Sister's Choice Quilts

Where to Find the Angler Two

Several people have asked me where they can find the Angler Two sewing guide.  It is a hard to find item, as most quilt shops do not seem to carry it.  I have gone through two of them in my life, and each one was purchased at a quilt shop that has gone out of business.  I did a Google search for "Pam Bono Designs"  (she invented it) and "Angler Two Sewing Guide" and got these results:

Pam Bono Designs--$6.00

Soft Expressions--$5.25

It is money well spent.  In fact, buy two and give one to a quilting friend!

The Angler Two

For my Carrie Nelson class project "Jellystone", I have been making half square triangles.  A lot of them.  Around 300 to be exact.  The method we used in class was the traditional way of drawing a line from corner to corner on a light background square, sewing a quarter inch on each side of the line, then cutting on the line to get your two half square triangles. 

That means you have to draw a lot of lines to get 300 half square triangles.  I get bored drawing lines, and want to just get to the sewing part.  You may notice that my square in the picture above has no line drawn on it, yet the stitching looks pretty good, yes?  I am about to share a little secret with you.  It is called the Angler Two.

This little gizmo is a miracle.  You just line it up and tape it to the throat plate of your sewing machine, and line the corners of your square up with the proper line and sew away.  You can use this for making half square triangles, flying geese, snowball blocks, you name it.  It is a huge time saver, and I really recommend it.  How accurate is it?  I will show you.

Here is a finished half square triangle made with the Angler Two attachment.  And below is the square lined up with my 2 1/2 inch square ruler:

I LOVE the Angler Two!  You still have to trim off your dog ears from all your squares though.  If only they would come up way for us to skip that step...

Jellystone AKA The Humility Block

istockphoto

Remember old Yogi Bear from Jellystone Park?  "Hey Boo Boo!  I am smarter than the averrrr-age bear!"  "Hey Boo Boo!  Want to go on a piiiick-a-nick?"  Well, Carrie Nelson named one of the classes she taught us "Jellystone", because her new pattern features a variation of the classic Bear Paw block.  I can't show you a photo of Carrie's finished quilt, because it has not yet been published.  What I will do, however, is take you through a couple of construction elements that had me fairly confuzzled.

Now, you all know me as being a careful piecer.  I pride myself on my neat and accurate work.  Maybe I was star struck being in the same room as Carrie Nelson, maybe my girlfriend Lisa was distracting me, I don't know.  The fact is, I have never had such a piecing fiasco in my life.  There are a number of ways one can go wrong putting the elements of this block together, and let me just say I am familiar with them all. 

Here is the first unit we were asked to assemble:

And this is how mine turned out:

All righty then.  Next, I show you a photo of one quarter of the finished bear paw block:

And this is my effort:

Of course just at the precise moment it is dawning on me that something is very weird with this block, Carrie strolls by my table, picks up the block and says sympathetically "Oh, Nicole.  This can be your humility block".  Suffice it to say, I felt a bit foolish.   Since I know I am smarter than the averrrr-age bear, I was sure I could get this thing right.  Humility block?  In MY quilt?  I don't think so.  I am not having any humility blocks.

My silly mistakes did provoke a very funny discussion about finding a major construction mistake in a quilt that has been already quilted.  Carrie says that if you make a mistake and it accidently ends up in your quilt, it will always be exactly eye level in a hanging quilt, and exactly the first thing that anyone notices in it.  Carrie pointed out to us that in her new quilt Storyteller, there is a big boo boo in one of the block orientations.  Can you find it?  Even quilting Rock Stars make mistakes.

Side Dishes

This is a picture of some of the side dishes I served at my dinner party on Saturday.  The nice thing about them is that they can all be prepared well ahead of time and served chilled or at room temperature.  They tasted pretty darn good too! 

The main part of the dinner was a mixed grill of steak and chicken, so I wanted to offer some tasty side dishes that could also be vegetarian options for those who do not eat meat.  This was the first time I had ever made these recipes. I know, I know, they tell you never to experiment on your guests, but what the heck, life is too short to stick to the tried and true all the time!  Happily, they all turned out to be terrific, so I thought I would share with you.

The dish on the right is the tortellini salad.  It is comprised of cheese tortellini, roasted red peppers, and a dressing made of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, basil, parsley, garlic and green onions.  I got the recipe from foodnetwork.com  Roasting the peppers and peeling them sounds a bit labor intensive, but trust me, it wasn't bad at all.

The dish in the middle is an eggplant salad from the Silver Palate Cookbook.  This was so simple, you hardly even need a recipe.  Roast three peeled and diced eggplants (drizzled with olive oil, salt, and lots of minced garlic) at 400 degrees for 35 minutes, then combine them with two large sauteed onions and a dressing made of of 1/2 cup good olive oil, and the juice of two lemons.  Add a bunch of minced fresh basil and toss. 

The dish on the right is a white bean salad.  With this dish you do have to plan ahead and soak and cook one pound of small white beans in advance.  Make sure the beans are done enough, but not mushy.  You want them to retain their shape.  Then simply toss with a dressing made with 1 cup olive oil, 2/3 cup of lemon juice, 1/4 cup white wine vinegar, 1/2 tsp dried thyme, salt and pepper to taste.  Add in 1 1/2 cups diced celery, 1/2 of a red pepper, lots of chopped parsley, and half a diced onion. 

My Favorite Moment

My favorite moment when I entertain is that magical half hour before the guests arrive and I stand in the middle of the room appreciating how nice everything looks.  The house is clean, the table is set, the flowers arranged, the food mostly prepared, the wine chilling---all we need are the guests.  That moment never seems to last quite long enough.  In just a moment the door bell will ring, greetings and hugs will be exchanged, coats and purses flung down, wine poured and happy chaos will ensue.  The next three or four hours will pass in a blur.  Conversations will be held, jokes told, the decorations admired, the food eaten, the wine drunk, dishes dirtied, spills wiped up, coats and purses found and guests ushered out the door.  Everything will be over with way too fast.

Upon reflection, all of the preparations were worth the effort, a good time was had by all, and every moment is to be savored for more in depth examination later.  It is all about relationships and taking the trouble to sustain them.  Friends, home, family, good food---I feel very lucky indeed.

Juggling

No, I am not about to juggle these eggs, but it sure feels like I am multitasking all the time lately!

Is it just me, or is this summer simply racing by?  Every potentially lazy, relaxing day turns into a whirl wind of activity by noon.  All I want to do is sit out on the chaise lounge reading or hide out in my sewing room and sew something---but it just doesn't happen.  My library books are due already, but still unread; my ten different quilting projects are in the exact same stage of being unfinished as they were three weeks ago.  What's up?  Is this typical of what happens during summer?  Are we by nature more industrious at this time of year, therefore more sedentary activities fall by the wayside until the weather turns nasty?

Is sure isn't as if I haven't been busy.  On Thursday I found out that I am entertaining eight people on Saturday night, two of whom will be house guests for the weekend.  (Yes, that is today, so this will be a short post).  Now, I LOVE entertaining, and planning the menu and cooking the food is dead easy for me.  Decorating the table?  Piece of cake.  But *cleaning the house* .....  Oh brother.  There is nothing like having company to make me look at my house with a critical eye.

My poor husband has been my willing slave in the monumental cleaning activities I proposed.  Lucky for me, because I couldn't do most of them myself.  The curtains?  Up went the big ladder, down came the curtains for cleaning, and of course, up they had to go again.  The slip cover on the sofa?  Off it came and into the wash with it.  It sure came off a lot easier than it went back on, is all I can say.  The carpet in the family room?  OMG.  You should have SEEN the water from the rug shampooer----ick.

So the house is clean, but now I have to go cook!  Talk to you all tomorrow!

This was close!

I needed to put the binding on my early fall quilt, but since it had been a year since I finished the thing, I couldn't find the fabric I had set aside to use for the binding.  I have no clue why I procrastinate so much when it comes to sewing on the bindings to my quilts.  The hand sewing isn't an issue--it seems to me to be a rather calming and peaceful activity.  I love the picture I have in my mind of me sitting on the sofa doing hand work--very domestic and kind of womanly.  Do any of you find that you delay sewing on your bindings too?  What are your reasons? 

Anyway, after searching around in my stash out in the garage for an hour, I finally located a piece of one of the fabrics I had used in the quilt in the stash box labeled "Browns".  A very small piece. 

I figured if I cut my binding narrow (2 inches) I would possibly have enough fabric to go around the quilt.  You can see in the photo above how much fabric I had left over after cutting my eight strips.

I know I recently posted a picture of the quilt, but here it is again:

 

The pattern came from a book called "Wild About Flowers", and is called "Three Bean Salad".  Super fast and easy to do.  In fact, every pattern in that book is a winner.

This is the fun all over quilting design of sunflowers, which really shows through on the back side.

Blocks #5 and #6

Some how between house guests, helping out my cousin with a fashion show, and reading Harry Potter, I managed to finish block number 6 of the sampler quilt project I am working on with Lisa.  I thought I was ahead of the game, having had block number 5 done two weeks ago, but life got in the way and I never got around to block six until the very last minute, just in time to post today! 

I am enjoying this sampler challenge, and as I was telling Lisa, it seems like this quilt top is coming together so easily, the way we are working on it every now and then in between our other projects.  The variety in all the blocks is definitely keeping my interest, and I have a feeling it will be a real favorite once it is quilted.  Mine is going over my brown leather chair in my living room.  The subdued chocolate, tan and red colors will be a subtle, but still quilty decorator touch to that room.

If you haven't had a chance to check out Lisa's blog site "Stashmaster", be sure you do--she has a brand new look that will knock your socks off!

Happy Monday!  Hope you all have a great start to your week.

Finito

I was working on an original quilt design for my daughter Sara to use in her upcoming shop, and this is what I came up with.  It was going to be bigger, and it was supposed to be easy, but those things didn't happen.  The pattern was intended to be aimed at a beginning level quilter, and it turned out to be way more tricky than I thought it would be.  When I got well into the project, I decided the experience would be just too frustrating for a beginner, so I made the quilt top into a crib size, and maybe Sara can give it away to friends who recently had a baby.  It just will not work for a beginner level quilt kit.  I am back to the drawing board for an easy pattern that would be appropriate for these yummy Joel Dewberry fabrics.  Don't you love the bird print border?  It calms everything right down after the craziness of the center blocks. 

Coming up with original designs is hard, but writing accurate pattern instructions is even more challenging.  I have written one pattern for Sara, and my sister Kate is testing it out as I write this.  She started working on it yesterday, and by the time she got to the second item on the instruction list she had come up with around six editing suggestions.  If you are writing a pattern that someone else is going to use their expensive fabric and valuable time on, you have absolutely got to get it right.  I would feel ghastly if the yardage amounts were wrong, or the instructions said to cut 2 1/2 inch strips when it should have been 2 3/4 inch strips.  There are just so many ways to go wrong!  No matter how good your intentions and how many times you double and triple check, you must have someone else follow the directions and actually make the project to detect any errors. 

You all know how much I love to sew and make quilts, but pattern creating and writing is one of the hardest things I have ever done!

Sewing With Friends

Long post today, but stick with me, and look at all the pictures.  You'll be glad you did!

I spent Wednesday doing one of my favorite things.  I went to my sewing group called "Banish the UFO's", which has been meeting for years at a local quilt shop, under the tutelage of our Leader and Quilt Guru, Bev Stookey.  The group meets two Wednesdays and one Sunday a month, and we regulars have gotten to be very close and supportive friends over the years.  Today was no exception, we spent approximately 75% of our time together chit-chatting and 25% actually doing any productive sewing.  In other words, we had a ball.

Since I haven't done anything particularly productive myself lately, I decided to post on the projects my friends are working on or have recently completed.  Enjoy!

The quilt above was done by my friend Connie, who is a very prolific and talented quilter.  Go back up and click on it to enlarge it.  Her quilt was done in shades of green, gold, and light orange.  The background fabric is not black, but the darkest green.  It is so fall like in feeling, and so beautifully executed.  She does all her own quilting too.  When she displayed it, she said firmly, "This one is MINE".  She gives so many of her fabulous quilts away, we all applauded her decision to keep this beauty for herself.  Seriously, this woman is amazing.  Last summer she and her dachshund Maggie took a trip across the United States, visiting quilt shops in every state.  She toted her Featherweight along with her, and at night she would stitch up things she had bought along the way!

The quilt above is one my friend Barbara just got back from being quilted.  It may look like a sweet and simple baby quilt, but please click on the photo to enlarge it so you can see the gorgeous quilting custom done by our Guru Bev.  She plans to give it to some lucky mom-to-be in the next couple of weeks.

This is another quilt of Barbara's, a pattern called "Mrs. No-Name".  She made it at a quilt camp led by Guru Bev a year or so ago.  Cool block, isn't it?  Bev also did the quilting on this one.

The next quilts are quilts in progress, so you can just get a glimpse of the blocks made so far.  The next three pictures are of blocks Joyce has made for a fabulous heirloom quality pieced and appliqued quilt that will take her decades to complete.

The blocks pictured below were whipped up in no time flat by my friend Bette.  Bette has been sewing for years, and is just the most inspiring and fun person to know.  Whenever we get together, we jabber so much, it is a wonder we ever get any sewing done.  Wish you all could meet her, you'd love her too.  Bette's project was a kit she bought, which is comprised of vaguely 4th of July fabrics done up in a Friendship block with kind of a woven thing going on.  I loved the design so much I asked her if I could borrow the pattern.  She looked at me sheepishly for a count of ten, then reached into her tote bag and handed over a pattern.  Not looking me directly in the eye, she said, "Umm, I accidentally bought two of these patterns, so this one's yours".  Love it when that happens!  Usually it's me handing over a duplicate purchase, so this was a nice reversal!

Last, but certainly not least is my vastly talented sister Kate, whom you have met before in previous posts.  She is currently working on a quilt for her daughter Maddi, using the April Cornell Sunshine fabric group by Moda.  I think you will agree with me, that this is one of the most appealing designs using that fabric line.  Isn't it sweet and summery?

Having quilting friends is one of the greatest joys of my life, and I hope you enjoyed seeing some of my talented friends' work.  I wish you dear blogging friends could have all been with us.  You would have had a blast.