Saturday Sewing Project -and More

I awoke feeling alive and ready to tackle  embrace the world.   I played around for a bit online.  I walked past the sewing machine and saw some fabric I had woven and cut away from a project.  Thoughts swirled.  Could I use my woven fabric in a quilt block as a piecing material?  After some contemplation another idea stepped into the spotlight.  I could use the woven as an accent on a piece made with an upholstery fabric sample.

Pressing, cutting and more thinking happened before diving right in. The idea I had in mind changed as I went.  Suddenly I had this:

It is just a bit wonky and unusual - hey! just like me!   I used a mustardy gold color fabric for the lining -it peeks out at the sides.

So what is it for?

I didn't measure at all.  But it is the perfect size for my Kindle Fire.  Since I didn't buy or make a cover for the latest one (bought at a ridiculously low price)  this is perfect.

I also re-visited card  or tablet weaving on my larger inkle loom.   The cards act as shafts in the loom, making it a type of four shaft loom.  (Shafts raise and lower the threads to create patterns in the cloth.)

I threaded up twenty cards with four threads each to start weaving this particular pattern.

The pattern draft used gray, green, yellow, black and white as the colors.  I substituted teal/aqua for the green. Purple took the place of yellow, as navy did for the black.  I love the color combination.
This is a very precise, orderly, planned out type of weaving which is in contrast to the Saori - freestyle weaving that I do on my floor loom.  I am thinking that combining the two in a project could be wonderful.

If you happened to miss my affiliate post (Friday) for Craftsy's supply sale, let me remind you  that they are having a sale of up to 50% off on supplies.

I went looking for temptation and found this one at 50% off. There are 40 fat quarters in this box.  I am mightily tempted.

Cotton + Steel Fat Quarter Collection II Box

from: Craftsy

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If you need supplies---

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Sampler- As If.....

As if I didn't have enough UFOs floating around, I have joined a Sampler sew along. It is being run by Jane Davidson and Pat Sloan. It is the Splendid Sampler.

The info says there will be two blocks a week with two weeks off for Christmas and New Year. So there will be a hundred 6" blocks.  It also says there will be pieced, paper pieced, EPP, applique and embroidered blocks. The Q & A says that you don't have to make them all.  That is good because I doubt that I will make them all, but I will collect the instructions for sure. I will make the ones that appeal to me and eventually make a quilt from them.  The first block will debut on Valentine's Day.  So if you want to join in, follow the link and sign up.  

(just what I needed - another project!) Ha ha.

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More Quilted and More Woven

These colder days have given me a great reason to just stay inside.  So I have been quilting and weaving - and also reading a book..

First of all the quilting - if you have been reading the last couple of posts you know that I am working on a quilt.  I am quilting it in panels and will join it with strips once all the pieces are complete.  So far there are six of the eight panels pieced and quilted. I put the pieces together across my queen-sized bed to see how it looks.

I think it looks great!
I also took some photos of some of the quilting that I haven't shown yet. These are some of the solid blocks on the front of the quilt.

Wandering Vines 

One of my default designs

Not my best work - but it will do.

Not a clue what to call this one

So that has kept me pretty busy.
However, I have a six meter warp (about 6 1/2 yards) on my loom.  I used my wider reed (3 dents per cm) for this one. I am weaving with mostly warm colors but with occasional bits of blue, aqua and cool lavender tones.  So far, I have just over three meters (3 1/4 yards) woven.   Here is some of it on the loom.  I unrolled the cloth beam to measure and took a photo.

This is a lovely, light weave and I think it will be just beautiful. I can't wait to see what it becomes as a finished garment.


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Another Chunk Quilted

Yesterday, I posted a photo of the piece I had basted to quilt.  That piece is now quilted and trimmed.
But rather than show you the whole piece - or even any of the front of it - here is some of the quilting on the back of this piece.

I really don't plan out the quilting for the squares, I just decide as I get to them.  Some of the squares are simply stipple quilted.  One has a variation on pebbles.  I just played and enjoyed.  Are there "mistakes"?  Probably.  But as this will be a bed quilt, I don't worry about a few tiny "oops" moments. It was fun! And isn't that why we do it?  

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UFO Busting in the S---

The act of doing some straightening some things - along with an email discussion with another quilter - led me to decide that since we are going to have bad weather, it is a great time to do some UFO busting.

You may remember my Arrowhead quilt that I started back in April of 2015. I realized that I had over half of it pieced and quilted.  I also found more blocks ready to make the larger units. Oh yes, this is being done in a "quilt as you go" method - but I am doing free motion quilting on it.
Here are the photos from today:

This several pieces laying on my bed. The top four sections are quilted but not yet joined.

Here is a piece that is sewn into a big "to be quilted" unit.  The units are two sets of four patches with sashing.

And there is this piece that is layered and basted (see the pins?) and ready to be quilted - tomorrow, I hope.

It really feels good to have made a leap in the progress on this quilt.  I didn't mention but the previously quilted pieces were not trimmed before I started today.  So, lacking a large table, there was some crawling around involved in getting them trimmed.

I am hoping that the power doesn't go out due to the weather (I saw white stuff - (don't say the S word)  when I looked out earlier.  No accumulation yet but the temperature is starting to drop.


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It is a Puzzle

Sometimes, things take an unexpected turn.   I was reviewing one of my Craftsy classes based on a conversation I had with someone.  When I looked in the materials, I saw several block patterns to quilt. (It was a free motion quilting class.)  ***Lightbulb***  Look!  that one is made of half square triangles.  And I just sewed a number of half square triangles.
Of course, the ones in the block are 3.5 HSTs and mine are 6.5.   Did that stop me?  You know better than that!
The block is a Balkan Puzzle. It isn't one I was very familiar with so I used the design board again.  I carefully pulled two pieces at a time and sewed "twosies."  Then I joined the twosies into rows of four.  Once they were all in rows, I joined the rows.

Don't be fooled by the photo. The "grays" are actually tan/beige.  The fabric is the Zephyr collection from Connecting Threads.  Most of it has been clearanced and some of it is gone completely. I got a stack of 10" squares when I was ordering some fabric for another quilt.  I love the metallics in it. 

I am thinking I will add a border to this and quilt it to use as a wall hanging or maybe a table topper. Sometimes a "squirrel" 

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And then - Look A Squirrel!!!

I started to work on the pre-quilted blocks from the previous post.  They are now all nicely trimmed to two sizes.
But I went in to do something in the fabric/ catch-all room and found a nice little package of 10 inch squares.   My friend - Left-Handed Quilter - mentioned not liking to have blocks with bias edges.  And we discussed how many things from the Missouri Star Quilt Company tutorials are made with bias edges.

I thought - Hey, why not make these into HSTs?  (half square triangles that is.)  Being in the mood to do some "unplanned" sewing, I did these using the method of two squares together sew around the outside and cut on diagonals. It is a really quick and easy way to make HSTs.  Of course like most blocks they need trimmed to size.

The ten inch square make 6 1/2" HSTs if you are careful.  As you can see those trimmings are minimal.  I trimmed about half of them before my back complained that the table is too low.  So I stopped to play on the design board and see what I could come up with.

I ran out of board before I ran out of squares.  This prompted me to sit at the computer and play in Electric Quilt (EQ) for a bit.   EQ is a great way to play with design layouts.
First I put it in with the same layout as on the board above. Then I had a "vision" and took out the diagonal line.  I used the "fabrics" in the program to color it and I got this

It is all squares and HSTs and it makes two sets of stairs.  Of course, you could make only one OR you could make several sets of stairs.

I am still trimming (and playing) with the HSTs I sewed.  So at this point I don't know what they will become. But I did save the "stairs" project in EQ.

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Quilted Pieces

First of all, I never made it to sewing yesterday. And here is why:

In the past week, I was looking at some photos I had saved online.  I saw one and said "What did I do with that piece?"   I didn't have a clue. I looked through a stack of quilted pieces and didn't find it. So when I was getting ready to sew - a little gray squirrel ran by carrying that picture -

Not this exact one - this is a new picture after trimming

AND a clue as to where to look.  So, of course I looked there.   Oh my, I found another stack of quilted pieces.  I got a huge surprise too!  I can quilt better than I realized. Forgive the brag, but some of these are really good!

So I decided to iron them,  trim them

And see what I could come up with.
I laid out several of them on the bed - they are all different sizes, a fact I will have to overcome.

But they are so fun together. 

There are more that are not trimmed - I should be busy with this for a while. 

And some smaller embroidered blocks that are quilted also. 

Now let me show you some gratuitous photos of some of these blocks:

And there are more- whew!
If I can get these all joined into one quilt, I think it will be an amazing quilt.  This will certainly take some time, but I think it will be worth the effort.

Oh,  look---->  Squirrel!!!!
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Life Goes On

It has been a bit since I posted.  As the title says "Life goes on."  I have been doing various things each day but very little sewing.  (I did take up some pants for Mom.) I have also done just a little weaving.
One day this week, I started a batch of sauerkraut. I put a little over four pounds of cabbage and most of a pound of carrots in it for a total of five pounds of vegetables.  (The 'pound' of carrots after peeling and cutting off ends was about 13 oz. )  Those are fermenting in my food grade plastic bucket.  It will make a nice batch of sauerkraut in three to four weeks.

Yesterday (Wednesday) I made a batch of soap.  It has to sit in the molds for a bit to get to a stage where it can be removed -and cut if needed.  I made four and a half pounds of soap.  Soap is made with fats (which are acid) and lye (which is alkaline.)  The process  is one of neutralization.  Thus the end product should be mildly acidic for a good moisturizing soap product. (we call that mildly acidic state "super-fatted.")  For this batch, I used lard, coconut oil and grapeseed oil as my fats.  I think this is a really good recipe and I will likely repeat it in the future.  For fragrance, I used Almond, sandalwood and raspberry.   That made the work area smell wonderful.
I used a silicone loaf pan, a silicone cupcake pan  and one round soap mold to mold the soaps.   This morning I sliced the loaf into bars.  Here is how it looks.

The sun was shining in through the blinds  and it overpowered my flash. But you can see the bars and the nice creamy color of the soap.
Now it has to cure for about a month to harden and finish the neutralization process.

I mentioned some weaving:  For example, I had this warp on my Saori floor loom.

 The paint chip cards were the "inspiration/challenge" colors that I could use for it. The purple grey was not an exact match but it was closer than in the photo.
Finally, last night, I sat and finished weaving this piece.  It is set to be wet finished today.  It will have to hang to dry and then after that I can hopefully get a good picture of it to show.
But, I also want to get to my machine and sew some quilt pieces.
I never expected retirement to be such a busy time.
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A New Project and a Video

As you know, I have added inkle band weaving to my repertoire.  My video guy said "You need to do a video on how you do that." So here is the video showing the band I am now weaving.

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A different type of weaving

Playing with fibers, cloth, yarn, string and such has always had an appeal to me. When I discovered that I could weave and make my own cloth, I fell in love.  I can (to some degree) control the pattern and colors.

One of the things I had seen while researching and lusting over looms was a small loom for making narrow cloth bands.  It is called an inkle loom.
I finally decided that I had to have one.  So I ordered it from an Etsy shop run by a guy who makes them. I love it when I can buy handmade goods.

Having woven on other looms, my learning curve wasn't so steep.  When I got the loom, I got it set up to weave.

The warp (threads that run lengthwise in the fabric) are a continuous loop when you tie them on. I had to tie the heddles by hand to get started.  Those are the white threads that allow the threads to shift up and down for weaving.

This band is my own design and I plan to use it as a belt and perhaps use the leftover as a hatband.

The colors are actually navy blue and a silver gray. I can tell that I will have fun making these bands and finding uses for them. The little loom fits in my lap and will be great for road trips.

Fun fact: Inkle weaving is mentioned in Shakespeare's play Love's Labour Lost. (Act III Scene I)

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