Broken Bobbin Case.

I am now, once again, inbetween quilts.  I thought this would be a good time to send the sewing machine to the Fix-It Guy for an "oil change."  I was expecting to get it back on Wed.  However, I got a call from him  on Thursday, and it seems I have a broken bobbin case.  This could explain some of the trouble I had with the tension when quilting the Harry Potter quilt.  Seems a point broke off a piece in there.  I remember when I cleaned out all that dust and lint in the machine I did find a piece of gray felt (?) and when I plucked it out, it seemed to be stuck and/or half-glued down.  I wonder if it had previously been covered by something, because I didn't recall seeing it before.  Anyway, I authorized the repair ($40) and the Fix-It Guy will have to order the part, so I have no idea when my sewing machine will come home.   :(

Award Winning Quilt!

Here is my Harry Potter quilt in the Darlington Quilt Show: Quilts of Lafayette County:

I'm so excited and exhilarated!  My quilt won TWO awards!  The Viewers Choice Award and the Staff Choice Award.  People who walked through the quilts got to vote for their favorite, thus the Viewer's Choice.  The Staff Choice Award came from the people who put the show together, the venders, the judges, etc.  One judge called my quilt a "Masterpiece, clearly her choice for "best of show."  (OMG!!!)  She said it stopped her in her tracks and she knew "this is the one."  She took a picture of it and she says she rarely does that.  There was no Best of Show Award since this show was not for judging, but only for displaying the quilts.   I'm on top of the world. 

Here are my ribbons:

Baby Books

I am inbetween quilts at the moment.  There are a lot of fun, easy-to-do projects I'd like to try and so now seemed a good time.  I have an e-book of pot holder patterns, they looks really fun and fast!  (Maybe for Christmas gifts for all the ladies in the family...!)  My niece is having twins in January, so I want to do a couple of little baby quilts and I had these 2 book panels, which I whipped up today.

Books for the Baker babies

I've also been learning about "diamond quilts" and I'd like to try one of those.  Especially the art quilts.  Maybe do a wall hanging.  I took a Craftsy class on diamond quilting, and I'm eager to try it!  Those Craftsy classes really have a lot of great tips!  Here is a sample of a diamond "art quilt".

This is a very small sample of a very large quilt, but it shows how the diamonds combine to make an ocean picture.  It gives you the idea of what I'd like to do, anyway.  So!  That is what I have been up too!.  

Finished!

My Harry Potter Quilt is FINISHED!  I finished the binding today.  I had to rip the binding out and re-do it.  I had trouble with the tension.  I think the problem laid in my walking foot.  After spending hours ripping out the binding, I tried to resew it, and had the exact same problem--major loops on the backside.  I took the walking foot off, and put the regular sewing foot on, and tried some sample sewing on a scrap.  It sewed perfectly.  So I tried the binding and again, it sewed perfectly, and the binding looked great on both sides.  I don't know what the deal is, but I probably won't be using that walking foot anymore!  I might buy a new one, but this one isn't that old, it came with the machine.  When I take my sewing machine in for its oil change,  maybe I'll take the walking foot in too and have the fix-it guy look at it.

At any rate, here is my finished Project of Doom!  Next week it will be hanging in a Quilt Show:  Quilts of Lafayette County!  (It's not a show for judging, just for showing off quilts!)

Background Quilting

I have been working on my background quilting.  Originally, I had a free motion quilting pattern that looked like flames that I wanted to use, but decided to keep it simple.  I've been having trouble with my tension, and I have to take my machine in for a good cleaning and "oil change."  In the meantime, though, I have registered this quilt to be in a quilt show Sept. 14-15, and I HAVE TO FINISH IT!  I ditched the flames stitching, and made a practice sandwich and tried out some other ideas.  I tried pastel variegated thread.  I like the idea of variegated threads, and I had good success with it in the butterfly quilt.  BUT, not this time.  So, ditch that idea.  I tried stippling.  This is where my tension really screwed up.  Those little turns were not going to work!  SO I resorted to the old "tried and true", but also one of my favorites--- Echoing!  Echoing is so easy, it's very forgiving, and it showcases the objects it surrounds.  It also goes very fast, and I did all the backgrounds of the blocks in a single day!  What's left you ask?  I have to quilt the borders (I might try that flame idea here, there's a lot more room) and I have to put on the binding!  ALMOST DONE!  This has been a a very fun quilt!

I got a little creative in the quilting of the larger objects too.  The Sorting Hat has purple spirals in it (hard to see in the picture, but very pretty). This was a little daring for me, the stitches are meant to SHOW!  It's subtle, but still not a matching color!  Whoo hooo!!   I also used yellow thread to echo the flame of the candle so it would appear to glow.  All the rest of the echoing is done in an off white thread.

The Sorting Hat

Echoing the Backgrounds

Stitch in the Ditch

The quilting stage of the Harry Potter quilt has been underway for a while now, and I am stitching in the ditch around the books and knickknacks.  I am not good at stitching in the ditch!  I'm just not good at staying on the lines! It seems so wobbly to me!  I started out with a neutral colored thread, thinking I could use one thread for the whole job, but I didn't like how that looked.  So I switched to matching thread.  This involves changing threads more often than not.  But it looks better.  There is a learning curve to this and now that I am almost done, I am getting better at it.  I have been ripping out some of the earlier work and redoing it.  Oh, how I hate ripping out free motion quilting stitches!  Most of them are tiny, overlapping and sunk into the batting.  It's a tedious job.  I am looking forward to the easier and more fun part of stippling the background and borders!

Here's one of my re-do's:

The Teacup--"Before"

The Teacup--"After"

   

Lots of Progress

I have been working on my Project of Doom quilt, and I have the Serpent and the Spider incorporated into the borders now, and the borders are attached.  Tomorrow I will make and pin the sandwich!

My spider turned out really well.  It was a lot of work for a mere 8 inches of border, but it was worth it.  Here it is in all it's glory on the top of my bookcase!:

Cute Spider

I'm especially proud since I designed the spider and paper pieces.  The only really tricky part was getting those skinny legs to line up.  Looks easy on paper, but hard to do in the actual sewing of it.

The serpent was also redone (one section) so that it would not appear to be floating in mid border, but actually creeping up the bookcase and peering over the edge.  It almost looks like he'd like to have my spider for lunch!  Here is the revised serpent:

Maybe I should have had its body touch in another place, but it was not fun tearing out a section of the serpent.  I had to redesign the piece, but forgot that I had reduced the image to 80%...  Yep, more tearing out and more work.  So many details, so little brain!  LOL.  Anyway, re-doing one section was enough for me!

<DRUM ROLL> please!  Here is the finished quilt top!  

Harry Potter Quilt

I need to find a good binding color now.  I had planned on using the wood grained fabric but that will blend in with the book case feet on the bottom, so it has to be something different.    I don't want black because it would become too Halloween-ish then.  I will have to try out different samples to see what works best.  Got time for that too, I have to quilt this first, before I bind it.  I am pleased... I LOVE THIS QUILT!  It was so much fun to do, and it turned out really well (in my humble opinion.)