Putting on my shoes

Next on my list of "oh good grief, I'm so ridiculously behind" projects were the September and October blocks from the GenX Quilter's Moccasin block of the month project.

Although these blocks are 9.5" square, I seem to wizz through the cutting of them a lot quicker than some of the smaller 6" blocks from the Moda Building Blocks and Farm Girl Vintage projects. Perhaps because there's only 7 or 8 fabrics in total in Moccasin?

Here's the September blocks.

And then the October blocks (a bit cropped).

I love the neat, bright contrast of these blocks and am a little sad that, after next month, we're all done!

Finally, I'm adding a plea to all my October blog posts this month and it's aimed at any quilting Vermonters (Vermontees? People of Vermont?) out there. As you may know, I'm gradually visiting all 50 states and this November I'm visiting Vermont. As well as visiting various tourist attractions I'm also hoping to do a bit of quilt shopping. Can anyone recommend a quilt shop? Or anything else for that matter!?

Just in case anyone is about to say I'm missing the awesome fall colours by not visiting now (and I'm sure they are absolutely gorgeous) - this is the view I see out of my bedroom window every day.

I live in Sherwood Forest (alleged home of Robin Hood) so have beautiful woodland views every day.

Sewing without looking

I recently saw a t-shirt that said something along the following lines "I live dangerously - I run with scissors!". I had to snigger because I still carry scissors blades pointing down. I'm not a big risk taker.

So it was a bit surprisingly to find that I'd mis-pieced at least three units in block 8 of the GenX Quilters Moccasin block of the month project. I can only assume that i was sewing with my eyes closed when I turned two half square triangles the wrong way. And then sewed a flying goose unit in upside down. I guess I should be grateful nothing was back to front and that I didn't sew over a finger. 

Here's the blocks 

The eagle eyed amongst you will note that the colour scheme doesn't quite match the pattern. I'm going with the excuse that it's a design choice - I wanted the centre star to be more prominent and the block look to be less scrappy. It wasn't that I mis-pieced the pink and blue flying goose units. Nope. Noting of the sort. Ahem.

Note to self - look at what you're sewing in the future. 

Hitting the wall

I wanted to be able to post about a finished quilt today. I wanted to be able to show you a beautifully pieced and quilted project. I'd even settle for a sewn top at this point. But no. I've hit "the wall".

I've heard about this phenomenon from friends who do EXERCISE (yes, as fat as I'm concerned it deserves capitals). Apparently it's something that you "hit" at a particular point during a long bout of sweaty, painful, blister-inducing exertion. Not that I've ever experienced such a thing. Exercise I mean (see I'm getting better, no capitals this time). Let alone the wall.

But I've hit it with this double pinwheel commission. If I ever see another half or quarter square triangle it'll be too soon.

This is the plan of the finished project. Cute huh?

And this is where I'm currently up to. Not so cute.

The blue triangle blocks are sewn and trimmed. So that's half of the 960 blocks done.

But one half of the red triangle blocks are pressed and the other half aren't even that far along.

Apparently there are only two options for dealing with The Wall - give in or plough on ahead. I've promised myself that I'm going to crack on with this this weekend, if only to stop the moaning (from both me and you who must be bored hearing me moan!). There may be a slight break to piece this month's Moccasin BOM block from GenX Quilters or maybe even the triple scoop block from the FQS Snapshots but no more! I will stay on task, I will! Maybe.

And now we return to our usual programming

After yesterday's disasters, a much better sewing day today.

I finally managed to catch up with the GenX Quilter's Moccasin block of the month by finishing off block 6, a Dresden plate.

The only issue with this block was the (for me anyway) bespoke size of the blades. I have the EZ Quilting Dresden blade ruler which measures blades from 2" upwards in 1/2" increments. The size and angle of each size blade ensures that a certain number of blades makes a full Dresden circle.

However the Moccasin block required blades which were 4" high but the side angles of which corresponded with the 3" template on my ruler. A bit confusing! So I cut my fabric 4" wide, started to cut the blades using the 3" mark on the template until I ran out of ruler at 3" and then manually extended the cuts down to the end of the blade. I guess thus is how the block designers managed to get 20 blades to fit in a 9.5" block. It works!

Ironically, the Ultraviolet blocks of the Gravity quilt from Jaybird Quilts ended up being simpler block of the day, despite having partial seams! This block comes in two colour ways, purple and yellow.

Despite having one partial seam, the blocks came together very quickly. I used Carol Doak's technique of basting matching points with a quick 4" basting stitch first before sewing the seam normally to ensure that the points matched up beautifully. The basting stitch is quick as I only baste the points and pulls out easily once the seam is sewn.

One odd thing about the purple block though- three of the fabrics displayed a weird polarized effect when photographed. The other fabrics seem fine.

I'm sure there's a simple technical explanation for this (Julie at Jaybird says she's had it happen to her with photographs before) but it certainly made the block seem even more out of this world!

One of those days

Have you ever had one of those days where everything seems to go wrong? There's no milk left for your morning coffee, the handle breaks off your mug and you can't find a parking space?

I had one of those sewing days yesterday. Nothing dramatic happened but there was an endless stream of niggles.

I finished the Pine Needle Basket from the Craftsy Jinny Beyer BOM project and it went fine. Not great, just fine. It took me a good few hours though!

As always with these Craftsy blocks it came out 1/4" too small all around but I can fix that at the sashing stage. French homework is done!

I also finished up the two block 5s for the GenX Quilter's Moccasin BOM. I think I'm almost caught up now (May is block 6). Again these weren't particularly problematic (apart from trying to tear copy paper out of the paper foundation; I'll always use Cadol Doak's paper in the future) but took a good few hours.

Hopefully today is a new day and I've left the trials and tribulations of yesterday behind!

Desert and white oak

Sounds like an upmarket fragrance, doesn't it? Or maybe more like a supermarket brand body spray! Either way, it's the next instalment in the epic sewing week.

The "desert" bit comes from blocks 3 and 4 in the GenX Quilter's block of the month pattern for this year, called Moccasin.

They were fairly straightforward blocks, being shoo fly (or Sherman's March or Church Dash) blocks plus a Bears paw block.

I'm slowly catching up with the BOM - I think I'm only two months behind now!

Next up was the White Oak Basket, one of two for the Craftsy BOM for May.

This month's blocks were a little like French homework - you know that you have to do it but would rather do fun stuff instead. But if you leave it, it's going to be looming over you all holidays. Best to get it out of the way ASAP. Particularly as this month's blocks had 13 pages of instructions; yes, 13!

I'm not 100% happy with the block (I somehow managed to miscut the basket lip fabric so that more than just the border print is visible in some spots). However I know that I'm just being picky and should instead embrace the glory of those partial seams which came together with no problems!

Pine needle basket is the other block for this month. I'll get cracking with that tomorrow.