FMQ challenge continues

So far I have been able to do the FMQ challenge for the last 7 days. I seem to only grab a 15 –30 minutes time frames, but at least I am doing in each day. Thanks Wendy and Joanne for the challenge, it was just what I needed to jump start the FMQ again. Here is what I have been doing for the my day 6 and day 7.

For day 6 I finally figured out the swirl design for my daughter’s quilt. It was staring right at me in one of the fabrics in the quilt.

It’s feather design with swirly curls for the feathers. I wanted to quilt the red blocks in red and the only red thread that I had left was a spool of invisfil 100 wt. poly.

So I did one small area and it was a dream of a thread to work with, I melted into the fabric and showed very little wobble in the back tracking areas. The small area that is next to the swirl feather is about 1/5” wide by 1”  long. The invisfil thread is so fine that you can get very detail in the spacing and control of your movements. If you ever get a chance to work with this thread, do try you will be amazed by control you can have.

On day 7 I started the quilting the red blocks in DD quilt, going slow and that is OK. I mark each 3” block with a pilot frixion pen just enough to see. It might take me the next 7 days to do this quilt, at least I will have been working on it and not folded up in the corner. One thing that I noticed about this design is that every now and then the swirls form a heart shape, fitting for who the quilt is going to.

Cheryl M.

Eye opening experience

Why is it that when things spin out of control for a day or two, it takes two weeks to recover. The out of control started in thinking that I could clean my sewing room up in a couple of hours and after 2 weeks it is more of a disaster than when I started. With things all over the place I seem to not be able to sew. Then I came down with a sinus infection and strep throat, that laid me out for about 4 days. One thing after another seems to be getting in my way with finishing my charity quilt. I have 4 braids done and the dark purple bought. So if I have a couple of hours to sew I might be able to sew the top together before Thursday, which is when it needs to be done.
The one thing that I have been looking forward to for a long time is taking a classes at the guild retreat from Harriet Hargrave this last weekend. Oh my gosh it was a eye opening experience that will stay with me for a long time. In the quilting area of sewing I have felt that people where missing something in the quality or lack of knowing the correct things when it came to small things in the quilting area overall. Like the proper thread, and needles, how to lay out the fabric to get a straight grain cut. Since my background comes from the garment construction and heirloom sewing, quilting people always did it differently just because someone that quilted said so. That the two worlds of garment and quilting where not to be intermixed. Ms Hargrave has the idea that you have to have a good understanding of the correct basic, not the idea of what is new and neat gizmo that will do the magic trick and everyone is quilting. She was saying things that I learned from my mother and aunt 40 years ago, I just take it for granted that others learned it also, but the case is not so. Several people that I have meet have only quilted and pieced for only about 5 or 10 years, when it started to become popular to quilt.
The things that you need to do is get back to basics, have a good sewing machine, turn off the automatic buttons, and practice. Find the speed and hand rhythm that is comfortable for you, may it be slow or medium, not fast and quilt away.
She has a new book series out that is called quilters academy, you work through the book step by step and understand the ideas and basic to know the correct way to do things. I am hopeing that my daughter Angel will work through it with my help. That maybe I can start teaching classed on this series in the local area. My hopes are looking up in that there is a place in the quilting area that will satisfy my need for my last career.