Quilter's ADHD: Holiday Edition

When I went to the Missouri Star Quilt Company site the other day to get the link to the Christmas throw/quilt tutorial, I noticed they had a new video posted...




Well...   I have Christmas fabric leftovers from the holiday table runner I made for my daughter!  And....  I have a Dresden template...

I tried to resist....  but I couldn't...  

The tutorial was easy to follow (my first Dresden plate) and the pieces went together quickly.

I made the quilt sandwich from the spokes, the batting and the backing and stitched-in-the-ditch to quilt it before adding the center circle.  I loved the part about gathering the round center fabric around the cardboard template!

I used a button-hole stitch around the center circle to sew it down and for sewing down the binding (used bias tape cut from the same holly fabric as the center).

The table topper finished at 23" in diameter due to the 11"-long Dresden template I used (MSQC's specialty template is 10" long). I'm sure it will shrink a little after washing and drying.

Someone....  tell me to stay away from fun quilt-y tutorials!    *lol*

A Holiday Finish

It's been a long time since I finished a quilt so it was nice to pull this from the dryer last night and say:  "Done!"

I quilted a small loopy line in the red sashing...

....and an even larger loopy line around the outside border.

The quilting didn't look too bad before washing and it looked great (imho) after it was washed and dried.

I got the idea for this quilt from a tutorial by Missouri Star Quilt Company.  The finished quilt is about 57" square and is now draped over the back of the sofa in the living room.

A Little Sewing

I'm doing better... but still a long way from "completely recovered."  So... to distract myself, I did a little sewing the day before Thanksgiving....  a table runner for my daughter, modeled here by my darling granddaughters, still in their jammies.

I even did FMQ-ing for the very first time!  It's supposed to looking like the outlined path of snowflakes falling...  what do you think?

The fabrics came from my FQ stash and I used a pale gray thread to quilt.  I wasn't up to making a trip to the LQS for silver thread, which was my first idea.


I followed a Missouri Star Quilt Company tutorial...



...and used the cardboard template I had made earlier this fall.  This is a quick and easy project... even if you make it as long as I did.


It felt good to be sewing again...  but I'm still going to have to pace myself.

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Addendum:  Several have asked about how I made the cardboard wedge template, including Judy who, unfortunately, is a no-reply blogger (meaning I do not have a way to reply to her via email).  

The "how to" is in the post "Cheap?" and the exact measurements of my triangle are:

Base of isosceles triangle:  8 inches
Sides of isosceles triangle:  11.5 inches
Base angles of isosceles triangle:  70 degrees
Top angle of isosceles triangle: 40 degrees  (70 + 70 + 40 = 180, the total amount of degrees in all three angles of any triangle... a little math fact fer ya!)

Hope this helps!


 

A Woman with A PLAN!

After the panic subsided, I came up with a reasonable goal for completing the tumbler quilt... the end of June.  One thing about college graduates... they don't mind getting late gifts! My nephew majored in something like "historic preservation" and I thought a tumbler quilt in 1800s reproduction prints would suit him to a "T"... might even make him interested in pursuing a specialty in historic/antique quilts!

I had this quilt figured out so it's just a matter of setting short term goals and keep moving!  I received several comments about using a GO! cutter... but I don't have one and don't know of anyone who does... including the LQS.  No matter... I have a handy dandy tumbler block template from Missouri Star Quilt Company!  (Link has video tutorial.)

The neon yellow (look at it glow!) acrylic template is made to fit charm squares... so I've cut 5" WOF strips and sub cut into tumbler blocks with very little waste...

And despite my youngest granddaughter's preschool graduation this evening....

...I manged to cut out over 200 blocks!

I'll get her done!

Gratuitous photo of my three little girls... otherwise known as my daughter and her two daughters...

It's hard to take photos of moving targets...