March Cornucopia

 This monthly cornucopia scheduled post thing is working out pretty well, so on into March I go. Collecting links and so on to share at the end of the month. The picture is of a drink I make when I feel like I'm getting a cold, sliced lemons, the juice of one lemon, chopped up fresh ginger, some pressed ginger juice, green tea, and honey.

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The 100 Day Project, I've seen a lot of folks doing this over on Instagram, if you need some art inspiration go check out the hashtag #100dayproject. I haven't decided whether to do one this year or what to do.  Maybe I'll do another 100 quilt block project, or something else like journal pages or something like that. It feels weird to start it in the middle of the year or month for some reason, I suppose I should just settle on something and do it.

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If you're missing going to see art in person, check out this exhibit, Sources of Solace, yes it's online and it's not the same, but the art is very very moving and I felt better after taking the time to go through the exhibit.

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Sign up for for Sister Artists 2 - A collaborative art quilt project put on by The Advocacy Project. You'll get to use an embroidered panel by an artist in Kenya to use in a quilt of your own design.

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Art Gallery Fabrics has a lot of really nice (and free!) quilt and sewing patterns, I particularly like this one pillow made from flying geese. They also have a board on pinterest with 20+ free spring sewing patterns, there's some beautiful stuff  to make illustrated there.

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I learned a whole lot from Fashion Revolution's post Women's Rights and the fashion industry.  #WhoMadeMyClothes indeed!

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Such beautiful indigo dyed and hand woven silks at 7Weaves. I love seeing the process pictures.

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I spent a relaxing hour + watching this video of a miniature art exhibit displayed in a set of vintage printer's letterpress drawers. It reminded me a bit of the 1,000 Journals project.

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If you need a few short stories to read, it's hard to beat reading the entries from the SOA (Society of Actuaries) Speculative Fiction contest. Some really interesting stuff in there.

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A great and easy way to make your own chai tea mix using these instructions from our local garden store.

Into The White

Whew! Finally done with all of the quilting on the Lone RR. 

The small bits of white fabrics are all done. 

I could have used a grey or even black on these, but I thought it would look better with white thread.

I trimmed off the edges a little roughly (ie this isn't "squared-up") and pinned the quilt up on the design wall.

Hey hey, I like it! So close to all done...

 Finishing off this series of quilting process pictures with music videos with "Into The White" which is a fabulous b-side by the Pixies.

Super Worm Moon

 The full moon last night was especially beautiful. And it was a Super Moon, as well as being the Worm Moon. I like the automatic night settings on my iPhone, this almost looks like a daylight picture!

And an update: How a Supermoon Helped Free the Giant Container Ship From the Suez Canal

Stronger tidal effect made it easier to partially float the Ever Given but also gave engineers a hard deadline

Ah-hah! Super Moon to the rescue.

Back In Black

Nearing the finish line with quilting the Lone Round Robin. I've finished all the black thread sections and only have left to do a tiny bit of white. Then I'm done.

I'm very pleased with this corner.

I like how the black lines of quilting slightly distort the precise fabric pattern.

And obviously I have to use this video to close out this post. 

This is a (41 year old!) song that still holds up in my opinion, 

 

Pass It On

I'm going through my stash and trying to pass on usable fabrics to people and groups who could use them.

 One of the groups I follow on twitter, @FoPRR which is Friends of Pine Ridge Reservation passed on this list of Native folks who can use fabric for mask making and quilts.They can also use patterns, buttons, zippers, needles, thread, ribbon, quilting supplies, yarn, knitting needles, crochet hooks, beading supplies, leather and embroidery thread. If you can pitch in and help, that would be great. And if you can't, then please pass on the information to help with getting the word out to the wider quilt-y world.

Lucky Lucky

 

Time for an anniversary card! 

I really loved this design and the idea behind it. 

Because it's so very very true. 

Being married for so long (31 years today!!) it is absolutely an adventure, loving the same person through all the changes and circumstances that have come our way.

Lucky lucky am I. 

Gone Grey

 

I'm done with the grey stitching on the Lone Round Robin. And as you can see by the sort of floppy black/white fabric, I've still got the black stitching yet to do.

And a little bit of white. And then it'll be all quilted and done. I'm really really wishing I hadn't gone all walking foot on this one. It's rather tedious in some spots and honestly a bit boring. Not a big surprise that I like the free-ness of free-motion quilting.

And yes, I've Gone Grey--alllll the way. Talk about freeing.

Sizzix Situation

So now I might have inadvertently turned into a Sizzix hoarder.

I bought a Sizzix cutting machine because of my great experience of using one at a Victoria Findlay Wolfe class at QuiltCon in 2016. I have really enjoyed using it so far, it makes it so much easier to get accurate shapes and is much nicer on my hands. I had a small collection (only 8) of dies that I had used in various projects. But I was putting off buying many new dies until I'd "used-up" the ones I already had. There were new dies coming out all the time but I put off purchasing new ones. But then they discontinued the push towards marketing towards quilters (boooo!)😒

I decided to go look for a few new ones to scoop up before they're all gone...and I went a little nuts on eval because they were super super cheap now! So now I have a whole lot of options. I know there's also a mat that makes the Accu-quilt dies work in my machine, so that's also an option for the future if  I ever get tired of all of these or "use them up".  I put that in quotes because it would take quite a while for that to happen.

Sister Artists 2

The lioness block I chose for the Sister Artists 2 project arrived today. Isn't it amazing? The embroidery is very very nicely done by an artist named Diana Nelima. She lives in Kangemi, which is a neighborhood in Nairobi, Kenya. I only hope that I can make a quilt worthy of it.

If you're interested in participating, there are still some embroidered blocks left to be claimed.

Tassels Again

Once I had the Sizzix cutter out and cutting out tassels out of card stock, I couldn't help trying it out on something a little more flexible. In my scrap basket the Color Catchers I used after the red fabric dye rescue were waiting for me. They're just about *almost* fabric so I tried them out on the tassel die. They cut out perfectly.

This is what the piece that's been cut looks like when you take it off the Sizzix die. The die includes a little separate rectangle to use as a hanger for the tassel. The first card stock I tried it out on was plain white so I marked it up a little so it would be more interesting once it was rolled up. But first I glue-sticked the hanger on the top.

I rolled all the card stock and the color catcher tassels up, using lots of glue stick and then secured them at the tops to dry with binder clips. I used two pieces of card stock on the dual colored tassels because I just thought they looked better that way.

They turned out pretty cool and I think I might string them up with the stars I made with the CriCut.  You'll note, I have yet to try this fabric yet! I'll get there.

Workspace KaleidaCam

There was some down time while I was on hold on the phone the other day while I sat at my worktable. 

So that meant it was time for KaleidaCam. Here are the views of my workspace and the kaleidoscopic pictures created by the app.

Wouldn't this be a whole lot of fun to try and piece?

The design wall and fabric piles.

I actually like the way the Lone Round Robin quilt looks when rearranged like this.

The edge of the Tula Pink box.

Yes, that's about right.

Leftover rainbow strips from AGF from the rainbow table runner.

I love the complexity of this one and the way the fabric designs change.

 This one would make a great ad copy photo for AGF as the end label features so prominently.

A Texture-y Pillow Idea

 I've recently been thinking about long textured fabrics, like deeper than deep shag and how cool they look as pillows. Think Wookie length fur, but not an even allover density like fur on an actual animal (or Wookie). But even more chunkier than fur or hair I guess. (that's an amazon link to those furry pillows so please Note: "As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.")

I think something closer than faux fur (which I have sworn off ever ever sewing again after one too many furry Halloween costumes) would be small strips of fabric. The idea I'm coming around to is to use up a bunch of my scraps to make such a piece of fabric and use it as a pillow cover. A very very heavy pillow cover. I will be using a piece of canvas to stitch this onto to support the weight. But how?

Here's my plan, I'm going to go through my boxes (and boxes and boxes) of scraps, find pieces that are big enough to fit on this Sizzix tassel cutting die. I'll cut zillions of them (note, that's an estimate). Here's what the tassel looks like when made out of two layers of card stock.

 I'll layer the tassel cut out pieces, but flat, not rolled up like the above for an actual tassel. That way I can sew each row along the top part of the cutout tassel shape and it won't be too bulky to sew over. 

Maybe on the edges of the pillow I'll make actual tassels that hang off, that would be added after making a pillow cover. I could see stitching them on with embroidery floss with a chain stitch. 

I'm thinking that having a lot of fabric pieces that aren't dyed all the way through and only printed mainly on one side leaving the other mostly white will change the look of this quite a lot. I'll try to sprinkle those around or at least alternate them with hand-dyed or batik type fabrics.

My goal is cutting all this out of scraps, because I'm absolutely drowning in them here. And I solemnly swear that the bits that are trimmed off when using the Sizzix die will go into an empty pet bed and not back into the scrap box.

Seasick Quilting

 

Well, I learned something new yesterday. It's possible to get seasick right in your own home! I was concentrating on machine quilting the Lone Round Robin and it was an unusually windy day, a very steady wind was blowing. I'm quilting along and all of a sudden I got that awful sudden swooping feeling in my stomach that usually means either an earthquake or the onset of vertigo. Neither of those was happening. It was the constant movement of the palm and redwood trees in the window that was visible in my peripheral vision. I think it was made worse because it was blurry as my glasses don't wrap around and correct my vision. So the quilt was moving, and the needle, and my hands and also the world outside my window. It was too much for my brain I guess. 

Seriously, I stopped quilting and started looking up the earthquake tracker and considering going and laying down until the vertigo passed. Thankfully the seasick feeling went away quickly and I got back to quilting. Guess I'll have to try to remember to close at least that curtain in my studio on windy days. Luckily windy days aren't super regular around here.

I've gotten a lot done on the grey quilting.

The big polka dot fabric corners were fun to do and I like how the swoopy lines worked out.

You can really tell which bits are quilted and which are not.

I had to pin it up on the design wall to check that the quilting isn't adding "too much" to this already busy quilt.

A detail of one of the squares. I came up with this design on the fly and I really like it.

Put Some Beans On It

Beans have been a thing around here since we started quarantining for the pandemic. I went as far as joining a delivery club for beans. Yes, beans. It's the Rancho Gordo Bean Club, which is usually full but sometimes they open up spots. They specialize in heirloom beans and have international projects with various indigenous growers. I highly recommend it, just so that you get challenged to try cooking new things on a regular basis. We try for using the beans at least once weekly in our meals. If beans give you gastric issues, we've found our systems adjusting when we eat them frequently.

The beans of the week were our dinner last night: cicerchie (pronounced: chee-CHAIR-key-ah). It's almost a garbanzo bean, put tastes of peas also. This is basically a version of pasta e fagioli  (pasta and beans). Very simple, easy to make, subtly flavored with fresh mushrooms, Bay Leaf and some garlic. Topped with a little grated parmesan, and a drizzle of olive oil, perfect! I have great memories of my Italian grandparents making this for us when we visited them and teaching us how to say it.

Planning on Putting A Ring On It

 Looking forward to taking another class with Latifah Saafir, this time in April with Bay Area Modern Quilting via Zoom. I'm guessing that it will be a different experience than the pre-taped one I took via the QuiltCon Together platform. Not better or worse necessarily, just different.

I just received my templates and pattern in the mail yesterday, so I'm getting going on selecting fabrics and cutting so that I'm ready for class.

Put A Ring on it is a really great pattern design and there are a lot of options presented. It's going to be hard to decide which way to go. I definitely like the look of the pushed neutral background of the cover quilt, and am considering using a selection of black and white prints. I'm really looking forward to learning how to use the Clammy ruler/templates.

And yes, that song is now stuck in my head, so here you go, so it can be stuck in yours too:

Meg's Dream Finally Comes True

 It was a day she always knew was coming, she never gave up hope.

Someday there would be a pancake just for her.

And when that day arrived she couldn't believe it.

She waited to make sure that this was really a pancake meant for her.

And then she ate it up in a few bites.

The Happy Ending We All Deserve

Green Gone

Cataloguing my progress through the various thread colors I'm using on the Lone Round Robin. All done with the green parts. Onto the greys and then finally, the black.

As I used several different grey colored fabrics in the quilt top, I'm using three thread choices to quilt in those areas.

The darkest, most brown grey went well with this floral. I used more curvy lines to echo the branches and vine shapes in the fabric.

I like how it's visible but not too prominent.

Seeing the last two grey cones of thread side by side, it's really apparent how one is quite silver and one is almost over into gold. Both are rayon.  In some of the grey parts the sections are big so I'll be doing more planning ahead on what sort of design to stitch. Especially in the grey rectangles that have the quotes about the pandemic.