As usual, I keep jumping around on projects. Anyone out there identify? I am almost done with the signature blocks! yay! I can't mail them Monday, because it is President's Day and there is no mail service. But Tuesday for sure, they will be off to Cynthia in Australia. Bless her heart for taking this on! All the sorting and shipping for 40 of us quilt bloggers-we appreciate it Cynthia!
I have been working on the Home Sweet Home quilt with my friends. I have two blocks done. This quilt is so much fun that it is an effort to force myself to do other stuff. I am not an accomplished appliquer, but I do enjoy it, and hopefully, after this is quilted, I will have a quilt that I am happy with. It all takes time: choosing fabrics, preparing the pieces, etc. We all must love the process or we would just buy something pre-made. Right? I do 
love the process. I love to dig through my stash looking for the piece of fabric that is just right. Sometimes it takes a while, and I change my mind a couple of times before I am satified. I love being able to machine stitch the bigger pieces and then hand stitch the smaller pieces. I am using the method of machine applique that the Blackbird Design girls taught us, and I know Barbara Brackman and others teach it as well. But for the smaller or trickier pieces I am happy to use a needle and thread. There is satifaction in using a needle and thread that you don't get from a machine. And I say that while having great love for my sewing machine. In fact, I would be lost without my sewing machine! But handwork is a whole 'nother love.
love the process. I love to dig through my stash looking for the piece of fabric that is just right. Sometimes it takes a while, and I change my mind a couple of times before I am satified. I love being able to machine stitch the bigger pieces and then hand stitch the smaller pieces. I am using the method of machine applique that the Blackbird Design girls taught us, and I know Barbara Brackman and others teach it as well. But for the smaller or trickier pieces I am happy to use a needle and thread. There is satifaction in using a needle and thread that you don't get from a machine. And I say that while having great love for my sewing machine. In fact, I would be lost without my sewing machine! But handwork is a whole 'nother love. Also pictured is my friend Sue, and the beautiful bird she just finished from the BBD book, Birds of a Feathe
r. Take a close up look of how she placed the bird fabric so the eye is in the right place. Then she added a teeny-tiny piping around the block as a frame. Really nicely done!
r. Take a close up look of how she placed the bird fabric so the eye is in the right place. Then she added a teeny-tiny piping around the block as a frame. Really nicely done! Well, I am off to see what today holds. Hopefully I will get some sewing in!
12 comments:
Marcie: Your Home Sweet Home blocks are adorable! I don't do as much applique as I would like. Your friend Sue's block is perfect. She has done a nice job of using the fabric to represent the eye of the bird! Very clever. - Norma silverthimble@shaw.ca (Dang Blogger! I can't seem to leave a comment except as anonymous!)
The houses are beautful - and I love the sampler background fabric you used on the top one. I don't think applique is something I would ever have the patience to do, but I love to see the work of others.
Those Blackbird Designs gals sure give us a lot of wonderful things to work on -- I love both that you are sharing here.
Your blocks (and Sue's, too) are wonderful, that is a great pattern.
Your Home blocks are breathtaking! Mine's all kitted up and ready to work on -- just need to find the time! Maybe you can poke me with the justdoit stick!
Beautiful work!
I'm in awe, seeing your house blocks, they are sooo beautiful ! I just bought the "Home Sweet Home" book and I love it very much (the nosegays quilt is appealing to me, too... in fact, all of them ! LOL)
Smiles !
NADINE.
I didn't see a picture of Sue and her bird, but your house blocks are quite beautiful. I like your fabric choices.
The blocks look wonderful Marcie! That's another design that is on my list on "one day" quilts! I also love you friends block. I think of all the blocks in the quilt, it's one of my favorite ones!
I love this book and intend to make the houses....some day. I agree with you that the process in making the quilts is the best. Looking through all my fabrics to fine THE right colur for that piece. And my sewing room is always a mess after preparing fabrics, because I do not have time to put them back in place.
Your Home Sweet Home blocks are looking stupendous! I sure wish I could allow myself to start this now, but I can't. I'm just drooling over the blocks done by all you other girls. I need a plastic cover for my keyboard that I can type through!!!!
Forgot - Sue did do a marvelous job on her project - LOVE the bird's eye placement! That's what the good ladies of Baltimore used to do when they created their masterpiece quilts back in the 1840's.
Your Home, sweet homme is going to be beautiful !
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