Tag Archives: hand piecing

Chintz Circles & My Aunt

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Sunday was the big day, my aunt’s 90th birthday.  She is an absolutely amazing lady — sharp as can be and has a fabulous sense of humour.  I have the most wonderful memories of playing double solitaire with her at the cottage.  The two of us would be laughing like hyenas and my mother, who was always a sports fan, would be trying to listen to a baseball game on the radio.  She usually gave up and went out on the porch to listen to her baseball game.

The birthday party was at a golf club.  The setting was beautiful.  This was the table just before dinner began.  My aunt is sitting with her son and daughter standing on either side of her in this picture.

Between courses, my aunt was opening gifts.   I love the wide-eyed look when she saw her quilt!

The quilt was washed and dried on Sunday afternoon and it got that wonderful crinkly look.  I think if you click on this picture to enlarge it you can see the effect.

The label for the quilt, before it was appliqued on to the back:

The best part? I know my aunt will use the quilt.  I enjoyed making that quilt and knowing it will be used makes every hand stitch and the fabric wrestling, aka machine quilting, a real labour of love.

There was some big news at the party on Sunday.  There will be a new addition to the family in February, and I’m planning a quilt now.   I’ve got a few ideas floating around in my mind, but no definite plan.

Looking out the window of the dining room, Mr. Q.O. got this shot of a cardinal.

My hands/wrists are definitely somewhat better, so starting today I will get caught up on replying to comments and will finally be able to start visiting blogs and leaving comments.  Monday is a holiday here in Ontario and we’re about to head back into high heat and humidity.  After Saturday, when 70 felt cold, I look forward to the warmth again.

Smudge, generally speaking, ignores cat toys.  But there is one which he absolutely loves.  A friend sent the kitties what we call the caterpillar or “Cappy”.  They have been playing with one for a few years but it was starting to look pretty worn out so we finally broke out the second one.  Every evening Smudge will suddenly start playing with it, so we’ve now dubbed it “Cappy Hour”.  The other night he had both the old and new ones.

Lester was in his usual windowsill position on the weekend.

A Last Few of the Pink Ice Blocks

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Following up on Wednesday’s post, a few more of the Pink Ice Blocks.  Whether I’ll get the setting pieces cut and at least a start on putting the top together this weekend is still up in the air.  My wrists/hands feel somewhat better as I have been careful this week (and, as a result, owe a lot of responses to comments) but I don’t want to push it.  Maybe by Monday, which is a holiday here in Ontario.

Another five of the blocks:

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Both cats had lazy days on Thursday, and both of them curled up with a soft toy. First Smudge with a lion:

And Lester with a teddy bear:

Clams on the Half Shell

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After finishing Chintz Circles yesterday, rather than working on a project already in progress, what did I do?  Started a little doll’s quilt with the new Inklingo clamshell edges collection which has all the shapes to finish the edges on a clamshell quilt made with the 3″ clamshells.  This block finishes at 6″.  It’s made with the side halves, but I have ideas as well for some blocks made with the top and bottom halves as well as the quarter clamshells.

The back:

These are the fabrics I’ve picked out for this little doll’s quilt, which won’t take long to put together.

After we took the photos of Chintz Circles yesterday, we went out for dinner to celebrate.  On the way back home we came through the bookstore in the retail section of the complex and heard the most incredible piano playing.  The bookstore is a multi-level store, which we had entered through the lower level.  There’s a baby grand piano on the main floor of the store which is frequently played by a number of people.  But yesterday?  Yesterday was phenomenal.  I was sure it had to be a professional pianist playing.  I couldn’t have been more wrong.  It was an 11 year-old boy who was playing so beautifully I actually had tears in my eyes listening.  We ended up staying in the store for quite a while just listening.  After striking up a conversation with his father, we learned he has been playing for only three years and has had no classical training at all.  Apparently he and some others have been playing there nightly for a while and sometimes are there until closing at 10:00 p.m.   I know where we’ll be going most evenings.

It was fun watching people’s reactions.  Any number of people stopped and just stood quietly drinking in the beautiful music.  A little girl was standing absolutely still,  mesmerized by the music.  After each composition he played, there was applause.  It was one of those magical moments when you come upon something totally unexpected.

Lester had some windowsill time on Tuesday.

Smudge at the toy basket.  He rather exhausted himself playing with the toy we call Cappy — the orange and black striped one, and seemingly had to have a nap right there.

Chintz Circles Completed

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The binding is finished and photos were taken out on the roof garden this afternoon. I am thrilled with how it turned out.  672 pieces in the top that all went together so easily thanks to the Inklingo Orange Peel Deluxe collection printing the stitching lines and matching points on the fabric.  I couldn’t wait till tomorrow to post these photos!

The back.

The final touch was a totally lump-free binding thanks to this tutorial I found on Bonnie Hunter’s website.  I’ve tried doing lump-free binding many times with instructions from books and various sites, with varying degrees of success.  The tutorial on Bonnie’s website made it absolutely foolproof for me.

Now I can’t wait for August 1st when the quilt will be given to my aunt on her 90th birthday.  All that’s left now is the label, which will be added this weekend.

To see more finishes, go to Lit and Laundry and the post here with links to Friday finishes.

Pink Ice Block 28

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… got finished after all on Tuesday night after some quilt wrestling of Chintz Circles was accomplished.  After doing more of the quilting, I think I’ve got a “route” mapped out so as to be able to avoid having quite so many threads to bury.   Today and Thursday will be busy with work, but Friday and Saturday I plan to stay at the machine and keep going until the quilting is finished.

Two more Pink Ice blocks to go and then I’ll try a few of the 9-patch blocks to see if they will work as the setting block for the quilt.

Although it’s hot and humid again, Lester saw a few things out the window that he had to keep his eye on.

While Smudge was staying with his in warm weather, do as little as possible mode.  He was awake — if you click on the photo to enlarge it, you can see one eye open watching to make sure he didn’t miss anything interesting.


Chintz Circles Quilting

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A sneak peek of the quilting I’m doing on Chitnz Circles.  The fabric wrestling, aka quilting by machine, will result in interlocking circles following the shapes in the blocks.   I haven’t done a lot of machine quilting, or machine stitching for that matter, but I’m relatively pleased with how this is turning out.  Wrestling with a quilt that has a silk batt is a lot easier than wrestling with one with a cotton batt.  The difference is quite evident.  I’m not finding it anywhere near as hard on my hands as I have when I’ve machine quilted a quilt with a cotton batt.  What’s taking forever is the burying of the threads.  There is some continuous stitching I can do but not a huge amount, which results in a lot of threads to bury.

It’s not going anywhere near as quickly as I had hoped, but I feel like a fair amount was accomplished Monday night.  If I can devote 2 or 3 hours every evening this week, I should be able to finish it by the end of the week.  Then it will be a matter of figuring out what fabric to use for binding.  That has me completely perplexed at the moment.  There are so many different fabrics on the outer edges of the quilt that choosing a fabric for the binding may be a bit more challenging than I had anticipated.

As well as the clematis (thank you everyone for identifying that) shown yesterday, Mr. Q.O. got this shot of a part of our friend’s garden.

Neither cat was very active on Monday.  Lester slept on the pink loveseat.

While Smudge was having a snooze on the pink chair.


Pink Ice Blocks 26 & 27

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Two more done, block 28 about half done and two full ones left to go.  But nothing else is getting done this week other than the quilting on Chintz Circles.  I realized on the weekend that I didn’t have enough time to hand quilt it, so removed the hand quilting I’d done and sorted out how I’d machine quilt it remembering, of course, that my machine skills are not great, and started on it Sunday night.  The quilting will be intersecting circles to emphasize the circles created by the design.  I got enough done Sunday night to realize I like how it’s turning out, so now it’s simply a matter of sitting at the machine and getting it done.

The back of one of the two completed Pink ice blocks.

Mr. Q.O. took this photo of a flower in a friend’s garden.  I haven’t got a clue what it is, but I love the colour.

We had a couple of days of much less humidity, although it was still quite warm.  They say the heat and humidity builds up again starting today and by midweek it sounds like we’ll be back to the extremely high heat and humidity.

Lester took advantage of the nicer temperatures and spent some time looking out the window.

As did Smudge.


A Replacement Patchwork of the Crosses Block

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Earlier this week I made this block as there was one that just didn’t fit in and had to be replaced.  The more I look at the blocks I’ve made for my POTC quilt, the more I realize just how drawn I am to shades of purple.  Now all the blocks for the top are made, the cream surrounding hexagons are on more than half of them and the only thing I have left to sort out is what I’ll use as the connecting squares where 4 blocks meet.

The back:

E-mail on Wednesday was completely unreliable.  Among other things that didn’t get delivered, I realized Wednesday night that many comments that were left on my blog on Wednesday didn’t arrive in my inbox.  So if I owe you a response, please bear with me while I sort this out.  I wonder if the extreme heat and humidity we’re having is affecting our ISP?

Wednesday night I started on another Pink Ice block.  As I like to match my thread to the fabric I”m stitching, I ended up using a Mettler 50/3 thread.  I can’t believe how thick that is in comparison to the Mettler 60/2 thread or the YLI Heirloom thread I love using.  Aside from being a struggle to thread the needle with it, I felt as though it was harder to pull through the fabric.   I’m curious about the Superior Threads MasterPiece thread and will, when I see it here, buy a spool to try.  Have you tried it?  What do you think of it?

When Mr. Q.O. was downtown on Monday, he also got this shot of the flowers outside a restaurant.   Doesn’t this look like a great spot to spend some time on a summer day and just watch the world go by?

Wednesday was another extremely hot and humid day.  Today is … well, more of the same.  The humidex readings have been the highest I can ever recall.  While we rarely have to put the air conditioning on in the living room, this week it has been on daily.

Mr. Q.O. has been playing with some photo editing software and this picture of Lester taken on Wednesday is a result.

Smudge spent some time on the windowsill on Wednesday.  At one point there was a robin he could hear but not see.  The tail was swishing and he was very intently staring out the window.

Pink Ice Block 25

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There are enough of these blocks done to make a lap quilt, depending how I set them.  That said, I have the pieces ready to make five more of these which would make it a slightly better size — again, depending on how I set them.  The blocks finish at 9″.  They’ve been sitting for so long now that I think, although it’s a given that I’ll have trouble sticking to this, that I shall just focus on them for a week or ten days to get them all finished and ready to put together.  Of course, this may well be because I’ve named the quilt Pink Ice and ice of any sort sounds very appealing at the moment with the heat wave. I’ve used so many various shades of pink and rose for the stars/partial stars that I may need to use a different colour when it comes to setting them.  I’m leaning towards setting them on point.

The back:

I’m working on another POTC block now as, when I went through those left to be framed with the cream hexagons, I found a few that really don’t fit with the rest.  But once that block is done I think I’ll start on the next Pink Ice block and try to stay focused so that these blocks at least get put together into a top, ready for quilting.

It was incredibly hot here on Monday.  A temperature of 33C and a humidex of 44C (91F and 111F respectively)  made it a bit like walking into a wall of heat when venturing outside.  More of this all week until Friday when it should cool down a bit.  On top of that, we have smog advisories which is typical for us with a heat wave.  And just to top it off, huge parts of Toronto were affected by a blackout Monday afternoon as there was an explosion at a transformer station. Thankfully, we weren’t affected but I immediately thought of those with whom I used to work on a high floor in one of the skyscrapers.  I cannot imagine walking down 45+ flights of stairs in this kind of heat in a building that had no air conditioning. The blackout occurred right around the time when people would begin to leave the office for the day.

The planters outside buildings around here are very bright and cheerful.  This is one that’s in front of a building right across the street from us.

And this one is in front of an office building across the road.

Both boys were pretty quiet Monday.  Lester draped himself over the arm of the pink chair.

While Smudge, when it was his turn to have the pink chair, curled up in it.


A Few More Clams

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Clamshells seem to have been the focus this week.  I can’t get over how quickly I was able to add two more rows Thursday night.  They’re short rows but, with continuous stitching and hand piecing, they seemingly go  together in the blink of an eye!  I’m leaving the pressing until the end because of the amount of bias, but am finger pressing as I go.

Thursday I did the final pressing of Chintz Circles and its backing as it will be basted today.  I’m looking forward to starting the quilting.  With any luck, I’ll get at least half of it done this weekend.

Another one of the Seven Sisters blocks is finished.  Not pressed, as my wrist was really sore from pressing Chintz Circles and the backing.  Each one of blocks will be a different blue and I am undecided as to how large it will be, although I’m thinking a lap quilt.

I’m using 1″ diamonds with to make the stars.   There’s the opportunity for lots of continuous stitching in these as well, which is something I look for when stitching.  It will join the first one I finished a couple of years ago.

I’m terribly behind in replying to comments but will catch up this weekend.  Do you go back to blogs to see if your comment has been replied to directly on the blog rather than by e-mail?  I know that some bloggers respond that way and others don’t and am curious about opinions are on that subject.

Thursday was a beautiful day, lovely and sunny and warming up.  It looks as though our weekend will be wonderfully sunny and hot.

Smudge was very alert Thursday evening when posing for this photo.

Lester showing off his huge whiskers.