Stitching Path

When I posted about my Denim Log Cabin placemats I had 8 tops pieced, but only two of them were quilted and bound. I finally got the rest of them quilted, and last weekend I finished binding them. This stack of placemats makes me so happy!

I quilted them using the swirl hook design, which I learned from Angela Walters' video tutorial. For the first few placemats, I quilted it randomly, but then as I went along I realized that I could quilt it in a spiral so I did that for two. I couldn't believe the difference in the look of the finished quilting!

Here is one quilted randomly...

 ...and one quilted in a spiral.

See how when I quilted in a spiral the motifs end up looking like they're in rows? I also find they ended up more uniform in size and all facing the same direction.

Personally, I like the random look better, but quilting in a spiral was certainly easier. When quilting random I had more of a tendency to quilt myself into predicaments, mostly because I left spaces between the motifs that were either awkward to get into or that I couldn't get into at all. Following a spiral path eliminated those problems because I was just building on the last row quilted.

Have you ever tried quilting the same design in different paths? Did you find it made a difference in the look of the finished quilting?


I'll be linking up with Let's Bee Social, NTT, TGIFF, Can I Get a Whoop Whoop and Finish it up Friday.

No Matter How Big

Devotion for the Week...

What is your first inclination when you screw up big time when no one you know is around? Do you immediately rush to tell people, or are you secretly grateful no one saw and vow to keep it to yourself?

If you're like most people, you tend to keep those things quiet, unless it's one of those 'so stupid it's funny' stories that you're able to laugh about later. We don't really like letting others know how many mistakes we make, do we?

Before He was arrested, Jesus told His disciples, "This very night you will all fall away on account of me," (Matthew 26:31) meaning that they would all scatter and abandon Him. 

But "Peter replied, “Even if all fall away on account of you, I never will” (v. 33). Oh, the confidence! It's easy to be confident you'll stick around through the hard times when everything looks perfect, isn't it?

But Jesus knew the truth. "Truly I tell you,” Jesus answered, “this very night, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times" (v. 34). How that must have stung Peter, hearing that Jesus didn't believe Peter's declaration.

So then "Peter declared, “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you" (v. 35).

Well, that's not what happened, is it? Jesus did get arrested and all the disciples scattered, Peter included. When Jesus was taken away, though, Peter followed.


"Now Peter was sitting out in the courtyard, and a servant girl came to him. “You also were with Jesus of Galilee,” she said.

But he denied it before them all. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

Then he went out to the gateway, where another servant girl saw him and said to the people there, “This fellow was with Jesus of Nazareth.”

He denied it again, with an oath: “I don’t know the man!”

After a little while, those standing there went up to Peter and said, “Surely you are one of them; your accent gives you away.”

Then he began to call down curses, and he swore to them, “I don’t know the man!”
Immediately a rooster crowed. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken: “Before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times.” And he went outside and wept bitterly" (vv. 69-75).

Talk about screwing up big time! Where hours before Peter had been sure he'd be willing to die with Jesus, when the threat came, he found himself denying that he even knew Jesus. Once he realized what he had done, of course Peter wept bitterly. Wouldn't you have?

I once heard a preacher ask, "How do we know Peter denied Jesus?" When you stop to think about it, the only possible way we know this story is because Peter must have told the others what happened. I doubt Peter ever forgot the shame he felt after denying Jesus, but I think he probably told the story hundreds of times in his life. Not because he was proud of himself, or liked telling about his worst mistake, but because once he shared that story, he could then tell the rest of the story.

The first people to learn of the resurrection were some women who went to the tomb to prepare Jesus' body for burial. They arrived at the tomb to find Jesus' body gone and an angel sitting outside the tomb. The angel said to them, "You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you" (Mark 16:6,7). Tell his disciples and Peter! In other words, don't leave Peter out. Make sure he knows what is happening. Give him hope.

Peter screwed up big time, but that just meant Jesus could show him the depth of His grace. Paul wrote in Romans 5:20, 21 "where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." The bigger the sin, the bigger the grace that covers it...and the sin can never be so big that there isn't sufficient grace to cover it. Just ask Peter.

I picture Peter all through his life, talking with people who think their sins are too much for God, that God would never want them because they've screwed up their lives too much. I see Peter smiling as he shakes his head. "You think you've screwed up?" he says to them. "Just listen to what I did, and Jesus forgave me. If His grace is big enough for me, it's big enough for you."

The truth is, there are people today who think they've screwed up their lives too much for God to ever forgive them. Maybe you're one of them. But no matter how big your sins, or how many, God's grace is always big enough to cover them. 

John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." Whoever believes...not only those people who have tiny sins, or those people who hardly ever sin...whoever believes! That means anyone and everyone who believes. Even if your sins are as big as Peter's.

A Seat for Judah

This is Judah.

Adorable, right? Every quilting blog should have a dose of baby cuteness now and then! Judah belongs to our friends Greg and Crystal, and he's 5 months old (I think). A few weeks ago Crystal said something along the lines of, "I have a pattern for something and I was wondering if you could make it for me."

Now, I can confidently acknowledge that my quilting skills are pretty good, but my sewing-anything-else skills can be a little questionable. For example, if the finished item has to fit a person properly, I'm not making it for anyone other than myself just yet! Once I had a look at the pattern, though, I agreed to give it a go because it seemed both pretty simple and more than a little genius. And, having now finished the project, I can say I was right on both counts.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures of it not in use, so we'll have to go with my description of what isn't clear in the picture.

This is a portable baby seat that folds up really small, but holds the baby securely in any dining room style chair. Isn't that brilliant?? I mean, how many times do parents go out to visit friends or family and they want to have baby with them, but not actually in their arms? You can't lug a high chair with you everywhere you go, but this little thing could easily fit in a diaper bag (or suitcase, if needed), then you just pop it over the back of the chair and suddenly your arms are free! How I wish I had had one of these when our boys were small!

How does it work, you ask? Well, there's an opening in the back part that slides down over the back of the chair, and then the front part comes up between baby's legs. What you can't see in the picture is that the red bias tape that goes around the edges extends past the fabric to become long ties. Those ties get threaded through loops on the sides of the back piece. Pull the ties as tight as needed to hold baby in place, then tie a knot at the back of the chair. As you can see, Judah was quite content to test it out for us!

I used this pattern** from Canadian Living, which instructs you to buy pre-quilted fabric. That wasn't available, so Crystal picked out these two cute prints and I just quilted it myself with a quick stipple. I had a serious moment of confusion over the width of the fabric needed, though, since the pattern said it required 1.2 m of 115 cm-wide fabric. Now, the 1.2 meter part I had no problem with because all the fabric stores in Canada sell fabric by the meter, so whenever I go to the store I buy in meters. The 115 cm threw me off, though, because my brain automatically went to extra-wide quilt backing, which is typically 108" wide. It wasn't until Crystal and I had our second or third text exchange about what to buy, and I checked the pattern again (for the third time), that I realized she didn't need to buy extra-wide fabric. Regular quilting fabric, the 45" stuff I've been buying for years and years, is 115 cm! I don't think I've ever seen the width of the fabric measured in metric before. Crystal told me afterwards that every time she said something about the fabric being 115 cm to the lady at the fabric store, the lady would respond with, "yeah, 45 inches." I guess I'm not the only Canadian who thinks of the fabric width in inches!

This little seat would make a great gift for new parents and I'm thinking I'll be making many more of them in the future, especially now that I know what size fabric to buy!


I'll be linking up this week with Let's Bee Social, NTT, TGIFF, Can I Get a Whoop Whoop and Finish it up Friday.

** Edited September 1, 2016...Aack, it seems the pattern has disappeared from the Canadian Living website! I'm so sorry that link is no longer valid.

***Edited April 10, 2017...okay, here's a new link that is working (for now!).