Rough Black Sea this weekend

Oh boy ever have one of those days when nothing seems to go quite right. Well that's how my quilting weekend was.  See all those pretty half circles?  I thought they looked fine.  I told myself about 3 times that I should look at the pictures of the top and make sure it was good. But I was certain I remembered how I did it. I had those big circles in the corners.  So I just forged ahead and got them all done.  I was ready to add the feathers but honest I couldn't remember if I went clockwise or counter clockwise.  So I decided to take a peek.  I think I almost cried when I looked.  All those circles, all the way down that king size border, all wrong.  What took a little over an hour to quilt, took 6 hours to unquilt.

Here's what the circles look like after.  Good grief!!! The white threads are the circle threads.  The black are the trimmings along the way, I had some really stringy black fabrics in this one.  My thread catcher is so full!! But all's good now, the circles are all in the right place, with feathers going counter clock wise.  This is a big plus of taking pictures of your work.  Rather than rolling a king size quilt back to the top, all I had to do (if only I would have listened to myself) was look at the pictures.    And the other lesson that I have to work a bit harder is LISTEN to myself!

I'm staying away from the machine until next Saturday.  Then I've got a 5 day weekend.  I can't wait to get that black sea finished up.

Black Sea quilting fun

Last week I quilted this gorgeous bargello for Nancy, I LOVE the colors used.  Lucky me, I got to use some of my bright cheery Glide colors that I have.  Glide thread on top and bottom and hobbs 80/20 batting.  I did feathers on this, well no surprise right?  Given the chance I'll feather anything!  But really, the veins of feather mimic the curve of the strata and the feathers, give that rounded softness for the bargello.  See there really do make sense.

This weekend after they had 25% work force reduction at Motorola Mobility in Chicago, I just got lost in the quilting.  I'm still there but there are people that I've worked with for 20 years that were impacted.  It was a sad day Thursday at Motorola.  All that stress was put to good use this weekend quilting.  I think I might be 25% done, but there's a lot left to do. The inspiration for me came from Kathy at Tamarack Shack  Her's is amazing.  The minute I saw this I knew I wanted to make one and quilt similar to hers.

the outer plain border

wasn't sure what I was going to do with the start but I really wanted them to stand out.

I may rip out the feathers around the wreath and do some boxes around the wreath like the stars.

Check out the linky parties on the side bar, lots of exciting things out there.  Hope everyone has a great week.

What a whirlwind of a week!

Oh my my my.  Do you ever have one of those weeks where you just sit back and say, what on earth happened and how did we get here?  Man, it's been one of those weeks at work and next week isn't suppose to be any better.  What to do when that happens?  Hide in the sewing room and sew like there's no tomorrow!!  So now I have to have my standard disclaimer that while it's going to look like I was really productive this week, that's just not the case.  The truth is, all these weeks while I've done a little here, a little there and looks the same week to week, finally started to look like something different this week.  So, I've got a lot to show, but really most of it was done in previous weeks.  The funnest of all these, was a visit from Elvis.  Ha, not just Elvis but Romeo and Larry too.  These are Nancy's Pugs in the Garden.  I can't tell you how much these little guys helped me through some of the craziness at work.  I LOVE what Nancy did with these Pugs.  This one has two layers of batting, Hobbs Heirloom 80/20 on bottom and Hobbs Wool on Top. They Pugs just jump right off the quilt.  I used one of the flowers in the bottom row as a template and quilted the same flower in a couple of the rows.  A little butterfly and dragonfly here and there to tease those Pugs.  What fun this was.  So glad Nancy let me quilt this wonderful quilt for her.  

Elvis has left the quilting studio

that bike is adorable!!  

Romeo, oh Romeo

The last few quilts have all been custom.  I had this quilt, backing and batting that all but jumped on the frame to get done. My goodness the pantograph that I used was still on the table.  This thing practically loaded itself and quilted on it's own.  I used this pattern from Sharon at Vrooman Quilts.  Not only did Sharon share this pattern, but she taught me how that pop of white can add so much to a quilt.  This one finished at 50 x 60ish, Hobbs Heirloom 80/20 batting, Glide thread on top, magna glide in the bobbin.

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Boxes in Boxes - Great use of those 2.5 in squares. 

Look at this, my design wall looks a little bit different.  Look at all that color!!! I'm like in heaven.  Now again, these blocks have been done for a while but it's just now they got up on the design wall.  This is Old Friends BOM from Calico Girls - love this one.

Old Friend Bom, so big won't fit on the design wall, crazy crazy color!! That dark purple has to go

While it was good to have a finish, and a quilt with all the blocks done,  what I'm even more happier about is Black Sea is officially a flimsy.  Not only that, but this baby is loaded on the frame.   I've wanted to quilt this ever sense I saw Kathy's version at Tamarack Shack.   I saw this an instantly fell in love with the way she quilted this.  I've wanted to make this quilt for over 2 years and finally I have one and it's ready to quilt.  I hope I can do half the job that Kathy did - so unbelievably excited about this one!!! The pattern is Judy Martins' Aegean Sea.  I added a couple of borders to make it king size. This one ended up 121x121. You know I'm going to quilt this like crazy so I expect to loose a couple of inches at least in the quilt.

Black Sea, my version of Judy Martins' Aegean Sea - super sized 

Absolutely Positively can wait to quilt this guy.  Feathers are going to fly!!

Don't forget to check out the linky parties on the sidebar. Oh and a new button added for 100 Quilts for Kids 2015, what a great cause - take a look and make a quilt for a kid, we all remember those special cuddly quilts and blankets from when we were young.

Storming through the Black Sea

I just about shut out the world completely on Sunday.  This sweet little guys spent the weekend for his Aunt's (daughter #3) birthday.  What fun we had.   He gave us a special delivery right from the garden to the kitchen.  Local Brews, Blues and BBQ was so awesome with this guy,  he loves the music.

We picked some veggies from the garden, special delivery!!

Daughter #3 Birthday, isn't that an adorable cake??

Enjoying some Blues music in the park

But Sunday after they all left, I went and locked my self in the sewing studio.  I think that when I sew I'm able to process all the things that I need to process in the background and get everything where it needed to be.  I spent 6 hours sewing, how wonderful is that????  I even got 4 loads of laundry done while I was sewing (that part of the world just couldn't be shut out any longer ;)  It was like a mad storm going through that black sea.  Only 1.5 borders to go.  I ran out of material and time.  All the blocks are done so when the material shows up later this week we can get this baby together.  I'm so anxious to start quilting this one!  All the background processing done and now I can look at the world in a whole new way.

Black sea - currently at 96 x 108, 1.5 borders to go, will finish at 120x120

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I also got all the 9 patch blocks done for Old Friends BOM and my Irish chain.  Pretty excited about that, I didn't think those blocks were ever going to end!! Here's my stacks of blocks, all just waiting patiently for our next sewing day

stacks of blocks just waiting

I finished a fun quilt on Friday, here's a sneak peak. Yep that's right, Elvis - seriously how fun is that?  Wait until you see the rest of this one.  I'll be shipping this one back to Nancy this week.

Check out the linky parties on the sidebar - something to inspire you every single day of the week!!  Have a great week and Happy August!