse's Girl

Today as I continued to quilt this Bowtie beauty, it quietly told me who it would belong to (not these rascals).

Wraith has very deliberately kicked the towel out of his way.

Unstuck...and stuck

Today I exposed the towel-covered lump on my quilting table and discovered it was this, last blogged about in August 2019:

It was a lack of any quilting inspiration that was holding me back. I didn't want to do the same wiggly design I had done in my previous bowtie, but knowing what I didn't want to do wasn't helping me to find what I did want to do!

Here There Be Pins

The Loud started his new semester today--he'll be teaching for long, 9-to-10-hour days every Tuesday and Thursday for the next few months. This leaves me with a quiet house all to myself, free to listen (or not) to whatever I wish, and monopolize any surface I need for the day.

Today it's the pinning/dining room table. This is where I'll be all day and probably into the evening:

Ignarcrescence

That's right, I made that up. I was searching for a word that describes the ability of something to grow while being completely ignored and untouched. I mentally pronounce it as IG-nar-CRESC-ence, but I suppose ig-NAR-crescence would work too.

Anyone familiar with this phenomenon can probably surmise, correctly, that I just opened up a "Projects On Unlimited Timeout" container (ha! just made up a new quilting acronym, too!) My design wall was empty, you see, and I thought I'd pull out the oldest UFO I could remember lurking about and take an accounting:

This was #4 on my MEQ Hit List, the "I Spy" quilt.

Back in the saddle

March. MARCH!

That was the last time I did any quilting on this!!

Yesterday (Saturday) I wandered into the sewing room, thinking I would sew together some of the blocks lurking about on the design wall, but instead I decided to sit down at my quilting machine and get over myself.

True confessions: my quilting machine intimidates me, a little.

Sneezy, grumpy, sleepy, and dopey

If there were characters named Whiny and Coughy, I'd be channeling them too, but not wine-y OR coffee. This nasty cold, that has had me mostly couch-bound since the end of February, makes coffee taste bitter, and the wine hurts my mouth. Even chocolate holds no interest right now. Of all the times to be completely disinterested in the things that comfort me!

My robe quilt has been my constant companion, and Wraith will even snuggle with me on the couch while I'm under it. Normally he doesn't cuddle, so that was a nice treat. Of course, he's probably just waiting for me to be done with it so he can go back to claiming it as his own.

National Drink Wine Day

Hubby informed me seconds ago that today is "National Drink Wine Day", the irony being that I'm low on that very substance and I was within walking distance of a supply several times today while running errands! Arrrgh!!

Perhaps had I been a little less ... erm ... "generous" last night, I'd have something to enjoy tonight. (Or, I could jump back into the car and fix this problem right now!) I don't know if it helped my free-motion quilting last night (emphasis on "free"), or just helped me accept the organic-ness of the results (I was aiming for in-the-ditch).

Bowties

Peruse the web, and you'll find a bazillion patterns for bowtie quilts. Here's one more.

I was captivated by Bonnie Hunter's Cheddar Cheese quilt, but there were 2 things about it I felt needed to be changed:
     1) Orange,
     2) The pattern called for 2" and 1.25" squares.

After spending hours upon hours organizing my scraps (using Bonnie's Scrap User System) into 1.5", 2", 2.5", and 3.5" squares, bricks, and strips, I had no desire to trim yet again! So rather than use her measurements, I chose to rummage in my 2.5" and 1.5" boxes for matching and complementary squares.

That's when I started to ponder the possibility of using the 1.5"x2.5" bricks to achieve the two little corner pieces (the "knot" in the bowtie), and discovered that it works beautifully and has very little waste. So here's the pictorial tute:

Bowtie block, using 2.5" squares and 1.5"x2.5" bricks