The Road Home Row Along - New Milford, Connecticut

Welcome to the Seacoast Quilter! I am enjoying the row along so much. Thanks to Marian of Seams to Be Sew and Amy of Sew Incredibly Crazy for organizing this event. No small task, with 40 participating designers! I'm fairly new at blogging and I'm very grateful I was able to join the fun. I knew right away what I wanted to do. I started with a row that was just the Christmas trees. I decided last week to add the bandstand because it was just too plain. The templates were a challenge, but that's good for you, right?

New Milford, Connecticut

Download Row Here from Google Drive

or find it at Craftsy

My row depicts the town green at Christmas time. I didn't get a very good photo with my phone but will try to post a better one soon. As a typical New England small town, we have a green in the center. The bandstand is the only structure on the green itself. Trees are set up along the whole length as Christmas approaches.  It's a well known event in the Litchfield County region, and made the cover of Redbook magazine back in the sixties. 

The WWII era tank is another well known feature. 

I was born in, and grew up in New Milford, Connecticut. We had lots of Aunts and Uncles and cousins in town. Saturday nights usually found the whole family at one house or another. And a number of them played instruments so there was always music involved. New Milford was only about 8,000 people when I was a child. It's now about 28,000! I live in the Seacoast region of New Hampshire now.

I took some photos as I made the row. First I used printer friendly pieces of Steam-a-Seam 2 Lite for the applique shapes. Simply printing the pdf template pages is so easy. It has removable paper on both sides. When you remove the first layer it is tacky so you can place your pieces and they stay put. Once you are happy with the arrangement you fuse in place as usual.

I have two methods of joining the sky and the ground fabrics in the pattern. I ironed a fold at the top edge of the ground fabric and applied a fusible tape. This is by Clover to use with their bias tape makers. I then fused the ground to the sky and sewed it together with a blanket stitch.

The next step was to place the applique pieces. For the bandstand, I placed the pattern placement guide under an applique sheet (Bohin Non-Stick Ironing and Craft Sheet),

This allowed me to position all the pieces for the bandstand and fuse them together.

Now I can peel the completed unit off and place it on the background fabric. Adding the lamp posts and trees was simple from here. I usually tack down fusible applique when I quilt but I think I may do something on the bandstand to help define it. Maybe just black thread and "sketch" the details?

Now, to the fun part. Everyone has the opportunity to win one of lots and lots of prizes over the course of this blog hop. Thanks to all the sponsors. Please visit Seams to Be Sew to be entered in the drawing for the Calibre Art cutting mat, and lots of other goodies. To enter the drawing for 5 winners each day of an Anita Goodesign Machine Embroidery CD answer the question in the Rafllecopter widget here. Both of these are for U.S. entrants only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

If you've just found the Row Along today, no problem. You can visit any of the participants on or after their day to collect rows. Most will be available through the end of October. The schedule for The Road Home Row Along is:

September 6

Allie-Oops Sweet Happy Life creates Harrisville, MI Sunrise Coast
Cynthia’s Creating Ark creates Adelaide South Australia
Kissed Quilts creates Grand Coulee, Washington
Renee’s Quilting Addiction creates Alberta, Canada

September 8

Sew Incredibly Crazy creates Colorado
3 Patch Crafts creates Bulgaria
Just Let Me Quilt creates Las Vegas, Nevada
Quilt in Piece creates Amanzimtoti, South Africa

September 13

Tweety Loves Quilting creates Edinburgh, UK
Quiltscapes creates Heber City, Utah
Seams To Be Sew creates Idaho Falls, Idaho
Pine Valley creates New Zealand

September 15

bdieges designs creates Road to Tehachapi (CA)
Elizabeth Coughlin Designs creates Worcester County in Central Massachusetts
Patti’s Patchwork creates Toronto, Ontario Canada
Seacoast Quilter creates New Milford, Connecticut

September 20

Beaquilter creates Denmark
Heleen Pinkster creates Netherlands
MooseStash Quilting creates Alaska
Rebecca Mae Designs creates Northern Maine

September 22

Words & Stitches creates Beaches of California
Quilt Art creates Africa
I Can Quilt 2 creates Baltimore, MD
Any Pattern creates Port Angeles, Washington
Patchwork Breeze creates West Michigan Shoreline

September 27

Creatin’ in the Sticks creates Dodge City, Kansas
Sue Griffiths Featured At Just Let Me Quilt creates Northern Rivers Region, NSW, Australia
Seams To Be Sew And Batts In The Attic creates Hollywood/LA
(Dual Posting)

September 29

Quilted Fabric Art creates Burlington Vermont
Westend Quilter creates Manitoulin Island, Canada
Pamela Quilts creates Oregon
Quilt Fabrication creates Silicon Valley, CA

October 04

Patchouli Moon Studio creates Central New Mexico
Linda Robertus creates Netherlands
Elm Street Quilts creates North Carolina
Sarah Quinn Featured At Seams To Be Sew creates Outer Space

October 06

Cheryl LaPlant Featured At Quilt In Piece creates York, Maine
Miss Loreen’s Schoolhouse creates New Hampshire
Bumbleberry Stitches creates Oklahoma
Needle in a Hayes Stack creates Mojave Desert
Cloth and Paper Studio creates North Georgia Mountains

October 11
Show N Tell Day
TBA

Thanks for visiting. Please join me on Facebook or sign up for my new e-mail newsletter. I am doing a block a week honoring 101 Patchwork Patterns by Ruby Short McKim. We're only up to block 12 so there's plenty of time to join in.

Thanks,
Mary

101 Patchwork Patterns Block 12

Today is the start of The Road Home Row Along. You can see the full schedule here. From what I've seen already today these rows are fabulous. And it's so interesting to see places like Adelaide, Australia, where I never expect to visit. The row along is like the Row by Row Experience, but without all the driving. Visit the 4 or 5 bloggers each Tuesday and Thursday and download their rows. They will remain free until the end of the row along October 11th. Lots of great prizes too. I hope you'll visit and have a tour of "The Road Home." My post will be on September 15th and I've designed a row for my hometown, New Milford, Connecticut.

Now, on to this week's block. This is called the Beggar Block. In looking for any history about the block I found several different blocks with the same name. Also, one theory is that the name comes from quilters begging scraps from friends. It is a block that would lend itself to a scrappy approach.

 Download Beggar Block Pattern

I had a little trouble with making this block. The first time I made the blue pieces from a square and two half square triangles. When sewn together they looked like this:

Next, I put the block together with the pink strips and the beige center square. Unfortunately, with so many seams, the block came out a little off square and too small.

Oh well. So I started again with placing beige squares on each end of a blue rectangle, sewing the diagonal, and trimming.

This approach eliminated 2 seams in each 1-1/2" x 3-1/2" piece, and the block came out much better. I know you end up with a pile of little triangles from trimming, and if they were bigger I would save them, but not these!

One more block to go and we'll be able to put the center of the quilt together. I can't wait to see how it looks. I hope anyone making this quilt will share their blocks. There is a Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SeacoastQuilter/ and a Flikr Album at www.flickr.com/photos/seacoastquilter/. 

Steady Betty

You may have noticed that I got a new pressing board. I've been using a Steady Betty ironing board that I purchased just before my quilt shop closed in June 2011. As you can see below, it was past time to replace it.

It somehow had a small slice out of it, and the edges were worn down to the board. The surface is a nice foam material that grips your pieces when you are pressing and keeps them from shifting. I think the brown discoloration is from years of starch buildup being ironed into it.

My original board had "Patent Pending" on the label! 

I'm using a pressing cloth when I starch so hopefully it will stay nice for a while and last as long as the first one did. I love ironing, which may be weird, but I do.

Hope you get time at your sewing machine today!

Mary