day 1: success

Yesterday afternoon, I loaded the anniversary quilt.  I decided to use what daylight I had left to get a jump start on quilting for today.

This morning I got up and dug in.  A few deep breaths, fingers crossed that my thread tension would be good and I wouldn't have trouble with threads breaking or any other, new troubles, and off I went.

In all, everything went quite well.

Skitter had a vet appointment at 10:30, so I had to stop for a bit.  But I'd done 6 passes of the panto.

There are two passes of the quilt on the roll.  It's "Rose Vine" and marked N. Woods.  Since these came with the machine, I don't know any more.  Each pass is about 6 inches wide.

By lunchtime, I had enough of the quilt done that it wasn't hanging down on the floor any more.

I knew at that point I was going to have it finished by the end of the day.  And it's good timing.  My dad is coming down tomorrow to install my light bar.  Actually, I think I'm going to do the bulk of it, as he fell off a step ladder last week and broke his wrist.  (We're all thankful it's not worse.)

At this point, I had a little tension trouble (okay, it was big trouble and required some unpicking, but the solution was simple - rethread the machine and start a new bobbin).  Thankfully it was easily resolved and I went forward.

Before I finished, I had to take Tucker in for his yearly appointment, too.  You may ask why I don't do them both at once.  First, I only have one cat carrier.  Second, Skitter, true to her name, is very skittish and sometimes decides to hide inside the box springs of my bed, forcing me to cancel her appointment.  If I schedule two separate ones, I can always take Tucker for her appointment and try again.

Back from the appointment for a few more passes and it's done!

I didn't calculate or anything and came out with the motif finishing just a few inches from the edge of the quilt.  Close enough to call it done!

Here's one of my favorite parts.  This was not planned and only happened once.

And so finally, I took the quilt off the machine, cleaned and oiled it, folded the extra batting and backing nicely and now it only needs binding and a label.  And the binding is already made!

I used my new Red Snappers to load the quilt.  They were faster to unload, but loading...I'm not sure they were that much faster.  They take a lot of strength to snap on and I'd be willing to bet I was making some pretty good faces while working on it!  I think with some practice I'll get faster.

To date, this is the largest quilt I've ever quilted myself.  I'm pretty happy with the results, though I'm a little stiff!  (Too bad the hubby isn't here for a backrub!)  And I'm excited that it's mostly finished and not needed for a gift for another 3 months!  (You all know I'll be sewing binding on on the way to give it away, though, right?)

And now, it's time to make myself some dinner, feed the kitties and have some snuggle time.  With two traumatic visits to the vet (not really, though with all the meowing going on, you'd think it was pure torture the whole time), my kitties would probably enjoy some lap time.  I think a movie is in order for that.

Happy quilting,

Katie