Purple, Purple and more Purple!

Want to see what I've been working on all weekend? A purple quilt!  My friend Paula's mother-in-law passed away almost a year ago.  She was a quilter.  Paula found this quilt top along with the backing fabric in a bag and I volunteered to quilt it for her so that she would have it finished for the anniversary of her death next month.  I found the fabric to make the binding and bought the batting and finally got started Saturday afternoon.  I tell you, now I know why it is SO important to press your squares after you have pieced them going a certain way!  It sure has been a challange getting this quilted when the blocks aren't exactly square and the seams not pressed properly.  It has been a wonderful learning experience.  Here is the quilt top layed out for the basting with safety pins.

I've worked on it all weekend, today ALL day except to eat lunch and dinner. I've finished the quilting and have made the 30 yards of binding.

Here is  a close up of the binding.  I couldn't believe I found something that would match so well.

Here is what the quilt looked like when I finished quilting.

The back is the solid dark purple that was used on the blocks.  It seems that the blocks were made in 1986 since 2 of them were dated with the person's name that made the block.  The story is that Rita's (Paula's mother-in-law) quilting group made the blocks and then they were put into this quilt.  Several are signed by the person's name and others aren't.  It is pretty remarkable for me to be working on something like this.  I feel like I've finishing up a piece of history.  I wonder if the other ladies that worked on it are still living and do they wonder what happened to the quilt?  Some of the blocks were hand stitched and others were machine stitched.

I hope to get to work on it a bit more next weekend, but if not it will have to wait until the middle of October since I am leaving on October 6th for Porto Portugal for a work meeting....and a bit of R & R with my husband since the 8th will be our 34th wedding anniversary!

After this quilt is finished, I'm going to finish the Mama's Boy quilt I started earlier this year!  I'm really not turning into a quilter...full time at least, I will get back to garments one day!!

Later!



Sorry for the massive absenteeism!!

I have been very, very absent from posting, not sewing...but posting. 

I left off after I wore the dress I had been working on.  Since that time I have finished another dress, with the same pattern

AND took my trip to London!  We had a great time - we did have a chance to see the Grace Kelly exhibit

at the V & A.  It was wonderful. Sewing related, I went to a nice fabric store (I don't remember the name) I didn't buy anything there.  They did have the fabrics displayed a bit different than I've ever seen.  They had strips of the fabric hanging from  pants hangers and then those were on round racks with the price/content/location on a cardboard piece on the hanger.  If you wanted a swatch, you just cut a piece from the bottom.  All the actual bolts of fabric were stacked on top of each other along the walls.  Not the most appealing way to display, but efficient.  Then we went to the Liberty Dept. Store....beautiful fabrics!  I bought 3 different fabrics there and it was very hard to decide on just those 3 (limited luggage space).

Once home, I had to begin my next project...an A, B, C baby quilt

for my soon to be born Great Niece.  The shower is in 2 weeks and all I have left is to stitch the binding down. I just can't decide if I want to try the stitch in the ditch with invisible thread, or hand stitch it. I decided to hand stitch!  It came out really nice, for my first "real" quilt.  A few stitches are showing since I did the stitch in the ditch - I wasn't always in the ditch....I was even using my machine magnifying glass.

As soon as I finish this quilt, I'm going back to the "Mama's Boy" quilt that I started in January.  I feel more confident to be able to finish it now that I had success with the baby quilt.  I'm also taking a machine quilting class next Saturday.  It should really help me a lot.  I'm looking forward to the class so much.

One other thing that I almost forgot to mention was my first vintage machine that I purchased on E-bay from a seller in Canada a Bernina 121 born somewhere around 1957. She is a beaut and she purrs like a kitten. I have had some trouble with the stitches but I'm sure it is a threading problem.

Wearing of the dress

I wore the new dress today.  It was very comfortable, but I have one issue with it.  The lining seems to have stretched in the front as the day went on.  Every time I got up the lining was longer than the dress...only in the front.  Which is strange since the lining is cut the same length all the way around the dress.  I'll have to take a tuck in the lining between the front darts before I wear it again.  I'm taking it to the dry cleaner tomorrow for cleaning.

I wore it with this white denim jacket from Chico's today, but once I make the purple linen jacket, I'll wear it with the dress.  It gives me options!

I went through and purged the pattern stash yesterday and posted the 10 patterns on PR yesterday to give away and I gave them away today!  A nice lady in New York has agreed to take them from me.  They will be on the way to her first thing tomorrow.

It's a celebration!!! Happy 4th of July!! And I finished the dress!!!

I finished See and Sew B5235..at least the dress portion of the pattern.  I don't think I mentioned that this dress was inspired by a picture of a dress (109) in the Burda Style magazine from May 2010.

The photo of the dress and this fabric is close enough. My dress doesn't have the princess seaming or a back waist line.  

The view from the back.

Here is the detail of the zipper slipstitched to the lining.

I need to adjust my dress form...she is "larger" than me!!  I just noticed this when I put this dress on her inside out.  The dress fits me much more loose than it does her.  I'm planning on wearing the dress on Tuesday, so I'll snap pictures and post later.

I've changed my mind on making the jacket right now.  I want to make another dress first.  This time with a V neckline.  I saw this but I'll have to trace the pattern and alter it because it only comes in Plus size.  It is dress 123 in the March 2009 issue of Burda Style Magazine.  Not the coat, just the dress.  I'll have to give this more thought since the last dress went together so well...I really hate to take the time to try this one and alter.   

I will give this much more thought!!  Until next time.

Progress

I've had distractions today that have kept me from my sewing.  I didn't get into the sewing room until 2:00  pm.  I had to draft the pattern to make the interfacing for the neckline since I read somewhere that for best results, I should interface the lining along the neckline.  Once that was done and I cut the interfacing, I then got started.

I took a break at 8:00 pm to have dinner and post.  I'm now understiching the neckline and the armholes..at least as far as I can go.

I'll get back in there and finish the understitching and then I'll press really good and call it a night.  Tomorrow the zipper!!

Have a great 4th of July!!!

And the winner goes to - the 4th try

I finished the last pair of Kwik Sew 3614 - the shorts. I made these with the welt pockets and they came out pretty good. I am very satisfied with the outcome. I really think I like this pair best of all of them. Forgive the goofy look on my face!

For my next project - I'm making Butterick See and Sew #B5235.  I'll be making the dress from a Purple  Greek Key stretch cotton fabric that I purchased at Joanns when I was in Florida a few months back.  The jacket will be from the purple washed linen that I have had in my stash for years.  Both items will be lined with Ambiance, the dress with white and the jacket with purple of course.  I'm going to underline the jacket with an ivory cotton batiste to keep it from wrinkling so much.

A few weekends ago, I went to Slidell with my sister-in-law Danette (who I haven't seen in years!) to the quilt show.  I bought two packets of fabric, one with LSU motif fabric and the other with the Saints motif.  I plan on making a quilt using the Cotton Theory Quilting technique so that one side will be LSU and the other side will be Saints!  There were some beautiful quilts on display.  I felt so inadequate and in awe of the work these quilters can do.

I also bought a quilt pattern that I hope to try soon.  It is very simple, but I'm sure it will be a challenge for me.

 

And this is the last of the fabric that I bought at the quilt show...a gorgeous purple and gold Fleur De Li's.

My plan for the Holiday long weekend is to sew the dress, cut the jacket muslin and then adjust if needed and then cut the fashion fabric. The dress muslin was made last week and it fits perfect straight from the envelope with no adjustments. 

That is all for now, happy sewing.

Kwik Sew 3614

Ok, I finshed 3 pair of shorts with Kwik Sew 3614. The first pair was a light weight tan pair that are now too big but great for around the house.

The second pair is from an aqua blue twill from Hancocks and that I also used to practice welt pockets. These were the practice pieces. #1 was using the instructions from a PR online class by Shannon Gifford. I only tried it once and knew more practice was needed.

The second try was from instructions in a post on Gorgeous Fabrics' Blog from Friday, February 23, 2007 http://gorgeousthings.blogspot.com/search/label/Pockets which came out much much better.

Then I made a denim pair of shorts and was scared to mess them up with a welt pocket if things didn't go well, so I'll put the welt pockets in the next pair of shorts - a dark green twill. Here are the denim pair

They are cut 1 size smaller than the first pair and I love the stretch denim. I bought that at Joann's in Winter Springs last month. I messed up the buttonhole when I went to cut the slit and ended up cutting the threads! Drat! I'll have to hand sew around the cut part to keep the denim from unraveling, but since I always wear my shirts out, no one will see it but me.
I didn't do a review of these shorts on PR because they had been reviewed several times already and I really didn't have anything to add.
Next up, the green pair of shorts then a couple of dresses. Hopefully I won't be so long in posting.....