A Red Mustang, A Wedding, Planting Beans, and Memorial Day

There's been a lot of activity at our house the last few weeks.  My son and daughter-in-law came for a visit with a surprise!  A new red Mustang that I can drive,

But I'm just a little too big!  Oh well it was a nice dream while it lasted.  So a cute little red car is upstairs with a sheet over it waiting for a little one to enjoy it someday.  Nathan has wanted a Mustang for several years and Jeanna wanted to get him one.  Jeanna and her Mom found this beauty at a rock bottom price!  It even has seat belts and a CD player!  (I haven't tried the CD player, although my CD's are probably too big!)

We loved every minute they were here to visit and were sad to see them go home.

It was nice to have both my sons' home at the same time!

(They don't like to pose for pictures!)

Spring planting has taught us patience this year.  This has been a very rainy spring.  We received our April showers in May, but we are now blessed with everything now in the ground.

Yesterday, it was dry enough to plant.  Dean did take enough time to eat dinner.

He also took time to check out the tomato plants that were planted on the farm this week--while eating!

There was time earlier in the week to play with Toby and to notice the beautiful flowers that were in bloom.

This weekend we also went to our friend's daughter's wedding.

Best Wishes and Blessings on your marriage Drew and Laura!

This weekend I hung up flags for Memorial Day in honor of our veterans.  I have no words to say except Thank You!

(The flags pictured are the fifty star American flag, Boston Tea Party flag, 1976 flag, forty-eight star flag, Ohio flag, and Betsy Ross flag.)

Next post I will give some more tips on binding.

Happy Quilting,

Kay Lynne 

May 2010 Friday Night Sew In

I finished my flower pincushions so I now can give them away as gifts.

I'm still working on my chili pepper potholders, but I do have two that are finished that are going to Helena, the May Giveaway winner!  I hope everyone is taking time to check out the Blogger's Quilt Festival this week.  So far I've seen a lot of beautiful quilts.  My quilt is pictured below.

Happy Quilting,

Kay Lynne

Amy's Creative Side: Blogger's Quilt Festival - Spring 2010

Amy's Creative Side: Blogger's Quilt Festival - Spring 2010

Blogger's Quilt Festival & Give Away Day Winner

(Click on the link above to see other beautiful quilts!)

How exciting to be in my first online quilt show!  I'm pretty new to the online quilt world out there, but it's fun to make new friends.  My Button-Up Shoes quilt has traveled to many quilt shows over the years and has even won a purple ribbon and a second place ribbon at two local county fairs.  It's my first try at hand quilting.  I started it in 1984 when I was pregnant with my first son who is now 25 years old.  The pattern came out of a quilt magazine that was published in the 1980's.

The buttons that I used were vintage buttons that were from two of my Great Grandmother's.

My husband thought that I was crazy when I had the kitchen table dumped full of buttons, but as you can see there was a method to my madness. I wanted five matching buttons per shoe.  The shoes were machine appliqued with a satin stitch.  The ribbon was added because the quilt needed just a little something more.  There is a story behind the hand quilting.  I started hand quilting this quilt when I was pregnant and my hands were swollen.  So I used the stab method because it hurt my hands to quilt the way grandma had taught me.  At the time I just needed something to do and this kept me busy. 

Here is the back of the quilt.  As you can see I put it together block-as-you-go because I didn't have a quilt frame at the time, but I did have a wooden hoop that I used.  I finished this quilt in 1987.  My oldest son and daughter-in-law will eventually be the proud owners of this quilt.

And the best is saved for last.  The Give Away Day winner is Helena at

http://thumbelena.blogspot.com
My husband randomly picked out a number and you were it.
Congratulations Helena!  I will ship as soon as you contact me with your address.

Happy Quilting

Kay Lynne

May Giveaway Day and Binding A Quilt

I've decided to do something fun and join May Giveaway Day!

I'm going to giveaway two machine quilted potholders fresh out of my sewing room!

To enter just post a comment by midnight May 20th so I can contact you for an address.

I will have my husband randomly pull a name out of a hat on Friday, May 21st.  The potholders will be shipped by Monday, May 24th.

Pictured here are the potholders to be given away.  I am presently working on the second one and it will be finished by delivery.  I will ship internationally. 

These potholders do have a short history.  I made my daughter-in-law some potholders and placemats last summer for a bridal shower gift.  She loves the color red and chili peppers.  I bought the chili pepper fabrics in Florida the winter before.  These are the leftovers from that project.  I still have UFO potholders floating around my sewing room that I will be finishing on the Friday Night Sew-in.  If you want to join, check out: http://www.handmadebyheidi.blogspot.com/

I also wanted to share how my Mom taught me to finish a quilt with binding.  I start off with 2 inch strips that are on the bias.  I fold the binding in half and press.  So there are no lumps in your binding, I press 1/4" at one end of the bias strip (Note: the bias strips ends are cut at a 45 degree angle).  I use a 1/4 inch seam allowance.  I sew to 1/4 inch of the corner.

Note:  On a large quilt use more pins that I do in the picture.  This is only a potholder and not as much pinning is needed.  The binding will stretch as you're sewing it on, which is not a good thing.  Also make sure that you don't stretch the binding as you're pinning it on.  We want our binding to lay nice a flat!  Just wanted to add this edit to my tutorial so it will make the job easier.  Thank you Irina for calling this to my attention :)  This is something I didn't even think of, although I've done the same thing!

When I reach the corner, I make a 45 degree turn and sew off the fabric and backstitch.

I fold the fabric back and down and stitch at the pin which is at 1/4 inch.

Update:  When you start sewing again, start at the edge of the fabric and back stitch.  I didn't used to do it this way and I know it doesn't make sense, but that was how I was taught.  So the picture below should show a line of stitching that is off the fabric and not a quarter inch in.

When I'm at the beginning of the binding, I cut off at a 45 degree slant so there is no bulk.  I blind hemstitch everything into place folding all the corners into perfect miters.  Thank you mom for teaching me how to do binding the neat and easy way!

Happy Quilting

Kay Lynne
 

Free Motion Feathers and Other Adventures

I have always enjoyed free motion quilting.  This weekend I used some free time to practice up on my free motion quilting skills.

Where do you start with free motion feathers?  You have to start at the beginning and practice, practice, practice.  I like starting with a small project like a potholder, but before you start sewing--lets practice by drawing. 

I have a sketch pad that I use to draw designs and curvy rulers that you can buy at an art store.

There are also curvy Quilt rulers that you can use that are now on the market.  I draw the curve and then fill in with the feathers.

The picture above shows the steps that I use to draw feathers.  On the actual quilt I only draw the curves so I have a reference to go by.  Marking quilts is not my favorite thing to do so if I can skip a few steps that is fine with me.  If you can draw it by pencil, you can draw it by needle.  Warning:  Your feathers will not look like mine--they will be unique and your feathers. 

As you draw do not lift your pencil from the pad and draw like you would be drawing with your sewing machine needle.  The drawings are just some of the examples of feathers that I have tried.

Check out Diane Gaudynski's blog and Leah Day's blog for more free motion quilting posted under my blog list.  Another favorite professional quilter that I like is Harriet Hargrave.  She is one of the first machine quilters that I've learned from.

Today my new Janome 1600P QC came in!

I have been perfectly happy with my Bernina 1630 and Singer Featherweight for my quilting hobby.  I have even quilted a queen size quilt on my Bernina, but I wanted something with a little bit bigger area to free motion quilt.  This machine only does a straight stitch.  It has a needle up and needle down, a presser foot lifter, and a bobbin system similar to Bernina and Featherweight.  I had to buy a darning foot separately.  This machine fit into my budget perfectly.  So far I am very happy with this new adventure!

Our corn that Dean planted last week is now about three inches high!

You probably think I'm crazy, but it always amazes me when all the seeds start growing.  Maybe that's why I'm a farmer's wife.

Another adventure I had was on Friday when I came home from the bakery after working eight hours to find out that my husband had another job for me to do--work ground while he planted beans.

I wasn't too excited about driving tractor, but the job had to be done.  Overall it was an enjoyable afternoon helping out my husband on the farm.  I hope everyone had a wonderful Mother's Day.



Happy Quilting

Kay Lynne

Baskets, Bears, Eagles, and Cardinals

There's not much sewing getting done at my house, but there's a lot of spring cleaning going on.  I always dread cleaning, but I always like the final result.  I also get out a different quilt to put on my bed.  Below is my "Baskets and Bears" quilt that I made about ten years ago.  The baskets are machine appliqued with a blanket stitch.  The quilt was machine quilted at a local quilt shop so we could enjoy a new quilt on our bed.

I remember being so happy to finally have this project done.  It was a time in my life that I was so busy with raising my two sons, but I made time to do a little sewing on the side.

There's a wonderful secret in our neighborhood!  We have an eagle's nest about a half mile from our house.  A nice neighbor let us borrow his spotting scope that magnifies things up to 60 times.  I've enjoyed many moments looking out my window watching our eagle.  They now have babies and you can see them tend to their young.  It will be fun to watch the babies grow up.

My neighbor, Steve Shoemaker, took this picture west of our house this winter.

(Note: Steve owns all copyright privileges.)

We don't know if this is the eagle near our house or another one, but it doesn't matter.  It's just something that has been a joy in our neighborhood.  With eagles on my mind I found a pattern at the Chicago Quilt show that I want to try out.

So there's a future winter project.  The pattern is called "Spirit" by Toni Whitney.  The Bigfork Bay Cotton Company sells the pattern.

Well we've talked about baskets, bears, and eagles.  I also wanted to share that we have a cardinal's nest outside my kitchen window.

I haven't been able to photograph the male, but here is the female.  I guess he's like most of the guys in my family--they hate cameras!

Happy Quilting

Kay