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!

October Temperature Column

 

Back to working on finishing up on piecing the Temperature Quilt.  The October column has been up on the design wall for a while. And I finally made the decision to put it together.

I used the wooden clapper on each seam sewn and it really helped to keep it flat.

I like how it looks on the back! The Wonderclips really work well to hold it together and out of the way when it's almost done.  Less stretching and holes in the fabric.

Here's how July through October is looking. Two more months left to piece together now.

Here's a closer look at the columns. After the summer introduction of hotter colors, I'm liking this more and more.

September Sewn

Trying to get a little more room on the design wall to work with the Bohemian Wife quilt so it's time to get the September column for the Temperature Quilt sewn together.

It goes together pretty quickly once I get back into the rhythm.

Once again, I'm very pleased to be working with all of these beautiful colors that I've hand-dyed.

By the end of the column, it goes to the black pieces, and my eyes were extra tired so I got out the around-the-neck flexible light that I have to help a bit. Black on black is extra hard, so the extra light in the right place really helped.

Tah-Dah!! There's the third quarter of 2023 done, July August, September. On to the fall and winter and getting this done.

I'm keeping the columns carefully folded up and protected in this nice large project bag that friend Jaye made for me. Pretty sure that there's enough room for the next three columns.
 

Hourglass Begun

 

The new prompt for Project Quilting is Hourglass. That made me think of how a couple years ago I was trying out some Gelli Plate experiments and was quite pleased with this image of my desk hourglass that I drew and painted on the plate.

I printed that picture out on printer fabric and decided it needed some sort of frame. That meant it was time to make some hourglass blocks for the corners. I used this great pattern/tutorial to make them pretty easily out of my hand-dyes.

I used the technique of drawing two lines diagonally on a square using the Seams Easy tool and a Sewline marker.

Cut the square apart on the diagonal between the two stitched lines.

And then before moving the two pieces, cross cut again.

Ready to sew the pieces of the hourglasses together.

Trimming the blocks down to size, I happily re-discovered the criss-crossing 45° dotted lines on the end of a Quilter's Select ruler. Very handy.

The border needed something a bit muddier to tone down the brightness of the hourglasses vs. the printed out image. This is one of my all-time favorite ever dyed pieces, it's a linen/hemp woven checked fabric that was dyed and over-dyed again. Using this fabric is going to count towards an entry in the President's Challenge for BAM this year. Using the precious, I'm doing it. That's for tomorrow.

Solid Choices

Post Pineapple Express Storm Report: Our power is still OUT, cell service is BACK, internet is still very miraculously ON. Our solar production is just barely powering the house, with a little trickle left over to recharge our nearly depleted backup batteries. So there'll be no sewing for me today unless the sun really really starts shining on this day in-between rain storms or that PG&E gets around to turning our power back on.

I've signed up to make the Temperature Quilt with JayBird Quilts over the next year. She had some recommended tools on the first class instructions, so I went ahead and got them. First is her new release of Fussy Cut Shapes templates. They have a nice see-through yet still dark 1/4" edge which helps to figure out your fussy cutting placements. I have found that I like fussy cutting (go figure, right?!) and I think these are really usable sizes that work well with her other rulers.

The second tool was one I haven't used before, it's the Clover Hold It Precision Stiletto,  It has a silicone tip which is grippy for guiding fabric through the machine. The silicones also heat resistant, so you can use it with your iron.

Instead of doing this quilt in all solids, I'm considering using hand-dyes and/or small prints in addition. These ones in the picture are the ones left over from making the Sightlines Triptych. The problem is having enough of one particular fabric to represent that particular temperature throughout the making of the whole quilt. Also, I really really like the look of the all-solids quilt.

Along with the tools, I (of course) bought some fabrics. It's always to not pay shipping, that always works on me.

I'm pretty excited about the Pantone Color of the Year for 2023, Viva Magenta. So I ordered some of the Kona solid color of the year, Crush, which is awfully close. Along with it, I chose a few other hot colors, for a quilt I want to make this year, potentially entitle Hot Hot Hot. My initial idea is to make two versions of the same block with each color, using the Crush as the foreground and the background. I'll have to plan that out in EQ8 I think.

The Binding Tool

I was recently searching for a ruler in my ruler drawer, and found this gizmo that I've never used, The Binding Tool. It has pretty unhelpful instructions printed on it and a now-defunct website on it. 

I had a couple quilts that I'd nearly finished sewing on the binding for and was at that final dreaded step that always gives me so much trouble so I thought I'd search and see if there was any information online about using this thing.

I found a very helpful video from Missouri Star Quilting Co. from 12 years ago detailing its use. And what do you know, it worked for me! Really really well, like perfectly. I feel silly for not having figured out The Binding Tool, but now that I know, I will never dread that final going round the quilt step on sewing on binding. 

In Conclusion: If I didn't have one, I think I'd buy one. That's the best review of a tool like this I suppose.

 

Only One Bag Full

 

A big bag full of PIQF purchases all stacked up on my table. I took some pictures before I put everything away so I can remember where this stuff came from.

This Halloween FQ stack came home mainly due to the hilarious grinning bug print. 

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The others are also great together. I think I might make another table runner (I know I know), this time for our coffee table. Then that's 24 (2 per month) that I "can" make without too many eyebrows being raised.

In the same booth, Quilts by Kat, I met Kathy Allen who is the author of this super interesting book, ModernScot. She even signed it for me, how fun is that? What a brilliant idea, to make quilts based on the traditional tartan patterns. The booth was filled with examples from her instructions and they are really beautiful quilts, I can't wait to make one for my mom inspired by her family's tartan.

ThimbleCreek Quilts had this really nice selection of Alison Glass +-sign batiks packaged up, and sometimes I just can't resist a rainbow.... I almost almost bought this halloween quilt kit.

This was the first thing I bought, the barkcloth Charley Harper skull with a bird in the eyehole print will become a bag of some kind. The two Tula Pink solids were just because the colors sang together. Can you imagine an entire quilt made out of this fabulous combo? Or maybe we should change Christmas colors to this pairing? A Christmas quilt in these colors, that's the ticket! I may have to get my hands on some yardage...

And lastly, an interesting new-to-me tool, Scrap Tape, from the Batty Lady booth. It's a water dissolving stabilizer to make 2.5" "fabric" out of your scraps, sew, flip and then sew in to a quilt. Then the stabilizer washes out, stay tuned...I'm interested in how this will work. Super Scrappy Sashing in a solids quilt, or?

Tool Tuesday: The Clapper

 

I think I found this new tool via instagram somehow, but don't quote me on that. I mean, that was a whole two weeks ago and I can't recall. 

But...it's a clapper!

Nope, not that kind! (sorry,  just couldn't resist) 

 This is the one made for flattening seams in blocks and other sewn seams. You iron your block and then set this device down on the seam and it holds the heat in and weights the fabric just enough to really make the ironing work better without the risk of distortion.

 I haven't gotten to use it yet, so no performance review from me as of this writing. But this is a lovely lovely tool, the wood is beautiful and smooth, the weight is just right, and there are grooves on the sides for your fingers. And as you can see, the seller offers personalization. 

There's a strike of Etsy sellers ( protesting seller fees being jacked up 30% !!) going on right now that RossieCrafts is participating in, but for next week, here's the link to go check it out. 

If you want to support the strike, the Etsy sellers participating are asking people to not shop on Etsy this week April 11-18. 

FYI: the participating sellers have put their shops on vacation mode.

Last Shop of the Month

One of the things about being subscribed to bunches of newsletters for various sewing businesses is sometimes they catch your eye and you go buy stuff. Sew Sweetness got me when they highlighted these beautiful woven labels. I ordered three kinds, and may or may not actually use them as actual labels, we shall see. And then some OdiCoat, which I need to use on some fabric to make a tablecloth for our deck table.

Closer up on the label, very very finely made. Beautiful even.

The other thing I bought from Sew Sweetness is a MyPad. I've been frustrated lately with remembering which needle I have in my machine and the letters on them are so teeny tiny and the color on the needle shaft isn't always terribly helpful. So enter the MyPad as a possible solution. The idea is, you stick the needle you used for only a little bit and is still good and sharp, but an unusual one in the corresponding location on this foam pad. I don't like putting a slightly used needle back in the plastic package because then I'll think it's brand new the next time I go to use one. The yellow flower head pin is to indicate the current needle you've got loaded in your machine.

Of course I had to modify the thing immediately to account for the Chrome needle I'm using right now. But that's okay, my mod cancels out the visually objectionable gigantic MYPAD on the bottom right.

It was an extra good mail day because my Quilty Box came and it's allll purple-y, yay! I had always wanted a BobbinSaver and just never bought one. It's so nice not to have to dig around in the machine foot box for my bobbins, very handy. The green thing is a magnet that you put on your spool to hold your needle on. Not quite clear on how that works.

Again, this month, the fabrics were not ones that I would pick in a store, but are nonetheless perfectly fine and are going to look great in the quilt pattern seen to the right. I have a bolt of a very nice navy fabric to use for the setting strips.