Unallocated Quilt Finish

Now that QuiltCon entries are done and dusted, I'm plunging into quilting four quilts in my backlog!

In six days of quilting and sewing, one more is quilted and bound. Here is Unallocated, the free block design I found on Michelle McKillop's Instagram feed. After lots of scrap-busting - scarping my scraps! (Thank you for naming that fun activity, Char!) - I completed the quilt top in April... and set it aside until now. 

Unallocated, 61" X 80"

Quilting was all done on my Bernina 770QE with a walking foot - straight lines at a 3.1 stitch length; and stitch #4, a lengthened serpentine stitch.

More elaborate quilting would have been lost in the busy-ness of the prints. I used Aurifil 50-weight thread in the top and bobbin, in a pale green color #1231.

Also, for the first time, I used Elmer's School Glue to "baste" down the folded binding, and then use my machine's edge foot #10D to machine sew the binding into place. It looks nice enough, but I won't make a regular practice of doing it this way. I just don't think it looks as nice as hand sewing. 

Piecing the quilt back was fun! I used a backing idea from Kelly Young's book Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs, and happily used-up a fair amount of yardage - not quite 4 yards. 

Special thanks to two quilting friends from Central Florida MQG - Donna P. and Mary T. - for being my quilt-holders outside our CFMQG Sew-In meeting place. Using pockets pinned to the quilt corners, and two adjustable length poles (a method learned from Debbie at A Quilter's Table) they held it high. Thanks friends! 

Now I've moved on to quilting my other scarp my scraps quilt - the one that's a combination of Harvest Moon and Yin-Yan blocks. The 72" X 86" quilt top was completed in April! (Heavens! I'm slow to finish!)

For quilting I'm using a cone of 50-weight Presencia thread in pale gray. I've been using my ruler quilting foot and a Westalee template for quilting concentric circles. This is the "Circles on Quilts Template Set 1." Yes, I do like circles... in piecing, appliqué, and quilting!

Book Recommendations

If Only by Kate Eberlin is about two young people - Letty and Alf - who meeting while in Rome, taking Italian language classes. Initially, Letty tries to avoid him, but Alf's continued gentle and persistent attempts to befriend her find them enjoying site-seeing together. 

Deeper into their relationship, each of them flashes back to their separate lives in England - Alf as a competitive ballroom dancer, and sometimes instructor in his mother's dance school, who doesn't pass his A-levels and takes off with his teacher; and Letty as a former ballet dancer who suffered a life-altering injury, and as an Oxford student makes poor decisions that get her into a bad situation. Neither Alf nor Letty shares their histories.

So when they're ready to go away for a weekend together, and Alf's girlfriend and her father show up, Letty runs away. Alf is feeling guilty and bereft; Letty is feeling guilty and bereft. Will they ever find each other and be totally honest?

My favorite aspects of this book are the characters site-seeing in Italy, and the occasions when they're dancing together.

Linda's score: 3.8/5.0

Special thanks to my blogger-friend Nancy at Grace and Peace Quilting for suggesting to me a series of books written by Spencer Quinn. After I recommended in a previous blog post the book The Art of Racing in the Rain (about a dog, written from the dog's perspective), Nancy recommend to me the "Chet and Bernie" series, about Chet, a failed police dog owned by Bernie, a private investigator.

Chet is a happy mongrel with ears that are two different colors. He's owned by Bernie, a man who's divorced with shared custody of his son Charlie. Bernie has been contacted by a mom whose 14 year-old daughter, Madison, has gone missing. Because of endless financial concerns, Bernie accepts the case. Shortly afterward the missing girl returns. In the meantime Bernie is visited by a woman from the local newspaper who's doing a story on private investigators. 

When Madison's mom calls Bernie to tell him that Madison is again missing, Chet and Bernie are on the case. It's very suspicious. No ransom has been demanded. Madison's dad insists she's taken off for Las Vegas. Yet Chet can smell that there's something book. The scent is beets. It's up to Chet and Bernie to find Madison. Such an adventure they share! (If only a dog could talk... or at least keep a train of thought.)

Such a delightful book! I began listening to this when heading out on a power walk. I know that several times a wide grin spread across my face as I chugged along neighboring streets. Ha, ha. So-o very good. Book #2 is Thereby Hangs a Tail. I will be reading it!

Linda's score: 4.2/5.0

Hubs is still the #1 cook in our kitchen. He doesn't like me to refer to him as a chef because a chef develops his own recipes; hubs follows those of others. But, I consider him my chef.

With our purchase a few months ago of a Cuisinart counter-top oven (convection, air-fryer, etc.), he's been experimenting with preparing foods in smaller quantities that keep him from having to "fire-up" the big oven during the hot, hot summer days we experienced.

His latest test was to make a half recipe of beer bread which turned out perfectly - and cute too! It was just the right size for the two of us, with a little left over for toasting the next morning. 

I always enjoy his experiments because, inevitably, they're great! Linda