Dreaming of Chevrons made by Elves

Yesterday, I made about 15 Chevrons for Part 2 of Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt, Celtic Solstice,

and then went to bed, thinking about how many more Chevrons there were to make!  Here's a picture of my bed, with Christmas sheets, and Bonnie Hunter's Roll Roll Cotton Boll quilt to snuggle under.

I was so comfy that I dozed off right away, and while sleeping, I had a beautiful dream that my little dolls, Sophia Grace and Rosie, had turned into Christmas elves and had organized a Chevron Factory!

MY TWO ELVES!!

The dream was very vivid, and these two elves had an assembly line going.  

Cutting and marking area:

Supervised by Sally, our yellow lab, they made batches of 30 Chevrons at a time.

Sophia Grace and Rosie had cut enough 2 inch squares of yellow and white and rectangles of brown to make 240 Chevrons, enough for a full sized quilt, per the instructions on Bonnie Hunter’s blog.  The cutting process also included marking each of the 2 inch squares with a diagonal pencil line.  Sophia Grace did most of the pencil markings, and Rosie made sure the piles of cut fabrics were in little piles of 2 browns, two yellows, and two whites – enough for one Chevron.  The piles were laid on the floor in rows of 10 until there were 3 rows,

before my little elves moved them on down the assembly line.

First factory sewing station:

In the sewing room, Hitty was sitting on a little chair, supervising to be sure all was done right.  Two brown rectangles were laid out, with a white square on top of them, each with the drawn line laid out in the correct way, under Hitty’s strict supervision.  Sophia Grace soon had the white squares sewn on, and then let Rosie sew on the yellow squares, cautioning her to sew in parallel lines to the previous line on each brown rectangle.  Hitty insisted on pressing the sewn squares up on the front of the piece, to see if they covered the part of the brown rectangle that they were supposed to cover.  If they didn't, there was trouble, and seam ripping.

 

Second cutting station:

Then the batch went back to the family room, where the little elves flipped the Chevron parts over to the back, and if there was any yellow or white showing at the edge, they cut it off.  Then they turned the Chevron part to the front, and gently lifted the top triangle up and cut off the 2 triangles underneath.  They knew I liked to make doll quilts, but they determined that these parts were way too small for even doll quilts, and they threw the tiny triangles away.   Sally was supposed to supervise this part too, but she had fallen asleep. 

What can I say?  She is a 13 year old labrador, and after all, I was asleep too!

Final pressing and sewing:

The batch went back to the sewing machine, where Hitty was again in charge.  She insisted on an extra step of turning each part to the back to make sure it was ironed properly, so the seam allowances were pressed up on one of the pieces and pressed down on the other piece.  Sophia Grace and Rosie rolled their eyes, but they did it.

Only then, could Sophia Grace and Rosie begin the final sewing of the center seam of the Chevrons.  They decided to use three pins, one in the center where the two brown pieces meet, and one at each end to keep the two pieces straight.

The two pins at the top and bottom were placed further back in the fabric, where they didn’t get in the way of the sewing machine needle, and the center pin was pulled out by Rosie just before the needle got to it.

Hitty did the final pressing of the center seam, and pressed it open.  If the center of the Chevron didn’t meet her approval, she asked Sophia Grace and Rosie to use their seam ripper, and redo the seam.  Sometimes they distracted her and put the offending Chevron back in the pile of completed ones, and hoped Hitty wouldn’t find out.

 

While I was smiling about how resourceful they were,  I woke up and wondered if my dream could possibly be true, so I got up and checked.  Alas, there were only my 15 Chevrons completed, and the dolls were in their beds, dreaming their own dreams.

 

Ah well, the Chevrons will get done the human way, all in good time.  Merry Christmas everyone!      Linkup to Bonnie Hunter's blog where you can see what other quilter's are doing on this quilt:  (Here)

Also, Design Wall Mondays linkup here:  Patchwork Times blog