My Form of Procrastination

I’m probably not alone in that I have a to-do list longer than the average 10 year old’s list for Santa. My to-do list starts with designing the web pages for our Colorful Monday sale (our response to black Thursday) and making samples for the children’s Sew Camp I’m hosting during this year’s winter vacation, pretty important tasks. Despite that, I started a new project. And… I’m sharing it. 

To start at the beginning, my son and his significant other, the lovely Chisa, will be decorating their apartment for Christmas for the first time this year. You know what that means. I can make a present that they’ll actually use.

My first thought was to make them one of my mantle scarves using my Bell Choir designs. The scarf is easy-to-make and stunning. Unfortunately, a mantle scarf loses its charm if you don’t have a fireplace and mantle. Alex and Chisa don’t.

Mantel Scarf

The Mantel Scarf

This is what the bells look like close-up. This particular one is the free sample. Go to the Bell Choir page to download it.

Obviously I needed a plan B. Hmmm… Everyone can use a table runner.

Back to my story. It just sew happens I was rummaging around in my stitch-out hamper last week and I ran into a full set of the bells sewn out. Synchronicity!

I spent a few minutes designing this layout. The gray rectangles are for the bells. The white sections would need stippled stitched pieces so I digitized designs that would fit. It is really easy to make stippling designs in the Bernina Artista software. All you have to do is import a jpg of the required shape, trace around the shape’s outline and then click on the stipple fill stitch button. Voila, a design the shape I need filled with stippling.

 Of course, I have a special knack for creating obstacles. In this case the stumbling block was the virgin red fabric I used for sashing. 

My mistake was not pre-washing the fabric. To give myself credit, I’ve heard many a quilt teacher say that if you have good fabric you don’t need to pre-wash. This was good fabric, very good fabric, a laurel Burch purchased from a reputable quilt store. It might have been good, but it wasn’t good enough.

You can see where this is going. I used a water soluble pen to mark the white embroidered panels. When I spritzed the panels with water, the red sashing bled. The once pristine red and white table runner was now a white, red and pink table runner. 

Luckily a little perseverance, a couple of Shout Color Catcher sheets and three times through the wash and the table runner was once again white and red.

I don’t think I’ll write the blow-by-blow about my binding adventure. Let’s just say I’m finished now.

The finished table runner

On another note, I’m giving the stipple patterns to anyone who has already purchased the Bell Choir designs or purchases them now. (E-mail me for the designs if you already own this set.) The designs fit in a variety of hoops though they are easiest to sew if you have a Jumbo Hoop for a Bernina. If you own the very large hoops for a Viking Diamond or Pfaff Creative Vision or the newest Brother or Babylock, you won’t have to do much re-hooping either. 

The pdf version of the pattern is available on my Bell Choir page for anyone to download