Not Quite New

I really would like to make more gifts at Christmastime. Last year, I made three. This year I only made two. But one was an entire quilt, so think that should count as four.

When I was trying to think of something to make for my godmother, I realized that I have kind of a limited repertoire. I made her a scarf last year and had to come up with something different and ended up stuck. I have a jillion books and magazines about making stuff, so it was a little ridiculous that I had trouble thinking past scarf. Part of the problem was that I had limited time and needed to make things fairly quickly. But it is mostly that when I make gifts, they are usually big blankets, baby blankets, and scarves which are just short skinny blankets. I’ve made baby hats, but only because I had yarn left over from the blankets. So when it was time to make something other than a blanket or blanket like object, I was stumped.

In the end I did manage to come up with these bowls. They are crocheted and felted. I also added some random embroidery. It was my first time felting and I really liked this project, which is scary because I need another craft like I need a hole in my head. But this combines crochet and needlework so I think it should only count as half a new thing.

Hopelessly Crafty

I was in Michaels with my son when he saw a book with knit snake on the cover. “Make me a snake Mommy.” He’s three years old and has taken to randomly asking me to make things for him. He knows that I can make stuff. He’s seen me make quilts and blankets and socks. He even helped with the placement of the circles on my Mom’s quilt.

So he saw the book and asked me to buy it and make him the snake. Here’s what makes me hopelessly crafty. I already HAD a book with a pattern for a toy snake. A crochet snake to be exact. Not only that, I already had enough yarn AND stuffing to make it without having to buy anything else. I’m like one of those people who can just whip up a rack of lamb and a cheese soufflé on a whim from the stuff in their kitchen, except mine would be amigurumi. Frankly, I don’t even remember why I was at Michaels in the first place.

He wanted a “big, big” snake which is good since he has a mother who never checks gauge and that is exactly what he ended up with. The pattern was for a big snake, but I don’t think it was supposed to be quite this big. But who cares when you get to watch this.


By the way, the pattern is from Baby Crochet by Lois Dakin.

Separation Anxiety

It has been a while since I posted. But not because I haven't been busy.

I'm hand quilting the quilt I swore I wouldn't hand quilt.

I finished piecing the Olympic quilt.

Which left me with lots of delicious scraps to play with.

And I've done a lot of crocheting.

Mostly I've been dealing the work/life stuff that causes me to neglect my blog. I always manage to find time for a creative life. Just not the time to talk about it.

Hello, my name is...

I'm making some calling cards. Not that I ever go anywhere or meet anyone. But I was thinking about things like artistic voice and communicating a point a view. Something like a business card or calling card has to communicate everything you want someone else to know about you and where you're coming from in a very small format. So I decided to try making some. They are pretty much like ATC's but 2 by 31/2. And there is text on the other side. I was thinking of attaching them to projects.

Work on everything else has stalled. Mostly because I just can't get to it. But I can work on these little cards here and there and feel like I'm accomplishing something. I'm crocheting baby blankets too. Lots of people seem to be having babies these days. I don't know if they will be girls or boys. But I figured I'd make a few in different colors and get ahead of the curve for a change.

I'm hoping to get back to the other projects soon. The cityscape and the olympic quilt were moving along really well. But I just haven't been able to get to them. I think someone is slipping me decaf.

Super Easy Fun Bag

I made a bag. I've been wanting to make a bag for a while now to hold crochet projects. The fall issue of Quilts and More had a pattern for a super-easy bag. I'm usually skeptical when I see words like "super easy". And I doubted the pattern the whole time I was making it because if anyone can get a pattern wrong, it's me. But this bag really was super easy. In fact I made it in one night. With an almost 2 year old. And a cranky husband.

The bag has six pockets on the outside which is perfect for hooks, scissors, stitch markers, a pattern, an ipod, a bag of M&M's. Everything you need for crocheting. And I do love pockets.

The inside can hold a surprising number of skeins of yarn. It's holding an unfinished scarf right now. The finished bag is 8"x10"x4". So it is not huge. I don't think I could cram a whole finished afgan in it. But I prefer not to cram afgans into bags anyway. I just want to keep the yarn away from cats and toddlers and keep all of the related notions together. Now I can be super organized.

This was a fun project. Super fun. Now that I have it figured out I can add all kinds of embellishments next time and maybe some kind of closure. It's perfect for those big prints I've been hesitant to cut. And I've got that fashionista fabric in all kinds of color ways. I was thinking it would be cool if I could make it a little bigger. Then I could make a bag that matched the baby afgan and put the afgan (folded not crammed) inside the bag. The baby can use the afgan and the mom can use the bag. On second thought, I might have been better off if the pattern hadn't been so super easy.

Progress Through Guilt

I'm making progress. Slowly but surely. Here's what I've been up to.

I figured out what was missing from that improv quilt. I reconstructed the circles and lines I deconstructed in the other blocks and voila - a new block. Now I just have to figure out the quilting. It's always something.

I've also made progress on the coffee quilt. Actually, it is pretty much done. But I don't have the right fabric to bind it. Like I said, it's always something.

I was approaching the other UFO, the blue quilt, in the same way I approached the coffee quilt. That is, stop piecing and see what I could make with what I had. But I didn't seem to have enough blocks to make something out of what I had. So I pieced some more. It's still not working. Did I mention, it's always something?

I've also picked up my crochet hook. I have all this yarn in my sewing room and it has been sending me on a guilt trip. Every time I go in there, "So you're making stuff out of your fabric stash again. I guess we're not good enough to be stuff." And, "We were here before some of that fabric. Sorry, we're not as much fun." That kind of thing. Yarn can be so whiny sometimes. So I'm also busy converting the yarn into scarves and hats and other such things so it will get off my case. It's looking at me right now. I'd better go.

Pardon the Interruption

My regularly scheduled quilting was interrupted by a baby blanket that needed to be crocheted. The baby arrived on Easter and I was not already prepared with a hand made blanket for him, so I quickly whipped one up. It kind of looks like a quilt doesn't it?

I know these are rather bold color choices for a baby blanket. I usually make them in more traditional pastel colors. But I fell in love with that blue. And, based on the one week pictures, I believe the kid has the sophistication to pull off such a bold choice in baby blankets. This is actually from a Vanna White pattern and made in Vanna White yarns. It is very unusual for me to follow a pattern so closely. Fortunately, I accidently sewed two blocks together in wrong place so my streak of not following the directions remains unbroken.

I made this little hat from what I had left over. It looks too small to me but I have been assured that it is newborn size. My son was nine pounds and change when he was born so I can never gauge how small regular sized newborns are.

Now, back to the quilting.

A Baby Blanket and More of What I Got In Chicago

I finished the baby blanket. Yippee! Sewing it together wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Though I still think it could have been worked as one piece. The recipe called for fringe, but I don't care for fringe. I don't like how it frays and it just seems like something to drag on the floor and get all linty. Plus I think a baby would have a hard time resisting the temptation to pull the fringe out and eat it.

Instead, I added a double stitch around the edge and capped it off with a crab stitch. Far more elegant, don't you think? I hope the baby will be content cuddling with it.

You know how every time you go home, your mom gives you stuff to take with you? While I was in Chicago last week, my mom gave me a mystery bag of fabric. Apparently, she started collecting it thinking she would make a quilt. But she didn't know anything about quilting when she started collecting the fabric, and never learned to quilt. So she decided to give it to me. From the looks of it, most of the fabric has been hanging around since the early 1970's.

There's this pretty pink silk dress. Very 80's.

I'm pretty sure these are cotton. But they are very heavy. Like upholstery fabric. The funny thing is these patterns are back in style.

These are either satin or polyester. I'm leaning towards satin. I've heard that polyesters from the 70's were not very good quality. But these fabrics are in excellent condition.

I don't know what these are. I think the blue might be some kind of cotton or linen with a shiny finish. I think that washed out fabric is polyester. It looks like a piece of commercially produced baby quilt. There's batting and a backing and it is machine quilted.

I like these fabrics. I would never have bought them for myself - even if you could still find them. Now I have the opportunity to try something different. I think these fabrics will be especially good for book covers and bags. I'm thinking of experimenting with paints and embroidery on these too. Especially those solid cottons. So even though I didn't do any quilt related stuff on my trip to Chicago, I still managed to add to my stash. You gotta love moms.

The Elves Strike Again

I finished all of the panels for the baby blanket. Look at this. The end panels are longer than all of the other panels. I measured each panel as I made it to be sure they would all fit together. I even measured them against each other. I swear they were all the same length. And yet two panels still came out too long. Frankly, I think this is the work of elves. Not cute Orlando Bloom type elves. But those scrawny little ones with the pointy shoes. I think this is just a matter of unraveling the long panels until they are the same length as everything else. This would not have happened had the blanket been worked as one piece. I'm just saying.

So now I'm busy sewing the panels together. Between that and tending to a baby with a cold and a husband with cracked ribs, there hasn't been much time for any other type of sewing. The sewing is actually not as painful as I thought it would be. It is going together fairly quickly. And the yarn needle is a bajillion times bigger than the teeny tiny sharps I like to quilt with. So threading is easy and I'm not jabbing myself with the needle. And if I spot that elf, I'm going to drop my Encyclopedia of Crochet on it.

New Year's Resolution Quilts 1 & 2

I finished two bad luck quilts. The first one is called "If You Hand Someone Scissors, You Will Argue With Them Later". In my family, if someone needs a pair of scissors, you lay them on the table for them to pick up. It is bad luck to hand someone a pair of scissors. The background is foundation pieced. The scissors are needle turn applique. It is machine quilted. That bead in the middle of the scissors is actually a brad from the scrap book section. I punched a hole in the quilt and placed an eyelet there for the brad. This quilt is 100% from my stash. The big lesson I learned here is once you trim a quilt, you can't untrim it.

The second quilt is called, "Don't Spill the Salt". I think most people know that it is bad luck to spill salt. The background is hand pieced and the salt shaker is needle turn applique. The quilt is machine and hand quilted. And it is hand beaded. The big lesson I learned here is that you don't have to take things so literally. Actually, I think I may have known that. But I was reminded of that lesson in the quest for beads that look like salt. I had white beads that were too clear, or too big, or the wrong shape. I couldn't get them to work. I tried the pink beads just to see if they were the size I wanted, and really liked the effect. So I used them. There was no reason to use white beads. The only thing I bought for this quilt was the black thread for the salt shaker. The embroidery is too tiny for you to see how bad I am at french knots. I really like the back of this one. It has that whole "book of shadows" effect I was going for. Maybe I've seen one too many episodes of "Charmed".


On baby blanket front, I have 8 panels down and one to go. The only panel left is the center popcorn stitch panel. Yippee.

Buzz Buzz

I've been a busy bee this week. Working, running errands, cooking, doing the laundry, running around after my son. Nothing out of the ordinary, but it feels like it has been more hectic than usual. I think I'm longing for a change of scenery, so I'm rushing through the days. I'm feeling pulled again by my quilting. I know I promised that I would work in my sketch books on days I couldn't get to the quilting. I haven't been doing that because I've been crocheting. But I've got ideas buzzing around, and frankly, I would be better off if I got them down on paper. After all, I wouldn't just sit there and do nothing if the ideas were actual bees. Actually, I probably would. I don't make sudden moves around bees. But I would be way more attentive to them than I have been to my creative life these days.

I painted the tea dyed fabric for the back of the bad luck quilts. I was going for an old, wrinkled, rusty, patina stained look. Like beaten, leathery paper. And I'm pretty happy to say I achieved that. I dampened the cloth and then scrunched it. Then I took a cotton ball and pounced on light green and dark green textile paint. Then I used a wet makeup sponge to brush on copper Lumiere paint. I finished by dripping on green Lumiere paint and going over the drips with a cotton ball. I'm especially happy with how they look creased and wrinkled even though they are not. That's what I was hoping would happen when I wrinkled the fabric before painting. Every now and then, things work out the way you expected.

On the baby blanket front, I finally finished the bobble panel and I'm on to the yummy diamond panel. I love crocheting cables. It is one of the simple joys in my life. If you are keeping count, that is 5 panels down and 4 to go.

Likes Shiny Objects Too

I did some tea dyeing. I haven't done any fabric dyeing all year because of the drought here in Georgia. But tea dyeing doesn't use that much water. I was contemplating the backs for my bad luck quilts. I'm planning to write what the quilt is about on the back. Whenever you see a book of spells or legends or whatever in movies and on TV, it is on that funky, old timey brown paper. I thought that would be a good look for the back of the quilts. And I figured tea dyeing would be the perfect way to achieve the look.

I used cranberry tea, blueberry tea and regular orange and black pekoe tea.

My son stole my spoon and wouldn't give it back, so I let him stir the fabric.

I'm pretty happy with how it came out. You can't tell from the picture. But it is kind of brownish pink. I think it will be a good base for adding some paint and some lettering.

On baby blanket news, I have another panel done. I heart cable stitches. I rewarded myself for finishing the bobble panel by doing a cable panel. Now I have to do the second bobble panel. But at least I have another cable panel to look forward to. And then I get to do popcorn stitches. Whoo hoo. It doesn't take much to make me happy.

It's January 20th Already!!!

I haven't been doing much quilting because I've been working on the baby blanket. I have sort of a deadline now, and for some reason, January is slipping away quickly. Holy smokes, it's already the 20th! I have two panels done and I'm working on the third. It has 9 panels all together. This one is referred to as the bobble panel.

I don't find it as interesting to work as popcorn stitches or cables, so I'm anxious to get it done so I can move on to the more fun panels. Are you wondering why I'm crocheting a baby blanket instead of quilting one? I've been crocheting since I was about 8 or 9 years old. I've given away almost everything I've crocheted. I do have a few crochet pieces that I've kept, but that is just a big, flat way for me to store yarn. I often pull these pieces apart and make them into something else if I find an interesting pattern or stitch I want to try. When I was laid off a few years ago, I spent a lot of time unraveling and crocheting blankets in between looking for a job. Lynn Krawczyk recently posted a list of 10 reason why it is good to crochet when you have a head cold and I realized that a lot of those are the same reasons I crocheted when I was unemployed. Being laid off is a lot like being sick except you can't spend the day hopped up on cold medicine. What was the question again? Oh yeah, I crochet baby blankets as gifts because I've been making them a lot longer than I've been quilting. It's kind of my thing now. If Martha Stewart showed up at your dinner party with a liter of Coke, you'd be like, "What's up with that?" It's the same thing with me and crocheted baby blankets. And it's fast and fun. Not a lot of people crochet, so it also makes a unique gift.

I did get a little bit of sewing done this week. I did some needle turn applique on one of my bad luck quilts. Can you tell which superstition this one will be about?

I love needle turn applique. It makes me feel like anything is possible.

When You Assume...You Make a Blanket Out of Panels

I don't think I've been doing anything interesting to report on lately. I've just been doing what I do. I finished another background for my New Year's Resolution quilts. These are pretty much going to be applique quilts, and I've been putting the backgrounds together. I haven't decided how to bind the quilts. Whether they will be self bound like a pillow case or if I will apply binding. This is kind of a crucial decision because I can't do any quilting in the meantime. I only have one more background to put together, so I better make a decision soon.

I've also been working on a baby blanket. I know it looks like a scarf. But it is a fisherman's sweater pattern that is worked in panels which are then sewn together. Believe me, I didn't know that when I picked the pattern. I didn't bother to read it before I started working on it. I just assumed it was worked as one piece. I actually had the yarn tied on when I looked at the pattern and realized it was worked in panels. Now I have to pay attention to things like the gauge - which I never do. It's a blanket, who cares? I just crochet them until they are blanket sized. But now all of the panels will need to be the same size, so I'm actually going to have to pay attention to what I'm doing. Not to mention the sewing at the end. Yes, I'm that lazy. I actually thought about picking a different pattern, but I really like this one so I'm forging ahead.

That's it. See, I told you.

Just Say No

I cleaned my sewing studio. I use air quotes when I say "cleaned". Maybe tidy would be a better word? Let's just say it is somewhere below Martha Stewart and somewhere above Oscar the Grouch. Things are pretty much put away. Scraps have been stored or thrown out. There is space to work. That's all I'm looking for. I don't really have any interest in doing any more cleaning than that. I'd rather be sewing.

Here is my work area. It is pretty much a desk where I do my drafting, cutting, and machine work. I keep my beads and embellishments on the desk too. I keep scraps under the desk in bins sorted by color. There is also a big rubbermaid tub of yarn under the desk. The cats love it under there. It scares me a little.

Here's my stash. It is sorted by color. I also have a cube for fat quarters, novelty prints, batting, PFD fabric, and plaids. I even have a cube for extra special, too awesome to cut fabric. The rest of the cubes are holding fabric for projects. Once I pull fabric from my stash, I keep it separated from the rest of the stash until the project has the binding on. That way, I have fabric if I decide to make extra blocks, sashes or whatever. There is a tapestry that hangs over the whole thing to protect it from sunlight.

This week I've also started making the backgrounds for the bad luck quilts. I've put two together and I'm hand piecing the third. It is a baby block design and I love hand piecing those y-seams. I was at JoAnns today to buy yarn to crochet a baby afgan that I will be making as a gift. I was walking around with 5 skeins of yarn thinking it would be nice to have a cute bag to tuck the yarn into. Of course they didn't have any so I thought, "Why don't I make one". Five words that are like crack to a crafter. So now I am also making a quilted bag. At least it keeps me off the streets.

Murphy Strikes Again

I decided to make myself a cute skinny scarf and look what happened.

I ran out of yarn with two inches left to go.

Sigh.

I don't think I'm being overly dramatic when I say that this kind of thing happens to me all the time. It's pretty long so I think I will just fold the little dangly bit and tack it in place. Darn you Murphy and your cursed law.