SEWING ON A SUNNY DAY

After a very long winter it was nice to wake up to a sunny day.  I spent my morning at my sewing machine working on some ideas for quilts that I have been thinking about for some time.  I wanted to make a bow tie quilt with 4" blocks.  I have planned all along to make dimensional bow tie blocks, so I looked up a tutorial about how to do it. After making a few,I finally decided against it . 

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At the top of the photo are the dimensional blocks sewn together.  They are okay, but they are a hard to trim to look nice, my ruler just rocks back and forth.  they are a little to fiddly for my liking.  

Enter the easy cheater bow tie .  Really easy.  Basically a 4 patch, where a small triangle is made in the corner of the two background blocks.  I guess that if you quilted a square around the center it would look fine.  

I decided to go the traditional route. I printed out templates on EQ that would make a template that was about 1/4"  larger than I wanted my block to be.  That way, I could trim to exactly 4.5". These take a little more time. set in seams, 8 steps for each block, but it has the look that I want. Plus, I can make a block out of one charm square.  I have a bunch of those, so it will be a very lively quilt. 

I am also putting an I Spy quilt together.  I have a weakness for novelty fabrics.  Admittedly, there aren't a whole lot of things you can do with them once you buy them, but I have been cutting out hexagons for a while to make an I Spy.. Yes, I know that there are easier ways to make an ISpy, but this looks really nice.  I am putting polka dot fabrics on the end of the rows that the block is trimmed.  I didn't want to trim an image that could be 'spied'.  I envision this a future child or grandchild's 'Sick Day' quilt.  Nothing would brighten a day more than a quilt with lots of things to look at. 

Finally, this year is a decade birthday for me.  I've always wanted to make myself a letter T quilt.  I decided to make mine all polka dots.  And just so you don't think that everything I do has a black background, a neutral is being used.  Although.. I DID plan on also making this a black background. When I get started really working on this I will change the thread in my machine to match the fabric.  I was just to lazy to do it for this block.  All of this to avoid quilting this miniature for an upcoming guild show.

 

  

HARRIS TWEED MINI IPAD COVER

I used this idea GADGET COVER and a Harris Tweed jacket I found at a thrift shop and made a sleeve for my mini ipad.

 I had this handmade thistle button in my button jar which was perfect.

 I put the label on the front

This was the first one that I put together.  I like the drop in the top sleeves.  I put a protective cover on the back of my ipad and just the smart cover.  I don't like adding a lot of bulk and weight to the ipad.  Kind of defeats the purpose.  A nice padded sleeve protects my ipad in my purse, and makes it easily accessible.

END OF YEAR ORGANIZING

Had today off work and I decided to do a little end of the year organizing. I found this nifty Ziploc tote at Lowes. I was able to put almost all of flannel yardage into this one tote. 29x16x12"

I did end up with some left over I don't know why I never just dig in and use this stuff.  What a waste.

I did start to piece some of these blocks at one time, but now I lack the desire to make such a precisely pieced quilt with flannel.  I put the pieces into a bag and I will put it on the free table at guild so someone else can mess with it. 

I think that I would rather spend the time making a flannel quilt like this.  not precise, but interesting and colorful.

I was at this big fabric warehouse onetime and I found a panel of these blocks, which are fairly big, and the accompanying print.  They are both Andover fabrics, and both flannel.  I need to figure out something to do with these for myself.  I don't have much of the print though, so I have to make up something with my other flannels that may coordinate. 

I'm working on a couple of things, knitting some things, thinking of a new miniature to do.  Looking forward to the new year. 

Hope yours is good!

WISE MEN STILL SEEK HIM

THE REASON FOR THE SEASON

AUTUMN IS HERE

Makes all of the time that I spent knitting when it was hot outside worthwhile.

 I had this orange yarn that I loved and I knitted two small shawls with it.  I like the one with the blue the best.

 I am going to do a knitting KAL this fall and I will use this yarn for it. 

WOODBURNE CARDIGAN

I'm working on a test knit of a shawl called Cinnamon Toast.  The project name I am working on is called "Toast and Jam".  

Earlier this summer I knitted a sweater called BERNHARDT  which turned out a little big, but since it was knitted in washable wool, I tossed it in the dryer a bit to shrink it up.  don't worry, no disaster.. it fits just right now. 

My sewing room is a disaster, and that is the primary reason that no sewing is taking place. 

My Air Force daughter is coming home on leave before going to Japan for two years.  

So everything is going well, and I am enjoying wrapping up in soft wool.

GREAT WEEKEND

Hi Everyone!
I hope that you all had a great weekend!  I went to my first major league baseball game.  Even though the Indians have played 25 minutes from my house for most of my life, I prefer to watch on tv.  That way I don't feel like I have been ripped off on parking and everything else that goes with it.  But I must say, I had a really good time. They were playing Boston, who at least win once in a while, and since the last time the Tribe broke my heart with the 7th game of the Series, I have not let myself be too invested in them anymore.  The Cleveland teams are cursed... the get right to the point of a championship.. if they are even that lucky, and they blow it.  I like baseball best, because I like the game.. truthfully I didn't care who won. And the Indians didn't disappoint... they lost.

 

As always, I knitted in public

And I decided to finally christen a baseball quilt I made 15 years ago.. It is a small quilt, lap size, and it was perfect for what turned out to be a chilly night, and came in handy when it rained for 5 minutes, and I didn't think to grab a jacket on the way out of the house.

Another happy part of this weekend, is my daughter graduated from Basic Training and now is an Airman.  I don't know how she ended up in band flight as she never played an instrument.  But they won top PT honors, so they are tough band geeks I guess.  I'm very proud of her.  She has had a couple of disappointments in the last year that were out of her control, but instead of wallowing, she picked herself up and worked very hard to get into the Air Force.  She lost over 60 pounds and worked out every day for months.  She is a little older, has college, and will go in at a higher rank after further training.  I'm very proud of her.  She is another in a long line of our family that chose to serve her country during wartime.  That fact will just encourage me to double down on my efforts to find her a new boss.

So I hope that you all had a great weekend, and that you are enjoying the weather as summer is winding down.  I am almost finished knitting a sweater, and I am searching out enough yarn for another.  It is hard to find enough of this one color that I want, but I will keep trying. 

Happy Monday!!!
Teri

GRAPH PAPER AND FOUR PATCHES

I publish the newsletter for my guild. I try to put a tip or something in it to make things fun for the members. This month I am including my version of a tutorial for a quilt that was inspired by this video

It is called Katie's quilt. The video has some of the information, but I couldn't find any information about the layout. So I used the quilt hanging in the background as my starting point, and got out my trusty graph paper.

Yes, I have EQ.  I've had it for years, but I haven't upgraded to the newest version because I have never really learned to do much with it beyond simple stuff.  But it great for printing out patterns for miniature quilts.
When I want to design a quilt, I go to graph paper, a mechanical pencil, and color pencils.  As you can see, if you look, you can find all kinds of little and bigger graph paper books.  This is the time of year to look.  Lot's of back to school things out.  Target has interesting little notebooks of graph paper year round, I found the composition book of graph paper at Staples. Barnes and Nobles carries the Moleskine brands which are really nice, but more expensive.  I carry one with me all of the time. you never know when inspiration will strike.
Anyway, I came up with this:

sorry, blogger reverts photos back to original orientation.

It would be for a quilt size 72 X 88.
I used 5" charms for the 4 patch blocks
You would need ;
Four patch blocks - 140 - out of these you will make  thirty 16 patch, with 20 four patch left over
Sashing blocks  - 49 at 4.5 x 8.5
star point blocks 192   2.5" squares
inner border finishes at 2"
Outer border finishes at 6"

Use this video as a guide for making the scrappy four patch

This works great. I just grabbed some black Moda Marble off of my shelf. I didn't have enough to make blocks for a twin size, but there was enough to make a smaller lap size quilt. 60 x 72 I had to get enough finished to put in the newsletter

And since I am kind of making blocks as I go along instead of all at once, I have enough made for the first row

It will be scrappy goodness when it is done.  And by the way.. pay attention when piecing the 16-patch that you don't place blocks of colors similar to the star points on the outer edge of the larger block.  I didn't notice until I was done that I had done this and you lose the star points.  Look closely and you will see.  I haven't decided if I will take the time to fix this.. I think I will leave it as an example. 

I hope that you are all making it though the summer.  I am going to finish up my newsletter and head out to find some sweet corn for dinner.  Have a good weekend!!
Teri

KNITTING THE SUMMER AWAY

This is the first clue to a mystery shawl that started last Friday

Just a bunch of shawls thrown over a dress form

This is the first of my summer mystery shawls.  I think it is very pretty, although if I had known how it was going to turn out I would have added several pattern repeats to make it wider.

The truth be told, I like to knit. I don't need all of these shawls, but I like making them, and they are small enough to let me work through different techniques and yarns. I don't need a lot of yarn to complete a project and by the time I tire of it, I'm done. I am working on something more practical, a sweater. I'm up to the sleeves, so it should be finished by the time it gets chilly enough to need it. I hope that all of you are well and are enjoying the summer!

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

This is a beautiful rendition of our National Anthem and perfect to listen to on this day. My eyes tear up when I think of what my generation has allowed to happen to these children's futures. By our selfishness, we have saddled them with overwhelming debt. With our laziness and apathy, we have allowed many of their choices be taken away. All of you who refuse to live in the real world and see politicians for what they really are, those of you that never vote, that only vote on party lines, those of you that know more about the current reality show or celebrity than you know about who is voting what way in Congress,or what the President and his appointed chairmen are doing, you are the ones to blame for this.

 The sad thing is, many people that stumble across this blog post are truthfully so ignorant of what is really going on, that they will either not have a clue what I'm talking about, or refuse to see anything is actually wrong. You are also to blame.

 When historians look back at this time in our history, they will see what happened when we allowed temporary politicians to take it all away from us, because it was easier for too many people to rely on the government for help, than to accept responsibility for themselves and their own families.

Just remember, what you get for 'free' from the government comes at the expense of someone else. The government doesn't have their own money, they don't earn money by providing a service, they take it from those of us still willing to work.

And remember, all of you who think this Obamacare thing is a great thing, you are fools.  Anyone that truly looks at other socialist healthcare plans, know that people die all of the time because they have to wait, or they are denied care.  Our spoiled, instant gratification generation is eeking into that age group that will be the first to go.  And truthfully, I can't wait for the first one of my liberal friends that complains that they have to wait months for an MRI, or that they can't get that life saving cancer drug because they are a year too old, or 10 pounds too fat.  Or there won't be that life saving drug, or a great doctor available to them because what's the point if there is no money in it?

Boo hooo.. they don't like Capitalism.... it all comes down to money.. Yep. What is the point of working hard and taking risks if there is no money in it?  What are you left with?  Medicine like they have in Cuba?  Oh boy, how will Obama blame Bush for the destruction of the American healthcare system?  The one people come from all over the world to take advantage of because they don't have any choices in their own country.  Of course these are the people lucky enough to have money.. the rest of them have to wait and maybe die.

I hope that all of you Obama defenders enjoy a long healthy life.  Or like he said "take a pill".