mini quilt: favourite things

"Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens.  Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens.  Brown paper packages tied up with string.  These are a few of my favourite things!"





I have officially finished my second mini quilt!  This one was for the month of June in the STUD (Swap Till You Drop) mini quilt swap group.  I was lucky to be partnered up with sweetteamom.  Our theme for the month was "Movies."

Initially, I was really excited about the theme and thought it would be easy coming up with a concept.  Movies are an endless source of inspiration, right?  The idea was to send your partner your favourite movie as inspiration for the mini they were to make you.  Neither my partner or I could decided on just one movie as inspiration (the first of many problems) so we each sent a list of 5 movies (and a tv show!) for each other to choose from.  I sent:   Up, Toy Story, Garden State, Willy Wonka (the original), The Office and The Big Bang Theory.  Sweetteamom sent: Willy Wonka (the new one), Beauty and the Beast, Pirates of the Caribbean, Psych, Breakfast at Tiffany.

Her list is pretty great!  Originally I had thought about doing the iconic picture of Audrey Hepburn from the Breakfast at Tiffany poster.  Then I thought about the opening scene from Sound of Music.  When both of those concepts failed, I turned to "Favourite Things."  (As it turns out, my partner was having some trouble coming up with a working concept as well so we agreed to extend our June 30 deadline and try again.)



I`m not really sure how "Favourite Things" slipped my mind to begin with.  Who hasn't had that song stuck in their head before?  (Before I go any further I should make the shocking confession that ... wait for it ... I have never actually seen The Sound of Music.  I know!!  I'll have to remedy that soon.)

After many hours spent cruising Flickr for inspiration, I decided that rather than a whole lot of applique (which I am currently boycotting because I want to by some Lite Steam a Seam 2 but refuse to pay the marked up prices of The Store That Shall Not Be Named) I would try my hand at foundation piecing.  I figured I could try it out in preparation for (hopefully) someday making the Geese in the Forest quilt by Twiddletails, and if it turns out I hated it then it would only have to be for this quilt.

It took me days to either track down or create the patterns for the first five items in the Favourite Things song.  It was painful.  But it's done, and I'm happy.  Other than the foundation piecing (which I may just be crazy enough to try again, and only because Twiddletails makes it look easy) I got a chance to try some embroidery.  My favourite bit is the phrase "these are a few of my favourite things".  I grabbed a couple of fonts off Word and traced the words onto the fabric before embroidering so it would be perfect.

I sure hope sweetteamom likes it!

favourites: blue

1. If it's a boy quilt - front, 2. it's been a while..., 3. 3 - nursery 2, 4. square dance, 5. pattern2c, 6. small squares quilt, 7. winter palette., 8. Doll Quilt Swap 9, 9. Little squares WIP

a quilt top and a salad

It's finished!  I sat down and worked on this for a few hours this morning and it's finished.  I love it.  There are a few wonky bits where the seams don't quite line up, but after ironing the seams to the sides it worked a lot better.  I came to the conclusion that my cutting was to blame mostly.  I cut all of those pieces in one night and clearly didn't pay much attention to how accurate it was.

The finished top is 65" by 45".  Not quite as big as I had hoped, but then I didn't do any actual calculations before sewing.  My question is, do I want to add a border?  I took a (terrible) picture of the quilt laid out on a big piece of off-white fabric and I wasn't sure how I felt about it.  Maybe in chocolate brown?  Or do I just leave it alone and let it be a bit smaller than I wanted.

And of course the other question: what do I back it with? I've got some Amy Butler Midwest Modern honeycomb in linen that could work, but it's perhaps a bit washed out.



I've been thinking about another Amy Butler print - Lacework in Olive which is from the Lotus collection.  This fabric actually shows up in the quilt top which is why I think it would be great, plus the repeat is quite large.  Unfortunately, there are no squares left over from the top that I could piece into the back or I would.

 

What do you guys think?  Should I go with one of those or should I find a solid?

In other (random) news:  this was my delicious lunch.



A citrus salad - yum!  A homemade citrus vinaigrette dressing with sliced strawberries and oranges on top.  So light and delicious and perfect for summer.

the random object: voodoo fred

Meet Fred.  He is a voodoo doll toothpick holder and I have never seen a more hilarious object.

Fred came a friend as a wedding present.  (He originally came with a really cool suspended picture frame which I broke almost immediately - oops!)  I think everyone has a story about getting a gift from someone who decided to go "off registry" (for whatever reason) and it was that weird serving tray or table cloth or obvious re-gift (really, if you're going to do it you should make sure to take the CARD out of the box top before passing it on, yikes!)  But every once in a while you get that amazing gift that is so original and so thoughtful it makes everything off the list you personally put together seem boring and a little pedestrian.

Fred is that gift.  He and a really cool set of handmade serving dishes from Portugal definitely sit at the top of the best gifts list.

Unfortunately, when I was taking the picture I didn't have any toothpicks to demonstrate his incredibly toothpick holding abilities, but I think you get the idea.  Favourite bits: his slightly tilted head and the hole between his eyes.

Oh and before anyone goes reading too much into his name (he shares it with my dad) I DID NOT NAME HIM!  It says it on his back.  :)

P.S. Thanks Rachel for the utterly original, fabulously thoughtful wedding gift!

single girl

I've started a new project. Or rather, I'm finally getting around to a project I have had all the supplies for for 18 months.



This project is particularly special, important and time consuming.

For starters, it the famed "Single Girl" pattern by Denyse Schmidt. How can you go wrong? That woman is inspirational and I love just about every pattern and piece of fabric she has ever made. It is a dream of mine to one day own one of her beautiful collection quilts and to attend a class at her studio in Connecticut. (If there are any generous and wealthy sewers out there who want to help me achieve those dreams let me know.)

I decided to do something I wouldn't normally do and use the recommended fabrics. Actually, I wouldn't normally even use a pattern but I couldn't resist both the wit of the title and the fun design.

The suggested fabrics (Katie Jump Rope) are colourful, fun and a little retro and I love them all. So, I am henceforth attempting to recreate the exact project on the cover. IN KING SIZE! Am I insane? I think I might be. I did some quick calculations and figured out that a king sized quilt will include exactly 804 pieces to be cut and painstakingly, precisely pieced before being quilted. Yikes!

But wait, there is a good reason for me to be so insane as to attempt this. Joel. I love that man and it's going to be a gift for him. He is the one who found the pattern at The Workroom, and he is the one who loved the colours on the cover just as much as I do, and he is the one who suggested it would be the perfect quilt for our bed.  He is the one who spent weeks tracking down every last piece of fabric I would need to make it after I found out it was out of print.

So far, Joel has put more effort into this thing that I have, and it's supposed to be his gift!  Look out for regular updates on this monolith of project and for pleas for motivational comments!

pink patchwork perfection

I've gone back to an old project.  This one has been in the works for at least 6-8 months, I can't quite remember.  I wouldn't normally describe myself as a "pink" person, but it seems that this quilt and the first one I completed for myself would say different.

I love this quilt for a number of reasons.  It's comprised of fabrics purchased mainly at The Workroom which if you ever have the chance you should definitely visit.  My husband and I drove to Ontario for 3 weeks during the Christmas season of 2008, and while we were there took a little trip into Toronto.  I love Toronto and have decided that I could live there (because I am a lover of metropolis') but Joel has lived there before and isn't so thrilled with it even though like me he loves urban centers.  Other than the giant soaker in my UGG boots and the trudging through 13 blocks of melting snow, it was a perfect day.  We went to the Hockey Hall of Fame (because how can you possibly resist it!) and then took a trip to the Workroom where I had a large budget to stock up on fabric with.

Even better than ordering online is the experience of actually handling the fabric before you buy it and I rarely do that because of prices here in Calgary.

So, not only was the experience of buying the fabric great, but the quilt is full of really great fabrics from now out of print collections: (Katie Jump Rope, Mendocino, Cake Rock Beach, Country Fair, etc.) are you jealous yet?

So there is a reason that I think of it as perfectly pink.

Originally, I was apparently trying to make more work for myself by ironing all my seams open.  But after an extremely helpful meeting with the Calgary Modern Quilt Guild I was advised to start ironing the seams to the right and left alternating by row.  (Which, yes, I have seen a dozen times before and for some reason never did it).  Since changing to ironing my seams to the side the whole quilt has been moving along much quicker.  The seams are lining up more easily and I don't want to scream and throw it in a drawer anymore.



So now, this is where I am.  I have finished piecing all the squares into rows (22 in total) and have moved on to sewing the rows together.  I start in pairs and then sew the pairs together and so on and sew forth.  Har har, I am a punny woman.

I don't know if I could love it any more!  I figure I'll knock off the rest of the top tomorrow and then I will move onto worrying about the rest of the quilt which includes finding a great backing fabric and ordering more batting.

Right now I am contemplating Connecting Threads for thread and batting because the prices seem great and the shipping is dirt cheap.  Has anybody used this?  Do you have another recommendation for cheap (100% cotton, 120" wide) batting?  One thing I don't love about Connecting Threads is the arbitrary 7% charge added to all Canadian orders to cover who knows what.  I live in a Province without sales tax (how did I ever live anywhere else and thank goodness we don't have the dreaded HST here!) so it irks me a bit when an extra whatever percent is added to my order.  I don't know, can I do better?  Suggestions and links greatly appreciated!!

favourites: yellow

1. Seven Stars, 2. Zig zag quilt finished front  92/365, 3. quilt top, 4. yellow blanket, 5. Yellow Inspiration, 6. summer blocks, 7. Sunshine Squares, 8. shut it i love it, 9. Untitled

peony obsession

I've been obsessing over flowers recently.  Peonies to be exact.  I love having fresh flowers around but there are a few things that usually stop that from happening:  money and allergies.  Obviously, fresh flowers are expensive so they generally don't appear unless Joel surprises me with them.  But Joel is the one with the allergies.  Bad ones.  Face exploding bad.

On my birthday, my dad sent me a gorgeous arrangement of pink everything.  Roses, lilies, gerbera dasies, carnations, it was gorgeous!



Unfortunately it was stinkin' hot in the house (we were avoiding the a/c as long as possible) and so they didn't last as long as they should of had I managed to move them downstairs to the cool basement.

Before that I had some fresh lilacs cut form the front garden (sorry no pics).  And so now I am hooked.

When we moved into this house I was pleasantly surprised to find that someone had planted an amazing garden in the back.  There are chives, blue fescue, day lillies and best of all - Peonies!  With very little help from me, and lots of help from my mom (who just finished a great week long visit) the garden is looking great.  But, the peony bush is huge and definitely needs to be staked.  Since I'm not planning on staking it, I am cutting the blossoms when they get too big and start to touch the ground.



So now I feel like Martha Stewart with pretty vases of peonies around the house.  This one lives on the dining room table.



And this one was living on the coffee table in the living room:



But then we had friends over last night and Bre loved them so they went home with her.  There are plenty more where those came from, so I'll have to find more loving homes.

Of course, one downfall to growing peonies is all the damn ants!  We already have an ant problem and I'm pretty sure the peonies are making it worse, but they are so pretty.  Since I cut the blossoms in the rain, I thought I would avoid the all the ants in them, but after arranging them I found (no kidding) almost 30 freakin' ants all over my house!  We are past that point now, but man that was a pain.

All this to say, I'm feeling a little more inspired recently.  We had almost a full month of visitors at the house and I was feeling a bit run off my feet.  Not much was happening in the creative department (aside from my mom's visit which I will get to in another post) but now it's getting better again.  I've got a little something in the works for a mini quilt swap that I'm excited about and then maybe some selfish sewing.

happy birthday to me

24 years ago today (at 3:13 MST) I was born.  Today I am celebrating with my wonderful hubby and so far it's great!

In celebration, I'll be hosting a giveaway later this week.  Look forward to that!

entertainment

A few things are keeping me entertained recently.  I've succumbed to the oh-so-dramatic Grey's Anatomy.  Yes.  THAT show.  Go ahead and laugh.  Okay stop now.

My dear husband likes to find shows for me to watch.  Since I hate watching live television (because really, when did there get to be 4 minutes of commercials for ever 10 minutes of show??) Joel and I tend to watch new (or new to us) shows on our PVR or online.  It's fantastic.  You can get through a 1 hour show in just 40-something minutes!

It took us just 3.5 weeeks to get through the entire series. Yes, I need a life.  I really can't tell you how thankful I am for all of the quality time I get with my husband, even if he is sitting through hours of Grey's with me.  It used to be that we both worked and volunteered so much, that we would get an hour before bed each night and maybe a few hours on the weekends.  It has been like a wonderful vacation to have him home so much since our job changes.

Previously, Joel and I both worked for a large multi-site church in town and for various reasons have left both our jobs and the church.  It was very hard to move on from the people we had grown to love and respect in our jobs and our church life, but it needed to happen.  While we worked there he was working up to 60+ hours a week running the buildings for rentals, and I was working a normal 40 hour week in the office, but we both added at least 5 more hours of volunteering on top of that.  It got to the point where we didn't get much time together, and when we did we were so tired, sometimes it was hard to have a conversation.  So when we couldn't muster anymore energy, we shared tv shows and movies.  It's a special thing we do, and it may seem brain melting or mundane to some, but I love it.

Needless to say, I am now addicted to Grey's and can't stop watching.

Another new show we've been watching:



I'm not even really into the whole vampire thing, but I like this show, even though it is sometimes (okay, most of the time) extremely over acted and a little cheesey.

I've also been re-watching The Office.  How can you go wrong with that genius?  And before you think that I am a couch potato who does nothing but watch tv, I mostly watch while doing other things , (laundry, sewing, eating lunch, etc) or late at night once we are in bed.

The other thing that keeps me entertained is my brother-in-law.  Joel's youngest brother Jamie has been staying with us since the end of April and needless to say it is an adventure having and 18 year old boy living with us.  He is here for the summer to work and save money so he can go back to university in September.

Here's a few of the highlights:

1.  Getting woken up at 4am because Jamie is sure there is someone trying to come through his window.  Apparently he was sleeping naked (ew, TMI?) when the blinds blew off the edge of the window sill because of some wind coming through the open window.  Panicking he first got ready to grab the guy and "pull him to beat him senseless" but then ran upstairs to grab Joel (and a knife!) and run around the side of the house.  There was no one there.  Oh, and Jamie was somehow wearing Joel's clothes, which I guess is better than nothing!

2.  His 7 word vocabulary: "geez, JO-EL, stop, shut up, ugh, NO, what"

3.  Hearing stories about his university parties where he drinks liquor from a vase and mixes white wine with sprite.  Yuck.

It's an endless parade of silly at the house recently and I love it.

teeny tiny baby gifts

A friend of ours recently had her 4th baby!  Little Nathan Victor arrived just a few weeks ago and we couldn't be happier for him or his parents and siblings.  Too celebrate the little ones arrival, a friend threw them a "Sprinkle Shower".  The idea was that since he is number 4, they already have a lot of the essentials, so guests were to bring little things to sprinkle the new mom and baby with.

I agonized over what to give.  Usually I would make a baby quilt, but I didn't because a) I am severely lacking in boy friendly fabrics and b) I doubt that a quilt can be considered a sprinkle, even if I really want it to be.

In the end, I made the little man 2 bibs and a monster.

I picked out a solid chocolate brown, some Alexander Henry Teeny Tiny Zoo in pool, and some Cake Rock Beach Eclipse in Water and whipped up two little bibs using a combination of the Nested Basic Bib template and the Quilted Patchwork Bib tutorial on Sew She Sews.  They were fun and really easy to make and so I am sure they will become a go-to gift for baby showers.  I also made a little RevoluzZa monster with her tutorial and pattern.  I only made a slight alteration to the mouth since I didn't want to make the embroidered one from the instructions.

All three resources provided really easy to follow instructions, so the only error I made was to sew the monster together with a wrong and a right side facing together instead of the right sides together.  Due entirely to make lack of attention.

We dropped the gifts off on our way downtown since I was unable to actually attend the Sprinkle Shower.  I got to meet tiny perfect Nathan and spend a little time with his mom and siblings.  It was great fun, and so nice to hold such a new baby.  I am glad that Nathan's mom enjoyed the gifts and am anxiously awaiting the pictures of him with the bibs and monster.

the random object: wedding rings

My wedding rings. Before I tell you about them, let me tell you how this picture came about. One of the two families I work for has an adorable set of twins. Occasionally I will go over in the evening, put them to bed and then have several hours to myself before their parents get home. Most often I will read or watch tv or hand sew, but recently I have started taking my computer. I spend time blogging (like now)or getting sucked into Flickr and Facebook, or I bring tv episodes or movies to watch.

A couple of days ago, I brought my camera with the intention of taking some pics of my wedding rings for this post. I was out in the backyard in the last of the late afternoon sun, my rings on the railing, practicing my macro skills. After about 10 photos, I took a step back to look at the composition and fell down the deck stairs! Ouch! Although it was only 3 steps, it was really quite a spectacular fall! I didn't injure anything but was definitely sore after that! As my old joke goes "Grace is my middle name!"

Okay, back to the random object. I decided to start with this because I forgot to take some pics of the things that inspired this meme. (And of course they may be my most important random object.)

For some reason, for a long time, I had an irrational fear that I would never get married or have kids or be loved. Probably because as a teenager I dated a guy for a few years and in my naive teenagery ways thought that we would be high school sweethearts and blah blah, and obviously, most of the time that is not the way it happens.

I'll save the story of how we met and married for another day, (perhaps our 3rd wedding anniversary coming up in September?) Today instead I will tell you about how he picked the rings and proposed.

Joel knows that I am a picky person when it comes to well, everything. When we started talking about getting married, he asked me if I wanted to go ring shopping with him or have him pick the ring himself. Something girly and old fashioned inside me said I should send him on his own (or perhaps with the help of a friend, but I had never so much as been in a ring store before so I was curious and really wanted to go with him.

The actual shopping part wasn't really anything special which is probably why I enjoyed it so much. We stopped on a whim on the way to doing something else and wandered quickly through the store. We went to Spence Diamonds mostly because we had heard all sorts of ads for their better prices and open showcases. (Who said radio advertising wasn't effective?) I was so sure was looking for something simple and classic that I didn't even go over near the modern stuff. I knew I wanted a solitaire and most likely in a classic tiffany style setting.

As soon as I tried one on, I knew it wasn't right. So we kept looking. We looked at 3 stone rings, engagement bands, super sculptural stuff, nothing was right. And then Joel saw it. THE ring, and he made me try it on even though I was skeptical. I fell in love with it as soon as it was on my finger. (Even though the floor model was about 5 sizes too big.) I loved the squareness of the band, the little frame of metal around the diamond and I love that it had an equally modern wedding band that fit right under the engagement setting. Perfection.

So we got someone to right it down and we left, we didn't even buy it right there. That came a little bit later when we went back and picked out a diamond together.

(photo by Brooks Ryenolds)

Joel proposed to me on a bridge overlooking the lagoon in Bowness Park.  The picture above was taken a year after our wedding, at my friend Amanda's wedding (I'm right of centre.)  We had gone to Bowness park on our first date, and Joel brought me back there to ask me to marry him.  We had had a delicious dinner at Mongoli Grill, and were going back to his house to watch a movie when he made an excuse to stop at the park.  Just like shopping for rings, and like most of the other important events in our relationship, it wasn't anything huge and special, it was just us, being ourselves, and I loved it.  We wandered through the park on our way to the bridge, holding hands, joking and smiling.  When we got to the bridge it was peaceful, not another soul in sight.  And then he started saying mushy things (which of course I can't remember now.)  He got down on one knee and asked me to be his wife and I jumped up and down and cried "Of course!"

The first thing I did was take of my other ring (another random object for another day) and let him put my shiny new diamond ring on my finger.

I found out after that, that many people knew that we were getting engaged that night, including a friend who lived just a few blocks away and had agreed to take photos after he proposed.  So off we went.

I could barely hold my hand still long enough to take this photo.  We called my our parents and friends and generally just floated around.

And now this photo hangs in our room more than 3 years later.  The rings are well worn and loved and are certainly not as blindingly bright as they used to be, but I like it that way.  They almost never come off, and I still haven't tired of staring at them as they sparkle in the sun.

For those who are interested, these are the specs:  Engagement ring is platinum, size 3.25, .75 ct Princess cut IF, F colour conflict free diamond in a bezel setting.  Wedding band is platinum, size 3.25 with 8 princess cut diamonds in a channel setting.

meme me

I've decided to start participating in a couple of memes for two reasons.

1. I need a couple of things to encourage me to continue writing on a regular basis. I go through periods where it's difficult for me to pluck creativity out of the air and I feel like picking a few memes can help me to find some inspiration.

2. I like to write because it helps me to remember and appreciate. Looking through photos and writing about experiences keeps things fresh in my mind and often makes me laugh.

So, starting this week I will be introducing two memes to superlative sewing. Sunday Stash and The Random Object. Sunday Stash is probably well known to most quilting blog readers, but The Random Object is one I've made up for myself. I was cleaning the kitchen a couple of days ago and came across a couple of random objects that are special to me and come with interesting stories.

I'm hoping you enjoy them and would appreciate any feedback you'd be willing to give as well as ideas for random objects or even other memes you might enjoy.

For now, another picture from a trip to Banff. Love the hat!

adventuring

Today we went here:


(The Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel)

and here:


(The Fairmont Hot Springs Upper Pool - borrowed from wakarimasen82's photostream)

We soaked and relaxed and then wandered downtown.


(On Banff Avenue)

We posed and then we went to eat.


(Wild Bill's Legendary Saloon)

And Joel made faces.

All in all it was a pretty great morning. I'm glad I have a husband to wander with, and some out of province visitors to force us to visit such great destinations.

the criss cross quilt

A few weeks ago I posted about a new project. Well, it's done!

Introducing the Criss Cross Quilt.



From the get-go, this project has been a challenge. Generally speaking, to start a project I need a big dose of inspiration. Sometimes that comes from cruising Flickr, sometimes from a stack of fabrics, or an outfit a friend is wearing, sometimes from a book. Since I knew I wanted this to be a more traditional quilt, I had originally chosen a sawtooth star block. The inspiration came from the book  Quilting for Peace: Make the World a Better Place One Stitch at a Time. I think I have mentioned this book before, but I'll say it again - I love it! There is a quilt in the book that is monochromatic sawtooth stars and it is so beautiful.  My idea was to go out and get a bunch of different fabrics in red, gold and off white type colours and to piece many, many sawtooth stars out of them to create an eclectic but somewhat traditional quilt top.  I didn't think I had time to order online, and I didn't have the money to pay what my LQS was charging and so I went to the dreaded Fabricland in search of fabric.  Thus the end of all my inspiration.  After a frustrating hour wandering around the store and finding literally NO red fabric, I gave up.  All while uttering quiet profanities.  Oops.

I decided to focus on solids.  I had seen a beautiful quilt on Flickr by cauchy09 and used that as my inspiration for this quilt.  She mentioned that the pattern came from a book called Quilting Pieces of the Past (Better Homes & Gardens) but not being able to find it at the library, and not wanting to purchase the whole book, I decided to just figure out the pattern myself.  I stuck to the red and white of the original quilt because it's beautiful and it was a set of colours I knew Grandma B would like.  I found an AMAZING deal of some Kona cotton at Blueberry Buckle Quilt Shop and ordered up 7 yards of it in Chinese Red and Snow.

I had mentioned in the previous post about using Oh Fransson's postage stamp piecing method and how well it had worked.  It did actually work very well, except that I forgot to account for seam allowances on my first block and it went to waste.  Then of the subsequent 9 blocks I was a little sloppy in some places and ended up running into issues with squaring the blocks.

In the end, it got done.  I did come to like it more than I thought I would, especially after quilting it was my standard stippling.  I spent several hours at work binding and a few more at home in bed binding and it got finished last night.  I have to say, if I'm proud of anything on this quilt it's the corners.  For the first time, all of my binding corners are perfect.  And I mean, PERFECT.  They are perfectly shaped and even on all four corners and that is a big accomplishment for me.



The back is solid red with a whole lot of bright white stitching showing.  I think it's a neat effect.



The label of course.  I don't really use cowtown baby as a label anymore, usually just an s for superlative, but I thought I'd throw on this one because that is the label that Grandma B and my mother-in-law know.



And the ubiquitous folded with binding out picture.  I love it.

This morning it got sent off in the mail all wrapped up pretty.  I paid a whopping $36.00 CAD to ship it which if you ask me is a bit unreasonable for shipping withing Canada, but I wanted to make sure it got there on time and that it was insured in case it goes missing.  (Which by the way is highly likely, stupid Canada Post).

I've got a couple of things in the works for more posts soon, and a giveaway coming up at the end of the week in honor of my birthday, so stay tuned!

been away for a while now...

But I hope to be back soon.  I'm working an abnormal amount of hours this week, plus scrambling to finish a couple of projects with deadlines looming too close.  Lots of pictures and stories to come I promise!  Thanks for your patience!

For now, some kitty love:

favourites

1. Untitled, 2. 115.365 Sampler Stitchery, 3. Fruity geometric embroidery, 4. "StarStruck", 5. doll quilt - log cabin/courthouse steps variation - top, 6. echino bag 1, 7. Quiltlet #7, 8. felt fishy mobile, 9. Squares quilt

sexy hexies

I realize I never posted a follow up to my busy work post about my new love of hexagons!

As it turns out (and not at all to my surprise) hexagons are super fun!  They are small enough that they travel well in a purse or little bag, and with a little prep, you can sew them just about anywhere!

I took my little pack of hexagons to the Toyota dealership so I would have something productive to do while I waited for my car to be serviced.  (They offered a shuttle but I declined since there was nothing close enough for me to do while I waited.  When we bought the car, for some reason we purchased from the dealership on the other side of town instead of the one down the road and now we have to drive all the way by the airport to get service!  oops!)

Anyways, I had spent the night before cutting all my templates and little bits of fabric and pinning them to the templates so that I could just bring a pile that were ready to sew.



After talking to a service rep, I got myself all settled into a comfy chair in the lounge and started sewing.  I must have looked like I was setting up camp.  I had a water bottle, snacks, all my sewing supplies and a book.  Apparently I was prepared for the long haul.

Even though the dealership is across town (a very LARGE "town" indeed) I really don't mind going there because of this:



That's right.  Possibly the most beautiful carpet I have ever seen in my life.  It is the most beautiful colours and detailed scenes and it's endless inspiration.  Who knew you could find something so beautiful in a car dealership?

Back to the hexies.  After that first day I have about 18 done.  According to my calculations, 18 hexies over approximately 2.5 hours including a bathroom break and a coffee break works out to about one every 7.2 minutes.  Not too shabby for my first go round.



I'm not sure what I will be making out of them, but I love them.

a new project

I started a new project today.  Correction:  I started a new project several days ago, but undid it and started again today.

I love to sew and quilt and whatnot but I am not the worlds greatest piecer of small things and so when I decided on this particular pattern I must have been having a mental moment.  Lots of small squares to piece in rows that need to be perfect.



This project is a commission, and came about when my mother-in-law asked me to create a quilt for her mother for her birthday this month.  Joel's grandmother is a lifelong quilter with a great deal of talent, so this is VERY intimidating!

I decided to do a more traditional pattern to reflect the kind of work that she does in her guild, but that I would quilt it in a more modern fashion so that it has a bit of my personality in it as well.  I love the look of a sawtooth star and thought about doing a quilt much like the one from Quilting for Peace by Katherine Bell.  In the end I decided on something similar to this.  Apparently it is from a book of historic quilts.  I could never find the book so I made up the pattern myself.

(As I am typing this I realize that I really should have been taking pictures of my process.  I apologize!)

For those of you that read Oh, Fransson! you are probably aware that she (Elizabeth) has been creating mini quilts for the winners of her Giveaway Day contest and one of them was a mini map of the Tokyo Subway system.  This woman is a formidable quilter and she has created a tutorial over at Sew Mama Sew for what she calls her Stamp Collection quilt.  It's a fantastic tutorial and such a great way to piece small squares and get perfect seams.  Thank you Elizabeth!

Last night I went out to The Fabric Store That Shall Not Be Named and picked up 4m of light weight fusible interfacing to help me piece my blocks.  Amazingly, they had what I needed and how much I needed and at a way lower price than I thought it would be!   Only $2.50/m!

I rushed home and didn't look at it until morning.  This morning however, I ripped out all of my previously imperfect stitches and got to work!  And this is what I got:



Ta Da!  I am SO happy with this block.  (Sorry about the crappy picture, no sun today.)  It is so satisfying to spend all that time cutting and organizing and ironing and sewing and whatever, and to have it turn out exactly as I wanted.

Only 8 more to go!

a long break after the long weekend

Oops!  It's been a bit of a long break since my last post.  Oh well, I'm here now right?

Remember that long list?  Done.  That's right, I did it all.  (Okay, fine, I only washed one guest bed, but it's not like anyone is staying in the unwashed one.)  Gardening?  Check.  Clean house?  Check.  Work on wedding quilt?  Check.  More hexagons?  Check.  Actually, I guess I didn't write a post about the wedding quilt either.  So here it is.  Let's start with the weekend.



There was gardening.  Lots of it.  3 hours worth.  Just on one small kidney shaped garden bed in the front.  But in the end, it was worth it.  Last year I left the wedding until the end of June and we looked like trailer trash.  I learned my lesson.  This year I put my brother in law (who is living with us for the summer) to work on the lawn to get the dandelions taken care of.  It all looks much better.



See?  So pretty.  I still have much to live up to though.  Our nice neighbours next door have an immaculate lawn and a perfect garden and my goal is to get ours up to par so as to no longer embarrass them.  Unfortunately for us, we are dealing with roughly 5 years of neglect at the hands of the previous tenants so it might take a bit.

Not even a week after all my hard work, this happened:



It snowed for almost 3 days.  Not that all of it stuck, but still!  We are talking about the last weekend in May and the temperature dropped to 0 (celsius) and there was SNOW!  I really shouldn't be surprised.  I've lived here 6 years and every year I tell myself not to get excited about nice weather in the spring because it WILL snow again, and every year I think "Nah, it won't happen" and it does.  It's really not all bad though, because apparently it's going to be a really dry summer so we needed some big time moisture to start off the season and we got it.

There was some hexagon sewing, (pictures later) and some pot holder sewing (pictures later) and some quilt top sewing.  After weeks and weeks of painstaking work on this dang quilt, the top is finally done!  This was the original sketch:



And the original notes on fabric needs and measurements:



And this is how the top turned out:



I hope you noticed the little upside down scribble of finished measurements on the back of the sketch.  That's right, it reads 64x80.  Guess how big it is.  75x99!  How did this happen???  I think I forgot to account for the width of the stripes.  Oh well.  It's huge which will hopefully make it even better for snuggling under during movies.  Unfortunately, it's not quite big enough for a bed.

I am making this quilt for my friends Troy and Amanda.  Troy was our roommate for almost 2 years, and we love him dearly.  When we met his girlfriend (now wife) for the first time we just knew she was the one for him.  Together they make a wonderful couple and we couldn't have been happier when we saw them exchange vows just 1 month ago.

Obviously, that means this quilt is late, but there is not rushing me because when I do rush I screw things up.  A LOT.  I must have ripped out 30-40 lengths of stitches trying to put this thing together!  I didn't think it would be that hard when I decided on an argyle pattern, but I was wrong.  There are a lot of seams to match and looooooong straight lines to make, and SO much ironing.

I really, truly hope that the new Mr. & Mrs. Dunham love their quilt when they eventually get it and that it gets a place of honor in their home.  They definitely have a place of honor in my heart.  (Okay, I know that sounds cheesy but it's very true.