Sweet Peas for April

For my BFF. And this is only a smidgen of my adoration. :)

Japanese Garden

... And another quilt finally gets finished. It's been sitting in my UFO pile whistling sweetly that all I needed to do was quilt a corner and the border. Then I herniated a disk in my neck mid-summer and not much got done for about 2 months. (Well, except sewing circle skirts; you can't keep a girl down totally!) then mom bought the genius sewing machine and I wrestled my way through the corner hand quilting and machine did the border. I love it, I am in love, and I have 3 more quilts ready to finish with that puppy!

Sweet dreams are made of these

Woke up from a nap and suddenly knew what I wanted to do with the box of fabric under my bed.

And another begins... King-size, of course.

Burlington Industries, 1971

My favorite purse is um, 12 years old and a Gap $5 special. I'm pretty sure I got my money's worth. I haven't used it constantly but it's been a good one to fall back on when I needed a change.

The poor lining has been patched many times and when the patches were the only thing holding it together I wasn't sure what to do. It's the perfect everything (corduroy patchwork) and there is nothing like that in style right now.

Lucky thing I've been in an extreme-save $-thrift shop kick because it dawned on me: just replace the lining; that's all that is wearing out. Get a great funky cotton pattern.

Went fabric diving at mom's and found 2 absolutely fabulous retro prints. Only thing with the retro part, they are actually from the early 70s. The selvage on the main one said 1971.

Awesome.

Bazaar Or Bizarre, Either Way is Fine

I downloaded the blogger app and am finding new freedom in our desktop-less world!

Here is the "bizarre" quilt for the church bizarre. Made to use and love you back!

Yarn Diving

I think the knitting hiatus might be coming to an end. Since the stockings I've been piddling with dishcloth patterns and a pair of socks but not really getting anything done. There have been no deadlines so I've taken advantage of the no stress crafting. Only problem is when I don't have a deadline I seem to think nothing needs to be worked on. On second thought, that really isn't a problem, just nothing new to post!

However, two days ago I suddenly was inspired to knit a teacher gift for Little Guy's teacher: a lovely purple chunky scarf with cables. Yum. She taught in Guam for 6 years, has only just moved back to the states, and has little to no warm clothing. Definite need and inspiration there. I casted on, started knitting away, and it has been bliss. A lovely break, new zest for knitting and knitting projects, and loving the chunky yarn because it means it won't take forever to knit. I'm giving it to her Friday so it needs to knit up quick anyway.Speaking of the knitting break, I spent the time quilting, i.e. cutting out pieces, planning, piecing, quilting, sandwiching (when you stack the layers), quilting some more, cutting binding, binding, some embroidery thrown in somewhere, and finishing. For some reason I decided in the midst of cleaning out Mom's stash, mine needed cleaning out too and stuff used or moved on, operating with a realistic mind set: I can't keep it all and will I really use this? It was exhausting at times but I have several finished, some almost, and some in progress. Hopefully will have those posted soon. Mom and I also did a raffle quilt for the church's Christmas Bazaar that they went nuts over. It was so cute and I'm glad they liked it so much. I'm taking a deep breath and preparing myself for us being asked again. Mom pieces and I quilt and finish it. It uses up more of her stash and we get to try out new patterns. I'll be ready for it again in oh, maybe two years. :) I have a king-size quilt being pieced for Crochet Queen.

"Monet's Childhood"

My baby.  Totally birthed itself out of trying to use up all the fun kid fabrics I kept finding and throwing in a pile.  And yes, that delicious back is Amy Butler design and a gift from LMSS just so she could "see what I did with it."  Love it.  Love her.  And this is 90"x 90" and a dream to wrap up in on chilly days (not that we are having many of these anymore!)

The title came from a "Clueless" quote about a girl being "so Monet," i.e. from far away it looks o.k. but up close it's just a big mess.

Just twist the rag on the 10th.

Um, I've been quilting.  A LOT.  Not much knitting.  Finally finished the bee stitch shrug (oops, need to get a picture of that) and have been working on the Christmas stockings for friends but Harriet hasn't been speaking to me through knitting.  She's all up in the sewing and so sewing I've been doing.

Above is a rag quilt variation for one of HHubby's nieces.  Her mom gave me the fabric to use (the niece had picked them out with her mother a few years ago) and I came up with this for her 10th birthday. 

Love is in the air

(the pictures are backwards; still haven't figured out Blogger's order reasoning no matter the order I upload the pictures)

SuperGirl's quilt was pieced and stacked yesterday. We took a day off, as in we stayed home because SuperGirl and I were tired and Little Guy still hasn't shaken whatever virus he's caught. I got caught up on the laundry, some cleaning, and moved more projects closer to completion. This quilt was one I was wanting to make some sort of progress on, especially since SuperGirl was home this week for Intersession and I can finally make her sit down long enough to give me an opinion on what she wanted. The above is the result. It's Moda's "Love is in the Air" 5" squares (can't think of the term for them ; they are the little 5" square stacks of sample fabric in a set/theme) cut diagonally and sewn with same size triangle flannel (the purple flowers on white). Pattern is sort of "Broken Dishes" (that was my thought anyway) and I bordered it with some leftover fabric from one of my baby slings. The pink and red plaid was perfect and I really wanted to use it as the back too but SuperGirl insisted on the blue flannel with the bunnies (see Picture #1). It's reversible!

I'm going to hand quilt it eventually (shouldn't take too long; it's only 45"x45" and I'm going to freehand a heart pattern) and bind it in the purple flower/white flannel. I was really excited when I stacked it because I was able to use two big pieces out of my batting leftovers, thus helping shrink that stash bin also! No necessary shopping and another thing on the conveyor belt of progress!

...and depression breeds productivity?

I've had a bad attitude lately. Don't get me wrong, life is fine, family is wonderful, I've just been a downer and it's all me. I've been working on improving it. Triggers are the current circumstances I can't control and the fact that there is nothing I can do really bugs me... like REALLY ticks me off. Some days it's better than others. The negative side is I'm not good company the tired-er I get (is that even a word?) but the positive side is I'm a demon getting things finished. Understand, I'm not getting the things that need to be done by Christmas finished. I'm finishing the things that have been hanging around in drawers, final-final things for projects already done and the scraps were still hanging around (like the picture above; will discuss in a second), and finding things that need to be organized better and used up so I know what I have/where it is/how much I have/if I need it. (Last month it was baking and we are still enjoying the frozen products of that bout of crankiness and so are the friends and acquaintances that received the give-aways. I think they are looking forward to me getting depressed again because it breeds pumpkin pies. For me a baking depression breeds less freezer space and I can't do that too often.)

I told LMSS last night that this passive-aggressive attitude towards the 2 projects left for Christmas gifts was amusing but not great for the thrill I get completing things and crossing off to-do lists, not to mention the people the gifts are for that I have NO IDEA what to buy them otherwise. (I actually broke down and bought a Christmas gift for the 3rd pair of potential socks hanging around because I couldn't do another speed-sock-ing like last weekend.) Also, if you knew how much I had already made for Christmas gifts you would think I was crazy for balking at the last 2 pairs of socks.

Well, I never said I was sane. Socially acceptable most days, yes, but not sane.

Anyway, now for the above picture. Those are the pillow shams for our quilt that I had thought about making but I'm not a decorative pillow/pillow sham person so I wasn't sure if it would happen. I started with the one on the left and it turned out so good I made the one on the right. They look nothing like each other but they fit ("Like us" Hubby said) and I love how they turned out. I used the leftover partially sewed scraps for the left one, simply sewing more frames on until I had the deminsions I needed, and did the back as two panels overlapping. I even had a little fun by sewing the remainder of the bias binding as a trim around the edge between the front and the back. The right one was from scraps too but I was able to plan a bit more with bigger scraps, thus more piecing, back done the same as the left but in different fabric. This eliminated all those little scraps, blocks, binding, squares, strips, etc. and left only the big pieces of fabric which are now sorted by color in my stash to live on in another project one day. I love it. I love the new space and I love how this filled a space that needed to be there, I hadn't reached the time to do it until now.

I'm the left pillow, Hubby is the right pillow. Couldn't you tell?

A stitch in time...

Here are the quilts. The top one is a gift and the bottom one I did for me. It's "Hush-a-Bye" by Moda and I am a new fan of their fabric. The top was whatever colors I picked out at Hancocks and it looks just right for the person it's for. I tried to add close-ups of the stitch patterns, done by one of my knitting class ladies on her machine. I might be a new fan of that method too... certainly saves time! The added effect is lovely also.

Present, Past, and Past Imperfect

Things had gotten desparate. The angles were ok (and I hestitate to say that; they might seem ok to someone who had never made anything in their life and didn't have an opinion on irregular borders, i.e. someone who doesn't pay attention that this thing looks like a lopsided mass first project of a kindergartener [not a comment on you, Crochet Queen, a comment on my wacky irregular stitch decreases when I should know better]) but I didn't like it. I didn't like working on it and it, again, was taking way longer than I thought it should take. So, I made a call to Crochet Queen after putting Sgt. Cribb on pause (it was at a part I felt I needed to pay attention to anyway) and asked her if she cared if the blanket turned out in an oval shape. She didn't really but wasn't going to be picky. I told her no, if she wanted a rectangle, by golly she was going to get a rectangle, not matter what. "The blanket has gotten to you, too, huh?" she said. I didn't want to confess to my impulses to light fire to the thing, even though Crochet Queen had already confessed her sordid ideas, but I did. We had a good laugh and I told her it still would be finished and not to worry.

I had the blanket laid out on the floor and was looking at it on the floor when I decided to try something I had thought of initially when the mitered corner idea took over. I could mark the tentative side point(s) (it's flatter there so I could fudge a little), start there by picking up a stitch and crocheting rows, picking up every other stitch along the sloping side as I came to it, keeping the border side straight, and increasing 1 stitch next to the slope side every few rows. I started, fully prepared to rip it out, and guess what. It has, for the most part, worked!

So, here is the blanket. The first picture is the current progress that is (thankfully!) working. The second and third are views of the mitered corner that I thought was going to work and didn't. I posted them because I wanted to show the whole blanket and my first attempt at the corner. I'm sure I could find a way for the mitered corner technique to work if I felt like doing the math and really thinking about it but I don't feel like it and it takes to long to miter once I actually start crocheting. The top picture method is working out better but still isn't as rectangular as what would be perfect. However, it is more of a rectangular shape and will have corners, plus I'm still going to crochet a border, add a row of Granny Squares already crocheted by Crochet Queen, and then see what the blanket wants for a grand finish. I asked CQ if her sister liked frilly (I like doing scalloped trim on Granny square blankets; I have one of my own that's king sized that was a huge stash buster and preggy project to use up all my acrylic yarn I still loved but would never use 2-2.5 years ago. It would be our current bedpsread (and I would have had made no attempt to make our lovely quilt) if Hubby tolerated that sort of thing. He drew the line at Granny Squares, thus the quilt idea was born) and she said not really but her sister wouldn't care because her blanket was finally going to be finished. The scallops don't really say frilly but I'm not going to decide yet. The blanket will tell me what it wants.

I've also had some more success on the quilting front: I've found the patterns I want for the Christmas fabric I had that was unearthed in Mom's fabric stash room (yep, those dresses I was going to whip up for Bailey that never happened... oh well, she would have outgrown them long before now) and the cute cotton prints I've been collecting for some reason. I had to take both groups out of my stash drawer (more like pry the drawer open and liberate them so the drawer didn't explode at some random, inopportune time) and put them in covered bins that are now hidden, um, STORED under the bed so that I had more clear space in the lived in part of the house. They now have their plan and I'm so excited! I've told myself not to start them till after I finish everything else I've started so we are looking at 8 months from now. Let's see if I actually wait till then.

Everything is beautiful in it's own way

I love it when projects suddenly are finished a day early. I love it when that allows other projects that have been hanging around like stinky cheese monkeys to be suddenly finished. I love it when all the projects suddenly make the house more organized and clean, whether that is by providing a spot for things to go or by finding a way to my car to be taken to their true homes. I just love it. That stack of books overwhelming the poor little book shelf holding them to the right in the previous picture? Gone. The books are now organized in a large, oak bookshelf, stained by yours truly and Hunky Hubby. It is finished and standing tall and lovely. There is an even taller one in the front room for all the socially acceptable books and hardbacks but it needs to finish fully drying for another 24 hours. The kids' books are organized and separated in their rooms. They now have the smaller particle board bookshelves, i.e. shelves I'm not going to have a heart attack about when I found them markered and covered in stickers.

The separating of all the kids' books was interesting. I didn't realize how much I collected through the years and found lots of the old favorites from when I was a kids. (Note to siblings: if there is a book you want from when we were growing up, I probably have it. Let me know if you want it.) Most of the books had not been moved from the crates they were squatting in and I found lots of dust bunnies and a missing puzzle piece in the process of cleaning them out. Now everything looks like it belongs and it's BEAUTIFUL!

Just like the quilt, beautiful. Even Little Guy comments on the quilt every time he comes in our bedroom; he pats it and says, "Hm! Mommy's quilt!"

Now for Christmas presents to start on and finish. And a few baby presents. Oh, and another lap quilt. Oh yeah, I need to get my modern sewing machine back from the shop so I can fill bobbins for the antique sewing machine and use it. And that would enable me to finish the mending for that friend of mine...

Yep, still have more to do. But no more stinky cheese monkeys. These projects are sweet, cuddly monkeys I like having for company.

Beautimus

It is done. It took all day Monday to do it and my sewing machine is now having professional maintenance work but it is done. It is so lovely.

I probably don't need to tell you how frustrating it was when what I thought was a 3-4 hour project turned into a 10 hour one. I probably don't need to tell you about how 2 year olds can sense blood, sweat, and tears because that's when they decide to come "help." Or at least demand milk, water, and whatever else they feel like they need at that instant. It was at supper when I was sitting there, staring at my hastily prepared supper and the quilt with binding half done, half not, when SuperGirl asked me "Mommy, are you tired?" I said "Yes honey, and I'm ready for that quilt to be done." "Me too, Mommy," she answered.

It took 40 minutes to wash, 3 hours to dry (cotton batting is great for absorption and resisting dryer heat), and I finally tucked it around Hubby (who was asleep) at 1 a.m. It was beautiful. the crowning achievement was the next day when I had the bed made and he came home. He looked at it and said, "It looks really good!"

It's actually a little too long but it's still fabulous because we don't have to worry about the ends riding up while sleeping. The cotton batting is not too heavy (I was worried about that and almost changed it but something told me not to) and feels wonderful. It feels so good to have it done and on my bed. I can look at it and say "I did that. I did all of that. I didn't just finish it, I did it ALL." And the flipping thing is king size. [patting self on back for not shying away from what "experts" would say isn't a "good idea"] I did, however, make an emergency call to LMSS while sewing the binding telling her about wanting to throw the thing out the window while my sewing machine tried blow up. She talked me down off the ledge and said "Whatever you need to do to get it done, do it." Thanks, LMSS.

The other thing I feel good about with this quilt is it's totally us, one of a kind, well-made, and will stay on our bed for ages. It's not trendy or synthetic. It's our colors and our feel. When I was looking for bedspreads years ago I couldn't find any in the stores that were big enough and/or the colors/patterns we wanted and we were living with a cheap substitute bedspread. I say cheap because the fabric and sewing work was cheap; it in itself was not cheap, although was for a king-size bedspread. I've been patching holes on it from the day we got it, which means 2 years, and I'm happy to fold it up in the closet and have a bedspread that I have constructed from the ground up. If anything happens to it I can fix it.

I celebrated all this by doing all the laundry and housework that has been left undone for the past 2 weeks. We also are staining and finishing bookshelves for the house which means all the books will finally be organized and in the right place, i.e. kids' books in kids' rooms, adult books, photo albums, and nice books in front room, paperbacks in our bedroom. I'm so excited but of course that means cleaning more stuff out and moving things. It's going to be great once done. And we are actually enjoying the staining and polyurethane coating procedure so it hasn't been too bad. Of course it helps the weather has been gorgeous.

Keep your eye on the ball

I have to remember that things do not happen overnight. This means quilts. This means big, heavy quilts that are 7/8ths of the way done and still need time and attention for a few more days. No rushing.

I have to remember that the Little Things (like children) do seem to happen overnight and I need to drop everything and pay attention to them at every opportunity because I'll blink my eyes and they will suddenly be gone. This includes not grumbling about volunteering to chaperone Kindergarten field trips. She will only be in Kindergarten once, this will mean a lot to her and the teacher even though the 2 year old comes along, and I should not even think about the quilting time that is being lost. There will be plenty of quilting time later on when I should be sleeping.

I have to remember that I do still have work to do, even though it's not official work, and I do still have working projects to finish doing. These need to be done and out of the way because they are taking up room at Mom's house and even though they do not involve knitting needles and/or a sewing machine, DO IT ANYWAY WITHOUT THE KNITTING EVERY 5 MINUTES.

And the one thing I don't like about playing cards or any other game: it's hard to knit or sew during, but is possible. Even if it annoys the others. That's why I try to only play games with other knitters or quilters. They understand and are knitting under the table too.

Weekend separation

The quilt is being quilted at the moment. I've decided October is my month to finish it and starting in Novemeber it will be Christmas presents only. Well, not exactly be quilted on at the moment. It's been put up for a rest over the weekend because we had company last night and I realized that in the fervor of getting things knitted/sewed for Christmas, etc. I had totally neglected housework and other responsibilities and things were not acceptable for a friend to come show us our new boyfriend over dinner. So I put the quilt up and cleaned.

It actually worked out for the best because the quilt and I were starting to have issues. It's totally me, I admit. I had finished quilting the middle part with all the blocks and got really excited because that means I'm almost finished, right? Um, WRONG. I spread the quilt out on the table, stenciled in the lovely little pattern for the yellow stripe, pondered over what to do for the red, and totally knew what I was going to do for the blue. Imagine me humming a clever little tune, thinking how nice it will be to have it on my bed within the week, binding cut and sewn on, lovely. Then I put it back on the quilt rack and realized that it wasn't oh, the 12 inches wide my brain was thinking. It was about 20-22''. It takes up most of the space on my rack and that means at least 2 hours each square. Bummer.

I got a little aggravated but started stitching, thinking I could work through it, trying to ignore a sock project calling to me from it's bag saying "Hey, I'M almost finished! You can work on me and to heck with that quilt! Your husband is hot natured anyway and I'm not for him! One more gift to cross off on your list!" But I still stitched away, getting more and more aggravated that this project wasn't going to be over as quickly as I thought. Finally, it was too late to grumble anymore, I had tons of things to do the next day that required me to have a full nights rest ( like, CLEAN), so I put it up and away, hoping that the weekend break would work to get me revved up to work on it next week and not 6 months from now. Or even 2 years from now. It's happened before.

I'm glad to say that it's only Saturday night and I'm starting to get excited about working on it again and totally understand that it's going to take 2 more weeks. I'm going to cherish the experience and do everything right, or at least remind myself that that's what I'm doing because things that are rushed aren't done correctly. I'm also glad to say that I'm leaving the quilt alone until Monday so I WILL finish that sock and there will be one more gift crossed off the list. I'm down to the last 3-4 inches on the mate. I owe it to it. It's been so patient through car pools and doctor appointments.

By the way, finally saw a cardiologist. Nothing is wrong. Everything is working fine. More great, fantabulous news.

All apologies...

Since I'm not sitting at a computer for endless hours I'm sorry to say that this blog has fallen on my list of priorities. However, other things haven't. Knitting is still happening (way too many project bags!) but isn't this other lovely?

The big quilt with the black, red, etc. is our new bedspread. Or it will be once I finish quilting it. It is now squatting on a quilt frame in our living room being used as a tent by the little ones. I love it all.

The purple is a throw that is a Christmas present for a niece, along with the purple purse that is for her birthday. They sort of go together but not really.

The purse I sewed up on a whim when I got mad trying to sew a knit dress for me (I don't think sewing clothes is my thing) from a quarter contest free pattern thing on www.allpeoplequilt.com
Love the vintage-style corduroy.

Where the quilting has come from, I don't know. I'm enjoying every minute of it.

Thursday's child has far to go

The scarf is finished, blocked, and looks lovely. I am glad to be finished with it, only because I was running out of places to sit and pay attention to the multiple row repeats.

I have been to Austin and back, but there is no baby yet. Still waiting for LMSS to call. Mom is still there and she is helping LMSS nest, i.e. organize all those hand-me-down baby clothes. Baby blanket is still for the baby's 1st birthday but LMSS has got a pair of socks with another pair I'm working on, nearly 2 nursing wraps (Mom's almost finished with the 2nd one), and she's knitting like a nut on 2 different baby outfits. They are lovely and I'm totally jealous she's the one with the little one to wear them. Well, jealous until I realize I have a 2 year old nearly fully weaned, thus my nights are almost mine, all mine. But the little dresses are SO CUTE!!!!

Little Guy sang to us every morning at LMSS's house. I'm not sure what tune it was but it sounded like a combination of the Imperial March and the ending chorus of "Hey, Jude".

I picked up some cotton yarn in Austin to carry on the wrap-knitting theme. It's 8"s long, 42"s to go. Light blue and dark blue, using a "bee stitch" which uses the "knit one below" idea. Interesting. The pattern in the book was wrong and I looked it up on Ravelry. I'll have more on that later...

I did finish both quilts at LMSS's friends house. Long arm quilting is fabulous for those projects that need to be finished and out of the "to do" pile. I still have a soft spot for hand-quilting though...

I'll try to get pictures up of everything as soon as I can. I'm no longer working at the in-laws so their computer isn't as easy to access but I'll see what I can do. Plus, any day I might get the call and go running off to Austin again. Weekend trips to Austin (5+ hours, depending on how you drive and how much you stop) will wear you out.

Lovely waves of color...

Here is the lacy scarf I have been working on. Picture #1 is it now. Picture #2 is what it was a few weeks ago and I was bored to tears. The pattern was nice and interesting but the mercerized cotton was too stiff and non-elastic to carry the give and take it needed to make the holes and waves. I knew I wanted to make a lacey scarf but didn't know what pattern to do it in. Picked up the latest "Yarn Forward" magazine and bam! there it was, near the back. Picture #1 is coming along nicely. It's wanting to curl on me so adventures in blocking is a must (note to self: must get mesh drying rack; still haven't washed that other sweater either and need this badly now!) but I'm finding I might like lace. It has enough changes to keep the attention and it's lots of fun to see the pattern emerge and see why there are so many yos, ssks, sl2k1pssos, k2togs, etc. and how they shape and move the lines in the yarn. I do not recommend knitting lace during a car trip. Tried that a few weekends ago and somehow dropped several stitches, which can be detrimental when knitting lace. I had to put it away before I was tempted to panic and throw the whole thing out the window.

I was reminded that I need to be working on AAnt's afghan; his birthday is in a few weeks. Must do. Cross-stitch birthday gift is being changed to cross-stitch Christmas gift, unless I get on a serious cross-stitch kick, something I seriously doubt. Hunky Hubby's sweater is coming along slowly but is so soft and so nice to zone out and knit. LMSS's baby blanket has been pushed to being a 1st birthday present. So I have little over a year... I think I can get up the courage in that time. How come I can knit sweaters and not bat an eye but a baby blanket is freaking me out? Must over-analyze...

LMSS also informed me that she has time saved up for her friend's long-arm quilting machine so when we are there on baby watch in another week or two we can go there and finish up whatever quilts we need to do. Very tempting. I still have a quilt to quilt (pinned together and waiting for me in a bag), SuperGirl's quilt to layer, pin, and quilt (was given to me pieced, thank goodness and I have all the materials, just haven't put it together yet), and my first quilt I started but haven't gone anywhere with it yet. It's cut out but I have yet to start sewing. I think a king-sized quilt was a huge thing to take on but I'm still going to do it. Until now, I've only done 9-patch and patchwork quilting, no actual quilt blocks, and I need to make that bridge even if it's to finish it and say "look what I did!" and never make another again. I have a feeling the cross-stitch will be a project like that too...