Theresa, do you make quilts for sale?

bk

Theresa, the more bindings you machine sew, the better you will get at it. Like everything else, sewing takes practice! I don't machine sew them often, either, for the same reason. :)

And yeah, I've had lots of those "What was I thinking?" moments! Some years ago I bought a kit at a quilt show because I really liked the sample in the booth. By the time I got around to sewing it a few years later (!) I wondered what I had seen in it at first! It was all shades of grayish browns. I made it anyway, and gave it to someone as a gift. She just loved it!

Anyway, your plan to make a few blocks and see how you like it is a good idea.

Donna

bkay, the answer is no. For the last several years, I have been making charity quilts, especially for chemo patients. They are given away as needed or dropped off at the cancer clinic.

Theresa

What size do you make for cancer patients?

\bk

The quilts usually work out to about 50x60, depending on the pattern. That means about 4x5 12inch blocks. Sometimes though, they do get larger, again because of the pattern. Two of the last ones were at least 60x70.

Theresa

I really do like to hand sew the bindings to the back and I do a creditable job. I find it relaxing and time for thinking about a lot of things. But this time with four to do, I opted for speed. It will depend on the quilt, my mood and the "day of the week", as to which method I use. But I felt pretty good about these machine sewn bindings. "For every thing, there is a time..."

Theresa

I'm with you, Theresa. I do mostly machine bindings now - machine stitch to the back, fold over to the front and top stitch just at the edge. My mitered corners are darn near perfect (if I do say so myself), and my topstitching is really consistent. I do believe that it is a sturdier binding, and it certainly is faster. I like the look of the traditional binding better, but finished is better than perfect, in my book. The recipients of my quilts wouldn't know one binding from the other, and they are most appreciative.

Well it's awesome to finish 4 quilts in a week and machine binding is the way to go for speed. I can say the last two quilts I bound, I FINALLY felt really good about the binding, and the mitre corners. I like the sewn on front, fold over and hand stitch to the back, but have tried machine binding and I'm ok with that! I like to use a small decorative stitch or a blanket stitch when I machine bind, they look just fine and they are much sturdier!

V.

to answer the second question, yes I often have a project fabric set aside and when I pull it back out years later, I don't really like it as much as when I bought it. I often have two of the three needed and I'd have to hunt for that third and I lose interest. But, If you switch up and use something else, you might go back to the other fabric one day and it will be perfect. Good job, by the way. Whatever you finally pick will be great I'm sure.

Theresa, To add some color, how much did you have in mind? Adding to the blocks? Maybe for the cornerstones? Or a narrow border? Auditioning is pretty much the only way for me as I need to see what it looks like and if it really does look like it does in my head. What color did you have in mind? There are many that look nice with brown.

A few years ago, I was in a JoAnn's with my DIL. I found two fabrics that I liked and were co-ordinates. Both brown, one with a swirl of two or three colours, the other was a polka dot. Future project material so into the brown bin they went. In my head, the main colour besides the brown was turquoise and so that was my plan for the sampler. The pattern is called Cinnamon Teen Chocolate, a BOM, from Fat Quarter shop. (where do they get those names?) it uses only shades of brown from dark, to medium to very light, but I thought I could use turquoise from my stash to replace the mediums.

But when I pulled these fabrics out of the bin, I was very surprised, and a lot disappointed, to see the dots and part of the swirl is lime green with some bits of turquoise. Probably a colour combo popular a few years ago.

So my options are 1. Make the pattern using only shades of brown,

2. Replace some of the mediums with lime green,

or 3. Mix in some turquoise with lime green.

There really won 't be too much of either colour.

I am still auditioning fabrics trying to wrap my head around these options.

and Donna, I know you aren't fond of brown and turquoise but I kind of like it.

Sorry to be so longwinded. Sometimes writing it all out makes it clearer to me. And helps me decide.

Open to any suggestions!

Theresa

I hate how lighting in a store can mess up colors. Especially if I forget to take the bold to a window.

Theresa, Sometimes it helps to put your fabric choices together somewhere that you'll see it throughout the day for a few days to help to make your decision. I like turq with brown, peach with brown, pink with brown, even a dark yellow/gold/orange/rust. Anything along the fall color line will go with brown....green. Of course it all depends on the shade of that color, too.

Funny you should suggest that, Sharon. I had put several choices out on the ironong board. Thay looked fine up close but from across the room, one of them just didn't fit. I will leave them out for another few days and see what calls to me.

Thanks for your comments.

Theresa

I like to lay out the prospects on the cutting table and take a picture with my phone. Things always look different in a picture.

I was told the chemo patients like their quilts at least 70 long so they can tuck it under their feet. so 50 x 70 would be good.