Mother nature & a healthy slice of humble pie

Mother Nature can be very fickle. She can change her mind whenever she chooses. I think that meteorologists need to have the same disclaimer as doctors " that they are practicing".  They tell you in the evening that its supposed to be clear & hot the next day & you wake up to storms. In the past 18 years this is the latest we have ever been in the hayfield. I thought that last year was bad on how long it took but this year has it beat by a long shot. We're not done with our place & we have 3 more fields after we get our place done. We also have the issue of storage. Where do we put it all? The complaints and the benefits change as the weather does in farming. I'm hoping that what was mowed yesterday will be ready to bale tomorrow & there will be no storms until tomorrow night. I can always hope.

I had a very large piece of humble pie today. My longarm quilter texted that my Chess Board quilt was finished. I was excited. Well that excitement went down the drain when I saw my quilt. She had done a fantastic job quilting it but I did not do a fantastic job in piecing it. I'm not entirely sure on what went wrong. Maybe I didn't cut accurately or piece with at a scant 1/4" seam. In any case the probelm was that the body of my quilt was not square & she had to do some fudging to get it quilted.

Is it a huge flaw, nope. Does it prevent the quilt form being used, nope.  Did it wound my pride, you betcha. I also need to remember what was going on in my life during the construction of this quilt & give myself a little bit of grace. What this quilt taught me though is priceless. I poured my life, the good & the bad, from the past 5 months into this quilt. There are spectacular spots of piecing & there are horrific spots as well. I guess I should rename this quilt "Humble Pie". I wouldn't trade it nor will I shy from showing it. I think that sometimes we only want to show our best & never our flaws.

Here are the quilty things that I learned:

#1 Stay on the same cutting mat & ruler that you started with. All mats & rulers are not created equal.

#2 Stay on the same machine if you are not going to test seam allowances on any different machines that you piece the same project on.

#3 When you are piecing the quilt body do your best to be accurate. This quilt is square but the quilt body is not. When I put my borders on I measured down the center of the quilt for the length & width of my borders therefore making the quilt square.

#4 Don't get into such a rush. I get so excited to be finishing such a huge project & I need to keep the same level of accuracy in the end as I do in the begining.

I hope that y'all are doing well & that you have a great night. It's time to finish supper, my fellas are starting to come inside. More later on,

Vicky

p.s.  I think that I have figured out/solved hopefully the tension issue on my Singer 301. I'm thinking that somehow the tension knobs or discs got bumped when I was taking it to Sew night with friends. I fiddled with it for quite a while & it's finally sewing ok but I have my tension knob set at 6 & that just seems high to me. I'll keep sewing with it & if it acts up again she might have to go to the shop. I'm definitely learning that whenever I want to sew away from my house to take the featherwieght. She's in a protective box.