Puppy and projects

I made a puppy! From the book Softies by Therese Laskey. 

It was really fun. If i made it again i would probably machine sew some of it. Also the belly fabric pattern was not really the right size and i had to trim that down. 

It is a birthday present. Fun to use up scraps!

Today i have been cleaning the craft room. I moved my light box and a sewing machine off of my other work table. Hopefully that will help me have more of a workspace to actually work on stuff! 

Currently i have projects laid out. It is so easy for me to start a new project and set other aside. 

(On the table are piles which represent: wallet, kleenex travel pouch, placemats, hexagon quilt pieces, yarn of the month knitting, and the big pile of fabric, some quilt triangles)

I recently got a lot of quilting fabric, smaller pieces and so yesterday i spent a few hours cutting out triangles. 

I think i will go with this arrow design. I am thinking i may frame each block with a border. We'll see! 

Not pictured: A dress i bought that i love but need to alter the shoulders since i am short. And another knitted present... Shh...

I also ordered these awesome labels!! Can't wait for upcoming projects to add these to! 

I recently signed up on Instagram. It is so inspiring to see crafty stuff and you can search quilting photos etc. I am tired of the negativity of Facebook and so far instagram has been fun!

Oh fabric...

Some things I found at the 50% off Salvation Army sale today. 

Awesome fabric book with potential to embroider etc. 

Giant bag of quilt scraps. It's not like i need more fabric. But i do have some quilt plans and this bag had a ton of variety and stuff i liked. So hopefully i can get some projects done! Somewhere i have missplaced my hexagons i had cut a while back. They are about 6 inches across. I think some of this new fabric will be hexagons! 

Currently blocking a knitting project. I also started a new project but am not sure if it is the right project for the yarn... 

Dark to light

3/21/16

Working on a project...

I am learning how much exactness I need to make things line up right... Carefully trimming things before I sew. It is slow going but rewarding when I get a good corner! 

I have collected and saved (and cut out) black & whites for several years hoping to make a quilt from the book Worth Doing Twice, where women reworked old quilt tops. That pattern basically relied on having 4 values. I got so tired laying it out because the colors were so relative. Put a dark gray here and now the light gray doesnt pop as much as it did before.. Etc. 

Lately I thought a chevron pattern might be more the way to go. http://dustyandmarlina.com/rainbow-chevron-quilt/ there's an example of the style. 

A few months ago when I found out that my brother in law was marrying his awesome girlfriend, I realized these quilt triangles were perfect! To personalize them a little more I embroidered some, created a hand printed fabric about their dog, Chili. Got some chili pepper and St Patricks Day fabric. I got a fabric pen and drew a duck square and a killer whale square. 

More pictures later. I am saving this as a draft and will share this after the wedding!   I do not yet have a backing fabric. It is very true I doubt the whole project will be done before the wedding, but I must try! It was delayed enough by us moving to our new house etc. 

catching up on podcasts while i work! 

3/29

Sewing the last of the quilt top this morning. I bought backing fabric,  batting, binding and thread last night. Hoping to get as far as I can today. I am now wondering if it is still small for a twin size. Sigh! 

Final product! I did go with a border! Bias tape for the binding. 

Here is the back. I bought just enough so had to expand with the gray fabric. 

Close up! So fun! 

They have now received their gift so now I can share photos!

Sock Re-Do

These are some socks I made years ago. I ran out of yarn so started using the light green/white yarn to make it stretch. The socks were toe up. I found them in my knitting bin at my parents and knew that a moth or somebody else had came and went. I decided to rip them out and since they are bright rainbow, make something for little kids to wear. 

 As I began to rip out the socks I found that the pale green yarn was coming apart, I don't know if it was just eaten or just didn't last well. I only saved a small amount of it that still seemed good. I think it was Tofutsies brand, so it has soysilk in it. I'm trying to decide if I will make socks or mittens from it. Yesterday I wound it into big loops, got it wet and let it hang on a hanger to get some of the kinks out of it. It is pretty much dry today and I will wind it into balls.

 We are moving in the next few months (Not sure where yet...) I am trying to slowly sort things through. The last few weeks I have been cutting 6in squares for a denim quilt. I think I am close to having enough of the same types to start the quilt. When I cut up pants I take off buttons, occasionally zippers (To repair my husbands jeans some day, if needed.) I often cut off the tags (I am interested in them)  and If there are good sized patchs I save them to someday make a sort of crazy quilt hopefully. I saved pairs to remove the pockets so I can get 2 more squares from the fabric underneath. It is tedious but hopefully I can get it done soon and throw out the rest of the pants.

Pink quilt

This is an awesome old quilt we got. It is old and coming apart at some seams. I love the combinations of patterns and colors. It does need a new binding at least and maybe someday i will get around to replacing more of it. (Sorry that my photos are not amazing)

Yesterday I got a few hours to work on a wool quilt top I got at a rummage sale forever ago for $2.50. It had random non-matching squares I am trying to recover. The whole quilt is awesome old wool (perhaps Pendleton shirts?) And then there was random magenta, teal, beige courdoroy mixed in. So... i have been hand sewing some patches over the worst offenders. I hope to finish sometime sooner than later and find fabric for the back and make a quilt that actually will fit our bed. So many quilts to do. So little time!

Baby Bear Quilt (Finished Object)

I thought I had already posted the final photos of the baby quilt I made for our friends. This was such a fun project! See the previous sneak-peek post for more photos.

Pretty much all of my quilts have had hand-sewn blanket-stitch binding. It does take forever. 

Sneak Peek!

Just a little look at a baby quilt I am working on. I cut out many squares. (Maybe 80 more than what I needed, oops!) But I wanted lots of options and wasn't quite sure how big it would be. I did 4x4in squares. The fabric was random vintage kid fabric from my stash, along with greens and grays as requested that I got as fat quarters. I also got some random fabrics at SCRAP which is a great place to find fabric. More pictures when it is finished. I sewed the whole quilt top in the afternoon today. I find it is best to power through quilt tops if possible, even if I get a little tired. I'm so glad that the quilt top is done because I can get it off the floor and fold it neatly! 

 I bought this cassette flannel fabric several years ago, thinking I would make PJ pants. I have grown out of large prints on my PJs, so I have already used some of this fabric for the lining of an awesome laptop case I made several months back. It will be perfect for the back of the quilt.

The good thing about all the extra squares is that I can make some more quilts and there are Plenty of friends and acquaintances having kids now. Sometimes I wonder if I should just start making items for my (hopefully) future kids. To try to get ahead while I have some free time?

Podcasts Listened to today:
  Stuff You Missed in History
  Stuff You Should Know
  Knitmore Girls
  Knitting Pipeline

Green Jeans Quilt (Finished project!)

      Hooray! I'm so glad to say that I finished sewing the blanket edging for the jean quilt I have been working on for a while now. I have made at least five twin sized jean quilts and one queen sized one over the years. I really like the blue-green look of this one. The back is a blue-green wool that I got from an elderly neighbor who was moving. It is pieced in a few places to make it the right size. Normally with denim quilts I just do two layers because the fabric is so heavy. For this one, since the wool was lighter weight I decided to do a middle layer of fleece that I had. I tied the three layer together with embroider threads.

I arranged the colors and sewed the top in a weekend. Then I got the great idea to hand embroider our friend's dogs on there. The longest part definitely was the binding because I did not have enough wool to fold over top. I made strips of fabric and ironed the seam allowance under so I could just pin the edging on and sew it. I used a blanket stitch and I think it looks great. 

Even though it took a while I think it is definitely worth doing it "right" and having handsewn details.

I finished the binding when we were on a weekend trip. We stopped to take pictures on the bleachers in Irrigon Oregon. (Mike's hometown).

I have a problem sometimes of making things and giving them away right away without proper photos. My Ravelry page is pretty sad because I dont have photos for most of my projects. Oh well. I am trying to learn to document things better. Yay!

          

Next projects: 

Baby blanket. Squares are cut but i need to lay it out and sew.
Sewing the Sorbetto and Hazel that I have cut

Squares!!

4x4 squares for a baby quilt! I have more to cut and then I will figure out the layout.

Snow Days

Yesterday work was closed due to snow that has been here for the last few days. I spent part of the day sewing a quilt in my new studio space. (I'm not sure if I shared yet that I moved upstairs to a new area). I love the light in the room, and the red carpet that already has stains on it. Mainly I love that there is floorspace and I can lay out quilts. There are other roommates, but they are on the other side of the room for the most part and we seem to rarely be there at the same times.

Denim quilt for a friend. I'm planning on using a black fleece fabric for the backing. It will just be the two layers. I may embroider a little bit on a few denim squares, we'll see... (I have an idea, just not sharing it yet). I also started cutting jeans/cords for 2 other quilts for friends... Yay!! I love how simple they can be and I love making useful items for friends (especially if it is from their own old jeans...

I have More! quilts on the brain. Baby quilt for a friend... Perhaps a medium-sized hexagon quilt? I have been favoriting things in pinterest. I don't know yet what colors.

Also I have cut many black and white quilt triangles for a quilt and was going to go with a pattern I have in a book. It is hard to describe but sort of plays with 4 values of light to dark. It was hard to lay out as the values of the patterns kept changing (being relative in value to the fabric I placed next to it) I think I will instead go with a chevron idea which will be easier since I can just play with lights and darks. I am already much more excited about finishing that quilt. It doesn't seem so daunting.

Here is some snow!!




We had about 5 inches or so, it's hard to tell... it seems deeper some places. I'm definitely glad I have friend's kids I can borrow to hang out with in the snow. I also did a tiny bit of tobogganing. And jumped on a trampoline with snow on it.


Podcasts listened to:
Stash & Burn
Stuff You Missed in History
The Moth
This American Life (Beach episode!)

Baby Blanket

a little elephant (i wish i had a finished photo when he's stuffed!)

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry about the crazy photos, the editor on blogger seems to not want to let me rotate them, which seems like it should be the simplest thing, especially if you rotate them, and save them, and then it still doesn't work.

During the end of the summer/early fall I started making a baby blanket for a coworker. It was before she knew if it would be a boy or girl. I used cottons I have had in my stash forever, and also batting that I had. The only thing I bought was red binding. It was really fun to piece together, and since I had started the blanket so early I decided to try hand quilting. I ended up doing just a basic sort of loose stitch. We had a large hoop, but the quilt wasn't really fitting in it, so it was easier to just wing it. I'm pleased with the result, even though it is definitely not perfect. For the back of the quilt I had a weird piece of printed fabric from a kids blanket I had gotten for free (from a neighbor) years ago. It has a boat with some cute animals in it. It was the perfect size for the project, and I hand embroidered a little on that, just to make it more personal. To cover the whole back of the blanket I added two other panels.

Anyway, It was really great to work with my stash and not have to buy any fabric for it, plus i'm very happy with the end result, and so is my friend! and her baby will be arriving soon, so i hope he likes it too!