A steep learning curve

 Hi all! How has your week been? After a brief respite, we are back to very warm temps. Not great when you're trying to teach in a mask! And the students, who have been great about wearing their masks literally everywhere, are not great about sitting in hot rooms. It will cool down by November, right?

I have some happy news-- I have had another longarm lesson, and I managed to get another quilt done. Yes, I could take some random fabric in with me and use that instead, but it seems like a waste when I have all of these tops that need to be quilted. Why not use them for practice, especially when I know that a few wobbles won't matter? And I remembered how to load everything! Yay me! Here is my latest learning piece:

 

Well, it's colorful and happy, and finished, so that's all that matters, right? I'm actually pretty happy with it. This is the brown bear quilt top that I made from a disassembled kit earlier this year. My granddaughter loves the Brown Bear book, so what can I say? She will love this quilt.

 

Longarming is a ton of fun, and much easier than using a domestic machine, but there is a steep learning curve. I've been trying a lot of different quilting patterns, as directed by the teacher, and while I've been getting better, there are a lot of wobbles and uneven patterns. Yikes-- some of them are quite bad.

 

Thank goodness there is a stitch regulator! A few times I got going a bit too fast, and it certainly shows. Uneven loops! Circles that look like ovals! And I'm not even showing you the feathers! And I won't, either, because golly, those turned out badly. I need a lot more practice on those. And somehow I managed to miss a whole big area (in the turquoise strip), so I'll have to see what I can do about that. I'm happy to say that there are no big tucks or pleats in the backing, though I did manage to get two small ones on the top. I picked out the tucks and then had to re-stitch, which was a lesson in itself.

I have a lot more respect for the physical aspect of longarming, too. Wow, it is a workout! I did two small quilts (this one is about 48 by 54) in about 4 hours, and I think I got about 4,000 steps in that time. And lots of reaching and stretching, too. Much more fun than going to the gym, though.

For the back, I used the dots I bought a couple of weeks ago, and you can get a good perspective on how huge those dots really are. Surprisingly, my dear hubs really likes them! He called it one of the best backings I've ever used. I'm just touched that he noticed! I'm not sure that I knew that he knew what a backing is.

Even though there are plenty of mistakes in this quilt, I am really looking forward to sharing it with my granddaughter. She already knows the difference between a blanket and a quilt, and I can't wait until she sees the characters from the book on the quilt. It will be fun! Plus, it turned out nice and crinkly when I washed it, so all the mistakes are hidden!

So that's my newest lesson! I give myself an A for effort, but a C for actual stitching. Decent grade, but plenty of room for improvement. Looking forward to the next lesson, which will involve more practice and curves. After that I can learn to use pantos, and then-- rulers!

Have a wonderful weekend, everyone. I have another quilt to bind and many other sewing-related things to do, plus I promised myself some ice cream. Hey, it's still plenty warm out, right? I think you should have some too!

 

Sharing at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Finished or Not Friday, and Brag About Your Beauties.

Longarm lessons

 Hi all! How is your week going so far? It is so incredibly humid here that I'm having a hard time breathing outside. I didn't go out walking this morning because when I got up there was already an air quality alert and the humidity was at 88 percent. Okay, I'll sit on the sofa for the morning, thanks! I'm almost hoping for rain. Do you think that would help?

Unbelievably, I have a finish to show today! Everyone knows that finishes are for Fridays, but I'm too excited about it to wait, plus I might forget. Why take the chance? Here is the finish:

 

 

Hurray! This is the top that I made from the blocks in the Color Challenge at Patterns by Jen last year. I'm not doing the challenge this year, but there is something else that is special about this quilt-- it's the first one that I've ever longarmed myself!

 

I had planned to rent time on a long arm a long time ago, before we moved to Maryland, but with one thing and another, it never happened. (I even lost my deposit!) Here we are two years later and this past week I've finally taken the required class and gotten permission to use the long arm at a shop here in Maryland. It's about a half hour from me, but I'm willing to drive it for the chance to do this again.

 

The class was one of the most fun times I've ever had stitching on any machine. There were only two of us in the "class" because there were only two machines for rent, and we each got to use one. We each brought a quilt top and back and actually got to quilt it up during the class. We only used a big meander, which went fast, but we did get through all the steps and the whole quilt. It was so awesome that I have no words.

 

The instructor was really good, and using the machine itself was a dream. Five minutes into the work I was wondering how fast I could save enough money to get myself a long arm. I actually thought, "I have got to get me one of these!" Alas, I'll be renting for a long time!

 

So, here's how nervous I was about using the long arm-- I actually made a pieced backing for the quilt. I never do this, but I figured that if I ruined it, it wouldn't be so bad if it was just leftover pieces. It was actually really hard to mess up, so the backing turned out great, too. These "stripes" are just leftover pieces from previous backings. I bound it in a nice gold from my basket o' scrap bindings, so everything in this quilt except the border is a scrap of some sort.

This quilt is a bit dear to my heart because it kept me sane through the very challenging year of 2020. Sometimes I forget it's 2021 because last year was so weird and stressful. I feel like we should have a do-over! The blocks brought me comfort, and the finishing brought me joy, so I'm donating this one so that someone else can have some comfort and joy, too, especially if they're in a challenging situation. I washed it and it came out nice and crinkly, and now it's off to it's new home.

There's the story of this quilt! I've already made another longarm reservation for a few weeks from now, and I'll be trying out some better freehand patterns then. The meandering was just learning to use the machine, go the right speed, etc. There is no computerization on these machines, so I'm on the lookout for a simple pattern I can practice. It will be fun, if imperfect!

Hope you all are having a good week. If anyone needs me, I'll be sitting next to the dehumidifier!

Sharing at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished or Not Friday, and Oh Scrap!