Softies and Sewing

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Say Hi To Eddie!

Sock Monkey Eddie!

I’m happy to say, I have finally created a softie to submit to A Month of Softies. I’ve been wanting to do this for months, and I just haven’t had a chance to try it out yet. I’m really pleased with my first attempt.
Now on to quilting! I’ve been trying to decide on my color scheme for my Eclipse quilt, and I think I’ve decided on red, pink, yellow and orange. Here’s Fun Quilt’s version first:
Fun Quilts: Eclipse

Here’s some of the fabrics I have pulled up so far:
Eclipse Fabric

I’m just not sure how I’m going to work this though. I want this project to be as much about making the right fabric choices as the quality of my quilting. I think my fabric is really going to be lacking in the lighter hues, especially in the reds and oranges. Does anyone have any good tips for me, or would be willing to do some fabric swaping for some of those lighter colors? Let me know.
And since my kitchen is still taking up the majority of my life lately, (it’s so cool to see everything starting to look like a real kitchen!) here’s another look at the same wall that I showed in the last post. We have cabinets, a microwave, and a fridge that isn’t in the living room anymore! It’s so exciting!
It's A Real Kitchen!

No Time To Sleep

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I’ve been meaning to update for days now, and I’m finally going to sit down and do it. We have been so busy this month, and I’ve had so little time to do anything quilt related. Ben and I have spent most evenings and late nights for the past several weeks hanging drywall, plastering, painting, scraping and laying tile in our kitchen. We gutted the whole thing, and turned an awful, ugly, once covered completly in nasty wood panneling into a halfway decent room!
Here’s before:

BARF!

Here’s the same wall now:
Becoming Less Barf Like!

The cabinets just came in today, and tomorrow night we’ll hang all of the uppers. I’m so excited to have a kitchen again! Do you have any idea how much of a freak it makes you look like to have your fridge sit in the middle of your living room? It’s bad.
And so after that’s all finished, I’m looking forward to finally going back to quilting full force. I haven’t worked on my wedding quilt in weeks; it’s been impossible to with all of our other work, plus with the heat here in Michigan this summer. And since I love starting new projects, I’ve signed myself up to participate in Dioramarama’s Modern Quilt-Along! I’m so excited! I wish I could spend the money splurge this month on The Modern Quilt Workshop, but with all of our kitchen expenses right now I think I’ll hold off. I’ll instead be working on the Eclipse quilt. I love piecing curves, but I usually piece by hand and I think I might go ahead and try this one on the machine. I’m looking at this project as a chance to improve my machine skills, as well as make a cool quilt. I’m still thinking about colors, but I’d like to try to do a mix of both solids and prints. I have a lot of fabrics that I’d love to use, and haven’t had a use for yet, so I may be able to find a home for it in this project. There’s still a lot to think about!
And before the month is up, I really want to find the time to participate in Loobylu’s A Month of Softies. This month’s theme is Sock Monkeys! How freaking cool is that! Now I just have to find time to make one….

Modern Quilting

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There’s been a lot of inspiring talk about modern quilting going on lately! I’m longing for a copy of The Modern Quilt Workshop: Patterns, Techniques, and Designs From the FunQuilts Studio by Bill Kerr and Weeks Ringle. It just seems that with this book and the soon to be released book by Denyse Schmidt, that there will finally be some better reference for people who are interested in more than just traditional quilt design.
I’m so inspired by many of these contemporary quilters. Of course I love to look at Denyse Schmidt’s and the Fun Quilt’s designs for possible new ideas. I also love the simplicity of Lori Mason’s quilts, and the idea of using textiles like linen and wool to replace ordinary cotton.
Lori Mason’s–Signal, linen

Signal, by Lori Mason

I also recently discovered BeBeBold Quilts, based in Australia. They do a little more traditional design, but varied with modern elements. Some look like they could have been made in 1900, or last week–awsome.

Wool Is Wonderful

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Despite being a perfect weather week to work on quilting, I’ve done nothing but knit since Monday. I finshed my felted bag (not really mine, it’s actually a belated birthday gift for my friend, Kate) in less than five days, since it was pretty much the only thing I did this week. It turned out great though!

Birthday Bag

(See my pretty lilies in the back? I did gardening this week too!)
I bought enough black wool to make one for myself too–mine will have pink stripes instead though. I need to have a knitting break for a few days first.
To anyone concerned that I’ve gone over to the knitting darkside for good though: it’s just easier to tote a knitting project to my work this summer (I have a lot of downtime there) instead of the queen sized quilt in progress. Sometimes (and I’m sure there are a lot of quilters who agree with me) I just have to take a break from my big projects, since they do consume so much of my time. I don’t have to have the wedding quilt finished until October 8th (and then you both are getting MARRIED, Laura and Steve!!!) and I just don’t feel like I should burn myself out on it!
No way will I ever give up the quilting.

New Poncho

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Since it’s been 85 degrees and over for what feels like forever, I’ve been knitting instead of quilting lately. The nice thing about knitting is that unlike quilting, I can have a major project finished in a couple of weeks if I put my mind to it. It’s just impossible to do that with quilting. To keep myself busy, I made this poncho:

Knit Poncho

While I was working on it, Ben asked why I would ever want to work on a sweater on a 90 degree day in June. At the time, my answer was that it was too hot to sew, and that I was making it to wear in the fall. Unfortunatly, I want to wear it now, despite being so hot that I would die while wearing it.
And until the heat breaks a little more, I’m going to be doing more knitting. My friend gave me a pattern for a bag that she’s already made, and I’m going to make one for myself and one for a friend’s birthday. For Kate’s I’m using a dark gray and bright blue wool.
Felted Bag Yarn

I’m excited to get the first one started, but I really do want to get back to my quilting too (the hot weather is supposed to get better by Wednesday–yay!). But, being that this is primarly a quilting blog (and since I like to write about quilting and not other random things) I’ve been slow on the news this last month. I’d rather have quality things to say about my blog’s topic, rather than blathering junk. Some people may have more interesting lives, or have the ablity to make their lives seem that way, but I’m just not about that here. So please don’t give up on my blog, friends, I just haven’t had anything too interesting to say lately! 🙂

Bags

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I’ve been really into bags and purses lately, and it’s been taking up a lot of the time when it’s been too warm to quilt. I’ve wanted to try felting for quite awhile now, and a couple of weeks ago I finally picked up some wool yarn. In typical Sarah style, I started knitting (without any clue) until I thought I had a decent bag. Turns out on this one, I did pretty well:

Felted Purse

I’ve been excited to have several compliments on it at work. (Does that mean it’s not a piece of crap?) I’m pleased with it at least.
Also this week my friend Kate sent me this awsome bag:
Cirrus Bag

To explain: we call each other Cirrus and Nimbus because we’re like that. No one else gets it, but I think the bag is so cool! She ordered it from a company called Neighborhoodies that sells custom made bags, shirts, sweatshirts and other fun things. I think it’s an awsome idea.
Off to quilt before bedtime tonight.

Fun Mail

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I have to show off the goodies I got today in the mail! Brit (from Running Stitch) sent me this package today:

Trade Goodies!

For our book trade, Brit sent one of the Elm Creek Quilts books, The Quilter’s Legacy. I’ve not read any of them yet, but I’m very excited to check it out! Also in my package: a yummy candle, a very yummy loaf of zuchini bread (which I’m currently mowing down on) wrapped in a fabric tape measure! I’m going to have to work out these trades more often! Thanks Brit! 🙂
I (like many things around here lately) took a little break from working on quilting the wedding quilt the past few weeks. I was starting to feel burned out on it so I decided to give it a rest. Then, this week when I started to feel motivated to start it again, it got hot and muggy and not great for working on. Luckly, I live in Michigan, and the weather never stays the same for longer than a few days. I have big plans for big work while it’s cooler.
I really should plan my quilting better–only piece tops in the spring and summer, when you don’t have to hold a giant piece of cotton on your lap, and quilt in the fall and winter, when it’s nice to have a giant piece of cotton draped over you!
In the meantime, I’ve been working on a piecing project:
Bow-Tie Quilt

The pattern is technically called the “mini” bow-tie quilt, and it really is pretty tiny to piece. Each one of the blocks (with 4 bow ties in it) is about 5 inches square. I like piecing small projects and I figure, even if this project takes me years to do, it’s still one of those quilts that you can take with you in your bag and bring out whenever you’re stuck somewhere without anything else to do.

Let’s Make A Trade

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Okay, here’s a question. Last Thursday was my birthday, and my in-laws gave me a new quilting book. Unfortunatly, I already own it, and it’s not returnable. Here’s what I’m thinking though: If anyone is interested in trading me either a book, fabric, or just goodies of any kind, I’d be willing to give away my book. It’s the Encyclopedia of Classic Quilt Patterns. If you’re interested, let me know and maybe we can work out a trade.
I wish I had some new, exciting work to show you all about, but recently I’ve just been out of it. Between feeling lousy from allergies, having crappy weather bum me out, and realizing today is my 2 year anniversary of graduating from college and still not doing what I had planned on doing, I’ve not gotten much of anything done. I’m hoping to have the rest of the Wedding Quilt done by the end of May (mainly so I don’t have to work on it during the summer months in a house with no air conditioning!) and I had thought that I’d have no problem with that timeline, but everytime I sit down to quilt lately, I’m just not able to get much done. It’s making me feel so lazy–I hate it!
We have started a major project in the house though. We began working on our kitchen renovation, and it already looks different. The previous owners of the house loved wood panneling, even in the kitchen. Two of the four walls were panneled, along with the cabinets. We took down all of the panneling on the walls (not on the cabinets, since those are all just going to come down in one big piece) and Ben took down the drywall on one wall. We’re replacing drywall on both of the walls that will have cabinets on them in the final project. It’s been a huge mess though–our stove is sitting in the middle of the kitchen, there’s dust everywhere, wires haning out of an unfinished wall, and scummy, dirty walls that they hung panneling over without cleaning first–yuck!

Kitchen, Minus One Wall

Isn’t that yellow awful?!? It smelled so very, very badly when the panneling revealed those walls. It’s going to be a long couple of months, while we wait and piece the kitchen together ourselves. We’re looking forward to what all of our hard work gets us, but ugh–it’s not the greatest now!
A Work In Progress

Happy Birthday

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I just realized it’s Hip To Piece Square’s birthday today! I’ve somehow made it a year talking about not much more than just quilts and quilting. Are you guys still really still interested in reading about this stuff?? Anyway, here’s to another year of quilt talk! I can’t tell you how much fun it’s been for me to keep this up–I’ve loved getting to know quilters and crafters from all across the country. You all make writing this blog a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone who’s read for the past year, and I look forward to talking to all of you who haven’t posted yet–I love hearing what people think of what I’m doing and what people are doing in their own art.

A quick post otherwise: this past week I took a little break from quilting one day to make my friend, Kate, a little gift. I used wool felt (which I think is just the most fun stuff ever) and put together a little pouch.



orange pouch

It seems like everyone is making these pouches lately, and I thought I try one for myself. I have to say, that little zipper is kinda tricky! I hand stiched it in, and it seemed alright to do. Hopefully it won’t fall apart on her once she gets it though.

And if you aren’t on the receiving end of a wedding quilt by me, click on to see the quilting in progress!

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Quilt Show

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I decided to wear my quilter geek flag proudly this weekend and went to a quilt show. I have to admit, I really had a lot of fun. Most of the quilts were really traditional with the traditional quilting colors, but there were a few unique ones in the mix too. Overall, I think my favorite though was this one though:

Tiny Strips Quilt

It’s just a small part of it, but the pattern was amazing! On first look it just looks like a “t,” with angled edges, but each of the t’s were hand pieced with 36 individual strips, probably no more than 1/4 inch wide. It was really very cool. Plus it was one of the few quilts hand pieced and quilted there. The handquilters were really pretty underrepresented, which made me pretty bummed. I was hoping to see more of that.
As far as my own quilting goes, I’m hoping to start quilting the wedding quilt today. I basted the quilt together last night, so as soon as I can get the quilting pattern mapped out on part of it, I’ll get to work. As soon as there’s something to show, I’ll post a picture!