Seasons

Now that the leaves have all fallen it feels more like fall is here.  Except, now that Thanksgiving is behind us, Christmas sits in front of us and that means winter is just around the corner.  Every year I have high hopes of making holiday gifts, but every year the days slip by with other important tasks ahead of holiday crafting.  I have no illusion that this year will be any different, but I hope to have a big project completed and out of my hands shortly, freeing up my time to sew for family and friends.  I have a fun ornament swap with some of my close blog friends and I have the ornament tutorial to share with all of you (I haven’t forgotten, it will be posted mid-month at Say Yes to Hoboken as part of her BlogNog series).  I have had so much fun using Pinterest and having gotten friends hooked into it as well just makes the experience even more time consuming.  One of the pins posted was of braided hair – something I’ve been doing more and more lately.  I love a messy, all over the place braid – yet hardly leave the house in braids because I like hair framing my face.  Weird, I know.  Anyways, the braid was to the sides and so I just had to do that today.  Another favorite braid is to go from the top side down to the bottom of the opposite side of my head, with the excess braid trailing over my shoulder.  Even when I’m not sewing, I still find a way to craft, because braiding my hair counts as a craft…right?

Cookies You’ll Love

Yes, it is that time of year again.  That time of year where we break out the gobs of butter, sugar and flour and begin to make cookies and candy galore.  I was asked to contribute a posting to the Real Butter blog The Gift of Goodness this season, which included making something delicious and packaging it up for gifting.  I’ve mentioned it more than once that I struggle to figure out host/ess gifts at the last minute and this is always a perfect way to get around that.  Because who wouldn’t love something delicious at the holidays?  I made some lemon ricotta cookies that were unlike anything I’ve ever eaten before – not too sweet and very moist!  They went together so quick and easy.  Head on over to The Gift of Goodness blog to grab the recipe and check out all of the other fantastic contributions throughout the season. (And for the diabetics in the audience, there’s already one recipe up that isn’t sweet, so you can find some ideas for yourself as well!)

I Love Primitive Prints

There is a great primitive prints quilt shop just north of me in Longview, WA.  I first learned of them years and years ago at the Portland Quilt Expo when I bought a few stacks of fat quarters.  As much as I love modern and modern fabrics, I will always love the traditional prints and quilts.  I know there are a lot of new (and probably experienced) quilters that say “Oh, I don’t like traditional quilts” but it’s really all about the fabric choices you make and the pattern you pair it with, not the designer name or manufacturer.  I’m willing to bet seeing this stack of fabric will make a few “modern” enthusiast rethink traditional…at least a little bit.  I picked out these fabrics, not to go together, but because I liked each of them.  But wouldn’t you know it, they work together so well that I think they will all need to be in a quilt together (that happens more often than I realize).  I haven’t decided on a pattern for it yet, but I will.  After the holidays.  Because apparently Christmas time = no time around here. 

Lucky #97

That was our random number of the day!  Congratulations #97.  I bet you’d rather have a name than a number, huh?  Congratulations to Jeni!  If you’ve never been by Jeni’s blog, you’ll want to head that way as soon as you’re done here.  So cute and creative and she has a great Etsy shop where she sells vintage sheet fat quarters!  I haven’t really been up to much the past few days.  I took some photos for friends for their Christmas card and we went down to the Pearl District for part of it (that’s where this photo was taken) and met up with a blog friend from out of town.  We had a great time, I love meeting up with her and I’m glad she comes to Portland often.  I got to meet her sister as well and had so much fun visiting with the two of them.  I can’t wait for the next time. 

I’m working on a custom quilting job right now for Michelle.  It’s been a blast and I love the “doodling” on the quilt.  It’s a nice change from the usual all-over design.  We also have had a little snow yesterday and it’s accumulating again, but it wont stick around for long.  Still, an inch or two is a nice surprise for us here.  We are usually cold and wet, but never seem to have the right conditions for snow at our elevation.  I am going to print up some more owls tonight, so I will add a few more of those to the shop soon. 

Sewing Mini Calendars

Alright, the first batch of sewing mini calendars are listed in the shop!  I love these little guys, the fit perfectly in my wallet, or on my desk on a mini easel.  I have a few away last year as gifts and they were a hit! 

They are “wallet” size (roughly 2” x 3”) and make a nice small gift for inside stockings or for acquaintances that you don’t quite know what to gift, but need to stay on a budget.  The little easels can be found at Joann’s with the canvases. 

I didn’t print any of this set yet, but it is available (with 2011 calendar dates of course) if anyone is interested.  I have everything printed at a lab, so it would require a minimum order and a few days for me to get it out.  I gifted this set to the men in my life last year, seeing as how none of them sew. 

I also made this little owl block print mini quilt.  I don’t know why, but it took me a few weeks to get it done, mostly because I had to sit down and hand stitch and just didn’t have the time to do that.  I finished binding it last night at the Portland Modern Quilt Guild meeting.  I love being able to do that!    He’s in the shop, too!

Scandinavian Stitches–Don’t Wait To Own It!

I have had a copy of the Scandinavian Stitches book in my hands for a month or so now and have thumbed through it more times than I can count. It is a rare find in a craft book for me, in that I love it for inspiration and love making the projects from it. Most of my craft books seem to be for inspiration. Rarely do I seem to find the time to actually follow the directions and make something from them.

That was not the case with this book, I made not one, but two projects from it! Kajsa’s blog, Syko, was one of the first blogs I read when I found out that there was such a thing as a craft blog.

I absolutely loved her birds mini quilt and how it was outline stitched with black thread (in fact, it inspired me to create this mini quilt for a swap). I’ve watched her creativity grow and expand and have always loved what she makes, and her book is no exception.

The instructions are well written and easy to understand. Photos accompany each project and there are lovely sketches to help you along the way. Something you don’t see in most craft books, that I just love, is that most of the pattern pieces are right with the pattern instructions. There’s no going to the back of the book and hunting down the right pieces. This is very helpful!

The photographs are so inspiring and eye catching. Her choice in fabrics was perfect as well as the projects they adorn. If you find yourself liking what you see on her blog, then you will definitely want to own a copy of this book. I know a lot of you are going to say “It’s on my Christmas list!” but I honestly wouldn’t wait that long. Each of the chapters is broken down by season, and there is a Yule chapter full of great ideas for this holiday season – one of which was the little tomte I made (above).

Scandinavian Stitches is full of projects and gives you just the most basic of overview of techniques. There is 21 projects including a quilted basket, mini quilt, pillows, larger quilts, softies, zipper pouches and more! A little bit of everything for everyone in Kajsa’s signature style.

Now for the part that involves you – thanks to the generosity of Stash books, just leave a comment below to enter for your chance to win a [well thumbed through] copy of this book, and this adorable set of cards provided by Kajsa, displaying her original artwork. I will choose one winner on Monday. Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the tour to find out more about Kajsa and her fantastic book! The blog tour continues tomorrow and all next week!

November 19th – Pikaland
November 22nd – Lucykate Quilts
November 23rd – Whip-Up
November 24th – Peikonpoika
November 25th – Patchwork Pottery
November 26th – All Sorts

PB+J BFFs

 
Finished!  Linen is always fun to work with…here I went a little crooked on one side of stitching – but that’s okay!  Now I just need to figure out where I'm going to hang it.  The craft room for sure, but which wall…

 
The pattern is by The Frosted Pumpkin and can be found here.  Thanks for a great patter, Amanda!  Don’t forget to stop by tomorrow for my review and giveaway of Scandinavian Stitches!

Didn’t Quite Finish

 
I wasn’t quite able to finish this project while it was still light outside (4:30p and it’s already dark?!").  I had to run out to Joann’s for some thread in the right color.

And while I was there, I found this totally adorable fabric!  It’s actually printed on some quality {for Joann’s} fabric, which is nice.  I’m not sure what to do with it yet, but thought it might make a cute backing on small wall quilts or ornaments.  I just couldn’t pass it up!

Cross Stitching Found Again

Well, it’s that time again – time to pick a winner for the Fanciful Felties book.  But first I wanted to talk about the felt I used.  Some of you mentioned “stretching” and “piling” with your felt and I didn’t experience that at all with the wool felt I got from Felt on the Fly.  It really is wonderful felt, but again I'm not really an expert on it.  Although, I would recommend it 100%!  So if you’ve had some issues with felt and are looking to try something else, I would highly recommend Janet’s shop.  So, I totally love it when the random number generator makes my life easy.  It’s hard going through and counting down all the entries and then recounting to make sure I got the number right.  But there are no troubles for me today, as the winner was #3 – Pink Stitches.  Who by the way, has a totally cute blog!

My little guy is totally sick today.  102 fever and just generally not himself.  I think I got 4 hours of interrupted sleep last night.  But, it was perfect timing to work on one of Amanda and Ashleigh’s new cross stitch patterns!  I haven’t mentioned it yet (bad friend that I am) but these two talented girls started a new pattern company called The Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery.  They have some of the cutest cross stitch and sewing patterns!  Last night I started work on the Toast BFFs cross stitch (and finished it today!). 

Before I could get started I had to go out to the garage and dig out an old Rubbermaid labeled “Crafts” and find all of my old cross stitching supplies.  They had been in there a long time.  I can’t remember how long it’s been since I cross stitched – the 90s sometime.  Anyways, all of my floss was still there and labeled and easy to find (there are three of these floss holders!).  I didn’t have a few colors which I think were new since I did all of this years ago, but it was great to have this plethora of color sitting around.  I've been wanting to get back into cross stitching since all of these cute patterns have been hitting the market, but just haven’t wanted to start yet another project, but I'm glad I did.  I’ll *hopefully* be back tomorrow to share the complete project with you!

Don’t forget - tomorrow starts the blog tour for Kajsa’s book Scandinavian Stitches and Fat Quarterly is kicking it off!  Be sure to check it out and enter for your chance to win a copy.  I’ll be giving my review on Thursday – so see you back here then!

Projects, Projects, Projects

I can’t seem to stop starting projects, especially knitting projects lately.  Both are for fingerless mitts (of which I have none).  The chunkier one is going to have owls on it and the light fingerling weight yard is just going to be a simple, but elegant set that goes up my arm.  (We’ll see if I ever finish even one of those – it’s going to take some time.)

At least I did finish one project!  The cute little house is from Kajsa’s new book.  It was quick and simple to make.  I needed quick and simple yesterday.  I am hoping to find the time to make several in Christmas colors for decorating this year. 

My red and white fabrics were getting dangerously low, so I had to go out and replenish.  There are some good ones in here, but not all of what I was hoping to find.  It seems that red and white are not in print at the moment…at least not around here.  So I will probably have to take to Etsy to find what I need.  But it’s hard to buy stripes and dots when not seeing them in person.  It’s hard to judge their size and I want very specific widths and distances in my dots and stripes.  I also picked up some pink thread for hand quilting that plus quilt from so long ago.  I haven’t been able to decide on a quilting design, so I'm just going to hand stitch it with a running stitch.  I’m excited to try this “new to me” thread, too.  I’ll give a full report when I'm done.  There’s also a little bit of wool felt snuck in the back there…I think it needs to become an owl!

Upcoming Book Blog Tour

I’m sure you all remember the cute little tomte I made from Kajsa’s book Scandinavian Stitches, and my brief comment about how wonderful it was..  Well, starting Monday the blog tour for her book is kicking off with posts every weekday for two weeks.  Every stop is a chance to learn more about Kajsa (aka Syko) and her book as well as enter to win a copy of it for yourself.  I’ve been wanting to make another project from the book, so it’s on my to-do list for this weekend.  I’ll be sure to stop in and share it as soon as it’s done.  In the meantime, here are the stops on the tour (an AMAZING group of blogs you will want to get to know, if you haven’t already):

November 15th – Fat Quarterly
November 16th – I Heart Linen
November 17th – Tallgrass Prarie Studio
November 18th – The Sometimes Crafter (moi)
November 19th – Pikaland
November 22nd – Lucykate Quilts
November 23rd – Whip-Up
November 24th – Peikonpoika (This one is Finish, but click top-right for English)
November 25th – Patchwork Pottery
November 26th – All Sorts

There are also Facebook and Flickr pages to get to know the book even more!  And, if you are not familiar with Kajsa’s blog, take some time to get lost in all it’s wonderfulness, too!  See you all back here on Thursday with more about Scandinavian Stitches (and a giveaway, too)!

Fanciful Felties (And A Giveaway!)

Fanciful Felties by Samantha Cotterill

This adorable book has been sitting on my desk for a little while now, waiting for me to give you a review. It magically appeared on my doorstep and I though: I don’t do felt… But it was too cute not to share. I didn’t feel it was right to review a book on a topic that I honestly know next to nothing about without trying at least one of the projects. Life, as usual, is full of deadlines and all sorts of crazy busyness, but I finally set aside some time to get one of the cute little projects made. The short of it is this: The book is fantastic! If you have every wanted to create with felt – this is the book for you! If you are already experienced with it and want to create some cute “People To Meet, Places to Go & Things To Do” – then this is also the book for you!

Every project in this book is something I want to make – if only there were more hours in the day. I decided to start with the city brownstone – not only was it so darn cute, but I thought Brice might have fun playing with it and his cars. He’s already test drove it and I just finished making it! So it was a hit. I hardly ever use my darning foot, but that’s what I did for all of the “sketching” on this piece (the roof, windows, door, smoke stack). I was worried about my quality of work, but I’m very happy with the results and love the fact that the charm of it is to not have it perfect, but to have it be freeform and whimsical. I think that is honestly what stalled me for so long in making this, was the free-stitching of the details. But it was a breeze.

Since I never work with felt, I knew nothing about it. I knew that Joann’s carried some that was mostly acrylic and I really didn’t like the feel of it and wanted to work with some wool felt. Samantha talked briefly about the natural fibers you want to use (wool felt and cotton), but doesn’t overwhelm you with “you have to use this”, which I really appreciate. After reading through the books Getting Started chapter, I went in search of some shops on Etsy, and I feel so luck to have found Felt on the Fly. The shop owner set up a custom listing for me and told me all about her experience with felt and I honestly felt like I not only had the best felt out there, but the best price as well. I ordered a small assortment of colors so that I could create a few of the projects in here. So there will be more in the future (just need to find some time!).

I love the books layout and photos, everything is laid out so well. The projects start off with a full image and then list the materials you will need – because you’re working with felt you are given size (1 piece 6x3”, 4x2”) and I find this fantastic, because if you just have a little scrap of felt, you know exactly what size you are going to need. So often with fabric you are told you need “1 Fat Quarter” when really you might only need a 5” square. I went through and found 4 projects I wanted to make, noted the color I would need and the size and then made a list of exactly the size pieces of felt I would need for each project. It worked out fantastic for me.

After listing the materials, you are given easy to read instructions, broken down into do-able sections. I felt I could read each numbered direction through fully, and then go on to complete that step. No stopping halfway through the directions to complete some part. As well as easy to understand directions, the illustrations to accompany them were brilliant.

All-in-all, even though I've never worked with felt, having tried this book I will definitely be doing some more felt projects. Samantha peaked my interest and had me walking away from my first project proud of the results and in no way flustered. I think this book is perfect for creating little master pieces for my craft room shelves and little towns and people for my 2.5-year-old to play with. Cute, versatile and easy to understand. An A+!

Thanks to the generosity of C&T Publishing/Stash Books you have an opportunity to win this (slightly used by me) copy of Fanciful Felties by Samantha Cotterill (aka mummysam). Just leave a comment (and maybe any helpful advice you might have on working with felt, or sources you like for purchasing supplies – or just a “pick me” will do) and I will choose one lucky winner on Sunday. And, if by chance you want a copy of this book right now, you can buy an electronic copy of C&T Publishing’s website (as well as a hard copy). How cool is that?! After you’ve entered, take a minute to check out the Stash Blog as well – here you can find out more about all of their wonderful titles.

Red Patchwork Owl Pillow

I used one of my turquoise block printed owls (all sold out, by the way…but there are still some black ones left) to make a new little pillow for Brice’s rocking chair.  He doesn’t sit in it much, so it’s nice to have a cute pillow there.  I just grabbed some red scraps and sewed this together log cabin style.  I even added an invisible zipper on the bottom, but I'm not going to show that, as I ripped it out a few times.  I haven’t worked with zippers in years (since my senior prom dress maybe…?) and was trying out my new invisible zipper foot for my Bernina and had some trial-and-error moments.  It’s functional and looks okay, though.  But not my best work.  I’m hoping to use invisible zippers in my pillows from now on, as I really like the finish of it.  (And honestly, they aren’t hard – sometimes I just like to make things difficult.) 

Also, while we’re on the topic of the owl block print, isn’t this the cutes iPad sleeve!  Amanda made it and I absolutely love it!  Now to make myself one!

City Girl Apron Pattern

I know I said that I wouldn’t be around as much for awhile, but one of the items on my “to do” list just got done and I had to share!  I FINALLY finished my City Girl Apron pattern and have it listed in my Etsy shop.  I originally drafted this pattern TWO years ago!  It’s crazy that it took me so long to finally put it into pattern format.  I’m happy to report that I've had multiple pattern testers, and they all have said how easy it is, and some of them were learning box pleats for the first time.  It was wonderful to hear.  Thanks to everyone that tested and read through it for me and for all of your suggestions – that is invaluable.  Now I feel confident that it will be an easily understood pattern for all confident beginners and beyond. 

  
This pattern seriously stitches up so quickly and is the perfect gift for the holidays.  Who wouldn’t love a cute apron to bake holiday meals in?!  The pattern is full of color photos to help guide you through the steps and I'm just an email away if you need help.  As always, please feel free make and sell items made from my patterns in reasonable quantities in your Etsy shops, at farmer’s markets, bazaar's, etc…  And, I hope to have time to get back here tomorrow to share a photo of a cute pillow I made a few weeks ago.  I totally forgot to blog about it and I can’t wait to share it!  (It involves an owl block print…)

My Plate Is Full

My plate (or maybe bowl?) is a little full at the moment, so it will be quiet around here for a few weeks.  But, I will try and pop in from time to time to say ‘hi’.  I slacked off for a few days, but now it’s time to get on the ball and finish up some commitments that have deadlines.  Thanks for the feedback on the calendars!  I think I'll order a few and give it a go and if there is enough interest, I will do further printings.  I’ll see about having those up by the end of the month.  Of course I'll announce it when I do.  Okay, off to bed and up bright and early tomorrow to get crackin’!  Oh yea!  That new pattern should be in the shop in a few days, too!  It’s on the really big ‘to do’ list…