Good Morning, Quilty Peeps! As you can see by my way-too-long blog post title, I have lots of ground to cover today. First things first, I am happy to report that I've finished prepping ALL of the remaining broderie perse rosebuds for my FrankenWhiggish Rose blocks, they are all glue-basted in position on the blocks, and the hand stitching to secure them is in progress. That's right; I have a portable hand stitching project again FINALLY!
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| All FrankenWhiggish Rosebuds Are Prepped and Ready for Stitching! |
In case anyone is interested in what's in my portable hand stitching "toolbox" for this project:
- YLI 100 wt silk thread in color 256, matched to the rosebud fabric
- Bohin size 12 Appliqué Needles (these are the only ones I've tried that don't bend or break on me)
- Colonial Needle Company Leather Thimble Pad stickers (I use one on my right pointer finger to help grab the needle and pull it through the fabric, or to protect my fingertip when I need to exert a little pressure on the back end of the needle to force it through a spot where the glue dried stiff)
- Thread Heaven (no longer available) or Thread Magic thread conditioner to help prevent snarling and knotting -- I don't need it when I'm using silk thread, but I have it in my hand stitching kit because it's a big help when I'm hand stitching quilt bindings with cotton thread
- My new 2.75 magnification sewing glasses from Warby Parker, so I can thread the eye of my needle and see how many threads of fabric I'm grabbing with each stitch
- That nail file in my kit is actually for my fingernails, because often I'll discover some little scratchy spot at the edge of a fingernail while stitching when the thread gets hung up on it
- Not pictured, I also have a tube of Neutrogena Hand Cream in my hand sewing kit and another one in the drawer next to my sewing machine. I like this kind because it's not greasy, has no fragrance or dye, and a tiny drop goes a long way to just barely moisten my fingertips so I can get a better grip on what I'm stitching without gooking it up with lotion
- Either my Apliquick 4" Microserrated Scissors (pictured) or my Gingher Spring Action Thread Nippers (preferred if I'm just clipping thread and not trimming needle turn appliqué shapes while stitching). If I'm planning to take my hand stitching kit on an airplane, I'll swap out for a cheap thread clipper (in case Airport Security confiscates it and throws it away) with a pack of dental floss that I could use as a backup thread trimmer in a pinch
(Those are affiliate links, by the way). You probably won't see much of FrankenWhiggish for a couple weeks while I'm stitching the rosebuds to the blocks because, if you've seen one of my blocks get rosebuds, you've seen them all! My Seven Sisters pattern and templates finally arrived from Australia and I'm planning to start on that project in September.
Instead of sharing FrankenWhiggish, I thought I might share some of the backlog of long arm quilting clients' quilts that I haven't posted about before, like Michele's version of Emily Dennis's Log Cabin Stars quilt. Here's a teaser to whet your appetite; we'll return to this quilt later in today's blog post:
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| Michele's Log Cabin Stars Quilt, Pattern Available here |
