The finish is in sight!

Whew! Lotsa quilting happened today. :) Which also means that plenty of thread was used too.

I opened the "Milk Chocolate" spool yesterday, and above shows how much I've used. Well over half of it!! I made a little mark on my Excel list to order some more whenever I make another purchase from Connecting Threads, probably not until some time next year. Perhaps in a year from now, I'll have 2 spools of each color "in stock" and even more of the ones that I use a lot, say black or white?

I also kept track of how many bobbins it took me to make this quilt.
-4 bobbins of the silver for the piecing of the top and adding the binding
-9 bobbins of the brown for the free-motioning! NINE! I have never used so much thread in one quilt before. I guess that means I'm getting closer to doing more custom work on my quilts?

Here's the top on my computer chair - I put it there so I wouldn't be tempted to sit on it and procrastinate on making the binding. :P

I did find the Connecting Threads fabric to fray a bit more than my normally prewashed fabrics, and you can see a bit of it on the batting.

Binding on, trimmed and ready to be hand sewn down!

And you can see a bit of the backing. It's one of my hand dyed backings - using leftover green and blue mixed together. Since my other backing choices were orange, purple and neon pink, I felt that the teal was the best shade for this quilt. :)

Leah

Quilting update

I merrily started to quilt the Pineapple Blossom last night, and then I discovered a little problem.

I'm quilting it waaaaaaaaaaaay denser than I expected to. I can't help it! My machine loves free-motioning with Essential threads. Absolutely loves it. So I'm having so much fun, and shortly after I quilted the third block... uh oh! I'm out of bobbin thread.

Wait! How can I be out? I figured I'd need two bobbins at the most. I wound up 2.5, just in case! And then I find myself done with the first bobbin - not half way through the quilt - but a mere 1/10th way done! Math time: so three blocks use up 1 bobbin, and there's 30 blocks... that's TEN bobbins! Yeah. I still don't get it. I used only 4 bobbins on my sister's quilt and it's twice as big at this one!!

Therefore, half of the quilt weight is gonna be in thread alone. :P And thankfully I have enough thread, but I'll be adding more "Milk Chocolate" to my next Connecting Thread order. :)

Leah

Pinning Progress

I got the layers trimmed and pinned.

I couldn't decide between a fluffy polyester batting, or some Warm & Natural cotton batting. So I compromise, W&N with a low loft polyester on top of it. It was a weight that I'm happy with, and hopefully it'll have the fluff and drape I'm shooting for after I wash it.

No yoga classes needed for me, weird pinning angles cover all the moves. ;)

And I decided to go with my husband's suggestion, brown thread. "Milk Chocolate" to be exact, and I think that's a great name for the thread, cuz you certainly can imagine yourself wrapped up in it with a mug of hot chocolate. :)

Maybe I'll even have it all quilted tonight! Dare I hope?!

Leah

I can't stop yawning...

I'm so sleepy right now... I just wanna take a nap. So logically, I'll sew to keep awake! That's right, operate dangerous machinery with eyes half opened. ;) But you know... I think I'll stay away from the rotary cutter for a few hours. :P

I'm also blasting out my playlist on the iPod in hopes of staying awake. And getting up a lot to go back and forth from the machine and computer. And yawning enough to put 10 people to sleep.

I'm tired cuz I woke up at 5am. I was sleeping with my hands above my head and my fingers were touching the wall. I felt some rumbling, and of course the first thought this California-born gal had was "earthquake!" Then my second thought was "oh no, my fabric fell through the floor... hope the rest of the building doesn't go down too." (I think it's time to bust some more stash!)

I looked out window and noticed some water on the glass. Was it raining? Can't see without my contacts. So I started to drift back to sleep, then there was this huge crack of lightening, followed by some more rumbling - thunder. Ah! Just a typical monsoon-like weather. But I couldn't fall back asleep, cuz I started to think about my quilt, and thinking of what thread to use... and what quilting pattern... and what to do with the bonus HSTs (yes, that's what the picture is)... oh, my husband's alarm went off. Might as well get up too. :)

Leah

Oops! And Thread Suggestions?

Well, as I was sewing the top together, I accidentally sewed the same fabrics next to each other.

Too late now! I think I'm only annoyed because it's really close to a couple other pinks, and I don't want it to pop out.

And hooray! I got the whole top pieced before bedtime... now we have our bed back. ;)

Can you give me some thread color suggestions for the quilting? I was thinking dark green, because that's what the binding will be... but my husband suggested brown. And that makes a lot of sense to me, cuz there's a bit of brown here and there, why not tie the quilt together with brown thread? But I love green! I'm biased. :P

Go ahead any suggest any color (and perhaps give a reason why?), I have almost all the Essential threads, except for a few of the neutrals and variegated ones. I'll probably be undecided on the thread color until I take it to my machine to quilt it.

Leah

30 hours progress

My quilting energy is certainly showing in this Pineapple Blossom quilt! I think it's because I've had this quilt on my mind since July. I got a Connecting Threads catalog in the mail and drooled over the Country Fabrics. Then with my car troubles and buying a laptop, I put my order on hold til we had a bit more cash. But my desire to make a Pineapple Blossom never changed.

So here's the tale of my past 30 hours, since I received the box in the mail, at noon. :)

Here's all the pieces I needed to make 30 nine-inch finished blocks. It doesn't even cover half of my cutting mat. Boy, do we quilters tend to overbuy on fabric or what?!


I sewed until a little after 10pm last night, and this was my stopping point.


By noon today, I had this much done.


By 6pm, I had all the blocks finished!

I succeeded in a few things. I did not want there to be any repeats in a single block. I also did not want any of the same fabrics touching each other in the final layout. That was a little tricky, kept having to play musical blocks to get a good fit. :)

Next I need to get this into one piece before bedtime, there's no way I want to try to refigure the blocks again!

And if I get my way, there will be no scraps left, except maybe a wee bit of the green from the binding... you'll have to wait and see what I mean. :)

Leah

It came!

Finally! It got delivered to my town at 4:30pm, but didn't make it's way to my mailbox until noon today.

I'm happy with everything! I already flipped through the Nine-Patch book (good job Judy!) and peeked at the Prairie Children and Their Quilts (I'll give it a deep read later).

More thread! I had to order their newest collection, "Garden Thread Set", along with 3 spools of silver for piecing, and 2 white spools for quilting. I'll have to remember to update my Excel list with the new threads. :)

Then there's the "yo-yo" makers. One makes flowers, the other makes circle yo-yo's. The circle one looks like it'll be a good portable quilting activity, like in the car or when I visit the in-laws.

Last of all, the fabric! 15 FQs (Fat Quarters) and a 1 yard dark green piece. The yellow/gold fabric is going to be the triangles in the Pineapple Blossom, and the other FQs will be for strips. The dark green piece will be for the binding. If I did my math correctly, I'll be able to get 30 blocks from the FQs. I'm *not* prewashing the fabric this time, I can't afford to let it shrink and I'd like to give myself a chance to quilt with unwashed fabrics. Of course I'll wash it afterwards. :)

And there you have it, my goodies. ;) I'm gonna eat lunch and then start to make the Pineapple Blossom quilt.

Leah

Disappointment

I'm a little disappointed today - my Connecting Threads order didn't come! I think it's because I so rarely order stuff online (half a dozen times a year?) that I count each second it's supposed to arrive. I check the tracking number about 200 times. It hasn't been updated since the 10th. And it said it'd be here on the 13th! Hmmph.

To console myself, I just made my purchase from Amazon.com. :D Hopefully it'll come some time next week and I'll bury my nose in the books while everybody else can enjoy Thanksgiving and the mad rush of Black Friday. Have fun! ;)

*********

I got this in the mail last week, all the way from England! A cute purple needle book.

Thanks Anne, I love the colors, and completely agree with the statement! I think I've only mended 2 things since I got married. One time was when a button popped off my husband's dress shirt. I took it to my machine right there, right then and sewed it back on before I could think about forming a complaint. The other item was a pair of exercise pants and the decorative side strip popped open a few inches.

No mending for me! I have a sister who loves to sew clothes and we made a deal - she'll sew whatever clothes I (or any future kids) need, and I'll make quilts for her and her someday kids. ;)

Leah

I'm 25!

Today's my 25th birthday!! I'm pretty happy about it, and things that have been happening. :)

The picture is the candle that my sister-in-law gave me yesterday, spiced cider. Mmm, mmm, mmm!! It'll be vying for attention for my nose along with Bath and Body Works "Sugar and Spice" lotion. Man, I just love that stuff. :D

Highlights of the past few days...

-We celebrated Thanksgiving yesterday. My MIL is going out of town on the actual Thanksgiving day, so she decided to do it 2 weeks early. That also leaves the day free for other family members to celebrated Thanksgiving on the actual day (like my sister-in-law's husband's family).

It didn't really feel like Thanksgiving - more like they were having a grand feast for my birthday. ;)

-On Saturday I got a birthday card from my only living grandparent, Pops. You all "met" him last Christmas. Inside of the card was a $50 gift card to JoAnn's. I'm *really* touched by this gift! Pops has never mastered the computer (yet! I still hope he will) and so finding a JoAnn's isn't a one-click away for him. And the gift card also says to me that he really appreciates his quilt and wants to fully support my hobby. :)

-This morning I got an email from Amazon.com... I nearly deleted it! It turned out to be an egiftcard from my parents, for a very generous amount! I am planning to buy the Foxfire Books, and the Dangerous Book for Boys.

I almost got the Daring Book for Girls, but I read a few reviews and somebody warned that there was palm reading, fortune telling and summoning spirits mentioned in the book. Just not the kind of thing I'm interested in promoting or reading about. Plus, a bunch of the Boys book review said it was great for girls too, so I'm gonna stick with that one. Hey, I was the one who wished I could be in boy scouts when I did a year in girl scouts. :)

I'm pretty excited about the Foxfire books though! I checked one out at the library and have been slowly reading it (a LOT of information to process) and would love to own all the books in the series. This is my chance! Thanks Mom and Dad. :)

-Since the beginning of October, I have lost almost 20 pounds. Whoo!!!!!!!!!!! This is my first time losing more than 10 pounds since 2001! Yeah, I have been struggling for years. One of the biggest changes I've done was to go off of birth control in the beginning of summer. I still gained over the summer, but since my visit to my parents house in October, I've been dropping. Feels so good. :)

While I was at my parents, I went to the thrift store and found this GREAT pair of dark green dress pants. Oh, I so loved the color, I just had to try it on, even though it was one size smaller than what I could comfortably wear. Sucked in my breath to get them to button and told my husband IHaveToHaveThesePants!

Yesterday I was able to get them on with ease, eat a Thanksgiving meal and touch my toes a few hours later! Yeah! :D

-I can drive a rental car now! In the past few years it's been a wee bit of an issue. On a couple of my family vacations we had to drag my dad around as the driver, cuz none of us kids could legally drive the rental cars. And my poor mom had to navigate Gettysburg to find a bike rental shop - for a quick second she forgot that I wasn't 25 yet and almost handed me the keys. :) (Of course, we kids teased her about not giving birth to me sooner so I could drive).

-Tomorrow my Connecting Threads order better come! I'm still pouting that my birthday has been declared a no-mail day, in honor of Veteran's Day. Sunday was a no mail day. I'm a mail-a-holic. Can you tell? :D

Off to update my profile, I'm no longer a 24 year old quilter!

Leah

Close to home

I'm sure many of you have heard about the Alum Rock earthquake in California. When I first heard about it, I was like "yikes! That's really close to my parents!" But felt better when I saw the magnitude was only 5.6. Ok! I know that might be a lot for some of you, but after the 1989 one, it's considered a more mild one, on my personal scale. :)

I've been looking at pictures online and trying to figure out how close to the epicenter my parents house is. From what I understand, it was just about 3-4 miles away. Too close for comfort.

The green arrow points to their house, the orange circle is where I believe the epicenter is. The epicenter is 7 miles from Milpitas (top left corner) and 5 miles from Alum Rock (bottom center).

My dad was sure thinking ahead when he built a steel-frame house (can "give" more than wood houses), but they gotta quit having so many adventures!

Leah

Gave me the giggles

In today's mail there was a notice from our (only) credit card company that they've raised our credit line up another $1,000.

Do you think they're getting nervous about the fact that our current cards expire on the 31st and we haven't activated the new ones yet? :D We're just lazy and haven't gotten around to activating it yet.

Maybe I better make that Connecting Threads order tomorrow, cuz I'm clean out of white thread now. Somehow I'm not motivated enough to consider activating the new card just for some thread, bit o' fabric and Judy L's new book. ;)

Leah

Another one to the list

Looks I have another antibiotic to add to the "allergic" list. :(

Not very itchy, but I'm flaming red, swollen and hot to touch. Hopefully this is the last time I'll get hives - it was about 15 years ago when I discovered that I'm allergic to penicillin. Now bactrim.

So I've been taking it easy and the only quilt-related thing I've done is curl up under them. :)

Leah

Drop out

I'm dropping out of my quilt guild's challenge. It's called "Someday Is Today" and you had to make the quilt that you've been wanting to do "someday". I knew *exactly* what I was gonna do. In July 2006 I cut a bunch of strips for making a Jewel Box quilt.

The sign up for the challenge was in February, but I got distracted by several other quilts to make and finish during that time. So I didn't start to tackle it until August. Then in August it was decided that my parents were gonna come and visit in September, and that my husband and I would visit them for a week in October. So that put me behind. It wouldn't have been a big deal, except I came home with a bad ear infection and took it easy.

So today I emailed the host of the challenge and let her know that I won't be joining. The quilt would need to be quilted, bound and labeled for me to admit it. I'm just cutting it too close and have been working harder at not adding quilting stress to my life! :)

I'm still happy - I finally got started on the quilt! Now just for some borders and I'm even thinking about trying to do feather quilting on it somewhere. But I'm going to enjoy finishing this quilt more at my leisure. Which means it'll likely get done faster... go figure! ;)

Leah

Mystery completed!

I finished Renee's mystery this afternoon. Woven Rings. Can you see the green and yellow circles?

The funny part is that somebody mentioned that it looked like those chairs/furniture with wood woven in small circles. I had to think hard (and back to the 1980s) about what she was referring to. But I had a nice laugh about the unintentional pattern. :)

I'm thinking I might add another "round" of blocks to the bottom and left side, so the green dominates. That will make it from 36" to 42".

Leah

A month of Saturdays

I'm about a month behind in blogging, aren't I? :P

Saturday September 15, my parents were here. Below is a picture of them touring the Tombstone Courthouse.

It was a nice visit, but time flew by way too fast! At least I could rest in the knowledge that I would be seeing them again in 3 weeks.

Saturday September 22, we went to the in-law's house and celebrated my brother-in-law's 24th birthday.

Saturday September 29th was the wedding. I had spend the week helping prepare for the wedding. I put together the favor boxes (and fought to death with the printer!) and help set up the tables and such.


That morning my husband and I had to pick up the cake from the bakery. I had to carry it on my lap for the ride home. Every bump and wiggle made me wince! I didn't want to be responsible for the cake toppling!


Here's a picture of my husband the night before the wedding. Longish hair, beard... all has to go.

I gave him a hair cut Saturday morning and he shaved. Doesn't he clean up nicely? ;)

On the left is the newlyweds, my husband and his parents on the right.

And of course, there was the whole wedding itself! :)

Saturday October 6, I was flying over to my parents house.

Then I spent the whole week either dyeing fabric or preparing the house for my brother's Eagle Scout Court of Honor.

Saturday October 13 my dad wakes me up at 7am and I spent the next 5 hours typing and preparing the program for the Court of Honor. Then there was the whole event itself. Top of it all, I had to pack everything I could that night, cuz we were leaving Sunday morning. Whew. :)

But this Saturday? Mine! All mine! :D Hubby is away on a conference, and there's a mystery quilt on one of my groups. I'll be making the baby sized quilt and so far I think there's snowball blocks in it. With my hand dyed fabrics from last week, of course. ;)

Leah