What's Happening!

I have been working on my Christmas Diamonds quilt top...slowly.  A few minutes here and there. I have my Pfaff  Ambition 1.0 setup in the hallway so that I can work on this project alone.  RetiredHub gets a kick out of me flitting from one machine to another to get some work done on each project. Everytime he comes into the basement I am sitting at a different machine, working on a different project.  I really love that I am able to devote a machine to a project so that I dont have to pick up and move everything when I am finished each time.  My Pfaff QE 4.0 is devoted to freemotion quilting at the moment.  We even have a  Kenmore set up in the furnace room.  We are working on sewing up new lawn chair frames from vinyl.  More on that later. 

 

I have a finish!  Just in time for Dad's 87th birthday this weekend.  His actual birthday isnt until May 14 but we are doing Mother's Day and his birthday together this year.   And also just in time for Show and Tell on Wednesday for our May meeting of the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild.  I was so inspired by guild buddy Jenn's rendition of this quilt, "Deer in the Headlights" by Boo Davis that I knew I just had to make one.  I  didn't want a bedsized quilt so I downsized it to 24" x  28", a nice size for a wallhanging. 

My rendition of  "Deer in the Headlights" by Boo Davis    My quilt measures 24" x 28"

 For the blue background swirls, I used Auriful #50 colour 2600 a very light grey.  It actually sparkles!
In the orange bits (Kona kumquat) I used a Sulky Blendables 30# orange with yellow variegated
For the thread sketching on the face and ears, I used Wonderfil 50# Tutti  colour TU34 a variegated brown/orange/rust
For the pebbling on the neck, I used Gutterman 50# Colour 3110 dark brown
For this project I tried an Inspira Microtex needle size 80/12.
Each of the three different threads worked well with this needle and my freemotion quilting was problem-free.  I also tried a new free-motion foot for my machine but more on that later. 
The binding is a brown/white stripe that reminded me of a necktie,  that I cut on the bias. Attached by machine and sewn to the back by hand.
I had to pay great attention to sewing to match the stripes when joining to make the binding strip and as bad luck would have it...one of the seams landed dead on a corner!  But I steamed the bejeepers out of it and it is not noticeable. 

Here's a link to a video that shows some of Boo's other creations from her book "Dare to be Square" 
Boo Davis

I am linking up with The Needle and Thread Network so why not stop by and check out all the Canadian quilty goodness.