September 2008

Trying to get as many pictures done as possible before the Carolina Patchworks VP of Quilt-Holding-Upping leaves for a business trip.  I guess I don’t pay well enough and he must work elsewhere?  Hrumph…

Delicate florals and orderly rows of roses in soft pastels get the wacky treatment in this off-the-wall take on a traditional log cabin pattern. But rather than being jarring, this combination of subdued and modern works together, with the almost organic rings breathing life into the airy springtime colors.

Off Your Rocker Wacky Log Cabin Quilt Pattern.

One glance and you’ll see that this traditional log cabin quilt isn’t quite … right. Perhaps it’s been built on shaky ground, or perhaps it’s spiraling up from a looney animated world into our own, but either way, this new spin on an old favorite is a lot of fun! Create one of the curviest quilts you can make while sewing only straight lines! Whether you end up with a quilt that is abstract and thought-provoking or zany and playful depends only on the fabrics you chose.

Finished quilt measures 53 x 66 inches (134 x 167 cm).

A custom request through Etsy.  I’ll have another similar one in the shop in the next week or two and then a different Christmas design sometime in October.

Off Your Rocker Wacky Farmer’s Market Log Cabin Quilt.

This colorful quilt glows with a cheerful summertime vibe. Playful shades of red, green, purple, blue and pink from Sandi Henderson’s Farmer’s Market collection brighten up the not-quite-traditional log cabin pattern, creating a lap quilt at home in any sunny setting.

A pattern will be available for this quilt starting September 29.

Maeve’s preschool does programs every other month so the kids can sing their songs and show us other coolness that they’ve been doing.  So the first one for this year was held yesterday.  After singing Frère Jacques (and yay!  Maeve is actually singing and participating.  This is SO different from last year when she sat with a frowny face the entire time.) Maeve gets up and runs over to us saying she wants to give Liam a kiss and hug.  Just watch the expression on his face.  It goes from, “Aww, Maeve is hugging me!” to, well, just watch.

And at the end, the teacher asks, “How do we say bye-bye in French?”  And a little boy answers, “Hola!”  Close enough, right? Hehe.

And just a disclaimer, we think the video is absolutely hilarious but Liam was not hurt, he was totally fine.  Just to clarify. Oh and the little man did kick-butt awesome yesterday in physical therapy.  Perhaps we’ll have a walking Liam by… Tofurky (or maybe Tofurducken) Day?

Maeve is in the center with the blue jacket on and the Pebbles piggy.

Another custom order through Etsy.  (I love Freshcut… though that’s probably obvious by now eh?)

And I should have the next pattern done in about 2 weeks.  This one is tres tres cool (and tres tres chic …  for all the Mocean Worker fans out there… who apparently have had this song go mainstream?  I had no idea until I went to go find the song for this post.  We giggled at this song oh so long ago (it was released in 2000)…)  And that is a complete tangent from the Freshcut quilt…

We spent the weekend at the beach… sun, sand and relaxing (as much as possible with kids at least).

I need to go read about how this block got it’s name…

I forgot to mirror the colors of this one when foundation piecing it so the yellow and green triangles in the pinwheel are switched.  Oops but so not worth re-doing just for that.

Fuzzy bubbles bounce among checkerboards in an abstract scene composed of exuberantly colored paisley, stripes, and flowers. Raw-edge applique softens this starkly imagined design for a quilt that’s both playful and cozy.  Fabrics from Sandi Henderson’s Farmer’s Market collection.

I was originally going to keep this quilt but then came to my senses and realized it would just end up buried under toys so it’s off to the UK.

I’m amazed at how many quilts have sold this month.  The shop is getting downright empty.  I have something new going in tonight so that should help!

Link and the Octorok left today for Chicago after 9600 views and 112 hearts and about a dozen trips around the blogosphere.

And the kids are sick.  Again.

Ok, so that part had nothing to do with quilts…

I purchased the Pfaff Quilt Expression 4.0 on 8/12/08 and immediately started using it.  I do all my piecing and binding on the machine (quilting on a Mega Quilter) and so far it has done 15 quilts and started piecing #16 (holy cow!).  For reference sake, my previous machine was a Pfaff 2134.  There was nothing wrong with the 2134 but since I was doing so much quilting, some of the features that the 4.0 had made it very appealing.

Pros

– Dual lights.  Especially since I do so much of my sewing in the evenings.
– The presser foot can be controlled by the foot pedal.
– IDT (previous machine had it too but is definitely a plus if you’re coming from another brand)
– Needle down/foot up option.  Great for chain piecing and appliqué.
– Large foot pedal.  Never thought this would be a pro or con, but it’s actually really nice.
– I like the tie-off style of this machine better than the 2134.
– Low bobbin indicator.  The 2134 had one but never worked properly.
– It cuts your threads for you!
– Dual tension plates for the needle thread and bobbin thread.  If you’ve ever wound a bobbin without taking your needle thread out first, you’ll appreciate this!

Cons

– Sewing with the included 1/4″ foot is horrible.
Problems include:
– fabric is ‘eaten’ by the machine at the beginning of every seam
– fabric tends to veer off to the left (leaving you with 1/8″ or 1/16″ crooked seams)
– the machine has a hard time sewing over thick seams (think the middle of a kaleidoscope or while attaching binding strips when you have binding+backing+batting+top with seams).  The IDT doesn’t help and you have to tug a bit by the back of the machine to get it over the hump.
– The top fabric tends to bunch and become unaligned with the bottom fabric (even with IDT).

– The bobbin is top loading.  That alone isn’t really a problem but they designed the bobbin cover so that it could be removed without removing the free-arm part but in the process of that, they made a dip right before you reach the needle and it will flip all your seams that you have so neatly arranged (hopefully that all makes sense).
– Second thread spool holder is not nearly tall enough (that’s pretty minor but I usually sew with two spools of thread - one going to the needle and the second to wind bobbins so I don’t have to rethread every time.

Ok, so yes, those are some pretty significant cons.

The bobbin cover just downright annoys me.  I’m hoping they’ll come out with a table that I could use instead (or perhaps a new free arm?).  Honestly, I would have preferred to remove the free arm to change my bobbin than how they did it.  When you have you seams set and then they go through this hump/dip they flip.  Every time.  This is however a deal-withable problem.

The stitching problems are just downright ridiculous BUT THERE IS AN EASY FIX!

Basically, you need to buy a new 1/4″ foot.  I’m not sure if the style I bought 2 years ago for the 2134 are still made but I certainly hope so.  Sean and I both examined the feet and cannot see anything that would make the foot that comes with the machine stitch so badly.  But it does.  I pulled the old 1/4″ foot off of my 2134 and all of these problems disappeared.  Put the new foot back on and all the problems reappeared.

Some pictures (please pardon my linty cutting mat).  You can click on them for larger versions.

The bobbin dip.

The styles are different but none of these changes seem like it would cause these problems.

I oversharpened the next image to make sure the stitches were visible (I should have used black thread!).  In the fabric on the left the machine initially ‘ate’ the fabric and then tried to recover and the fabric veered to the left.  I never could hold and guide the fabric to prevent this.  The fabric on the right when straight in and has even stitches.  Both of these were fed in in the needle down/foot up scenario since that’s how I feed almost all of my fabrics for chain piecing.

—–

So that’s that.  Why does the foot cause so many problems?  Really, I have no idea.  I think it’s rather silly to have to buy an additional 1/4″ quilting foot for a quilting machine to stitch properly.  But at least it’s fixable right?

Hopefully I got all my pros and cons in.  I’m sure there are more so feel free to ask questions if you have any.

59 blocks and 5 triangles.

Glow in the dark skeleton jammies are just cool.

It’s 4:30 and my kids are already bathed and in PJs.  I’m ready for bedtime.

(Check out the grain on that!)

So I’m supposed to be cutting back on my fabric shopping.  Right.  That’s going real well.

That’s 30-some yards of Cotton Blossoms on the right and Christmas on the left.  I got more Christmas fabric for two quilts like this one.  One is spoken for and the other is going into my shop.

Not Your Grandmother’s Log Cabin Quilt on Etsy.

If you’re not careful, you could nearly fall into this bubbly reinterpretation of a classic pattern. Concentric rings of rectangles chase each other willy-nilly through fields of flowers, in rich subdued tones of coral, blue, green, and yellow. If you do lose your balance and fall, though, don’t worry — you have a soft landing waiting for you!

September.

Current temperature in Raleigh, North Carolina: 84 Degrees Fahrenheit.

Humidity: Don’t Ask.

Proving impossible to write an appropriate description under said conditions. Perhaps when summer is over and the air conditioning is turned off, I’ll try again.

Until then: think Christmas!

I came up with this quilt as one for our family room for the holidays.  And then I realized I had WAY, WAY too much fabric.  So now the store gets one too.