Olympics formula

winter time + Olympics = couch potato knitting

Hopefully by 14th August these will be my first pair of knitted socks.

Raggy Circle Quilt {WIP 7 of 12}

I have five minutes before I have to head up to school and collect the kids, so this is going to be quick! I started this quilt in Jan 2011... Hey look at the blog dates... the start and finish dates of this quilt are exactly 18 months apart!

I pattern is a free tutorial from Cluck Cluck Sew, Raggy circle Applique quilt. I modified things slightly, which I explain in my original post.

To finish this WIP I basted, quilted and bound the quilt. A super quick process as it's only baby/bassinet size, therefore requiring no piecing for the backing, and I quilted in the ditch. I also machine stitched on the binding to speed things up. I finished the whole WIP up in a matter of a a few hours.

Used up some of the dreaded aqua birds! I have 6 metres of the lying around (only 4.5 now!).

The the binding I decided to use up some Denise Schmidt Picnics and Fairgrounds. I used 2 of the prints in the range, but you only notice this close up. From a distance the scale and colour of the prints are very similar. I also washed and tumble dried the quilt to get the raggy process happening on the raw edges of the appliqued circles.

Getting prepared

I've had my machine in for it's twice annual service. I could have pulled out my spare Janome, but decided to spend time preparing my next few quilts.



First up I sandwiched a quilt top I sewed ages ago. More about it later as I am posting from my iPhone and it's too hard to hunt out the old post!




Then I decided to cut out my black and white fabric for my houndstooth quilt. That pile represents about 10 yards of fabric! I have the popular V & Co houndstooth quilt pattern but am actually using a different pattern by StudioCherie on Etsy.




In the background of the houndstooth photo you can see this quilt. It's a bit of a impulse charm quilt I started with Elizabeth on a Saturday afternoon. It features the 5 animal prints in the Ed Emberley 'Happy Drawing', plus a whole lot of random fabrics from my stash.



I also settled on a quilt pattern for my 'Picnics and fairgrounds' fabrics and cut them out.

Three of the four quilts mentioned in this post are on my 12 WIPS in 2012 list. Most of the remaining WIPS on this list are big projects so I am trying to pace them by working on several at the same time.

Curly whirly scarf finished

Nice and warn too.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Fart in a bottle

This week I feel like I have been zipping around like a fart in a bottle, unable to settle on any one project.

I started off the week with good intentions. I pulled out my rainbow bargello project, with the intention of getting an early finish for my July WIP for the 12WIPS in 2012 challenge. Only problem??? I found the fabric, but couldn't find the actual  bargello WIP. I turned the sewing room upside down... then sulked... then vaguely recalled chucking it out (???!!!! why???!!!)... then sulked some more. Finally I admitted I still had plenty of fabric to make a lovely quilt and to just get going already!

I surfed around the Internet for ages looking at images for rainbow quilts, spectrum quilts, roygbiv quilts (you get the picture) and finally settled on this one as my inspiration.

At the moment I am deliberating between these two layouts. Do I go for the bargello-esque option in photo 1 or mix it up as in photo 2. I am also tossing up adding more rows or leave it as a square quilt. I have picked out a rather unusual sashing and I am waiting for it to arrive. In the mean time I think I might start working on another WIP for the challenge, just in case I wont get this one finished by the end of the month.   

Meanwhile, I will remind you of the granny vomits I have been stockpiling (granny square + clown vomit coloured selection of yarn = granny vomits).

Well I sewed some together to make this.

I think its kind of cool, but its not working for me somehow. I need to abandon or tweak. I think it might need to be bigger, and it needs an edging on it to stop the squares splaying out. Don't get me wrong... I love the look and colour of a granny square arm chair protector (call me weird!), but its just a bit more floppy than the one in my imagination and it keeps losing its shape and sliding off. Maybe that's just what anti-maccassars do. My inspiration was this picture and it looks perfectly flat in that one.

I am tossing up unpicking the seams and turning it into a blanket, but I am not sure I have the energy to make an large granny square blanket.

So, a bit more sulking later I decided to visit a yarn store and bought this YUMMY variegated wool. It is a Japanese wool called Noro Kureyon (colour 188) and I am turning it into a curly whirly scarf. It is a gorgeous varigated yarn in purple, green and charcoal.

Here is what I did (NOTE: extremely novice crochet instructions). I made a chain that was as tall as George (approx 1m+) then, for row 1, I trebled (thats double stitch for americans?) all the way back down the chain, but did two trebles per chain. Rows two and three were the same as row 1, 2 trebles per chain. The crochet twists itself into a fun spiral as you go.  That used up about 2.25 of the 3 x 50g balls of the Noro wool I bought. So as to not waste the remaining yarn I am going to do a 4th row, which will be a picot edging (thanks to youtube!).

Kona hexagon quilt top completed

Today I completed my Kona jelly roll hexagon quilt top. I started it about 8 weeks ago and if you pop back to my original post you will see how I turned the jelly roll into a bunch of tonal equilateral triangles.

This picture shows how I pieced all the triangles into rows and then stitched the rows together into a completed quilt top.

Half of the 60" triangles have light coloured bottoms and dark coloured points and the other half of the triangles have dark coloured bottoms and light coloured points. I arranged these triangles into hexagons, either with dark centres or light centres, but not a mixture.

In the final quilt top the arrangement of hexagons looks pretty random, but in fact the light centred and dark centred hexagons are placed in rows (on the diagonal). I actually expected that the hexagon pattern would be more prominent, but when photographed the the dominating feature in the quilt is the extremely dark tones and the shapes they form.

On reflection I like that it has more of an abstract form. At first glance if just looks like a random triangle quilt, not unlike the shattered rainbow style seen here. But when you study it you can see other patterns emerge, such as the intended hexagon pattern or even a tumbling blocks pattern.

This quilt is intended as an art piece and will hang on a wall in my foyer. It will be the first thing someone sees when they enter my house. I like that there is lots to see and different ways to interpret the shapes. 

Crayola Washable Markers

Recently I've beem reading on quilting blogs that some chidrens texta's produced by Crayola are suitable to use on quilts to mark quilting lines. I happened to see some at OfficeWorks when I was buying other stationary so I decided to get some and give them a try.

I decided to test out the textas on the back of a mini quilt. I drew one line of each colour, ironed over them with a hot iron, left the quilt to sit for a week, then popped it in the wash. Afterwards I tumble dried the mini-quilt.  

To my disappointment a fair few of the colours were still obvious to the eye. I am not going to risk using these washable markers on any of my proper quilts!

George was very happy to receive a box of new textas!

Granny bug

Over the last two Saturdays I have joined a couple of friends in a Crochet course at my local quilt store, Calico and Ivy. The course is run by a lovely lady who blogs here.

At the first lesson we mastered chains, double and treble stitch anc changing colours.

During the week I kept adding to the practice piece we started and then turned it into a cute striped scarf for George.

At the second lesson we learnt how to do a granny square, and join them with an invisible seam.  

I've already got a nice little collection going.