Tag Archives: quilting

Big news from TQS…

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In honor of International Quilting Weekend, March 20-22, 2015, The Quilt Show (www.thequiltshow.com), the web TV show hosted by Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims, will open all of its shows from the first nine series—shows 100-1513—for the entire weekend. I’m telling you today so that you can reserve time this weekend.

For three special days, everyone will have the chance to view over 200 shows, featuring some of the quilting world’s leading artists, for FREE. See—that’s big news!

This year’s sponsors are contributing over $5000 in prizes, including the Grand Prize, a BERNINA 550 QE.  Other prizes you have a chance to win are:

  • Innova – Have your quilt professionally quilted ($500 value)
  • Superior Threads – five $100 gift certificates
  • RJR Fabrics – a Delicious Selection of RJR Fabrics
  • AccuQuilt – GO! Big Electric Fabric Cutter
  • Missouri Star Quilt Company – $500 in Quilter’s Cash plus signed copies of Volume 1 of Block Magazine and Man Sewing Swag
The Quilt Show_Season_6

Here I am with Alex and Ricky.

As you may already know, I appeared as the featured artist on TQS in show 611. If you didn’t have the opportunity to see this show the first time around, now you’ll have the chance to see it—and so many other terrific shows—at no cost in this unprecedented three-day offer.

I hope that you’ll share this information with all of your quilting friends. It’s a fantastic opportunity to enjoy three days of learning and fun without leaving your home…all for free.

Enjoy the shows, and thanks for helping to spread the word!

Click here to go to the TQS website landing page.

Put your light in the right spot…

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crbal150307

This is what happens if your light is way over there on the table and you are sitting too far from it. ‘Growing toward the light’ happens especially to hand sewers/appliquers. It is very hard on your back and shoulders.

Place your light in position so that you can sit up straight and see what you are doing, both at the same time. This probably means that you need an adjustable floor lamp. I use my Stella floor light, but there are other lamps that also work.

As always, pay attention to your posture.

If you are right-handed, the light should come from the left. Left-handers, the light should come from the right. In both cases this keeps the shadow from your dominant hand from falling on your work, where you are trying to see what you are doing.

Show and Tell…

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Ilsabe emailed this photo of her quilt. She says:

I had one of your books for years and finally just finished a quilt based off of one of the quilts.  I hand quilted it.  So I thought I would send a picture of how it turned out.  I love your color choices in the original but wound up in a different direction.

IlsabeUrban

I am always happy to see how other quilters use our patterns. Ilsabe, you did a great jpb!

FYI: In case you are wondering, this pattern is from our book, Applique Outside the Lines. The quilt in question is Peppermint Sparkle.

Yet another new iron…

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I recently taught at Quilt Fiesta in Tucson. (It is fun show if any of you can make it next year!) There were lots of quilts, and there were vendors. I walked the vendors at a slow time and darned if Jamie didn’t rope me in…

Jamie-EurosteamIron

How have I missed the EuroSteam booth at every quilt show I have ever attended? Who knows. But this time Jamie had my undivided attention and darned if she didn’t sell me a EuroSteam iron. (Let me just say, she’s good at her job.)

You can buy the iron online, but it’s cheaper at a show. Plus you get to talk to a person who is very familiar with it.

EuroSteamIron-1 copy

This is a heavy iron, which is fine with me. It has a ceramic sole plate that is supposed to never scorch. Dandy! It has an aluminum water reservoir, not plastic, so should last longer.

You see that plastic/silicon thing it’s sitting on? The iron lives there. It should never, ever, be stood up on it’s end. Jamie was very clear on this point. Enough so that I have not forgotten.

Jamie showed me how to use the measuring cup that comes with and was very clear that I should never, ever, (ever!) use distilled water. Irons need the minerals in the water. Without them, they spit (I forget why). There is a very good chance that I have ruined previous irons all on my own by disregarding the instructions to use tap water. The end of the long spout is flexible so that you can fill the iron while it is flat.

EuroSteamIron-2

This iron puts out lots of steam. And it does the job. Here is cotton/linen before:

EuroSteamIron-3 copy

And then after a quick-ish press:

EuroSteamIron-4 copy

The EuroSteam works better than my most recent irons. It cost $200 and, if it continues to work well, I will consider to be money well-spent. If you are interested, look for EuroSteam at your next quilt show and try one before buying.

FYI: If you read the instructions that come with the iron, you will find lots of warnings that lead you to think that if you don’t relieve the pressure in the iron (release steam) every 10 minutes it might blow up. Jamie assured me that I could pretty much ignore that. I didn’t mean to, but I did walk off and leave the iron hot and plugged in, with water/steam inside, for over an hour. It did not blow up. I am not saying that you should ignore the safety warnings, but I personally didn’t let them frighten me off.

And, back to the water: Sherman water is full of appliance-killing calcium and salt. Jamie said to use bottled water if I wanted to, just not distilled. I was about to use what I thought was bottled spring water until I looked at the label and noticed that it said ‘purified’. I googled it and it sounds like purified water has a lot of the particles removed from it, making it similar to distilled water which is not good for the iron. I chose to use tap water instead and will look for bottled spring water for my iron.

And I have promised myself that I will follow Jamie’s instructions and drain my iron when I’m done for the day, every day. Cross my heart :-).

It’s done!

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Before I left town, I put the binding on the last quilt for the piecing book.

BindingWowie copy

I don’t know that I have ever, in my life, made a quilt this big. It’s 118″ x 118″. Angela Walters quilted it and she did an excellent job. I think I would have given up way before I was finished.

I put the thinnest Quilter’s Dream batt in this quilt—the request weight. It turned out to be an excellent choice. This quilt, as big as it is, would have been way too heavy with a thicker batt. As it is, I’m not sure that it’s washable in anything other than a commercial machine. This is a bed quilt with a lot of white and I have cats and grandkids—washing is going to happen.

The piecing book that Linda and I have been working on is a revision of our book, Piecing the Piece O’ Cake Way. That book is out of print, but the information in it is still completely relevant. We, and C&T, decided that it needed to come back in an updated form.

This is a ‘heavy’ re-write, with lots of new information and quilts. It has both fun and actual work. And as of Friday, the quilts and the manuscript are now in with C&T. It feels great to have finished exactly on the date of my own personal deadline.

I know that most quilters do not link Piece O’ Cake with ‘piecing’, but I’m hoping that that will change. We were both piecers first. I hate to toot my own horn, but I can piece just about anything. And to link this train of thought back to yesterday’s post, this is yet another reason that I enjoy teaching an independent study coarse: I get to work with piecing in class!

What does your head have in common with a gallon of milk?

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(I also shared this information in the Piece O’ Cake newsletter.)

They both weigh around 8 lbs. Your head may actually weigh more.

Now, stop and think about your sewing posture. When you sit at the sewing machine, is your head balanced over your body or is it thrown forward, facing down? What about when you applique? Are you hunched over your lap, or are you sitting upright?

Now, imagine that your head is a gallon of milk that your poor neck is trying to support. Just the idea makes the back of my neck hurt and my shoulders sore.

I started talking about this in class a few months ago and then I ran across this image and the related article, What Texting Does To Your Spine, from The Atlantic.

WhatTextingDoesToSpine

The article is eye-opening, reporting on a study published in the journal, Surgical Technology International. In short, the farther you bend your head over, the more pressure is put on your neck. The same texting posture shown is often a quilter’s posture. Is it any wonder that your upper body feels so bad after you’ve been sewing?

So, hold your head high—or at least, hold it in a more balanced position over your body. Fix the height of your sewing machine chair and/or table. Find a good chair to applique in. Put your light in position so that you are not bending sideways toward it. Put your feet up if that helps you to maintain good posture as you applique.

I’m going to post this same information on my blog, so that you’ll be able to find it again if you ever need to. Did you know that there is a search option on my blog? Look in the menu bar for the area with the spyglass. Type in a search topic and you can find all sorts of things.