May Long Weekend—>Quilting

Having several days off to spend solely focussed on quilting is a luxury. And considering that in recent years the May long weekend turns into a rain fest it was a no brainer to choose quilting. My weekend got off on the right “boat” because for some reason I chose to go through Nanaimo’s Duke Point terminal instead of Victoria’s Schwartz Bay terminal, which had nothing but ferry breakdowns causing hours long waits. Quilting started Friday afternoon and went straight through until Monday afternoon with a fabric shopping spree and movie thrown in to shake things up.

All the President's Men

I’d pieced 4 Canuck Place quilts before arriving at Joan’s. It was her job to quilt 3 of them before I put the binding on. The first quilt was completed Friday night with the 3rd Canuck Quilt completed  Monday afternoon. Joan convinced me that I had to sew the bindings on by machine. This means sewing the binding to the back first and bringing it forward to the front of the quilt before machine stitching it down on the front. It took some convincing but I found that it could be sewn neatly if you have a big enough binding and make sure you have really good mitred corners.

Saturday was such a beautiful day that we had the design wall outside to make the most of the natural daylight. In the late afternoon we decided it was time to make a trip to the fabric store as we needed backing for a couple of quilts. While there I spied a sale on batiks and came away with 2 metres…I do, however, have a plan for them and can’t wait to start that quilt.

Magic Tiles

This Magic Tiles quilt was in the 12 separate blocks stage for several years. There was no “grout” left to stitch them together, nor any fabric for the borders. We couldn’t get any more of the fossil fern fabric that was used in the blocks but found an awesome batik that worked well for both the grout and the borders. We also found an awesome backing and now it’s in the lineup to be quilted on Maybelline.

Joan had a jelly roll that needed stitching. For me it was another move towards “modern” quilting. And, I actually didn’t mind the way it turned out, I guess it all depends on the colours in the jelly roll itself. It certainly does stitch up fast! Joan will add borders, quilt it and then give it to her neighbour who is hoping to return home after a stroke.

This Jelly Roll reminded me of the sixties

Heart of a Canuck

My niece Kadi took this opportunity to get working on her 10th anniversary retreat quilt. She is doing an awesome job considering she is a very new quilter. Can’t show you what it looks like as it is to be revealed in September. Trust me when I tell you that it looks fabulous!

the first 3 Canuck Quilts

Overall it was a very productive weekend and something we could do while looking outside watching the rain fall for two thirds of the long weekend.

Happy Quilting…Valerie Raye