Almost All Applique

The Solstice to Solstice quilt is still waiting its turn. It's going to have to wait another day, I think, because I got involved in prep work for next week's camping trip. Of course, the day always starts with a little slow stitching. I finished off the flowers and grass below the barn and then moved my hoop to the left, encompassing the rest of the piece.

My next stop in yesterday's sewing binge was to finish off the applique on the Garden Sunshine BOM. There were two identical blocks, each with different fabrics. I've been able to use some of my smallest scraps in these blocks.

The picture on the pattern has the two laid out in this configuration, although I still have no idea how all these blocks are going to fit together into a finished quilt.

For this quilt only, I've been trying a new-to-me product for fusing the applique. I saw someone working on a project in a quilt shop last year. Her fusible applique was so soft, it almost felt as if there was no fusing medium in use, and so I decided to give it a try.

As I put it to use, the first thing I noticed is that it's hard to remove the paper, which is my biggest complaint about Wonder Under. Yes, I know the scratch-with-a-pin method of scoring the paper to make it easier to get hold of it, but that's only partly satisfactory. It's still hard to pull it away while leaving the fusing medium stuck to the fabric. My roll of Soft Fuse is less than a year old, and yet, I noticed this yesterday...the fusible is separating from the paper already. I imagine this is a function of aging, but come on. The product shouldn't be considered old in less than a year's time.

So, that's annoying. I was still able to use it, but it added another dimension of difficulty to yesterday's project. I've tried several different fusibles and Heat 'n Bond Light is still my favorite. It too has its drawbacks, but like a Bic pen, it works first time, every time.

With those two blocks finished, Sadie and I worked together to lay them out for a picture.

With significant help from her, I laid them out the best I could.

There's lots of color in this quilt. I'm curious to see how it's all going to fit together.

So, as long as I had the sewing machine set up for machine top-stitching, it seemed like a good time to make up the next block for the Dancing Chickens and Flying Pigs quilt. This is in my pile of hand-stitching projects, although there is a lot of applique on all of the blocks. With applique and hand embroidery together, it's important to get all the pieces fused in the right places. I figured out I can put the placement template behind the fabric, and iron right over the top of it.

When it was all finished, it looked like this. These applique pieces were all drawn from my smallest scrap bins. This block is called Butterflies and Hares.

Feeling confident about having it finished, I put it in the box for hand stitching. When I went to bed last night, my eyes sprung open when I realized I'd completely forgotten to top-stitch down the applique. Doh! So that's what I'll do first thing today.

Instead of top-stitching, I decided to make up the next blocks for the "I Believe in Snowmen" quilt. There's so little hand-stitching in the Dancing Chickens block, I knew it wouldn't be enough to keep me busy on our camping trip. These next little blocks stitch up so quickly, I decided to do them three at a time. Here are the next three blocks I'll be stitching.

So it was nearing the end of my sewing day by that time, and I quit there. Today I'll finish top-stitching the Dancing Chickens block, and then, Solstice to Solstice really will find its way under my needle. I'm ready to get started. It's a large quilt. Do you think I can finish it before we leave next weekend? It would give me great pleasure to be hand-sewing that binding while we're away.