Just Enough Borders

This quilt lived up to its name right until the very end. I had just enough of both the inner and outer border fabrics to finish the top. I had to photograph it on the floor because it’s too heavy to stay up on the design wall.

Now it just needs a backing. I might have one in the stash, but I’ll have to see if the blues coordinate.

This will probably get an allover quilting design. I did loopy flowers on the original.

**********************************

I bought myself a new iron yesterday:

I am very particular about my iron and my ironing board. I learned to iron using my mother’s GE iron on her Mary Proctor ironing board. The Mary Proctor ironing boards were rectangles with sections that folded down. The “single-flip” board folds down on one end to form a point:

The “double-flip” board folds down on the end and also on one side. I spent a long time searching for my own Mary Proctor ironing board and now I have one of each. I use the single-flip every day. The double-flip needs a replacement piece to keep the side extension up and I haven’t fixed it yet, although it works fine without the extension. The double-flip board lives here in my office for when I’m sewing in here and need to press something.

I’ve been buying those old GE irons—the heavy ones with the cloth-covered cords—when I see them at thrift stores, because the newer irons are too light and have idiot features like auto shut-off, which is timed perfectly to shut off a few minutes before you need to press something. The old GE ones are getting harder to find, though, and often have damaged sole plates or frayed cords. The one I’ve been using died the other day, so I decided it was time for me to just spend the money and buy myself a new Oliso iron. These are designed for quilters—no auto shut-off—and also have little legs underneath that lift up to keep the sole plate off the ironing board when the iron is not in use. Clever! The Oliso irons are also nice and heavy.

On my to-do list for today is to organize everything for my serger classes next week and make up the handout for the third and final T-shirt class. I think I will need to break up that T-shirt class at some point. We’re getting into some advanced pattern drafting and not everyone needs or wants that. I’m going to make up class materials for making a raglan T-shirt—because one of the students asked about that specifically last time—and see which topic the students would prefer we tackle.