I only sewed for a little while on the machine today. I added 4 more rows to my Squares Surrounded quilt. The left edge measures 73" long. I am going to set it by counting the pieced squares...9 x 11. The left edge is 9 long. I need to add 2 more rows before I hit a corner, if that makes sense. All the blocks and setting triangles are pieced for this.
Inspiration hit in the area of keeping track of on-point rows. I used 4 daisy-head pins (shaped like a daisy, but flat...I use them for pinning my quilts onto my leaders on my quilt frame). I numbered them 1-4 and pinned them onto the top triangle of the rows after I laid them out. Then I pinned each block to the next in its row with a regular pin. Pieced them, ironed them, and attached them to the mother ship w/o any mix-ups. Grand!!
I hardly thought it possible, but I think we have too many large quilts. Our quilt rack and my closet shelf overfloweth.
So I was thinking about the gift-giving quilts thing again. What if I contacted people I want to give a quilt to and showed them pictures (with measurements) and said, "I'd like to give you a quilt. Which one of these would you like?" Is that super tacky??
Lastly, I am putting up new curtains in my bedroom. In this post I talked about the possibility of having a Christmas quilt in my room. My curtains were a fall print. A lovely fall print--quite possibly my favorite Thimbleberries print EVER. My current bed quilt has a string of red squares down the center of each braid. The Christmas quilt, obviously, would go better with red. So I bought these two types of red valances. The problem is that I like the color of one and the design of the other. I am returning both sets. I have another plan. I am going to buy one panel of the color I like and make my own valances.
Here are the two that bombed:
I wanted something that looked like it went with quilts, but wasn't ho-hum old-fashioned looking. I think what I really want is a dark mostly red homespun with a tiny cream plaid line in it.
~Joan
