Sandwich Workout.

 

Two more quilts are now joining the To-Be-Quilted-Queue, Trinket and Made It Work. My first step is re-ironing the top and the back that have been sitting around waiting to be sandwiched. Then I pin the back up on my design wall, smoothing out all the wrinkles (hopefully).

Then I place the quilt top onto the fusible batting and cut it out to size with some extra batting all around. I use Hobbs 80/20 fusible as it has the fusible on both sides of the batting unlike some others out there. I really dislike using pins to baste so I just go with what works for me.

Then the quilt top and batting are pinned up and smoothed out. Then I get some weight lifting in as I iron it on the wall.

Once it's all mainly fused up, I take it off the design wall and iron the front and back smoothing out any remaining wrinkles. So to be honest, all of that is a whole lot of ironing.

Then I put them in the To-Be-Quilted-Queue pile and think about the quilting designs and threads I'll be using. Whew! It's a workout for sure.

Made It Work Back

Time for a back to the Made It Work quilt top I just finished. This is all the leftovers from making it, many of which are from the freebie table at the BAM sew day.

 And done! With only a few additions from my blue fabric boxes. Ready for sandwiching tomorrow hopefully.

Made It Work

Here's where I left off working on the "Make It Work" quilt for the BAM community giving effort. Still not done, not big enough.

First step was to attach that right hand border.

That addition on the bottom is good but way too big.

Final border beginning possibilities. I chopped that bottom border in half and I'm much happier with it.

Not the final form quite yet but getting there.

All the way around now with a final border, but still not decided on exact placements of the pieces.

There we go, all done. The title is: "Made It Work"

Make It Work Again

 

I picked up a "Make It Work' baggie at a BAM sew day back in July. It was mostly filled with blocks made by various people and some pieces/parts that kind of sort of went together. I put this on my To-Do list for December, so it's been churned up to the stage of getting worked on once again. That's how that making a list thing works for me, it stirs up all the to-do stuff in my brain and makes more of it accessible.

I worked on assembling it at another Sew Day in September, but hadn't gotten back to finishing it off until now. I'd gotten stuck on a badly done angled seam that made everything not be flat. After some *un*sewing* it was pretty easy to get back to it. 

I ironed and put up the rest of the small and large pieces of fabric I'm maybe working with for the rest of this top. The dark fabric on the right will probably be the binding.

I have to decide how big to make this thing now. Probably will be at least "lap quilt" size.

December To-Do

 

Here's how my design wall was looking on December 1st. There's my half-way assembled Temperature Quilt, and then the three pieces of dyed yardage waiting for their second dye baths.

Here's my To-Do list for December:

Sew-a-Long Thingies

Trinket - layer and quilt.

Color Collective - Quilt and bind the Slopes Quilt, 

and make another side for the Clover Pillow with Swerves, start cutting for Colorwash

Temperature Quilt- cut remainder of needed pieces from newly dyed fabric, keep piecing monthly columns.

Pantone Project - keep making blocks and pass them on to friend Jaye.

Secret Lives of Color- it's still oh so very secret, keep reading the book and making the blocks, post some too.

Indigo Way - Begin work on this year's Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt. Assemble fabrics, make the first blocks.

New Work

Wedge Quilt - finish assembling quilt top, make a backing, quilt, bind, label.

A Hot One - planned quilt celebrating the color of the year, Viva Magenta.

Garment Sewing Academy - finish Cielo top.

Make It Work - assemble a quilt top out of the materials for BAMQG, make backing, layer, quilt, bind.

Make binding and finish the other BAMQG quilt for donation.

Dye Mastery Class - finish final unit on over-dyeing and patterning.

Finish It Already

Make a back for Metro Twist, layer, quilt, bind, label.

Finish quilting Japanese Houses, bind, label.

Y.E.S. Coat - lay out what I've made, make more elements, start assembling.

And finally and most importantly: finish making the gifts before Christmas.

That should keep me busy enough for December!

September Sew Day

 

Yesterday was Sew Day at BAMQG, and I got a lot of things done in addition to socializing of course. I cut out more backgrounds to use in the Metro Twist quilt and cut the other fabrics into shape as well. I pieced together half of them which are still yet to be trimmed in this picture. Unfortunately I didn't pack for Sew Day very well as my Quick Curve Ruler broke in the pocket of my rolling sewing machine tote. 😞Right at one of thinnest points on the edge. I put painters tape on it and worked out okay. I think I'll crazy glue it though .

The new donation quilt project is a 9-patch based design, and I got a bunch of pre-sorted stacks to sew together.

I got three blocks done, but as you'll notice two are prints on the corners, and one is background on the corners. I'm guessing that's part of the quilt design, needing some of each type of block. My plan is to use these for leaders and enders as I sew together the following:

The Make It Work bag that I took from the donation quilt table in July is now partially sewn together after my efforts at Sew Day. The outer sections aren't sewn in yet, they're just up on the design wall for now. I think I need to put some more solids in from my stash to "make it work". Also, I need to decide on what size quilt I'm shooting for here too. The Kitchen Sink Quilting class is definitely running through my head as I'm working on this.

Make It Work

 

I picked up a "Make It Work" bag from BAMQG Super Sew Day. I'm supposed to put these elements together into a quilt top for our guild donation efforts. It's going to be a challenge, but I really like the colors. Time to use my Kitchen Sink Quilting skills. On the left is part of the March Temperature Quilt layout.

I also was feeling happy about getting the Orange You Glad bullseye quilted so I also picked up an assembled donation quilt that needs quilting. It's fairly small and simple and the fabrics are super cute. I'm not going to densely quilt it so it'll get done quickly.It came all rolled up, a top, a back and the batting.

Cute fabrics, huh?

I like the fabrics on the backing.

After all the quilts had been photographed and rolled up and put away, that left behind the table runners. So here's a group photo of four of them before they get put in the closet where they should live unless they're out on tables. Three are recent finishes from this year, the Rock Candy on the left was from back when I did Journey2Nebula