sewtakeahike

mother's day 'paw paw'

 

Last year, when Laurie contacted me and asked if Robert Kaufman fabrics sent some of her upcoming line, Brrr! to me, if I would make something from it and post about it, I said "absolutely" without hesitation.

I've loved this quilt since I started cutting it out and I was really hoping to keep it, but once I had it pieced together, I knew it would end up in my mom's arms.  I don't really know that it's her style, but I do have an undeniable pull in my heart to send it to her for Mother's day.

 

 

So last Friday, I started quilting it with my Juki and I have to say, it was a rough start.  It was skipping stitches all over the place and the fmq'ing foot was too low and was not allowing me to move the quilt freely.  I changed the needle, I rethreaded, I rethreaded, I changed the needle, and after 3 hours and no improvement, I ended up taking my Juki back to the dealer for a look over. 

After 30ish minutes there and a few adjustments and oil, things started working a bit better and I took her home. 

To make a long story short, after a self imposed time out of camping on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I came home Sunday afternoon and finished quilting and binding paw paw in about 2 1/2 hours.  And not a single skipped stitch.

Wha???  Ok, I must lay this out for you.  It took 3 hours to quilt 1/4 of it on Friday and then 2 1/2 hours to finish quilting and bind on Sunday.  You heard me right.   

Now it's official, I LOVE MY JULIKA!!!  (Yes Effie, I chose your suggested name for her!  Email me your address and I'll get that pincushion in the mail to you as soon as I make it!) 

 

 

(Brr! and Kona for the front, Delhi for the backing, and some J. Paganelli "dance with me" for the binding)

And now to get a label made for paw paw and get it mailed to my ma ma!

Happy week everybody!

~Penny

 

 

Made with speed...

(Bag inspired by Chase's bag, here)

One of the things that impresses me most about my Juki is it's speed.  So I decided to do a speed test on it and the best way I thought to do this was to do a little quilt as you go bag.

I cut a piece of batting roughly 25X25 (the bag didn't end up this big!) and started out.  Now way back, when I made this quilt, each square took about 2-3 hours and they were only 14.5" squares. 

The end result was, quilting a 25 inch square on the Juki took me about 3 hours (I get pretty wound up in fabric selection so this took most of my time!) compared to 2-3 hours for a 14.5" square.  I have to say, I'm pretty happy to be able to quilt something 3 times as big in the same amount of time!

 

And if you haven't entered your name suggestion for my Juki yet, bring it on!  There's still time!

Happy Saturday!

~Penny

a debt of gratitude

 

 

The second annual Sewtakeahike weekend paper piecing workshop was a huge success!  We had a cozy group of 8 and sewed our hearts out.  Aaaaaand, to top it all off, everyone left with some seriously great booty.

Take a look at these two pics:

 

 

I was so humbled by the generosity of the sponsors for the workshop.  Tara worked her tush off to make it all happen, but these shops, designers, and businesses went above and beyond with their support and I am so thankful to each and everyone one of them!

Laurie Wisbrun who sent loads of fq bundles from her personal stash

Angela at Mama Said Sew who provided embroidery floss, a pattern, a sweetwater fq bundle, and that sweet Simple Home book you see up there and a discount for all purchases by the attendees

Randi at Fresh Squeezed fabrics who provided scrap packs and fq bundles of fabric (also, Randi has all her dot fabric on special sale this week!)

Olfa who provided a cutting mat and a rotary cutter

Kelly at Superbuzzy for the fab gift certificate

Kimberly at The Fat Quarter Shop for two awesome gift certificates

Warm and Natural for the batting

Fig Leaf for the discount to all the attendees

Kathy at The Inn at City Park for allowing us to workshop there

And of course the lovely Tara, who made the a pillow, a quilt as you go bag, and donated the Modern Patchwork magazine and made goodie bags for everyone and stuffed them chock full!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!  I am deeply indebted to each and every one of you!

~Penny

Pins (no needles) and QuiltCon

 

For Amber's month in Ringo Pie, she asked for sewing themed blocks.  I have some pins with button shaped heads, so my first thought was to do buttons.  After drafting the first pattern and getting feedback that they looked like Ninja faces (thanks Tara for your always honest, and humorous opinions!), I went back to photoshop and did some redrawing and decided to make them into button headed pins instead.  Don't know why I didn't of that in the first place??

 

 

And lets see a show of hands of those of you that are going to QuiltCon in Feb 2013? 

Yay!!, my hand is raised too!!

I'll not only be there checking out it's offerings, but will also be teaching a few paper piecing classes.  I'm completely humbled and totally out of my mind excited to be associated with the high caliber of stellar quilters/designers that will be lecturing and doing workshops there also. 

Happy Saturday to you all!

~Penny

Yurting weekend

 

This last weekend was full of surprises here in sewtakeahike-land. 

 

We had been planning a yurt weekend trip to enjoy some backcountry skiing with friends, but when we got to the yurt, this was the scene. 

Beautiful, but without much snow.

So instead of skiing, we ate, played uno, made sauce, dyed eggs, and napped. 

 

 

 

I guess we did get a few short hikes in there as well, with some impromptu snow angels.

 

 

The lack of snow was difficult to swallow at first, but once we settled into lounging, it was all good.

How was your Easter weekend?  Hopefully as blessed as ours was, spending time with good friends!