A NEW Grandson!!

The BIG news this week is that our new little grandson has arrived!  He came early yesterday morning and I can hardly wait to hold him and give him kisses. He's adorable 🥰.  I can't wait to see our granddaughter too - she will be an awesome big sister!  What a blessing - we're so thankful Mom and Baby are doing well, and so excited for their little family!!

My Zoom class with Jen Kingwell was SO much fun.  There were only about ten people in the class so it felt very personal even though none of us were in the same city or even state and of course two were in Australia.  Several different time zones.  I logged in at 4:00 PM and Jen would say, "Good morning!"

She did indeed talk about all things hand stitching.  She went over hand piecing, which I have tried before and am interested in trying again because it's so portable and you don't have to think too much about it, unlike embroidery stitches etc.  She gave many, many good tips on hand piecing.  She also went over several different ways of doing English Paper Piecing, which I've done quite a bit of and I like it "ok".  I just don't really enjoy the prep work (gluing the fabric to the pieces).  There seems to be a bit of prep work for hand piecing too, I guess there is with anything, so I'll have to decide what I like to do the most.  A couple of nice things about hand piecing: it's very portable, it's kind of relaxing and once you do prep work, you don't have to think about it too much.  Also, no paper pieces to remove, once you're done!  One of the gals in class also brought up the fact that many of us have a lot of quilts and have gifted many quilts to our families so we don't need to turn out a large number of quilts, so taking our time and making one by hand is kind of nice.

The second class, she went over hand appliqué, which I've also done a lot of and really enjoy.  And she mostly does the back basting method that I like!  She will occasionally do other methods as well, and demonstrated several.  Then she talked about Big Stitch quilting, which I've never done before and was very interested in learning. I definitely want to try it on a quilt - small to begin with. 😊

She finished up with showing a LOT of different finished edge techniques which I'm super excited to try.  I need to go back and re-watch the video and take some screen shots like the one above, so I remember them - there were so many ideas!!

Here is a little piece I started hand piecing.  I'm starting small, but she has a pattern called Daisy Do that I really want to do.  I need to get the template pack and get going on it.  This is one of her postcard patterns I will sew little squares in between the hexagons (you can kind of see them in the photo at the top).  I'll make this into a pillow or a little doll quilt - it won't be very big.  Maybe I'll practice some Big Stitching as well (see my practice piece below).  She uses size 12 Aurafil and a chenille needle.

Anyway, fun, fun, fun!  She is a delightful person and I learned so much.

Hope you're all enjoying a wonderful weekend!! ❤️❤️