Report from last week-end

OK I meant to post this all of last week and never found the time...

Last year when I went to the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham, I ordered a quilting frame for my machine from Freestyles. The frames are made in England by a gentleman who started his business after making a frame for his wife. Anyway, the frame got delivered in October

and I was really excited about it and was ready to post how great it was on my blog BUT... it brought me nothing else than frustration and anger unfortunately. Now, this is nothing to do with the frame and I thought it wasn't, I thought it was just me. I had tried the frame at the Festival and it was so easy to quilt on it. Anyway, I spent a few week-ends trying and getting frustrated and annoyed until I decided to concentrate on other projects. The frame stayed in the conservatory for a while (and it was a painful sight really) until it was moved to the garage to make more space. So this year, when I went to the Festival again, I went to see the gentleman who make the frame and told him the issue I was facing (the machine was literally jumping). And he said straight away, you know what you need to play with this little knob and adjust until you get the correct height for your machine. So I went home and told hubby what to do. And we tried the adjustment he recommended and finally, it worked perfectly well. Now I have one full year of not using the frame to get back (hubby was started to rightly moan about the price of the unused frame). So last week-end, since it was a quiet one for us, I decided to have a go at quilting a table runner I pieced last year

and tried to quilt on the frame. I was really pleased that I managed something acceptable. Of course, it isn't perfect but then that was my first try. I managed to write Paix (Peace), Love, Joie (Joy), Star, Merry Christmas and Joyeux Noel around the border. I draw some holly free-hand at each point and also tried some free-hand Christmas trees. Here are a few snapshots:

 I was so happy that I did manage to quilt it (I had tried on the same table runner so many times last year and also unpicked my disasters so many times that I nearly ruined it. Now all is left to do with the table runner is to put binding on and that will another UFO finished but this is a special one owing to its history! Next on the frame will be the caterpillar quilt, hopefully very soon.

Celine