Does This Look a Little Long to You? - W.i.P.

This is my version of Bonnie Hunter's String-X quilt. It is very scrappy and very long!  At 68" by 94" about 2 feet of it will wrap under the end of a twin bed!  It is so long because I wanted the pattern to match around the edges and at the corners. Now that it's all quilted, I'm debating about chopping off a row. Except that if I do that, the pattern won't match.  Let's see... who do I know who is very, very tall?

Here's the back. 

The hand-quilting is finished but I still need to cut the edges, square the corners, and cut and sew binding.

I'm linking this post to W.i.P. Wednesday. If you haven't been to Works in Progress (W.i.P.) Wednesday at FreshlyPieced.  I encourage you to race on over right now. You can see the most beautiful images of quilts and other works in progress. Then you can click on the images and be inspired by what everyone else is doing!

--Nancy.
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Happy Thanksgiving

Both of my daughters are home.  One is single and the other has come with her husband and 5-month-old baby, Malachi.  I think my husband and I are in heaven to have all of us here together for this holiday of gratitude. 

I hope you are spending time with family and loved ones, too.

I wish you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving!

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A Problem with Chocolate

How is it that 2 ounces of chocolate, unwrapped and sitting on the table, become 16 ounces as soon as they pass through my mouth and into my body?  What exactly happens between the unwrapping, the chewing, and the digesting that I just don't understand? 

Does anyone else have this problem, too?

--Nancy.
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Gratitude

To those who fought to preserve America's freedoms

-- because freedom has always been worth fighting for --

I say thank you for your service

in war and in peace,

at all times, and in all places.

Please observe a moment of silence

at 11:00 a.m. on November 11

in honor of the soldiers who have given so much.

Reminders to Self about Hand Quilting - W.i.P. Wednesday

This is my very scrappy String-X a la Bonnie Hunter.  What you see in this photo is essentially all I have left to hand quilt.  Do you think I can quilt it in two weeks?  I hope so.  I will be so thrilled to have this finished!

Notes to myself as a beginning hand quilter.  
Remember!

Choose your thread carefully.  Use the same color of thread as the fabric you're quilting, or at least choose a thread that blends or mostly disappears into the fabric.  That way your novice abilities won't be so obvious.  Once you're an expert hand quilter you can use a different color of thread so your stitches will stand out.  By then you will appreciate that people will notice your quilting skills.

Press seams open!  Seams pressed to one side are hard to push a needle through.  Sometimes a seam with two layers of fabric overlaps another seam with two layers of fabric.  (You can just barely see it in the photo to the right, where the colored corners are.  You can click the photos to enlarge them.)  That's four layers just for the seams.  Add the top of the quilt and the back of the quilt and you're quilting through 6 layers in the finished quilt.  Six layers are too many!  Press seams open and it will be easier to quilt.

Improve the pin basting.  Find a way to prevent the loop end of the pin from catching the fabric and making a hole.  Maybe a small bead on the pin before putting it into the fabric would prevent the holes.  Or maybe tie a knot with a large string and slide it down to the end of the pin with the circle.  If you can't find a solution to prevent the holes, thread baste!

About penciled lines.  Following lines in quilting is boring.  It's like coloring in a coloring book instead of making your own drawing or painting.

Get a good thimble and use it to push the needle through.

Build up callouses on your fingers and keep them.  That means quilting every day.  Until you have callouses, you'll have sore fingers.  And never, never, never, never hand quilt immediately after washing your hands!  It makes even calloused fingers so soft that the back end of the needle might poke through your fingers.  Wait till your hands are completely dry.

I'm linking this post to W.i.P. Wednesday at FreshlyPieced.  Thank you, Lee and Svetlana.


Thanks for visiting.
--Nancy.

God, Give Us Men!

     God, Give Us Men!  A time like this demands
        Strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands;
        Men whom the lust of office does not kill;
     Men whom the spoils of office can not buy.
        Men who possess opinions and a will;
     Men who have honor; men who will not lie;
     Men who can stand before a demagogue
        And damn his treacherous flattieries without winking!
     Tall men, sun-crowned, who live above the fog
        In public duty, and in private thinking;
     For while the rabble, with their thumb-worn creeds,
     Their large professions and their little deeds,
     Mingle in selfish strife, lo!  Freedom weeps,
     Wrong rules the land and waiting Justice sleeps.

--Josiah Gilbert Holland          

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"The White House is a character crucible....  It either creates or distorts character.  Few decent people want to subject themselves to the kind of grueling abuse candidates take when they run in the first place...  Many of those who run crave superficial celebrity.  They are hollow people who have no principles and simply want to be elected.  Even if an individual is balanced, once someone becomes president, how does one solve the conundrum of staying real and somewhat humble when one is surrounded by the most powerful office in the land, and from becoming overhwlmed by an at time pathological environment that treats you every day as an emperor?  Here is where the true strength of the character of the person, not his past accomplishments, will determine whether his presidency ends in accomplishment or failure."

Bertram S. Brown, M.D.,

(psychiatrist who formerly headed the National Institute of Mental Health)

quoted in In the President's Secret Service by Ronald Kessler

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Election Day in the U.S. is almost over but if you haven't voted, there may still be time.  It is a right and privilege not to be neglected.
Thank you, Katie G, for your generous permission to post the above image.

Bison at Rest - Shadow Shot Sunday

I love how the lens of the camera caught

the atmospheric conditions that were not visible to my eyes.

When I take photos I focus on the subjects without noticing backgrounds, shadows, etc.  What happens between the subjects and surrounding environments and the camera lens soften turns out as a surprise.

This is a post for Shadow Shot Sunday.

Unsewing

Do you unsew?  Or unstitch?  Or rip seams?  Or pick out threads? That thing we do when the needle and thread went the wrong way or did something we didn't intend?  It probably has other names, too.

I learned to unsew not long after I learned to sew.  I was about five when my mother showed me how to sew on a button, then put a needle and thread into my hand.  In the process of attaching the button I realized there was some problem:  with the thread coming out on the bottom, I had moved it around to the top and sent the needle back down again instead of coming up from the bottom.  I attempted to put the thread end of the needle back into the whole from whence it came.  Somehow I succeeded and was able to fix my mistake and begin sewing properly again.

My father had a watch repair business in our home (in addition to his regular job).  When people came to drop off or pick up watches they came in through our front door, walked through a section of our living room, and into the room where my father worked.

Once when I was still new to sewing I was sitting in our living room unsewing another button when a man came to pick up his timepiece.  He greeted me, stopped to watch me, squatted, then asked what I was doing.  I explained that I needed to get the needle and thread back through the hole.  He laughed.  He told me it wasn't possible, that I would need to cut the thread and begin again.  Unfortunately, he left before I succeeded at my task or he would have learned that it was, indeed, possible.  Not easy, but possible.

My mother used a needle to unpick threads until she became acquainted with a seam ripper.  She once used it unwisely and ripped not just the threads in the seam but the fabric on one side of the seam.  Knowing the power of a seam ripper, she was much more careful from then on.

These days I use different methods to unsew.  I usually use a seam ripper, a little tool that's probably well known to everyone who has ever sewn on a sewing machine.  Sometimes I use small, sharp scissors to cut the threads if the stitches are large enough and I'm able to begin unstitching at the end of the seam.

Now I have a new unsewing tool, recently introduced to me by Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville.  I was watching Bonnie on Quiltcam one evening when she was ripping out a seam.  I can't remember if another viewer asked her what she was using or if she instinctively knew that some would want to know.  She turned to the camera and explained that she was using an eyebrow shaper:  not too sharp but sharp enough to cut the threads without cutting the fabric.  She told us that they came three to a pack for under $3.00.  At Wal-Mart, in the cosmetics area.

I like tools as much as the next gal so when on an errand at Wal-Mart I went over to the cosmetics area and found them.  I would have preferred to buy just one until I knew if I liked them, but the eyebrow shapers came three to a pack, so three I bought.   I wasn't sure I liked them until I realized it takes a one way sawing motion - downward only, for me at least.  Perhaps they work differently for different people.  They're very effective and, I think, less risky than a seam ripper.

I'm pleased to have one more tool in my arsenal of unsewing equipment.  The less I need to use any of them, though, the better.

Do you unsew?  What tools do you use?

November

No fruits
No flowers
No leaves
No birds! -

November!





I expected more rainy grey again today but our Ohio sky has been bluer than blue.  I don't know what the weather was like in the coastal states as Sandy finishes her reign.  If there were rain instead of cloudy skies, would it brighten the spirits of those suffering loss?  I don't know.  I often wonder how sunshine affects those in horrendous situations.  I would hope that sunshine would help but I just don't know....

My thoughts are with those poor souls effected by Sandy and my prayers continue heavenward in their behalf.

The poem above is the last stanza of a poem by Thomas Hood.  It speaks of the greyest of grey days and since today wasn't I couldn't post all of it above.  But here it is:


November

No sun - no moon!
No morn - no noon -
No dawn - no dusk - no proper time of day.
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member -
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds! -
November!


Blessings to you!
--Nancy.