W.I.P. Wednesday

So much has happened since last week. Last week I was all excited about my new Pfaff machine, and since then that machine has gone back (sadly) and has been replaced by Elizabeth. So far we have had only happy times together and I think my sewing productivity will pick up some pace now!

{some of the fun that my kids and I have been having with Elizabeth's fancy stitches}

Completed Projects:

1. I have completed one project since last week, a mugrug/placemat/kitty rug for my furry friend Max! And for your viewing pleasure, a hilarious picture my friend sent to me that wasn't in my previous post. He is apparently saying thank you. :)

Ongoing projects:

1. Sparkle QAL - I've jumped ahead of the QAL (oops!) and have completed 12 out of 16 blocks. These blocks have been worked on using 3 different sewing machines - I don't know how many projects manage to earn that distinction! haha

2. Chrysalis Quilt - no progress, but maybe soon

3. Modern Halves - no progress (psssst.....if you haven't already you should go check out my good bloggy friend Debbie's modern halves quilt. It's awesome!)

4. Kaleidoscope Quilt - backwards progress :( This is the last time I'm going to mention it in my WIP Wednesday posts. It may suddenly appear finished, sometime in the future. Maybe.

Upcoming Projects:

1. Ideas for a sewing machine cover for my new machine are brewing in my head. I plan to follow Svetlana's tutorial for the general idea, but am not sure of the layout yet. Maybe a plus design or something like this lattice quilt. I am going to use at least some of these charm squares that I received from Elizabeth at the Pieceful Life blog.

2. Finally, I do hope to participate in the Modern Mini Challenge that is being hosted by Jennifer of Ellison Lane Quilts, but no inspiration has struck quite yet. We'll see....I have a problem with making minis and then not knowing what to do with them! Anyone else??

Happy Wednesday everyone. I look forward to checking and seeing what the rest of you have been up to!

Second time's a charm?

Alright, here we go again!! I could consider this a totally stressful situation, or I could consider myself lucky to be able to unpack and experience two brand new machines in the space of 10 days. I'll choose the latter.....now that it's over. hehe :)

{the odd reflections and light spots on the right of the machine are
just from the window in my kitchen}

Meet Elizabeth. I hope that we have many happy years together. :)

I took the 1.5hr drive this morning to the shop where I bought the Pfaff. The shop wasn't busy and my saleslady (AWESOME!!) was expecting me. We started off by trying out my machine and showing her my samples with the puckered seams. It did the exact same thing there that it was doing for me here at home (phew...I had this fear of it working perfectly with her watching!). Next we tried it on the their floor model of the same machine. It did the same thing. So it wasn't just my machine. Another phew! The saleslady was really surprised, she said she'd never encountered that problem before, and no other customer had ever mentioned it despite them selling more than 60 machines like this. Are people just not straight line quilting??? Because I don't know how you wouldn't notice. Weird. Then she tried it on the Pfaff Quilt Expression 4.0 with the IDT engaged (waaay out of my price range, but just to see...) and it worked perfectly. Double weird. My saleslady went so far as to say that she will not be recommending the Ambition 1.0 anymore to anyone that wishes to do straight line machine quilting. Ouch. And it's a shame because otherwise it was a lovely machine.

I decided that I definitely wanted to exchange it, so next, she started showing me other machines in about the same price range for me to try out, and without any request from me she put walking feet on all of the machines I tried so we could test out the results. First I tried the Janome 4120. It was okay, I wasn't totally impressed. The machine itself was okay, but the work of the walking foot wasn't perfect. Next I went and looked at the Babylock machines. I wanted to try the Melody, but resisted because of the price. So I sat down at the Elizabeth, and the rest is history! It sewed beautifully, the walking foot worked totally perfectly, no puckers whatsoever. The other features of the machine that are awesome is the thread snipper, it has a knee lift for the presser foot, and comes with all of the quilting feet - walking, 1/4", and free motion. Also a super nifty needle threader. And the icing on the cake, even though it was a bit more expensive she gave it to me as a straight exchange, to "help you out a bit for the extra trouble of coming back into town". Awesome.

I've taken it out of the box, but haven't even wound a bobbin yet so that's about all I can for now, except that I'm cautiously optimistic!

A placemat for Max, and some very sad news

My good friend Karen wondered a while ago whether I could make a little mat, a mug rug of sorts (minus the mug!), for their cat Max. It was in the back of my mind for a while, then when I was experimenting with the asterisk blocks a few weeks ago I thought it would be perfect for Max. Colourful and scrappy and just kind of fun. :) I think Max likes it!

And now for the very sad news. I have to take my new machine back...for now at least. I've been having some struggles with it, mainly around the IDT (integrated dual feed, somewhat of a built in walking foot on Pfaff machines). I've been experimenting with well-basted practice quilt sandwiches and I've been having a lot of puckering, really bad at seam intersections (though the stitches themselves look really awesome, front and back), and it is clear to me that the feed is not even. I have been noticing it even when just piecing two fabric pieces together without any batting, that the top layer is being forced forward more than the bottom. I've adjusted the presser foot pressure all the way to the highest and all the way to the lowest, sewing seam after seam, trying different needles, trying different stitch length, tension, etc., with no different results. I spent some time on the phone with my saleslady this afternoon and she said I should definitely come in. So I'll go early this week, unfortunately a 1.5hr drive away, but I need to sort this out! Either it's a bum machine and a new one of the same would work better, or this just isn't the machine for me and I'll need to look for a different option. I reeeeeally want to love this machine but if it just won't quilt for me, I'll need to reconsider. :( Wish me luck!!

Linking to the following:

Little Quilt Monday @ Pieceful Life

W.I.P. Wednesday

Completed Projects:

~ Not a quilty project, but rather my sewing machine shopping! Finished!! If you've read my previous post then you already know that I am now the proud owner of a Pfaff Ambition 1.0. Love it so far!

Ongoing Projects:

~ Kaleidoscope Quilt - still no progress, but now with this new machine I am wondering whether I might give the machine quilting another try. Am I crazy???

~ Sparkle QAL - cutting instructions were released last week, and I got a little ambitious, finishing my cutting and wanting to move on, so I cheated (psst...don't tell anyone) and started assembling blocks based on the pictures and the measurements of pieces given. I am using four different fabrics, making 4 "sparkles" out of each, and so far I have all of the dark blocks finished.


~ Modern Halves Quilt - I had quickly made 4 blocks, then realized that my scraps situation was such that this project would not last long, and as an 'ongoing project' waiting for scraps to accumulate, I decided it would probably end up not going. So I took the blocks that I had, sliced and diced them and ended up with this....will probably end up as a baby quilt for charity.

~ Chrysalis Quilt - no progress
~ Asterisk project - no progress

New Projects:

~ Not in the works yet, but my sewing machine will need a cover, don't you think? Something a bit nicer than the plastic one it came with. Maybe something like this....

{Photo used with permission from Svetlana of s.o.t.a.k handmade. Click on the photo to go to Svetlana's Flickr stream, and click here to go to the tutorial for this sewing machine cover.}

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I look forward to seeing what the rest of you have been up to this week. Happy Wednesday!

Sew Spoiled

Hmmmm, what do we have here??

Could it be?? YES, yes it is! A new sewing machine for me!

Meet my brand new Pfaff Ambition 1.0! This was my first time ever actually shopping for a sewing machine, and let's just say it was a bit of an overwhelming process. After a fair bit of shopping around, a trip to a nearby city (well, 1.5hrs...), and a very supportive husband (much to my surprise and delight), we agreed on this lovely machine. I had definitely been focusing on a lower price range and machines with less features than this, but we were both so impressed by the demo of this machine, and really, the price difference between it and a much lesser model was really very little, considering the countless extras that this machine offers in comparison.

The woman offered us a brand new in the box machine for the same price that they were selling their floor model, but rather than that Graham asked if for the sale price (rather than demo price) they could include a extension table and they said yes! So that's totally awesome. I can also have as many one-on-one lessons as I want, for free.

I've only had a very short time to get it set up and try it out, and so far it's amazing. I have a lot to learn and get used to, but I look forward to many many projects minus the frustration that my old machine gave me!

Been cutting....

Another snow day for us, not as far as school being cancelled or anything like that, but as far as me not having a car because Graham needed to drive it, as opposed to his scooter, to work today!! I didn't have a whole lot needing to be done around home today (though I do need to fold the towels that are in the dryer and bake banana muffins) and the cutting instructions for the Sparkle Quilt Along came out today so I figured I had plenty of time to do the few chores plus get cutting for the QAL!

This is enough for the largest size, in other words enough of the print fabric for 16 "sparkles". I have yet to cut into my solid background fabric, which is going to be cream.

A question for you today.....

In general, do you press your seams open or to one side??

This is not by any means a right/wrong question, I am just curious! I think it's all of the people working on the Swoon-Along that has gotten me wondering. Before I made Swoon, I pressed all seams to one side. Then with Swoon, which has so many seams needing to line up and intersect it made more sense to press everything open and I am so glad that I did! With that project, I got in the habit and liked the results and now I press all seams open, with very few exceptions.

So, just curious, what do you do????

W.I.P. Wednesday

Another week! Another W.i.P. Wednesday. Thanks again, Lee, for hosting (click link above to check out everyone else's W.i.P.'s).

Ongoing projects:

1. Chrysalis Charm Quilt - I finished the quilt top yesterday, and it's now waiting for a new machine with a walking foot to come into our house so it can be quilted!

2. Kaleidoscope Quilt - no progress, we're still at the same stage. I really need to just get it tied so I can move onto the binding, which really is my favourite part of the quilting process. But I feel like this quilt and its poly batting are in a time out right now and I'd rather work on just about anything else.

New Projects:

1. I've been playing around a bit with some scraps and this asterisk quilt block tutorial. It is SO fun! And I am just as amazed by the back of the block as I am by the front. The seams are all pressed towards the center, and I was envisioning a huge bulky mess in the center, but look at how nicely it all fits together! These blocks are small, only 5" each.

2. Sparkle Quilt Along - so far only the fabric choosing part is done. I am going to use the bundle that I received for Christmas, adding in a second bundle of the same that I found in my shopping around, for a total of 8 fat quarters which should allow me to sew the largest size. I'm really looking forward to this. Something fun and kind of flashy! Cutting instructions come out this week.

And finally, not a project yet but today I received this totally awesome charm pack from Elizabeth of the Pieceful Life blog, cut by her on a Go Baby, two squares each of twenty different prints. I had won a giveaway on her blog at least a month ago and had forgotten from time to time that I was expecting this package, so it was a very nice colourful surprise to receive today. Thanks so much Elizabeth!

Chrysalis top complete

I worked hard on the weekend to get the Chrysalis quilt top finished, and didn't quite make it. But today I was able to sew the last 2 rows together, then move onto adding borders on each side! It ended up being approximately 50" x 62", taking into account the 3" borders that I added. I am so happy with how this turned out. It will be perfect as a throw quilt for in our livingroom. I would be remiss if I didn't mention once again that my inspiration for this quilt came from Krista of Poppyprint, with her beautiful Full Circle Quilt.

Today has been a bit of a cold/cloudy/wintery day, but I just squeaked in the finish with enough time to take it outside for a few photos before things got too dark.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately?) I will not be able to move onto quilting this until I purchase a new machine. My Janome, the only machine I had with a walking foot, sold today! I am trying to be patient, waiting for a call from a local quilt shop to let me know when a shipment of machines arrives. The machine I'm looking at is a Janome 2030QDC (on the website it just say "DC", but on the machine in my quilt shop it says "QDC". Huh???). I have yet to actually sew on it, so I'm not sold yet but that is my #1 option at the moment, in my price range. I'll be sure to update as soon as anything happens!

Honoured

I was surprised yesterday to receive an email from Amy, of 'Amy's Creative Side', letting me know that me and my Blogger's Quilt Festival Quilt had been nominated to be featured on her blog! I answered the interview questions, emailed them off, and lo and behold this morning already my feature was up on her website! Head over for a read if you feel so inclined. I am truly honoured.

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And in other news, I have decided what to do with my fat quarter bundle (of which I now have two....I found the exact bundle while shopping the other day so now I have two fat quarters of each print, YAY!), and thanks to those of you who left suggestions on my Tuesday post.

I am going to participate in the Sparkle Quilt Along, being hosted by Megan of Canoe Ridge Creations, and Jeni of In Color Order. With the fabric I have, I should be able to make the largest size Sparkle Quilt since the instructions say that 2 sparkles can be made from 1 FQ. I'm looking forward to it, but feeling impatient as I'm not used to having to wait for the instructions to be released, week by week!

Have a wonderful weekend everyone! It's chilly here, and maaaaybe we'll be getting some snow this weekend {which I always like the thought of, but the reality sometimes not so much!}. We have very little in the plans for the weekend, asides from a soccer game tomorrow and church on Sunday, so it should be a nice relaxing few days. How about you?

W.I.P. Wednesday

It's Wednesday again! I have a few things on the go this week.

1. Chrysalis Quilt - I received in the mail this week the second charm pack of Chrysalis (one I had won at Clover & Violet, and one I had purchased from eBay) and got to work adding the 1.75" strips to two adjacent sides of each charm. It has gone from this.....

.....to this......

2. Kaleidoscope Quilt - earlier this week I asked if any of you use polyester batting for your quilts. It seems a viable option, based on availability and on how happy the people look in the photos on the packaging...don't let that fool you. I have had such a hard time with it.

~ Basting. I went with pin basting because I was out of 505 spray which I prefer to use. You know with cotton batting how it sort of clings to the fabric? Poly doesn't do this at all. It was slipping and shifting and was difficult to even baste.

~ To the machine. After two attempts at basic straight line stitching with a walking foot and brand new sewing machine needle, I gave up. It was not going through smoothly, the stitches were uneven and batting was pulling up through the needle holes, it just wasn't a pretty picture.

I decided to quit before I got too far into it, ripped out those stitches and decided to finish it off by tying rather than quilting. I do still think it will be super cute, and I will finish it off with a proper binding, but I was just so disappointed. I don't think I will be giving polyester another try for a looong time.

3. Modern Halves Quilt - no progress since Monday's post

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Tell Me Tuesday?

Okay, so the title is goofy. It's not going to be a regular event here on my blog, but a few random questions for you today...

1. I received these 4 coordinating fat quarters for Christmas. I'd like to make something incorporating all of them, maybe including a solid of some sort, but I need suggestions. Give me ideas, or link to your favourite quilty tutorials or whatever! I don't want these lovelies to just sit in a nice pile somewhere looking pretty.

2. I was emailing back and forth with Katie about this yesterday. Maybe there isn't an answer but I thought I'd put it out there. Why is it so difficult to find out the suggested retail prices of sewing machines, online? I'm not talking about purchasing a machine online, I just want to be able to do my research at home, in my price range, before going into a machine shop and being completely overwhelmed. It kind of seems like they don't want you to know!

3. Do anybody else's "straight" pins look like this? And here I pride myself on being someone who doesn't sew over pins. Almost never. Really. Eh, who are we kidding? At least I change my sewing machine needle frequently!

4. The saleslady in one of the sewing machine shops I visited yesterday told me that you should never sew off the edge of your fabric because the feed dogs can damage the bottom of your presser foot. Is this true??? This is something I feel like I do all the time!! Especially when chain piecing.

So please, comment away!!

A start and a finish.

Elizabeth, from the blog Don't Call Me Betsy, has a great new quilt pattern up at the Moda Bake Shop - the Modern Halves Quilt. Her example was made with an awesome fabric line, but mine is so far a very random assortment of scraps. I don't have a whole ton of scraps so this will definitely be an ongoing project. Here are the four blocks I have made so far. I like the blue one a lot, as well as the orange and pink/purple. The red one...not so sure. The fabrics just don't seem to play together very nicely. It will either be on a "set aside" pile, or I'll just incorporate it and hope that it behaves better once sliced and paired with another colour half.

My "finish" for this week is this set of potholders for my Mom, made to match her apron from Christmas. These were not made using a pattern, I just winged a log cabin design to a size that felt appropriate for a potholder, sandwiched it with one layer of Insul-Bright and one layer of cotton batting, did some basic quilting, added a binding and send them off in the mail. :)

And other exciting news - I finally decided to try to sell my Janome Sewist 521 that has given me so much grief and frustration, and am now in the market for a new machine! I'm not looking for anything fancy, in fact I prefer a basic mechanical machine that will be reliable and will handle the quilting I like to do. The machine I'm most strongly considering at the moment is the Husqvarna Viking Emerald 116. I've read a ton of reviews, have been emailing back and forth with someone who has the machine and loves it, and was able to "test drive" it at the shop on Saturday. It is on a super sale this week at a local store, which is a bonus for sure! Tomorrow though I am also going to go visit a different shop that sells Pfaff and Babylock, two brands that I am totally unfamiliar with but I want to at least check out. My budget is very modest, but I'm confident that I'll be able to find something that will work for me. Fun times!!

A Winner! and a few random thoughts...

{Is this totally dorky or what...I took a photo of my computer screen in order to show the random.org results....so far haven't figured out a better way. Though I have had some suggestions, I have been able to make none of them work. This does the job though, hey?}

The two Hometown blocks offered up earlier this week are going to commenter #6, none other than Lucy!! One of my lovely faithful readers and commenters from the UK! Congratulations, Lucy. :) I will email you shortly.

Now, two random questions for you all this Friday.

1. Do you ever quilt with 100% polyester batting? I decided to give it a try with this quilt because quite frankly it's so much cheaper, and the charity I am going to mail the quilt to accepts poly batting, and hey, why not try something new? But now that it's basted, I'm a little concerned. It's really....poofy. And this isn't even the stuff labeled "high loft". Here's hoping it's not a disaster.

And now the earth shattering question of the day.....

2. Would you wear PJ's to bring your kids to school? And I'm not talking about just throwing a coat on over your PJ's to drive them, never actually leaving the car, because I will admit that I have done that, but actually going inside the school in your PJ's. I saw someone at school this morning like that, and it made me think, REALLY???? Am I alone in this?

Please comment and let me know. Happy Friday!!!!

W.I.P. Wednesday

Lee is back at it, hosting W.I.P (works in progress) Wednesday at her blog, Freshly Pieced. I have just a few things on the go, and another few brewing in my head. :)

First up is this finished quilt top. It came together rather quickly, but now I'm at a standstill as I don't yet have backing fabric or batting. The pattern is Kaleidoscope by Cluck Cluck Sew. Once finished, the quilt will be sent to Bumble Beans.

Next up is a set of potholders (only one pictured, but there are two) that I decided to make on the spur of the moment the other day. You may recognize the fabric as what was used to make my mom's apron. So of course, these potholders are going to be for her as well. Surprise!! Just quilting and binding needed.

Speaking of the apron, a photo of my mom and sister wearing them. Pretty adorable, hey?

Okay, finally at the end of the W.I.P. list is what is going to be, I think, a generous sized lap quilt, maybe one that will live on our couch. I was first inspired by Krista of Poppyprint when I saw this beautiful quilt (pictured below) that she collaborated on, as a relief project for Japan following the earthquake and tsunami last year.

Photo used with permission - click on photo to visit Krista's Flickr stream

The quilt was made using 2 charm packs and solid fabric. That's it. Each charm square is bordered on two adjacent sides with a strip of a solid fabric, then sewn together in this arrangement (a take-off on Malka Dubrawsky's sewing machine cover, pictured on the front of her book seen here). And voila, a beautiful quilt that looks far more complicated than it actually is. I am using Chrysalis from Moda for the charm squares, and Nugray by Free Spirit for the solid. Has anyone used Free Spirit solids?? This is my first time and I'm not sure if I'm impressed. It kinda has this weird sheen to it. Ah well. Here's a sampling of my progress so far. One charm pack down, one to go.

I think I'll stop for now! This new year is definitely filled with new ideas. In 2011 I made bed quilts for our whole family, and quite a few other items for us as well, and in the year ahead I hope to focus a bit more outward - with more items for charities and for family & friends.

Happy Wednesday, everyone.