Tag Archives: Inklingo

Saving My First Quilt

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When I began quilting I clearly jumped in at the deep end, making a top like this. Some of the stars have holes in the middle through which a truck could be driven. Well, okay — that might be an exaggeration, but there are definite holes that I cannot close.  Over the years, I’ve tried.  I’ve had the top tucked away now for years, trying to decide how I could save it.  Buttons in the centres was one idea, but not one that I was crazy about.  Appliqueing on some shape was clearly the best idea, but what shape?  Now I think I finally have a solution.

On Thursday, a new Inklingo collection of circles was released.  The combination of Karen Kay Buckley’s Perfect Circles ® and Inklingo Circles means perfect circles with virtually no fabric waste at all.  This way I can pick my circle size to applique over the centres of the stars and finally finish that first quilt.

It’s not a perfect quilt by any stretch, but it’s one I want to see finished and in use. The other goal I have in mind for this quilt?  I’m going to mark some quilting designs on it and see how well I do quilting by machine.

Thursday we woke up to a new dusting of snow.  But there was also a sign that spring isn’t too far off.  For the first time in months, we saw grackles out on the roof garden.  Soon Lester will have lots to watch out the window.

Thursday evening Lester decided it was his turn to curl up by the heating pad.

Smudge gets into one of the round kitty beds and immediately sets to kneading it into the oval shape he prefers.

More Melons

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All 52 melon blocks are made, so the X’s and O’s top should be finished relatively quickly.  I am going to machine quilt it, know exactly how I want to quilt it and may get this one finished within another a couple of weeks.  Making the melon blocks has me tempted to start another quilt using some melons and other shapes.

A while back, I joined the Bargain Lover’s Club at Sew Sisters and have been receiving 10 great FQs every month.  This time?  This time, when I opened the envelope, Mr. Q.O. said he wanted these fabrics.  I keep threatening to get him piecing to help get all these designs I have in my notebook and in my head actually made.  Maybe this grouping will do it.

Smudge likes to lounge by the water and food bowls.  This was a shot we couldn’t resist taking.

Lester found himself a cozy spot to curl up and have a nap.  It was cold again on Tuesday, but he’s showing more interest in getting up on the windowsill every day. Maybe that’s an indication that spring will be here sooner rather than later.

Half a Dozen Melons

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I’m hooked.  No question about it.  Stitching these little blocks is nothing but fun. They’re a quick stitch and those perfect curves make me smile every time.  I need around 40 of them for the border I’m planning but, at the rate they’re going together, it’s not going to take long.  But ideas for a quilt made with just these blocks keep floating through my mind.  It’s one of those blocks that I find irresistible.

Thursday was a great day.  The pink and cream quilt top is finished.  When I got up Thursday morning, I decided it was time.  Sashings were cut, sewn to cornerstones and added to the blocks and then the final border was added.  What I learned yesterday?  That machine piecing isn’t that difficult.  All the joining was done by machine, while the blocks themselves were hand pieced and I got it all put together without having to rip out any seams.  The top finishes at around 60 x 70, and I am thrilled with it.  Pictures when it’s quilted.  I’ve already got the quilting planned for it.

Charlsey posted some pictures on her blog post here from our two days of stitching, talking and planning as well as some interesting people watching.  There’s one shot of Charlsey’s Seven Sisters quilt and my X’s and O’s quilt that I love.  The hotel lobby is rather beige and I think our quilts added some needed colour!

For some reason we got no new photos of the cats on Thursday.  Things are definitely looking up — the two of them had one of their mock battles on Thursday evening, which they haven’t really done for a couple of months.  This is one of my favourite photos and a rather rare shot of the two of them together that was taken a few months ago.

Melons

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I’ve started putting together one of the elements for the borders of the X’s and O’s quilt.  These little 4″ blocks go together so quickly that I don’t think it will take long at all to get this part of the border ready to put together.

The back of one of the little blocks.

We’re definitely going to have a couple of days of milder temperatures.  If the forecast is correct, we may hit 50 on Friday!  It looks like it will go back to the cold winter weather shortly after that, but what a treat to get a day that warm in February.

Lester continues to improve.  Mr. Q.O. was taking pictures of the boys, focusing on their paws.

Smudge was showing off his paws while he slept.

6 More Pickled Ladies and a Plan

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Lots of stitching and talking on Tuesday resulted, for me, in six more finished Pickled Ladies.  I think this will end up as a large wall hanging with a narrow stop border in black and a larger border in a shabby floral.  When I have all the ones that are currently prepped done, then I’ll assess its size.

Tuesday was chilly again with temps in the mid 20s.  But it looks like we’re heading into a nice warm-up, so I’m hoping that maybe we’ve had the worst of winter and now it’s just a matter of waiting for the warmer weather to arrive.

Smudge was reaching for the kitty toy basket from the kitty bed.  Always makes me laugh when he does something like this.

Lester was having a snooze.

More Arcs for Pickled Ladies

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I realized that it’s the middle of the month and no new Pickled Ladies have been stitched, so last night I put together some arcs for another dozen or so of them. They go together quickly and it’s even faster to add them to the clamshells, so I’m hoping to get these all stitched today.

Monday I met up with another Inklingo’er, who is here with her husband.  We had a prime spot in front of the fireplace in the lobby of the hotel at which they’re staying and stitched and talked our way through a good part of the day.  Today will be more of the same.  Monday I worked on the triangle bands for another Farmer’s Delight block, but today it will be the Pickled Ladies.  I’m behind again on replying to comments and visiting blogs, but will catch up on Wednesday.

When I’m upset about something, I have a tendency to throw out things that I don’t mean to toss.   Last week, when Lester had the stroke, I apparently threw out my finger pincushion.  It’s hard to believe just how lost I was without it.  Thanks to my friend, I now have a new one.  This one is going to be very carefully taken care of and tucked away each evening after I finish stitching so that there’s no chance of it getting tossed out!

Lester is definitely on the mend.  Monday night he was spilling out of the kitty bed as he stretched and then slept in this position.

An hour or so later and Smudge had taken over the kitty bed.


Carpenter’s Wheel — Lots of Photos

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A friend asked me how I’d make one of the Carpenter’s Wheel blocks so I decided to do a mini tutorial on it.  Smudge is watching intently.

The first thing I did was figure out what I needed to print, which was 8 diamonds for the centre star, 8 squares in the background fabric to surround the centre star, a total of 24 other diamonds for the frame around the star/square centre,  8 QSTs and 8 more squares in the background fabric, and 4 squares in another colour for the corners.  Once that was done, it took only minutes to print and then cut out my pieces.

The first step was to make the centre star.

The next step is to add the 8 squares around the centre star.  As I hand piece, I look for these continuous stitching possibilities.  Two lengths of thread later and all the squares were added.

Pressing after each round isn’t normally something I do, but this time I did.

The next step is to make the frame of diamonds that will surround the centre star/squares.  As I was using two colours, I first stitched the purple diamond pairs and then added the orange diamonds in between and continued joining them until I had the frame ready.

Another opportunity for lots of continuous stitching and a few threads later, the frame is added.  In fact, it went so fast that I had started to add the final squares and QSTs around the block before I remembered to take this picture.

The final step is to add the background squares and QSTs around the perimeter. Again, lots of continuous stitching.  When adding the squares and QSTs, I left the corner squares until the end so that I could take advantage of the continuous stitching opportunities and then went back and added the 4 final squares.

It presses beautifully and lies flat as can be.  Because of the perfect stitching lines and matching points printed with Inklingo, making this block is not difficult at all.  I used the 6 inch LeMoyne Star collection to make my block, which finishes at 12″.

The fabrics I used for this block really had me out of my normal comfort zone as far as colour goes.  It was interesting stitching and now that it’s done, it’s on its way to a friend.

Lester found this whole thing so relaxing that he fell asleep!  He’s continuing to improve and has been playing with toys, is eating on his own and seems more like himself every day.

Farmer’s Delight in Stages

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Another Farmer’s Delight block completely finished.

One that just needs the frame around it to square it up.

And a third which is awaiting its two bands of triangles.  I’ve decided to make the remaining blocks all at once.  It’s faster, I think, if I make the blocks up to the point of completing the addition of the two rounds of triangles and then, once the remaining 3 or 4 blocks are at that stage, I’ll add the frames to square them up all at once.  That’s what I’ve been working on this week.

We ran down to the hospital for a bit on Wednesday afternoon to meet Cameron, who was born late Monday afternoon, and to deliver his little quilt.  His father, who is the son of a quilter, wasted no time in making sure Cameron was cozy and warm with the quilt wrapped around him.

Thank you to everyone for your thoughts and messages about Lester — they were greatly appreciated and helped enormously.  Lester has been slowly recovering.  This is his third stroke and the recovery time has been longer this time.  As of Thursday night he’s eating on his own, drinking and even playing a bit with kitty toys.  It has been a roller coaster of emotions watching him, wondering how well he’ll recover.   We took no pictures of him this week until last night, when he was acting more like Lester, our house lion — lounging in the kitty bed near the kitty toy basket. We were, once again, extremely lucky.

There has been good news with Smudge as well.  He finally seems to be eating enough on his own.  So much so that Thursday was the first day in close to three months that there was no syringe feeding at all. Tuesday and Wednesday were rather tough days with syringe feeding necessary for both of them and then Thursday was like magic — they were both eating on their own.  Smudge was having a snooze after eating on Thursday night.

Baby Windmills Quilt

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Friday evening the last stitch was taken to tack down the binding and the baby windmills quilt was finished. Nothing like a last-minute finish — the baby is going to be delivered sometime today.   I had decided how I was going to quilt it and, with a little advance planning, was able to get the machine quilting done within a couple of hours and had only 4 thread ends to work in.  All straight line quilting, of course, as that’s my skill level when quilting by machine.

When I found this flannel a couple of years ago, I bought enough yardage of it for the backing for 3 baby quilts.

The label is ready to be written and stitched on to the back.  As soon as we know the baby’s name, I’ll write out and attach the label, give the quilt a quick wash and dry and we’ll be off to deliver it to the hospital.   I’ve found that a 2″ hexagon is perfect for a label as it gives me lots of room to write.  I’ve got the turn-under allowance basted down as that will make the appliqueing on to the back go very quickly.  Right now it’s ironed to a piece of freezer paper to stabilize it when I’m writing on it and the fabric pen is ready and waiting.  I can’t wait to hear if it’s a boy or girl!

The quilt was made with “other” half 1″ hexagons which I printed using Inklingo. This was a UFO that had been sitting for a couple of years.  I love tessellating designs and had started this quite a while ago but then it sat.  However, when I learned my cousin’s son and his wife were going to have another baby I knew what this particular UFO was meant to be.  Once I made that decision, it only took a couple of weeks to finish piecing it.  With a tessellating design like this, there are tons of opportunities for continuous stitching which makes the piecing go very quickly.

Lester looking rather majestic — one of his house lion looks.

Smudge has definitely turned a corner, we think.  He’s more playful and is eating more every day.  Sunday night he was playing with the favourite toy, Cappy, and then decided to rest while lying on top of Cappy.  I think he wanted to make sure it didn’t get away from him.

Farmer’s Delight … Again

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Along with finishing the quilting of the baby quilt, I started piecing another Farmer’s Delight block on Thursday.  The photo above was taken back in April, and there are a couple more blocks that have been done since but this is another of the UFOs that has made its way up the list.  It will only take 3 or 4 more blocks to finish it.

Tonight I’ll add the binding to the baby quilt and make the label.  Pictures of the finished baby quilt and the newest Farmer’s Delight block will be taken for Monday’s post.

A surprise package arrived from a non-blogging friend that included the book EQ6 Simplified.  I was thrilled and can tell already, from just looking through it, that it’s going to make a huge difference.  I’ve already picked up a couple of things.

We were absolutely delighted when Smudge decided he wanted his yogourt treat again.  He hasn’t evidenced any interest in it for what seems like forever, so watching him go for the yogourt Thursday night made us both feel fabulous!  He has been eating a bit more each day on his own, and we’re still struggling to find a food that he likes and that is good for both him and Lester.

Lester seemingly will eat almost every  food we offer.  There have been a few he’s not liked, but he’s nowhere near as finicky as Smudge.