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Quilting Time

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Happy New Year!

On Thursday this week Maria invited Ida and me over for a day of quilting in her recently cleaned studio.

When we arrived we found her living room to be a feast for the eyes. She had her lovely Christmas quilts hanging on the wall.

and many other beautiful quilts folded over ladders.

Along with clocks! So many clocks! And they were all at different times!

So, we had to ask. Her answer got me to thinking about time – a thought very pertinent, since we’ve just started a new year. Time can crawl, or it can fly (like all of 2016). It is also of the essence, and this related to Maria’s reply.

She said that time is very, very precious. It’s the most valuable thing we have. Food, things, people, and just about everything else can be replaced, but when time is gone – it’s gone. She loves to go thrift store shopping and look for old or interesting clocks. This was the point when we noticed none of the clocks were at the current time. When asked she replied her clocks represented important dates in her life: her dad’s birthday, March 12, was 3:12 on one of the clocks. Her birthday, October 9, is 10:09. Each clock meant something. Wow! I had never noticed that a 12 hour clock could represent the dates for a 12 month year.

Then she showed us the one set for three o’clock to represent the time of Christ’s death for her sins. She said she has the alarm on her phone set for that time each day, so she will pause and remember His sacrifice. I think I may be in need of a few more clocks  🙂 .

We each got quite a bit of quilting done, plus a lot of good conversation, and a nice lunch out. Maria showed us the quilt she’s been working on for almost a year, Jinny Beyer’s Moonglow. She has one more border for the top to be finished.

Gorgeous! Thanks Maria, for a delightful, and insightful, day.

My wish for the new year is that you will have time to do what you love, and to spend with those you love. And that you will use it wisely. God bless you in 2017!

Merry Christmas 2016!

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Joy to the World!

I love Christmas! It is such a joyful time of year. And when it snows, everything is so beautiful! We’ve had 5 major snow falls so far and I feel like I’m living in a winter wonderland.

I enjoy the preparations for Christmas. One of my favorite pre-Christmas activities is to “ring and sing” for the Salvation Army. My friend Sharon and I have done this for over 15 years, and this year Margaret joined us.

One of my family’s Christmas traditions is to bake Christmas cookies together. My mom and I haven’t missed a year since I was able to help. This year Betsy, Sommer and Trey joined in the fun.

My dad was in charge of helping the kids “unwrap the Hershey kisses”.

Christmas Eve and Christmas day we were blessed to celebrate with all the family who live nearby. I couldn’t resist having our family Christmas picture taken in front of my round robin Christmas quilt this year. Merry Christmas from the Kirsch house!

Many gifts were exchanged, but the most amazing gift of Christmas is that God became man, lived, died and rose again, out of love for each of us. Oh come let us adore Him – Christ the Lord!

Quilts and Staples?

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It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas in our woods. Last week we got a few inches of snow, so I headed out to take some pictures. This was my favorite:

Yesterday we brought the canoe into the barn just in time for more snow. The pond is now frozen over, the birds are loving our feeder, and it looks like we’ve had about 6″ more so far.  I think it’s beautiful!

This week’s post has nothing to do with snow, but I hope you enjoy it!

You may remember a post I did last Spring about rust dyeing (click here to read that post). My friend Ida created a couple of pieces of rust-dyed fabric when our group experimented with the technique. Well – she decided to do something with a piece of that fabric. She added a Seminole border in wonderful matching fabrics.

idas-rust-quilt

Our group had discussed the difficulty of quilting rust dyed fabric. The rust leaves enough metal in the fabric to make some areas impenetrable to a needle, thus making the quilting step a frustrating experience. Ida surmounted that problem by “tying/tacking” her quilt with brass staples!

idas-staples1 rust dyeing

Ingenious! And just when you think there’s nothing new under the sun. Leave it to my very creative friend Ida – to come up with the perfect solution.

Stapling your quilt… it might become the new, “in” way to quilt!

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An Exciting Update for quilters in and out of Wisconsin!

This past week I received good news about the Treasured Quilts of Wisconsin video on pbs. The entire show is now available on-line. So, even my out of State viewers can access it! Here’s the link!

http://video.wpt.org/video/2365906809/
Join host Nancy Zieman for this special featuring interviews, stories and quilts.

Scarecrow Faces

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Important information about our upcoming cruise

Our Sew We Go cruise from Quebec to Boston in September of 2017 is going to be norwegian-dawnspectacular! And we still have a few cabins left. Because this is such a popular cruise, most cabins not spoken for by December 26 will be released back to Norwegian Cruise Lines. So, if you’ve been contemplating joining in on the fun, we need to hear from you soon. This could be a wonderful addition to your Christmas “wish list”. For all the details go to: http://www.chrisquilts.net/trips/, or to open a printable pdf click here!”

***And now for my topic of the week***

While teaching in Nebraska last year, I found a pattern for a table runner I just had to have.
topsy-turvy-scarecrow-pattern
To order your own pattern go to: Happy Hollow Designs!

I usually like to design my own projects, but these scarecrows were just too cute, and I promised myself I would make it this year! I pulled it out in the beginning of September only to realize I didn’t really feel like tracing/cutting out all those little pieces. Inspiration struck when I thought about scanning the pattern into my Brother Scan ‘n Cut™, and letting this wonderful machine do the tedious work. It was a great project for me to learn more about what my Scan ‘n Cut™ can do (to read my previous Scan ‘n Cut™ post click here).

Once the pieces were all fused and cut out, Sommer helped me to “build” the scarecrows. She was disappointed when I ironed them down

scarecrows-faceless

and machine blanket stitched around them,

scarecrows-stitching

because she couldn’t keep playing with them. So she offered to draw the faces. I stalled until mommy came to pick her up. That night I told Mike about it and he said I should let her. Duh!

The next day I had her draw some faces on paper first. We talked about different expressions, and shapes for eyes and mouths. I was amazed at how confident she was. Then I handed her a washout marker (grandma loves her, but she’s not crazy 😀 !) and stepped back. Without hesitation she drew every face: boom! boom! boom! She was done and never even needed to turn the piece around to draw the upside down scarecrows!!!

 

scarecrow faces scarecrow-faces-detail2

And here’s the finished runner:

scarecrow faces

I love them! I traced over Sommer’s lines with permanent marker. I think it’s my favorite table runner ever.

Garment Art

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Before I get to this week’s topic – I have some exciting news! I finished my most recent contest quilt this past month, and sent the photos and entry papers to the National Quilt Museum in Paducah 24 hours before the deadline. The New Quilts From an Old Favorite challenge block this year was “Flying Geese”. My quilt is entitled “Silly Goose” and it was accepted as a finalist!!! It will be hanging in the museum during quilt week this April – praise the Lord! I can’t share pictures until after the judging, but I learned a lot while creating this project and can’t wait to post about it in the future.

And now – my topic of the week:

I have a jacket I made to wear while presenting my “Gone to the Dark Side” lecture, but I like it so much I wear it often (and Mike is ok to be seen with me wearing it in public  🙂 .

quilted art jacket

quilted art jacket

I may have shared the jacket previously but, if you haven’t seen my lecture, you haven’t heard the story.

I often refer to my fabric stash and UFO’s as items that are marinating until they reach the perfect time to be used and enjoyed. Usually a project hits the UFO bin because I’m not sure what to do next, and it’s not until I learn a new technique that will work in it, or I have a person or contest to finish it for, that that particular project comes to fruition.

Way back in the mid 90’s I found a yard of fabric in a remnant bin at JoAnn Fabrics that grabbed me.

dark-side-fabric

I wasn’t sure it was even all cotton, but I didn’t care. I bought it, brought it home, and threw it in the stash (a healthy stash needs to be fed regularly).

A few years later I passed by a clearance shoe rack at a major department store and found a pair of shoes in the exact same fabric (and I did still wear this type of shoe back then)!

dark-side-shoes

Now I’m sure I need to use that fabric in a garment, so I buy the shoes and throw them on a shelf near the stash.

A few years later I’m at a discount store and there it is … a purse in the same fabric!

dark-side-purse

So I threw it on the shelf, next to the the shoes and pulled out the fabric. After pulling some additional fabrics from my stash, and finding a jacket pattern in the pattern box, I began string pieced units for the jacket fronts. About an hour into it I lost interest and everything was thrown into a brown paper sack and pushed to the back of the shelf.

Additional years passed until I met a trio of garment sewers at a Sewing and Quilting Expo, who referred to quilting as “the dark side” of the sewing world. This led me to create the “Dark Side” lecture. As I’m putting this lecture together I realize it would be great to have a “costume” to wear while presenting it. I dig to the back of the closet, decide I still like the fabric, and discover the shoes still fit. I also have a newer jacket pattern that I really like. It’s called the “As You Wish” jacket by Kate Art Designs. This is not only a well done pattern that is easy to use, but Kate has a video in which she shares the perfect way to fit your jacket on her site.

The marinating is finished, all the necessary components have come together, and the time to create the finished project has arrived.

I marked each pattern piece at the correct size, and cut it out about 1″ larger than needed from  3 fabrics: the outer fabric, the lining and a piece of flannel to act as a thin batting/filler. I layered each piece and began the fun part – creating a design. I played with design techniques from my most recent book: “Where Do I Start With Fiber Art”.

Where-Do-I-Start-With-Fiber-Art

Squares and square-spirals were fused in place and then secured with top-stitching. The solid yellow areas are made from ultrasuede.

The sleeves yelled at me “don’t overdo it”, so I continued the square theme in a “Big-Stitch” with embroidery floss (click here for a post on the Big Stitch).

Once the designing was done, I cut the pattern pieces out at the correct size and sewed the jacket together, binding the outer edge and covering the seams with the focus fabric.

I’m so pleased with the results and especially thrilled that this very old UFO has a new and exciting life ahead of it. I’ve also discovered that I now utilize some quilting techniques to speed up and augment the garment creating process.

Do you have a garment background? Any garment pictures you’d like to share?

Birthday Block Update

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I love Autumn. So having a Fall birthday is always a joy, but this year it was especially delightful. While the children were enjoying their leaf pile:

leaf-fun-sommer-trey

I was enjoying my block pile:

birthday quilt blocks

Are you ready for the grand total?

60 blocks exactly!!!

I can’t believe it. How amazing! I had to recount the pile twice, just to be sure.

In honor of my 60th birthday, Wendy invited friends to send me 4-patch blocks during the month of October (click here to read that post), in hopes of getting 60. And I did! What wonderful fun!

Thank you to everyone who made this gift so special. I have enjoyed every moment reading and re-reading the blocks and cards while thinking about the dear friends who sent them to me. Some contained short messages, others quoted famous people (there were two from Einstein!), and many included Scripture verses. Each block is special to me. Here is a sample of just a few:

The block from Wendy, who came up with this delightful idea. We have shared so many adventures together and words can’t express what a blessing she is in my life.

block-wendy

My mom taught me to sew and, even though she is not a quilter and she had a broken hand at the time, she made a block and wrote on it (I love the X O X O X O white fabric, and I love you mom!).

birthday block

At Patched Lives quilt guild Geraldine came up and handed me this block:

block-geraldine

She wished me a happy birthday and then explained that her hands shake too much to write well, but when I look at her unsigned block I should think of my dear friend Geraldine who is 89 years old. You’d never know it to talk to her!

A surprise block came from my friend Nina. We haven’t seen each other in quite a while, so imagine my glee in receiving this message along with a block: “Dear Chris, Happy 60th birthday! I read your blog every week. As we travel quite a bit, I can actually report that it has been read in some wild places – New Zealand, Tasmania, the Ukraine, Israel – to name a few. It has given me great pleasure and a cozy sense of home.”

block-nina

The last block I’d like to share was the last one I received. It was #60 and came all the way from Arizona. Evelyn and I have had many wonderful quilting adventures together.

block-evelyn

I’m not able to find the words to capture how truly humbled and blessed I feel by the generosity of all you dear, dear people. Thank you so much! I can’t wait to start playing with a layout for my favorite quilt (I’ve already decided this will be my favorite quilt 😀 )!

If you’d like to see the list of the Scripture verses included on my blocks click on birthday-block-bible-verses!

Comfortable Quilting Tips

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This past week our son had a few well deserved days off of work – which meant grandpa and I had some time off from child care. Mike decided to make good use of the time, and beautiful weather, making fuel for our wood-burner.

lumberjack-mike-2016

And I was able to finish my current competition quilt! The deadline is this week, so the timing was perfect! I had previously machine quilted about 1/3 of the project, and the time had come to do the free-motion background fillers. I placed the quilt under my HQ Sweet 16 and hooked it up to my “Quilt Float” system (for details on the Quilt Float, click here and then here). That’s my #1 suggestion for making quilting more comfortable!

comfortable-quilt-float

The clamps hold the bulk of my quilt and carry the weight, so everything moves easily under the needle. This works for domestic sewing machines as well as mid-arms, and it makes the entire process so much less strenuous!

You may have noticed the magnifier arched in front of the machine. It is one of my favorite new tools and my #2 recommendation for making quilting more comfortable. It has a “goose-neck” arm attached to a heavy duty clamp for easy positioning, and it increases my visibility so much now that my eyes are over 60  :-). I purchased mine in Paducah a few years ago, but I did find it on-line at jabetc.com

comfortable-quilt-mag2

Don’t you just love my quilting gloves? I got them in the gift shop at the International Rose Gardens in Portland, Oregon last year when Wendy and I took a group of quilters to the Sisters Quilt Show (click here for information on our next adventure). Quilting gloves make moving the quilt so much easier, and are #3 on my list of recommendations for making quilting more comfortable.

So, I began to quilt, but I still couldn’t seem to get comfortable. I tried adjusting my chair height (elbows should be even with the table top), but that didn’t help. I scooted the foot pedal around, but that too wasn’t working. What was wrong??? I finally stopped long enough to analyze the situation and realized the chair was cutting into the back of my legs. I’m not sure why I hadn’t had this problem before (could it have something to do with that age thing again?), but it was bugging me now – and I needed to do something about it – fast!

It occurred to me that I needed to raise my feet off the floor. I found a sturdy, 3″ tall cardboard box in the attic and it did the trick! It was especially nice to have both of my feet on the platform. I felt much more balanced and a whole lot more comfortable. Thus, “raising the floor” is tip #4.

comfortable-quilting

You might have noticed there are small blocks of wood under the feet of my sewing machine table. This is my husband’s method for protecting the carpet, and it did raise the table about 1″, exacerbating my problem. Since I’m 5′ 6″ tall and this worked for me, I bet “raising the floor” could really be helpful for quilters with shorter legs.

Do you have any additional quilting comfort ideas to share?

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Last week Marla responded to my post about Slow Stitching with a picture. This is what she said:

“I love this slow stitching movement.  I started slowing down the process almost a year ago.  Sometimes life gets in the way of our quilting, and we become frustrated by not producing all the quilts we’ve designed in our minds.  I have started doing more handwork and improvisational piecing with minimal planning.  It’s very satisfying and quite beautiful.  I’ve attached a piece of embroidery on felted wool, all improvisational except for the leaf shape.”

Marla Morris-Kennedy slow stitching

It’s lovely, Marla. Thanks for sharing.

I’m hoping to try my hand at “slow stitching”, but it may need to wait until I’m past my “fast chasing after grandchildren” phase of life.

A Consistent Seam Allowance

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turkey-blog

Happy Autumn! As I was about to post to this week’s blog, Mike hollered for me to come quickly to the kitchen window. This is what I saw – a large Tom turkey and 9 hens running through the leaves. I must admit – this has nothing to do with the topic of the week, but it’s Autumn, so I couldn’t resist! Now on to the topic at hand  🙂 !

I often have students who struggle with keeping their 1/4″ seam allowance consistent, or their blocks always end up too small, or they are using 2 different sewing machines on the same project and the distance between the needle and the edge of the foot differs between the machines. If your seam allowance isn’t accurate or consistent, your frustration level can really skyrocket.

I have a trick to help with all of these issues. I don’t remember where I learned it, but I’ve used it for years and shared it with many quilters.

To begin with, I prefer to sew with a scant 1/4″ seam allowance, because I like to press my seams to the side and this always takes up an extra thread or two, thus shrinking the blocks. By using the scant 1/4″, my blocks remain the correct size. So… here’s the trick:

  • Take an index card, marked with 1/4″ lines, and cut off the bottom of the card on the lowest blue line.
  • Place the card under the needle of the machine and lower the needle by hand so that it pierces the card just to the right of the next blue line. When the needle is at the lowest level, it should be “kissing” the line.
  • sa-index-card-hole-1Place masking/painters tape along the right side of the card, making sure you don’t cover the feed dogs.sa-index-card-tape
  • If you struggle with keeping your seam allowance consistent, it’s helpful to stack a number of layers of tape on top of one another, to make a thicker edge to run the fabric along (sort of like the bumpers in bumper bowling  🙂 ). I’ve really appreciated knowing this technique when teaching children to quilt.
  • Remove the card and piece to your heart’s content.
  • Keep this card. sa-index-card-holeIf/when the need arises to sew on a different machine, put the needle down in the hole on the card, tape along the right side, and be assured you will be stitching with the same seam allowance on both machines!

This can be especially helpful when a group of quilters is working on the same quilt, for charity or competition purposes. If one person tapes each machine using the same card (or if the card is passed around), everyone will be making blocks the same size!

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Birthday Block Update

Thanks again to everyone who gifted me with a 4-patch birthday block. So far I have 42 beautiful squares! This was Wendy’s comment to last week’s post (click here to read that post):

“Anyone is welcome to send a four patch to Chris. I am sure she would love to have a block from any of her blog friends!”

I will gladly keep you posted on what these blocks will become – as soon as I figure it out!