A new adventure in quilting

I have used my mom's Gammill longarm quilting machine before and if you have been reading my blog for a while you know that it is pretty intimidating for me. So for the next little while, my mom will be mentoring and teaching me to quilt on the longarm!

Last week was the start of my new adventure. I brought an old UFO to mom's, along with a nice piece of flannel which I thought would be great for the back of the quilt. I got everything ironed and squared up and then my mom started teaching me how to load everything on the machine. In the past when I used the machine, my mom did all of the loading, threading and even the rolling for me. (Yes, I am a lucky girl!)

The scariest part is cleaning, oiling, and threading the machine. As with any sewing machine it's always tricky using different threads and playing with tension. This will definitely be a big learning curve for me. I am happy I know a little bit about these things thanks to my embroidery machine. That is definitely a plus!

I decided to start with some pantograph patterns on the first quilts I do. These are also known as "edge to edge" patterns.

While quilting the first couple of rows, I had trouble with the flow of the design. The perfectionist in me wants to make sure the lazer light follows directly on the line, so when I would go off even a little bit, I would jerk the machine so the lazer would go back to the line. It took me a while to get it in my head that it was okay to move off of the line, as long as the movement of the machine is flowing. My mom is very patient with me and an awesome teacher. She could hear the machine going fast, then slow, so she came over to see what I was doing. She gave me some pointers and tricks of things to tell myself to get the machine to flow better. "Swoopy" and "point" are now going to be a part of my vocabulary while quilting!

I had a lot of fun quilting this quilt and learning some "new to me" things about quilting. I will be putting the binding on this quilt and will then get a good photo to show you all. I am pretty proud of it, if I say so myself.

I went back to my mom's the next day and quilted another quilt. I will blog about that one next time, so stay tuned....

 

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Hexies and fabric pulls

The girls went back to school on Tuesday. I have been busy catching up on making embroidered labels for customers and added a few blocks to my Hexie Garden quilt.

I also started pulling fabric for the quilts I am going to make in my Angled class with Rachel Hauser from Stitched In Color. I had so much fun pulling fabrics, and I can't wait for class to start on Monday!

This morning, I used the Color sheet provided for the first project, the Indian Blanket quilt, and coloured in the fabric placement for my quilt. This should make cutting easier as I know where the fabric will go.

Hope you all have a great long weekend! We are going to enjoy my parents pool before summer is really over.

 

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Angles

I have been doing a lot of piecing this summer. I am wanting to learn more about using my mom's long arm machine this fall and winter so I have been preparing a lot of quilt tops to use for practice.

Last week I started cutting fabric for a quilt called Hexie Garden by Terry Atkinson. My mom bought me a kit for this quilt in the spring. She thought of me because there is a lot of orange fabric in the kit. I only changed one fabric. They had a solid grey fabric for the triangles inside the flowers and I changed it for a turquoise print. I am not a huge fan of solids and the fact that the background is a solid, well, that's enough solid for me in one quilt. I also thought the turquoise would brighten up the quilt, I thought the grey was a little dull.

I used my HexnMore ruler to cut out all the triangles and the hexagons. I finished cutting the fabric on Saturday.

I couldn't wait to start making blocks, so while I was doing the laundry on Sunday, I started piecing.

 

Isn't it pretty? It took me a couple of blocks before I got the hang of it and felt more comfortable piecing these diamond shaped blocks. Once I got going though, I was having so much fun!

I now have 7 blocks, only 11 to go! I am really happy I decided to change out the grey for the turquoise. I am looking forward to sharing more with you as I progress with this quilt.

I also found out last week that Rachel over at Stitched In Color is giving a class on piecing angles this September. I took a handpieced class from Rachel back in January 2013 and I absolutely loved it. Her classes are online and she offers you an eBook so you have all of your instructions at hand whenever you need them for future reference. Registration opens today and I am off to sign up now!

Maybe I should have taken the class before piecing my Hexie Garden quilt... oh well, I am having fun anyways!

 

 

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WIP Wednesday - 08/13/2014

It's been a while since I have done a WIP Wednesday post. I have been working on my appliqué for my BOM, although it is going a little slower than I had anticipated. I am still really enjoying this project though and am getting better and better at needle turn appliqué.

So I am still on block number 3 but two thirds of it is done. I only need to add the little hedgehogs and stars to the bottom.

Linking up to The Needle and Thread Network

 

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Mini quilt exchange

Earlier this summer I participated in the Schnitzel and Boo mini quilt swap. It was organized by Kristi over at Schnitzel & Boo. I heard about it on Instagram and thought I had to participate in a swap where I could stalk my partner to find out her likes and dislikes. It was also fun to make a quilt and make lots of new friends. 600 people participated in this swap!! It was amazing! I got to see what a lot of people were working on by checking out the hashtags on Instagram and trying to guess which was mine. There were so many beautiful quilts, I wanted them all!

Anyhow, I got a great partner called Debbie. She lives in Oaklahoma but is from Alaska and loves her coffee. She even works in a coffee shop part time. She also loves bright colours.

When I got all the info about my partner, I had just finished this quilt top.

I was looking for inspiration and saw this hanging on my design wall and thought it would be perfect. So I looked through my stash and scraps for some fun bright fabrics and used that same cup pattern from Lori Holt's book Quilty Fun. I also thought it would be fun to add a little embroidery to the quilt so I machine embroidered her initial on one of the cups. Here is the quilt top loaded on the longarm.

I put both quilts on the longarm at the same time. I quilted mine first so as to practice before doing Debbie's. I hadn't used the long arm for months so I was a little rusty! It felt good to get back at it. I quilted some loops in the background and then used 3 different designs in the cups.

Here is mine:

I also made Debbie a mug rug with leftovers from her mini. I included an embroidered zipper pouch and a lanyard in her package too.

Here is a photo of the back and the label I embroidered.

All packed up and ready to go.

I am happy to say that she loved it and found the perfect spot to hang it in her craft room and I now have a new friend!

I will show you the wonderful mini I received in my next post!! I strongly recommend you participate in swaps if you get the chance. They are so much fun and it is a great way to meet some great quilty people from around the world!

 

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