Liberation

In addition to being very educational, the process of making my DJ quilt has been very liberating. I'm afraid the quilt police would not approve of a lot of what I have done, but tough!

As I've bored my faithful blog readers before, you know that I do not like to do hand applique and have found as many ways as possible to avoid it in this project. If you click on the "applique" label on the sidebar to my blog (scroll down to see the label list), you will see all the posts that have had to do with applique in one way or another.

With this block, "C-11 Soldiers and Sailors Monument", a beginner-level block, I was at first going to use the raw-edge invisible machine-applique method that I've come to enjoy. However, when I sat down at my sewing machine with the broken needle threader, I really didn't want to try to thread the needle with the #$%^&* monofilament thread. I then had a light bulb moment -- my machine has fancy stitches for a reason -- they are supposed to be used (I paid for them, right?). They are also supposed to be seen.

So, the orange piece in this block was attached by using the raw-edge machine-buttonhole stitch applique method. The needle was already threaded with the yellow thread, so I didn't even have to change that.

Now I am free to use more of the fancy stitches in my quilt...