Quilting

Sometimes I look at other people's blogs and feel jealous of their fabulous crafting environment with quilting walls, huge tables and special built in wardrobes. Admittedly this tends to be people who craft for a living rather than a hobby, but still, it's difficult not to wish that we had room for an extension to our small South London maisonette. This week I took two days off and the weather was gorgeous so I moved my sewing machine from the kitchen table to the garden and was completely cured of my jealousy because, as far as I'm concerned, nothing could be nicer.




After my intensive spell of working it has been lovely to have a holiday. I decided to carry on working on my sunrise quilt and decided to add three borders to finish off the patchwork.



The next step is to layer the quilt with the patchwork on top, wadding in the middle and a backing fabric and then quilt the layers together. To attempt to make the quilting easier I bought an 'even walking foot'. This is a cumbersome looking sewing machine foot which feeds the fabric though from the top at the same rate that the feed dogs feed through the fabric at the bottom. I was petty flummoxed as to how to fit the foot to my Janome DC3050 until I found a fantastic post and a fabulous diagram from Hoppo Bumpo.

I took some photos of the process in case anyone else has the same difficulty as me:
1. Remove the foot holder


2. Prop the foot handle over the needle clamp


3. Screw in the foot


I quilted a test piece of patchwork and was very impressed with the new foot:


From the back:


So the next step will be to attempt the same thing with my much larger sunrise quilt.

More Quilting

One book I bought last year was Last Minute Quilted Gifts. I enjoyed Last Minute Knitted Gifts and hoped for more of the same. I thought the book was OK but nothing really leaped out at me as a 'must make'. I did make one project from the book which used up some of my quilt disaster fabric:



I'm very fond of these little coasters.

I finally made a decision on yesterdays patchwork. I went for a combination of #1 and #2 in the end after much rearranging and deliberating. I'm going to call this quilt the 'Sunrise Quilt' because the colours look like the sun rising over the sea. The brightness of the fabrics is a tonic in these grey winter days.



The next step is to make a border then bind and quilt (or is it quilt and bind)...

Quilt Confusion

I just don't know what to do with my quilt. This is my second attempt at patchwork and it's very confusing to know what is best.

I sewed the version on the LHS into strips but then decided that I could do a better layout; I spent 2 hours unpicking and rearranging (see RHS).

Now, looking at the photos, I'm not so sure that the first version isn't better....

Sewing

Now I'm obsessed with sewing which is quite new to me. I'm a big believer of trying not to be intimidated and 'jumping in the deep end'. The two projects below show the good side and bad side of this approach!

My biggest project (and one which I'm very pleased with) has been the Amy Butler Weekender bag. This bag is huge - big enough to store a sewing machine:



I posted a review of the pattern on the pattern review website and I've pasted it in here:

I thought I'd write a review of this pattern because I'm very much a sewing beginner so it might give other beginners an idea of whether or not they want to commit to this pattern (especially since many of the reviews do not recommend this pattern for beginners).

I loved making this bag and was very pleased with the result which did look a lot like the photo on the pattern envelope. Also I've had some very nice comments from friends who were genuinely surprised that I hadn't bought the bag in a shop.

Making the bag took me a long time - much longer than I expected. I spent more than a day just cutting out the pieces because I realised that if I cut them as recommended in the instructions that the various elements to the pattern would not line-up and then it might look pretty messy. I learnt that I might have had an easier job choosing a smaller pattern repeat!

After the cutting out it took me about another 3 full days of hardcore sewing. The most difficult part for me was making the cording and 'crowding' the cording - and just the concept of cording! The zip was very easy and I didn't have too much problem with the thickness of the sewing but I used a substitute of Timtex* (I don't think you can get it in the UK) that was recommended to me (on u-handbag.com) so maybe it was slightly thinner.

*The substitute was - Vilene Craft/Pelmet Sew-in (edit)

One downside was the cost of this project - it worked out to be hugely more expensive than I expected when I bought the pattern. I'd recommend that people price this bag out before starting sewing because it easily cost me> £100.

I followed the instructions exactly. I thought that they were very clear although I had to read through some parts a number of times before getting them. I am a much better sewer now - I learnt a whole heap of techniques and I am now much more confident with my sewing machine as a result. I would recommend this pattern to an enthusiastic beginner who is prepared maybe to do a little research on the internet if they get stuck.


However all has not been successful in my sewing mania. I bought some Kaffe Fassstt prints with the intention to make a quilt from last minute quilted gifts. So here are some of the beautiful original prints:



And I did this to them (which in real life looks even worse):




I've learnt that just because the fabric look nice separately they won't necessarily look nice all together. And although I think unpatterned neutrals are boring - that is sometimes exactly what is needed. I will use up all of that material in different projects but my punishment for my bad taste is having to unpick all of those stitches.

So if you're going to be brave and jump in you have to expect to occasionally get into a bit of trouble!