I Have a Notion....

Not so long ago, the big box craft store who's name starts with a "J", had an online notion sale. I needed a few things, and to qualify for free shipping, I perused the notions pages for other items that sounded interesting.
Don't we all love new-to-me notions?

I had read about these fork pins and decided to give them a try. The pins are supposed to be great for securing either side of a seam instead of using 2 pins.  I found they worked pretty slick keeping the long yardage together that I was sewing together for a backing. They don't fall out, and seemed to keep the layers of fabric more stable. I like them!
(I did remove the selvages after sewing my seam in case you were wondering.)

I had never seen this notion, but after trying other methods of cleaning the bottom of my iron that didn't work, I decided to try out this iron cleaner stick. I forgot to get a "before using" photo--the stick is much prettier when it's new!

I'm surprised there is this much of the product left after cleaning my iron.
It had a big job to do after all the wool fusing I've been doing all summer!

Looky here!
This sole plate hasn't been this shiny since it was taken from the box!
Bohn Iron Cleaner is going on my "always have on-hand" list--love it.
FYI: It is messy--the iron is on the wool setting and the gunk drips right off like melted butter.
You need to cover your pressing surface with an old cloth to catch spills and polish the sole plate.

This handy little tool wasn't from "J"'s.
 I won it during a Notion Commotion blog hop from Kristine Poor of Poorhouse Quilt Design.
Check out her blog Quilting at the Poorhouse HERE.
She also sent me a kit for one of her Fold 'n Stitch Holiday Ornaments-hopefully I'll get it finished before Christmas!
Anyway, this precise tweezers works great on getting the last remnants of the dreaded paper piecing removal paper bits. I don't remember what it was I paper pieced (blocked from my memory--not a fan), but this tool was invaluable--the Dritz Soft Grip tweezers! 

During the Notion Commotion blog hop, I also won this Brilliant Bindings long arm ruler (1/4" thick as opposed to the usual 1/8" thickness of regular rulers)  from Debbie Wendt. It's to be used to attach binding to the quilt while still on the machine. I haven't had the guts chance to do that yet, but it's kind of become my go-to ditch quilting tool.
 I'll give the binding a try soon! 

Debbie also sent me her regular (non longarm) ruler to give away!
 She has a video on how to use the tool.

To win the Brilliant Bindings ruler, leave a comment on this post.
Note: if you subscribe via email, you will have to click through to go to the actual blog post.
If you reply to the emailed post, I have no idea where the reply goes, but I can assure you I never receive it.
I'm guessing they are floating around out there in outer space with (spoiler alert) George Clooney in Gravity

Gift Basket Update

It's been a crazy week and I just realized that I needed to post some photos of the Gift Basket quilt finished!

Gift Basket pattern by Edyta Sitar/Laundry Basket Quilts.

I took the finished top to my longarm group two weeks ago for a little advice on the quilting.
It's so obvious to me now, that the baskets needed a flower quilted into them.
Of course that never occurred to me--thank goodness for our longarm group and the awesome input!

At first, I had planned to use the same flower design in every basket, but once I got started, I couldn't stop trying to invent new floral and leaf designs. This turned out to be a lot of fun to quilt. 

Marcia Stevens suggested using an icy blue/gray thread and she was right on the mark--it was perfect.
I used 50 wt. Aurifil color #2610.

Marcia also pointed out that the space between the baskets was a perfect opportunity to put in a leafy vine.
 When Marcia speaks, I listen!!!

I went back to the scrap bag and made another basket for the label--
a special label for a special quilt.
This scrappy version of Gift Basket will be available as a kit soon at Colorz for Quilts. 

By the way, they now have kits for my Simply Red in Blue quilt too!

Since there's a blue theme going today (okay, almost everyday here!) I had to show this bundle of fabric I recently won in a drawing from Norma Whaley of Timeless Traditions. She is a wonderful designer and has an very inspiring blog HERE. It's not going to be difficult finding a place for these sweet shirting's!

And a little more addition to the stash--I wanted some yardage from the Haberdashery line by Jo Morton and somehow a fat quarter bundle of the blues from Woodlands jumped into my cart too.
I had been a little peeved that the Old Country Store closed last year before I had a chance to use my gift certificate, but guess what?
The new owners re-instated my expired gift certificate code and allowed me to use it--pretty nice of them, I think!

Quilt Like An Eagle Quilt-Along

I haven't done any piecing this week--too busy quilting Gift Basket--but...

I've joined the Quilt Like An Eagle Sew Along!

I've been wanting to do a version of this quilt for years, so I'm happy to have the motivation of a sew-along! 

I was first drawn to this quilt when Quilter's Newsletter published this pattern in 2002.
It uses the center motif of an early 19th century quilt. 

In 2005, Quilter's Newsletter published an article about this quilt.
It was inspired by the previously published pattern, but this quilter did some research and based her version more closely on the original. 

This is a photo of the original quilt.
 The quilt is made from hemp, as so has become known as the Marijuana quilt!

Barbara Brackman wrote about this quilt several years ago HERE. As Barbara points out, Jan Patek has a version of the same eagle in her book Flags of the American Revolution--you can see it on the cover:

I just got this book in the mail--it was a Bobbins Bargain a couple weeks ago.
The eagle pattern from the magazine needs to be enlarged, but the eagle in the book looks to be about the size I will want to use, saving me a trip to the printers.

There is also some information on the quilt from the National Museum of American History HERE.

I'm not sure how my version will end up, but I will be doing the center similar to the Ever Vigilant version. 

Just Another Woolie Wednesday

Wow--the month is almost over and I have done almost NO stitching on my Stitch Society hexagons! 

I felt I should at least do the monthly project, so I used one of the sampler hexies as my centerpiece. The pillow pattern showed how to add the 60 degree triangles to create a star. the pattern also has a ruffled edge made from wool, but I chose not to do that (because I'm lazy, but mostly because I abhor ruffles!). My triangles looked a little bare, so I stitched in some little paisleys I made up--just the shape with a little flower.

The pillow is very practical too.
It's supposed to be used on the lap as support while stitching. I have several friends that use a pillow for this purpose. I'm determined to try to get used to it. It does work great when working Colonial knots! 

I'm so glad we are winding down on the Sunflower Gatherings Summer Block of the Week!
It's been pretty stressful trying to keep up with this project during a busy summer.
I hope I remember that next year!!

I changed this one up a bit....
...subbed Colonial Knots for the stars in the centers of the little blue flowers.

This is the last block of the summer--yay!
But once this is all stitched down, I have a lot of piecing to do!

August UFO complete!

Before I loaded the Gift Basket quilt on my HQ16, 

I wanted to be sure to get my August UFO quilted up.

This is the Blue and Gray quilt from the book The Blue and The Gray by Country Threads.

I added some blocks to make it lap size--"borrowed" that idea from some quilting friends.

I almost forgot to do the rounded corners.
I hadn't cut my binding on the bias, so I wasn't sure if it would still work.
But it did--yay!
 I ran out of my blue binding fabric, so there are a few bits of red in there--I love "making do"--just makes it more interesting to me! 

I really wanted to hand quilt this one with a big stitch and red pearl cotton, but there is no way I could do it with the arthritis I have in my wrists.
My machine quilting was kind of an experimental free-hand Baptist Fan.
 Hopefully, it will look better the next time I do it--haha!
I used Mountain Mist Blue Ribbon 100% cotton batting--it shrank up so cuddly and crinkly--love it! 

And finally, these old fence boards I white-washed back in July....

...were made into a few shelves like this one.
Thanks Mr. Moosebay!

(above quilt pattern by Jo Morton: Prairie Basket from Yesterday's Charm book)

Gift Basket and Stitch Therapy Update!

The Gift Basket top has been done for a few days.

Here's sneak peek before it gets loaded onto the quilting machine.

I have to say that the blocks went together like a dream! The blocks are 8" finished and both the handle section and basket section are 4". As long as the center of the block is always pressed down and the joined blocks are pressed up, and because of the half basket in the alternate rows, every seam locks together and sews up perfectly!

Susan gave me this delicious piece for the backing--it's from Edyta Sitar's Snow Birds line.
Some of the fabrics in the line have snowflakes, but they are very subtle--it definitely does not scream winter to me.
I'll be leaving it out year round once it's ready to come home after doing it's job at the quilt shop!

And here's some inspiration from the talented Stitch Therapy ladies!!

Gift Baskets--almost there!

I'm making good progress on the Gift Basket quilt.

 It's a very easy pattern and goes together quickly. 

Since I have so many hand sewing projects in the works right now, I opted to do machine applique on the basket handles. I used the method I learned in class from Kim Diehl: open-toe foot, smoke colored monopoly for the top stitching and 50 wt. cotton in the bobbin. Oddly, Aurifil doesn't work for this technique, so my bobbin thread is a very light silver colored Masterpiece.

This is the setting I used on the Bernina 440--a very narrow zigzag.

The piecing of the basket block is so simple--only 4 seams!
This is seam one--a flippy corner.

The flippy corner block gets split...

...and attached to the main basket triangle--seams 2 and 3.
Then the handle piece is ready to add on--seam 4. 
Boom! Basket block done!

Confession:
I had a little trouble getting my corners to come out nicely, so I tried a sneaky trick--glue basting!
OMG--why haven't I tried this before?????
Just a tiny dot of glue at the corners where you see the pins--awesome!
No reverse sewing on this puppy!

Now to do a little block placement tweaking before putting it all together. 

I immediately sewed my waste triangles (from those flipped corners) into half square triangles--not sure what will become of them, but when I need them, they are ready to go!