Buffalo Tree Hopper

Here is the Dear Jane E4 or Buffalo Tree Hopper. In the book and quilt, there are set-in seams from the points of the diamond at top left and bottom right to their respective corners. I switched the seam lines because there was enough fiddling going on to make the tree hopper wings, legs, horns or whatever those extensions are. (To see a photo of an actual Buffalo Tree Hopper, visit the Fabadashery blog here.)

Otherwise, there was not much sewing today. I have been tending to Roy who was under the weather after the trip to the shelter yesterday. He actually sat in my lap and licked my fingers...that's how sickly he's been. He said it was due to the devastating news that he remains assigned to a severe fabric hoarder for two more weeks. But I have since learned he's been hoarding his own foster internal parasites and the medicine he received yesterday is forcibly evicting them. (A good reason why fostering is easier in a pet-free home.)

More Dear Jane blocks

This could be a study in contrasts, but its really just two more Dear Jane blocks. The top block is C12 or Family Union and the bottom block is F13 or Tour de France. Yellow was an obvious choice. And as a reminder, the blocks are 5 inches unfinished, so the smallest squares in the nine patch are half inch finished. The nine patches are 1.5 inches finished.

Meanwhile, Roy the Kitten went to the shelter today for a check-up. He bit no hands, including mine, leaving me looking like a delusional nut case. And yes, I did hear some chuckling in the carrier on the way back. So Roy will be staying at Kitten U for a couple more weeks working on his independent studies: plastic bag and eating.

Dear Jane Melissa's Cross

I recently began making Dear Jane blocks to follow along with the Fabadashery blog.  I thought it might expand my piecing horizons (eg. applique and paper piecing) but I find myself reverting back to my usual flip and sew techniques. This block is  B11 or Melissa's Cross and you can see Fabadashery's interpretation here. Oddly, the version in the actual antique quilt and the pattern in the Dear Jane book by Brenda Papadakis are different. This meant I went back to the drawing board, I mean graph paper, to draft my own version, shown above.

As usual I start with strip piecing. I should also mention that I began by making the block with 1 inch cut (1/2 inch finished) strips of background fabric, but this didn't leave enough room for the circular wedges. I then started over with 7/8 inch stips and a 7/8 inch square center. The large dark squares are cut from a 2.5 inch strip.

Then the three strip sets are sewn together.

Next, I made chalk lines one and 7/8 inch from the corners of the large blocks and aligned my strip of 7/8 inch background fabric to those marks. Then, just like a flip triangle, I sewed a 1/4 inch seam and ironed the flap back.

I sew and flip the four strips around the block. (The picture here shows the construction using one inch strips--but for my final version I used 7/8 inch strips.)

Next, I cut two 3.5 inch squares of the dot fabric--that I also used in the center square (following Faberdashery's three fabric version). I cut these on the diagonal to make 4 right triangles that I then attached to the light fabric stripping--covering up the pyramid fabric squares. At this point I trimmed away the fabric pile-up on the back of the block.

I had intended to cut a circle out of the block I had made and applique it to the background fabric, but realized that I might as well use Dale Fleming's six-minute circle. So I made a five inch square of double freezer paper and drew the circle on that. I demonstrate how to make these inset circles here and here and here.

The freezer paper  template is used to make the background circle which is laid over the pieced block and sewn along the crease in the fabric (using a zipper foot).  The excess background fabric is cut away. In the version sewn here, the flaps are still ironed outward which creates a less than lovely outer ring...so I will fix this by ironing the flaps to face inward.

Here is the finished Dad's Plaid (Dear Jane A7).

And here is a collection of four recently completed blocks.

Patient X Lack of Progress Report

Dear All. I am Roy the Pet Therapist Secret Agent Kitten assigned to socialize a patient with SFHD--severe fabric hoarding disorder. I have instituted a tough love policy with this patient where I bite her hand whenever she thinks about fabric. I attack her hands relentlessly on the computer keyboard to prevent further fabric purchases. Despite constant attempts to prevent her from wallowing in her stockpile, I must give up all hopes of returning this person to society. I have wasted almost a quarter of my life to this useless pursuit. Until I get reassigned, I will just take time out and write my memoirs.

Roy's Progress Report

Roy has made excellent progress. When he first arrived, he was an attack kitten with a hand obsession. When I threw a toy, he bit my hand. If I used a wand toy, he attacked the hand. If I held him, he gnawed on my hands.

To adapt to Roy's special needs, Kitten U converted to KMI--Kitten Military Institute where Roy was forced to run laps chasing a wand toy, endured hours of chasing thrown toys, had to battle with stuffed toys (not hands!). Bites led to puffs of air and the dreaded time out. I even put lemon juice on my hands--which worked for about ten minutes--but then like a sugar addict pulling a cake from the trash can, Roy would bite my hands anyway.

Now, after a week at KMI, Roy now chases thrown toys. He can even initiate play with cat toys. And when he lapses into biting and attacks, they are much gentler.

So the extra good news is that Roy has graduated from KMI and is now enrolled at Kitten U. He has already passed exams in tissue paper, scrunched paper balls, and tiered roller ball. He excels at multi-tasking--playing with several toys at once. Or maybe he has kitten ADD. He is now taking lessons in the sewing room including runway running and strip pile mining.

I am only using a very small pile of strips to begin with because I don't want to overwhelm him.

Brown owl

This month we are celebrating chocolate...I mean the color brown...over at the Rainbow Scrappy Challenge. At first, I thought a brown owl would look ridiculous, but I think it looks fine. There seems to be something wrong with him though.

Because the other owls are keeping him at a safe distance.

Dear Jane: Daytona was adopted!

This Dear Jane block was too easy to resist. But I did put it off until after I had done some basic rain preparation like clearing the rain gutters. The forecasts are fluctuating, but, in any case, everyone around here is expecting that some of our roads will become impassible.

And I pulled together this applique block in case we lose power.

But the real news of the day is that Daytona was adopted today! I went to visit him yesterday and he refused to acknowledge me. He said he will never trust anyone with cotton breath again and how come he never got to learn to build with legos. And yes, the last of the lego kittens (Nicholas) had been adopted. But even more surprising, in the last week, Daytona had turned into an adolescent cat--double in size--with a loud disapproving meow instead of his high pitch squeak. And even better, the cloudiness in his eye had almost cleared entirely. He may end up with a normal eye after all. Now he can use both eyes to investigate his new forever home.999999999999999999999 

Note: Additional key strokes provided by Roy--the kitten that loves the keyboard because that's where the hands are!