International Dog Day and Free Motion Mavericks

Hi and welcome! Monday was International Dog Day and Susan is holding her annual party. I've been making scrappy mats and since I'm addicted, I thought that I'd make a mat to fit under Poppy's water bowl so that she could appreciate it when she visits. 😁 

Scrappy Mat for Poppy

I was out of town (more about that in a special post) so I didn't have time to free motion quilt (FMQ) the mat yet. Since I watched many of the videos last week from the FMQ Summit, I want my scrappy mats to be quilting in designs that I learned during the summit. I've been practicing one of the designs by drawing it but it's taken quite a few pages to get it right! Hopefully I'll have my scrappy mats quilted for you soon!

Front of the scrappy Poppy mat 🐕

Back of the scrappy Poppy mat 🐶

Poppy hasn't visited since I made the mat, so there's no picture of Poppy with the mat, but I do have lots of Poppy pictures! If you're wondering, Poppy is my son and his fiancé's dog.

Poppy really wanting a treat 😀

Poppy chilling in the sun in my back yard

Poppy's coy look 😍

Poppy with her Rocky Raccoon toy!

Poppy's water bowl (made by my daughter) on her new mat

Poppy's water bowl on the back side of the mat

Here is the other scrappy improv mat that I made last week. Once more I used an orphan block and just added fun fabric to finish it off. It's finished off pillowcase style and is now ready to FMQ.

A second scrappy improv mat ready for FMQ

What I learned

• I checked to see if Canada was also celebrating National Dog Day and it turns out that it's an international celebration, so Happy International Dog Day (on August 26!) Hope you had a chance to hug your/a dog!😊
• I've had a great time making scrappy improv mats. I used the lovely fat quarter paw print fabric as well as other scraps, including the centre piece which is from a panel. I know that I have many other doggy fabric scraps....but I'm not sure where they are! When I stumble upon them, I'll put them where they now belong. 🐕
• I used the pillowcase method to finish both mats. It's such an easy finish and once it's stitched ⅛" from the edge and the opening is closed, there's nothing left to do but FMQ.
• I'm thrilled to say that I remembered my lesson learned for doing a pillowcase finish - what ever is facing the front will be the back! 
• I also learned a valuable lesson when I made my first half-square triangle block! I thought that I was doing so well not having to look up how to make them....well, if you check out the front of Poppy's mat, you'll see at there are two half-square triangle blocks. The one on top was made first, and it has a half-square triangle block made up of the same fabric 😁! The second block, with two different fabrics, was made after I remembered to use two different fabrics! 
• So the lesson is: use two different fabrics facing each other to make half-square triangle blocks. I'm sure that you don't need the reminder so this is for me!

Related links

• Orange Scraps on Free Motion Mavericks, August 22, 2024

  

• Susan at Quilt Fabrication celebrates National Dog Day every year.

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties, including Susan's National Dog Day 2024. Why not check them out...and remember to link up below! Monday Musings, Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Needle & Thread Thursday, Off The Wall Friday, Beauties Pageant, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2024, Oh Scrap!,

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 496 of Free Motion Mavericks! Wow! What a productive week! It's a long featured section but well worth it! Thanks for linking up. Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. 

Frédérique of Quilting Patchwork Appliqué made another of her lovely baby quilts - Baby Quilt Floralies - to donate. I really love this pattern and just might have to make one too! Frédérique quilted-in-the-ditch around the blocks and border and then quilted straight lines in the outside border. She also made her quilt gender-neutral by using both blue and pink for her binding.

Frédérique's Baby Quilt Floralies

Frédérique quilted the outside border - very effective!

I think that Gail of Quilting Gail had lots of fun making these two Elephant quilts for the It's a Jungle Blog Hop! They are so cute. All the quilting was FMQ with echoing the elephant shapes and stippling the elephants themselves. 

Gail's two elephant quilts

Margo Young of MY Quilts and Crafts made a really striking wall hanging using a new alphabet pattern. You'll have to check out her post to learn more! Margo used straight line quilting to finish it off.

Margo's alphabet quilt

Deb the Scrappy Quilter had a very productive week finishing up quilts and picking cherries! The string quilt is the twin of the peak that we had last week of her finished quilt. The blocks were quilting with a large zig-zag design. 

Deb's string blocks quilted with a large zig-zag design

Deb's string quilt looks like jewels set in the quilt!

Deb's yellow Irish Chain scrappy quilt

Preeti of Sew Preeti has shared her Blush Quilt which she made in the 2024 Pantone Colour. Preeti loves to play with colour values and it shows! What lovely gradation of peach!

Preeti's lovely Blush Quilt

Last week Melva was able to reveal her 50th Anniversary Quilt. It's lovely and was obviously greatly appreciated. What a great idea to have messages on the quilt of the couple's siblings. 

Melva's message and signature 50th Anniversary Quilt

Anne-Marie of Stories from the Quilting Room custom quilted a customer's Looper Quilt. Since it was to enter in a show, Anne-Marie went all out! It's another Wow quilt!  She used individual FMQ motifs for the coloured strip sections and then went all out in the background!

Anne-Marie's custom quilted client quilt

Anne-Marie's custom quilted graffiti-style FMQ

Carla of Hawk Studios is working hard to get those deadlines done, and it includes lots of FMQ! She's been FMQ this quilt to enter it into the fall show. I know that she had lots of fun FMQ among the flowers 😊 

Carla FMQ among the flowers

Carla FMQ in the sashing

Sally of Crafts, Cavies and Cooking has just finished a lovely quilted jacket that she made using a sweatshirt. Sally will be entering it into her local fair. She used two different sets of fabric and it looks great!

Sally's quilted jacket made with a sweatshirt

The inside of Sally's jacket - check out the quilting
and the amazing finish!

I hope that you've been inspired by all of this eye-candy. It makes me want to play with FMQ!😍 It's now your turn.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Remembering Bandit (2002-2014)

Two women’s best friend died this week. Bandit brought joy to our lives, especially to my daughter and me.

Adopting Bandit

Bandit was a rescue dog from Florida. Apparently there are a lot of cocker spaniels in Florida and so older dogs have more difficulty getting adopted. Bandit obviously had some wonderful owners in Florida. He was generally well trained and confident…sometimes a little too much!

Two mothers

This is my daughter and I adopting Bandit in January 2012. We got him from a wonderful foster mom. Thanks Margaret for all of your support! Although I had a dog growing up, he wasn't my responsibility so it was a steep learning curve. We also had a good coach in Jane Madigan of Inspired K9s.

Bandit in Northern Ontario

Within a month of moving in, Bandit went on his first road trip to Northern Ontario to my grandmother’s funeral. For a Florida dog, he sure loved snow, especially when he discovered that he could eat it all! He had no problems adapting to the cold and the snow. He was also wonderful in the hotel room. A perfect gentleman.

A confident Bandit on his pink and brown quilt

Of course as soon he moved in he got his first quilt. He would lie down on the couch on his pink and brown quilt. No doubt about it, he was a confident cocker!

Bandit and Twix

Bandit has his own quilt

Bandit was often in my room when I was quilting. Here he is with his cousin Twix (my brother’s dog). They both wanted to be there as I was binding the quilt before my brother and his family moved to Denmark.

Finally, Bandit got a quilt made just for him. I had a great time shopping for fabric in Philadelphia last fall. I also got to practice my free motion quilting.

Last Christmas I made mug rugs for my colleagues. Since I worked late into the evening, Bandit made himself at home in my Christmas stash. What a sweetheart.

Bandit in the Christmas stash

This is one of the last photos of Bandit. He was quite sick and lost a lot of weight. He still loved to hang around with me when I was quilting. I think that one evening he decided that he wanted attention – lying down on my sewing machine pedal did the trick!

Thank you so much Bandit for your love. You are truly missed.

Bandit wants attention

What I learned:

• It turns out that having a healthy pancreas is important :-(
• Unconditional love is rare and precious.
• It's almost more upsetting that it hurts less as time goes by.

Quilting for Woman’s Best Friend

Challenge # 1: free motion quilting requires a lot of practice.  Challenge #2: I needed more blankets on the couch to keep the couches clean and to make Bandit, the dog who adopted us last winter, more comfortable. Solution: I made a doggy blanket for Bandit and practiced my free motion quilting. It was a win-win situation. No matter how good or bad the quilting, Bandit won’t complain. That’s one of the reasons he’s our BF!

Bandit on the pink blanket

There are several blankets already on the various chairs and couches around the house, but none had been made specifically for our Bandit. Here’s Bandit on one of my very pink quilt. It’s a good thing that he’s quite confidant in this masculinity!

While I was in Philadelphia, I bought a few doggie fat quarters. Unfortunately, the colour palette leaves a lot to be desired – brown, grey, beige and black. I know that dogs are colour blind, but I’m not!

The Gallery pattern adapted to lap size

Thank goodness one of the fabrics had a hint of a teal blue on the dogs’ collars. I also picked up an interesting promotional pattern on that trip. The pattern is The Gallery by Heidi Pridemore that was used to feature the Illustrations fabric collection by P&B Textiles.

Free motion bones

Free motion hearts / leaves

I wanted to make Bandit’s quilt lap-size so one evening I sat and adapted the pattern. That was trickier than I expected, particularly keeping track of those ¼ inch seams. I made a few minor calculation mistakes, like the top-right panel that’s a couple of inches too large.  Since I’m trying to keep my quilting in perspective (i.e. it’s a practice piece for the dog), I didn't redo the block.

Writing on the quilt

I had a great time free motion quilting it. I did quilt some bones but I didn't see myself quilting bones for 5 or 6 hours! I loved the heart/leaves that I came up with.

To keep practicing and for variety, I wrote out Bandit’s name and “Woof” a few times. I also quilted a design by Leah Day – Icicle Lights. I included them on the quilt since they look like snowflakes and Bandit loves to eat snow. He’s originally from Florida so his first winter here was an adaptation. Bandit loves to eat and it was a momentous occasion when he discovered that 1) he could eat snow chunks and that 2) they were everywhere! He’s now a huge fan of winter!


 Here's Bandit enjoying his quilt.




Lessons learned:

• Adapt patterns when you’re mind is fresh – not after a full day’s work! It will probably lead to fewer miscalculations.
• The amount of un-sewing on a quilt should depend on the context (like who gets it and what it’s for).
• Even if a free motion stitch is easy, practice it on a scrap before using it on the quilt. That’s why there are no pictures of that lovely Icicle Lights pattern. It’s worth checking it out.