Quilting over embroidery - It can be done [Quilting]

A couple of weeks ago, MIL and FIL came for a visit, partially due to MIL needing to drop off some crib quilts she wanted me to machine quilt for her.

I've quilted some of her hand-embroidered quilts in the past.  The first time was the toughest because I struggled with the thought of, "Dare I really quilt over her embroidery?"

I had found only a few images via a google search about quilting over embroidery before attempting it for myself.  My biggest concern for quilting over the embroidery, of course, was losing the embroidery in all the quilting, but I don't think that really happened.  Another concern was 'catching' the embroidery with the machine quilting foot, but that never happened.

A concern for NOT quilting over the embroidery was whether the non-quilted areas would get all puffy looking in comparison to the quilted sections.

Therefore, in the end, the full pantograph quilting won out.  And MIL was satisfied with the results.

I had been putting off the quilting of these projects for her simply because it is SOOOOOO cold downstairs in the basement, specially in my open space where the quilting frame is.  At least in my sewing room, I can turn the space heater on, but not so much in the open area.

Therefore, hubby to the rescue this morning without me even asking him to do this.  He simply realized that it's COLD down there, and I NEEDED to get going on this quilting projects.

He uncapped one of the venting pipes from the wood furnace that is directly in line with my open quilt-frame space.  Yay!  It was actually reasonably comfortable while quilting my mini-marathon today.

The first two quilts went smoothly and quite quickly, using a pantograph "Climber" by Meredith England.

But as I unfolded the last two ....

*sigh*

Oh dear MIL.  I must must must stress to her again the importance of having at least 2" of extra width on each side for the backing and batting...

These last two.... well.... she kinda gave me zero.  In fact, in some spots, the batting almost equated to a -1" span. Ummmmm...... 

*sigh*

But, I did my best, and figured I'd trim off some of her edging if needed...

After breaking three (3) needles and dealing with some minor frustrations on the finishing edge...

They were both finished.

Quilting marathon -- a success.

Finally, a substantial post :)

Yes folks, there are quilting related photos in this post.  Can you believe it?!?!?  :D

My mother-in-law sequestered me into quilting a couple of tops; one for a customer of hers, and one for a family member.  This earth-toned one has such beautiful colors!  The customer left all design aspects to my MIL.  I love the framework that MIL came up with.

I quilted it with an Edge-2-Edge feather pantograph, but I left the center photo section untouched.  It has a poofy effect now that I'm not a big fan of, but the decision of quilting/not-quilting over the picture wasn't mine to make.  Overall, it still turned out alright.

Total quilting time and machine binding sewn on:  About 7 hours on and off during this past week.

This little thing was a smaller wall-hanging that a cousin of my husband asked my MIL to make, and for me to quilt.  I again used the E2E overall feather pantograph in a taupe color.  I loaded and quilted it today in just under 3 hours.  Pretty quick.  Nice-n-small.

THEN, I decided to actually shower up for the day :) LOL

I know I'm not the only one who goes for one (both?) days of the weekend without "looking human."  BUT, there is an article being written about the QOV program; my name was shared with the writer of the article by the Wisconsin QOV representative.  Last weekend, there was a presentation in a local city where two of my quilts were given to local QOV recipients.  Sadly, I could not make the event due to Hunter Safety and needing to be a single mom for the day, driving everyone around to where they needed to be.  So, the writer asked if I could share a picture of me either working on a QOV quilt, or presenting one.  Well....psht!  I didn't have one!  In all my pictures, .... nada.

So, I got all "humanified" and had Cassie take a picture this afternoon.

{{sign of a happy quilter = clutter and mess. Right??}}

 But yeah....THIS is part of the reason I couldn't make the event last week.

Not only did Cassie sign up for Hunter's Safety Education... I did too :)  

And we both passed :)  People keep joking with Paul (husband) about needing to share his hunting gear.  He just laughs and says..."HA!  It just means I can buy MORE tree stands, blaze orange, food plot land, .....etc...etc...etc..."

Last weekend was also Caitlyn's birthday.  Nine this year.  And that girl...... yup.  She wanted jeans.  

On the running front... 

I hit a mental wall after a botched 20-mile run last Saturday.  At mile 7, I texted Paul to come get me if he could.  By the time he got to me, I had run 8.9 miles....a far cry from the 20 I had set out to run.  I just wasn't feeling it.  And I've been fighting the mental block of "failure" all week, ONLY having run once since that day.

But today, despite the weather yet AGAIN bringing on blizzard-like conditions.... I ran .... and this was the view from my treadmill.   Only 5 miles, but they felt good.  And truth be known;  I'm considering jumping back on the 'mill once I'm done with this update post.  Time is still on my side;  Five more weeks until the Green Bay marathon.  Next weekend, there is a Half-Marathon that I'm pretty certain to run in.  I haven't completed my registration yet, but... yeah.  Pretty sure I'll be running it.  {{Amy--it's in Oshkosh.  Interested?  There's a 5K too, I think}} :)

Oh!  Need a funny to close your weekend before heading back to work?

One of my 7th grade advanced math students.  And I honestly don't know whether to laugh or not at this.  Does this show proficiency in mathematical reasoning???

LOL

I think we all need sunshine and 70s!  {{Heck, most of us will even settle for 40s!!!!!}}

Happy Sunday everyone.

Some quilting for MIL

My mother-in-law handed over this little baby quilt to me a few weeks ago.  It is hand cross-stitched;  I believe either a sister of hers or a niece stitched it.  She wanted me to finish it with quilting, so I kept the quilting very simple, VERY.  Some 1/4" outlines around the "blocks", some echoing in the clouds around the Ark, and some swirls in the border.   The star of this quilt is definitely the hand-work of the cross-stitch.  Since I kept it for a bit longer than I had hoped, I trimmed it up and put the binding on right away for her.  

So, can I claim this as another finish?  :D

Happy Wednesday

Some quilting for MIL

Since my quilting frame was finally open again, I loaded a quilt that my MIL requested for me to finish up for her. The fabrics are absolutely GORGEOUS!!!!!!!

I chose a simple pantograph---really simple. Start-to-finish: this quilt took under three hours to load/quilt/trim.

The other evening, Paul fried up some freshly caught pan-fish (oh yes. YUM!!!!!!) and he double-dog-dared Cassie to eat an entire wedge of lemon.
The FUNNY thing though.......notice that completely eaten wedge on her plate. Yeah...that was her FIRST wedge from the dare. And the face she made was so hilarious, that I said DO IT AGAIN for the camera!!!!!!!!!

On the frame...

MIL's Dressed to the Nines quilt was quilted and bound first thing this morning. Nothing fancy, just outline quilting.

She used some lace and ric-rac to embellish the waistlines of the dresses. A dearing touch :0)

Surprisingly, I didn't feel I needed to sit with any new project; instead, I pieced and loaded backing on the frame for In Flight. A couple of hours were put into it....until I ran out of thread. I KNEW that I was going to run out, so I figured I'd quilt until that time and then move on to the next task :0)

Next? Our rhubarb patch needed to be picked.

12 cups were set aside for me to make some Rhubarb Slush tomorrow. Eight packages of 3 cups each were bagged and frozen. All set again for the upcoming year. I must admit, it WAS nice to take a package out throughout the winter to have some Rhubarb Crunch.

This is a later post; I played softball tonight at 8:30 and arrived home a bit after 10:00. I needed a bit to eat so warmed up some soup, and now am sitting with my feet up watching "Disclosure".

Finally, this sign was shown on Green Fairy's blog the other day, and it really says it all :D! I managed to fit in about 5 loads of clothes today and even some closet tidying. Yesterday, a few hours were spent in Caitlyn's and Candace's closets; weeding out clothes too small; stocking the shorts/t-shirts drawers and setting the warmer clothes aside for now. A few times today, I was the nagger motivator to push the girls to finish cleaning their rooms. They finally did with my final threat of "No Painted Walls unless it's clean in 45 mintues!"

Five gallons of paint now sit in the entry-way; two gallons of Royal Blue and one gallon of Yellow for Cassie. She wants a "school colors" room. Two gallons of "rich purple" are for Caitlyn's and Candace's room. I have a feeling tomorrow will involve some painting :0)

Another loose end and a Play-Date

Despite wanting to start something new, and already having cut into some fabrics for a new project, I'm ALSO still motivated to keep plugging away at little loose-ends and UFOs. My Serenity (55"x78") quilt was finished and already recorded for January (it was the NYE mystery), however, it still needed binding.

Another small project checked off to have a complete finish (minus a label). And the weather was BEAUTIFUL yesterday, albeit windy. I'm usually not one to take a "decorative" picture outside, but this quilt sure blends nicely with the Lilac bushes in front of our house.

On another quilty note; Last night, I decided to pin-baste the last of my MIL quilts. I actually thought I was finished, but I found this quilt all folded, waiting patiently, while I was tidying up the other day. Oooops! I'll be quilting this lil' thing on the Bernina; it's too small for me to putz with loading it on the quilting frame. This way, I can use my BSR again; it's been TOOOO long since I've used a regulator.

Did you know: Kids change! ??? Candace here is eating one of her favorites; Cocoa Puffs with marshmallows. She USED to only eat the marshmallows and suddenly be "too full" to eat the cocoa puffs that were left. NOW.....see how many cocoa puffs are left? She was fishing one out at a time with her spoon so that she would only be left with the marshmallows-----'best for last', afterall :0)

Before....

After
See, kids are changing all the time :0)
Candace had been begging and begging for a playdate, so I called up a friend and invited her over for the afternoon. She is a couple of weeks younger than Candace and is a PEANUT! I'm kicking myself that I didn't take the camera with me outside when they went to give the chickens and pigs some treats (end of bread loaves and apple cores). She was ADORABLE holding the rooster....LOL.....and the pigs were bigger than she was.

Three MIL quilts done

Yes, they are small, but I'm a bit pooped and have an achy back for whipping out three of these lil' guys one after another. I used the "Chinese Crescents" pantograph and it went quite quickly due to the larger looser design.

I'm taking a break; skimming through channels to see if anything worth watching is on. I also plan on counting up the voting slips my students submitted yesterday for their favorite quilt and will add those to all of your votes. I'll post the "winner" later on.

Maltese Star Mystery - Step 2

The Maltese Star - Mystery 24 Step #2 was published yesterday, so I spent my morning hours piecing those together. And naturally, when there is the flip-method suggested, it also means BONUS TRIANGLES :0) So, a little pressing and piecing and I have 60 Flying Geese Units set aside for a potential pieced border. I typically piece bonus Pinwheels from the bonus triangles, but I thought I'd try Flying Geese this time.


Then I figured I'd spend some time today working on some quilting for my MIL. We are getting together next weekend up at the farm for a little get-together with family friends to celebrate a late Christmas. It would be nice to have most of her quilts finished and get them back to her.

So....a little bit of lunch and then an afternoon of some more enjoyment.

MIL Thursday...

Okay, so MIL Monday didn't happen....

and Tuesday was Candace's birthday....



and Wednesday....well....I barely made it over the hump

SO...Thursday is finally MIL night!!!

I couldn't even remember all the projects MIL handed over to me months ago, so I started by laying each of them out and snapping some pictures to know what I was working with. MIL's piecing isn't extremely precise, so some of these will not be able to be quilted on the frame. There is simply too much "puffiness" to some of the center blocks of some of these; there simply wouldn't be a way to "quilt-it-out."

I started out with this pink/brown quilt; it seemed to be the "fun one" to start out with. AND, one of the most POOFY centers of 'em all, so.......I went back to my "old-school" quilting with my DSM. I used a walking foot and did a simple stitch-in-ditch along the sashing. That's it. I actually thought of tieing buttons to the dresses where the straps "attach" to the front. Thought it would be cute. So, I'll suggest that to MIL.

Here are pics of the other quilts that I hope to check off before the end of the month.

Another quilt for MIL...

My MIL's Balloon quilt didn't really inspire me today when I eventually made my way downstairs, but it needed to get done. It measures 38.5" x 44".











backing fabric

Definitely nothing that would win me any awards.....but as (I believe it was Candace?) who said something like......."Done is better than perfect." Or maybe it was Linda (TX)?.....

Anyway.....this lil' quilt confirmed that I MUCH prefer to quilt using a pantograph than freehand. Not having a stitch regulator to help me when I get to corners...it's a bit difficult. However, an edge-to-edge pantograph doesn't have any (many) corners that I need to stop for....