5 blocks in 4 hours - More Jane

I know why I have nick-named this quilt "Crazy Jane" but now you can all appreciate why also. I made 5 blocks today. Each block is 5 inches square. So for an entire afternoon of work I have a bit more than a square foot of this quilt finished! No matter, I know this wasn't going to be a quick and easy project when I started, so I shall just keep on until it's finished!
This is block E-2. I had background fabric and the two football pieces in a baggie. No fabric for the border. So, I pulled the freezer paper off and chose another fabric. The two footballs are appliques, then the border pieces are simply stitched on by machine. Took me about an hour. (I'm not a super speedy applique-er!)
Looks very nice!
On to E-5. I decided to do this using a paper piecing technique, then applique the circle. The hardest part was figuring out how big to cut the pieces for the rays. After that, it was just stitch, press trim until I got each half done. Pieced them together and appliqued the circle. Another hour.
I remembered to use starch on the edges of the circle when I pressed it for the most awesome crisp edge! Just spray a little starch in the cap, apply it to the seam allowances with a paintbrush and press. No basted needed at all and you get the neatest circle you ever saw!
Block E-6. This one was a little scary with some very small piecing and lots of triangles. I jumped right in and decided to just piece it normally using the strategy of cutting the pieces larger than needed and trimming for each step. The very center I made by adding white borders to a print square, then cutting the square in half diagonally to sew with two print triangles. This was then trimmed down to 1 1/2 inches!
After this I just sewed on the print borders with white squares, trimmed up again, then the white triangles and a final trim. I thought I was done at this point, then realized I needed to applique those squares on! They were cut at one inch, then (using spray starch again) I pressed in the two sides 1/4 inch, then pressed the top and bottom in 1/4 inch also. This made a nice tight square that I appliqued down using about 4 stitches in each side! This took an hour also.
I broke from the order to find a couple more blocks I could get done quickly. E-9 was a good choice. It's a simple lattice, and I did it using strip piecing.
I cut 4 colored strips, sewed them with 3 white strips, then cut into sections. Each section sewed together with white strips, then border with more white. 1/2 hour block!
And for the Fifth block - F-4. Been looking at this for a while, not quite sure how I wanted to approach it. The measurements were a bit odd, involving 1/16 of an inch, but I blasted through it and it came out great!
I made a 9 patch with the four large triangles and white strips with a blue square in the center. Then I added small triangles to the corner to fill it out. Another 1/2 hour block and I had time to organize and put away all my stuff. I'm happy to be making good progress on this project, and if I can keep up my current pace should be able to finish the top by my next birthday! (My goal for this year!)

Yes, I'm a little crazy, but aren't we all in our own way?

Another Day

That makes two days this week with no stitching! Definitely not the norm for me, but I hope to make up for it this coming week. The man of the house will be back to work, and I will not have the extra meetings and work this week myself. I did get two boxes with lots of sewing projects that I get to work on (the first box arrived yesterday!). My dear customer Margie has outdone herself with this batch of wonderful bags and goodies, I will be happily sewing for the next few weeks on these lovelies!


This is my Buster cat. He likes to sit in my lap and tries to compete with the computer. I can't decide if he looks pathetic or just plain spoiled! A little of both. We share this chair, and if I'm not sitting in it, he likes to nap in it. He only has one eye, but gets along just fine and is a sweet boy. He doesn't keep me company in my sewing room like his sister used to, but loves to snuggle when I'm blogging!

Such a life - doesn't he look like a neglected kitty? You should see when he tries to lay on the keyboard, we have our battles for sure!

Dresden Plates - looking good!

I got a box in the mail last week with the pieces of a quilt that I was requested to finish for a customer. I need to get this one pieced and quilted by Christmas, so need to make sure I keep working on it so I make it for the deadline. We decided that I would machine stitch the plates to the background, which looks really nice. I used a lightweight fusible webbing underneath the Dresden plate so I could turn the edges neatly, and it worked like a charm! I then stitched around the edge of the inner circle and pressed the seam allowance to the inside. I top-stitched this edge also and was pleased with the result. One block down, 47 more to go - how many days till Christmas? Guess I'd better add this to my daily list for sure!

For a person who can't seem to finish her own projects, I'm pretty excited about finishing other quilter's. Guess it's easier to deal with someone else's stuff than my own - at least I'm accomplishing something, though! I did put together the top row of my sampler quilt today, I really am excited to get it all together. All in good time, I suppose.

Speaking of in good time, it's time I was in bed, I have a planning meeting tomorrow for our church Ladies Retreat and I want to be able to concentrate! Sleep well!