Artful Homemade Quilts Have A Way

[koshergrl]

Green is my girl's fave color, so I'm working a lot of edging in that color for her to put on whatever....I think we'll probably attach it to some towels...and her pillow cases...and who knows what else. It takes me a couple of hours to work enough for a pillow case, and I really like the way it looks and feels.

 

[koshergrl]

You know, I recollect wonderful pillowcases with elaborate lace edgings on them...a couple of inches and more....my auntie had a whole pile of some nice old ones adn teh last time I saw those was at our family reunion where they were being used for the SACK RACE! AAARRRGG! I told Aunt shirley "Oh my gosh, the pillow cases!" and she said "What those old things" lolol....

 

[koshergrl]

Oh well, I can think of worse ends for linen, lol. The kids' sack races are legend...

 

[freedombecki]

Green is my girl's fave color, so I'm working a lot of edging in that color for her to put on whatever....I think we'll probably attach it to some towels...and her pillow cases...and who knows what else. It takes me a couple of hours to work enough for a pillow case, and I really like the way it looks and feels.

It looked wonderful to me, koshergrl.

 

[freedombecki]

You know, I recollect wonderful pillowcases with elaborate lace edgings on them...a couple of inches and more....my auntie had a whole pile of some nice old ones adn teh last time I saw those was at our family reunion where they were being used for the SACK RACE! AAARRRGG! I told Aunt shirley "Oh my gosh, the pillow cases!" and she said "What those old things" lolol....

I'd check auntie's valium use ...

 

[koshergrl]

I have my basket with me and am back on the needlework/crochet express...

I am committed to completing a quilt in August. We will start on the first, I hope to have it done by the end of the month. Wish me luck. I gear up slowly....but I am going to put the minions to work. I have slowly but inexorably been working towards that end...

 

[freedombecki]

I wish you luck on your quilt, koshergrl. Quilts are a lot of work! Best wishes, but the good thing is the wonderful feeling you get when one is done and ready to cover a loved one up with all the love you poured into the long task.

 

[Sunshine]

OK, Beckums. I went to English's. Their cheapest Pfaff is $3,000 and used. Their cheapest new Pfaff was $6,000. If I already WERE where I couldn't do anything else, it might seem a bargain. But I'm just not there yet. They have a Brother Innov-is 1500 for $2500. Didn't buy today. Haven't gotten a real demo on the Singer one, but I did like what she showed me on the Brother. I chose a design and she did it with my name over it on a little linen mat. I go back to that town on August 10, so I should have my mind made up by them and the place made for whatever I get.

 

[freedombecki]

OK, Beckums. I went to English's. Their cheapest Pfaff is $3,000 and used. Their cheapest new Pfaff was $6,000. If I already WERE where I couldn't do anything else, it might seem a bargain. But I'm just not there yet. They have a Brother Innov-is 1500 for $2500. Didn't buy today. Haven't gotten a real demo on the Singer one, but I did like what she showed me on the Brother. I chose a design and she did it with my name over it on a little linen mat. I go back to that town on August 10, so I should have my mind made up by them and the place made for whatever I get.

Only the best good luck when you make your decision, Sunshine. 5 years of technology since my last dealer's convention. It's a lifetime of innovations, which is how quickly technology is moving these days. Back then the software was so confusing it sucked, although I got through it enough to teach other people how to use it proficiently without being a complete geek. It was nice when the larger hoops came in. There was a lot less placement and plane geometrical math. Some of it is so complex, few dealers have instructors who know all of it. They're far more complex than a digitized race car. I never figured out how they could make money at the prices charged, when the same technology in medicine brings equipment prices to six or even seven figures.

 

[Sunshine]

OK, Beckums. I went to English's. Their cheapest Pfaff is $3,000 and used. Their cheapest new Pfaff was $6,000. If I already WERE where I couldn't do anything else, it might seem a bargain. But I'm just not there yet. They have a Brother Innov-is 1500 for $2500. Didn't buy today. Haven't gotten a real demo on the Singer one, but I did like what she showed me on the Brother. I chose a design and she did it with my name over it on a little linen mat. I go back to that town on August 10, so I should have my mind made up by them and the place made for whatever I get.

Only the best good luck when you make your decision, Sunshine. 5 years of technology since my last dealer's convention. It's a lifetime of innovations, which is how quickly technology is moving these days. Back then the software was so confusing it sucked, although I got through it enough to teach other people how to use it proficiently without being a complete geek. It was nice when the larger hoops came in. There was a lot less placement and plane geometrical math. Some of it is so complex, few dealers have instructors who know all of it. They're far more complex than a digitized race car. I never figured out how they could make money at the prices charged, when the same technology in medicine brings equipment prices to six or even seven figures.

Everything medicine is grossly over inflated.

 

[Sunshine]

I'm looking at the brochure on the Brother. It says, 'designed for those who love to quilt and embroider.' When I went to Singer, they told me there was no machine that sewed, quilted, and embroidered. It would seem this one does all three. Am going to look farther into it online. I like the English's store better. They have a lot of things to sell, and I'm not sure why the Singer store doesn't as many Mennonites as there are around here.

The next most expensive is $1000 more. I asked for the money what was the difference. Answer was color screen, uses flash drive and doesn't require computer to download stitches, remembers where you were if the lights go off. Well, it will be in close proximity to my computer, and I can lose a couple of cocktail napkins way cheaper than $1,000.

They all seem to try to sell you two machines and I just have to tell them I don't have the space for that. I'm taking the mirror off my mother's old dresser and using that and a chair the seat of which I did in Hong Kong grass 45 years ago. It will go in my 'office' room in the basement, where I also have a rocker, overstuffed chair, all my books, and daybed. Now, I need a TV down here. LOL.

 

[freedombecki]

I'm looking at the brochure on the Brother. It says, 'designed for those who love to quilt and embroider.' When I went to Singer, they told me there was no machine that sewed, quilted, and embroidered. It would seem this one does all three. Am going to look farther into it online. I like the English's store better. They have a lot of things to sell, and I'm not sure why the Singer store doesn't as many Mennonites as there are around here.

The next most expensive is $1000 more. I asked for the money what was the difference. Answer was color screen, uses flash drive and doesn't require computer to download stitches, remembers where you were if the lights go off. Well, it will be in close proximity to my computer, and I can lose a couple of cocktail napkins way cheaper than $1,000.

They all seem to try to sell you two machines and I just have to tell them I don't have the space for that. I'm taking the mirror off my mother's old dresser and using that and a chair the seat of which I did in Hong Kong grass 45 years ago. It will go in my 'office' room in the basement, where I also have a rocker, overstuffed chair, all my books, and daybed. Now, I need a TV down here. LOL.

It's common for dealers to be misinformed about other dealers' machines unless they are dealers for both and attend certification classes. They also glean info from customers who come through their doors. Customers have this habit of asking to have the cheapest machine demonstrated, so they communicate to the next dealer how crummy the machine was that they just looked at. I've been on both sides of the aisle. Finally, the Pfaff company brought in competitive machines to a convention and good operators. We finally had a handle on how good our machines were that year. Not to be outdone, Bernina got wind of it and cleaned up their 'who needs all those stitches and all that technoyap anyway' line. So did Brother. Singer was sold 10 times over to different corporations in the 23 years I was in business. It was musical chairs ownership there for awhile. Even so, businesses get over it, and eventually check out what their competitors are doing and for how much. One thing I loved about Singer though, was their online free patterns. They were boss, and I could sew them using my Pfaff converter software. Their color coordinator agreed with me, and could they ever make something they gave away free look like a million bucks on a sweatshirt or pillow!

Pfaff, not to be outdone, found the best embroidery software folks in the EU and put together the most exquisite line of traditional folk and fine art embroideries on the continent. They also had a direct line to the special embroiderers of Australia as well as the finest traditional Austrian embroiderers. Add that to their Hummel embroideries on my watch, and we had the best of the best, except for one thing: Bernina found a few dynamite American instructors who schooled with Theta Happ, so the competition for most beautiful embroideries from around 1996 to the present day has been astonishing. Even so, there's nothing like those Danish-style cross stitch work Pfaff brought to the fray. Nobody could touch them on that. Unfortunately, 3 computer upgrades later, and I haven't been able to read my prettiest Pfaff designs. I'm wishing I were more of a computer geek. Oh, well!

Oh, I was going to say, Pfaff, Viking, Brother, and Bernina all 4 have machines that will set up embroideries with computer software, translate patterns from one machine language to their own machines, hook up to their own specialized quilting frames, and one touch, footless nonstop sew feature, which means you will get anywhere from 800 spm - 2000 stitches per minute, depending on where you set the machine's stitch speed button. If Singer was a little late to the party, they excelled some places in which upgrades remained through different ownership ebbs and high tides.

 

[freedombecki]

Pardon my top of the line shop talk, Sunshine. After thinking it over, maybe Singer is presently the only one as they claimed. Sometimes last decade's loser is this decades winner in the competition struggle.

As I said, 4 or 5 years can bring about changes good and bad. The Germans sold Pfaff to the Swedes who control Viking, and as I was retiring, it got back to me that an oriental man and his wife had purchased the company from the Swedes and planned on moving top of line production to Asia rather than Europe. Selling two machines is likely a more competitive angle than selling a one-machine-that-does-it-all scenario, and when I bought a top-of-the-line Bernina a couple of years ago, the dealer was fuzzy about its capabilities, and the instructor even more so. Not everybody runs their business like me. I had to know everything the machine would do or else! So there I was, running from table to table asking experts questions only engineers could answer, and I would often fine one of them to explain the ins and outs of whether something could be done or not. The dealer conventions at Pfaff rocked that way. The German engineers always knew the language and exactly what the specifications and parameters were as they worked with designers and all their issues ahead of time in creating best ways of doing artistic needle crafts that looked deliciously hand-done they were so beautiful and perfection was the orientation of a lot of the better designers who agreed to work with developing machines for Pfaff. I don't mean to sound like a sales person, because I know all the machines are very versatile. It was just so much fun, though to get ahold of an engineer who'd investigated the needs of designers and desired the company standard of being as perfect as could be achieved with a history of outdoing everyone else from 1862 ad on.

 

[Sunshine]

Pardon my top of the line shop talk, Sunshine. After thinking it over, maybe Singer is presently the only one as they claimed. Sometimes last decade's loser is this decades winner in the competition struggle.

As I said, 4 or 5 years can bring about changes good and bad. The Germans sold Pfaff to the Swedes who control Viking, and as I was retiring, it got back to me that an oriental man and his wife had purchased the company from the Swedes and planned on moving top of line production to Asia rather than Europe. Selling two machines is likely a more competitive angle than selling a one-machine-that-does-it-all scenario, and when I bought a top-of-the-line Bernina a couple of years ago, the dealer was fuzzy about its capabilities, and the instructor even more so. Not everybody runs their business like me. I had to know everything the machine would do or else! So there I was, running from table to table asking experts questions only engineers could answer, and I would often fine one of them to explain the ins and outs of whether something could be done or not. The dealer conventions at Pfaff rocked that way. The German engineers always knew the language and exactly what the specifications and parameters were as they worked with designers and all their issues ahead of time in creating best ways of doing artistic needle crafts that looked deliciously hand-done they were so beautiful and perfection was the orientation of a lot of the better designers who agreed to work with developing machines for Pfaff. I don't mean to sound like a sales person, because I know all the machines are very versatile. It was just so much fun, though to get ahold of an engineer who'd investigated the needs of designers and desired the company standard of being as perfect as could be achieved with a history of outdoing everyone else from 1862 ad on.

A few years back one of the drug companies tried to recruit me to be their rep for the Vanderbilt territory. Seems that their reps who were not licensed people got eaten alive. They felt I could hold my own with the Vandy doctors. I probably could have. But they only offered me 10K more than I made and a car, and a lot more stress.

 

[freedombecki]

Pardon my top of the line shop talk, Sunshine. After thinking it over, maybe Singer is presently the only one as they claimed. Sometimes last decade's loser is this decades winner in the competition struggle.

As I said, 4 or 5 years can bring about changes good and bad. The Germans sold Pfaff to the Swedes who control Viking, and as I was retiring, it got back to me that an oriental man and his wife had purchased the company from the Swedes and planned on moving top of line production to Asia rather than Europe. Selling two machines is likely a more competitive angle than selling a one-machine-that-does-it-all scenario, and when I bought a top-of-the-line Bernina a couple of years ago, the dealer was fuzzy about its capabilities, and the instructor even more so. Not everybody runs their business like me. I had to know everything the machine would do or else! So there I was, running from table to table asking experts questions only engineers could answer, and I would often fine one of them to explain the ins and outs of whether something could be done or not. The dealer conventions at Pfaff rocked that way. The German engineers always knew the language and exactly what the specifications and parameters were as they worked with designers and all their issues ahead of time in creating best ways of doing artistic needle crafts that looked deliciously hand-done they were so beautiful and perfection was the orientation of a lot of the better designers who agreed to work with developing machines for Pfaff. I don't mean to sound like a sales person, because I know all the machines are very versatile. It was just so much fun, though to get ahold of an engineer who'd investigated the needs of designers and desired the company standard of being as perfect as could be achieved with a history of outdoing everyone else from 1862 ad on.

A few years back one of the drug companies tried to recruit me to be their rep for the Vanderbilt territory. Seems that their reps who were not licensed people got eaten alive. They felt I could hold my own with the Vandy doctors. I probably could have. But they only offered me 10K more than I made and a car, and a lot more stress.

Yep. I'm glad you stuck with your academic best, Sunshine. You likely benefitted a lot of people by saving them a lot of grief with your professional knowledge and its application to the very best care.

 

[freedombecki]

Today the last of 24 blocks was finished around 5 am, and now they are scanned. Sorry the blocks are about 11 inches square, and the scanner is only 8.5x11 so some will not show.

The quilt will alternate bright and dark steps-to-the-whitehouse block, and not sure how they will look. I've missed doing log cabin work since the 4 or 5 tall ships quilt series was done earlier this year. Everybody who saw them loved them.

Another quilt like this one was named Mexican Fiesta or something like that earlier, but the blocks were only about 9" when finished, and lights touched the deeper colors in alternates, so this one will have greater contrasts. You never know what it's going to look like till it's completed, because just one block can change the feeling of the work, and colors do interact. That's what makes quilting fun. That most beautiful quilt you're working on can fizzle, and the hopeless one can ring bells sometimes, just by the way you place the blocks. Aesthetic comes in a thousand ways...

So here are some glimpses of "Steps" and like "first, the good news," some of the 12 brights:

 

[freedombecki]

More brights:

 

[freedombecki]

Even more brights:

 

[freedombecki]

And last but not least, the blue brights:

 

[freedombecki]

In the sewn stack there are 19 dark squares, because initially there were just going to be 6 types of 2 each. After shopping that the local quilt shop the other day, so many blacks and dark gray prints were found, that it was clear to not disappoint the quilt shop owner, it'd be nice to show all her pretties in the quilt, so here are just some of them: