We had a bit of a sleep in this morning followed by a leisurely breakfast of my home grown strawberries and yogurt with a good cup of coffee — all enjoyed on the patio. Afterward, I took the boys for a 3.5 mile walk.
It was a beautiful morning but a little warm by the time we got home.
After our walk I started working on putting my quilt sandwich together for the sea glass wall hanging. I didn’t have much time because we had a sheep herding lesson up in Battleground, WA, at 2:30.
We left for our lesson at 1:30 and the heavy traffic meant that we barely made it on time. We usually allow an hour to get there and we typically have at least 15 minutes to get ready for our lesson.
Rico was amazing at his lesson. We worked on driving the sheep, which is pushing the sheep away from me. The dog’s instinct is to bring the sheep to me, so learning to push them away is hard work. Rico was so good, on top of a really good lesson yesterday. It’s so much fun to watch a dog do what they’re bred to do. He was nice and tired after his lesson.
I took a picture of my sea glass quilt outside this morning. I’m just loving this!
Once we got home from herding I dug in and finished the sea glass quilt sandwich and started quilting. I managed to get around half of this piece quilted.
The free motion quilting on this is very free form, so it’s fun because you don’t have to be precise. It’s all meant to be a little disorganized and organic. Just my kind of quilting!
I used my stitch regulator for this. It works really well, but it always beeps at me because I like to go really fast.
I love the look of this quilted. It’s always fun to see how a project evolves when the quilting is added.
I’m using six or seven thread colors on this piece. That slows things down as I have to stop, wind a bobbin, rethread the machine, and then wrestle the piece back under the needle. But the different colored threads make a big difference.
I also have to start and stop quilting on each small piece of fused fabric. With the colored thread and a white background, I can’t just stitch from pebble to pebble because you would see that traveling line.
Since I had to change thread quite often and had to cut and restart the thread with each pebble, it was a hassle to use my quilting gloves. So I pulled these little rubber finger sleeves out and used them. I had one on each middle finger, which was plenty to give me grip on the quilt sandwich so I could move it around, but it left me lots of fingers free to deal with thread and needles.
I may use these more in the future.
I received photos of a couple more Frankenbags from blog readers.
This first one is from Annette Allen. She’s in Australia and said they’re in their fifth full lockdown during the pandemic and said she made this bag while she was stuck at home.
Annette said she’s never used black and white fabric with these bold colors before and thanked me for “giving her permission” to use them. She said she loves the way they make the colors pop. I agree!!!
I love this bag! Of course, the black and white is fantastic, but her colors are really pretty too. And that striped lining with the polka dot pocket… LOVE IT!!! I really need to do more black and white linings!
This next bag was made by Debbie Rothman’s grand daughter “S.” This is her first Frankenbag and Debbie said she is very proud of herself! (I’ve blurred her face for her privacy.)
I love this bag… the bold stripes and shapes, the colors. It’s all so good. And it looks like it’s really well made too! But what I love most is that “S” looks like she really loves it! I think “S” has an amazing future of quilting and creating ahead of her! Thanks so much for sharing your joy with your project with me!!!
Thanks to Annette and Debbie for sending me photos!
agilejack 
Ann, I so look forward to your posts. I read them as I eat my breakfast and drink my tea.
I love your sea glass quilt. I have admired them for a while and may plan one for next year.
When you first posted the light pebbles on the white background, the layout was similar to the shape of Vancouver Island, where I live. It gave me the idea of doing a Islands version, of the Canadian Gulf Islands. Galiano is my favourite and inspiration for many of my quilts.
Something for me to think about over the next few months.
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MIchelle; That sounds like such a fantastic way to personalize a sea glass quilt! You could make a series. I’ve got so many ideas for more of thest. As I look at the photo of the entire thing, it reminds me of mosaics.. which brings in all kinds of ideas and color combos!
Thanks for reading and commenting! I’m having a blast hearing from people all over he world.
Anne
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Yay Rico!!! The sea glass quilt is stunning, she will LOVE it 🙂 And for Bender’s photo yesterday – He is awesome no matter how many white hairs – they both are 🙂
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MY dogs definitely awesome! Thanks for agreeing!!!
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Gorgeous. i have been saving mini HSTs to start a frankenbag, inspired by one on your Pinterest
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Great! I’d love to see your bag when you have it done! I need to start another one. Can’t decide what direction to go.
Anne
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Thanks for showing the closeups of your quilting, really shows of the organic shapes. A lovely photo of the doggies, we have always had two dogs, three at one time and all Irish Setters which we fell for way back in 1969, boy do we miss them all.
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I’m not a huge fan of free motion quilting. I always spend way too much time fighting the machine and dealing with thread issues. But this is fun because it’s so free form.
I find two dogs the perfect number. And here I am starting to think about another one. Three is exponentially more difficult than two. I have a friend who has a theory that you shouldn’t have more dogs than you have hands.
With my two, I’m on the low end of all my friends. Most have at least three, some have four, five or six… some more!
Anne
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Love the quilt! What appliqué method did you use
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It’s raw edge applique. I used Heat and Bond to adhere the pieces to the background.
Anne
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You motivate me! I had rotator cuff surgery last week, so I won’t be sewing for awhile. But my husband and I moved my sewing room upstairs, so I (with his help) can at least get that organized.
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I hope he’s doing all the lifting! I’ve heard rotator cuff surgery is really painful. Be careful!!!
Anne
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I have seen a YouTube on a FMQ technique where you take an extra stitch or two at the of quilting a section or piece of sea glass to lock the stitches. Then, you raise the needle and gently re-position the needle on the next starting point. Stitch once or twice in the same place and continue quilting. I believe the technique is called jump quilting. (Maybe.) The “jump” threads get cut off unceremoniously when you’re done.
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that’s basically what I did on my sea glass quilt. but I think I just went back and forth a couple times by moving the quilt sandwich. Then jumped to the next piece. But only did this on the sections where the thread didn’t match the background. If the thread matched the background I just traveled from one stone to the next.
Anne
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