A slow start to 2009

After more than a month off from sewing (family trip to the States for Christmas, entertaining family back home for New Years, cleaning up after family, etc...) I finally got back into it last Saturday (it's just taken me four days to find time to write about it). I think I had sewer's block or something - I kept trying to get into one of the projects on my list, but would end up just cleaning my sewing area... only I can never quite get it clean... I did manage to sort out most of my fabrics, and cleared the huge pile of misc sized pieces on top of my cupboard.

On Saturday, A took the kids for a few hours (and even better, did all of the grocery shopping!!!) so that I could sew. I worked on the pile of squares I'd cut for the scrappy pinwheel quilt (which I started when Riley was born and doubt I will finish anytime soon). Or rather, I tried to start working on it, but encountered problem after problem...

First, I realised I'd marked the wrong side of my white squares - all 100+ of them. So I begrudgingly remarked them all on the other side. Finally got through that stack and started sewing my squares together. Only to realise that it had been way too long since I'd worked on this quilt - I was sewing on the cut line!! Whoops...

Felt like an idiot, but went back to square one... again... Only this time, my bobbin kept stuffing up. Can anyone help me fix this problem?? I have no idea what causes it, but out of the blue, I will suddenly have heaps of thread bunched up on the bottom of whatever I'm sewing. The only way I can fix it is to take out the bobbin, fiddle with it, and put it all back together and start over. Only it tends to take about 100 tries before finally, it seems to kick in and work! This happened two different times, and after I'd taken the machine apart upteen times, it finally seemed to fix itself. Can ANYONE help me with this? I'm sure it will happen again in the near future...

Finally got that problem fixed, and got into my squares.

After a full afternoon of sewing in my pyjamas, I was nearly cross-eyed (especially since the light went out on my machine late last year and I still haven't fixed it...) but happy to have made some progress.

Riley's quilt

The very first quilt I made was supposed to be for my first baby, but at the time we didn't know if it would have a boy or a girl. A and I picked out some green fabric, which we thought was rather neutral, and I made a very basic nine patch (hope to take photos of this quilt soon...). It seemed to take forever to complete each step along the way, as I didn't really know what I was doing and had to keep refering to a quilting book that my mom had given me years ago constantly. (I was actually shocked and a little proud when I actually finished it - hand quilting and all!)

But upon finding out that we were having a boy, I decided it was too girly and decided to make another one. I fell in love for the first time with fabric - Japanese carp with bamboo and waves - and fussy cut the fish out. I had sewn about 9 blocks of this together (with the fish squared and the green / blue boxes turned), when A suggested I change directions and turn the fish squares instead! It was a challenge to turn it without taking it all back apart, and I wasn't as happy with the way the fish were cut this way, but overall we preferred the look, and I'm glad we did it. I like the way the finished quilt turned out.

This was only the third baby quilt I had made and I must confess - I look at the green and blue solids (and the plain blue backing) now and think, "How boring!" At the time, I was worried about spending too much on fabric (that worry is now loooong gone... replaced by periodic fabric splurges followed by guilty conscience), had only gone to two fabric shops (one quilt shop where I bought material for quilt number two and nearly died at how much it cost and a local craft shop with cheap fabrics) and wasn't brave enough to start experimenting with more adventurous fabric combinations. It's a pretty simple quilt, but I remind myself it is all a learning experience.

(By the time I made my fourth quilt (the fish and bubbles rail fence in previous post) I decided what the hell, and started to really get into fabrics, resulting in a more adventurous backing and binding!)

My first post

Well, I never thought I'd be into quilting, much less starting a blog about it! I was once a globe-trotting marketing manager, circling the globe several times a year for work, never in one place long enough to even think about a quilt, much less start one. My mom always liked quilting, and after we kids left home, had devoted more and more time to her hobby. But her encouragement to take up the 'art' only made me swear never to like it... I always considered quilting to be an old lady craft! But here I am, a fabric-obsessed thirty-something, fantasising about all the quilts i'm going to one day find time to make... and I certainly don't consider myself OLD! Not yet, anyway.
So how did this happen? My husband, A, bought me a sewing machine for my birthday last year. I had big plans to start making my own clothes, but had no clue where to start. But as I was newly pregnant with our first child, I decided I would make a baby quilt. A actually helped me pick out the fabric and I got busy 'fussy-cutting' (though I had no idea at the time there was such a term) little Japanese dolls out for my first quilt.

Then I found out my best friend was also pregnant, so I got to work picking out gender-neutral fabric for her baby, and made this railfence quilt.

Then my husband's sister-in-law fell pregnant, and I decided to make her expected boy a baby quilt...


And voila - I was hooked!