This one is for you MOM!!

Hmmmmm - the weather was beautiful - there are four bikes in the garage begging to be taken out for a ride. I got a garden that is screaming - weed me and distribute that bag of mulch in the driveway. The backyard swing was very inviting, BUT I decided to stay indoors and do something for my Mom!!!!!

And this is how my day went - even when I try to be nice to my Mom - she caused me no end of problem!!!  Wait until you see what happened................


When I was home in February, my Mom gave me a number of quilt tops that she had made a LONG LONG time ago. She gave them to me to quilt. I thought that Mother's Day was a perfect day to quilt one of them. I grabbed the scrappy one - with the squares of fabric that I recognize - well at least some of them and that got loaded onto the machine.

Mom's scrappy quilt

Went to the batting closet and after quickly browsing the labeled pieces of batting, I was able to find four pieces that would be big enough for the quilt

Joined those four pieces, measured and OOOPS - not big enough. OK - so math was never  my strong point.  Back to the closet and two more pieces of batting 

Those little labels that get pinned on the batting pieces are a brilliant idea!!!

Despite all that - I still short changed myself on one side of the batting!!!!!!   Not to worry - I just cut off a peice that was hanging on another side and used the interfacing and fused as I went to fill in the hole.

Let's say that I NEVER do that with a customer quilt.   But for my own quilts - I have no problem to join batting. It is an excellent way to use up scraps. And I got rid of SIX pieces. Once I get this quilt trimmed - there won't be much left. I'll show you tomorrow.


While I was ironing the quilt top I found a little treasure. Well not as exciting as a US feedsack, but if you look closesly at this next photo - can you see it????

Right in the middle of this picture- in washed out blue ink - it says 20 LB.  Obviously a feed sack, but we did not have fancy feed sacks in Canada like they did in the US.  I thought that was neat. 

So I knew that one end of the quilt was a bit wonky - I loaded the quilt and then thought I had better deal with it otherwise I will be trimming off a bit of quilt.

See - two rows were short

And at the other end three rows were too long

Oh yes - it would have been so easy to have fixed this BEFORE I loaded the quilt. I even contemplated taking if off the machine. Then I had a brain storm. I cut off the excess from the one end and resewed it to the short end - all while it was on the long arm.

The new piece sewed to the short end (right through all layers with the long arm)

Flipped back into place

Edge basted and ready to quilt - VOILA - problem solved and took only a few minutes

And that is what was left for batting at the end!!!!!   You can see that I was working with all different lengths

And at last - the quilt is quilted!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My Mom likes flowers so I used a floral pattern to quilt it with

Nice cosy flannel from the stash on the back

And the binding? Well - I will just pull scraps from my binding scrap bin - join the pieces together and then get that sewn on. 

I still have to trim the quilt and will try to get that done today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


So Happy Mother's Day Mom!!!!!!!   I spent a good part of the day cursing you but the bottom line - the quilt got done. I had fun and lots of memories.    Oh - and I spent a long time on the phone chatting to Mom and one of my aunts!   It was an awesome day and the girls and I went for a nice walk to enjoy the weather.



Have an awesome day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Ciao!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!