Factor in the Trimming

Ok, so, this yellow blanket quilt for my sister's 1st born. I had originally planned on having about 60-65 11 inch hexagons made from 6, 5.5 inch equilateral triangles.

Issue 1 - I'm not patient enough to cut each triangle individually. So, using my June Taylor Shape Cut, I diced up about 4-6 layers of fabric at a time. Not Precision.

Issue 2 - I didn't count on issue 1 causing me to trim each diamond

Issue 3 - I didn't really plan on how to put everything together. I thought, originally, that I would do rows of triangles, but I was worried that my  corners wouldn't match up (per experience from snake quilt), so I took two diamonds and put them together in a "V" and then attempted to add the 3rd diamond to form a hexagon. I'm sure that years from now I'll wonder what all the fuss was, but figuring out how to do that, keep it flat, and lined up without too many wrinkles! Sheesh! What a learning curve in pinning and twisting, and seem ripping.

Issue 4 - Issue 3 caused the need to trim the end hexagons by more than anticipated! to 9inch hexagons. On the first 3 hexagons, I had to go all the way to 9in. By the 5th or 6th, I probably could have done 9.5 or 10.

Issue 5 - Trimming has left me with fewer hexagons than needed to fill the quilt top as desired.

End quilt should fit on the 108 x 72 in backing, I plan on leaving the hexagon edges instead of finishing square. So Tomorrow I'll go find a fabric to border each hexagon, which might help hide the issues with some points not quite lining up..

Tutorial I found helpful....tallgrass prairie studio: sewing hexagons by machine

Husqvarna Viking Emerald 203 - further review

Maybe too much electronics....

OK, so I've had my machine for about a year. I purchased it for a steal, and primarily for the step up in motor and capability. But at the time I thought it had 100 more stitches than I would want. And I confirmed that. A few weeks back I was trying to embellish some plane fabric for a simple attention getter. So I started experimenting with the fancy stitches. The leaf, the flower, some lettering. It was OK. I would expect that someone might see these as a feature capable of creating labels or minor details. The quality is not so good. The flower petals aren't round, the stitch lengths are too long to achieve a neat design. Lucky me, I don't do this often. I'm much more of a straight stitch kind of girl.
Also, the instrument makes an interesting "BONG" noise when I lower the needle, which it doesn't make if I just press on the pedal. The feed dog settings aren't really as sensitive as the number of positions (6). I really only noticed about 3 real positions. This is a common trick on blenders. What does work really well, the feed dogs can be lowered completely out of the way. With a $20 generic open loop foot, I've experimented with some free-motion quilting. Which the machine handled quite well, much better than I did.
I've also taken apart the feed dog cover and have done a manual cleaning, which was easy to do and easy to put back together. SO MUCH LINT! Wow! it was really amazing how much had built up in relatively few hours of quilting. I suggest you open it up and run the vacuum over it after every quilt sized project!
The Auto-threader.... some needles get loaded in or are just a little off center. So sometimes, I've had to push the needle to one side to get the threader through the hole. No big deal. The bigger deal, the little light is not quite enough. But $10 at Ikea got me a tiny and very flexible little lamp for better lighting. I also found the nook to the right of the needle a little small for quilting. I had to pretty tightly roll up the last quilt to get it to fit for the quilting portion. But, with the walking foot, it went so easily! Nice and straight and even. And I didn't have any tension issues the whole time!
My sister has an Emerald in the 100 series, which she likes very much. I believe she has a manual stitch selection knob and little or no electronics. Yet, she makes custom purses from upholstery fabric on hers.

Love my Viking!

So, 9 months later... No, it's not a baby, it's life.

As I was spending my Sunday morning drinking my coffee, enjoying the quiet and browsing through my bookmarks of crafting blogs, I suddenly remembered, "Didn't I start one of these?"

Since November.... Work has really taken over and my motivation has dropped. I have a long commute, and with the hours I keep, I find very little time to give to myself. I wake up between 6 and 6:20, I leave between 6:40 and 7, I get home between 6 and 7, I go to bed at 10PM, on the dot, just before I turn into a pumpkin for the night. That leaves 3-4 hours between getting home and going to bed to do some of the following:

1. Make dinner
2. Play with dog
3. Pet the cats
4. Chat with husband
5. Television
6. Sewing
7. General Computing
8. Landry
9. Dishes
10. House cleaning
11. Personal Hygiene
12. etc. etc.

There just aren't enough hours in the day... Excuse made.

In the last 9 months, I completed a couple projects. And I attempted some more.
1. A quilt for my sister (Referenced in the Nov. 2011 post)
2. A quilt for my friend Sara Jane and her first son, Elijah

3. A dress for my sister (just need to ship it)
4. Started a quilt for my FIRST niece, due in January 2013

And it will be yellow...

5. Purchased fabric and planning many other projects
6. Had a very fruitful garden this year

Garden Week 3

Garden Week 14-ish

At least this has been coming out every week for 4 weeks...

 So, hopefully, I'll post more often so I can track what I've been doing with so little time. I also need to stop watching so much TV and limit my computing... Good goals, I guess.