Quilting update......

 Another week has gone by, and I wonder where, and what have I done? While I am not completely retired, I have tried to step back a bit, which means I should have a lot more time, shouldn't I??? Even today I had intentions of getting a quilt done, as it has been loaded for a couple of days, and I switched Max on first thing intending to do a few rows before my first appointment for the day, but the day had ideas of it's own, and tonight the quilt has not been started. I did change the needle and oiled it this afternoon, but by then it was too late to start, and I decided that tomorrow was another day!? 

Well what did I do, you might ask? Mid morning there was a coffee date with a few for a friends birthday. Then sit and linger and chat and the time flies by. On the way home I visited with another friend who also had a birthday today and then did some shopping for bread and milk. By then it was time for late lunch. I have another friend who has been in hospital for a few days, so I decided I may as well take a bit more time out of the day and visited her. On the way home from there I called in to another friend (these friends are all quilters!) who has been not well for a couple of days and lives on her own. She was still very unwell so I took her to the doctor and then home again. Called to the post office on the way home from there and collected a parcel for another quilting friend and delivered that to her. By the time all that was done, it was too late for me to start the quilt, and here I am on the computer instead, catching up with newsfromjude. Are you exhausted?? Because I am. It seems to be so easy for a day to disappear and I feel like I have done nothing.

Catching up on customer quilts again and first up is made by Jenny using the Quick Curve Ruler. It was only a small quilt, so I did a simple custom by placing a block pattern on each block which gives it a custom look.

This is another simple quilt made by Jenny with a cute Sweet Dreams Panel. I quilted this allover with a pattern called Nightskies, which you can see in the second photo taken of the back.

Another by Jenny, and you may have worked out by now that Jenny is a prolific quilter. She brought me a bundle last year and I still have "some" here to do yet. This quilt she called Blue Fantasy and it was quilted allover with Funky Flowers.

                          This is Marie's Mysolation quilt that was Rachelle Denneny's Mystery for 2020. 

We were going to do an allover pattern on it, but decided on a simple custom that would show up on the background fabric. The following pattern was designed by Laurie Thomas of It's a quilt thing designs and fitted the block just nicely.

Marie and I were very happy with how this turned out, and was a much more cost effective option than full custom, but just that bit more than an edge to edge.

Joan used up a lot of scraps to make this small quilt for a nephew to use in his beach house. It was quilted allover with Curling Waves.

For our local exhibition each year, the President usually sets a challenge and this year it was a Mystery quilt, called Mystery and Mayhem. Over time instructions were given out for several blocks, all using different sized half square triangles. I do admit to not having started this project, but Ruth gave it a go and here is her finish. Others in the group are still working on their quilts and I have heard a few mumbles calling it more Mayhem and even worse! Ruth makes a lot of quilts that are donated, but she is keeping this one for herself. I am looking forward to seeing them all hanging together in the quilt show and they will all be so different!

This was quilted allover with a pattern called Ocean Froth, which you can see on the back in the 3rd photo. Ruth picked out a "safe" thread colour of teal, with orange a second choice. A couple days later she said let's go with the orange. I am usually more of a blend thread person, but went with her choice and it was amazing!!

PERFORMING MIRACLES

Some of the quilts that I receive occasionally pose a challenge for me. This is one of those. These lovely Dresden blocks are appliqued onto a linen background fabric. This was posted to me with instructions to just SID the dresdens only. After a few emails back and forth, things changed and now I was to fill the background and she wanted lots of quilting. Hmmm. Thinking and came up with a plan.

Double circles around each plate was my idea with some feathers in the space left. I needed to line up those circles going up and down and across so they were level. So I chalked in some lines and basted them to keep me on the straight! But can you see the problem? The plates were not all lined up the same. In some blocks the edge of the applique is closer to the circle on one side.

But I kept to my plan and hoped that the quilting would draw the eye and you would not notice the applique that was not right in the centre of the circle?? Hopefully my plan worked??

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 The next miracle needed was a round robin exchange quilt that Dot sent to me for simple custom. I had studied this hanging on the wall and had a plan, and one of the borders was half square triangles, so was looking for a simple pattern for these.......... until I noticed how that border really was! Can you see those rectangles in the border. There were quite a few of these in each border and all in varying places! So I needed plan B, and a way to camouflage those and not draw attention to them. I did consult Dot and it was then that I found out the quilt was a Round Robin quilt and borders were added by other people.

Hopefully my Plan B gives you something else to look at and you don't "see" the HST blocks with the fillers in between??

The rest of the quilt was easy to quilt and we were happy with the outcome. I did ask Dot whether I could post about the issues with this quilt and she was quite happy because it wasn't her work anyway! She even suggested that I include a lesson on how to avoid such things as having to place a filler into the border!? I decided I would stick to a conversation about the quilting issues and leave it at that!

I think that's enough for tonight's post, as it is well past my bedtime. I need to be bright eyed for the morning to get that quilt done as I will be away again on Friday. 

There are a few more things I have to post about, so hope to be back soon. 

I also need to apologise for not replying to a lot of comments on my blog. I love to hear from you and thank you for visiting and leaving me a comment.. I have been trying to keep up with reading but have got a bit behind.

Blessings, From Jude