I have two Quiltie Ladies sharing tips today ---and their ideas can open up whole new worlds!
The first one is Pam who writes:
Bonnie,
I started making 3" spools as my leader/ender project mid-August. I decided
to collect the tiny triangles I cut off in a recycled plastic box. (I'm not
sure why).
Anyway, yesterday my friends were over to work on a birthday
quilt. We each had a task - cutting, sewing, pressing, and removing the
freezer paper from the back of the signature blocks.
Since I was sewing, I had my box of corners out and Sheryl, who was pressing asked for the box.
When she wasn't pressing she rooted through my box of triangles and then
hand stitched this tiny square in a square.
The box contains the trimmings from about 110 spool blocks.
Waste not!! These are adorable! And --- well ---after I finished my Pineapple Crazy, I let a bunch of these go, only saving the trimmings from 2.5” squares…..Maybe I have to re-think that!?
Which brings to mind a bunch of laughter a group of us shared seeing what was being pulled back OUT of the “save for dog beds” bag in class last week when folks realized that yes – any trimming over 3/4” in width went into string blocks just fine! My feeling is this…..the dogs can get the batting scraps, the threads, the little pieces that are really not sewable…but I’m not stuffing a dog bed with $12.00 a yard scraps!
If Tiny-Size isn’t your cuppa tea? How bout a go-round with Triangle Buddies, Biggie Sized!?
Tina over at Seaside Stitches loves to sew with Charm Squares, but sometimes their 5” size can create a lot of sliver trimming when it comes to getting a 1/2 square triangle unit that finishes at 4” square.
She’s made a template based on my bonus triangle buddy ---and biggie sized it to streamline her triangle making! Instead of drawing a center line and stitching 1/4” each side to get overs-sized triangles – her lines are drawn to give her the size she needs with no sliver trimming!
Click HERE to read more of Tina’s great explanation on streamlining her biggie-sized triangles!
Busy day here in Quiltville. I have a lunch planned with Llisa and Karen, discussing more details of our August Collaboration Celebration retreat with Mickey Depre and Me ----That website info page is NEARLY ready! We should have the sign ups ready in the next week, so be watching for that post.
I’ve got errands to run, and a massage at 3 ((Happy early Valentine’s to me since I’m leaving on the 14th!)) and on top of it all: my big desk top computer decided it didn’t want to boot up anymore. I’m doing everything on my laptop right now --- hopefully it will be back from being fixed by the time I return from this next trip to Georgia.
The Singer 115 with the most gorgeous decals ever, shown in last night’s post –is STILL not sewing right. I think it’s the feed dogs. If I treadle fast – the stitches are small, if I go slow, they are larger, and I don’t know how to fix this one…….so this just proves to me another thing I’ve been told all my life:
You can NOT judge a book by its cover, or a machine by the prettiness of its finish! My biggest workhorse with the best stitch is the ugliest machine of all……And I guess that proves that she was someone else’s favorite as well, and explains why the decals and finish are worn clear down to her bare metal on the machine bed.
At the end of my life --- I hope that I’ve done everything, experienced much, played hard, loved completely, lived every inch of my existence and that my decals and finish are worn clear down to the bare metal from years of service and joy too!
Happy Monday, everyone!
8 comments:
I always get a kick out of seeing other quilters ideas, quilts, and thoughts on scraps. It's all just fun isn't it? Makes me itch to go sew too.
Safe travels and Happy Sewing, I know you are glad you are not in NY, a foot of snow up here now getting covered with freezing rain.
What a great sewingmachine methaphor, I fully agree :-)
Great post...I think that last paragraph are words to live by!! I need to post them in my sewing room!! Keep on stitchin'!
P
I agree with the methaphor. At the end of the movie "Second Hand Lions" it is said that the two old uncles REALLY LIVED. I have always thought that would be a good way to live. And now there's another thought to put in my book. Wear my decals out! Or from Steel Magnolias "I would rather have 30 minutes of wonderful than a life time of nothing special." Now I have to get busy and quilt--that is my wonderful!
Instead of just cutting off those extra triangles. I always sew the second line of stitching and cut in between and then save the little triangles for another project. I am working on one right now with the leftover triangles from 3 quilts that play well together. Here is a picture of the center so far. http://www.flickr.com/photos/lucysquilts/8464531345/in/photostream I have purchased a great border fabric to go with them but that is on hold while I get a raffle quilt finished.
I love saving those little triangles and I do what 'Not Lucy' does. It keeps them all together and is so easy to do at the same time. I store mine with my other squares that are cut from scraps - 1.5, 2, 2.5 - it is so much fun to toss some into a scrappy project.
Right now, I am hoping I have enough to go around the outside of a scrappy quilt that went from two 60x80 to a king-size (thanks to my husband). I put the two smaller quilts together to be 120 x 80 and am now making additional blocks to enlarge the 80" side. Just when I thought I had them ready to go on the longarm. The backing is loaded and the batting is 'resting' while I finish the top.
LoL.... Amen to your last! Maybe you could find a happy medium in the treadling dept.? Good luck... and enjoy your massage!
Love that last - me, too!
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