Quilting for those who (like me) can't quilt

The current project being worked on in the sewing room is a table runner made of three large flower blocks with sashing between, a border to match the sashing then a pieced border made of rectangles. For the quilting design in the sashing I wanted a leafy vine (or a viney leaf, whichever you prefer) . Now....I can't draw very well, and I certainly don't trust myself and the free-motion foot on My Lovely New Bernina to quilt something spectacular without lines to guide us, but I can manage a curved line with a few leaves and tendrils hanging off it.

You can see the finished quilting on the sashing between blocks, and the border design pinned on ready for its turn. The design is drawn onto thin paper (sold here as lunch wrap) - it's slightly transparent - mistakes are easily corrected or redrawn using a pencil, then the paper is pinned onto the quilt and the design is sewn through. It is easily torn away after quilting.

Below, the corners have a little gap.....need to fix that before the quilting gets underway. Easily done, just cut a small piece of paper, pin it under the corner gap then draw on a bit more vine and a leaf for a seamless trip round the corner.
The flower centres looked a bit bare with no quilting so they now have a curly design. The thread is a variegated Signature size 40 thread in a colour that is not beige....not gold....not brown....not khaki but a little of all those, and it suits the muted colours of the fabrics.
If one doesn't look too closely, the quilting looks like embroidery. The advantage of this method is that there are no lines to remove on the quilt; I have heard horror stories of washable marking pens that won't wash out, and air erasable pen marks which re-appear after disappearing for a while.

Tonight we are going to the theatre to see a play written by a local bloke. We saw one of his plays last year and it was very funny, tonight's play is the follow-up to that story. He's a very talented bloke, plays piano, sings, writes and directs plays and musical plays, directs the Thursday night choir, and in general does a lot for the musical life of this town.

In the local paper today my stars say I will set myself free in a healthy creative way......does this mean I will come over all arty in the weekend workshop? Had to chuckle when I read that.

Last weekend a new quilt shop opened here in the Small Smoke. While it has quite a large selection of fabrics, and reasonable prices, and lots of patterns and some kits, if the owner continues to verbally run down a shop which has been in town for quite some time she won't be getting my custom again. The owner of the first shop has always been good to me and I will continue to shop there, even if I have to pay a wee bit more at times to do so. It's not a good idea to say negative things about the opposition to a customer.......after all, you never know if said customer is connected to the opposition in some way, do you?

"All well-bred persons will conduct themselves at all times and in all places with perfect decorum. Wherever they meet people they will be found polite, considerate of the comfort, convenience and wishes of others, and unobtrusive in their behavior. They seem to know, as if by instinct, how to conduct themselves, wherever they may go, or in what society they may be thrown. They consider at all times the fitness of things, and their actions and speech are governed by feelings of gentleness and kindness towards everybody with whom they come into social relations, having a due consideration for the opinions and prejudices of others, and doing nothing to wound their feelings."

Do you think the owner of the new shop should read this? Somehow I don't think it would make any difference to her.

Enjoy your days!