Hello Again, Kawandii

 

Back to work on finishing my Kawandii. It's my #2 on the UFO Challenge list, so I'm really trying to get stitched all the way into the center.

There's a lot of pieces left to anchor down, and a lot of pins.

I love the big needle that I'm using, it's so easy to handle.

To Cover ELIMS

 

I've been looking at this piece, May You Ever Return up on my design wall for a while now, and two of the words stick out way too much: SMILE and REMEMBER. The other words have been disguised well enough or pushed back visually enough to work for me. SMILE has been inked onto the fabric and then zig-zag stitched in brown. I pinned up two embroidery thread colors above the words to see how they looked on the fabric in question.

This was helpful to "make visual decisions visually."

Just doing a close little whip-stitch over the 

I think that helps quite a lot, so I'm going to continue and then work on REMEMBER

Green Snake Stitching

 

There and back again to Spokane, so that meant a bit of time for some airport stitching. I started in on one of the very last bits of Snake in the Garden that need to be stitched, the spiral-ly green pool. Instead of doing random stitches, I chose to follow the spiral printed on the fabric. I might also add in some of the gold green on the other part of the fabric design. Getting close to the end. 

Road Stitching

 We traveled up to my SIL's for Rosh Hashanah dinner, (Shanah Tovah! It's finally 5784) so I got to do some road stitching. I wish I'd taken a picture of the lovely table, but I think I was too busy eating the fabulous brisket that she made for us. As you can see I am using the great project bag that friend Jaye gave me.

Road stitching is what I call it when I take out my on-the-go bag to avoid the stress of being a passenger in freeway traffic. It's safer for everyone, really. Except for me vs, the needle of course.

My trick is to pre-thread a needle with floss before we are driving, that way I can at least get started easily.

One thread's worth done at a time will eventually finish this piece, right?

Work From Away

 

While hanging out in San Diego, I've been attending zoom meetings and hand-stitching during them. Thankfully the hotel internet is working well enough for that. Most of this stitching in the "sky" blue section of my Snake in the Garden piece was done during a SBAMQG meeting and a Creative Strength Training meeting. It was easy enough to multitask and enjoy the meetings while stitching. I definitely wouldn't have done this in person.

I pinned it up on the hotel curtain for a picture to see how all that stitching is reading from a distance. Well, I didn't have any pins with me so I used the needle. It worked well enough as you can see. I'm combining chicken scratch stitching along with some linework in the bigger sections. I may use some machine stitching on this as well. I think some machine embroidery stitches would fit in well and give me the texture I'm going for.
Memo to me: All the glue sticked pieces are still hanging in there for now, but I should get back to nailing down the edges with some stitches.

Pins Out

 

The Pantone Project Postcards (PPP) keep arriving from friend Jaye and I need to make some more blocks to go with them. I was sorting out some embroidery threads during the BAM meeting I was virtually attending yesterday and randomly made this very nice color arrangement.

It somewhat reminded me of this combination from the Stitch Happens quilt. 

I did some stitching on the Snake in the Garden piece during the meeting, it's coming along. I still have a lot of stitching left to do, but I'm getting there. This was started in a class with Pamela Allen way back in 2007.

Stitching through the "snakeskin" was pretty tough, that's a very weird fabric. It was the only piece of fabric on the whole piece that had pins holding it down, and I wanted to get those pins out before they rusted in place.

Whatever glue I used in 2007 really has stayed put. It might have been glue stick, I don't think it was fusible. Whichever it was, it worked, all the pieces are still in place. And the pins are out for good.

Two More to Embroider

 At the BAM Sew Day I picked up two new SJSA blocks to embroider. These two were made by adults and have extensive directions and notes and requests which is quite new to me. Normally I've gotten zero info from the block maker and have had to just proceed on my own. Every single block I've embellished for SJSA has taught me something new, I always research the issue that the block is about, it's been a good thing for me personally to learn about issues I might not have ever thought about.

This block is about the connection between humanity and nature. I'm looking forward to adding the phrase "We Are All Connected" as requested in the space between the trees.

This second one is about protecting trans kids which is a subject I'm very familiar with as one of my children is trans. Sometimes it's all I think about given what's going on in the political environment these days. As a parent, you just want your kid to be happy and healthy and safe, right? It's no different for parents of trans kids, but the threats out there are so enormous, there's a lot to overcome that most people have never spent any time thinking about. Being fiercely on her side and backing her decisions isn't hard, that's the basic job of a parent, right? But it's somewhat crushing to acknowledge the weight she carries of having to continually have to prove that her life has as much worth and value as anyone else's. So yeah! Protect Trans Kids! 

Here's an interview with Parker Molloy that explains a lot about this issue from a trans person's point of view.

Two Blocks Stitched

 

Here are the two blocks I embroidered for the SJSA/BAM quilt effort.

There was a lot of glue-i-ness going on which was a bit tough to hand stitch through. But it turned out pretty well and stitched up pretty fast, once I got going.

These two blocks were great to work on, I can't wait to see how this quilt turns out!

Ocean Stitches

The first SJSA block is in process and is getting stitched. The stiff glue-y situation turns out to be no problem. Although I've had to re-glue-stick some of the pieces that were coming undone. There are some really nice fabrics on this one.

So neat, so tidy! Well, at least it is for me. Not doing any exciting or complicated stitches so far as I'm trying to hustle this along and get them done.
 

Arkansas Blocks

 

Two new SJSA blocks are in my hands and ready for stitching. I'm excited to get started because I haven't done this work in a little while. BAM has volunteered to help with a quick turnaround quilt that will end up getting displayed pretty quickly at the Clinton Presidential Library museum in Arkansas for the Women's Voices, Women's Votes, Women's Rights exhibit. 

Apparently these blocks were made by Arkansas locals, which is really kind of cool. I hope that some of the people who made them get to go visit the finished quilt while it's on display, just to see how their work looks when it's all assembled into a completed quilt.

These are rather glue-y and quite a bit more stiff compared to the other ones I've worked on in the past, so wish me luck on hand-stitching these blocks. Maybe they used a different sort of glue in the workshop?

Illustrated October

 

Starting out on the first of October, here's what my design wall looks like. Kind of a crowded situation.

The eight pieces for the four green pillows are quilted and pinned up on top of the Ruby+Bee challenge quilt top. It's a lot of just about onto the next stage kind of transition happening. So...onto the illustrated to-do list for this new month.

October's Illustrated To-Do

1. First on the list just because they're on the top of my work surface and closest to done. Finish the four green living room pillows, add zippers, sew up sides.

2. Ruby+Bee challenge. Square up, add border to finish quilt top, Make backing, quilt, finish making binding and add. Photograph and enter.

3. Japanese Houses - Sandwich the quilt, quilt it, bind and label.

4. Orange Bullseye- Make a backing and binding, sandwich, quilt, bind and label.

5. Do some printing, Gelli plate or otherwise for the SAQA printers/quilters exhibit.

6. Catch up on making Pantone Project blocks.

7. Now that it's maybe hopefully getting a bit colder, back to working on the Y.E.S. coat.

8. Hand stitch the two blocks for the SJSA quilt that BAM is helping with.

Only By Hand

I'm still spending most of my time in the one air-conditioned room we have (112F today! More than a week of every day 100+) thank goodness we have our power still. So, nope, there's no machine work or rotary cutting from me so far this week of weather misery. Instead, I'm continuing to add hand-stitching to this small, previously beaded and machine quilted piece.

I thought some X's would look good on this building.

And I was right. I really like this variegated Spagetti thread that I've been favoring lately.

When is this piece done? Good question. When it's done "speaking" to me I guess. It definitely needs more beading, so I'll get on that tomorrow.

I would really like to know what the heck I was thinking about this beading right up to the very edge?! Seriously, can I go back in time and gently place my future hand on my past hand holding the rotary cutter and whisper gently, "Stop, think again." What in the world was my plan here? After looking at it for a while, I think it will take a completely hand-stitched small ribbon binding of some sort to contain the edge. Or maybe glue or paint, perhaps just mounting and framing it? 

I'll guess I'll keep stitching and beading and thinking about it, and hoping for it to cool off sooner rather than later please.

Hands On

 

Here I am, using some waiting in the car time today to stitch on my to-go project as my son gets his wisdom teeth taken out. This is a collage "scene" with a lot of machine stitching and hand-beading. You can see the beads on the right. Note, this is a closeup, not the whole piece.

Just some little chicken scratch stitches with the lovely Spagetti (I agree with you spell-check, very dumb spelling of that product) embroidery thread and a nice big needle.  The fabric on the left is a cotton/linen/hemp woven checkered fabric that I dyed and over-dyed. It's one of my favorite fabrics I've ever worked on. The way the fabric took the dye in layers of color, and how it transformed as it was washed several times, the oils from the hemp really do get released and it ends up with a very soft hand.

Working Progress

Three sleeves are ready to hand sew on the backs of the Colorful Triptych. Ready for stitching during the surprise unscheduled January 6th Committee Hearing happening today. Supposedly it's the assistant to Mark Meadows, the former president's top aide. People in DC found it strange that Meadows insisted that she be included in Every Single Meeting, so this woman knows A Lot. Hopefully it will be as well-presented as the other hearings have been.

 And some actual quilting got done, the Courthouse Steps has been anchored down with quilting between all the blocks. But not in-the-ditch as you can see here. I'm still deciding on the remaining quilting design.

Facing the Facings

Thanks to Wonderclips and lots of pins,  I'm getting the facings stitched down on the Colorful Triptych. It's a lot of stitching, because these are quite long but skinny. 

I'm doing the stitching while watching daytime (for me) Giants games as they play on the East Coast, so that means I'm hanging out with the Jawbreaker pillow that I made back in 2020. I didn't have a pillow form that was the right size, so I made my own out of batting and fabric scraps so it's heavy and solid and makes a great lap stitching device.

The Wonderclips really help a lot when you're trying to hold the rolled over edge in place while you stick down the facing an inch and half away.. I still need to make the three hanging sleeves to add on and get the trio hung up on the wall.

Old Friend New Stitch

After more searching for the Blue Squares binding (still can't find it), I came upon an unfinished project that yelled out to me quite loudly that it needed to be worked on. I was in a listening mood, being a bit frustrated that I couldn't lay hands on the binding and got out some embroidery thread.

I started this piece way back in 2007, which is 15 years ago (eep) in an EBHQ class with Pamela Allen. 

It’s mostly gluesticked together with a few pins here and there. And after all these years, it's still stuck together. There are a lot of layered parts that will be a little fiddly to stick down. The idea, as I remember it, was to hand stitch the edges of each piece and then to fill in with more stitching either hand or machine. I didn’t get too far on it back then and I guess it got tucked away.  But now it’s out of storage and getting worked on once again. It's like getting a visit from an old friend you hadn't thought of in a long time.

Still have to find that binding though.