The things I learn from others..............

OK - I want Peggy to come and live at my house! She knows a TON of stuff. How does she know all that she knows?  Remember I talked about those flyers in my mailbox - three for the SAME condo complex???  Apparently, I can chat with the mail delivery person and they can affix a sticker inside my mailbox so they don't leave that junk mail stuff inside my mailbox.  Wow - really???  OK - I'm going to watch for the mail today and see if I can have a chat with them. Thanks, Peggy!!!!  I wonder what other wonderful tips she has up her sleeve. What other issues am I having around the house?

Here's another thing I learned this morning. This one was a comment that came on the QUILTsocial blog. Have a read this morning - it's all about fixing bindings and what happens when they get damaged. I'm not sure when the comment will come up on the QUILTsocial webpage - I just approved it this morning -  someone was reading that blog very early this morning. Anyway, I was told years ago, that bias binding is the best. It's the strongest and you should always do bias binding. I've done the experiment on the blog twice and I got the same results. However as Melissa pointed out in the comments, the damage to the bias binding will be contained in a smaller area because of the bias grain.  AHA - that makes sense now.

Since it might take a while for Melissa's comment to appear on that blog post, here it is.

"While your bindings will be frayed the same after three washes, after much more wear and tear the threads that are cut will continue to get damaged. The damaged thread on the bias binding is a short thread so the damage is contained within a short distance. The two bindings that run with the grain will continue to get damaged for the length of that side of the quilt. This will also happen faster on the straight of grain binding as the quilt gets tugged on during use because it doesn’t have the stretch of a bias binding."

 Now I'm going to put that binding issue to bed, but I'm glad I pursued it and now I know the complete story and that's what it's all about.  I can die happy knowing the story about the "strong" bias binding. 

Life is all about learning and there just doesn't seem to be an end to it!!!

I learned one more thing yesterday. While I think I can multitask - I really can't. Wait until you see what happened. 

I've got so much to post, but there just isn't time in each day. The posts would be huge and they're already large.  

Let me start with what I did yesterday - Monday sewing.  I got three more blocks done on the Night Sky quilt.

Three more blocks for Night Sky

Night Sky quilt by Jaybird Quilts

I got two more blocks almost sewn together and I ran out of the black fabric for the last two blocks. All the cutting has been done for those last two and the fabric is back in the Monday sewing tote so I can complete it next week. This is getting exciting!

Ready for sewing next week

I guess I shouldn't get too excited as I'm going to have to figure out what to do with all those blocks before I can sew the sashing on. There should be enough blocks for two quilts, and how big I want the quilt(s) will determine how wide the sashing is. Let's get the blocks done first and then decide. Progress - as this is a UFO for 2018.


BUT - the first thing that I did was to work on my 150 Canadian Women blocks. Here they are!!!!

Six more blocks for 150 Canadian Women

Wait a minute - why is that last one smaller than the rest? Well, it would appear that each week, I've either forgotten to cut all the pieces or did a miscut or something silly like that. Diane has been bugging me to just throw all the fabric in the car so if I screw up, I can fix it then. That's too much extra stuff to carry so I leave all the fabrics at home. Well as luck would have it, things were going great yesterday. All the fabric had been properly cut, and there were no mistakes in trimming. I'm on the LAST block. I'm chatting to Joyce at the cutting table as I cut the LAST two triangles in half diagonally twice. The moment I did the second slice, I realized that I was supposed to cut only ONCE!!!!!!  Oh crap! Joyce and I got a chuckle out of that at the cutting table, but I didn't announce it to the group because Diane would be on my case. However, the new pieces are cut and waiting by the sewing machine for later today. BTW - I would like to mention that Diane couldn't finish the borders on her quilt because she left a piece of fabric at home.  Just saying..............

Guess what? That leaves SIX blocks to sew together. Four of the six blocks in this group were fiddly, but I was able to finish them by lunchtime even though I had arrived later than usual. The last six are fairly easy so if there no screwups, it won't take long to finish them. I think I'll be finishing before Peggy as she's up to her eyeballs with quilting a couple of projects!  ONE MORE WEEK and then I'm going to have to figure out what to do with all those blocks. I checked back on the blog and I had about 48 blocks done at the end of January. I'm thrilled with my progress.

I took pictures of show n tell from the others yesterday, but the pictures are on my phone so hopefully later this week, I'll get those posted.

Here is the rest of the show n tell from Sunday's Sit n Sew.

Pam finally finished the top of her tablecloth. There are four big panels with writing on them. We arranged them so that you can read one of the panels right side up from each of the four sides. That red background in the picture came from Photoshop this morning. Normally it's white. Not sure what happened.

Pam's tablecloth

France was working on a bowl. Remember the clothesline bowls that we did in a class a couple of weeks ago???   Anyway, I LOVE this bowl that she made. The shape and the size are awesome. She used a slightly stiffer clothesline and the bowl is pretty substantial. We learned that you need a topstitch needle for the stiffer cord.

Clothesline bowl

 And I LOVE the fact that she used this khaki colored thread to stitch. The bowl has a lot of visual interest because of the thread. It's fabulous!!!

Colored thread makes the bowl look cool

Diane was working on her Circle of Life pattern by Jaqueline de Jonge. She's on the final border and then she has to assemble all the pieces. Can't wait to see it finished - it's going to be a knockout!!!!

Sections of the Circle of Life quilt 

More Circle of Life pieces

circle of life pattern by Jacqueline de Jone

Sharon was working on her Border Creek station mystery. I think this is the one from last year. She's on Clue Three and making great progress once we got the appropriate pieces from the labelled bags. I love Sherri's mysteries. Everything is super labeled with the inventory at the end of each clue.

Border Creek mystery block bits

France also got this small table topper together. The pieces were all cut before she came but it still is time consuming to put this together.  The pattern is called Rock Candy by Jaybird Quilts.

Frances' version of Rock Candy by JayBird Quilts

Ronda was working on her Elvis quilt. She had all the blocks laid out on the design wall but I didn't get a picture of it. It's going to look super cool when she gets it completed. 

I think I'm going to get that house block back and I'm going to fix the foundation and I'm going to fix the sky. The person it's for is particular and I can't have shoddy work going out with my name on it. I did WRITE my name on the front of the block in a permanent pen  (very tiny - but it's there). I can get it back this weekend and get it fixed. Shame on me for thinking I could get away with shoddy work. 

Speaking of shoddy work, if you read that QUILTsocial blog post, you'll see what happened with the binding on the cat quilt. That quilt hangs in my family room and I'm so HAPPY that I took the time to fix it. Lesson learned - do things right the first time and you won't have to redo them. 

Now I wonder what else Peggy knows? Do you think her house is super organized with no junky mess of papers around? Probably!!!  And mine could be too if I took the time. Since I haven't taken the time, it can't be that important to me. But if I were more organized then I wouldn't be puzzling over stuff like this. I'm certain that someone gave me a pattern. I'm almost 100% certain that they did. However, the pattern wasn't where it should have been. This morning, I'm thinking that the pattern is in a brown envelope. So that helps to narrow down the search, but with all the moving of bags and stuff in the studio - it could have got tucked away anywhere.  Today, I'm on the hunt for stuff so I hope to find it. And of course in my searching for stuff this morning, I came up with another project!!  Not a big one.

I did more embroidery last night. Super excited with the progress. I didn't get a picture of it, but - well - it's looking awesome. 

As usual, there is lots to do today. One more pattern to write that's urgent. Some other writing and a magazine quilt that needs to be worked on. Actually, it's late as it should be out the door today and it's barely started, but it's small - I could totally finish it today so let's see what happens. 

On that note, I'm out of here. 

Hve a super day!!!!

Ciao!!!