Trimming Hourglasses

 

Feeling like I'm being extra pok-y slow on this first clue for the Lupine Mystery quilt. But I'm plugging away a few at a time. Here's the most recent batch, now that they are all trimmed up to size. That's about all I was up for as our power is out thanks to last night's big windstorm. Christmas Eve by candlelight maybe? But not on our tree, I promise! If you're celebrating, hope you're having a good one.

My total of sets of four matching hourglass units is up to a whopping fifteen out of twenty-four. Some of those lighter pinks are reading as quite yellow, if it's a problem I'll use some ink on them.

Tool Tuesday- Steady Betty(s)

 

One of my most frequently used tools is finally failing on me. At first I was a little mad about it, but then I realized I'd been using the Steady Betty pressing board for almost 10 years now. Just about daily. But unfortunately there are big tears in the material that make the board so useful. 

There are tears on both sides of the board. I don't remember seeing these begin, all of a sudden they're just there. They don't affect the performance of the board as far as ironing goes. But I'm pretty sure I can't just glue these down as it would either not stick well enough, or melt the foam, or make a lump under the pressing surface that would translate to the fabrics I'm pressing. The tears are just going to get worse if they aren't repaired or secured.

Besides the two big tears, there's a lot of little pieces missing, especially on or near the edges. Maybe from using pins and/or scissors on and around the board?

Or...perhaps some of the holes were started by studio assistant claws (as pictured above in action)? That probably didn't help matters.

But I also noticed that the same thing is happening with my Betty Bands, which the studio assistants do not use. I think this grippy foam material is just not endlessly robust. It wears out with use (like most things), which is really not terribly surprising. 

So, Merry Christmas to me...I ended up replacing both the mat and the machine quilting bands. They arrived today with very cute Sharpie-art on the package.

 Hopefully I'll get ten more years out of these. It's so much lighter, and a bit bigger. The edges are a little strange, but it seems like very similar foam. Now to maybe make something out of the old mat. Perhaps I'll cover it with canvas and use it for a surface to have for pressing underneath the wool mat I have in my traveling kit.

 

And unfortunately I didn't notice the redesign of the Betty Bands on their website, they no longer have adjustable velcro, so they do not fit my hands very well at all. I will be doing some modifying to be able to use these!

Four More Sets

 

Well, I guess I wasn't paying close enough attention, can you see the mistake that I made on these parts of the hourglass blocks for the Lupine Mystery quilt, clue one.

Yes, that polka dot is sewn with the wrong side showing.

But I think it looks better sewn wrong, as these are "supposed" to be neutrals, and the right side is much brighter, too bright.

There's a big big difference between the two "pinks". And that one batik is reading as too purple instead of "ice blue".

But from farther away, they're interesting and different enough from each other to have that variation I"m going for. That makes fourteen sets done (once these are trimmed to size), and thus ten more sets to go for Clue 1.

Ten Hourglasses

 

All ten sets of four hourglasses are trimmed and done for Clue 1 of the Lupine Mystery Quilt. Now to make either 14 or 16 more sets. I'm definitely pushing the definition of pink.

More Hourglasses

 Six more sets of four hourglass block units for the first clue of the Lipine Mystery Quilt are all sewn together and pressed, but not yet trimmed to size.

Still Clue 1

I'm finally getting back to working on the Lupine Mystery quilt. It feels like it's been absolute ages, even though it was just about 2 weeks ago. Still in Clue 1, here's another group of four matching hourglass units. 

I wasn't sure how that plaid was going to work out, but I think it looks nice.

Then because I've been think of blocks due to the BAMQ BOM, I played around with them a bit.

1/4 square triangles really make for different block options than HSTs.

Four out of 26 sets are done now. And then my wrist said "Hey!' so I stopped for the day.

Arranging Time

 

Another day, another short sewing session so I don't over-do it with my wrist. It's feeling a lot better, but I'm trying to be careful. Thankfully, I found that I had already cut out the majority of the remaining Patchwork Palooza sashing strips at Sew Day earlier this month. That made it easy to sew the cornerstones that I cut out yesterday.

The pile all ready to be ironed.

Nice and flat.

All ironed and ready to go up on the wall with the blocks.

Now it's arranging and re-arranging time. Looks like I made some extras? So that means I have more flexibility and can take out the cornerstones that are either too prominent or distracting.

Cornerstones

 

After a few days off, I couldn’t resist doing a little *something* in my sewing room, and so I cut out the twenty six remaining cornerstones for the Patchwork Palooza quilt. My wrist was feeling good enough for that at least. And then instead of cutting the corresponding background strips and sewing them together, I quit for the day. Don’t want to re-injure myself.

More Advent FQ's

 

My right wrist is really hurting, I think I strained it while I was traveling. That means that I'm taking a few days off of sewing activities to rest it up. So here's the most recent Advent FQ's up to the 11th, and some goodies that have come along in the envelopes as well.

Here's all of them so far, stacked up together. Would I have chosen these fabrics? Definitely some of them, but overall I like the choices so far. When you look at them together, the color palette and variety of prints work. I think they'll end up making a good quilt next year.

Snuffle Mat

 

At the BAMQ December meeting/Sew Day, we had a swap which I hadn't managed to make anything for. It was fun to watch even though I wasn't participating. There ended up being one thing left by one of our new members, Eleanor. She was so sweet to gift me with it. It's called a Snuffle Mat. This is for a dog, you hide treats in the flappy pieces of fleece, flannel and other fabric. Then they snuffle around and "hunt" for the treats. Meg loved it. She was done so fast I didn't have time to take a picture!

I had to flip it over to see how it was put together. It's such a great re-use of jeans. The whole thing is easily washed as well. Here's a video on how to make a different type of snuffle mat.

Davenport Trees & Sky Stitching

I was actually wandering on a Wednesday, yesterday that is. So, here's the stitching that I did while I was away. Two more lengths of variegated blue embroidery thread have been added to the sky in Snake In The Garden while I waited for my plane to board.

It was a rainy and windy morning in Spokane, so I was very glad I was inside stitching.

Also, strangely, there were birds indoors at the Peet's Coffee in the airport. They were nesting up above on top of the giant monitor screens that display great outdoors scenery. You know, like where the birds are actually supposed to be. I can't imagine they get enough calories out of the scone crumbs on the floor from Peets.

And this time, during the visit, I got to stay in the fancy old hotel, The Davenport, which was all done up for Christmas. Isn't that such a lovely tree?

The second floor was hosting a raffle fundraising event for the Spokane Symphony, so I went upstairs to check it out and got a great view of the big central lobby tree.

There were nine fully decorated trees (that's the LEGO one above) that came with "major prizes", actually they were prize packages worth $1,000's. It was quite a to-do, was absolutely packed with families in the evening, but still very fun to walk around and enjoy.

 

Wandering Wednesday - BAMPFA

 

This year on Black Friday we ventured up to Berkeley and went to the really awesome exhibit, Routed West: 21st Century African American quilts in California at BAMPFA (Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archives). I'm not going to share all the pictures I took, there's way too many. But here are some closeups of things I noticed or really loved.

These super cheery color choices with the curves and stripes was a really fun combination.

This block is very beautiful, I think it would have to be done by hand piecing.

A great example of finding a print you really love and then basing a quilt design off of it.

Each square stuffed, sewn shut and then sewn together. I loved the worn-in blues in this one, it look so cozy and comfy.

This particular yellow is just so beautiful with these fabrics. I don't think I've seen triangles and then curvy triangles used with this Sunflower block, so very pretty.

I just loved the orange used for this one, so vibrant along with the string pieced circles.

I don't know if it's this block or the fabrics used, but the spiky parts look curvy to my eye. It's very interesting and now I want to try a block like this.

I want a tile floor or a rug with this pattern and these colors, just so excellent.

I've never seen a hexie quilt arranged quite like this, much less the print hexies are string pieced as well!

And right outside at the corner intersection, the stop light post is covered in BAMPFA stickers. What a terrific exhibit, and if you happened to miss it in person, I really recommend the exhibit book. It has great pictures of the quiltmakers and a lot of historical information.