been sewing, not blogging

my pull for the penny patch quilt along

with my crazy goal to get 6 quilts and a quilted pillow sham done by Christmas (and maybe a penny patch, too), I have had to force myself to just sew and not blog. until this pile is finished and wrapped, i'm going to be limiting myself to one post a week to report progress. except today because marmee is downstairs sewing away on the remaining halloween costumes and i just can't take the stress! so i'm hiding and catching up on blogging for the moment.

i'm so grateful for the making Christmas link up because it has encouraged me more than i thought possible. i knew people would say nice things like, "you can do it!" and they did. what i didn't expect was that i'm actually believing them. i worked my fingers off this weekend and made tons of progress. i have so many funny moments to share, but i'll have to save those for later. let's just say every seam i've sewn has been unpicked and resewn at least once, probably twice, and in some cases more.

my first chore was getting my sewing space back in order.

 this is what happens when i have my carpets cleaned and everything needs to be moved to the tile, my last bits of on-line purchased fabric arrive (not buying again for a long, long time - really), my daughter cleans out our old car to trade in for the new car but just dumps it in the entryway, some school supplies arrive in the mail, costumes are being sewn, i bring home a foam insulation board for a design wall, family picture clothing purchases arrive in the mail, and it's all in my space where i'm trying to work on 7 quilts at once. all in the same few days. complete and utter insanity, even for us.

surprisingly, i did get this space whipped into a kind of order on Friday morning so i could sew. jill had to take her husband's car in, so she couldn't come sew with me. being on my own wasn't as companionable, but i got lots done. i got binding made and on "taite."

 all it needs is to be handsewn to the back. and i have to keep coming up with excuses for my daughter about why i am neglecting her nearly finished quilt since she doesn't know i'm saving it for a Christmas present along with her siblings' quilts. she's probably seething inside and feeling very unloved, neglected, overlooked. i hope getting the quilt finally will erase all that and make up for it. the binding of this quilt was pretty straight forward.

 "plus a diamond" is where things began to go terribly wrong and turned into a lesson in patience and ingenuity. i'll explain some other time. let's just say this is what happens when i try to be good and not buy more fabric when i absolutely don't have to - i come up short months later when it's too late. i spent all Friday fixing this problem. the binding is now on and awaiting a hand tack to the back. when no one's looking, of course.

 this little lady was my constant companion and kept things very interesting on Saturday. insert more patience lessons. i just hope she's learning to love sewing. her favorite thing to do is sit at the machine like this and say, "go, go!" or sit in my lap and put her hands on the fabric i'm running through, like she's doing the work. her cuteness certainly helps ease the troubles she causes. that and her loving heart and kisses.

 Friday evening i began the task of unpicking the too-small panels in this project. it's a good thing i did because after i laid the rows back out i noticed i'd switched the two blocks in the upper left hand corner. how did i not notice that before?! it would have driven me absolutely crazy if i'd not noticed this until too late. that's when i decided seam ripping wasn't so bad. and it's a good thing because i made good friends with that device this weekend. we were pretty inseparable, the seam ripper and i.

really, the whole experience just seemed to confirm that i won't notice something until after i sew it incorrectly. like how i laid out the border on the "twirly" quilt and checked to make sure matching fabrics weren't together. but after sewing the whole dang thing on, i find they are touching. rip, rip, rip. twice on each side for multiple reasons. perhaps i'm perfecting my seams with all this practice?

so here's the updated Christmas list:

d1 - "plus a diamond" needs handbinding to back

s1 - actually wants a stacked coins quilt now and to help me sew it. how this is going to work with it being a Christmas present i haven't decided for sure.

d2 - "taite" needs handbinding to the back

s2 - "bandwidth" still not started

d3 - "twirly" is a completed flimsy - yay!

d4 - pillow sham untouched, bottom of the list

d5 - "paris daydreams" still a flimsy

penny patch qal - fabrics selected

MAKING CHRISTMAS 2013

 

keep at it, friends! if i can do it, we all can.

 

linking up to wip wednesday at freshly pieced, needle and thread thursday at my quilt infatuation, making Christmas blog hop at quilt matters.