Friday Night Sew-In: Gracie's Pinwheels

Trust that little voice in your head that says "Wouldn't it be interesting if..." And then do it. –Duane Michals, More Joy of Photography

I have been looking forward to Friday Night Sew-In all week long. It was a really great way to unwind after a long week. I was able to leave work early {i.e. on time}, get a few errands taken care of, do a little blog reading, feed the family something quick and easy and by 6:53 pm, I was settled in for an evening of sewing. I decided to work on something completely new and never before seen on my blog. You see, in direct violation of the No New Projects policy, I'm trying to squish one more quilt into my list of quilts to finish by the end of June. Nevermind that it is already February 19^th and I've only finished one of the seven I've set out to do. A friend bought the fabrics and asked if I would make a quilt for her daughter's {toddler} bed. I'm just a girl who can't say no, so here are they are washed and ready for pressing and cutting.

And after an embarrassingly large amount of time, here are all the pieces necessary to make this quilt cut and ready to go. I used my Go! cutter and the starter die to cut that stack of 144 HST's in 15 minutes. It was definitely the fastest part of cutting.

Then it was time to get down to business. I got my pinwheels all put together and started to add the borders around them when Grace positively refused to take another stitch. She insists that I am working her too hard and she wants another spa retreat . I have a problem with this because if her manual told me where to oil her, she'd be getting the proper treatment that would prevent these little protests of hers. The only thing the manual mentions about oiling is where not to put it. So I dust the lint out very regularly and every once in a while I drop a tiny bit of oil down the holes in the face plate. I'm afraid of oiling her too much in the wrong places {because there is no indication of where the right places are}. I went on-line and Googled to see if there were some instructions out there, but no luck. I opened Grace up to see if I could be a little more strategic with where I put the oil so that she'd loosen up. But that didn't help much. So, I put an on-line request in to the manufacturer for instructions. Grace quit long before I was ready to, so this is as far as I got with my Friday Night Sew-In.

I haven't heard back from the manufacturer yet {I know. I'm a bit impatient}, but I'm anxious to get back to my blocks. So this morning I'm going to completely strip her down and see if I can find the sticking spot so that I can get these pinwheel blocks finished. This quilt is going to be like Grandpa's Candy Dish, only the blocks between the pinwheels will not be pieced from strips. I want to say the blocks will be solid, only the fabric is a print, so that is a little confusing . I think it is going to be really fun, assuming I can get Grace back on board.

Today's post brought to you by: