D314&5: A little dress

I've begun this little dress for Bub.  I'm hoping it will be good for one of her birthday celebrations.

This will be the Junebug Dress by Craftiness is not Optional blogger (http://www.craftinessisnotoptional.com/category/junebug-dress).  I've pinned quite a few of her gems. They're just gorgeous.

See how that panel is going to go on the front bodice?  

The print is "A walk in the dark woods" by Zesti, at Spoonflower (http://www.spoonflower.com/fabric/382063), on poplin. This was the first print I favourited in Spoonflower and I love it's subtle Red Riding-hood story.  I'm surprised at how little red there is compared to my memory of it.  Nevertheless, red buttons are destined for the font panel.

Hub and I are still sick.  The cold is barely marginally better in the last few days.  I don't recall ever having a cold that's be this bad for this long.  Blergh. 

Bits and Pieces

There are a few other things I've chipped away at in the past fortnight.

I went to a friend's fortieth and made some little cakes to share.  Turns out the Awesome Vanilla cake will convert to about 40 mini cupcakes.  I made up an orange glaze with some vanilla-orange sugar gifted to me.

I also bit the bullet and bought some capsules for my toy projects.  This is one of the few less-than-a-hundred-items I could find and thoughts I'd give it a bash.  Fingers crossed.

This means I've held off finishing the bowling pins and ball.  I'm still thinking of sending them OS to my nephew.  He's about to get a new sibling, but the baby's gift is still only on paper.  How much does my butt need to get in gear over that?!  I'm hoping, once this lurgy passes, I'll be able to spend a few hot hours over the machine and punch out this single-bed quilt in a few nights.  Bam, mothergoosers.

D312-3: Regulating my stitches!

I've spent these days getting used to the BSR (Bernina stitch regulator) attachment.  It's a foot with a mouse device built in, which detects how fast you are moving your fabric and adjusts the speed so that stitches are the same length.
There are two modes: 1 is stitch while the sewing pedal/button is pressed, 2 is stitch only when the fabric moves.  You can also detach the cord and use it as a regular darning foot.

Read these from right to left...

At least I got better...

Most recent effort, with notes

The notes show the BSR mode and stitch length, and then the last one was using the foot as a darning foot (detached BSR cord, feed dog dropped, regular straight stitch, length 3.0 I think).  The lines are where the lower thread has been pulled up to the surface.

I have a set of long margins and borders to quilt, and I thought this design would be a good beginner pattern.  This one below is also terribly pretty, very complimentary to the quilt, and I think it will cope with 'close enough for a beginning' quite well ;)

From Christina at A Few Scraps

 

There's no point me considering any of them, though, if I can't get my curves smooth.  And I've only been practising on a square foot of space - nice and light and easy to move - how am I going to go with a single-bed sized pieces! :S

The thread pulling seems to be a common problem with quilting.  I imagine it means I need to go slower around the corners.  It may also be that my upper tension is too high, but its' only at 4, so I'm not too sure about that...  I will be quilting this pattern on the back of the quilt though, so I'm not very worried about it because the stitches look fine on the front.

The reason I'm quilting "upside-down" for this part is that I need to draw the pattern onto the fabric.  However, I don't really have any spare fabric from the front design, so I can't test the pen and see how well it disappears.  Rather than take the risk, I'll draw it on the back, where I already know it will fade thanks to my practise pieces.  I can also manage the bulk I'm getting with the backing fabric having a lot of stretch.

Can I also add how rubbish it is to be sick?  It's only a passing sickness, but it's still no fun.  I have a terrible cold, just short of a flu.  My head is well full of clay, with achy teeth, cracked lips, watery eyes and a crackly chest.  I even have acne.  You know it's bad when your body tries to push it out via your skin. :(  I had gastro just a fortnight ago too.  Both these illnesses came via Bub and she coped with them well.  Her gastro was rubbish for a day, and the cold presented as three days of croup plus a few of misery, but my body's taken them on with full nerdy force and done both bugs with a thoroughness any librarian would envy.  Maybe that's why my blogging and craft have been so slack.  Anything I can't accomplish in front of the telly is a big deal at the mo.  Please get better body, for the start of term three!  I want to want to do things again!

D309-11: Stitching in the ditch...

... is all done for my gifted quilt.

Loving my walking foot with the ditch guide.  Not so loving the give on the backing and how it stretches to create bulk at meeting points.  Oh well.