Category Archives: 4.5″ LeMoyne Star

Scrappy Star Again

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After finishing the flannel top, I needed to do some hand piecing.  Another round is added to scrappy star and it’s now 29 inches.  I think it’s going to end up about twice the size it is now.

I’m glad I decided to press after each round as it only takes a few minutes.  I can’t imagine leaving this whole thing to press until the end.

I’ve started hand quilting Ferris Wheel and am much happier with the look. It was worth the time it took to take out the machine quilting I had done.

Baxter has been very busy watching leaves flying by the window.

Printing and More Printing for Quilts

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What’s that?  It’s the stack of fabrics I printed over the weekend for the Scrappy Star, Twinkling Stars, Summer Picnic Dish, Harpsichord and Joseph’s Coat quilts. The last couple of weeks I’ve been identifying the size I want certain projects to finish at. WIth the size of each determined, it took only a few minutes to figure out what I needed to print to reach that goal. Sometimes I print only a few of each shape for a couple of blocks until I’m sure I want to make it into a quilt. Once that decision is made, I prefer to get everything printed at once and get the shapes cut and into a box ready to stitch such as I’ve done for the Stormy Seas quilt.

This gives you a glimpse of the some of the shapes I printed for the Harpsichord, Joseph’s Coat and Summer Picnic Dish quilts.  Using the various Inklingo collections to prepare my templates makes it so easy to print on any number of fabrics, even black fabrics as most are markedly lighter on the back than the front and the templates will show up perfectly with one of the many choices of ink colours.

Almost all the shapes are now cut and ready to be put in a box, along with the matching threads, for the Twinkling Stars quilt, which I plan on trying to finish between now and the end of the World Series.

Because it was such a beautiful day on Monday, we took Scrappy Star out to the roof garden to photograph. It’s growing and is now 24″ across.  It will be at least twice that width before I’ll stop adding rounds. I needed more of the squares, which was another reason for all the printing that was done on the weekend.

The back after pressing.

Baxter is starting to look like a grown-up kitty in some photos, although his antics are still pure kitten antics. I think he was trying out his hypnotic kitty look in this photo.

Scrappy Star, Round 4

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The star is growing. I’ll keep adding rounds until it’s wide enough for a lap quilt. Then I’ll sort out how to add length to it, possibly with a couple of rows of small stars at the top and bottom. The round of squares isn’t added yet, but that’s not going to take long. It’s adding the diamonds in each round that takes the longest, particularly as it grows in size.

Over the years, I’ve tried numerous thimbles for hand quilting and, while some of them have seemed better than others, all of them have eventually resulted in hand issues for me. Then I heard about this, the hand-held quilting thimble from the House of Quilting. After about half an hour of practising with it, I was thrilled. It’s simple to get used to, makes it easy to get small even stitches and doesn’t seem to cause any hand fatigue. It’s even easy to quilt through intersections where many seams meet. Over the next few days, I’ll spend some more time getting used to it and then it’s going to be time to get started on that stack of 14 tops waiting for quilting.

Baxter’s markings are starting to show more and more. He has two rings, one on either side, just at his shoulders which I’ve dubbed the Baxter crop circles. This photo was taken as he was resting up, waiting for yogourt time.  Yes, we have another kitty who loves a yogourt treat. When he sees the yogourt container come out of the refrigerator, he practically climbs up our legs to get his treat.

Scrappy Star, Round Three

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While other projects have jumped to the front of the queue, Scrappy Star is not being neglected. Each round takes a bit longer but I’m finding that adding the next round of diamonds and squares only takes a couple of evenings of stitching. It’s fun to see it grow as each round is added and is about 19.5″ now.

When hand piecing, I often leave pressing until a block is finished. Not with this one. It only takes a minute to press after each round is added. That way, when I add the final round, it won’t take long to press it.

Edited to add:  The diamonds are 2.44″ from tip to tip and the squares are 1.32″.  I  used the free Inklingo collection to print the shapes on my fabric.

Baxter lost/hid Cappy, his favourite toy, for a while on Wednesday. After looking under every piece of furniture and behind closet and cupboard doors, Cappy was finally found in the very last place I thought to look. He has refined his game with it to the point that he drops it at my feet and meows so that I look down. When he finally decided to have a rest, he made sure Cappy was close by.

Scrappy Star Is Growing

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It’s getting bigger with each round of squares and diamonds. And it’s taking longer to add each round. I’m still deciding whether to make it a one-block quilt or whether I’ll make 4 or 6 of these blocks. Once I get this first block to a larger size, I’ll make that decision.

Once again, it pressed easily.

Baxter was peering over the arm of the chair as I was stitching. Within a few seconds, he would be on my lap attacking the fabric pieces.

More Scrappy Star

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The next round of diamonds is added. As each round of diamonds or squares is added, it grows and is taking a bit longer to stitch. The squares for the next round are waiting to be added and then I’ll have to sit down and figure out which fabrics to use in the following diamond round as I’m trying to not have the same fabrics too close together.

It took no time to press after adding this round.

Baxter was a bit sleepy, I think, when this photo was taken. It appears that we have another kitty with odd drinking habits. It’s hard to describe. He lays down on his side beside the water bowl, with his back to the bowl, and then reaches his head over his shoulder and drinks. When he finishes, the back of his neck and one side of his head is soaking wet. We’re going to try to get video of him drinking like that as it’s much funnier to see than to read about it.

Scrappy Star Beginning

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Mr. Q.O. was quite taken with the little quilt seen here, and dropped some hints, so I’ve started a lap quilt for him. This is the beginning of one of the blocks. It’s a fun and easy stitch, which is exactly what I want right now. At this stage, it’s approximately 10.75″. I plan on adding more rounds of squares and diamonds to this block. Then I’ll decide on the rest of the design.

I’m pressing with the iron after adding each round of squares and diamonds. I finger press as I go, so it takes only a few seconds with the iron and the pressing is done.

Baxter was 4 months old yesterday. It seems like yesterday that we brought him home. Now that he has discovered Cappy, he likes to keep it close. So close, in fact, that he sleeps on it.

Scrappy Little Stars

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These stars are the beginning of a quilt requested by Mr. Q.O.  He really likes the look of these reproduction fabrics, it seems. I’ve got a couple of ideas for setting these and once i get a dozen or so done I’ll start playing with that.

They press very easily. To ensure whatever layout I end up using will be easy to put together, I’m going to make sure that I press all the stars the same way.

There’s a stack of fabrics ready to print the diamonds from the free Inklingo collection and, once printed and cut, this will be yet another quilt in a box. The freezer paper is ready to iron on the fabric and I’ll print 10 or 12 sheets every day until they’re all done. Then the fun will begin as I want to try to ensure that no two stars are identical. And yes, there’s a lot of fabric there ready to be printed. There will likely be enough for a few little quilts as well.

Baxter is very nocturnal. He tends to wake up around midnight and is awake and wanting to play until just before dawn. So during the late afternoon/early evening he finds a comfy spot and snoozes.

Little Stars

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The Little Stars quilt is quilted and bound and ready to go to its intended recipient. It is small, finishing at approximately 13″. It was so easy to baste, quilt and bind that it makes me think about doing a series of small quilts.

When I checked on the bindings I had already made, I found the green which seemed to work just perfectly for the little quilt. I tend to make more binding than I need and so now have a stash of bindings that can be used on little quilts.

Saturday the perfect opportunity presented itself and I got this shot of one of Baxter’s paws.

This is a new spot for Baxter to stretch out. I think it’s because he’s eyeing the book as a chewing possibility.

A Little Quilt

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This little top will be quilted and, with any luck, the binding on this weekend. Working with these repro fabrics in the small star blocks was fun. I may add a small border before I baste and quilt it.  As it is now, it finishes at 13.5″. I used the free Inklingo collection to print the shapes and the blocks went together in no time at all.

There’s enough of the striped fabric I showed yesterday for the binding on the Ferris Wheels quilt. Now I really can’t wait to finish the quilting and get to the binding. There’s still a lot of quilting to be done on Ferris Wheels, but I hope to get the majority, if not all, of it finished this weekend and get the binding on it.

I’ve changed my blog theme yet again. This time it was because I only realized yesterday that the widgets in the sidebar weren’t appearing on individual posts, but only on the home page with the theme I was using. I think this will be it for changes for a while.

Baxter seems to approve of the little quilt. As soon as we’re setting up to take a photo of anything to do with quilts or fabric, he’s right there to inspect.

Earlier in the day, we got this shot of him. His paws are getting bigger every day.