Marshmallow

It's my favourite candy - marshmallow.

 

 Not just at Easter with little chicks anymore. My daughter spotted these gingerbread man Peeps and since she knows that I like them, they were purchased and brought home. They do have a mild gingerbread flavour too.

Current projects

Red Heart yarn has a great site for patterns for knitting and crocheting. For the 12 weeks leading up to Christmas they feature a couple of projects each week and they also give the instructions to make them. Here's the link to all the pattern offerings so far.  A mini hat and mitten garland and a crocheted wrapper for sweet treats is the latest. Last week, which was week seven, there was the cutest little sweater ornament and a crocheted raccoon.

The instructions say that I still have to crochet the front edge. I may add a flower just like the original but I will not be adding the pocket.

I'm adding a bit of outline embroidery on my Christmas Quilt Along challenge. It's coming along and should be finished in time for the big reveal.

There are some other things that I am knitting but since they are supposed to be a surprise, I won't show them until they are completed and gifted.

Blogathon Canada

It started yesterday.


 Go check it out. You will find many quilters right across this wonderful country. Click on the button to the right and it will bring you to a list of blogs that are featured for every day this week.

Go have fun exploring new quilting blogs. Thanks goes to Sew Sisters Quilt Shop for putting it all together.

Taming bias edges

Quilts are nice when the blocks are set on point.

  In Aunt Alice's quilt, the 16-patch blocks are set on point and the outer, border blocks are either half square triangles or quarter square triangles. 

This navy blue polka dot fabric is what I had decided on to use for the edge triangles. It's a cotton and I wanted to make sure that I didn't have a problem with the bias stretching.

I cut my large squares as per the pattern instructions. These are supposed to be then cut in half for the side triangles.

What I did was first draw a line from corner to corner. I drew on the reverse side but it really didn't matter if the line was on the right side of the fabric. This will be the cutting line.

Then I sewed a line about 1/8th of an inch away from the line...

 on either side of the line - from corner to corner...

using a long, basting stitch.

Since I also needed four smaller, corner triangles, I drew a line from the other corners also and sewed on either side of that line too.

 Then, the squares can be cut either in half, for the side triangles or...

in four triangles for the corners.

For those of you who have never sewn clothing, this is called stay stitching. It helps to stabilize the sides so that they don't go all wonky before the quilting is done and the binding is put on.

I hope this helps someone out there who wants to use half square or quarter square triangles for the edges of their quilts but were afraid of working with bias edges.

Tuesday Treat

Just photos.

COWBOY COUNTRY - how can you tell?