What was I thinking?

First of all, I’ve been practicing my free motion stippling. Quilter, teacher and blogger Leah Day has us stippling in rows this week. I was having trouble with her instructions last week because her stippling has more of a pattern than my random mess, but not enough of a pattern to be able to duplicate it. I tried to copy it on a piece of paper and then sew it, but it looked awful – full of jaggies and uneven stitching that you get when you forget what you’re doing. I didn’t think I was ready for stippling in rows, but I had some time tonight so I did some sewing before I could think myself out of it. And I had fun.

Started off with some sharp corners, but it was coming out much better by the time I was done. Instead of trying to memorize all of her stippling patterns, I remembered two that went together well and displayed enough randomness that most people wouldn’t know that it wasn’t all random. I was having a hard time at first doing the alternating lines “upside down” until I gave up and improvised for the bits that came out “backwards”. Just need to keep practicing on that stitch length, for one thing. I’m still drawing pencil grids so I can be aware of how big my pattern is. A little more practicing this way and I should be able to stop using them.

I’ve been using Aurifil 50 wt polyester in the bobbin and as my top thread. It sews nicely, but does it ever leave a lot of fuzz behind! I’ve never used a thread that has left so much lint for me to pull out of my machine. The price you pay, I guess. Just keep your lint brush handy.

Back to my Mexican Star. I decided after the last post that I did indeed like my inner borders after all, and that my plans for the corners were going to fit. I stitched one together just to make sure… but when I cut the filler triangles, I was thinking that I could cut them a half inch smaller than the Half Square Triangles, because you cut the HSTs bigger to allow for two sets of seam allowances.

D’uh. I left the first square the same size as the HSTs. The second one I trimmed – trimmed the seam allowance off! I’m going to have to that the corner apart – the last two rows of it anyway – and replace those triangles with bigger ones. Hopefully I’ll have enough fabric to do that. I’m getting quite low on the yellow. Such a shame if I had to buy more. :-)

Until next time,