The Dawn of a new solution!

Over the weekend I was working on a very large custom quilting job on an almost vintage quilt top. The quilt was a dark blue calico mixed with a solid cream fabric and the pattern was an 8" snow ball. The customer chose a very pretty block pattern called time after time, which essentially is interlinked double hearts. In the borders she wanted me to quilt a linear pattern called Pumpkin Coach.


I spent day one quilting the upper border and several rows of thes blocks. Each block required me to set the block pattern up, walk around the machine, check layout and centering, walk back around the machine, set the threads, trim, sew the pattern, stop, walk back around, set and trim threads and repeat. Mike watched me one afternoon and he was amazed at how much walking and movement I had to do. I think he understands why some nights I am tired from just quilting. It was another one of those quilts that strengthened my desire for a computerized longarm.



After the first day of quilting, I cleaned and oiled the machine so it would be ready for the next day's early start. The following morning with a steaming mug of joe, I headed to the studio and began my quilting day. I decided to quilt little double hearts into the snowbal corners. I started to stitch from the front of the machine and I noticed, the oil had soaked onto the needle and bobbin threads and created a dark line in the stitching. I was beside myself. This didn't happen in the dark pieced section, it happened on the lightly colored cream fabric and cream printed background. I immediately stopped and took the stitching out and wiped out the bobbin and needle to remove the excess oil. I stitched on a fabric scrap to ensure the oil was gone. I marked the section with a small safety pin and kept on quilting. I was really mad at myself for not remembering to do this before I started to stitch.

That evening, I did some ruler research online and found this set of videos by Rusty Farrell. As we watched Ancient Aliens on TV, I worked my way through his YouTube video channel and I really enjoyed binge watching most of them. He has one video on how to clean and oil your long arm. He was working on an Innova machine, but I figured I can always learn something new. As he was putting the bobbin case back in he casually mentioned that if you ever get oil on a quilt the easiest way to remove is with a touch of SEW-Clean or Dawn dishwashing liquid. I thought, wait, what did he just tell me how to fix that problem with the oil in the quilt? I backtracked and listened intently to the video 2 more times. Sure enough, there was my answer! THANK YOU RUSTY!

I googled Sew-Clean and realized it was not easy to find locally on short notice and expensive. So I decided to try option 2. Thankfully I use Dawn dishwashing liquid in my kitchen and for cleaning around the house. I had a bottle of white Dawn. I found a new baby toothbrush in the cabinet, put a little dab of Dawn in a small dish and headed down to try it. I also grabbed a microfiber towel en route.

I carefully put a little Dawn on the toothbrush and gently scrubbed the area on both sides of the quilt. I let it soak for a couple of minutes and then added some water to the dish and rinsed the brush. I dipped the brush into the water mixture and continued to brush the fabric. Low and behold, the oil disappeared!!! I blotted with the microfiber towel and rinsed the brush again with clean water. Rubbed it again onto the quilt top and back to remove the residual soap. I repeated this on the back of the quilt until I was sure there was no oil or soap left in the quilt.



I am happy to report, the quilt was saved. When it dried, there wasn't a trace of the offending oil or dark stitches. One important note: Dusty did say to only use clear Dawn, not the original blue formula which might discolor light fabric until the quilt is washed. I would recommend using the clear or white Dawn formulas if your quilt is light colored and use it sparingly.

While I am usually very careful to ensure that my long arm is well maintained, cleaned and oiled, accidents happen and I was really happy to find this great solution to a problem that I am sure is not unique to me. I just had to share it with you in case you ever need to figure out what to do like I did.

I learned two important lessons this weekend. Always wipe down the machine needle and bobbin every morning BEFORE stitching begins and DAWN works really well to get rid of sewing machine oil should lesson #1 be forgotten. I hope you never need this time, but if you do, remember, DAWN to the rescue!

#dawntotherescue #removeoilfromquilt #dawntakesitout #howtofixyourquilt #oopstheresoilonmyquilt

SHOP HOPS

How many of you out there participate in quilt shop hops? Have you ever joined in the fun? where you able to complete the entire list of shops during the timeframe allotted? Have you tried a drive to shop hop either by car or bus? Or was your shop hop online? What did you like about them and what did you not enjoy?


I ask these questions and hope you will share with me your feedback. The reason I make this inquiry is that I just found out the quilt shops in NJ are participating in a shop hop later this month. There are 11 shops participating between April 24th and May 3rd 2015. Details about the upcoming hop can be found at www.NJShopHop.com


Two of these shops are in North Jersey, Aardvark in Morris Plains and Rock Paper Scissors in Montclair. I frequent both when I can since they are both within 30 minutes drive to where I live. Aardvark is owned by Sally. She has many traditional, novelty and bali fabrics, good books and notions. RPS is a modern quilt shop that also carries paper rafting and jewelry making supplies. It is owned by Beth Rowan and her staff are the nicest and most fun in the state.

Three of the participating locations are in central NJ between 60-90 minutes drive for me to each. Pennington Quiltworks is a lovely shop close to where my sister used to live in Lawrenceville. They always have beautiful fabrics, kits, a myriad of notions to peruse and Bernina parts. Fabric Inspirations is a newer shop located in Manalpalan with loads of floral, batiks and big bright fabrics. Both are definitely worth the drive in my humble opinion. The third shop is in a new location since I visited them last. It's called Mouse Creek Quilts and I remember them as a friendly place with awesome FQs, fabrics, and nicely done samples. I will go there again for sure to visit them.

The southern most shop, called The Pin Cushion is found in in Vineland. I guess I am going to have to check it out Even though it's very far south as I have never crossed their threshold. I believe I will also hit up the shop in Swedesboro, which I have attempted to visit several times but never managed to make it to during their business hours. My fault, not theirs. When I spoke with them on the phone they were quite helpful and sounded lovely. I would likely just stop by The Little Shop in Haddonfield to get my passport stamped. It's my least favorite place on the list. I found the staff rather unfriendly and the shop very small. The fabrics they carry are not to my linking, however, if Martha or any knitters were with me there is a cute wool shop around the corner in that same town. it's really on the way between two others on the list. Another shop in Collingswood, NJ would be on my travel for that day since its in the Southern Hemisphere of NJ and nearby the other three and Mt. Holly.
Whether I make it to Fabric Inspirations in Forked River or not really depends on if we have time and if we can fit it in with the others. It's the east most shop on the list and requires a drive through the pine barrens of NJ. I am always on the look out for Janet Evonovich's character Stephanie Plum when in that area. It's a great shop and I hope to make it there to see what they might have that the other places do not.


I love The Village Quilter in Mt. Holly. It's a tiny place, jam packed with fun, modern quilt fabrics patterns, great rulers, and a friendly staff. I will usually stop in there when I go to Burlington to shop at Olde City Quilts. I was surprised that this huge shop was not on the shop hop list, but would likely stop in there anyway when close by because they always have something with my name on it. There are also some nice eateries nearby and Judy and her staff are wonderful.

There are some wonderful prizes up for grabs for those that complete the entire hop. They include two sewing machines, a quilt with blocks from each shop, some serious fat quarter bundles to increase your stash and even gift cards to spend.

Extreme Quilting

I recently had the opportunity to quilt a 6 pointed star quilt made from Kaffe Fassett fabrics. The quilt top was wall hanging size and had been created lovingly by a NJMQG member named Judy Josephson. When Judy brought the quilt to me to quilt it for her, she just wanted it finished. She told me she had struggled with the pattern and finishing the quilt top. It wasn't until after she had made the quilt that she re-read the pattern and saw an accuracy disclaimer in the book. I saw such beauty in this quilt, I set out to make it something that she absolutely loved when she got it back. We discussed how to quilt it and because it had a black background and was made almost entirely from Diamond shapes, it made sense to use some straight line quilting in the black area. The quilt wasn't flat, there were some minor problem areas because of the issues with the pattern directions and all those point intersections commonly found in 6 point stars. I love a good challenge.

We drew up some ideas on how to quilt the printed stars and background. Judy always does a fun pieced backing and had given me specific instructions on where to place the piecing and that it needed to be centered near the top. Because it was a wall hanging quilt, I made sure that the back piecing would fall well below the top of the quilt, allowing for placement of a sleeve to hang it and still be visible.

Initially, I set out to quilt the black background with black thread top and bottom. I used a ruler to start off quilting on the inside edges of the black diamonds and then did a free-hand greek key design to fill them in. To finish I added a diagonal stop in the center of each diamond. I liked the effect.

Once all of the black diamonds were done, I then did a curved quilting line inside all of the outer border printed squares. This is fairly easy a technique to do, you just bounce corner to corner down the squares and then around and up the other side. Then I decided that these needed more quilting into the outer most black border. So I quilted additional curves in a rainbow type of effect. It really turned out nicely.



Next I set off to quilt the floral fabric stars. I changed the threads to match the background color of each star. Because the stars merge with 6 seams set into the center, I decided that I needed to quilt from the center of the star and used a swirl. This morphed into a squiggly swirl to form the center of a flower like pattern. It also served the purpose of ensuring that the star centers laid perfect flat. Then I quilted around the outside of each of the 6 pointed star sections creating a free form leaf pattern with flowing veins in each leaf. I quilted all of the like colors at the same time before changing to the next color thread.

The little squares themselves spoke to me and told me that I needed to quilt something inside each one. As I finished up the lightest color stars, I decided to quilt a little tiny sprout, a 3 leaf shape into each one. I set them so most of them pointed up around the perimeter. Then just for fun and whimsy I quilted several of them in different directions.

Finally, the outermost border needed some quilting. I decided to quilt it in all black thread. I used rules and my channel locks to quilt straight line sections in each piece. I broke them up to give it a more modern look, by ending the stitching in different places and taking a few stitches across the section before reversing in the other direction.

The best surprise of this finished quilt was how well the back turned out with my quilting choices. Judy had provided a mostly solid black background. The leaf and flower patterns with colored threads offset by the black greek key sections made for an amazing back. I am extremely proud of this quilt and Judy was very happy with the end result. She plans on entering it to be judged in a few weeks in a local show.




>

The quilt still needs binding, a name, label and sleeve, but I think its a real winner.

#6pointstars #extremequilting #kaffefassettfabrics #beautifulquilt

Hope Springs Eternal...what's for dinner

Tonight's dinner is in the oven. We need something hot and filling on this rather blustery Spring day. I decided meatloaf and garlic smashed potatoes would do the trick.

Cheezit Meatloaf
You will need
3 lb package of lean ground turkey
1 - 7 oz box of cheesy crackers, any variety will do
1 package of dry onion soup mix
2 eggs
BBQ sauce
Freshly ground pepper to taste
1 tsp dried Italian herbs

Reheat oven TP 375 degrees.
In a large bowl, crush the crackers with the back of a soup ladle until well crumbled. Place ground turkey into the bowl. Sprinkle with the pepper, herbs,,soup mix and add the eggs. Toss gently until well blended. Form into a loaf and place into a baking dish that has been sprayed with non stick spray.

Bake for 20 minutes, remove from the oven and brush with the BBQ sauce until well coated on top, sides and ends. Place back into oven and bake another 40 minutes Or until cooked all the way through. remove from the oven and allow to rest for 15 minutes before slicing and serving.

Smashed Garlic Roasted potatoes
6-8 medium scrubbed and pricked red skin potatoes.
Micro wave the pototes until done in two batches.

Place potatoes in a baking sheet that has been lined with parchment paper.
Meanwhile, combine in a small bowl
2 TBSP EVOO
2 TSBP grated cheese of your choice
Freshly ground pepper
freshly crushed garlic cloves (I use one clove elephant garlic and squeeze it through my garlic press)
1/2 tsp italian seasoning

smash the cooked potatoes with the skin on with a potato masher to flatten and open them up.
drizzle with the garlic, cheese and oil mixture, brushing it over the potatoes. Drizzle with more EVOO if desired.

Place in preheated oven and bake for 15 minutes.

Enjoy!

Catch up!

It's been well over a month since I sat down and made the time to post on my blog. It's been a real roller coaster ride these last few weeks.

There has been some serious family illness to contend with as well as gymnastic championship meets and trying to catch up non my quilting backlog. Dont gt me wrong, I know all of this is part of life and not anything more than most people encounter during their middle years. Fortunately I found out several things about myself that I am willing to share.

1). I am great at dealing with emergency situations, as I do not panic but have the amazing ability to remain calm and think clearly.

2). I am fortunate to be surrounded by friends, family and customers that genuinely care about us and are willing to help if needed at the drop of a hat.

3). I am smart enough to know that I cannot and should not quilt customers quilts when life throws me a monkey wrench.
4). I am not good to customer follow up when I know I am going to miss a deadline. I need to work on this.

Here are some of the more recent quilts I have had the pleasure of finishing.
I call this one Doodlebirds.

It was a vintage quilt top, actually I think it was a vintage tablecloth that I picked up in Paducah KY many years ago. I freehand quilted it with a beige thread and used colored threads on the birds to quilt their faces and feathers. I put a similar aged (60's calico) fabric in orange on the back and binding. The birds are all hand embroidered with embroidery silks and they have these wild eyed look to them. Its a very folk artsy quilt, unlike anything I've ever finished. It was mindless to work on in between runs to the hospital. Eventually I will throw it back on the machine and add some more detail quilting to it, but customer quilts are always a priority to finish over my own. This quilt just helped me get through a rough patch.



This one I finished quilting over the weekend. The top is beautiful batik fabrics and was made by Kathy Mitchell. I quilted it with a variegated thread on top and a deep olive thread on the back. The quilting pattern I used is called Haiku. It worked really well with this quilt.



Lastly, here is a beautiful fun and lovely quilt made by Michelle Reiter. There are some lovely Kaffe Fassett fabrics in it. It was a joy to quilt. I used a wool batting and quilted it with a swirly pattern to give it movement. The wool batting has more loft than the cotton battings, but it quilts down nicely and will work well as a quilt to sleep under in chilly Vermont, where I understand it will end up.


So these were the 'easy quilts to finish'. Pantos are much easier to do than custom quilting. I have 4 custom quilt jobs next in the queue and I look forward to being able to take my time and give each of them the attention they demand in order to get the results my customers expect and hope for by allowing me to quilt for them.

Stay tuned there will be more quilts and pictures soon to see!

Keep on stitching--Diane

#doodlebirdsquilt #freeformquilting #kaffefassetfabrics #batikmapleleaves

Mock Black Forest Bundt

Today I found myself wit some extra time in my hands due to some missed connections. I decided to bake something new from what I had on hand.

Ingredients
1 box Devils Food Cake mix
1 box Greek Yogurt Cherry Flavored Pudding Mix
3 whole eggs
1/3 cup of oil
1 cup of water
1 tsp bourbon extract
1 TBSP ground cinnamon
1 TSBP vanilla extract
1 cup of frozen cherries. (No need to defrost)

Mix together all ingredients except the cherries. Beat at medium speed for 2 minutes until well blended, scraping the bowl as needed.

Pre heat oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare you favorite BUNDT pan, (I used the bavarian shape since its a Black Forest cake) by spraying with baking spray. Brush sides and center tube to ensurere all crevices are well coated. If your spray doesn't have the flour in it, you can sprinkle some cocoa powder in the pan and shake it around until the pan is coated. Tap out the excess by inverting your pan over the sink and giving it a gentle tap.

Pour 1/3 of the batter into the pan distributing evenly. Add the cherries around the ring, distributing as evenly as possible. Top with the remaining batter and spread it evenly in the pan. Tap the pan on a towel laid on your counter several times to ensure the batter fills all crevices and air bubbles are removed. Bake at 350 degrees F for 40-45 minutes or until tester comes out clean. Do not over bake, you want a moist cake.

Cool in the pan for 15 minutes on a rack. Invert onto the serving platter and cool completely approximately 45 minutes more. Sprinkle with powdered sugar sifted through a fine sieve.

Serve the cake with additional cherries (that you have defrosted first or use cherry pie filling as shown) And top with a generous dollop of whipped cream. For me, the cake stands on its own without the additional cherries and cream, but it's up to you.

Broccoli, Ham and Potato AU Gratin Casserole

It snowed again and is so cold outside, that the walk and roads are very icy. I decided to dig deep into my fridge, pantry and freezer to come up a hearty dinner for this evening.

I found two small honey ham steaks, some AU gratin potato box mixes, cheddar cheese, and frozen broccoli florets and Bacon! Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Mine was already hot from a cinnamon bun cake I'd baked earlier so it made sense to just turn up the heat and pop the casserole in after the cake was done.



Ingredients
2 boxes of store brand AU gratin potatoes (boxes were 4.7 oz net wt each)
6 TBSP butter, cut into chunks
2 small honey ham steaks, cut into bite size pieces
1 and 1/3 cups skim milk
3 1/2 cups boiling water
1 package frozen broccoli florets, defrosted in the microwave for 2 minutes
Freshly ground peper
Italian seasoning to taste
2 tbsp of Dijon mustard
6 slices of bacon
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Spray a large casserole dish with non-stick spray. Dump the dried potato slices and the contents of both sauce pouches into the casserole. Add the ham, broccoli, mustard, milk, seasonings and butter chunks into the casserole. Boil the water and then measure it the correct amount and add to the casserole, stirring the mixture to ensure the dry ingredients are well blended.

Microwave the bacon slices until cooked but not too crispy. Crumble over the top of the casserole ingredients and sprinkle with the 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese.

Bake uncovered at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. Check casserole and if getting brown, reduce heat to 350 for the remaining 15 minutes. Bake until the potatoes are done and the top is just starting to brown.
Remove from the oven and allow to set for 10 minutes before serving.

It should look something like this.

Serve with crusty fresh baked bread and butter or hot baked biscuits for a hearty winter dinner. Serves 4-6.


#broccolihampotatoeats #hothamcasserole #whattodowithaugratinpotatoes #jiffydinners