Florabunda Finish: A Plan B Life

I was supposed to go to New York City this week, but some weird side effects from one of my medications kept me home instead.  I wanted to turn that negative into a positive, so I spent my extra time at home finishing the quilting and binding on my Florabunda A La Mode quilt.

My new 2" Ribbon Candy Stencil is a perfect fit for this quilt.

I threaded my Handi Quilter Stitch 710 machine with FabuLux First Love thread and set to work.

 I love the high contrast between the black background and Melanie Testa's Florabunda fabrics.

If you look closer, though, you'll find that there's some color hiding in the plain black fabric:

I was surprised when I discovered that this particular blend of teal, hot pink, and royal purple thread only shows up on black when you look closely.  Who knew?

Now we both do.

This wasn't a bad Plan B for a sick day.

Do you try to redeem lost days?  As quilters, quilting can fill up the vacant spaces quite nicely!

Splendid Sampler -- Block THREE

Splendid Sampler block three is Clamshells by Helen Stubbings.

I love this block and can't wait to machine quilt it:

Helen is amazingly talented and has a great Craftsy class about English Paper Piecing.

Are you participating in this round of The Splendid Sampler?  Pre-order your book HERE.

Tuesday Tip: Pressing Seams Safely

I am a huge klutz and that makes ironing dangerous for me.  I am working on a quilt that requires some seams to be pressed open and figured out how to press those seams safely:

I keep my Dritz Easy Hem near my ironing board for when I'm making garments.  It works great for that and also works great for pressing seams open!