Quilting, gardening, and flying geese

Lately, there have been a few forks in the road of my quilting quest. The latest took me down a dirt path--quite literally. I've been doing some gardening, thanks to the beautiful weather we have been having this Spring. Things are looking alive and healthy. It is all I could do to not get out there and play. Last year, with its hot, dry conditions, I couldn't imagine anything ever coming back to life, but it did. So after tugging at the tangles of Bermuda grass in the flower beds, there were honestly times I wondered if I will ever quilt again. That stuff is so hard to pull with its long underground root system that rivals anything I've ever seen.

I did manage though, to get some quilting in, even though not as much as I'd like. I know I will never be far from a threaded needle. It really doesn't matter much, whether that needle is attached to my sewing machine or stuffed into a pin cushion, the little thing calls to me. 

I have a few projects in various stages, but the main one is my quilting board Block of the Month (BOM) project. I'm not sure if I'm pleased with the colors I've chosen--turquoise and yellow, but I'm sure when it is a completed quilt, it will be beautiful. After all, quilts are just naturally beautiful! 

The only other projects I have been working on lately are to make a few table runners as birthday gifts. I've made three so far, in different colors, using the same favorite pattern. 

I just made this green one for a friend of mine.  

The pattern is from my purple quilt, the BOM sample quilt from last year's Craftsy class. In fact, that's it peeking out from behind the table runner.

The quilted design is from the free-motion quilting pattern taught by Leah Day for her Craftsy class, Free Motion Quilting a Sampler. I'm getting pretty good at these stitches, but only because I've done them on 10 blocks now--three for the three table runners I've made and the original block in the quilt. 

This is the only table runner of the three that I managed to snap a picture. 

It is a simple block, made of several pairs of flying geese arranged with simple squares.

Flying Geese - done! (Photo credit: jeansophie)

For non-quilters, a piece of patchwork known as 'flying geese' refers to the pattern shown at left with four flying geese patches. There are many different ways to make this patch. I use the one where in this example, a blue square is sewn diagonally onto two corners of a cream-colored rectangle. The excess fabric--half of the blue square, a triangle, and its accompanying cream colored triangle beneath, are then trimmed away. The pattern is vintage and represents as it suggests the pattern made by geese flying north in the summer and south in the winter. 

It has been said that runaway slaves fleeing northward used handmade patchwork quilts to communicate, with one another. They used to hang flying geese quilts on the line to signal to others that it was time to follow the geese northward. Their movements were masked by the noisy geese. The direction of the points on the quilt showed them the way.

I've achieved 'flying geese' progress in that I no longer have to draw a diagonal sewing line onto my squares. I have learned to eyeball it. Now that's progress! 

Time to go water the garden.

   

Bonding with my sewing machine

Happy New Year!

I hardly noticed the date change since I've been spending time bonding with my sewing machine. I'm pleased to say we are becoming good friends. I believe 2012 will be a very quilty year.

Since I wanted to learn to machine quilt, that is what I set out to do. I'm fairly happy with the results, not because I'm good at it, but because I see where with plenty of practice, I could be good at it.

 
The Christmas table runner I was working on during my previous post Attempting to learn hand-quilting, has turned out pretty well.

Thanks to a quilting pro friend of mine, who does longarm quilting and does some of the most beautiful work I've ever seen, I learned that my bobbin tension needed adjustment as evidenced by the photo.

That makes sense. I had a terrible time trying to get the stitches to be uniform in size. They still aren't, but at least now I know what to do. My first couple of tries were definitely not good. I attempted to unsew them, that is, take the seam ripper to all those stitches. The stitches were so tight though that it was next to impossible to sneak the point of the seam ripper under them. I took great pains not to cut the fabric in the process, which was a failure. I actually did poke through it in a couple places. No problem, though as this table runner became a practice piece as soon as I made the decision to give machine quilting a try.

I actually think I could use this piece again, albeit under something larger than the tiny Christmas tree in the picture.

By next year, when it comes back out of the attic, I hope to be much more skilled at using my machine. I hope to laugh at myself the next time I see this piece because I will be so much better. So, onward and upward in this new, previously unexplored world of quilting.