One of the things that my manager asked me to do at work this year (our “year” starts in April) was to set two professional goals and one personal goal to work toward. While I’m not really usually a “goal” person, I figured this was a good idea, and so I set a personal goal of finishing at least six projects between April 1, 2023 and March 31, 2024. The only “rule” I set was that it had to be an actual project.

The first project was the mug rug I posted last month. I decided a couple of months ago that I really need to put all of these embroidery machines to good use, and this was a good start. Last week, Chris and I took a couple of days off just to rest and recharge, and I decided to embroider the work vest I’d brought home months ago for that purpose. I wasn’t sure how well it would turn out, but I could not be more pleased.

When I took it to work, people loved it, and now I have all sorts of requests to do other people’s vests as well. This is project number 2, and I love it. People at work keep commenting on it, and I’m seriously considering doing another one for the holidays this year.

I also started a new quilt, and this one is a little out of my comfort zone. My mom found these fabrics at her local quilt store.

For reasons I cannot fathom, I decided to make an orange peel quilt, which is, of course, all appliqué. My original plan was to do Lori Holt style appliqué, where I would sew the interfacing onto the orange peel shape and then turn it and sew it on. I soon found out, however, that I really and truly suck at turning pieces, so in my impatience, I decided to go with raw edge appliqué, but to be honest, I’m not crazy about it.

It isn’t horrible, but it isn’t great, either. But I’m going with it, and before I start my next appliqué quilt, because there will be others, I will learn how to properly turn the pieces.

This is tedious work, though, and I don’t think my next quilt will be appliqué, because it takes forever to get a single block done. ‘

I will say that the Bernina 570QE is handling this like a pro, and I’m super pleased with how the piecing is going. I’ve been on the fence about the 570QE, but the more I use it, the more I like it. I’ve found that piecing absolutely requires the dual feed, or else everything goes sideways and wonky. For the appliqué, though, I didn’t have the 20D foot; I only have the 20 and the 20C. I didn’t want to go out and buy yet another foot for appliqué, so I’ve been using the 20C and it’s been fabulous.

Using the Bernina for piecing and the Brother for quilting and embroidery is working out much better than I ever would have imagined, This might be my dream set up. I still use the Brother for sewing, but the Bernina just does a better job, and quite frankly, the bigger bobbin is a HUGE selling point. Both my 570QE and the 435 have an absolutely beautiful stitch, and they are just really hard to beat.

Not the best photo, but you get the idea.

Up next are some tea towels for the kitchen, and I’m hoping to get the Dazzling quilt sandwiched and starting the edge to edge quilting.