Last Thursday, I sewed the inner border of the quilt (the black border) during class time and the homework was to sew, at home, the outer border (the fall print fabric I picked out first when I initially conceived of what will soon become a wall hanging).Earlier today, I finished my homework and am pleased with the results. This coming week, we'll do the binding and maybe the actual quilting (today I also bought my "walking foot" for that purpose -- I have to say I love these quilting terms!).
When I did my first outer border strip, I somehow didn't piece it right and ended up having to do the "frog stitch" (as the Mom of Dr. S, an accomplished quilter, told me it's called): rip it, rip it rip it! It's amazing what an exercise in patience it is to rip the tiny seams of a quilted piece. But I need to cultivate that virtue so I just did it and paid more attention the second time around.
Not only is my small quilt coming along, but yesterday I also placed my pre-tenure review materials on reserve in the library and in a box (with color-coded folders!) in my department's secure closet. While my actual review doesn't start until January (since I'm on leave this fall), I wanted my colleagues to have access to the materials earlier, rather than later, so that those who want to work ahead of the deadline can do so.
This is also the completion of my 49th year, which I will celebrate on October 29th, with my mami (who arrives tomorrow!!) and my husband. I have decided that for my 50th birthday I will come up with some big shindig (perhaps even a restorative trip to the Red Mountain Spa, where I've been wanting to go for years). We'll see.
For now, I'm thankful for the way that endings become beginnings and beginnings signal endings. As my favorite month, October, comes to a close, along with these other projects, different ones await (perhaps even a winter quilt?).
5 comments:
You will love the walking foot! It makes sure that all of the layers of the quilt are fed through the machine at the same rate, so you don't get puckers. I use it for sewing the binding on my quilts as well as machine quilting. Can you drop the feed dogs on your machine? If you can, then you might want to play around with free motion quilting. There are so many neat quilting adventures ahead of you!
If you set the stitch length just a tiny bit longer it's easier to take things apart. Also, use the seam ripper to pop out every fifth or sixth stitch. Then just pull the bobbin thread.
Finally--aren't you glad I read your blog? :) --make a little sandwich of your scraps and experiment on it before you start quilting on your wallhanging. It will save you lots of ripping.
Good luck, and remember that this is supposed to be fun!
and Happy Birthday! :)
Dear Mother of Dr. S: Thanks for the birthday wishes! I can't believe I'm turning 49!! Augh!
And I love that you read the blog. I showed my mom (who's visiting) the gorgeous quilt you gave me and she said it was the most beautiful she'd ever seen. :) I'm really inspired by your design and hope to attempt my own version sometime in the future.
The walking foot is great! I'm not ready for free-motion quilting yet, especially given that I have trouble keeping my quilting stitch straight as I go through the blocks... :)
I've started quilting the wallhanging so I'll be finishing that over the next week or so, before class next Thursday when we'll be putting the binding on and the sleeve to hang it, and we'll be done!
Thanks again for all your great ideas and advice and encouragement! :)
49! Believe me, the best is yet to come!
Try watching where you're going with your quilting stitch, rather than watching the needle. Does that make sense? Think of the needle as a pen, and your quilting as what you're writing with it. The more you do, the better and more comfortable you'll become.
Enjoy your time with your mom.
Dear Mother of Dr. S: I hope so! That's good advise about not watching the needle, because when I do my stitch gets all messed up. And the quilting is harder to rip than the piecing.
Thanks also for the great quilting books Dr. S gave me today. That's very kind of you. I'll put them to good use for sure!
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