I've Been Stripping

Don't you just love those really bad quilt-y puns? Stripping. I slay myself. Ahem.

So, as I was saying … I added sashing and stripping to the quilt blocks. No, I don't know which is which. Anyone?

Things I learned:

1. I'm pretty sure these blocks were the result of a swap or other bee-type exchange because even though they tricked me into believing they were all the same exact size, um … they weren't. Other clues were that the muslin pieces are many different kinds of muslin (or plain white, I don't know), and none of the fabrics are repeated in other blocks.

I had to make the decision to keep the integrity of the blocks (points, etc.) and say to heck with the sashing (stripping?) lining up 100% exactly. It's a practice quilt, after all, and I fully expect and want it to be used as a snuggle quilt while watching TV. Don't ask me why (I don't know!) but my 17-year old son always watches TV under a blanket, even if it's 98 degrees outside. Which, by the way, it is NOT. It is FREEZING. Although less freezing today than yesterday. I think we might have reached 50 today. But it was still officially freezing temps when I took the dogs out this morning so I'm counting it.

2. It's really, REALLY hard to pick fabrics to coordinate with "old lady" colors but which themselves will help the quilt to not look so old lady. Apologies to any old ladies who may be offended. ;-) I went with a dark green, gold, and not-bright red although the red looks brighter in these photos than it is. Maybe because the whole room where it's hanging for this photo is red? I don't know. I'm now thinking it looks Christmas-y instead of old lady, but that's really only in the photos. The red is really not that red. My camera just loves to enhance any speck of red in a shot.

3. Duct tape is handy when you're hanging a quilt top off french doors for a quick photo. Especially when you're home alone.

4. I have NO IDEA where I'm going to lay this out to make my "quilt sandwich" in preparation for actually quilting the thing. The driveway comes to mind, but my grease monkey son has left, well, GREASE in the driveway so I need to figure out a way to not transfer grease onto the quilt. Then again, I may temporarily rearrange some stuff in my bedroom instead so I can lay it out in the "sitting area." Said sitting area is actually dog bed area, which means heavy-duty vacuuming before any quilt is laid down there and probably shooing dogs off the quilt while I'm working on it. It will also be warmer to do it there vs. the driveway, although "they" are telling us it may hit 70 by Friday. Woot!

5. I love LOVE my Featherweight! I won't be able to quilt on it because the harp is way too small, but that little beauty sews 1/4" seams like magic. I love the sound it makes too. It's very hypnotic.

6. I like strip quilting because it's more of a no-brainer. Intricate blocks, though I love them on finished quilts, kill me. My Stars & Stripes may never get done, although I hope I do muster up the motivation because it's going to ROCK whenever it's done. Strip quilting is relaxing. Nothing to fit onto my body. No pattern tissue to wrestle with. Pretty much just cut some straight lines and sew.

Here's a straight-on shot of the quilt top. If you click on the photo to enlarge it, you should be able to see where some of the blocks don't quite line up they way they should. But once it's in use, no one will ever know.



D1 Update: Still in the hospital. The $140 quote does include the Reverse, the Fix, my bobbin winder, and the needle threader. I think that's pretty much a bargin. Or bargain, if I could catch typos. Now that they have my OK to fix those things, they will also open it up and test the problem with the lights burning out. If that's an expensive fix like I'm afraid it will be, I'll continue to live without lights. There was a communication gap that seems to have been fixed now and I received at least 4 calls between yesterday and this morning. But I probably won't have it back until next week. We'll see. The repair guy doesn't make a trip to that store every day. I'm in quilt-y mode and I really need the D1 for that since it has a pretty good harp space. But I may just go ahead and start reacquainting myself with free-motion quilting on the Kenmore.