A Colonoscopy Quilting Bee For One

In case you were wondering how many hexagon rosettes Rebecca can stitch together in the time it takes a skilled gastroenterologist to perform a routine colonoscopy, the answer is ONE.  Behold, the fruits of my labors:

The Cuteness of the Bunny Rabbit Hexie Rosette!

I will not be sharing the photos of what the GE surgeon accomplished whilst I was stitching, as that would be gross.  😉

I suppose I should clarify that I was not the patient on the receiving end of today's colonoscopy.  I was the wife and designated driver of the patient, forced to endure 3 dreary hours in the hospital waiting room without benefit of any of the fun party drugs they gave to Bernie for his "procedure."  I estimate that it took me somewhere between 1 1/2 to 2 hours to stitch up my bunny rabbit surrounded by stars, and this activity put me in much better spirits than I was in after getting lost in the parking deck and struggling to find my way to the Endoscopy department of the hospital after dropping Bernie off at the front door.  Fun times.  Had I not brought a hand sewing project, I might have bit someone's head off.  Sewing really is a win for everyone.

My collection of hexagon rosettes is growing!  Fourteen completed, 154 more needing to be made.  I keep saying that I should get back to making the blocks for this quilt (or clean the bathroom, or start getting the tax documents ready for our accountant).  And then I decide that I shall definitely do all of those important things... Right after I make just one more cute little rosette.

14 Finished Hexie Rosettes!  154 More to Go

In other news, there is a quilt on my long arm frame.  It is a 2024 temperature quilt top made by one of my favorite clients, and it was impeccably pieced but it has been giving me some grief and forcing me to spend more alone time with my seam ripper than I would like.  😬. 

Spiral Quilting on Carrie's Temperature Quilt

I am experiencing thread breaks and shredding when the quilting direction is traveling up and towards the back left corner of the frame.  I have tried all of the usual remedies, like new needle, larger needle, different type of needle, tension adjustments, looser tension on the quilt sandwich, silicone thread lubricant, changing to a different thread (hence four days of ripping out the first row of quilting using the other thread).  Then today I thought to have Bernie check the positioning of the leveling "dead bar" -- that's the bar in the photo above with the tape measure attached -- and it was mounted too high, but even after adjusting it my thread shredding issues persist.  Super annoying.  It's possible something needs tweaking with my longarm frame after transporting and reassembling it after the move, but when I had issues like this several years ago it was caused by a burr (tiny scratch) on my machine's hook and I needed my Bernina dealer to diagnose that and buff it out for me.  

Happy Valentine's Day! I Love You More...

Happy Valentine's Day!  Y'all, I have been holding onto photos of this quilt for over a year because I wanted to use it for a timely Valentine's Day post, and then I forgot all about it last Valentine's Day.  Then I forgot about it again this year, until I was drinking my coffee this morning and realized that Valentine's Day is already NOW.  No time like the present, no day like today, and here we go --

My friend Marybeth made this sweet 36" x 36" Valentine's Day table topper quilt and I quilted it for her in September of 2024 using Karlee Porter's "I Love You More" edge-to-edge quilting design to really lean into the holiday theme and make the quilt feel like a Valentine.

36 x 36 Valentine's Day Table Topper Quilt Made by Marybeth, Quilted by Moi

This is one of those quilting designs that looks scary busy when you're looking at a black and white line drawing of the design, but as you can see here, the quilting can still be quite subtle if you use the right thread.  I used one of my favorite "supporting actress" quilting threads here, So Fine 50 wt matte polyester thread in color Blizzard from Superior Threads (this blog post contains affiliate links).  Notice in the photo below that even though Blizzard is a bright white matched to Marybeth's white background fabric, the thinness of So Fine thread causes the stitching to "take on" a lot of the color from the other fabrics.  So on those pink triangle patches, the white thread looks like it's the exact same shade of pink, and even where the white thread crosses dark red fabric, the contrast isn't drastic because the white thread looks more pink there than pure white.  

So Fine Thread Disappears Into the Fabrics

So Fine is a matte (not shiny) polyester thread that resembles cotton.  In fact, in lighter colors, the look of So Fine is indistinguishable from cotton in my opinion.  However, polyester is a lot stronger than cotton thread of a comparable weight would be, so even though this is a very fine, skinny thread, it's still plenty strong even for quilts that will be heavily used and frequently laundered.  These qualities would also make So Fine thread a great choice for English paper piecing or for hand or machine appliqué projects.  

And Then There Were Eight: More Hexie Rosettes for Stonefields Quilt Border

Greetings from the Land of the Ice and Snow, formerly the Carolinas!  I've been making the most of my snow days, continuing with the hexie rosettes for my Stonefields Quilt borders.  These little rosettes are addictive because they turn out so differently depending on the fabrics selected and how they are used in the rosettes.  Two alternating fabrics for petals?  Similar or contrasting?  All petals the same fabric?  Cut randomly, or "fussy cut" to capture a specific motif from the fabric print?  Each little rosette has its own personality.  So fun!

8 Hexie Rosettes Finished, 160 to Go

I am enjoying the hexie rosettes so much that I will probably be sad when I have enough for my quilt and stop making them.  It will feel like right after you I've eaten the last Godiva truffle out of the box, and I really REALLY want just one more bite of chocolate but they are all gone...  (Note to self: order Godiva truffles for Valentine's Day.  Note to readers: This blog post will contain affiliate links).  

I did manage to get out to my favorite local quilt shop with my friend Marybeth in between the ice storm and the snow storm, on the one afternoon when the roads were passable.  Several of my neighbors timidly ventured out to stock up on groceries or to fill their prescriptions, but I know how to set PRIORITIES when there's a winter weather advisory.  I drove past at least eight grocery stores on our way to the quilt shop.  

Rosettes for Stonefields Quilt Border + Ongoing Experiments with English Paper Piecing

Happy Slow Stitching Sunday!  You guys, I have finally been sewing again for the first time since moving back to North Carolina!  I had so much fun making the tiny 3/8" hexie rosettes for Stonefields Quilt blocks #14 & 15 back in September, so I decided that making a few of the 168 larger 3/4" hexie rosettes that I will need for my border might be a good task to ease myself out of my stitching slump.  It turned out to be the perfect choice.  As Tula Pink says, you have to eat your elephant one little bite at a time.

3 Rosettes Completed, 165 More Needed for Stonefields Quilt Border

I would have finished more than three of these, but I spent about two hours ransacking my studio closets, bins and drawers searching for my All Points Patchwork: English Paper Piecing Beyond the Hexagon... book by Diane Gilleland.  (This post contains affiliate links).  To my supreme irritation, I never did find it.  I was also unable to locate my little black and gold pack of John James size 12 Milliners needles, even though I swear I remember finding them mixed in with unrelated supplies when I was unpacking.  Where, oh where did I put those needles?  Before I moved, I could put my hands on just about any book, tool or notion in less than 5 minutes.  A place for everything and everything in its place and all that.  Well, I caved and ordered more needles on Amazon, but I did not buy another copy of the book as it's sure to turn up sooner or later.

My Stonefields Quilt (pattern by Susan Smith is getting harder to find, but there is still one copy available on Etsy here) was purchased from a quilt shop and came kitted with the necessary EPP template papers for 3/4" hexagons.  I can't remember whether this nifty windowed acrylic template for fussy cutting came with the kit as well, or if I purchased it separately from Paper Pieces.  For hexies that I wanted to cut from stripes or centering specific printed motifs from my fabric, I traced around the template with a mechanical pencil and sandpaper beneath the fabric, then cut the hexies out individually with scissors.

Tracing Acrylic Template Prior to Cutting Hexies With Scissors

These flowers from my Tilda fabric were cut in the same way, centering the template window on the flowers and tracing around them one by one with pencil, then cutting out each shape with scissors.  So much fun!  But OH SO SLOW...

More Fussy Cutting With Window Template

There was a silver lining to the chaos in my studio and the missing EPP book, because after wasting two hours looking for things I never found, I wasted invested a couple more hours going down a rabbit hole of YouTube English Paper Piecing tutorials, trying to find the method I used successfully for the smaller hexie rosettes I made four months ago.  Remember that I am an EPP newbie, and making two of something is not enough repetition to ingrain everything indelibly in my brain.  

Sorry, (Not Sorry), This Is NOT a Nine Patch Variation

If you've signed up to receive the email newsletter from the International Quilt Museum at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, you were treated to a photo of this glorious Civil War era antique quilt by an unknown maker yesterday:

93.5 x 85.5 Quilt From IQM Collection, circa 1860-1880

Look at the masterful color and value placement and deployment of design principles in this quilt that was created by someone who definitely did not have a "design wall" and probably didn't have any formal art training, either.  I love how those two opposite L-shaped brackets of darker blocks and the dark brown blocks surrounding the blue ones in the center create framing and structure similar to a medallion quilt for a one-block quilt that could have been dizzyingly busy with a random block placement.  I love how the strips of pink blocks do the same thing, but with more subtlety.  I love the glimmer of the teal center patches and the one block with the bright blue.  I was immediately captivated by this quilt, but scratched my head by its designation by the museum as a "Nine Patch Variation" and the newsletter description stating that this quilt contained "small diamonds" in addition to squares, rectangles and triangle patches.  

New Year's Day 2026: Studio Setup Continues with Design Wall, Ruler Peg Wall + Quilting Thread Racks

Hello and Happy New Year 2026.  I hope you all enjoyed wonderful holidays with your loved ones that were some combination of happy/healthy/peaceful/blessed/magical/exciting/restful and all the other good adjectives.  For those of us whose holidays were tarnished by things like grief/sadness/illness/disappointment/loneliness, I am sending out a big virtual group hug and a high five to you right now, because we made it through and we survived and now we are looking at a blank sheet of paper, a fresh bolt of fabric, and an empty design wall of possibilities for what we will choose to make of this brand new year.  Carpe Annum 2026!

The extra work of the Christmas season -- shopping, wrapping, Christmas cards, returning and exchanging -- necessitated a pause in the work of unpacking from our recent move and setting up my sewing studio in the new house, but we've used some of the quiet days between Christmas and New Year's to make progress in the studio again.  No, none of these Stonefields blocks is newly created, but this is the first time I'm seeing them again since I packed them up in Florida in October.  I have been struggling with motivation in recent weeks, especially with regards to setting up my sewing space, and I am hoping that these little quilt blocks will cheer me up and summon my "sewjo" to return to me.

Stonefields Blocks Unpacked and Back On My Design Wall

Here's what I decided to do with my design wall:

96 x 96 Design Wall Installed on Obtuse Angle Adjacent Walls

The new studio space has lots of windows and closet space.  Wall space suitable for an 8' x 8' design wall was in shorter supply.  I considered putting the design wall behind my long arm machine, but realized that there wasn't enough room back there for me to be climbing up and down on a step stool to arrange blocks.  So I convinced my husband that the design wall should go in this corner of the room instead: