Bindings 'n Backings

How do you spell binding?  In my home it's spelled C-A-T-N-I-P.

Normally, Lucas leaves me alone when I'm sewing.  Actually, the fat galoot is usually snoozing somewhere - if it's warm he's in a puddle of sunshine by the window - and if it's cold he's under the quilt on my bed (the big baby!).  But he loves days when I do bindings - either sewing them on or making them - in particular the ironing portion of the entertainment.  He won't be shoo-ed away either.

Moments after I took this pic he almost pulled me off my chair by launching his 25 lb mass onto the tail of the binding - I had made the mistake of wrapping it around my neck a few times in an effort to keep it out of his reach.

I decided today was the day to sew the bindings on two lap quilts.  I was under the impression that I had made the bindings for both quilts.  I had too - only I was obviously seriously math-challenged on the day I made them.  (A cautionary tale of why drinking wine and sewing don't go together.)

I don't pin my bindings on (pinning is for sissies, says I, with great bravado), I just sit down and sew.  Well about the time I was rounding the second quilt corner on the first quilt I began to notice that the binding was running out faster than the quilt.  This necessitated a search through stash for binding material.  I found a large scrap of the same material (actually I think it was cut off the backing for this same quilt) but no width of fabric.  I was obliged to cut many short strips, and piece them together.  Now I do pin strips when angle joining, and I viciously jabbed my lip with a pin so that I now look like I've been stung by a bee.  Pinning is not for the distracted, sez I, bravado forgotten.  I attached the new length to the binding partially sewn to my quilt - right side to wrong side.

That took a minute to unsew and resew the right way before I could finish attaching the binding.  Then I measured the second quilt against it's binding and discovered I was short by the same amount.  Stink!  I found more of that fabric (full width this time), cut two strips of fabric, joined it and sewed it on the quilt.  Here's what's left over of the bindings.

I obviously overshot the mark with the first binding, but I came within three inches of needing to cut more binding on the second one.  You know, I don't remember quilting being this fraught with frustrations.

Then I cut and pieced the fabrics for the backing for my black-sashed crumb quilt (the one I have to shimmy past as it has been hanging in the doorway of my bedroom as a reminder for days now).  Two widths of fabric wasn't quite enough for the length I needed so I shimmed it by adding in a row of the left-over crumb blocks in the middle.  The striped fabric is prettier than the solid colonial blue, so I sliced it in half lengthwise so I could have it at the top and bottom of the backing.

I wrestled this new backing over the ironing board twice to get all the wrinkles out and the seams pressed.  Then carefully folded it so I could hang it on a hanger with the quilt top.  It's now waiting to go to the long arm quilter.

And then I made the binding, much to Lucas' delight.  This time I double checked my math and added two additional strips for good measure.  Here it is all pieced and ironed.  I roll it around whatever I can find (a mason jar works well), then slide it off, pin the end and put it in my stash.

Make the binding when you make the quilt top or the backing, a more experienced quilter once told me.  Fantastic little tidbit of advice.  Otherwise I might use the fabric in something else.

Numerous small boo-boos aside, this was a productive bit of sewing.  I have some murder mysteries recorded on the PVR, so will start hand stitching the binding on a quilt tonight while watching the television.

Necessary Work and Quilt Gremlins

Housework is a necessary evil - and something I could easily put off, if I didn't share my apartment with a cat and his litter box.  In simple terms, what it really comes down to is a choice over vaccuuming the abode or brushing cat hair off my fabric.  I don't know how I can suck up enough hair to make another cat (every week) and yet my feline room mate still manages to maintain a full body suit of glossy black hair.  It's a mystery!  The accumulation became noticeable when I was adding the solid black borders to my crumb quilt.  Eeeewwww!  That's when the quilt gremlins hit - when I was distracted by the cat hair - I sewed a border on the wrong side.

Lucky for me I was sewing on solid black borders and the wrong and right sides are interchangeable, so I just undid the join and sewed it on the reverse.  There!  Done!  Take that Quilt Gremlins!  I would have hated to have to unsew the entire border.  I eventually did vaccuum.  In fact I spent an hour on necessary housework, even dusting and washing floors.  Once I give in to the task, I am thorough.

I trimmed double my daily quota of those half square triangles.  The trimmed box is filling up quite nicely, even if the box of untrimmed ones doesn't seem noticeably reduced.  By my reckoning, I may be 25% done.

And then I went digging in the "fling-it" bag in the hall coat closet (non-quilting fabrics and old bed sheets I was going to throw out, give to a friend for drop cloths, or donate).  I wanted a very thin cotton flat sheet I knew was in there for cutting up - for string block foundations.  I cut them out at 8.5" square and after slicing up the entire queen-size sheet, I have a stack of squares almost two inches high.

Now I must confess that, normally, a distracted procrastinator like me would have cut out one strip of blocks and started the new string project (just folded up the remainder of the sheet for future cutting). But it occurred to me when I was organizing my stash and identifying my UFOs that it was just this sort of procrastination that results in so many stalled and unfinished projects.  That's why I'm so pleased with this stack of foundation squares.  Now I get to play in the fabric stash for a unifying central stripe - orange or red?  yellow maybe?  I'll be ready to start making my first string blocks on Crumb Along Tuesday (if I can wait that long).  There are surely enough foundation squares here for a couple of string quilts.

While I was digging around in the "fling-it" bag, I pulled out these three items for reconsideration.  The pink and white solids are 100% cotton and it seems wasteful to get rid of them.  Sure solids are boring, but seen in the right light (say as the calming neutral in a scrappy quilt) they might work.  Right?  Yuck, that pink is really really pink!   The tea-dye coloured fabric is another flat sheet (a 50-50 poly cotton) and the frugal unemployed part of me can't help asking why can't I use it for a backing? 

Today was obviously a day for necessary work.  I put a much needed new ironing board cover on my board, put in the screws that hold firm the basket glides in my stash cupboard, and afixed the hinges to the cupboard door.  (No wonder handy men have such well developed muscles!)

I finished unsewing those nine patches...

...then started putting them back together the way I knew I should have in the first place, which is going to ensure the 9patches line up beautifully for quilting.  Notice the black shape under the ironing board?  Now you know why I was picking up cat hair on my quilt borders.  Lucas has a tendency to follow me around and get involved in anything and everything I am doing (except when I turn on the vaccuum cleaner).

And I picked up a couple of those plastic table cloths with the cotton backs to use as design walls.  I acutally stood there in the store agonizing over the colours I wanted to buy, before I remembered that the plastic coloured side would be against the wall and not seen anyway. 

And, there's my nightly stack of magazines to go through.  Tomorrow, I'm going to spend the day in guilt-less sewing.

Stash Reorganization - Delightful Surprises

It's like Christmas in August.  I'd forgotten more than half of what was in this bin.

I thought it was all quilt tops waiting to go to the long arm quilter.  There were definitely some surprises in here.

I forgot I had this winter toile in green.  I originally bought it on Ebay with a goal of using it for home decorating.  I ran it through the washer and dryer and it came out beautifully.  There's almost five yards - definitely a great backing for a Christmas quilt.  Hooray.

This is an extra wide backing, Thimbleberries Blue and Cream, that I bought because I definitely want to make a blue and cream quilt one day from my Thimbleberries fabrics and wanted the backing to go with it.  This is from the days when I thought the backing fabrics had to be one fabric and match the quilt fabrics.  I've broadened my horizons since then, though I still intend to save it for that future blue and cream quilt.

Another unexpected find.  I bought this fabric ten years ago to make bedroom curtains in a different apartment.  The fabric was stiff, but it read 100% cotton on the selvage so I ran it through the washer and dryer.  Wow!  The sizing came out leaving it silky soft but sturdy enough to pass inspection with even the snootiest quilt fabric snob.  It's 54" wide and I have 4 yards.  Another good backing.  These pretty florals aren't everyone's taste, I know, but I still like pretty florals and the pink and periwinkle are really quite lovely.

This hideous blue solid was on sale at a fabric store going out of business.  I bought enough to make a backing and haven't been able to force myself to use it yet.

The biggest surprise was finding new fabrics I had obviously tucked in the bin in a hurry.  I've long given up trying to find these.  Three yards of Christmas fabric, four yards of Kona black solid, a Fig Tree Layer Cake, and a bright charm pack.

Then there was this three pound bag of Christmas fabric remnants from the gals in my sewing circle.  I had completely forgotten them.  There are enough fabrics and scraps here to make a couple of Christmas quilts.  I don't have many seasonal themed fabrics in my stash so this is a delightful find.

What else did I find in the bin?  Check out my next post.