Sunday, August 23, 2015

Things didn’t go so well yesterday afternoon. I taped my backing to the kitchen floor, laid and smoothed the batting over top and then added my quilt top. How could I have been just an inch short on all sides of my backing? So it was back to my sewing machine to find a way to add strips to each side that didn’t make it look like I was adding a strip to each side.

I redid the sandwich first thing this morning and things worked out better. I have a feeling I may run into a seam on the backing when I go to do my binding but I’ll worry about that when the time comes. I also got my quilt for Family Place sandwiched.

Today was the Studio Tour in Powell River and there were a couple of places I wanted to check out. The first was a pottery studio; Dee is on the Cranberry Hall board with Pat and we’ve had lots of opportunity to chat. I’m not really a pottery fan but I think it is the colours Dee uses that draws me to her work. Her booth was right beside me at Art in the Park last weekend and I fully intended to purchase one of her large mugs to use as my tea cup. I didn’t get to it then but I picked it up today. She wasn’t really doing a tour of her studio (she had her gallery open) but since I was the only one there she showed me her workspace, kiln and answered a few questions for me.

Next stop was to one of our long-arm quilters. I enjoy Shawn’s company and her work is amazing; all free-hand, but done on her long-arm machine. We had a good chat about quilting “things” and she gave me lots of tips. I even had the opportunity to try my hand on the long-arm; it was much easier than I imagined it would be. Maybe it was just my first impression, but it seems easier to move the machine than to move the fabric through the machine. The machine costs way too much for me to ever test that theory out though.

So, after lunch, there was no escaping my own date with my quilting machine. I’ve made a start and, so far, all is going well.