Author Archives: Sarah Minshall

First off, let me just say thanks to those of you who haven’t abandoned my blog. I want so badly to be consistent and write all the time, but when months go by without doing anything really new, I just feel that no one really cares. I could blog about things like what I eat (I had cereal for dinner tonight), my dog (he’s snoring beside me on the couch) or my travels (I went to JoAnn’s for interfacing last weekend), but I’m not sure anyone really cares. We’ll just call it a creative block for now.

I am getting ready for some holiday craft shows in the next few weeks though, and it’s requiring that I actually finish some work. Most of what I’m working on is standard fare for my shows, but what is new are some patchwork quilted scarves.

I’m using cotton batting and fleece, along with the cotton patchwork for the front, and after washing them, they’ve turned out so soft and squishy. They are every bit like a quilt, and I love the idea of having a mini quilt to wear out in public on cold days. We’ll see how they do at my upcoming shows, but I really, really love them. In fact, I’m a little worried they’ll be hard to sell–mainly because I’m unwilling to let them go. I can wear 5 or 6 of them at once, right?

I’m getting ready to go back to work again in a few weeks, and after spending a couple hours the other day going through all the projects that I had planned to finish this summer (haha) something in my brain kicked into gear and told me to get sewing.

I started cutting triangles for this project back at the beginning of my time off. Whenever I had fabric out for something else that I was working on, I’d just hack off a triangle and stash it in my pile. It had been sitting on my desk with all of the other things I was working on for the show, and at that point was itching to start something with it. I held off, and then forgot about it for a few weeks.

As with all projects that I seem to start though, I’ve got dilemmas. I do love how it looks so far, but I’m just not sure that I’m up to par with the sewing skill to pull this one off. I’m going to have to be so precise with piecing, and I’ve already noticed that it’s nearly impossible for me to make the edges line up completely. Where I could normally fudge it with squares, the edges of the triangles won’t be perfect points if I don’t line up my seams absolutely perfectly. Does that make sense?

I nearly threw in the towel after the first row. I seam ripped several pieces (several of those pieces were ripped more than once) and it still just didn’t line up like I wanted them to. My argument to myself to keep going is that I LOVE the colors. And if I can squeak this out, I think it will look amazing. I’m just not so sure it’s going to look amazing in the end. We’ll see.

Oh nine patch quilt….you seemed to simple to make and yet you’ve given me such a bad headache. What to do with you?

I think the best thing for me to do is to be content where I’m at now. I spent another day today making blocks, and I think I’ve been able to achieve a better balance of color and pattern with some of my original blocks. That’s a very good thing to me. There’s still something though that I can’t put my finger on that bugs me about it, but I can’t really figure it out. That’s why I’m going to call it good. At least, I think that’s the plan right now. We’ll see what happens in the next few days when I move onto sewing the top together.

And, to report–I ended up going to the Modern Quilt Guild meeting last night and was so glad to have gone. I had a really good time and I’m looking forward to going back next month! They’re a really nice group of people and I don’t think my awkwardness scared too many people away. (Although I won’t know that until next month.)

Dang, my blog readers are hard core about giving opinions! I’ve really enjoyed reading everyone’s thoughts and I’ve been seriously considering what you all have to say about the both colors. Honestly though, I still haven’t decided what I’m doing.

Here’s what’s new though:

I spent today making new blocks. I added pinks, grays and blacks and I think it’s been helpful to see more colors added in. At first I wasn’t thinking a whole lot about how they’d blend with the other blocks–instead I was just on a mission to make as many new ones as possible and edit from there.

This is what I had made by mid-afternoon. I put everything smooshed together on my cutting table and stood above, and just let the blocks sink in my brain for a while. I realized that there’s some blocks that I really love….and there’s some blocks that I really can’t stand. I started by separating those into piles. Then I added what I thought would still look good with the “like” pile. I feel a lot better about the blocks now, but was depressed to see that instead of having at least what I started with this week when I first showed you this project (30 blocks) and then sewing more blocks today (20 blocks) I am now down to 25 blocks.

I hope no one is disappointed that I don’t have a real answer yet. I’ll be back with more progress on Tuesday.

Oh! One other thing. I’m thinking about stepping out of my comfort zone a little (Hi! I’m totally socially awkward! Yay!) tomorrow to go to a meeting of my (sort of) local Modern Quilt Guild in Brighton, Michigan. I’m very excited about it. Has anyone else joined up with a Modern Quilt Guild? I’m interested to hear how people like them.

Okay, I need opinions once again. I thought about the ideas that you all had from yesterday (thank you for pulling me out of my mini-meltdown with good ideas!), and decided to lay the blocks out again on Kona White and Charcoal. I also liked the idea of Navy as well, but I noticed that too many of the blocks have dark blue in them and it blended in too much. I thought the Charcoal provided a dark color with enough of a difference from the dark blues.

But, which to choose now? (Pretend you’re at the eye doctor.)

Better A?

Better B?

Here’s some important thoughts:

1. I’m not sold on the placement of the blocks. I’m not even sold on keeping all of these blocks in. Heck, I might add more blocks and turn it into a bigger quilt. I just kept them in the same placement as yesterday for consistency.

2. I’m still thinking about adding single 2 inch squares in the corner of the sashing. (Take a look at the picture in the Hip To Piece Squares banner–that’s what I’m describing.) I’m thinking about this, but not completely sold yet.

I’m determined to make this thing work. I’m going to finish it.

I’m not sure, but I think I may have just spent the last two days on a big failure of a project.

I don’t know what the deal is with it. Part of me thinks that I should have used prints and solids in each block, but I wanted it to be busy. I think it needs a sashing in between the blocks, but I’m not sold on the Kona Ash that the blocks are sitting on. Should it be white? Or cream colored? Or should I go darker?

But on the other hand, I’m wondering if I should actually add some more color to the blocks. Maybe it’s too small?

I don’t know. I need to put it away for the night because it’s making me frustrated and angry. Any constructive criticism will be well appreciated!

I really like sewing on rainy days. For me, it’s the perfect setting for catching up on hand sewing projects or getting new ideas started. Luckily, I’ve had no shortage of either over the past couple of days.

It’s getting close to craft show season, so I’m starting to work on getting a stock of things made to tote around the state with me later this summer. Yesterday I finished assembling five lunchboxes, and now they need several hours of hand sewing to finish off the binding on the sides. It’s a little mindless, but perfect for rainy days while Netflixing TV shows on the laptop. Perfect.

I think they’re going to become a nine patch quilt–something I’m really excited about. I was pumped to finish my little quilt last week, so I hope this is something that will go equally as well. We’ll see tomorrow once I get started sewing!