Back from a hiatus - Brayden's Quilt

Yes, I know it's been months since I've last posted something. But I promise you that more things are coming!! I've been on hiatus since having the baby, the holidays, then a crazy hectic schedule with some church events and work. But I promised myself that I'd find time to work on a project during my down time.

I had little bits of down time last week and have been intermittently working of this quilt. This quilt has a story...

My good friend, Mary, was having a baby boy and I had offered to help plan her shower along with her friend. Needing inspiration, I looked towards fabric and found this super cute Michael Miller fabric called "Silhouette Boys." It had coordinating fabric and everything! So I started pulling together some ideas and came up with the inspiration board below:


So the party ended up revolving around the blue and brown color and this "Boy" fabric. I even made invitations to match (A brown ribbon was tied to the top):


I bought the blue boy fabric and the brown fabric with the blue dots to use as decoration for the party. I turned them into table runners and wrapped some cylindrical flower vases with the fabric. Unfortunately, I was so busy at the party that I forgot to take pics!!

I had the intent of using the fabric to make a quilt... and I actually did - in record time!! This came out to approximately 36" x 46" - a good crib quilt size. I had the blue "boy silhouette" fabric, the dots and even the white fabric was the tablecloth at the party. I went to my friend, Pam, again to dig through her stash and found a black fabric with gold printing for my border. I was afraid that it wouldn't really match up since the silhouettes were a very dark brown but I think it worked out quite well.

I machine-quilted this bad-boy with my 301. It was the first time I tried stippling (thanks to Crazy Mom Quilts for giving me courage to try it). Some areas were looser than others but overall it turned out okay.

My favorite part is the back. I messed up my measurements, cutting 2.5" strips instead of 1.5". So I had a whole bunch of 1" strips laying around after fixing my mistake. I pieced those strips together to make the band on the bottom half. I pieced the rest of the leftover fabric and I nearly used up all my fabric! I love it when it works out that way. The quilting really stands out on the black fabric - you can see my stippling and crosshatching on the squares. Oh, and of course, I had to label my quilt. I finally bought muslin and freezer paper - now I have to label Mya's quilt, too.

Well, this was quilt #3 for me. I'm getting the hang of it. I still have to work on pinning my "quilt sandwich." I had a few areas that were bunched up and was real frustrated with myself. One day, I'll have a totally flat quilt... one day.

Oh, I have to add... Brayden was born this past Monday, March 30th. The quilt was finished on the 29th. Good timing, eh?

Next up on my project list:

• Easter's coming!! It's one of my favorite times of the year since I can make Spring treats!
  
  
• I went to an awesome garage sale and bought a Bernina serger for $50!! I'll show you an easy grocery bag using one piece of fabric (no serger needed for it, but having it is nice).
  
  
• Mya needs jeans. Pam recommended a good pattern and I'm going to face my fear of making pants (story on that to come).

Tropical quilt

Ever since I took the quilting class, I've been planning on making a quilt for Mya's room. When I was pregnant with Mya, I designed her room so that she could grow into it and not have it be so baby-ish. I made all the crib bedding and matching curtains. Now that she moved on to a "big girl" bed, she didn't have any coordinating bedding. I did a search and found that comforters (especially quilts) ran around $100. I was on a mission to beat that price by doing myself.

I found a quilt that I liked online and based the layout after it. I wanted to add my personal touch with some appliqué work. Thom and Mya flew out of town for a week to visit Grammy and I worked on the quilt and pillow sham for 5 days straight. It was really fun to do. I learned a lot while making this quilt:

1. Fat batting = pin closer together (I had a lot of bunching in a few places - the top was not taut enough)
   
2. Quilting with a darning foot and dropped feed dogs is a balance between the speed of the needle and speed of the fabric
3. Quilting uses A LOT of thread
4. A lead pencil is sometimes better than the water-soluble pencils when drawing on your quilt.
5. Using a zigzagger on straight-stitch machine can make you dizzy.
   
6. The ripper is my best friend

Here's a shot of the appliqué work. I zigzagged around all the appliqués since it would have taken me forever to hand-stitch it. There's a bird of paradise, a nipa hut (my homage to the "bahay kubo" in the Philippines), a tropical leaf, plumerias, and bamboo. On the side is a butterfly and a palm tree with the sun setting behind it.

By the way, material cost me $65. Extra thread and bobbins - $6. Time and effort - priceless :) .

The MACHINE (that almost killed the cat)

Notice a theme here?

Let me introduce you to my Vintage Singer 301a - a badass, all-metal, gear-driven, slant-shank, straight-stitch machine with a longbed and carrying case.

I was on the hunt for a good sewing machine for many months when my friend, Pam, steered me towards this vintage machine. She said that Singer machines made in this era (1950's-mid 60's) were very reliable and were built to run forever (or something to that extent). I did some research and found rave reviews of the 301a and even got to try Pam's. I loved how quietly and effortlessly it ran (I quilted my sampler quilt with her 301a) so I went on a mission to find one.

I did a search on Craigslist and one lady said she had one. By the time I got there to take a look at it she already sold it. So I turned to Ebay. It was the first time I've ever bid on a popular item. Boy was it competitive!! I lost about 3 auctions until I finally won this for $108 (including shipping). What a great deal! I eventually bought a zigzagger (which is interesting to use - it moves the fabric, not the needle) and a set of attachments/presser feet.

My 301a arrived the Wednesday after I made my shirred dress. It came with the same blue thread and a fabric/stitching sample that they showed on the Ebay listing. I tried it out and absolutely loved it. So I let the machine and case "air out" its antique smell for the day.

Here's where the cat-killing comes in. Thursday morning, I woke up to Hugs puking on our bed. I immediately thought of the machine and ran downstairs. The spool of blue thread was still there but the machine wasn't threaded. I couldn't recall if I had wound it or kept it threaded. So we took a wait-and-see approach to our cat's puking. We hoped she would cough it up like she did the brown thread.

A week goes by and Hugs is not getting any better. So I took her to the vet and they found the blue thread wrapped around her tongue. They gave us the option of either $1500 for the surgery or euthanasia for $100. Long story short, we talked them into another alternative where they would try to pull the string out while the cat was tranquilized. They did the procedure and called me 15 minutes later to tell me that they noticed that her belly moved and that the thread was wrapped around her intestines too. So that meant I had to opt for euthanasia. Sobbing, I went back to the vet and waited to say goodbye to our dear cat. I got called into the exam room when the surgeon came out and said, "Well, we got it out!" Boy were we lucky. The string was 2 feet long with about a 1 inch knot at the end of it (where it was getting into her intestine).

The vet was amazed that she lasted more than a week like this. He said that in most cases that he's seen, the thread caused the cat's intestines to tangle up within 1-2 days. Hugs was definitely very lucky. She's probably used up 8 of her 9 lives with this ordeal.

Now I keep a good eye on my thread and machine. I can now use my 301a without the guilt that it killed my cat. (cue the "Debbie Downer" theme song).

My First Sampler Quilt

Last September, I took a quilting class from my friend, Pam (who is, by the way, a very talented quilter and crafter). I put the blocks and sashing (the borders between the blocks) together last year and its been sitting on top of my sewing stuff for very close to a year. I've had the urge to finish the quilt so I could make another one. One thing that was holding me back was the lack of material. We just used fabric from Pam's HUGE stash in her studio. Unfortunately, the fabric I chose for my sashing wasn't enough to make an inner and outer border. Forward to late July, I headed over to Rosie's Calico Cupboard and found a fabric that would work and went to town on finishing the quilt top while using some creative piecing to make up for the lack of fabric for the border.

Since Pam just taught us how to put the top together and I had to go back to her for some guidance on how to finish it in August. I was a bit impatient and made a few mistakes. But after actually "quilting" the quilt (connecting the top, batting and backing layers by stitching) and binding the edges, I just stuck it in the washer and dryer and magically, my mistakes went away! Or at least they hid behind the puffiness of the fabric.

The photo above is my sampler quilt and the quilt behind me is one that Pam used as a reference for her quilting class. It's amazing how two quilts with the same blocks can have different looks just by fabric choice and block placement.

Quilting is fun - but it will get me in trouble since I can probably do this all day and I'd spend a fortune at the fabric store.