THREE MORE DEAR JANE BLOCKS

 I made three more Dear Jane blocks today.  So, I did get my four made for the week.  Just barely.

DEAR JANE A-11

 I had apparently passed this block by because it was difficult.  I made it today and it was very difficult.  Almost all of the seams were partial seams, which isn't easy with 1/2" pieces.

But, I got it made, even if it isn't the prettiest thing I've ever made.  This is block A-11, Penny's Protest.

FINISHING THE CUCUMBER CHIPS

 This morning I got the empty pint jars into the water canner to heat them up.  

I drained the brine the chips soaked in overnight, retaining it and heating it back up to a boil.

When everything was ready I packed the chips into the jars and poured the brine over them and put them into the water canner.  When they were all packed and ready to go, I set the canner to processing.  

Here is the finished product: beautiful and delicious, too.  And the whole process smelled sooo good.

CUCUMBER CHIPS!

 I love Cucumber Chips and we are having a lot of cucumbers from our garden this year.  So, I made some.

I made a double batch. The Ball recipe makes 4 pints, and I wanted more.

There are a lot of steps to making Cucumber Chips.

First there's picking the cukes and scrubbing them clean.  And then they are sliced using this fancy, wavy cutter.

They are then covered in salt and left for at least three hours.  This pulls a lot of liquid from them.  

The liquid is poured off and then they are rinsed. Next step is to soak them in a mixture of vinegar, water and turmeric.  This changes their color into a beautiful yellow green.

That liquid is poured off and then they are left to soak overnight in a spiced, sugary, hot brine.

THREE BEAN SALAD MIX

 I made and canned some Three Bean Salad mix today.

Darrell picked the green beans from our garden.  We bought some yellow wax beans at the West Seattle Farmers Market yesterday.  I got the rest of the ingredients this morning when we did our weekly grocery shopping.

First I chopped all of the vegetables: green beans, yellow wax beans, onion, red pepper and celery.

I boiled all of them together for a few minutes to partially cook them. 

I made the brine and got the water canner going and then when the jars were warm I began packing everything into them, included some canned beans, because I couldn't find the Lima beans the recipe calls for.

Into the water bath they went.

Here's the finished product: beautiful!

There was a bit leftover, not enough to fill another pint, so I had it for lunch - delicious!  

 

MORE JUNK JOURNALS

 I made two more Junk Journals.  I used another cracker box and a cookie box for the covers, covered them in fabric and reinforced the spines.  I used a simple pamphlet stitch for sewing in the signatures. 

The inside papers are an assortment of all different things.  I even went into my flat files and pulled out some very old sketches and paintings and cut them up to make pages.

I think this e bond fabric was meant to be a book cover.

I made the fabric on this cover with the Deconstructing Screen Printing method (it's been in my stash for years). The beads are some handmade beads from Sue's collection.

FINISHED JUNK JOURNAL

 I organized the Junk Journal signatures from yesterday and punched the binding holes in the spine of the cover I made.  (I love how this fabric looks on the cover - it always amazes me how much some fabrics look better than I thought when you cut them up).  Then using an awl, punched the holes into the four signatures.

I sewed the signatures into the cover with a simple pamphlet stitch and added some beads (some of which I inherited from my sister Sue) on the outside.

JUNK JOURNALING

 I watched a free workshop put on by Creative Bug with Jennifer Perkins and how she makes Junk Journals.  She made it fun and easy.

Today I made the cover from a cardboard cracker box.  I glued some fabric onto the front, reinforced the spine and put it under some weight to dry.  Then I started gathering paper for the signatures.  I had gelli prints, papers from the recycle bins, card stock, old watercolor papers, some with paintings, paper bags and stuff.  

I cut them to size and made four signatures and quit for the night.

JANE BLOCK FOR THE DAY

 When I started making Dear Jane blocks in 1996 I started at the beginning and was making blocks in order.  But, I apparently skipped a few.  Probably because they look difficult.  Today I decided to go back and do those blocks.

And, yes, this one was a difficult block.  Making it involved applique, curved seams and Y-seams.  

DEAR JANE AGAIN

 I made another Dear Jane block today.  It was similar to yesterday's drunkard's path block, but with another degree of difficulty.  This one I had to talk over with my husband, because I wasn't sure that I was thinking about it the right way.  And we decided I was trying to take short cuts that wouldn't work.  So I ended up making eight little partial drunkard's paths and trimming them to the right size.  And look!  it came out great. I am pleased I haven't lost those 'perfect piecing - making the points match' kind of patchwork.  It's a different way of concentrating and thinking.

ANOTHER DEAR JANE BLOCK

 I made another Dear Jane block today.  This one went a little quicker.  I made the drunkard's path blocks oversized and then overlaid the template, lining it up with the curve and trimmed the two sides.  I sewed those four little blocks together and then trimmed the whole block to size - 5" which includes the seam allowances.  Easy peasy.

DEAR JANE BLOCKS

 Yesterday I had pulled out my Dear Jane box, which contains the book and fabrics I collected to make the quilt with, to show some friends who were unaware of Dear Jane Quilts.

When I went up to the studio this morning the box was still at my work station.  So instead of doing what I probably should be doing, I made a few more blocks.  The first one took a couple hours, maybe.  The second one took the rest of the day, almost four hours.

It took me a minute to get back into the "making perfect seam allowances" mode.  And I turned down the speed of my machine, so I couldn't get ahead of myself by sewing too fast.  That helped.  I really had to pay attention.

FINISHED LITTLE OWL

 I finished putting together the Little Owl.  I used some of Grandma Jennie's buttons for the eyes.  

It's done and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it.  For now, it will sit up on the top shelf and watch over things.

DEAR JANE UFO

 I got out my box with the Dear Jane book and the fabrics I had collected to make the blocks with.

I haven't worked on it since 1996 - that's an old UFO!

But, I was surprised to find I had only done 9 blocks in 1996.  If I had just done a couple of blocks a year I'd be done by now.  Here's where my project stands today.

LITTLE OWL

 I bought Ann Wood's pattern for her Little Owls.  I started making the medium-sized one today.  I'm using some wool I bought at Carriage Country Quilts the other day.  I put some crushed walnut shell in the bottom to give it stability and then stuffed the rest with wool.  It still needs some embroidery and some eyes!

CONTEMPLATING QUILTING

 I've been thinking about how I want to quilt Spider Legs.  I keep coming back to quilting it on the diagonal.  Which means loading it onto the longarm on the diagonal.  I've watched a few how-to videos on YouTube.

I think I might do it.  So, now I'm wondering how I want to quilt it.  I printed out a photocopy of the quilt and started drawing lines on it.

Since it's called Spider Legs, I thought about putting hairy spikey things on the legs.  So, one of the legs on the photo has straight spikes the other has curved spikes.  I'm leaning towards the curvy ones.  And then there's what to quilt in the black legs.

What do you think?  Any ideas or suggestions?  I'm open for input.

BACKING FOR SPIDER LEGS

 I've been procrastinating, but I finally finished making the backing for my Spider Web project.  I've named it Spider Legs because it doesn't look like a spider web anymore.  

I think I'm procrastinating because I don't know how I want to quilt it.  I've got a few ideas, but I haven't decided on anything yet.

FINISHED BROKEN BRICKS

 I made some binding and got busy sewing onto the recently quilted Broken Bricks quilt.

So, it's officially finished now.  That's finish number 12 for the year.  

Close-up of the quilting.

For those of you that inquired, here's a few of my tips for machine top-stitching the binding on the top. 

First, I like a tight binding.  I cut the continuous bias binding at 2-1/4" wide and press it in half.  Then I sew it onto the backing with a 1/4" seam allowance or so.  After, I give it a good press to the outside.

A lot of folks use those little clips all around the quilt.  Not me.  I use a couple of them, one to get it started and another when I get to the corners.  But, my secret weapon is my wonderful little awl.

I use it to hold the binding where I want it as I go, stitching a few inches at a time. 

When I get to the corner I trim away the corner of batting and a little of the batting to the approach and some from the next side, so the bulk of the binding will have a place to go.  

Then I fold it the way I want and keep it clipped as I approach the corner.  I remove the clip, which has pressed the binding into submission, then hold it in place with the awl.  Sew up to fold, making sure I get just one stitch into the fold and then leaving the needle down I raise the foot and turn the corner.

 Continue on around the whole quilt.  

Those are my best tips.  You can do it.

FINISHED PLAID BRICKS QUILT

I made the binding yesterday. I auditioned several colors and settle on a Kona Stone. Today I sewed it onto the Plaid Bricks quilt.

It's done!  

BROKEN BRICKS QUILTED

 I finished the quilting on the Broken Bricks quilt.  I used the same pantograph I used on the Plaid Bricks quilt, but I made it a little smaller.  It quilts out really nice.