A Corner Was Brightened

This clunky door 

stood all broken down and sad

quite uncomely and dejected

against a weary fence

as I drove by one day 

a long while back.

Pass it by

I could not

for hidden beauty was seen

by this silly girl.

Married Man loves 

that his girl,

 with side-of-the-road treasures in hand

arrives home

as happy as if she had been treated

to the greatest of shopping sprees.

Loading this rather weighty find so lovely

into the car by myself

was quite a feat,

But maneuver it into the car, 

this girl did.

Since that day long ago,

it has been waiting in the corner,

or rather glaring at me,

demanding some inspiration

other than the random draping of this thing or that.

A few days back

this girl decided to make something

and of course, make it now

when preparing dinner for delightful friends

was the more appropriate use of this girl's time.

Being in such a hurry,

the room,

no, the house, 

was quite strewn 

with scraps of all possible goodnesses.

of yarn, fabrics, laces and more...

A few hours and a big mess later,

voila!

a curtain-ish lovely brightens the corner.

But a meal for dear friends

must be made.

The table set.

Our hearts prepared.

So set aside this curtainly creation I did.

Being the imperfectionist that I am,

tape and thumbtacks hide behind said door

where none can see.

So, indeed, someday I will return,

new lovely.

This girl will in time add

a goodly amount of stitches and adornment

to our newly brightened corner.

An Improv Single Girl Quilt

I love Denise Schmidt's Single Girl Quilt:

I love the simplicity and the old fashioned yet modern design. Most of the fabric is solid and the colorful circles are made with scraps, making it a budget friendly project. Being the patternless sewist that I am, I thought this might be a great pattern to embark upon actually following. With further research, and to my great disappointment, I discovered it's loveliness to not be as simple as this married girl had hoped. Each of the circles takes 32 separately cut shapes using templates. Doing the multiplication, I realistically decided such a pattern is not for moi. A smallish baby quilt alone would take nearly 200 smallish intricately cut pieces. Oh dear. A bit much for a highly non-perfectionist girl who likes to see a happily finished product sitting around the house in less than a decade.

So. What about an improvisational version? This girl, needing pillows around the house, and lots of them, alighted upon a small experiment, hoping for a simple way to create an Improv Single Girl circle. I think I did it. My own way. This one circle measuring about 22" x 22" was joyfully held up for my married man's approval in less than an hour and turned into a pillow shortly thereafter:

 

Although married man didn't jump up and down or burst out in melodious praises at the greatist of  accomplishments, this girl is now ready to begin the Improv Single Girl Quilt journey. Not being in the hunkering for a journey alone, and being somewhat enticed by the idea of an old fashioned quilting circle, I'm welcoming a few kindred dearies into my homey home for said circle of happy sewists.

For those of you kindred ones who can not make it to this homey home filled with quiltie friends, a tutorial is in the workey works. I promise. But as my homeschool week is upon me, time for reading good books and guiding my remaining two is quite at hand for this girl...

Today I'm linking up with Kojodesigns. They have some pretty amazing tutorials.

Simeon's Quilt - Loved

This boy and his momma made a quilt:

He made all the different shaped doggy squares.

You can see this boy was a tiny bit younger when this project he began:

I put them together:

****

I always take another quilt of the desired size and lay it on my bed. Then I arrange the squares on top. It's my small-house version of a design board. Simeon had a big say in the design process here. After arranging them, I cut and pieced in the brown negative space, or sashing. A lot of up and down from my machine to the ironing board, then to my bedroom, and back....

You can read more about our process here.

****

The back of the quilt is simple.

  A dog house on two of the corners,

One for Beau and one for Maddie, 

was sweetly insisted upon by this boy 

who misses his doggies so:

 for once upon a time, 

buddies they were:

 

 

Simeon's Quilt

Remember this boy and his quilt?

Recently finishing all the not-so-very-square squares

quite by his happy little self, 

and arranging them like so,

the precious pieces were entrusted to his mama.

Being the imperfectionist that I continue to be,

I left his free form square-ish squares quite alone

only pressing them a very tiny little bit:

 The brown in betweeny stuff,

the negative space,

is pieced,

which was no easy task, this mama might add.

Modern quilts,

or those made without the use of perfectly detailed patterns,
with measurements and rules,

can be a tad trickedy,

but is still most definitely preferred by this silly girl.

A little quilty sandwich making,

and a lot of squiggly free motion quilting:

 

all while this boy excitedly waits

and waits

and waits some more....

A Pillow, a Laundry Bag and a Girl

I love making things.

 

I especially love making things for my children.

  I often ask them which projecty goodness they want me to embark upon for them next. 

Sometimes I think they must certainly suppose I don't know them well enough at all. 

For you would think I could most definitely figure it out for myself. 

But, I cannot. 

It is not that I don't know them well.

I do. 

But I think it is more that I want them to be part of the creative process,
to have a say,

so it suits their individual unique one-of-a-kind style.

On one of my visits with my ever so far away Dear One in the city, 

we spied upon a vintagy pillow. 

Telling her I could make something of a similar sort someday, 

I took out my little notebook and roughly doodled away. 

I even queried her to choose some Hannah-like fabrics right then and there. 

I wanted it to be as she liked. 

I do hope I haven't given the impression of a finicky girl, 

for finicky she is not. 

After all, 

I don't know of many girls who are excited for the simple gift 

of a mom-made pillow.

Now, with a bag of vintagy fabric happily tucked under my arm, 

I told her she must please forget about the beauteous stash,
and off to coffee we went. 

But forget, she did not.

Instead she was quite looking forward to it, 

for Christmas was not in the too distant future. 

Well, 

I guess the gift giving event was a little too distant for me, 

for a sneakity peek

when it was all in pieces still,

I couldn't resist allowing.

On another trip to see my Dear One and Her Love,

our visit needed to be short but dear,

for laundry, 

this busy girl with hardly a spare moment,

had to launder.

As we were hugging and kissing our goodbyes,

and there were lots of them just now

for brothers and dad were dishing out goodbyes, too,

our lovely Dear One had a mom-can-make-it idea.

Laundry bags.

Laundry bags for two.

BIG ones. 

With straps for carrying.

I was to design laundry bags for their uphill ambling together

to the place where such mundane things need to be done.

She even handed me the destined vintage sheets as I was walking out the door.

Oh, yes, my sweet daughter knows of my affinity

for making goodness with vintagy sheets.

Behold my Dear One and Her Love,

ready to depart from our homey Christmas gathering,

happy with all their vintagy home made gifts:

But worry not,

for a bottle of good scotch to Her Love was in addition given!

A Journal Was Made

A journal was made

for a dear friend so sweet,

who from her place far away

sends me lovely notes on scraps of paper.

Paper torn and layered,

then covered

with doodles.

Whimsical doodles,

of flowers,

squiggles,

butterflies and such.

A multitude of designs

happy and bright 

intertwined with heart felt notations

of memories of time together spent

and hopes of new shared moments yet to come.

A journal was made

with my own Quilty squiggles

 and buttons

and stitches

french knots
a scrap
and more stitchy doodles

for my friend far away

to fill with her doodley art....

until we again shall meet.

 

 ******

To make a journal for a dear friend of your own, sew a tube that fits over the ends, that is nearly twice as long as your book laid open (no rulers and math necessary), and with edges  neatly finished. I only did my quilty stuff on the  front  part of the tube using free motion quilting. This is a picture of the back of the tube. You can see how very long it is and the one seam down the middle. The fun part is embellishing it with doodles and odds and ends.

Down the Rabbit Hole Quilt

Here is my happy little Down the Rabbit Hole Quilt

taped down to my floor and pinned into a 'quilt sandwich':

 Embroidery and applique

accompanied by curves, circles, knots and scribbles,

now form three whimsical flowers with leaves on the quilt back. 

They were really quite fun to create

during our summer's end camping trips.

To refresh your memory, 

for even I have nearly forgotten,

here is the quilt front.

This week, I took my happy little quilt sandwich into Hart's Fabrics, 

showing it to my friend Tina who manages the store. 

Well, she loved my quilt. 

I think she squeeled in delight. 

I like friends that like my stuff!

She also encouraged me to continue the detail by hand-quilting rather than free-motion.

I agree.

 

 And now that I've gotten over the fact

that this quilt most likely won't be completed lickety split,

I'm ready for some cozy hand-quilting time!

Kids Sewing - A Bag with Pockets

Remember my Bouquet Day Bag?

Well my survival boy wanted to make his own for art supplies. I thought of the grand idea for his bag to be a more simple version of my own. No lining and no pockets. But he would not have it. Oh, no. "Garrett makes bags with pockets", he said. So he wanted pockets too. And not just any old pocket would do. These pockets had to fit certain things like pencils, glue sticks, pads of paper, etc. Being the homeschool mom with the perspective that they will grow up and move on to other non-mom things in just a few more winks of an eye, I put away my own project, poured myself a cup of coffee - with chocolaty and creamy goodness, of course - and spent the rest of the day by his side. I only guided, though. He really had a plan of his own.

He is pretty happy with his bag.

Don't you think?

And thanks for your inspiration, Garrett. I think all our conversations around the dinner table about sewing bags and surfboard covers have shown my boys that sewing is cool. And that there is always room for a pocket.

I shared this on Show and Tell Fridays, too.

Don't forget to check out what others have been up to this week.

And maybe even put up one of your own finished projects on Amy Lou Who's blog.

Easy Peasy Tablecloth

This tablecloth is made from the Anthology Collection. You can find it at Hawthorne Threads here.

The back is a Kona cotton in dark grey.

I will give more details on how I made this tablecloth soon. It was easy peasy. But taking pictures at night that turn out is not so easy peasy for me, so I will try to draw out something soon to show how I made it in just a few hours. It really shouldn't even take that long to make. I had a friend over and we talked more than we sewed! It is also on Amy Lou Who's blog. Check it out. On Friday's she has a show-and-tell day where other creative folks show what they accomplished that week.

Another Curtain Up-Do

Company was coming.

Food needed to be made.

Lots of it.

The house needed to be put in some resemblence of order.

But wait. I want a new bathroom curtain. I want it now.

No time to shop.

Hmmm.

An old curtain panel in the cupboard...scraps of happy fabric calling me...

30 minutes later, I had the panel hemmed to the right length and nicely accented with fabrics that don't really match, and I was back to preparing the house for what turned out to be a great weekend whirlwind of family memories. You can see my other curtain up-do here.

Down the Rabbit Hole Quilt

Now for the back....

Here is what I'm up to today:

My pattern-less adventures continue, for as usual, I am just sewing as I go.

It's my version of this quilt by the quiltmakers of Gee's Bend:

No corners or seams matching up, random widths, etc. I do prefer larger pieces of fabrics because the fabrics are pieces of art themselves these days, so my strips are very wide. This should be more easily seen in my next few pictures.

Ok. Pattern-less quilting does have its problems. Like hoping I bought the right amount of fabric to complete the picture in my head. I am better at pictures in my head than I am at math!