Kitchen Towels--Fifth Finish 4th Quarter FAL 2018

Decorative band for towel--too plain

Band with rick rack embellishment

I've taken on a couple new projects and was busy with an instructor course so I haven't finished the gifts that I thought I would finish this month. Yesterday, I completed the two kitchen towels that were goal number eight on my 4th quarter list. This is my fifth finish for the quarter.

I wanted to make these look a bit different from the four that I made previously. Click here if you would like to see them. I used the large rick rack on the previous four towels and I hadn't planned to use rick rack until I stitched the decorative band to the towel. That band looked too plain to my eye. I had sewn all the large rick rack that I had purchased.

Pleated kitchen towel ready for handwork

I dug out my grandmother's rick rack stash and chose a red and black to compliment the print. The price on the black package was 15 cents and the price on the red package was 60 cents. Those packages have been around for a long time! Seriously, I like to use my grandmother's stash in a project. The action makes me feel like she is hanging out in my studio!

 I used a monofilament thread and zig zagged the edges to the towel. This took some time because the rick rack was narrow. I chose that time consuming edge treatment because I didn't want the edges to flop down with washing or use. I especially liked how the red added punch to the project.

Then I stitched the handles. I could have edged stitched the handle to the body of the towel; but, I chose to stitch it by hand as I wanted to be sure that the layers didn't shift in the process of stitching.

Finished kitchen towels

I spent hours trying to figure out how to make the pleats. I looked at one that my friend, JoJo, had made. In the end, I divided the towel into fourths and made the pleats from the back of the towel. It worked. After I had hand stitched the handle, I edge stitched around the edge.

I had two red buttons left from when I previously stitched the towels. The buttons also came from my grandmother's stash. It didn't take long to machine stitch the button hole and stitch the button to the towel. Both are now ready for gifting and not a moment too soon either!

I used about 1/2 a yard of fabric. I may have enough fabric left for two decorative wide bands and perhaps, for one of those wide bands to be paired with a skinny band.

I've now used 39 1/2 yards of fabric from my stash. I've 11 yards of fabric to go to meet my goal of using 50 yards from my stash this year. Because I'm not close to finishing my mystery quilt, I'm likely not going to meet my goal. My plan is to roll over what I didn't stitch into my goal for next year.

Last week, I taught the last classes for the year. I taught 11 in Basic Life Support and six in the Red Cross Lifeguard Instructor course. Year to Date, my numbers were:
41 participants--Lay Responder CPR; 25 lifeguards; 22 lifeguard instructors; 3 water safety instructors, 81 swimmers; 22 babysitters; 291 basic life support CPR, 21 inservice training; 21 blood borne pathogen training and 6 for quilting. For the year, I taught a total of 533 people. Wow! I had no idea I would reach more than 500 people!!!!