Chopin – A Passionate Quilter From Texas – I love to share my Quilting projects with other Quilters. My goal is to share my progress on projects that I am working on. I would love for you to follow along with me during my endeavors. I hope you enjoy watching me tackle new techniques and projects. Hopefully you can learn from my "hiccups" and mistakes and make your journey easier.

March 12, 2023

HQAL and Binding Status Post Number 670!!! 12 March 2023

Greetings to everyone. I will be so happy when winter gets here this year – we have not had one for 3 years. Yesterday it was 96-98 and today it will be in the 70’s. This week will be much cooler and more fun to walk in, but then we just HAD to go to DST! UGH. I have made a full 7 days of walking! YEA – It has been awhile since I did not have to take a day off! Maybe I can continue the steady daily walk. I did hear that La Niña died! YEA Come on down El Niño and send us lots of rain!

I spent a few hours on my Moda Holiday SAL embroidery project this week. Here is where I was on 18 Dec 2022! (not much to see).

Here is where I finished last night. WOW wonder what happened that caused me to be so slow on the project! LOL

Now to a “little” update on the start of the 10 quilts that need trimming, binding, then sewing the binding on the quilt for hand stitching,

I intended to start adding the binding on Irish Mist around 27 February and my GOAL (remind me to never make goals again) was to be finished with the 10 quilts that needed bindings by 14 March 2023 (which is not the Ides of March it is the 15th)!

Well, needless to say Unforeseen Requirements caused a delay (stupid people in Doctor’s office.) I did not get to start on the binding for Irish Mist on Tuesday (7 March). When I did start, I had this nutty idea to do bias binding. That was the beginning of the end of ever thinking I would reach my 14/15 March imposed deadline (stupid me).Ah ready to get this one out of the way!

Nice set up – you would think!

I started stitching and had nothing but problems with the fabric slipping and the Sapphire not wanting to function correctly with the walking foot. I believe I finished it Thursday afternoon. It took me about 3 1/2 hours to do it, but all along for this quilt, I had a FEELING that things were not well with it and decided to wait until Friday morning to sew the ends together.

On Friday morning I started to sew the ends together and had a total disaster on my hands. I have a way to close the binding at the ends and when I was sewing a basting stitch on the one end, the Sapphire decided to eat that piece up! I literally threw the quilt on the floor never wanting to see it again!

One of the issues was trying to sew black fabric with black thread and trying to see what I was doing along with the quilt and binding slipping, causing me to not have a consistent 1/4″ seam allowance.

Clay came to my rescue as he always does, and we switched back to the D1 Husqvarna that had just been serviced with new feed dogs. He cut a piece of plastic and added special tape and BOOM, problem resolved with slipping fabric that prevented me from doing a straight 1/4″ seam allowance. It is a great guide for binding.

This quilt has had problems from the beginning when I had a problem with the star points, so I remade the quilt. This is a Twice Made quilt and I guess the binding was not going to be happy until I did it twice! UGH. On Friday I ripped the entire binding off, did a stay stitch around the quilt to prevent further problems, cut new binding from the same crummy black batik but this time I did WOF and cut my strips at 2 1/8″ I pressed the binding and was ready to go on Saturday morning to try again!

It was a success with the changes I made (and Clay’s). It took me over 2 hours to sew the binding, but this time the problems that I had experienced were not repeated and it is now ready for hand work. Preparing quilts for Show require more time and effort to get things perfect, but this was a total overkill time wise for me. Taking 3 days was not fun, but I do believe that the next 9 plus 3 more quilts will be so much easier to sew the binding on.

By now you are probably asking yourself if I am a real nut case worrying about the binding being so perfect. Well, this quilt and 3 others are entered into the Hill Country Quilters Guild Quilt Show in May. They are located in Kerrville, Texas. One of the first things I learned in 2005 when I started entering shows was how to do the bindings! The very first thing a Judge looks for is if the binding is consistent in size front and back, and filled in with the batting. They love to grab that binding and run their hand down the side to check it out. Since then I have always been particular with any binding that I do on a quilt,

I know how importing the binding is because I have scribed for Judges in the past and there have been some nice quilts that had rippled binding or binding that was not consistently full that have lost a chance to place.

Next on the list to work on is going to be Alexander Bean Pot. He is a quilt that is cotton – not batiks – and I should be able to breeze through it today with no problems. (whoops there I go again -making a goal!)

Well, have a wonderful week and Sunday and happy stitching! Maybe this week will be the week I can accomplish a lot more that I have done since the end of February 2023!

Hugs,

Nanette

© Nanette Chopin Cook at Doitrightquilter.com 2022. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nanette Chopin Cook and Doitrightquilter.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Linking To: My Quilt Infatuation; Confessions of a Fabric Addict; Finished or Not Friday ; Em’s Scrap Bag; BOM’s Away; Sew Fresh Quilts; Crazy Mom Quilts; Oh Scrap; Scrap Happy Saturday; Slow Sunday Stitching Quilt Fabrication Mid Week Makers; Peacock Party; Design Wall Monday, Scrap Happy Days, Quilting Patch Linky Party, To Do Tuesdays

This Hand Quilt Along is an opportunity for hand quilters and piecers to share and motivate one another. We post every three weeks, to show our progress and encourage one another. If you have a hand quilting project and would like to join our group contact Kathy at the link below.
Kathy, Margaret, Deb, Nanette, Sharon, Karrin, Daisy, Connie

March 5, 2023

Slow Sunday Stitching and Things – 5 March 2023

I woke up today and wondered where has the month of February had gone. We had three very busy weeks that consisted of a week of tree cutting, new fence construction, and going through absolute hell in switching Cardiologists for Clay (took over 7 days of very difficult multiple phone calls – that is where it went.

As I look back over the last 4 months when I started making backings for 12 quilts for Rebecca, identifying UFO projects that I would quilt and getting those backs prepared, along with ripping the binding off 4 quilts sewn on by the 2013 long arm quilter. In mid December and all of January I quilted 16 quilts and had all bindings done. I guess this is why I had some “quilt” burn out in February along with the other “things” in February. I also have had problems with my shoulders – HUMMM – guess I over did things. So now I am now wearing my Carpel Tunnel braces and living with Icy Hot patches. (Price of Quilting!)

This week I began looking for quilt shows in my area that I will be able to enter my quilts. It takes time to become familiar with changes that have taken place since I have not been able to show since 2014 and I had not joined a Guild since 2015. So the first thing was to join two Guilds, San Antonio Area Quilt Guild and Hill Country Quilters Guild in Kerrville, Texas. I would love to enter all 12 (now 13) of the quilts that Rebecca has quilted for me, but the Guilds limit each quilter to either 3 or 4 quilts. Sometimes as the show draws closer if they do have not reached their stated goal, the will allow quilts to enter more.

Entering a quilt in a show takes time as each organization has different rules and requirements for paperwork. I am glad I started working on which shows were available Monday because the deadline for Kerrville is 20 March for all entries. Entering a quilt in a Quilt Show not only requires making, quilting, binding, making hanging sleeves, labels and of course pictures and detailed paperwork. In short – there is a lot of work in participating in Quilt Shows.

Yesterday I worked on my Kerrville entries and by the end of the day (a few interruptions) I have my information ready to enter the information into their on-line database. This is the first year that both guilds have on-line capability to enter your information. I like the way Kerrville is doing theirs. You mail in your money for Guild membership and entry fees along with pictures of the quilts. Then you enter your information on-line and it automatically downloads the entries into their database, thus saving someone from having to manually enter it into a database! Love it.

Now San Antonio is different – one can pay for their dues on-line, but when you enter the information required for the quilt entries, it will take 3 separate submissions and 3 more credit card charges. I am hoping for no glitches. I will have to follow up to make sure that my input is received into their databases.

OK enough of that, as far as my goals for March, I am pleased (?????) to report that the Irish Mist is still waiting for me to make the binding for her and get another quilt in the Studio for binding. Progress is slow around here, but it will be better today as I plan on getting all paperwork completed today.

I have not the had time to sit down and read all of the Bloggers I follow and maybe now I will be able to do more commenting. AND I am late in responding to all comments I receive on my posts (the few that have been done). Things will be better from now on.

I also am missing making a new quilt, but for now putting binding on the 10 quilts from Rebecca will help me through that miss, and when my shoulders settle down more I will start the hand work on 4 quilts waiting for me to bind.

A word to the those who might be looking for a Doctor, or changing Doctors. Make sure that you are not in a GROUP of Specialists because it takes an act of God to be able to move to a different Doctor within the Group in case you get into the situation we were in.. The Corporations have now made our health system totally more like the Government (of whom probably encourages Groups to control our Doctor choices). But at least we are now back in the Methodist Hospital System and have Cardiologist Doctor we wanted since we pay for their service! Just be sure that you do research on any physician that you are hiring to take care of your health. It is a mad mad mad world out there now – no consideration for the Patient!

I am hoping that I will be posting on more fun things on my next post – like something about quilting.

Have a wonderful Sunday and the rest of the week – enjoy stitching.

Hugs,

Nanette

February 27, 2023

Back to Quilting and Plans for March 2023!

I am ending out the month of February 2023 by catching up on my posts (check it out) and what has been going on in our lives.

Now back to quilting, I have only had sporadic times to finish up cutting up the scarps of fabric left over from quilts made in the last few years! I was able to finish them up during last week (Do not ask what day as that is gone from my memory bank!).

Ahhh Finished!

And back to storage under my cutting table – great place to store things that won’t be used immediately!

Now for my plans for the month of March and beyond. Rebecca sent me 4 more of my quilts that she has finished – only 3 more to go! I received( 1) Brinton Hall, (2)Cozy Christmas (I made this quilt in 2004 with Robyn Pandolph’s Christmas Folk Art III and IV and a few pieces of Folk Art II. This is the first pieced quilt I had made), (3) Alexander Bean Pot, and finally(4) Stars Around the Garden! More beautiful finishes from a quilter who really cares about your quilts when quilt them!

Brinton Hall, Nanette’s Version!

Cozy Christmas – a Fons and Porter pattern in a November/December 2002 Fons and Porter Love of Quilting magazine.

Alexander Bean Pot – by Carol Hopkins

Stars Around the Garden by Bits and Pieces

I now have a total of 10 quilts that I need to square and trim and put the binding on, and then they will be ready for the hand work. I have worked out a plan that I believe I can achieve hopefully in the next 3 weeks. (giving myself some time). I have already trimmed and squared Irish Mist. She just needs the binding sewn together and then sewn onto the quilt. I hope to have this one done by Tuesday. If I can I will select a quilt a day to trim. square, select the binding and sew it onto the quilt. If my life were perfect I could be finished by the 14 of March (is that the Ides of March? EKK) which would be great. But not expected here. I am hoping to do a post each day that I complete a quilt and getting it back in the binding pile!

After I get the 10 ready for hand work, there will ONLY be 14 LARGE quilts to bind. Maybe I can finish them by the end of April. That would be wonderful as I am ready to make more quilts for Rebecca!

I am also entering 3 of my 13 quilts that Rebecca quilted in the San Antonio Quilt Show in September – more on that later!

Hey the good news for the day – I had been paying $6.23 a dozen for my Organic eggs – today they are now $4.83 a dozen – When the prices goes to $3.98 a dozen, that will save me about $40.00 a month on the food bill. For some frustrating news – our HEB has really upset La Vernia residents and myself. They decided to enlarge the SMALL store rather than building a new one across the street from the existing store. But NO they added a new parking lot away from the store, went out 50′ from the current store front and put customers in a mess for 14 MONTHS, and it is a MESS!

I have decided to drive to Floresville (about a 45 mile round trip) to get my groceries, and I already have made contact with them to order my monthly case of eggs and chips! They seem to be more organized than the LV store and a much larger store. The drive is through country roads which are very relaxing now that all the idiot drivers are in La Vernia and San Antonio. I may never use the LV store again! Their loss and I am sure I am not the only one going to do this to get away from their disaster!

Additionally, I have found a fresh meat market that is closer to us and we are trying a few cuts of meat, and if the meat is better, or just as good as Whole Foods, that means I will not have to do a 100 round trip drive monthly for our meat! See, I can find positive things in our lives! And remember EVERYTHING good or bad happens for a reason!

Hugs and have a wonderful week stitching. I am hoping to be able to enjoy reading everyone’s post, and doing more posting about my work on the binding binge! LOL

Hugs, Nanette

February 27, 2023

Post Number 667 – Guess What I have been Doing!

Well, I am alive and fairly well, but oh so tied up with Unforeseen Requirements. I wonder sometimes if I am the only one who runs into problems at times. It looks like February has been taking me away from well planned plans since the last time I posted! I also do not like the number 666 and realized the other day that my last post was 666 since I started. Well this post gets me out of that mess! LOL All I can do is apologize for not having the time to keep up with my email and reading my favorite Bloggers’ Posts!

The first week of February was a week of “more tree cutting”. We have been in an extreme drought due to 3 years of good ole’ La Niña! This has caused us to be in an extreme drought and when that happens trees die and we have tons of trees. Last year we had over 45 trees that needed to be cut down in order to avoid a problem with high winds and dying trees that could damage our roads or the House or Studio. We hoped that we would have rain that could at least stop the problem. But it did not happen! So this year another $$$$$ to have the front area cleared 5 to 10 feet away from the fence line. We have a great guy (very expensive) that does our tree work, but this time we had him leave the wood from each tree stacked and they chipped the little limbs and branches and blew them back into the acreage! Saved some $$ on by doing that.

Then we contacted a company to replace the existing fence (very old) for the front of our 5 acres. Wish I could live that week over, but what happened bit us. We hired 2 guys who were willing to charge a low fee for doing the fence plus all the wood that was left from tree cutting. WELL, about 2 days into this it was obvious they just needed the wood to sell to BBQ Restaurants and knew nothing about doing good fence work. I have accepted that when we “fired” them from fence work that they still wanted to cart the wood off – so we accepted and paid them for the work they had tried to do! LESSON LEARNED! That was on Friday the 17th. On Saturday morning I called the local Hardware store and they recommended someone to get us out of our fix! We were so blessed, Kevin came at noon that day, started cleaning up the mess and by Monday morning we had our new fence! YEA. He did a great job and did not overcharge us. In fact, he is the nephew of a retired Fire Fighter that Clay worked with during their career in the SAFD! How about that one.

Then this last week, nothing went well. Too many problems with Caremark again, Doctor issues, and a few other problems. If that was not enough, how about the weather on Wednesday being close to 100, then down to 50 or so degrees for 2 days and now back to the 90’s. Yesterday I felt fine until the 30 MPH winds hit and boy this time Mr Menieres, Mr Migraine, and Ms Fibro all hit me at one. I was lucky to know who I was.

But today I am feeling more like myself, but still have a problem with “changing Heart Doctor problems” for Clay. It should work out BUT who knows. Things are changing. If you go to a group of Specialists and you have a falling out with the first one, they can ‘NOT RELEASE’ you to go to another doctor in that GROUP because of EQUITY! BRANDON’S DOING! Well, only 22 more months of this Communist Country! Republicans, Independents, Conservatives had better get their minds right for 2024! (OK enough of my opinion on that!)

Here are a few pictures of the stacks of fire wood that we have remaining.

And here is the new fence line. We used Horse fencing and ran barbed wire on the top and bottom.

In the end, all has worked out. Yesterday the individuals are now beginning to pick up the wood and haul it off. Each stack that they take makes it worth the $$ (small amount) we paid them for their inability to do our fence! You can see how the drought has impacted this area of South Texas. Many dead trees, but now they can fall and be left to Mother Nature!

Have a wonderful week and enjoy stitching. I am now going to do a Quilting Post! Hugs

Hugs, Nanette

February 12, 2023

Slow Sunday Stitching – 12 February 2023

And here we go! I have now recovered from eating the wrong food – a teaspoon of Ketchup every day for a week and a piece of Clay’s birthday cake, along with some green beans – Will I ever learn? Successfully back to walking – I did slack off 2 days – not feeling that well, guess I was just tired from all that fun and games in quilting those UFO quilts.

Rebecca just sent me a picture of Brinton Hall. I loved this quilt and wanted to make it as close to the original as I could, but as I moved toward the outer borders, I opted for floating Stars and Squares in a Square (SnS). Rebecca did a beautiful job. Tomorrow I will be receiving the 2nd set of 3 quilts finished and she only has (ONLY) has 7 more to go since I sent her Capital T quilt last week.

I have finished more of the quilts I quilted. I cut a 2 inch or 2 and 1/8th inch strip for my binding. This way the binding is the same on both sides. I started doing this when I made my first show quilt in 2005. This quilt is called Southwest Texas Stars

Rosemary Young’s BOM.

Red and Green Easy Peasy – fabric from New Zeland. The binding for this quilt is bias binding quilt cut at 2″.

2013 BOM –

I have 2 more to complete and then I will start on the 7 in the “room I never go in”! LOL I need to finish Boo’s and Bats and RSC Scrappy Quilt!

Well, that is all that I have been doing this week and today I will be working through my scraps from various quilts, cutting the pieces into different cuts! Here is where I was last post. I have completed the following.

All my Moda Marbles fabric are from the 1997 Patrick Lose collection. The fabrics are no longer available but I have a great stash that I built up when I first started quilting. The Moda Marble Mates are no longer being produced and now the Moda fabrics are so heavily over dyed and ravel so bad I do not purchase them anymore, so I am blessed to have the stash (not pictured) I have when they were made in Japan.

This is what I will be working on today. Hopefully be done before the Super Bowl Game!

Have a wonderful Sunday and if you like football, enjoy the game!

Hugs,

Nanette

February 7, 2023

To Do Tuesday – 7 February 2023

Happy Tuesday! I have finished all quilting (16 projects) and only have 3 more quilts to bind. Now that does not include 4 that have been sitting around since before I re-did the binding on them. Then Rebecca sent me 3 quilts last month and then 10 more will be forthcoming later. Those quilts will have to be squared, trimmed, and binding sewn on, so I will have plenty to keep me busy the next 3 months.

I did a post on Sunday that shows where I am in my “cleaning up ALL UFO’s” project. I already have a large stack of Churn Dash blocks that I made last summer that will be made into a quilt top, BUT not until I finish other things.

As an update to my Sunday post above, I have finished Rosemary’s BOM (the red one) and the box of scraps that I was working on Sunday are now cut into usable pieces for a quilt someday!

Goals for the next week will be to complete the “scrap cutting” project and more work on bindings in the evening and when that is complete, I have to dust my 2 rooms. I just cannot keep putting that project off. It will take me most of a day to do that deep dusting job.

Oh, here is a picture of Clay’s Birthday Cake from Whole Foods – it tastes just like cakes used to taste 27 years ago! NO GMO’s! Purchased 2 roasts and we divided them up into 6 meals and having roast for supper this evening. (I mortgaged the house for them!) LOL

Tree cutting has started, they took down one of the 45 foot Black Jacks and working on the other one today. Of course that is not all the trees that will be coming down on our property this year. But as soon as they are finished with tree cutting we will have our new fence put up! YEA!

Have a wonderful week!

Hugs,

Nanette

February 6, 2023

Slow Sunday Stitching and More Projects To Do

Morning to all! Back to the walking now that I have finished quilting for awhile! Weather was cold and wet then we had 4 days of sunshine and think it will be sunny today (Monday). But rain back Tuesday and Wednesday which is great because we are in such a drought. Our favorite Tree Guy whom we love to support is coming today to start working on the areas that we want cleared. We will then put up a new fence (about 400 feet) in the front – Should all be completed by 1 March!

I wanted to take some time to show you what Clay came up with to assist me in binding quilts – especially the larger quilts that Rebecca is working on. It is a small portable table (and yes Clay has modified it). Looks like a mini ironing board, but it works great and takes the weight off my left shoulder when I am putting binding on a quilt.

Clay also put a plastic wire covering on the edge of my quilting table. I found that the sharp edge prevented the quilt to smoothly move over the table while sewing. It is stuck on with tape!

I did finish going through all of my quilts, putting the Utility quilts (fun ones) in the closet. During that fun, I realized that I have another new project – making labels for over 20 quilts that I did to do when I completed them. (Just remembered – add 13 more when Rebecca finishes). Maybe all the “LITTLE THINGS TO DO” will keep me from making another top for awhile. LOL.

I have completed 4 of the last 9 quilts I quilted.

There are 4 more to complete. I will finish the red quilt today! There is nothing like tacking down binding on a red quilt, with red binding, with red thread! Talk about the blind leading the blind!

This is my current project – something I have not done in a few years – Going through scraps and cutting them in different sizes! I am calling this my Recoup from Long Arm Quilting Project. Besides the ones on the table (from York Lodge and Stars Around the Garden) there are 4 more buckets (on the long arm table) and one drawer to go through. After making a quilt top I put the scraps in a plastic bag and then go through them. Well, that drawer is also full. I am organized, but it appears that I need to really clean this mess up. I would love to make some quilts using the pieces up, or maybe I will gift some to others. Who knows, but as long as I am doing my 10,000 steps (including the 4500 during my walk) I can justify sitting in a chair during the afternoon.

A week ago I noticed this flower in the back yard. Clay caught a butterfly buzzing around it and snapped this picture! He is so good at taking photos. I am not as good! I put it on my iPhone for wall paper!

Well, today is taking a trip to San Antonio, Whole Foods. I have been craving a good roast and hope to find one that I would not have to mortgage the house to purchase! LOL. Then a trip to the Post Office and a quick stop at UPS.

And lastly I want to wish my Clay a Happy 79th Birthday! It is hard to realize that we have know each other for 70 years, and married 27 years this year. Hum, I don’t feel any older, but guess I am! We grew up on the same street, went through school together, lived life and he found me in 1996! How blessed we are!

Hugs and have a great week,

Nanette

February 1, 2023

OMG and PHD for January 2023

Winter time in South Texas. We need new weather forecasters, Sunday it was 88 degrees and then on Monday it was 38 and has stayed in the 30’s and will be in the 30’s until sometime tomorrow IF they have it right. They have missed the boat for the last 2 years! Today we have mild ice on our trees, rain, and the Pines (about 85) have ice. Hate to see this and hopefully this will end tonight – Prediction for tomorrow 60 – today it is freezing – go figure. I am using my walking time to catch up on emails and posts and working on lovely Income Tax.

Rather than re-hashing what I have been working on in January and what goals I have accomplished this month can be found here where I have listed all the quilts I have quilted this month. I am now left with 10 quilt tops to hand quilt and this will be a project started slowly and probably take some time. I will decide if I select one to start on next week.

Saturday I finished the last of the tops that I was quilting (13 were sent to Rebecca for E to E quilting and she does an exceptional job to finish my quilts)! Check out the latest finish here.

Sunday I finished going through my fabrics in the Studio by putting back all the fabric I was pulling making backs for the 10 quilts I did. My room looks so neat and back in order, just a few more things to relocate! You can see I have 2 large rooms to play in. So spoiled.

I can finally see this wall without all those quilts that were hanging around to be quilted! LOL

Monday was back to walking and working on paperwork.

Tuesday morning I went through all my quilts, moving some to the overflow room in the house where I keep extra fabrics, yarn, embroidery thread and now folded quilts. I have found about 25 that require Labels (won’t let this happen again) and this is the room where I am putting the 13 quilts that Rebecca is working on. So far I have 3 from her to square, cut binding, and hand sew the binding with 3 more coming in a couple of weeks. Then there are 4 more waiting for me to bind from November/December. They are all large quilts. This was also my goal for January.

Of the 9 that I quilted, I have 3 finished binding, 2 that I am working on, and 3 that I need to cut the binding, sew them together, then sew them on the quilts and yup – they will be put with the other 2 that I am working on. Lots and Lots of hand work, but that is fine as all my quilts are quilted!

My one goal that I have not accomplished is to dust both rooms in the Studio, but I will put this one in my February to do list after I have finished the binding on the last 3 quilts!

For February I will start with adding binding on 3 quilts, dusting the Studio, and working on bindings.

Have a wonderful February and enjoy stitching!

Hugs,

Nanette

January 30, 2023

OMIGOSH is Finished! – 30 January 2023

Just received an update from Rebecca! What a fantastic job, and a sweet compliment from her on my Quilt. “The piecing on this quilt is amazing!!!! That you could have so many tiny pieces, so many seams, and come out with a perfectly flat and square quilt top is so impressive, and made my job so much easier!”

Thank you Rebecca, my goal when I make a quilt is that out is square and flat and without issues because it may be me quilting it and if I send it out I want the quilter to enjoy quilting, not fight with a top! But you are the one with the talent – to be able to produce a quilt Edge to Edge that has the look of a Custom quilted quilt is just absolutely unbelievable! Thank you for doing my quilts!

Have a great week – Hugs

Nanette

https://www.elmstreetquilts.com/2022/06/one-monthly-goal-june-link-up.html

January 30, 2023

Happy Day was 28 January 2023! – Today is 30 January 2023

This post covers HQAL for 29 January 2023, To Do Tuesday, and would have included Slow Sunday Stitching, but I do believe I might have missed it!

I am BACK to the real world! Yea! The HQ16 is now put up and covered up! I have finished quilting 11 Quilts 4 Wall Hangings and 1 Table Runner. I have finished the binding on 3 of the quilts and all of the wall hangings and table runner! – Yea for me. I started on the “goal” of getting my backlog of quilt tops in 2022, but still had over 40 left to quilt. 12 were sent to Rebecca for Edge to Edge quilting (she is the Queen of E to E – absolutely no one else can do what this Lady can provide in professional long arm quilting!)

When I started in 2022I had over 40 quilts to be quilted. Somehow I did get some of the quilts finished earlier in the year! In November I sent 12 of the quilts to Rebecca for long arm quilting! That left me with 4 Wall hangings, a Table Runner, and 12 quilts to quilt on my long arm along with 10 quilt tops that will be hand quilted.

Of the 12 quilts, 5 are completely finished complete with binding. I sew my bindings on and then do handwork on the back side. I was having issues with my walking foot, and after speaking with my Husqvarna dealer we decided that I need new feed dogs and I knew I needed a new panel for the push buttons. My D1 is 20 years old now and really have not had a lot of problems with it. Clay cleans it for me. But this time it will go to the shop and they will do the maintenance.

I then set up my Husqqvara Sapphire Quilt 870 Quilter and will be adding the binding to the last 4 quilts I quilted last week. I started quilting the 23 December 2022 and finished 3 of the 16 that I would be quilting.

On 24 December 2022 Rebecca had finished York Lodge – it took 28 hours to quilt it and she is a beauty (I received it in January).

Here is where I started with some finishes on 1 January 2023.

For OMG for the Month of December I listed finishes on 2 January 2023.

On 3 January 2023, I listed where I wanted to be by the end of January with long arm quilting.

On 8 January 2023, I had made a lot of progress with getting bindings completed on the wall hangings.

By 14 January 2023, Rebecca had finished York Lodge, Radiant Feather Star, and Irish Mist and I had finished quilting binding some of my quilts.

On 16 January 2023, I was down to 6 more quilts to quilt.

By 18 January 2023, I was at a point where I needed a break from the long arm. I also knew that I had to finish preparing backing for the remainder of the quilts. I also had decided to start using bias binding for the quilts. When I do the binding for the 13 that Rebecca is quilting for me I will do bias binding, as most of the quilts are Show quality quilts. Especially York Lodge.

On 20 January 2023 I took a day off to look at the progress in my 2nd room in the Studio. I still have 10 quilts that will be hand quilted and wanted to move them to the Den. Then Clay took down the ‘portable cloths rack’ where it seemed all of the tops landed when I finished them. With it being gone forever, maybe from now on when I make quilts they will be quilted by me immediately, or send them to Rebecca!

Now this brings me up to Saturday, 28 January 2023. I finished all of the quilts with the exception of one quilt. It is called Capital T. She is 66″ x 66″ and I just could not bring myself to meander this quilt, so by bestest Quilter Rebecca will be receiving it on Thursday and will add to my 12 quilts. Additionally, I had just run out of steam for long arm quilting and refused to put the last one off for another month!!!

Here are the last 5 quilts from 21 January through 28 January 2023 that I have finished.

I have 3 quilts to cut binding for and after I complete sewing all the binding on the quilts they will go in the stack for hand stitching!

I have completed sewing the binding on 3 quilts, with 2 more that I am currently doing the hand stitching on the bindings.

I am hoping to be finished with them by mid-February or sooner!

I have two more projects to complete before I even begin thinking what I will do next! I have a overflow room in the house where I stash more fabric, batting, yarn, embroidery thread, etc. I want to straighten the closet and store some ‘utility’ quilts in it. I moved a large roll of Warm and Natural Batting to the Studio and it is now on the rail under the long arm table. After that is completed, I will put my Show quilts on the large quilt rack Clay built me a few years back. I am using my Z44 to display the quilts to be hand quilted in the Den.

When I have completed that project, I will have to dust both rooms in the Studio as there is white dust everywhere from the batting and long arm quilting. Yesterday I straightened all the fabrics in Studio Room 2 so that is a task that needed to be accomplished. I still have to decide where to move my printer paper, but that is for another day. But for now the room looks great to me. (Want to know what is in the white cabinet? it is filled from top to bottom with crochet yarn! When this room was first built I was not yet 100% into quilting and only did crochet! But that did not last long!)

Rebecca has finished quilting Stonefields, Pat Sloan’s Globetrotting, and working on OMIGOSH! She sent me pictures of the 2 finishes. They are beautiful! Perfect pattern selections.

Stonefields!

Pat Sloan’s Globetrotting BOM

Now you might know why I am always late in leaving comments to bloggers I follow. Starting 1 February I will be able to relax a little and just read what is going on in other’s quilting projects! Until then, have a great week, it will be cold and damp here in South Texas – like in the 30’s and 40’s with rain. Bet ice is coming to San Antonio and the Hill Country if the temps stay below freezing.

Hugs, and enjoy stitching.

Nanette

https://www.elmstreetquilts.com/2022/06/one-monthly-goal-june-link-up.html

January 21, 2023January 21, 2023

One Down – 6 to go and Slow Sunday Stitching – 22 Jan 2023

This is my 660th post! Wonder if I can make 1,000 someday! LOL Things are moving right along in getting the finishing the huge backlog of quilts quilted, Today I finished quilting a BOM that I made in 2013!

I used a backing fabric that has a very pretty swirling pattern and compliments the quilt. I also decided to do larger meandering rather than the smaller meandering I had been doing on the other quilts. I do free motion quilting on my HQ16, which is not computer driven. She is now 18 years old and with Clays assistance she runs better than when I purchased her! Now as the Operator if I would quilt forgetting things I should before quilting a quilt…….The mistake I made on this one – I did not run a stay stitch on the border and I had a small issue while quilting. I do wish I would have done the smaller meandering, but the quilt is quilted and I am happy!

Tomorrow I will do the binding and load the next quilt for quilting on Monday. Not sure which one it will be!

Have a great Sunday and do some Slow Sunday Stitching !

Hugs, Nanette

January 20, 2023

Happy Lazy Friday! – 20 January 2023

Happy Friday – I love Fridays as it provides me time to look back over the week as to my accomplishes! This week I have quilted all but 6 of the quilts that I am clearing out.

Yesterday I finished the last of the backs for them and then decided to do some rearranging. I moved all the applique quilts that will be hand quilted to the Den where I have my Z44 hand quilting frame. I decided it would be nice to have them displayed rather than hanging on a hanger. I may start on hand quilting sometime this summer after all binding is finished!

Now I only have 6 quilts hanging (along with the backing and the batting for the 2 white quilts not he left) waiting for their turn on the long arm! The clothes rack is destined to the garage for storage when all I am finished with the quilting.

I then moved all quilts that need hand binding to the Music/Overflow fabric room in the house. I have the 4 quilts that the binding had to be redone in December that I have to hand bind, along with the 3 that Rebecca sent me a couple of weeks ago.

When I have caught up on my quilting, a major dusting will take place in my 2 Studio rooms! I also need to straighten my fabric stash as I have been pulling fabrics here and there and they need to go back to where they belong.

So today – I have nothing planned except to just do what I feel like doing. I will start quilting tomorrow and hope to have the 6 quilts completed by the first of February!

Have a wonderful week-end – we will be watching all the NFL playoff games! Especially the Dallas Cowboys.

Hugs, Nanette