Quilting and Stuff by Knitnoid

Category Archives: Frolic

Chicken Bobbin

August 4, 2020 9:51 am ⋅

As I was finishing the last row of quilting on my SIL’s Frolic I thought I was playing Chicken Bobbin.  In reality I was playing Chicken Cone.  I ran out of cone thread, but not before I had finished the quilting.

I still need to trim the quilt, then I’ll send it back to my SIL to bind.

While the computer was quilting, I finished my first Starburst from Atomic Starburst.  This one will be used for quilting practice when I get that far as there are two spots where I didn’t catch the fabric.

This is my first “real” one as there are no missed seams.  The piecing went faster tonight, so I might get this done sooner than I thought.

Since I’m paper piecing I haven’t tried to do any leader/enders, but now that I have a better understanding of what I’m doing, I might be able to do them. My Easy Breezy count currently remains at 39.

 

 

Posted in: Atomic Star Burst, Easy Breezy, Frolic, paper piecing;

New Month – New Projects

August 2, 2020 11:50 pm ⋅

I suppose technically the title of this post would have been more apt for Saturday, but I couldn’t figure out a better title given the various topics of today’s post.

The day started off way earlier than I prefer on any day, but especially on a weekend, but I had a go-live for work. As a result there was plenty of time to quilt today. First up my SILs Frolic. It’s nearly finished – I think there are two more passes before I can take it off the frame. While the machine was running, I pulled out a project box from 2019 and cleaned up the scraps.

I finished the pink and brown top back in the spring of 2009. I also did a small wall hanging a couple of years later. The folded “FQs” are pieces which measure at least 6″ x 20″. I fold them all to 5″ tall by 6″ high to fit into my fabric boxes.  As you can see I also added to my pre-cuts with strips, bricks, blocks, and strings.  The box of fabric from the purple and green log cabin quilt that I recently finished was also dealt with, leaving me 2 empty project boxes. Which I immediately filled up with these fabrics.

I have 3 quilts planned. Atomic Star Burst, Bauble ‘n Beads and Shimmer. The first two will have the blue for background.  I think Shimmer will have a light background, but as it is the 3rd quilt, I’ll worry about it later. Anyway, I started on Atomic Star Burst tonight. I will conquer paper piecing, but that first half starburst needs to be redone. One of the spokes didn’t get fully caught in the seam. So, what do you think? 1/2 a starburst a night? 20 starbursts would work out to 40 days.  No, I am not going to do do another challenge – at least not one so intense.

Easy Breezy – 39

Posted in: Atomic Star Burst, Bauble 'n Beads, Easy Breezy, Frolic, Pink and Brown, Shimmer

Frolic is a Top!

July 26, 2020 12:14 am ⋅

At 118″ square, it’s too long to hang off the gutters and I didn’t want to climb the ladder – well the fully extended ladder – to get a picture straight on.

I need to make a few more blocks for the backing, but for now, I’m going to work on something else.

Cascade. Most of these blocks were done prior to me pulling it out Saturday afternoon.

Easy Breezy – 34

Posted in: Cascade, Easy Breezy, Frolic

So Close

July 25, 2020 4:58 am ⋅

My Frolic has gotten huge!  It has become quite unwieldy as I’ve added the borders. Originally, my plan was to just add a matching 1-1/2″ outer gray border, but I decided to make it wider. The first plan was to increase the border so there was 1-1/2″ of gray between the binding and pieced border, but when it came time to actually add the border I was concerned that the narrow border would look weird, so I opted for a 5″ border.  I still have one more to add to call this top done.

Of course what I failed to take into account is the top is now 118″ square.  My backing is only 108″ wide. I had a plan to add 10″ to the backing, which would have made it tight, but not impossible, but now I need at least another 4″ and 6-8″ would be better. At least the backing will be lighter when I finish piecing it.

The larger quilt has also thrown my binding choices into limbo.  My sister gave me a bit over a yard of blue fabric which I have used as the cornerstones, possibly one star block (I simply can’t remember), and the inner blue border.  The plan was to bind the quilt in the same fabric. Now I’m not sure I have enough. We think she still has a yard of the fabric, but it’s buried in her sewing room. Naturally she bought the last of the bolt and it was an older fabric. But I suppose I don’t need to cross that bridge quite yet.

Easy Breezy – 33

 

Posted in: Easy Breezy, Frolic

Progress on Frolic

July 23, 2020 11:06 pm ⋅

The end is near. That is I can see the finish line for my Frolic top.  Today I finished the inner borders and attached 3 of the 4 pieced borders.  I practiced sewed the 4th border – pulling pins as I went until I was about 12 – 15 inches from then end. At that point I discovered I ran out of bobbin thread about 12- 15 inched from the beginning of the border. At that point I called it a night.

Speaking of running out of thread, I finished off a cone tonight. It took me about 4 months to use this cone. Yes, I’ve been sewing a lot, but I didn’t realize just how much thread I was going through. It was kind of nice not having to worry about getting thread as I watched it dwindle on the cone, so I think I’ll go ahead and order another cone of thread.  It took nearly a month of get it in this spring.

Easy Breezy – 33

 

Posted in: Easy Breezy, Frolic

The Pieced Borders Are Complete

July 23, 2020 12:15 am ⋅

This is the 4th pieced border for Frolic. I probably could have gotten it attached if I hadn’t gone off to try to see the comet.

But as you can see there was some cloud cover.  I don’t know if I’ll try again tomorrow or not.

Easy Breezy = 32

Posted in: Easy Breezy, Frolic

Will This Border Ever End?

July 20, 2020 10:30 pm ⋅

I spent maybe 45 minutes at the sewing machine.  5 more and a corner block after I get this one attached.

Easy Breezy – 26

Posted in: Frolic

Then There Were 3

July 20, 2020 8:11 am ⋅

I spent the better part of the day sewing HST together until I had both side borders completed and 3 of the 4 corner blocks made.  By 5 PM I decided to walk away from the sewing machine.  The fact that I needed to do a bit of housekeeping had nothing to do with it.

My living room was a disaster.  I had setup my extra sewing machine in the room a few weeks ago while my sister was here using the quilting machine and it was time to put it away.  I also needed to move the furniture so I could do a thorough cleaning of the floor.  I thought I had short hair cats, but you couldn’t prove it to me with the amount of hair floating around. Anyway, since I was moving furniture I decided to rearrange it.

Before:

After:

There are advantages to both arrangements.  I’ll leave it this way for a while to see how it works.

I did not make it back into the sewing room after this.

Easy Breezy = 26

Posted in: Easy Breezy, Frolic, House

Saturday

July 18, 2020 11:20 pm ⋅

This morning started off with me cutting gobs of black and white HSTs to go with the blue and white ones I cut last night. Then the stitching began.

Each stack with the blue on top represents one 6 x 12 blocks for the border. The two stacks with the black on top are the 4 corners. After counting, recounting, and counting again, my count was off.  I think I have the right number of pieces in each stack, but until I lay them out I wouldn’t bet on it.

I managed to get one block made and attached to the border I’m working on, but when I went to press this block, I realized it was time to quit.

Two Easy Breezy blocks were made today.  I’m only sewing one seam at a time.

Easy Breezy = 18

Posted in: Easy Breezy, Frolic

Today’s Progress on Frolic

July 17, 2020 10:44 pm ⋅

It doesn’t look like much, but if I counted correctly — which I just realized I didn’t — I have all of the blue HST cut that I’ll need for the rest of the border.  I just realized I didn’t count the HST needed for the corner blocks. I need 16 more.  I’ve also kitted up 10 Easy Breezy blocks and have the neutral rectangles cut for ‘more’.  I didn’t count those.  Tomorrow I’ll work on cutting the black HSTs.

Easy Breezy = 16

Posted in: Easy Breezy, Frolic