New Under the Needle

Whenever I go to the Michigan House, I bring my Singer workhorse machine with me, knowing that I will manage to squeeze in some sewing time at some point.  The family has come to understand that the dining room table will not be able to be used for dining purposes once I get rolling.  Not that they like it very much... but that's what they make tray tables for.

This last trip was no different.  After cleaning up Lill, I scrubbed my hands, removed the tablecloth and broke out the design paper.  I use the end rolls of newspaper for drawing out my design patterns.  It's 24" wide, sturdy enough for handling but you can see through it enough to trace a copy of a pattern before you cut it apart if needed. 

Yes - I used a dinner plate for a template

I didn't take a picture of the design before I cut it apart so this will have to do.  I was making color placement decisions as I was drawing the design.  See the pile of solid fabrics - I removed the orange & red so that they became the bright pop of color from the striped fabric.

This will be my entry for the 2014 Sauder Village Quilt Show Challenge.  The theme is Line Dance and the link will take you to the challenge guidelines page.   The challenge fabric is Michael Miller's Big Stripe.

I got to work a little later in the evening than planned &  stayed up to 1 a.m. working on piecing the background. 

All of the striped strips, as well as the dot fabric, will be hand appliqued in place.

I finished the top on Monday and started the machine quilting on Tuesday.  And I've discovered something as bad as quilting with black thread on black fabric and that's white thread on white fabric!  Thank goodness for my Ott light and by brooder lamp.