#lori baker

In last week’s blog, I told you about this pretty little PIGS (Projects in Grocery Sacks) quilt. I’m working hard at finishing at least one PIG a month. I had to hurry to get this project finished while it was still April.

When I wrote last week’s blog, I was stitching the straight-line quilting in the yellow border on the Handi Quilter Avante longarm quilting machine that we have in the sewing studio at work. The straight-line quilting went wonderfully well.

April’s PIGS Project

I love the quilting.

In the four corner blocks of the border, I wanted to outline the applique and then do echo quilting similar to what I’d done in the center of the quilt. I just could not get the curved lines to look like I wanted them to. I’ll admit that I am a perfectionist and because I love this quilt and the other quilting on it, I wasn’t willing to settle for second rate quilting in the corners. So I didn’t quilt them on the Avante.

It isn’t a problem with the Avante. It’s a problem with my experience, my level of expertise.

A Quilted Corner Block

I took the quilt back home and unsewed the one corner block I’d tried to quilt on the longarm and then redid it and quilted the other three corner blocks on my Baby Lock Destiny. The Destiny is one of the newer machines with a large throat so free-motion quilting is easy to manage on it.

I went on to bind my quilt. I do all steps of the binding by machine.

Stitched and Pressed

Glued

I stitch the binding to the front of the quilt, press, glue the binding to the back of the quilt with Elmer’s School glue and stitch in place from the front. If you’d like more complete instructions for this method of binding a quilt, there is a Skill Builder in the November/December 2016 issue of McCall’s Quilting which is available at quiltandsewshop.com both in hard copy and digital format.

My quilt needs a name and a label and it will be done.

I’m going to try to complete 2 PIGS in May. Wish me luck!

And until next time, happy quilting.

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Welcome to Design Wall Tuesday! Thanks for stopping by to see what some of our editors from Quiltmaker and McCall’s Quilting have been working on.

From Administrative Editor, Deb McDonald:

Deb McDonald

This weekend I decided to do a bit of quick and easy piecing. Every year the Quilts of Valor(R) Foundation holds a Block Drive, where they collect blocks to be sewn into quilts for veterans. It’s a great way to support this organization without the commitment of making a whole quilt.

Blocks requested this year are the Snowball and Floating Star. I went through my stash of red, white and blue fabrics and found plenty of patriotic prints to choose from. For free patterns, size requirements and mailing information go to http://www.qovf.org/events/

Snowball block

Floating Star

From Associate Editor, Erin Russek:

Erin Russek

I spent some time this weekend preparing pieces for a hand applique project. Stay tuned!

From Acquisitions Editor, Lori Baker:

projects

I didn’t have my typical weekend. Instead of my usual things; shopping, cleaning and then sewing on a quilt, I went on a road trip to take a machine embroidery class from my friend, Louis Carney, who is an educator for Brother. The class was held at Country Traditions in Fremont, Nebraska. My friend (and a frequent contributor to our magazines) Scott Flanagan is the Creative Center Coordinator at that store. We were embroidering with the Brother Dream Machine II. I loved the store, the machine and our projects but most of all, I loved seeing Louis and Scott.

Lori with Scott and Louis

From Associate Editor, Mary Kate Karr-Petras:

Mary Kate Karr-Petras

  Audrey Hepburn movie poster

In last week’s Design Wall Tuesday blog post I said I was working on the binding for my queen-size Not-Precious Quilt, and that I figured hand finishing the binding would end up taking longer than the longarm quilting had.

binding

Boy, was I right. At approximately 350 linear inches, I estimate it took me about 8 to 10 hours to bind, but I finished it and the quilt has been laundered and is in use on our bed. It’s the first queen-size quilt I’ve completed, and I’m really happy with it. I’m especially tickled by the pieced panel backing that includes Audrey Hepburn movie posters, featuring one for my favorite romantic comedy of all time, “Roman Holiday.” I made sure to put that panel on my side of the bed.

The Not-Precious Quilt replaced a scrappy vintage quilt I found at a thrift shop in 2013 and that we’ve been using for an extra layer. I blogged about the scrap quilt for the Quilters Newsletter blog (which you can read here). In that blog post, I described how one printed stripe fabric was shredding and that I planned to applique patches over the problem areas. Well, I finally started to make good on that plan this weekend using vintage feedsack scraps I bought from a vendor at a quilt show; if you compare this photo against the photos from 2013 you can see that the fabric really disintegrated from use. After I finish the applique and do some binding repair (more hand stitching!), I’ll wash it carefully and put it away for the time being.

We hope you find some time to sew this week! Stop by next week to see what’s new from our editors. Happy Sewing!

Have you ever used a serger to make a quilt? Did you even know it’s possible to use a serger for quilting?

If not, you’re certainly not alone. Most quilters don’t think of sergers as being applicable to quilting techniques since we usually don’t use stretchy knits nor do we need to finish the raw edges of our seams, which is what sergers are known for doing.

However, because they can sew up to 1,300 stitches per minute, sergers can greatly speed up your sewing, which can be a huge help for people who make charity quilts.

In a video series she did for Quilters Newsletter, Connie Fanders of Bernina demonstrates different techniques that quilters can do with a serger. In an intro video, Connie describes the basic functions of two different types of sergers.

In the first of three videos demonstrating specific techniques, Connie shows how to use a cover and chain stitch serger to make a rag quilt.

In the next video, Connie demonstrates how to use the serger with a quilt-as-you-go method using 4″ strips of fabric.

And in the final video, Connie talks specifically about how to use a serger for piecing a quilt top, including what sort of thread to use and how to set up the machine.

Connie also wrote a blog post with even more on how to use a serger to make a quilt; you can read her post “Quilting with a Serger” on the QN blog. 

When you’re ready to use your serger to sew something other than straight seams, you’ll want to want to watch “How to Sew Curved Seams with Your Serger“ from Fons & Porter’s Love of Quilting. In it, Pam Mahshie and Mary Fons demonstrate how to successfully serge a curved seam with a serger, how to set the proper stitch width for an accurate seam, and also how to hold quilt fabric when piecing with a serger. Mary also provides a quick Serger 101 course to explain the basics of serging and how it can be beneficial for every quilter. Watch “How to Sew Curved Seams with Your Serger” on QNNtv.com.

One person on our editorial team who knows a thing or two about making quilts with a serger is Lori Baker. Fortunately for us, she’s written a few different blog posts with her insights on using her serger to make quilts.

Lori made her first serger quilt over 10 years ago. As she wrote in “Stretching the boundaries,” there are things she’d change if she made that quilt again. But it was a good experiment and one she appreciates. “I think it is okay to have things around that show how much my quiltmaking skills have improved,” she said.

“Serging is a nice way to get a quilt done quickly and to use up bigger pieces of scraps,” she wrote in a different blog post. “I think serger quilts are ideal charity quilts or car quilts.” She used a quilt-as-you-go technique after piecing 10″ precut squares into rows; read more about how Lori made her serger quilt in “Serge On!”

A couple of months later she finished the quilt after changing her mind a few times about how to quilt it. The ease of piecing and doing some of the quilting with a serger allowed her to put more time and effort into making it special with the rest of the quilting, including some free-motion cursive writing; read about “A Caring Quilt” here.

And then later while on a road trip Lori visited a quilt shop where the owner showed off the serger quilt top she’d made; it’s still an easy quilt but the piecing is more involved than Lori’s. “Isn’t it pretty?” Lori wrote in her blog post “Show and Tell.”

If you do a lot of sewing, especially for charity as Lori said, then a serger might be a worthwhile investment. It’s just one more tool in a quilter’s toolkit, and it’s also a lot of fun to use. So next time you’re in a sewing machine shop, give the serger a test drive — you may just get hooked!

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Lots of Pretty Fabric

I didn’t work on any of my PIGS (Projects in Grocery Sacks) this past week. Instead, I went on a little weekend trip and had a wonderful time.

Look who I ran into … well, okay, that might not be exactly how it happened.  “Ran into” implies that it just happened out of the blue.

The real story is this: a couple of weeks ago, I saw a post on Facebook saying that my good friend Louis Carney was going to be teaching a class on machine embroidery on the Brother Dream Machine II at the store where another good friend (and a frequent contributor to our magazines), Scott Flanagan, is the Creative Center Coordinator. That means Scott is in charge of the events that feature machines so he was the one I’d need to contact to set it up.

Scott (left), Louis (right) and me

Louis and I have been friends for a long time. He’s a gifted designer. He makes everything from home dec to garments to quilts and does them all well. I found a class at SewItAlltv.com that he taught.

I called Scott and signed up for the Saturday class. The story is a little crazy. I haven’t seen Louis for at least 2 years so it was important to me to see him.  I believe that good friends are worth extra effort.

The store where Scott works is Country Traditions in Fremont, Nebraska. Google Maps says it is a little over 500 miles from my house to Fremont. But again, friends are worth extra effort so I left home on Friday and drove to Fremont. Louis and I had dinner together and had a wonderful time catching up.

Saturday morning, I went to Country Traditions. It’s a lovely store.  Here are a couple photos of the store. Here is their website.

The Classroom on the Second Floor

Near the Front Door

My Projects

And here are my projects. The lunch bag is the perfect size to hold the accessories case for the Dream Machine II.

I had a wonderful time with Louis and Scott. I’m in love with the Brother Dream Machine II. And I can’t wait for the next time I have a chance to get away and spend some time with sewing buddies.

Welcome to Design Wall Tuesday!

Thank you for joining us to see what some of our editors from McCall’s Quilting and Quiltmaker are quilting this week. Get a peek at design wall inspiration, upcoming Quick Quilts and free motion settings.

From Associate Editor, Gigi Khalsa:

Gigi’s Design Wall Inspirations

This weekend I was working on quilting and finishing up a few projects to share later, but while I was working, my room seemed a little lackluster because there wasn’t anything colorful on my design wall. I have a few tie-dyed scraps given to me by a friend and I think I decided upon a way to use them, so I put them up on the design wall, along with some coordinating Northcott fabrics, for a burst of color and inspiration. I think the quilt that I’ll make of these fabrics will be a little more complex as far as cutting and piecing, but this is a good start to get my creativity flowing. I find my design wall is one of the most useful tools to support my creativity. If you don’t have a design wall of your own check out the Fons & Porter Design Wall.

From Acquisitions Editor, Lori Baker:

Lori’s Quick Quilt Block Design

Two weeks after I finished cutting the patches, with a multitude of interruptions (and a whole lot of evenings when I didn’t even turn on a sewing machine), my quilt top for an upcoming issue of Quick Quilts is finished. I’m excited about it. I love the beautiful blue and green batik fabrics from Island Batik Fabrics. Here is one block. You’ll have to believe me when I say the quilt top is wonderful. It is ready to be sent off to the quilter. I can’t wait to see it when she gets done with it.

From Associate Editor, Mary Kate Karr-Petras:

Mary Kate’s free motion waves

My weekend sewing was spent making pillow shams to coordinate with My Not-Precious Quilt that I finished last week. (You can read about my quilt here.) I decided to quilt the shams with wavy horizontal lines just as I did the quilt itself, the difference being that I’m quilting them on a new-to-me domestic machine as opposed to a longarm, which is how I did the bed quilt. As I wrote a few weeks ago, I’ve spent a good amount of time troubleshooting the free-motion settings on this machine; I’ve got the tension issues largely sorted out, so now my focus is on coordinating speed and stitch length with the goal of quilting pretty lines. As you can see, I’m not there yet. I keep waiting for free-motion quilting to get fun or even mildly satisfying, but I know I’m just going to have to put in a lot more time to get there. I have a quilt top for someone special that I want to free-motion quilt, so I have more motivation to practice than I’ve ever had before. I will gratefully accept all good FMQ vibes or words of advice you care to send my way.

by Adam Cogbill