More Block 12-ishes and a UFO

More blocks, variations on 'palooza block 12, for my planned 9-block top. This pair features back-to-back corner geese units:

I love the blue-yellow combo in these. The resulting star and large diamond really pop.

And for this last pair I placed the "geese" facing out:

The very dark accent fabric is actually a lovely small-print tonal brown.

I've had so much fun making these, and look forward to putting them all together into a top. I have ambitious visions (still somewhat vague) for sashing and bordering these. I will play with ideas as I finish up some other projects on more urgent timeframes. These blocks are about to go into a "works theoretically still in progress but temporarily on the back burner" bin while I quilt the monochrome forest, finish up the OBW borders, and maybe even get this little cutie quilted up:

This is a not-very-large "confetti" wall-hanging I made early last summer to play around with the method and my tiny scraps drawer. I liked it enough to add a border. The border and light blue background both are leftovers from making curtains for our bedroom, so I'm planning to hang it in there. I set it aside at this stage because I did not yet have the extension-table thingie that makes machine quilting so much easier. This morning I sandwiched it up with a backing fabric and got it pinned and ready to go. Best part is it's small enough I was able to do that on the kitchen counter instead of crawling around on the floor. I won't get to this immediately (the monochrome project is a higher priority), but do hope to get it quilted very soon.

Sewing Resolutions, revisited

I've just reviewed my sewing resolutions for 2010. Possibly if I'd done that on a regular basis throughout the year, rather than leaving it until 12/31, I'd have accomplished more of them. Or not. Regardless of resolutions met or abandoned, much fun was had in the sewing room during 2010:

Anyway, here's how I did:

"spend less, sew more"
I'm as stunned as you are that I can say I achieved this. Barely. $122 less on fabric purchases this year than last, although the difference in yardage accumulation is a threadbare 1.5 yards. And when fabric received as gifts is added, I'm up on last year by close to 10 yards, thanks to lovelies like these:

On the "sew more" front, I used less total yardage by a good amount but sewed more items. (2009 sewing included lots of curtains, which tilts yardage use heavily.)

Other resolutions accomplished:
"Make pants that fit"
"Sew some knits"
"Learn to machine quilt"

I did well on "delete all fabric sale emails unread" until about 2/3 through the year, with a noticable lapse in December which I blame on Santa.

"work on one garment and one quilt project at a time"
hahahahahahahahaha! Complete and utter joke.
Don't know what I was thinking.
I am just not wired that way, so why fight it?

"complete one UFO before starting a new project"
I did finish up some UFOs, but am confident I ended the year with more of them than I started. There's one on my design wall right now:

Frankly, I'd completely forgotten about that resolution (yeah, maybe don't wait until the end of the year to review the resolutions list?), although it's a good one. I might even attempt it again. I also forgot to "use stash patterns before buying more."

For this coming year, I am keeping it simple. "Spend less" for sure is a goal. "Sew more," though, is not likely. I did about as much sewing in a year during 2010 as I'm ever likely to do. I would like to maintain that momentum. Some clothes will be produced, but quilts are where inspiration and creative ideas are flowing for me right now. I'd like to end 2011 with a personal best in the total yardage used department, even if I produce fewer items. It will be tough to beat 2009's curtain-heavy total, but I see no reason not to try and if I tackle the UFO quilt projects I could do it. The 100-yard Challenge should keep me on track.

I might even aim to end the year with fewer UFOs piled up than at the start. First, though, I need to go count them.

Into the UFO bin it shall go

Butterick 5283 is a no-go, for now. I got the front and back of View B (lower left)...

... done and sewn up at shoulders and sides in about :45 for a quick try-on. I'd taken the risk, when cutting the muslin, of not lengthening the upper bodice. My fabric has more than the "moderate" stretch called for, and is stretchy lengthwide as well as across, so I was concerned that that V neckline might end up down at my navel. Mistake. In spite of stretchiness, I still need an inch and half more length up there to get that bodice seam to sit where it should (which is not perched halfway upslope toward the "bust point," folks). And even in a soft stretchy fabric there's something off about how the gathers sit on my chest, perhaps due to length deficiencies, perhaps not. And the back is still a bit too wide for me, even though I cut it a size smaller than the front.

I've set this one aside in the UFO bin, as it's got potential and is worth trying again. Before I do, I'll want to add sleeves to the muslin and assess those, too, but since this is no longer on my suitcase list I'm moving on. I only have a week of sewing time left, and the less fussing around with fitting I have to do at this stage, the better.

BTW, I happened no notice (when snagging the image) that this pattern is on clearance for $3 at the Butterick site. In case you'd like to try it yourself.

A dinosaur bites the dust!

Wow, does it feel good to slay finally do something constructive with this old dinosaur. The misshapen, badly planned, poorly sewn blocks for this quilt have been languishing in the darkest, most neglected recesses of my sewing room/project bins for... um... something like 15 years now.

Yup, only 3 fabrics in it: this one's all about the visual effect of purple "monkeys" twining around on a checkerboard background (that, and seeing how far I could push an acceptable color combo). The fabrics are prints, not solids, but "monotonal" in effect:, and quite lovely in person although they don't photograph well:

I still like the idea of this quilt, very much. I doubt I'm the first to make a bi-color "background" for a Monkey Wrench layout, but I came up with the idea on my own, and am happy (in a slapdash way) with how it turned out.

We'll be kind, and call this a "learning" project. If I ever decide to write a tutorial on how not to make a quilt, I can use this one as the example. This was one of the first quilt projects I tackled, and at the time I had no idea how to do things the right way, especially planning which of all those straight edges would be the bias ones. Most likely there are bias/stretch issues however you do it, although from my results I'm guessing I didn't take the best route through that particular jungle.

Don't know if I'll ever feel like tackling this pattern again, but paper foundation piecing would be the way to go, for sure. It's possible I didn't even know what that was way back when. If I had heard of it I didn't know enough to know that would be a good path to take.

More problems can be blamed on a sad combination of misinformation and ignorance. I'd been told, when I bought the machine I began this on, that the edge of the standard foot would result in a nice 1/4" seam for quilting purposes. Silly me: I believed the guy. Being a rank beginner at the quilting game, it didn't occur to me to check. So my seam allowances were all off by a wee bit. A wee bit off on a bunch of seams in some blocks and not many -- or none -- in the others, means my three blocks each came out a slightly different size. Plus, the non-adjstable presser foot on that machine pressed a bit tight, and pushed bias edges even more out of whack.

"Aaaaaaagck!!!" hardly begins to describe my emerging realization of the disaster the blocks were turning out to be, but nicely summarizes why I walked away from it and allowed these blocks to languish in a plastic storage bin for so many years.

Somehow that plastic bin came along for the ride through all my recent moves, waiting patiently for me to be over the trauma,. And there it was when I shopped the stash for fabrics to make a back for the "Nothing Too Girly" lap quilt I'm making for my husband. I saw possibilities in that bin, and enough time had passed that I no longer felt attached to making it come out right.

A little trimming down of the larger pieces, and some liberties taken with tidy seaming, and I was able to mash this together into something that looks (from a distance) almost presentable. Size at this stage is roughly 44"x68". It needs a narrow border all round (probably from the purple; I think I have enough) to come up to size.

Once I've tidied up the edges and added the border, this might even become the front of the "Nothing Too Girly" quilt. I'll let Mr. de Hilo decide which side he likes best.

My goal is to get top, back, and batting sandwiched and basted before putting it away for a bit. No machine quilting is gonna happen around here until I splurge on the table-extension thingie for my machine, which I am saving up for by abiding by the 120-day fabric and pattern embargo currently in effect.

Next up: making a pieced back for the pink lattice quilt I'm making for myself.

... No, I have not forgotten about the Kyoto skirt! Sheesh, it's sprawled all over my ironing board, leering at me. How could I forget it?

I might even sew another little bit of it tomorrow.

A month without sewing

Here we are, Jan. 31, and I have not even plugged in my sewing machine this month. In fact, said machine is poised to head to the spa for annual servicing (which should have happened last fall, but I was busy sewing). Probably I'll drop it off at the dealer/servicer on Tuesday. Could have done it this week, or even last, but it involves walking into my local fabric store and as we got closer to the end of the month I felt increasingly determined to make it to Feb. 1 without buying even an inch of fabric during January. Staying out of fabric stores seemed like a good way to do that.

I have also been keeping track (hashmarks on a sticky note) of every fabric sale/free shipping offer/special pricing/pattern sale, etc., sewing-related email I've deleted unread. For January that total has reached an impressive 68. Emails read: 0. Fabric purchased: 0. Patterns purchased: 0. So far so good for not adding to stash situation.

Did I miss a few bargains? Sure. Do I care? No. There will always be another fabric sale, probably within a week or two. And another pattern sale. And if I miss out on a lovely print or a particular pattern, no biggie. There will be new and desirable options coming down the pike soon enough.

Downside of focusing on a ton of other stuff this month is that no sewing = no progress on the UFO piles. Maybe I'll find some time to bite into one or more of those when I get my machine back from the spa.

Design Wall is up...

...and it's got something on it.

This will be a lap quilt for my husband so the primary design consideration was "nothing too girly." Hence the dark blue and green theme.

Blocks are small (6"), so this center will be 36"x60" when assembled, with a 6" burgundy border. This is not the final arrangement, just all the blocks stuck up there to see what I've got. I have 4 extra "A" blocks (the ones with the blue border) and can already see two I'm going to replace. (Hint, they're both in the second row from the top.)

The blue and green block borders are fabrics that I know for sure have been in the stash for over 10 years because they pre-date my move to Hawaii. Nice to finally put them to use. Other prints incude a bunch of Kaffe Fassett and Moda "Nest" charm squares plus more this and that from the stash. As usual, I took a crappy photo, not quite in focus, so close-up shots will have to wait for some future stage of project documentation. I'm delighted with the individual blocks, layout needs further tweaking.

Wish I'd had more medium greens for the "B" blocks outer border, as I can see now that the darkest green is too close to the blue. But that's what happens with a "100% from stash" project. I came up with this pattern because I didn't have enough greens for the several others I'd contemplated.

I'm already in love with having a "design wall" -- although that seems a rather grand name for what is just a large piece of white flannel stapled to the wall. Next "wall" project will be the border for the pink lattice lap quilt I'm making for myself. But really, I should tackle office curtains next. And I haven't done the bias finishing on Vogue 8232 yet, either. I'd better stop blogging and go sew...

Taxi Tote Done

It's done, and turned out fairly well, although not absolutely fantastic. At the last minute, I decided to use a third fabric for the bias trim: Amy Butler martini bubbles in yellow/pink. It picks up the little bits of pink in the exterior fabric, and the bits of yellow in the lining very nicely, so I'm happy with that decision.

Sewing the bias binding in place by machine in one pass was adequate, but not great. Partly I think because I was working with more and thicker layers. It looks okay, but I wasn't sure I'd be thrilled with the exposed stitching, and yeah, I'm not loving it. On the other hand, I don't dislike it enough to rip it all out and do over the other way (see #2, below).

What I'll do differently next time (if there is one):

1) Make the strap a bit longer; I'm on the tall side, wish it hung just an inch or two lower

2) Use a quilt-style binding: i.e., fold bias tape WST, align raw edge on top, stitch in place by machine, then turn fold to inside and slip-stitch by hand to finish.

I'm sticking with my rule that I have to finish one UFO before I can start a new project. Next up: the "muslin" for Simplicity 2957 is close to done, and looking pretty good at this stage. Whether I will like it enough to wear enough to be worth making from nicer fabric remains to be seen. Which is the whole point of making it from quilt-fabric stash first.

When I finish that I want to make something with sleeves (cooler weather is here, at least on overcast days) from some of the cotton lawn in my stash. I set some (non-sewing) tasks aside, though, to get the tote done, so don't know that I'll get back to sewing for a few days.

AMH Taxi Tote

I've cut all the pieces to make this pretty tote from Anna Maria Horner's new book.

It feels disloyal to use Amy Butler and Kaffe Fassett fabric for the first project I'm making from this book, but I'm in "use the stash" mode.

The AB brown (outside) is from a one-yard piece I've had for a while, waiting for the perfect project to come along, and here it is. And the pink KF (lining, trim) is something I bought with coordinating trims/lining/etc. in mind.

The problem is that the pattern calls for "heavy interfacing" and what I've got (sticking with the stash challenge) is very stiff. So I decided a layer of flannel between the outside fabric and the stiff interfacing would be nice.

And I can tell already that it will be. But I can also tell that without a walking foot, stitching it all together is going to be asking for trouble. I want this bag to turn out great, not all wrinkly and slipshod. So now it's on hold. Because I don't have a walking foot for my machine and--since getting a new machine is a huge priority--don't want to invest in one.

So, another project hits the UFO pile. Probably. I'm going to stitch up a test from scraps later (I've already spent more time on this than I should this morning) and see how it goes. But I know my machine and I'll be amazed if it handles this well.

Too bad. Is this button cute or what?

Will keep you posted. I can at least get the pocket made, the bias strips for trim cut. And now I have another incentive for meeting my end-of-year novelling goal, which is what I'm telling myself I have to do if I'm going to earn a new/better sewing machine.

Cute Fabric Baskets

Ooooh, I wanna make some of these, too:

Found the tutorial here.

Best part (aside from handmade gift potential): I already have a bunch of batik 4-patch from 2" squares ready to go. Original plan was to make some pincushions, but the first one was a bit of a dud (tip: squares of soft foam do not work as well for stuffing a pincushion as I'd hoped), so now I think I'll make a few of these. One of these days.

UFO update:

Finished Butterick 5210.

No pics yet, but will post soon-ish.