Christmas Star Quilted

Well, laying on the floor and working with painter's tape didn't really work to baste things smoothly, but by the time I figured that out, I wasn't interested in unpicking all those stitches and starting over. I know that's the wrong choice, and certainly the lazy one, but I just don't have 12 hours to spend unpicking all that stitching, or another who-knows-how-many hours to baste and quilt again. So, I'm really hoping that a good washing or two will help make the bumps a little less noticeable.

You can kind of see what I did so far - though I really fought to get photos of this one. I need to sign up for another photography class if I'm going to keep working with such light fabrics! Probably should anyway.

Anything that shows off the fabric really hides the quilting. Fortunately, that's not the case in person.

The quilting is even harder to take a photo of on the back side, but when you can see it, it looks great! I'm actually more excited about the turnout than I thought I would be. I'd intended to go heavy on the quilting, stopped thanks to all the issues I was having -- and I think it was the right breaking point.

It's hard to tell, but there's a tiny star in the center of the quilt, a couple square 'frames,' a larger star that matches the outline of the quilt pattern, another large rectangle frame -- and a few rather wonky stars scattered in the corners and large triangles of the background. I tried to branch out a little, rather thank sticking with straight lines. I like it, but it was a lot of work for my machine to handle on such a large quilt.

I think I'm happy with it, though I do wish a couple of the worst spots had quilted a little more easily (you can see a pucker in the lower right corner, where the background square meets the dark brown triangle point). I do think they'll be better after washing, but if not, maybe I can selectively unpick and do a little bit of fixing there.

Next up, binding of course. I'm not certain, but I think I'm going to take a chance and go with something very different. I'm leaning towards this:

In little pieces, I think it works well. I'm hoping the same is true once it's attached all the way around. We'll know soon!

Slow, but Not Gone

My terribly grown up plan of getting to sleep before midnight has gone out the window the last few weeks -- and I'm still not accomplishing enough with the extra 2.5 hours in my day!

Aside from work and other boring things, here's a pretty good hint of what I've been working on:

1) A cat costume. Yes, I know, I probably could have purchased something similar in any store right now for about $5-10. But, right now I'm sitting at $1 + time + things I already owned, and it helps that it doesn't have any glitter or sparkles.

2) Unless I chicken out, I'm about to attend my first costume party since -- wait, ever. It'll be my first time wearing a costume -- for a reason other than a play -- since I was about seven years old. Yikes. More nervous than I should be. Currently working on 4 costumes so I can go back and forth right up until we walk in. Yikes, again.

3) All those scraps? Mostly not from the ears. Mostly from my currently 6 page long tutorial/outline for my upcoming attempt on 'teaching' wonky stars. Yeah, I way over did it. But that's who I am. Sometimes.

4) No, not packing or moving. That's actually a box from my last move -- when I had no idea how long I'd be away from my things and absolutely did write the title of every book in that box on every side of that box -- and all the others I packed. That box is now completely full of random thread colors I picked up at a garage sale. I had to dig it out to get some black thread so I could finish the ears. Which better be tomorrow.

5) And because photos make me feel less like I've been neglecting to keep track of anything, here's a little more of the unplanned but fun wonky star project I started as part of the tutorial making process.

It needs trimmed up a little, but not bad for my first extra wonky star. I'm winding up with a growing pile of scrappy background wonky stars. I think I'm seeing another mini quilt in my future, but I might hold out and press on for a baby quilt instead. Never know -- I think I'm going to be sending out three in the next month...

What We're Doing Around Here

There's been a lot of 'helping' going on around here -- and truthfully, I haven't had the heart to push him out of the way.

I've only managed to finish one of this year's ever expanding pile of gift bags -- and it immediately attracted attention.

And every single time I manage to drag the Christmas Star quilt onto the work surface, it immediately attracts attention.

I'll have to wash it more than once to get all the cat hair and dander out of it. Or give it up and let Momo keep it (not the plan).

Today, I didn't even get a project out -- he still spent several hours sleeping on top of a pile of batting on my desk. So, instead of accomplishing anything, I just worked on reading a book. And actually, that's okay with me too.

I might not think that in a couple months when Christmas is here...

Different Basting Technique

I've never been great at basting. I've tried laying it all out on the floor -- which sometimes requires crawling on top of it. I've tried taping the different layers to the ground before/during the basting process. I've tried several different methods of layering it across a desk, counter top, or another work surface. I've tried using self adhesive batting -- which requires an iron, some water, and depending on the size of the project, some crawling around on the floor again. Truthfully, I think for larger projects, I like a combination of the self adhesive batting mixed with a few pins to make sure things are really working well together. That's probably out of my reach for large projects again, since I'm without carpet and I don't want to risk the steam on the laminate -- and it's not something I really need for the smaller projects that fit on my ironing board.

So, I'm constantly struggling with how to make basting work better. Crawling around on the floor is never fun, and usually gives me less than ideal results. I don't currently have a desk top I'm willing to put pins against. And I didn't have any kind of fancy batting. So, I tried something new I had seen brief mention of on Pinterest (where else, of course). (link goes directly to source, not through Pinterest)

Using a combination of painter's tape and pins, I attached the backing and batting to a blank wall -- which I only had because I still haven't finished rearranging the office -- pinned the quilt top across the sandwich, and started pinning.

The basting part itself went very smoothly -- but this was a fairly small quilt to start with, so it might have worked just as well any other way. I'm hoping that this good luck rubs off on the rest of the process. I'm using the same batting I've fought with several other times (gotta use up what I've already bought), and so far quilting with it has not been a joy. There's a chance that a better baste could result in a smoother quilting experience -- or at least, I hope so.

If I get a few lines in and this is still a nightmare to work with, I'll probably rip it out and start over with a different batting. Sometimes I can deal with wrinkles and imperfections - but this is one I really want to turn out right.

Not much of an update -- but I have been trying to accomplish things around here.

Still Here

Life has been beating me up -- nothing major, just a lot of little things keeping me from doing anything more than getting by -- but I'm still here and still making very slow progress on my projects.

Christmas Star quilt is basted -- but not much more than that. It's the biggest quilt I'll be able to do in this house unless I come up with a better way of basting them. Thankfully, there are a couple other houses where I can borrow floor space for a while.

Trying to make a plan for the rest of the fall -- but today is too beautiful, and I have about an hour and a half before it's too dark to enjoy it. I'm going to go do something fun outside before things get too cold, dark, and wet again. Cold, dark, and wet is much better weather for quilting than for getting my remaining five miles of walking!

Stars Aligning

After pointing out all the stars that shouldn't be near each other, I figured I'd better run a test layout on this quilt before I started sewing things together. It took a couple attempts, but within a few minutes I had something that seemed fairly balanced and kept all the 'too similar' blocks from being too near each other.

 Using the test layout as a guide, it took only a couple minutes to sew everything together into a completed top.

When I started this quilt, I was worried about the balance of light and dark colors. I think that turned out alright in the end -- the unexpectedly hard part was placing the smaller stars in a way that kept everything fairly balanced. I think there's a little more white space between the bottom center blue and the right side small star in a star than what would be ideal, but this was the best option overall -- and the area where I spent the most time during my test layout process.

I still love this top -- but I'm a little disappointed to learn that it doesn't get easier to take photos of even when outside! I think that's one of the biggest drawbacks to working with white -- I just don't know how to photograph it!

I've already got a back made, so I think it's just a matter of finding time to clear off my desk (or floor) and get this basted.

October Goals

October Goals

Personal: 

Read 5+ Books
Average 15000+ steps per week day (with Saturdays at 10,000-13,000)

New Projects / Pinterest Challenge: 

1+ new recipe
1 new mini quilt  

My Projects:

Finish 1 quilt top: Random Reflections 2 of 2
Baste 1 quilt: Christmas Star
Quilt 1 quilt: Wonky Star Sampler (?)
Begin quilting 1-2 others: Christmas Star, Random Reflections 1 of 1
Make a back for Random Reflections 2 of 2
Finish at least 2 blocks for scrappy x plus block

Grown Up Junk:

Schedule next cat/vet appointment
Replacement windshield for the car

House Stuff: 

Continue sweeping every other day, cleaning bathrooms once a week
Finish rearranging in master: take out orange chairs, begin brainstorming update for doors
Begin rearranging in office: swap desk set up to short wall, consider moving cedar chest to master?

Plus - Holiday Stuff
Begin testing possible recipes
Pick up hot drink mixes, check on coffee maker status
Make a plan for family pictures
Begin shopping

September Wrap Up

September Goals

Personal: 

Read 5+ Books

• "Call the Midwife" Jennifer Worth
• "Morning Glories: For a Better Future" (Volume 1)
• "Cat Burglar Black" Richard Sala
• "Victories" Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill
• "Landline" Rainbow Rowell
• "How to Marry a Marquis" Julia Quinn
• "Matilda" Roald Dahl

Average 15000+ steps per week day (with Saturdays at 10,000-13,000)

New Projects / Pinterest Challenge: 

1+ new recipe Reuben Quesodillas -- no photos, but super yummy

My Projects:

Finish 2 quilt tops:

• Random Reflections 2 of 2 -- I'm still probably 3-4 hours from having a finished top, but I've made progress. I think each print needs to be made into five blocks, and I've just started my 4th time through. So I'm close on that, and the top comes together quickly once all the 10.5 strips are made. 
• Christmas quilt
• Wonky Star Sampler  (photos to come soon)

Baste 1 quilt
Finish at least 6 blocks for new quilt
Finish at least 2 blocks for scrappy x plus block
Attend High School Reunion
Begin finalizing holiday plans

Grown Up Junk:

Schedule next cat/vet appointment
Replacement windshield for the car
Call health care company re: bill
Order boots for Greg

House Stuff: 

Continue sweeping every other day, cleaning bathrooms once a week
Finish rearranging art in office -- I'm actually leaning towards rearranging the whole office again, so I'm holding off on this. I need to finish up a couple projects in the master bedroom first, then I may shift the office clockwise 1 wall. We'll see. 

Plus - Holiday Stuff
Rental plans made
Menu planning begun (still need to test a couple recipes)
Tentative grocery list begun
Minimal rental decorating plans begun