Quilting Stars

I worked on Noon and Night for most of yesterday; I am not sure I will be able to pull marathon sessions like that very often as I don’t like to sit that much. I fell into a routine of quilting a star, then getting up to do something else for a few minutes before coming back to work on the next star.

From my practice blocks, I knew that I wanted to outline the star in black thread. I also liked the way the star looked when I quilted inside the larger, outer diamond, but I hadn’t decided on whether or how to do the outer star points. The Original Star quilt in the Fons and Porter book has a quilting diagram for hand quilting in which each separate star point unit is quilted 1/2” inside the seam. It’s a lot of quilting.

In the end, I compromised, quilting the diamond and inside each of the four star points. I treated the star points as one unit rather than two units.

The star pops off the background nicely. I’m using a Signature 40wt color called Pearl on top and Aurifil 50wt black in the bobbin.

The only other place I might need to add some quilting is in the background sections between the stars. They are approximately 5” x 5” and that might be too large a space to leave unquilted. I don’t want the batting to bunch in those areas when the quilt is washed. The easiest solution would be to quilt a straight line through the middle of the sashing both vertically and horizontally, but I don’t want to ruin the overall look of the quilt. I could also quilt a small motif in those areas. I’ll finish the stars and re-evaluate (and also check the labels of the batting to see what the recommended maximum quilting distance is).

I feel like I am moving at a snail’s pace, but it’s forward progress and that’s what matters. I’ve also started working on a new quilt design, after an exhaustive search of Google images and Pinterest to see if anything like it has been done before. The design is based on one of the blocks I sewed up on Sunday. The other block has been set aside for now.

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The last part of 2020 saw a proliferation of podcasts and YouTube channels. I’ve added several podcasts to my listening schedule and let some go. One of the new podcasts I am enjoying very much is called Drinks With Ali. I know Ali from one of the homesteading groups we both belong to. She lives in Nova Scotia. She’s been podcasting three times a week and focuses on a different subject—mixed drinks, wines, etc.—on different days of the week. I like that she explores the background of different drinks as well as offering cocktail recipes and pairing ideas. She also has a lovely voice.

Living Free in Tennessee is probably the best podcast in the queue, bar none. Nicole Sauce has podcasting, homesteading, and community-building dialed in. She is also part of the Unloose the Goose crew, but those podcasts are Zoom recorded and posted to YouTube, so the husband and I save those for evening viewing. The Constructive Liberty Podcast, with Ken Eash, is another one I enjoy. Ken also belongs to one of the homesteading groups. I tease him that I call his podcast the “Church of Ken,” because he sounds very much like a preacher (in a good way). Each podcast is about 20 minutes long. I usually listen to them on the way to town, and they make me feel like I’ve just been to church and heard an inspiring sermon.

Peak Prosperity and the KunstlerCast drop on a less frequent and irregular basis, but the episodes are always worth waiting for. I still listen to Sewing Out Loud and Sewing with Threads. And C&T Publishing has a great podcast called Behind the Seams. I’ll also add in episodes recommended by the husband from podcasts he listens to.

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The husband is off to check out a jobsite this morning to see if they can start forming a foundation. We’re getting a lot of precipitation—there is a string of systems coming in off the Pacific—but the temps so far have been in the 30s and the precipitation is in the form of rain. The longer-range forecast looks like we’re going to get hammered in February, which is to be expected.