Land of My Heart Forever…

Well… I got the “Scotland the Brave” quilt basted this morning and ready to hand quilt.  Should be interesting to see how hand quilting goes after not doing it for a decade. 

 

 

I used EQ6 to design the quilting stencil that will fill the white blocks. I will mark the quilt as I go along.  The chains will be quilted diagonally through the squares.  The center block of the piper (that is my hubby) will be cross hatched quilted around the piper.

I bought the Mountain Mist White Rose Cotton batting that was recommended on my small quilt yahoo group.  I’ll let you know how it is to quilt….guess I should have tried out a piece before I put it in the quilt!  I will start quilting it tonight.

Chris

Husband Loved His "Scotland the Brave" Quilt Top

Well another Christmas has come and gone. It always amazes me how the preparation for Christmas goes on for weeks and weeks and how quickly the actual day passes. My daughter loves her Nikon D40 which was pretty much her only gift. She has been taking photos like crazy. Now we have to figure out what kind of case to get her for it. If you have a SLR and have a camera case that you love let me know about it....thanks!

My husband had very few ideas for gifts for himself this year so we had to come up with a few on our own. We got him spicy candy. One was chocolate covered toffee with cayenne pepper in it and the other was caramels with habanero peppers in them. Yes, we do eat really spicy food in our house. We also bought him a stone mold to make shortbread which is one of his favorite cookies. I did finish the quilt top and he loved it. He even figured out that the silhouette of the bagpiper was him. After looking at it for about 1 minute he asked, "Is that me in the middle of the quilt?" I thought for sure that he had seen the quilt before Christmas since I had it hanging on the design wall in my sewing room. He claims that he did not even peak at it while it was hanging there. That is so much better than what I would be able to do. As a kid I used to sneak into my parent's closet and find all of the presents. I am not as bad as an adult, but I am still tempted to sneak a peak!

What did I get? I got my wonderful Sew Perfect Sewing Table. I have been using it for a few weeks already. I also got a wonderful book called "Creative Quilting: The Journal Quilt Project". My daughter bought me the DVD for the "Nightmare Before Christmas"....I guess to get my ornament idea for next year! (My daughter loved the Mayor ornament that I made for her this year.) I also got some people for my New England Village set up. My MIL bought me a bendable bright light that I attached to my machine today.

All in all another wonderful Christmas with family....
Chris

Scotland the Brave

It sure is an ugly day in New Jersey. We are having a wintry mix of precipitation as the temperatures hover around freezing. We are enjoying snow, sleet and freezing rain and apparently this is the first of a series of three storms that we are going to have. Today is the first one, the second one is on Sunday, and the third one is on Christmas Eve. Yikes...I am not a winter person. This is the view out of my sewing room window. My daughter is on her way home on the train from Boston today and her boyfriend is going to pick her up at the train station. I will not relax until I am sure she is home safely.

With all my pent up anxiety, I have been working on the bagpiping quilt and I now have the borders on and the letters fused in place. I decided to only use words from the song "Scotland the Brave" across the top and the bottom borders. I used Microsoft Word to create the letters. I picked a font I liked and changed the size to 150. I printed that and traced the letters onto Steam a Seam 2 Lite.

I don't think I will have it quilted in time for Christmas, but at least the top will be done. The next step is to use invisible thread to stitch the letters and the bagpiper down.

Chris

The Pipes, the Pipes are Calling.....

I am now done with finals and I am making some progress on the bagpiper quilt for my husband. I have sewn all the blocks together for the double Irish chain and have cut out the bagpiper silhouette to put in the center block. The silhouette is my husband in NYC for the Saint Patrick's Day Parade. That was his first big parade as a bagpiper. Yes, my husband is tall and thin. I am short and wide. He never struggles with his weight and I have a constant battle with mine.

Now I have to figure out what words to use in the border. His favorite piping song is "Scotland the Brave" so I want to use words from that. I just have to figure out which ones. I have to decide if I am going to go around all 4 borders with words or just the top and bottom border. I was going to do the letters in paper piecing, but they are so small I thought that would drive me crazy even though I have been called the "Queen of paper piecing." I am going to fuse the letters and that will give me a chance of having it done for Christmas.

Chris