Machine Quilting the Black & White

I finally started machine quilting this black and White "Paradigm Shift" quilt today.

Here is the photo of the 'sandwiching 'process. First the back fabric gets taped down well. Next the batting is placed on top of that and all the wrinkles are pulled out.  After that the quilt top is carefully laid on top of the other 2 layers as smoothly as possible. It's important that all the wrinkles are taken out of it. Then you start pinning the layers together at the centre, working your way outward, smoothing the top out even more as you go along.

Taping the back fabric to the floor, then smoothing out the batting on top.

Pinned together

In order to machine quilt you need to decide what method to use. After looking at the quilt top, I decided I would machine quilt it "in the ditch" (along the block seam lines) vertically, horizontally and then diagonally. This step holds the layers in place for good. with nothing shifting or bulging during use or the washing and drying process.  Last I will free motion machine quilt the border.

But first the quilt needs to be rolled up from the outer edges in, in order to fit it into the sewing machine to do the quilting.

Now it's time to get to work and start quilting !

Blue & Green Panda quilt #2

Here is the complete little panda baby quilt (#2) which has been machine quilted and finally completed!  I had made a similar (but not identical) baby quilt in the spring for my husband's niece's baby, Max.
I loved the gentle appearance of it so much, and since I had quite a bit of similar fabric left, I decided to make another one.... this time to keep.

Once this quilt was finished and the pins were freed up, I was able to pin together the black and white throw sized Christmas quilt for T & J...  (OOPS! I hope that doesn't give away the surprise... I don't think T & J read this blog anyhow... so the secret should be safe.)

Next week's job:  Start machine quilting that one.

'Scrappy' place Mats

I hate to waste anything so I was thrilled to find a book of patterns for using up left over fabric scraps. I made the little baby quilt top (see last post) from left overs and was so pleased with how it turned out! Now I  have also made a set of 6 place mats as a Christmas gift for my mother.

They were all made totally from scraps and left over fabric.   I sewed together pieces of the fabric every which way and then cut  24 rectangles out of it  6 1/2 x 4 1/2" inches in size.  I used 4 of them for each place mat. The dark green sashing separating them is 1" inch wide (the strips were cut 1 1/2 " wide to include seam allowances...) The outer sashing is 2 inches wide.  Each completed place mat is 17 1/4 " X 13 1/4". 

The back is chocolate brown, the same fabric as the block centres on T& J's Black and white Christmas quilt (which still needs to be quilted.)  I did buy extra brown fabric though, knowing I would use it elsewhere, so I guess I cheated a little...

I have lots of other left over fabric scraps so I might make another set of place mats to keep after Christmas... It is so much faster to make the mock edging using the back fabric, though, than making all the separate strips! I made all of these edge strips from the same leftover fabric as the inner rectangles and it took a long time to sew them together!  But I like how they turned out.  And isn't that really the main point???