Dear Jane F12 Starburst

Given I have delegated most of the quilt making activity, I had some time to spend on the Dear Jane quilt. Here is block F12, also known as starburst. Now, there may be some of you who have been thinking about making a Dear Jane quilt, have been hiding their kaleidoscope ruler and have issues with monkeys.  In turns out that this Dear Jane block was made with a kaleidoscope ruler and no monkeys were hurt in the process.

Here's the kaleidoscope base to this block. The Dear Jane blocks measure 5 inches unfinished so I made the octogon wedges a bit bigger than necessary, then cut them to size after piecing them together. Then I added the four light triangles on the corners and trimmed again.

Next I appliqued four triangles to the base of each of the light wedges to make the starburst. To applique, I traced the finished size template from the Dear Jane book onto freezer paper. Then I ironed the freezer paper triangle to the back side of the fabric. I cut around the shape leaving a seam allowance and then ironed the seam allowance back around the triangle on the two short sides. For these triangles, I only have to applique the two short sides. And to iron the seam allowance, I don't bother with spray starch. I just spritz it with a little water and that is enough to get a lasting sharp fold. Then I pinned the shapes to the block and sewed them on by hand.

Lime Plaid Bunnies

The Rainbow Scrappy Challenge has become so rancorous, I am just stepping away. I told the plaid bunnies that they aren't part of the Rainbow Scrappy Challenge, but they wouldn't listen. So this weeks offering was made by the plaid bunnies, and I had nothing to do with it. If you would like some sanity with your lime patchwork, I suggest you visit the other Rainbow participants who are celebrating the color lime for November.

The plaid bunnies also wanted me to show you that they have changed their construction, because apparently bunnies are the best at making bunnies. They are using a 2.5 inch square with a single 1.5 inch square flip triangle under their tail instead of "the horrendous seam-laden mayhem" that I was using. And yes, I'm just quoting how they described it.

Meanwhile, I would love to show pictures of Team Storm (the kittens Typhoon, Cyclone, and Hurricane). However, they are resisting their enrollment in Kitten U, and think they are part of a Scared Straight documentary. Oddly, this is a bit of a welcome relief after Roy.

Wonky, Jane, and Brewing Storm

I finished off a handful of wonky stars for Alycia's QOV block challenge. I wanted to get them in the post today so Alycia would get them by her November 11 deadline. Today was full of errands so I delegated packing to the owls. If owl post works for Harry Potter, I figured it would work for QOV wonky stars.

Here are two more blocks in the Dear Jane series. The top block is G3 or Four Leaf Clover. It was included in Fabadashery's most recent drawing. Happily, I had already made that block to test whether I would enjoy hand applique (after a long hiatus). The answer was yes, and that's why I made the bottom block, although it hasn't been officially picked.

And last but not least, Kitten U has three new enrollees: Typhoon, Hurricane and Cyclone. They are part of a litter of five that were split up to keep foster families sane. The other two siblings are Tornado and Tsunami. The admissions office has not sent me their photos yet. They are about 12 weeks old, just had their surgeries, and are in dire need of socialization. They have been here for about two hours now and have not made a single demand. Pathetic.

Snowball Fish Tutorial

This quilt gets pinned a lot and is often referred to as the Snowball Fish with HSTs although no HSTs were used in this quilt. It seemed straight forward, but I've decided to finally provide a tutorial that I have tried to lock down in one image.

In a nutshell, one starts with a 4 by 5.5 inch rectangle and cut off a 1.5 inch strip for the fish tail. Then six 1.5 inch squares of the background fabric are laid face down in the corners. Then flip triangles are sewn. For this, one sews along the diagonal but slightly towards the outside. Iron the flap back so the corner of the top triangle match up with the outer corner. Trim away the excess fabric underneath the flip triangle. The last step is to sew the fish tail to the snowball (fish body). Lay the fish tail face down on top of the back of the fish so the triangles align. This will give you matching points, a sharp triangle and approval from quilting judges. Last but not least, make the fish some friends and keep them all away from marauding cats.

In the meantime, I am trying to figure out the border, I mean, the background set for the lion musical. I was even willing to be elaborate, but my idea turned out to be awful. The lions did not want me to add cheetah fabric, claiming cheetahs are good-for-nothing show-offs. The only agreement we could come to was the wavy fabric used in the lion manes. Unfortunately, I only have four inches left. However, there was a lot of waste trimming the lion manes, so I'm going to try to fashion the next border out of that. Stay tuned, so to speak.

Kittens and quilt progress

Meet Kodiak. This is a new black kitten available for adoption at the shelter because Roy is no longer there.  Roy was adopted on Halloween. Apparently one of the local foster kitten servants fell in love with Roy, adopted him, and gave up fostering. I am very curious if his new family includes other cats or dogs who may be able to teach him more easily what a bite feels like. (That said, I don't think there is a formal shelter policy against biting kittens.)

Reeses also recently came up for adoption at the shelter. I wouldn't want to meet him in a dark alley.

And Twix is Reeses' sister. Naming the kittens after candy was an obvious shelter ploy to sweeten the darkness that resides within these kittens.

And last but not least is Ruben...unrelated to the others. He is named after the winner of American Idol, season two for reasons I can only imagine.

Meanwhile my quilting progress was pin basting the kitten quilt and then clearing off the table behind the sewing machine I use for machine quilting. Clearing the table took longer. The table top had become the dumping ground for everything that I was protecting from Roy the Foster Kitten. And of course, Roy spent most of his time in the sewing room trying to get onto this table. That meant I also built barricades around the machine and table and that had to taken down too. And yes, a before photo would have been more interesting...

Revised Stretching Cat Template

Here is the revised stretching cat quilting template. I found a profile view of Tommy that reminded me that cat's have protruding foreheads to house the executive part of their brain that they use to run their life and ours.

This is the photo I found with a good profile view of Tommy. He always preferred a quarter-turn posing view. In this case, he was too young to know better, and he was otherwise engaged and not paying attention to the camera. A common rookie mistake.

You would also think Tommy would be watching his brother Jimmy and that threatening display. Instead, he is looking above Jimmy, probably planning a surprise launch over him. Poor Jimmy was handicapped by having to live with a smarty-pants sibling...a challenge that I can certainly relate to.

Christmas Owl???

Really??!!? Christmas Owl shows up the day after Halloween Owl? Whoo thought that was a good idea? And what about Thanksgiving Owl? Or is he too afraid of being mistaken for a turkey?

In the meantime, I'm trying to figure out what to quilt inside the kittens. This is a silhouette of a cat stretching that I used back in 2011 for a fabric pattern. It was traced from a picture of Tommy and put into Illustrator. Unfortunately, to make it easier to quilt, I smoothed the image so much that the head looks more like a rat than a cat. Even the kittens are not amused.