Sugar and Spice is Oh so Nice

 Whats not to love?  It has everything in a quilt that I love.  Pretty fabrics, flowers, applique and that level of cuteness that makes me smile everytime I look at the adorable blocks.  

You might remember in a earlier blog post my frustrations with this pattern/kit.  Well I found another issue.  It's not an error,  more of  a personal preference.  Let me explain.  In the block below you see the Dresden as it finishes before the yo-yo's are attached.  The pattern calls for a large circle to be placed over the hole.  The large circle is just big enough for the 16 yo-yo's to cover the edge.   After attaching the large center circle and yo-yo's I'm supposed to applique the Dresden to the background fabric that is the same print as the large center circle....what?  

So here was my pattern alteration(because I can never follow a pattern to a "T").  I sewed my yo-yo's together, then centered them on the Dresden and glue basted them in place.  Next was to do some seam ripping from the bottom of  the dresden wedge seam.  The extra fabric on the blades will be cut away before attaching the Dresden to the background fabric.  Wish I had made a test block before cutting and sewing all the Dresden wedges.  I learn something new with each quilt.  LESSON LEARNED: Always make a test block.  The little cut offs would have added up to some nice sized  scraps.

Here's another lesson learned quite by accident.  A few years ago started using Roxanne's glue-baste.(on the right) to hold applique in place instead of pins.    Well I read somewhere on the vast internet...."Roxanne's glue baste is nothing more than washable school glue."   So when my large bottle (on the left with the big brown glob) was empty I refilled with the school glue you see laying to the side.   The big brown glob is school glue.  Why is it brown?  I've no clue why it turned brown, but if it'll turn brown on the bottle when it sets for awhile, what's it going to do in my quilts!?   Now I know what your thinking....It's washable school glue, just wash it when you finish the quilt.  True..but what if the one quilt I use it in becomes a UFO, lays around for weeks,months or years?  LESSON LEARNED: Some internet quilt tips are actually bad advice, do your research.

 So back to those cute yo-yo's.  Remember I told you I stitched them together before attaching them with glue baste.  Well hold on to your hats....it's machine stitching holding those yo-yo's together.   A tiny little zigzag.  Can you see it?

Here lets zoom in and take a closer look, can you see the stitches?

Invisible!  This was so much quicker than  handwork.  Making the yo-yo's by hand has been a real chore(bore).  So anything to speed up this quilt is worth a try.

I know my loyal followers are tired of hearing about Superior Threads MonoPoly  thread but it really can't be beat when it comes to invisible thread.  It doesn't show on a quilt, it doesn't melt under a medium heat iron, and it won't melt in the dryer.  I've put this thread through several test and it holds up very well.  It can take more heat than suggested by the manufacturer.  It can also be used for the actual quilting.  If your making a quilt with darker fabrics it also comes in a Smoke color.    At about $10 a spool it won't cut into the quilt budget to bad.   I've made several quilts with this one spool and will probably be able to make one or two quilts with the same spool.   Let me also say my blog doesn't make money for suggesting a product.  My blog makes no money ever.  It's just me doing what I do...quilting.  

~ Lea Anne ~

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Design Wall Daisies

Top of the morning quilty friends!  Hope you each had a wonderful weekend filled full of whatever makes you giggle.   I didn't get to stick to my weekend plan of quilting on the frame.  As soon as I touched my quilting machine ...she broke.  Oh well what can you do but whine to Mr. Podunk, ask him to fix it and move on.  This was the perfect opportunity to work on a UFO.  There's plenty to choose from in various stages of completion.  But the one below caught my eye.

A cute little stack of 50 or more mini dresdens.

If you've been hanging around my blog for awhile you probably remember my Daisy quilt.  Not sure why this one became a UFO because I LOVE IT.  It might have been the applique.  Due to the little dresdens being randomly placed on the quilt top over seams it's a little bit of a pain to machine stitch them to the quilt.   It was a even trickier to glue baste them in place as the quilt hung on the wall.

 All basted and ready to stitch.

 Awe now look at that, so springy and cute.  Why did I ever stop working on this?

~ Lea Anne ~

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Puppy Bow

 Happy Monday morning!  My little puppy quilt is almost complete.  Instead of sharing my quilt top progress today I decided to share how I made the bows for this cute little free Westie quilt block.

My original plan was to hand draw the bow and make applique templates.  Well doesn't that sound like a lot of work?!  Why not just sew a real bow to the block?  Sounds soooo much easier.  

Now remember the fabrics in these blocks are all old shirts.  So I can't tell you how long to cut your pieces, but I can tell you how long to sub cut them.  You'll need one strip that is 1.5" wide by at least 5" long.  And one piece that is cut 1" wide and at least 1.75" long.  On the 1.5" piece, press a quarter inch seam on both long sides.  On the 1" wide piece press the long edges towards the center.  Stitch down both sides of the 1.5" strip after turning the edges.  Sub cut the 1.5" strip into 5" lengths.  Cut the 1" inch wide piece into 1.75" lengths.  This might make more sense if you look at the pictures below.

Okay now that everything is pressed, stitched and cut let's add a few drops of applique glue(washable school glue works too!)  I use these handy close pins to hold them while they dry.  Now would be a good time to have a chocolate and pet some pretty fabrics in the stash.

Or in my case look for my camera tripod....it's still lost.  So lets improvise...cloths pins for fingers.  A picture is a 1,000 words so I'm going let the next group of pictures speak for themselves.

The only reason the pin is in the first picture below is because I needed my hands to take the picture.  You gals understand that you can add the glue without pinning.  Again I used cloths pins to hold it tight.  Or you could use your iron on Medium heat to set the glue.  I let mine dry with cloths pins while I caught up on some wifely chores.

Now that they're dry we can attach them to the cute little puppy using a medium heat setting.

Since the red shirt fabric was kinda thick I also pressed from the backside just to make sure it was good and dry.

It's really hard to see my invisible stitching....hence the name INVISIBLE.   The red dashed line below shows where I stitched.  I wanted the bow to maintain as much "fluffy" as it could and still be secure.

Here's the finished block.   I put the scissors and pencil in the bow just to show where I didn't stitch.

Hope this answered your questions Britney. 

~ Lea Anne ~

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Fat finger applique

The older I get it seems the harder it is to do little tiny tedious detail work with my hands.  So I thought I'd share with you how I pre assemble small applique.  

The little pins shown below are the original pins I purchased over 20 years ago.  I keep them around for emergency use only because they are to hard for my fat fingers to manage.  They are perfect for this project because the heads won't melt.  Glass head pins could be used but mine are finer and bend to easily.   Pinning each little petal in place allows re-positioning of one petal if needed without disturbing the rest.  The scissors are pointing to the one I moved.

Note:  for more exact placement of applique I would have the applique outline sheet under the white fabric allowing it to show through.  But these can be free handed and not cause an issue with the rest of the pattern.

Using a larger longer pin helps to hold small applique steady while applying basting glue.  It also serves as a skewer making placement easier and less messy.

I should also mention the only glue I used is what you see.  The petals are held together by the center of the flower.

No need to remove pins when setting the glue with the iron.  

Perfect little Posies every time!  OOPS...looks like one of them still has water soluble ink shining through.  A little shot of water will take care of that.

~ Lea Anne ~

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