Saturday, September 2, 2017

Geez, That Didn't Necessarily End Well.

I got a new toy the other day.  I saw some designers blog that had a YouTube thingy on how to do bindings, quick as a snap!  I am all in for that!



You had to buy a special foot to do it.    Bias binding foot.  Well, it is Frank's money, so what the hey.  I always look on amazon to see if I can get it cheaper.  And it was.  Quite a bit, and it looked exactly the same.  So I sprung for $3.99 and free shipping.

Not surprisingly, my package arrived.....from China.

I decided I would make some small quilted pieces and practice on them with that new foot.  I looked at the videos several times.  When I felt confident, I should say, over confident, I decided to use it for the first time on Sawyer's Dino Quilt.  I figured it would just be for me and him and if I was not perfect, he would love it anyway.

I had quilted the Dino Quilt this afternoon with a new Ripple panto.  Nice.  It was a bit confusing at the beginning, I had to backtrack twice till I got used to the lines that crossed everywhere!







I set my iPad up on my other new toy, a  pillow stand from Carol at Quilted Fiber Art.  Obviously she should be called Quilted Fiber Art And iPad Stands since she had a whole box of these guys on her blog the other day.  Thank you!  I love the dogs!
 




 I have a fly in here, driving me crazy.




I cut my binding and pressed it like normal.  Then I realized that was wrong. So I spent nearly an hour looking for the bias tape maker I have in 3 sizes.  Looked EVERYWHERE!  I found an unopened ripper I bought then lost.  I found a bag of pens I accused Frank of stealing, a pair of thread snippers I was pretty sure I bought, and I found the ripper I bought to replace the ripper I couldn't find!


I also found some binding clips that someone, Mari I think, sent me in a Care Package.  When I finally
found a couple of the bias tape makers they were the 1/8 inch and 1/4 inch ones.  So I went back to the old school way and pressed the sides toward the center.

Stupid fly, does he ever rest?  I can feel the breeze of his wings as he passes.

So I got things set up to go now.

It was awkward at first.  And it was a bit wobbly.  Even though this was a small quilt I immediately wished I had not been so confident and stuck with my plan for small pieces first.  Remember that if you decide to acquire one of these feet.

Damn this fly.  He has been buzzing me all night.  And we do not own a flyswatter.  On my list for tomorrow though!

Finally I got into a rhythm.  When I repositioned the quilt one time I accidentally moved the bottom piece out of the channel and it got wonky.  This is not the place for wonky so I decided to rip a small section out and redo it.



Well......this happened. No problem, I will just rip a bit further, cut it out and splice it back together.  Done.

I had to maneuver a bit to get it back in the channel and set  up again but when i looked on the back I saw the feed must have shifted because it was no longer sewing on the edge of the binding.

I needed to rip that out too.  I decided that was enough, between the fly and the foot I was done with the whole thing for the time being.  So I ripped out all the way back to the beginning with my newfound ripper.


That's it, that fly has gotten on my last nerve  There is not a dog worth his salt in this house to catch him.  And both boys are in here with me getting buzzed too!





After I sewed the binding on in the NORMAL fashion, I  broke out the new binding clips.  Pretty good!  I am not one to ever pin my binding, but I really think I like these clippy things.

I obviously didn't fully appreciate the gift until now!

So the whole night didn't turn out as I had thought.  And it didn't end well for the binding foot........or the fly either.

But I do love the quilt.  And I am pretty darned sure Sawyer will too.






5 comments:

  1. Now, before you fuss at me, I'm sorry for not visiting in a while. I don't even have an excuse that I can think up right now. I'll go back and read a few posts. (Promise. I forgot how funny you can be.) In the meantime, while you're dealing with flies, take on a few mosquitoes. They are a plague. A mean, buzzing, biting, annoying plague. Worse than flies but they are close contenders.

    So Sawyer's quilt is just too cute and perfect for a little boy. He will love it and drag it around Linus-like for years. Sweet finish!

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  2. A quicker way is to phone a friend who loves to hand bind! She trades quilting for binding.

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  3. Great quilt - glad you get to keep it at home!

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  4. You are a hoot! What more can I say...maybe a prayer for the fly!

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  5. What a post! Flies drive me crazy too. I will keep a thin catalogue around to roll up and whack any flying insects that dare to invade my space because usually I can't find the flyswatter. Too bad the new foot did not work out. I always use a simple embroidery style stitch rather than a straight stitch if I machine sew on my binding. That way I don't have to be super precise and it adds a bit of fancy to a simple quilt.

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