Staking Out the Mailbox

I love getting packages in the mail, don't you? I had ordered some new free motion quilting play things earlier this week and they had the grace to arrive together. Both packages were wrapped so nicely under their USPS outer garments.

First up comes from Spool, and the Bad*ss Quilter's Society. Now, I admire the attitude behind the pin, and while my language is colorful at times, (legacy of being a cow hand, rancher, truck driver, and farmer in my youth), I prefer not to use such language in the written word. especially with the kids around. Enough so that I almost didn't order this fabric from there. But I wasn't sure where else to find it and I thought both fabrics would be wonderful to do some ruler work samples on.

Inside are two 1-1/2 yard cuts of modern cheater cloth. The colorful one is Tangram, from the line Graphyx, by Mark Hordyszynski for Michael Miller. The second is design #14763 in the Color Composition line of Kona Coordinated from Robert Kaufman Fabrics. Sadly, the scale of both pieces are much smaller than I had envisioned, so I'm not sure what I will do with these yet. Especially the white and gray piece as the blocks of color change to narrow strips They are beautiful though. I might be inspired by them to do some similar piecing on a larger scale.

Then my new rulers! These are from Linda Hrcka, of The Quilted Pineapple. She's a long arm quilter who does amazing ruler work and has designed her own line of rulers. I bought the whole entire set and I'm happy to report that only one curve was a repeat of another ruler I had. The arc is the same, but the ruler is longer, so it's not an entire repeat.

I can't wait to try these rulers out! It's wonderful to now feel like I've got a good range of arcs to play with. I went shopping online for some smaller circle templates, but I just couldn't make up my mind. There are a ton of styles, sizes, and I didn't want to buy duplicates of what I already had. Long arm rulers aren't cheap and I have a post about their pricing coming up soon.

Let me know if you want the pin above and I'll pick a name from the comments who say they want it!

Giveaway is closed. Andrea R is our lucky winner!

Now, I am off to make my poor hubby a nice dinner. He works in marine construction and they not only got caught on the lake in a storm, but the boat had died and they had to paddle to the lake's marina. Thankfully, the work boat has a small cabin so they weren't out in the open during the storm. But I believe his arms are aching as that isn't a tiny boat.

Free Motion Quilting with Rulers: Parrs Reel Ruler Foot Video Review

After posting the video from Wednesday's post, I realized I had never posted my video review of the ruler foot from Parrs Reel Ruler. Silly me! The blog post version, A Ruler Foot Alternative: Parrs Reel Ruler, was posted in December.

My final verdict on this foot is that I really, really, really wish they had made the foot a standard 1/2 inch in diameter. That makes spacing a big issue and it won't work with rotating rulers like the TopAnchor Quilting Tools. I also am not wild about it being a hopping style foot, but that does have advantages when it comes to bulky seam intersections. The hopping isn't a deal breaker. I wouldn't choose it over my Janome foot, but that's me. The price is approximately $75 US, including a sew slip mat and ruler, not sure about shipping. Wish it could be bought with just the foot. It comes in low 'reach', high 'reach', and Bernina version. I don't like the rulers. You have to cut your thread to take the ruler on and off the project- no groove for threads to slide out of the center.

Now I am off to care for my little guy who has pink eye and strep. Why did I ever send him to daycare? Besides sanity and a need to work. Poor fella.