Taking a break from sewing...

I decided to mix it up this year. My loved ones have enough quilts, and I hate being so predictable.

I'm knitting instead. Cowls and scarves for everyone!

Two more to go! My wrists may never forgive me.

Progress...

Strip sets are pieced and pressed, Step Two is complete! Still a lot of cutting to do, but that can wait a little.

Taking a break from sewing to go out and cheer on the 2016 Marathon runners down the street.  It's a beautiful morning in Chicago!

A sneak peek...

I feel as though I've been cutting pieces for this quilt for weeks.

Another design I got into my head and couldn't get out, this one's for me and my bed. Archie, in his over-exuberance, has pretty much trashed my existing quilt, and it's time for a new one.

A better shot with better lighting, and a photobomb by Archie

Forty-two different yellows and blues, no repeats. And all ready for piecing this weekend.

Too many choices...

I think for now this top is done. I played with it for a couple weeks, added some blocks, took some out, added them back and then some.

I finally feel like I can't add anything else, so I'm content with leaving it this size (55" x 48" -- a decent lap size). My problem is having too many choices for the backing, which has put me in total indecision mode.

I found a beautiful turquoise/teal/tan leafy batik last week that was perfect...then in doing some digging for something else found another turquoise batik I'd have to piece with leftovers from the front...and also found a piece of Minkee the exact size I needed for this top.

If I use the leafy batik or the pieced back, I can quilt this as densely as I want, which was the original plan -- close, wavy quilting to echo the inset strips. Using the Minkee, I wouldn't be able to do that -- and I've kind of been saving that piece for a winter throw for the sofa, and I'm not sure I am in love with this enough to keep it in my living room.

I have to let it percolate for a while.  But look on the bright side:  it's a finished top, and no longer in pieces in my UFO pile. Which for me, is a big deal. I'll get it quilted...someday.

So much for pressing...

The top was draped over the ironing board next to me while I was sewing, and I watched him pull it down so he could curl up on it.

Apparently there aren't any other fabric-covered surfaces in my condo worth napping on today.

Where the heck did August go?

It's hard to believe that today is the last day of August!

I started the month out on a roll -- I quilted up a table runner and was on schedule to get it done in time to ship it off to my sister for her birthday, had a hand sewing project to work on during the Olympics...and then all hell broke loose.

Couch potato no more! There's always EPP!  Go USA!

Not possessing Wanda's foresight, I didn't heed the message that my workhorse computer was failing. Granted, I only had one day's notice, and the warning itself shouldn't have precipitated such a meltdown, but when it crashed, it crashed completely, and I lost several weeks worth of work. Stupid, I know. I'm usually conscientious about backing up my data, but I'd gotten busy and had put it off, and I'm still kicking myself two weeks later for being such an idiot.  I lost a lot of sleep mentally tallying what I could pull off email and what was irreplaceable, and eventually just accepted the fact that there were some things I would have to recreate. To add to the stress, this happened two days before a major project came my way. Between trips to the computer store to salvage my hard drives (nope) and meeting deadlines using an infinitely slower laptop, I was spending 14+ hours a day doing work and my sewing machine was gathering dust.

Early Saturday morning I delivered the first round of documents to my client, marched into the kitchen while the emails were still sending, opened the WIP bin and pulled out the first thing I laid hands on.  I needed to sew.

Looking back through my blog posts to find out when I started this, I'm ashamed (but not surprised) that these 48 5.5" batik blocks were from the spring of 2011. 2011! In 2011, my nephew was nine and came up to my shoulder. He started high school last week and is over six feet tall.

I was, at the time, trying a new technique, and apparently got tired of it because there were another ~50 blocks in the Ziploc that had been paired with inset strips but not sewn. Because of my impulsive sewing outburst Saturday morning, however, I created an conundrum for myself:  I'm pretty sure I don't want to do more of this wavy inset technique, so this has to be a medallion of sorts among the remaining solid blocks, maybe? I've laid out a couple different options, but nothing is floating my boat as of yet.

I'm afraid to go too long without making a decision with this one or it'll end up in the Duffle Bag of Doom and the leftovers to the WIP bin, so any suggestions are welcome.

And let me serve as a cautionary tale to BACK UP YOUR DATA!!!

Quilt as you go-go is done-done...

Remember this project?  Another one left sitting in a pile in my kitchen/studio, and the next on the list as I work my way down through it. I still have a few to go, some more intimidating than others, so, coward that I am, I'm getting the easy ones out of the way first.

The girls -- and I, for that matter -- ran out of steam, and vacations and school and soccer and sleepovers got in the way of them coming back for more sewing lessons this spring, so I was on my own to finish this quilt up.

I thought the sashing would calm it down, but it really didn't. It's blindingly bright -- pretty sure it will cheer up some small sick child in a hospital somewhere.

The back is much more subdued, and less likely to induce seizures. I actually like this side better than the front.

Now that it's done, I feel a little "meh" about the Quilt As You Go process. It was a great project for the girls, but it seemed less...I don't know -- satisfying? to finish the individual blocks and then sash them together. I'm glad I did it, but not sure I'll do another one.

But then again, never say never...right?

Gettin' stuff done...

I finished the flannel quilt and found yet another half-baked quilt in a pile that just needed additional quilting and a binding. My oh my, it feels good to get some of these things done! I'm on a roll!

This one was an experimental design, not for anybody in particular (started over a year ago??? Doesn't seem like it, but I posted this), so it got tossed aside when other deadlines loomed. I do that a LOT, don't I?

Ten Kona solids + Snow, 43" x 36"

It's a happy quilt, and it's fun to hang out on one side of the color wheel every once in a while. I might have to try it in other colorways at some point -- like when I run out of other projects. Hah!

Archie's quilt...

I started this quilt last Fall with leftover scraps from this quilt. It was one of those things where the pieces were hanging around in a pile and I thought it would be nice to use them up, along with my "up north" flannels.

Archie's Quilt, 60"x52", flannel top and backing, marbled cotton binding

I've made so many quilts with these two flannels I've lost count. But that's what I get for buying by the bolt off eBay about ten years ago -- I'm an impulsive bidder and I couldn't resist. There's a lot still left over, so if you like pine cones and pine trees and really soft, snuggly flannel, let me know and we can work something out.

Anyway, midway through making this, of course something brighter and more fun came along to work on and it got cast aside. Mostly to the corner of the sofa, and at some point during the chilly winter it became my go-to throw for watching TV -- half quilted and unbound didn't really matter, it was just as snuggly if I avoided some of the safety pins along the edges and tucked them in so Archie wouldn't play with them.

Then last Saturday morning dawned, and a strange sense of I-need-to-finish-something came over me. I'd just washed up the rose and green quilt, and the momentum was too powerful to resist. Next thing I knew, the quilting was finished and I was putting the binding on and it was DONE.

This one's for us. Or him, since he seems to have laid claim to it.

I guess I made my cat a quilt.  Is that weird or what?

Rose and pale green, she said...

"My client is having a baby girl and I need a quilt."

Any opportunity to rid my condo of fabric and batting is a welcome one -- even moreso when a friend is willing to pay for it.

"Her color scheme is rose and pale green."

Pale green I can do. But rose? Not a color in my repertoire. Conjures up images of dusty, darkened Victorian rooms with faded wallpaper and lots of lace. Not me. At. All.

I knew before I started combing through my stash that I didn't have anything resembling rose -- I'd have to buy fabric. Fortunately, the International Quilt Show fell about a week after my friend's request. I set off with high hopes, but apparently rose isn't very popular right now. And I'm usually really good with color, but had a difficult time defining exactly what true "rose" was -- some candidates were too pink, others too peachy.

If you were at IQS and a stranger asked you "Would you say this is rose?" well, that would have been me. I asked a lot of people. A LOT.

In the end, I found a rose(-ish) and green Kaffe Fassett dahlia print, a half yard of Aunt Grace solid that a few helpful showgoers thought came close, and another darker solid that was a match to the Kona Deep Rose on my color card.

When faced with specific color choices, I typically choose to aim around them so I don't miss the mark all together. I was hopeful I'd be close, but not very enthusiastic.

"Oh, and nothing too 'out there'," was another part of the request. Which I took to mean I should stay pretty traditional. Initially the dahlia print was going to play a bigger part in all of this, but it really didn't read "baby," so I used it sparingly.

I dragged my feet on this because I wasn't feeling it, but once I found the flannel backing two months later and pieced it, things perked up a bit. The quilting and a little piece of green there in the binding gave it a little more personality.

And, of course, before it gets washed, the QC inspector needs to test for nappability. It passed.

SO happy to get this one packaged up and out of the house. Finally!

Home again, home again...

Well hey, I'm back. My plans for Spring got upended when a weeklong visit with my parents turned into much, much longer. They're getting so old, and fragile, and moving them out of their house at this point would cause more confusion than good...so we kids motor on, providing a level of support that's acceptable to them, and hoping and praying for their health and safety.

I spent a great deal of time in the garden, laying down mulch and rescuing Dad's roses from Canada thistle, my new nemesis.  It wasn't until after I'd spent an entire day yanking 597 of them out of one bed (yes, I counted) that I read that doing so could potentially split the root (which can burrow 15 to 20 FEET), resulting in two new shoots, and twice the headache. Sure enough, within just a few days those suckers started poking back up through my fresh mulch, and I spend the next weeks cutting them off and applying Roundup in an effort to stem the tide.

On the upside, a few days of unseasonable warmth nudged the roses into action. They get about a month of unbridled bloom before the Japanese beetles descend, so I was happy to get some good pictures.

That last one is an old fashioned, on a bush that once belonged to my great-grandmother. It's close to a hundred years old and still going strong. My grandmother gave it to my dad when my parents bought their  house in 1952. That gift turned into a lifelong obsession, a seat on the district Board of the American Rose Society, and ~300 rose bushes (currently -- at some point we had more than 600). One look at his yard and you can tell where my fabric hoarding gene comes from.

And hooray for hand sewing projects! I thankfully took my hexie project with me to work on. It finished at 35.5" x 7.25" -- odd dimensions, I know, but it's made to hang in a particular spot and should fit perfectly. It's a little wonky along the edges (I didn't cut the hexie halves as carefully as I should have), but that will get covered up with binding anyway. I also could have been more precise when I cut my fabric pieces now that I see them showing through so clearly. There were some other challenges, and I have yet to speculate about quilting it -- for now, I'm just happy that it's done.

Not bad for a first effort, and I don't think it's my last. Hexies are fun!

A little Spring inspiration...

I was cleaning the hexie scraps off my coffee table this morning when this caught my eye:

Spring has been very slow to settle in around Chicago this year. We've been on a two-month roller coaster of high and low temps, accompanied by rain and gloom. These colors just popped against the Kona Snow, and of course got my imagination going on the color palette for yet another new quilt. They're pretty striking together, aren't they? And oh so happy on a damp, dark day.

And in pulling the above pic off my camera, I also found this one. I caught these tulips in bloom on a rare sunny(ish) day venturing out to my cousin's in the suburbs last week, where at this time of year it's 15-20 degrees warmer than it is near the lake. Those same vivid pinks and bright greens just pop.

I think it's a sign.

Uh-oh...

I wasn't feeling real great last weekend and the weather was pretty dismal. Spending a couple days on the sofa binge-watching the last season of "Downton Abbey" was pretty much all I was up for...except I hate just lying there, being totally unproductive.

Out of curiosity I'd bought some 3/4" hexie papers at the International Quilt Show a couple weeks ago (another post, and unfortunately my photos didn't turn out very well, so not much to show). I'd never done English Paper Piecing before and figured I'd try someday, and cutting and basting little scraps fit in very well with the weekend's planned event, which was, well, being a couch potato.

"Someday" doesn't usually come this quickly:  my first fabric purchase was in the closet for six years before I decided to attempt my first quilt!

So I pulled out my cache of solid scraps and went to town. I might rearrange some, add a few more flowers and I still have to finish all the border pieces, but I think it's pretty cute so far. It's destined for a friend with the perfect empty spot on her kitchen wall. She keeps bees (that lone yellow hexie is somehow going to become one, haven't thought that far ahead yet), so the hexagons are fitting.

It's laid out across my coffee table as it gradually gets pieced together. And covered with magazines every night so Archie isn't tempted to weigh in on an alternative arrangement.

Who knew hexies could be so addicting?

One more...

Here's a full pic of another Lenten Quilts for Kids project. Technically, I guess it's not really a quilt-as-you-go -- it's really more foundation piecing, given the back is one piece of fabric. Whatever you call it, it turned out OK.

I learned a few things (see this post), and will probably attempt it again if I need a quick no-frills project.

It ended up being 40" x 46", and very, very pink.

Faux feathers...

Man, I had a lot of drag issues with this quilt!

I'm not sure if it was due to sheer incompetence on my part, or the fact that the home dec weight on the back was slipperier than usual. When I trimmed it all up, it looked like I had quilted feathers into it.

You can tell exactly what direction(s) I quilted in. I had pinned parallel to my quilting lines; in retrospect, pinning perpendicularly -- and additional pins --  would have held the heavier weight backing more securely in place.

The backing before washing

The backing is a Crate &  Barrel Outlet Marimekko find from several years ago -- I think it was somewhere around $3 a yard, and was waiting for just the right quilt. I love how it picks up the colors from the front and lightens it up. 

I was pretty worried about how it was going to turn out with all that wacky puckering. Nothing was pre-washed, so washing in hot, hot water encouraged shrinkage, and in the end it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The puckering morphed into crinkles, and all is well.

It still needs a Quilts for Kids label, but is otherwise ready to be shipped. Hooray!

Quilt as you go-go...

Given the success of the last mini-QAYG project, I thought the girls would enjoy contributing to a larger quilt. Attention spans are waning now that their doll quilts (the original goal of our lessons) are finished; these 10" x 13" blocks finish quickly, and we're all looking for a little instant gratification at this point.

All ready for a QAYG!

I cut a bunch of backing squares and batting, established a layout for the back (the middle stripe on the front coordinates with the backing fabric so I can keep the layout straight without having to flip the blocks over to determine who's who), and emptied the box of trimming strips. Everything was spread out on the floor when they walked in the door.

The girls finished six of the colored blocks, which made a good dent. I kept going with the colored blocks after they left and got them all quilted.

I've discovered that I don't trim my strips nearly wide enough -- this would go a lot faster if I'd give up more than two inches of fabric when evening up cuts. Cutting some wider strips is in order to make the black blocks finish more quickly. The girls aren't big fans of "Skinny Minnies."

As much as I'd like to wrap this marathon up, they won't be back for at least three weeks with Easter and Spring Break coming up. Their mother really wants them to get a good sense of their contribution and understand that they're using what they've learned in order to give back. For that, I'm happy to extend the finish line a little longer.

My cat is a camera hog...

He knows where I keep my camera, and the thunk! the drawer makes when I take it out. The quilt is still drifting to the floor when he appears out of nowhere and pounces on it, ready for his photo op.

My original intent was to audition thread before I started pinning, but that notion got rejected rather quickly.

First the thread had to be inspected...

Then the quilt sandwich tested for nappability.

That workstep takes quite a while. Quality Control means everything to this guy.

And you wonder why I never get anything done?

The Curse of the ADD Crafter...

The girls didn't have acting class this week so didn't come by for their sewing lesson, which puts our quilt-as-you-go projects on hold until next weekend. That's fine by me, because I got it in my head around Wednesday or Thursday that I should see if I could do a QAYG project on a larger scale. You know, because I didn't have anything else to work on.

I cut a bunch of strips of varying widths from my "Good & Plenty" stash, and used that pink and black spray dot yardage for backing. Kind of wish I'd thought it through a little better, but if I don't charge full speed ahead with an idea once it's popped into my head, there's a very good chance it won't reach the finish line. It's The Curse of the ADD Crafter.

Turns out this was a perfect spell to counteract the Curse! It took a day to tack the strips down, and another day to quilt and bind. Wham bam, and it was done! And I learned a couple things along the way, which made the entire venture worth it:

1. Extra pinning perpendicular to the stitching helps avoid creep. I started out pinning parallel to the seam, and things on both the front and the back got shifty very quickly.
2. Press after every strip so the previous strip doesn't buckle. The wiggly quilting afterward helped camouflage this, but it's nice to have things flat to begin with.
3. I wish I'd marked horizontal reference lines on the batting before I started, because things got a little crooked toward the bottom.

Edited to add:  I would have started this whole thing in the middle instead of at the top. It would have been much more manageable if I'd gone in either direction, and I probably wouldn't have had as many problems with shifting.

It ended up ~40" x 48". As a first try and a really quick project, I give a thumbs up.

This one goes in the Quilts for Kids pile, and I get to put a check mark in the Finish column. Awesome!

More fun than piano lessons...

Big Sis' quilt is done! I bound the two long sides and saved the short ones for her, which she completed with flying colors.

Neither girl had the patience to move onto garment sewing, so as a surprise, I made each girl pajama pants for her American Girl to match the backing and binding on their quilt. Both girls and dolls seem quite happy.

I started Little Sis on a quilt-as-you-go string doll quilt, which she took to pretty quickly. The fast results and unbridled play in my box of WOF scraps kept her attention for the entire session. She'll add her own quilting on top of it this Saturday.

Big Sister gave me the ultimate complement as she was leaving:  "This is WAY more fun than my piano lessons! And there's no recital!"

Best-laid plans...

Big Sis finished quilting her doll quilt this weekend and we squared it up. I showed her what we needed to do for binding, and brave girl that she is, she told me I could start it this week, but leave her two sides to finish herself. Little Sis, however, lost momentum completely, too excited about a play date immediately following to have the patience to make doll clothes, which is what I had planned. She chose instead to start laying out the charity quilt on the design wall.

That lasted about five minutes, and got cast aside for pretzels and a session of Little Pet Shop on her iPad, which was fine because it gave her mom and me time to caffeinate and catch up. When they left, I put off all the things I was supposed to get done around the house that afternoon, finished laying the marble triangles out and started sewing them up. I can always cut more squares next week for the girls to design with if they want; I know better than to ignore the mojo if it knocks on my door.

I figure not all these sick kids are five- and six-year olds; older ones might want a quilt that's a little more sophisticated. This one's at the other end of the spectrum from the manic Wonder Quilt I finished last week. The triangles finished at 6", so it went very quickly.

I found backs for both tops, so it's on to basting and quilting this week. And trying to figure out what I can do with Little Sis next weekend that will rival Little Pet Shop.

My Wonder Quilt...

I finished this top yesterday. It's definitely going to be a happy quilt, and hopefully will help raise the spirits of a sick child stuck in a hospital bed somewhere.

The bubbles remind me of Wonder Bread, and also do wonders to calm these busy blocks down. Without the sashing, they were downright dizzying together; now they might just elicit a minor swoon or two. Maybe that's not a good thing, given where it's headed?

It'll take a couple nights of TiVo viewing to pick all the tiny pieces of foundation paper out of those points on the back, then on to getting it quilted. I'm already cutting Marbles for the next charity quilt to make with my two little proteges. We probably won't get to these tomorrow, but I need to be ready in case they blow through another lesson plan.

Gotta keep the momentum going -- Easter isn't far away!

Charity quilt time, plus a lesson update...

We're getting snow in Chicago today. While it's hard to believe at the start that those tiny flurries are going to amount to much, the flakes are getting bigger by the minute and it's quickly starting to accumulate on the grass and car windshields. The gusty winds and general gloominess makes for a good sew day as the white stuff keeps falling.

I'm still working on my Comma Spikes, but in shopping my stash for some additional fabrics to include in that project, I found these orphan blocks I made eons ago from this book not long after I started quilting.

See? My love of precise, spiky triangles goes way back.

It's a tad busy for my taste now, but seeing as it's Lent and I have some charity quilts to make, I figured this would make a good one, seeing as it's 30% done. It needs sashing and borders to calm it down, and a few more squares to be big enough for Quilts for Kids. Fortunately, there was a Ziploc of leftover fabric under the blocks, so I don't even have to cut anything. The template for the paper piecing was still on my computer, so no excuses -- other than maybe "Archie's napping on it, I'll come back when he's moved."

In Lesson Land, we're chugging right along. Little Sis finished quilting this past weekend, so this coming Saturday we're on to American Girl pajama pants. I'm going to do the binding on her quilt unless I can find a really simple tutorial.

I'm spending a lot more time on technique and the whys of sewing with Big Sis, and it shows in her work. Her blocks didn't need a ton of trimming, and her four-patch joins are spot-on. She chose to do a little more quilting than her sister, so she's a little further behind -- something sassy Little Sis chooses to remind her of whenever the topic comes up.

Big Sis is catching on really fast, and she's eager to get this done and move on to the next project. At the same time, she's old enough to have the patience and understanding to finish. It's fun to see when somebody this young gets it -- and wants to keep going. I think there's a big-girl sewing machine in her future!