Ooo! Ooo! It worked! (Liz, don't look!)

After getting my hopes up and making my last post, I couldn't figure out how I'd gotten that last photo from my tablet to my computer.  (It may have involved magic.  I'm not sure.)
Until this moment!  Literally.

Liz, don't look!

Three, two, one...



Here's a photo of my swap quilt, after I removed the hideous horrible ugly-excuse-for-a border and put on a simple pretty one instead:

A little closer:

And remember I told you I'm a little bit guilty of overbasting?  Check out the amount of thread in this corner.  What's in view measures about 6"x10":

I'll probably use less thread than that for the actual quilting...

Linking with Oh, Scrap! because it's my kind of party!

And I'm adding a picture of Garden Party just so I'll have a non-swap quilt picture to put in the photo header.  Just in case Liz visits Oh, Scrap, too...

Test... test...

I think I might have a workaround.

At least until I can find a card reader that works...

If at first you don't succeed, pretend Plan B C was what you intended from the beginning

Still no photos, so you'll have to use your imaginations.  The good news is that my quilt swap partner doesn't have to close her eyes, since she can't see the quilt anyway.  Even accidentally.
Speaking of the swap quilt, I got it basted this afternoon.  I finished the top over the weekend, then let it marinate for a couple of days to make sure I liked it, since the path to final assembly had been fraught with peril.  And cursing.  There was definite cursing. 
There was a problem with the inner border that I showed last week, in that the fabric I had planned to use was an inch shorter than the center part of the top (the part the border would be bordering, in other words), which I didn't notice until I had my rotary cutter in hand and was ready to go.  And for reasons unknown, I decided that I didn't want to just piece the border, probably because that would have been too easy.  Oh, no.  I came up with a really clever thing that I thought would be perfect, made up four border strips with the snazzy idea, and sewed one on.
And hated it.  And not just any ordinary hate - the flaming hate of a thousand white-hot suns.  I hated it so much that I set it down, went up the hill home, and still hated it even when it wasn't even in the same room with me, hate it hate it hate it.  I hated it all through supper, hated it till bedtime, hated it when I woke up in the morning.  Hated it as I was headed down to The Flat.
I was reaching for the seam ripper the minute I walked through the door, before I even dropped my keys in my pocket.  A quick ziiiiiiick!  And no more dreaded terrible horrible awful hated hated hated border.  Whew!
Now of course, the next attempt would have gone a lot smoother if I had measured correctly before cutting all four borders.  Because, you know.  Fit and everything.  But, hey.
And then, finally, while I was cutting the borders again (and starting to feel slightly worried about running out of that particular fabric), a light bulb went off in my head and I realized what I should have been doing from the beginning, and did it.  And it was perfect.
Ya know, Right Brain and Left Brain were both suspiciously quiet through this whole ordeal.  Probably off somewhere sulking after the last time.  Borders.  Yep.

So anyway, I decided I loved it in its final state, and I got it basted this afternoon.  I don't particularly enjoy basting, but that's probably my own fault since I have a tendency to overbaste.  Like I'm worried about the basting having to survive a cattle stampede.  Or an alien invasion.  That kind of overbaste. 
As I was crawling around on the floor with backing, batting, and top, cursing my aching knees and back, overdoing the basting, I found myself wishing that there was an easier way to do this.  Something that could raise the work up off the floor.  Maybe a piece of furniture.  That would be a wonderful thing.  I could invent something that would do just that, and make a fortune.
I'm thinking of calling it a 'table'.   What do you think?

Argh again

I had two (two, count 'em, two!!) posts all written in my head, plus dozens of pictures taken to illustrate all the looky-here's.  Unfortunately, all the pictures are stuck on my SD card because my card reader has died again.  And this time I didn't even shove anything in backwards or sideways.  So it's either the make of card reader (I got the same kind both times), the cards themselves (but I have two different ones that I alternate that have been working fine), or my computer.  Or me.  Because maybe I don't have to put the cards in all cattywampus to kill a card reader.  Maybe it's just a talent.
Anyone have a recommendation for a replacement reader?
*sigh*

Last of the Lawnbenders

Last summer I learned to use my dad's riding lawn mower.  Well, 'learned' might be stretching it a bit.  I became acquainted with Dad's lawn mower.
The first time I used it, I was happily mowing his front yard and was almost done when he flagged me down.
"You know, you're not really cutting the grass - you're just bending it.  You need to raise the rpms."  And he walked away.
Bending?  I looked back, and sure enough, my wake was a little tufty looking.  Downright scruffy in places.
But rpms?  What rpms?  And how do you raise them?
This was like telling a beginning baker that the cake didn't raise because there wasn't enough leavening.  Leavening?  What's that?  And how much is enough?
So, later, after some judicious questioning about rpms, I established that I needed to give it more gas.  Since there's no gas pedal, I have to give it more 'throttle' by raising a lever from down where the turtle is to up more towards the bunny.
Which would sound less crazy if I show you a picture:

That's actually a picture of a newer and fancier throttle lever than we have (there's a knob!), but you get the idea.
So naturally, for the rest of the summer, whenever I was headed for the mower, I would announce that I was off to bend the lawn.  (I've never been one who could resist a chance to be a smartass.  It's probably a character flaw.)
The other lawn I mow is down at The Flat, which is a family property about a quarter mile down the road, that I'm currently using for my sewing room and storage.  It's an interesting lawn, with trees and bushes and deadfall limbs and rope swings and mild inclines and a clothesline, and any number of other traps and pitfalls.  Literally, there's a pitfall.  It's a hole deep enough to get a riding mower stuck in so that you can't go forward or back and have to call your dad for help.  (Ask me how I know.)
This spring was pretty wet, with long soaking rains happening every time the lawn finally dried out enough to mow.  Finally, there was a stretch of a couple of dry days, so I bustled the mower down the road and started mowing, just in the nick of time - another hour and we'd have had to have a haying crew in...
So round and round I went, through grass 12-18" tall, past trees, under clotheslines, halfway over small logs (oops).  I was just congratulating myself on remembering where the hole was and mowing around it instead of through it, and "yay!  I won't have to call Dad to come rescue me", when the mower suddenly made a brrr-slither-chunk! noise, belched some black smoke, and died.
I said words.  Then I climbed down to investigate.
Hidden in the deep dark grass was a really long garden hose, and the mower had tried to inhale it.
Now everything probably would have been fine if it had been a crappy inexpensive garden hose.  The mower would have just turned it into orange confetti and gone merrily on its way.

.

But no.  This was a tough, top-quality, made to last a lifetime type garden hose, so it just wound around and around and around until it jammed the mower blade and gave the mower a small stroke.

Here's a closer view of the wound-up part.  The pics are taken of the hose after my Dad cut it loose and we threw all the bits into the back of his truck.

Because, yeah, I had to call Dad to come rescue me again.

Oh, hey, math

Ya know, I warned y'all that I can be a complete ditz at math.  Square roots, fine.  Find the volume of a truncated cone?  Fine.  Multiply a couple of numbers and add the sums?  Hmmm.
So, I was figuring out in this post how many nine-patches I'd need for my borders for the Starry Nine Patch (and by the way, from this moment forward, this quilt will be named Katie's Star Patch.  Because I decided.) and I doubled 15 and doubled 18 and added 4 for the corners and got an answer of 80.
And not one of you called me out on that answer?!?
Twice 15 is 30 and twice 18 is 36, and 30 + 36 +  4 is actually 70.  Not 80.
Luckily I was planning to make some extra nine-patches anyway, but still.  At least now I'll know when I'm done sewing triangles to nine-patches.  And I'll stop.  Whew.
I didn't bother to take any photos of the growing piles of nine-patches with triangles sewn to them.  They look the same as the ones in my last post, only there's more of them.
So, since I didn't actually need the center of Katie's Star Patch laid out anymore, I rolled it up and started using my Design Floor for my Garden Party, just to see how far I've gotten with it.
For a leaders-enders project, this thing is just sailing right along!

I keep a couple of hot cross buns blocks cut and lined up at all times (Though sometimes I have to work extra hard not to confuse them with the nine-patches I'm building.  Some of their construction points look remarkably similar...) and I've got stacks of orange nine-patches and squares at the ready.  I'm charmed by the fact that this is a quilt that's being built in the spaces.  It's like pulling blocks out of the air, fully formed and perfect and mysterious.  Sheer magic.
The other fun thing about this quilt is the sheer chaos of the fabrics.  I've got everything in there:  there's fabric from every decade from 1950 onward to just last month, plus some Civil War reproductions that I'd forgotten I had.

The only thing you won't find is 1930's reproductions.  And the only reason there aren't any of those in there is that I've never bought any, because I don't want to get them confused with the 1930's fabrics I have which are actually from the 1930's.  (My grandmother gave me fabric from her stash, as well as some blocks that her mother-in-law pieced back in the late 1920's or early '30's.   (When I come across them, I'll post pictures!))




And now we're at the point where Liz should close the post, because I'm about to talk about the swap quilt.


Ready?


No peeking.


(Unless you've changed your mind and really want to peek.  I'm okay with that.   Totally your choice.)


No going back now. 


Not kidding.


Five, four, three,


two, one...



Okay, here we go.  I pieced one more Ohio Star block and decided to set them on point.  (I'm just a sucker for on point.)  (You may have noticed that already.)  I assembled them with some blue squares and some madder paisley triangles.
And started dithering on the borders.  Of course.  Because that's what I do.
Here's the only mockup I took a photo of:

and a close up:

I'm going to sleep on it, but I think I like the narrow light paisley border, and then that dark blue.  I also auditioned a darkish brown with a tan ferny pattern on it, but it was sort of gloomy looking.  Gloomy isn't really the look I'm going for here.  Since the quilt group's focus is small quilts of Civil War antecedents, I'm trying to keep it in character and stifle my urges for zingy squirrely orange spiral prints, but I'm not wanting it to lean too far the other way, either.  Pretty.  That's what I'm going for.  Not gloomy.  Pretty.

Happy.  Happy works, too.





(Oops!  Forgot the most important thing!  Linking to Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework.  Go see all the pretties!)

Journey to Starry Nine Patch, with a brief sidetrip to Ohio

Now that the border decision has been made, the triangles and nine patches are flying along.  I had 57 nine patches left over from piecing the center unit and since I need 80 total for the borders, I've just got to sew a few more.  (For some values of 'a few'.)  (Because I'm planning to make 'a few' extras to guarantee variety, and because you can never have too many nine patches.)
And I'm madly sewing triangles to nine patches.  Stacks and stacks of triangles and nine patches.

And stacks.  And more stacks.

Since this is
mind-numbing 
slightly less interesting than some of the previous parts, I've started a small side project just to keep my brain fizzing.  (Wouldn't want those two hemispheres to get too comfy, now would I?)
And small is the key word here.  I'm in a small quilt group (that's small quilts, large group, btw) and we're doing a small quilt swap (again, small quilt, large swap).  (Adjectives are supposed to clarify things, right?  Hmmm...)
So anyway, if you answer 'yes' to all the following questions:

1. Is my name Liz?
2. Am I in the aforementioned small quilt swap?
3. Is my partner named Gayle?
4. Do I like surprises?

then you have to make a decision.  I'm about to reveal some of my work on the quilt for the swap, so if you want to be surprised, you should look no further on this post.

While you're deciding, the rest of us will look at this lovely bleeding heart that's blooming down at The Flat (which is where my sewing 'studio' is.):

Okay, everyone who answered 'no' to even one of the questions can now proceed.


Fair Warning.


Last chance...





I love quilts with stars.  (You may have guessed that already.)  Sawtooth stars, Lemoyne stars, 4-pointed stars, 6-pointed stars, 8-pointed stars, Friendship stars, Hunter's stars...  you get the idea.
A big favorite is the Ohio Star, and since I hadn't made one for a very long time, I figured it might be fun to make a small quiltful of them.
Experiments began.
I'm doing the cheating form of the hourglasses, where you just keep sewing squares on the diagonal until you end up with these:

Well, I guess it's not really cheating, but since it's so easy, it feels like cheating.  (Here's a nice tutorial, at a much larger scale than I'm working.)

I started with 2.5" squares, and ended up with 2" hourglass squares.  (Note:  I didn't use a full 1/4" seam allowance, because I wanted to see what the largest square I could end up with was.)
Then, just to be contrary, I trimmed down the hourglasses to 1.5" and pieced them into a star that finished at 3".

Right Brain was delighted.  "So cute!  So tiny!!  Let's make lots and lots!"
Left Brain was appalled.  "And so mathematical, yada yada, that's all very well, but let's be a little practical here.  Just how many fingers are going to be burnt in the process of pressing those little bitty 'so-cute' stars, hmmm???"
There's nothing wrong with practical, as long as you don't take it to excess.
So I made more hourglasses, which I didn't trim down to ridiculous proportions and made a block that will finish at 4.5", which is quite small enough, really.
Here's a picture of them side by side for comparison.

Yep, quite small enough.
I made some more:

and started playing with layouts.
Here we go again...




(And linking to 'Oh Scrap!' as usual - one of my new favorite hangouts!)