"Piping Hot", or is that "Red Hot Piping"?

Another adventure in techniques on this miniature of the "Focused on the Lover of  Red" quilt. Seems the small projects are the ones most easily side-lined, for me. Maybe because I think I will be able to knock them out in "no time". This one's delay, though, was because the piped binding seemed daunting. It really was not hard at all when I followed the tutorial found here; frequent breaks to view and review were needed. Remembering what I've seen all the way from the computer to the machine can be a bit of a challenge some days. (!)  Everything, including having the corners meet, worked just like when doing a regular binding.

Sewing binding to back of quilt.

Resorted to gluing and ironing the fold-over before stitching in place.

The quilt measures 15 & 7/8's x 14 & 1/2 inches.

 So,  is that hot, or what?

"The Fifty Minute Block"

Well, ACTUALLY, first came the ten minute block.

(Ten Minute Block)

Then came the trial, beginning with four ten minute blocks. Forty minutes?

THEN came the answer with the fifth block added, for the new "Fifty Minute Block"!

This was an experiment inspired by the ten minute block. I wondered if four ten minute blocks could be used with another same sized block to make a ten minute block (fifty minute block) without obscuring the tilted centers of the smaller blocks. It does work one block out, like this.

Dogs-gone Zigzagging

This is my first foray into FMZ (Free Motion Zigzagging). I transferred a pattern of the Japanese character for "love" 愛　to onionskin paper to stabilize the piece. The stabilizing paper has not yet been torn away from the portions inside the stitching; I thought it might show up better in the picture with the paper still there. 

        

          As with normal FMQ (Free Motion Quilting), the feed dogs are lowered/disengaged and a darning foot or free motion foot is used. The stitch width, however, is what makes this differ. Check with your foot on how wide you may safely set the width. When stitching, moving the zigzag up and down gives the widest stitches, and side to side makes a narrow line. If you move the fabric slowly, you can obtain a satin stitch. Faster movement makes for "sketchier" strokes of the thread.With practice this could be used like a chisel tipped marking pen.
          This technique could be used for quick freehand appliqué. Our local instructor, Sandy, shared a link with us that gives a short tutorial video on this, illustrating both the technique and applications of it.

The "wrong side" has the reverse of the character, but I like how the quilting looks like pen and ink; reminds me of the Japanese manga (graphic drawings).

  The back of the block turned out to be my favorite, but since the letter is not the same in reverse, I'll need to do another some day using a solid background. I think the white fabric with black quilting gives it a real pen and ink feel. Look closely and you'll see my tension was not set correctly, as there were so very many "eyelashes" on the curves. Still, it gives it that cartoon look.

Finished and waiting for a frame.

Got the perfect blendship

Braid laid first against one of it's fabrics, next with borders of colors either from braid or from background print.

Here is a "Friendship Braid" cut from 2.5 inch strips with 45 degree angle cut. The long side of each piece measured six inches. This braid needs at least three colors to show well. I was able to get eight opposing pieces from each WOF  (width of fabric) strip. 

The "how to" can be Google'd. I used more than one tutorial to get this going. It is not as difficult as it looks, but it took me a few runs to understand the right pointing and left pointing pieces and how they fit. Once that was mastered, it went together very quickly.

Jenny Doan does a version of this using a ruler from her company, [begin watching from the 1:00 minute mark for how to orient your cut pieces for sewing]but I used a binding tool that had a 45 degree angled edge. The main thing seems to be the cut at a 45 degree angle. 

I'll be using this one for a diaper pad, but it would make a lovely bag or table runner, if not wanting to commit to a full quilt.