Patterns In LA

I've been in LA this week as my DH attends a conference at the LA Convention center and so I've been walking around the area, or taking the metro, and going to museums. This is the very interesting entrance to The Broad museum.

These next two were taken by accident when I didn't turn my phone camera off and kept walking. It was 97F and I was in the direct sun, that's my excuse. But they capture the excess of pattern one can see in a city (or really anywhere) if you look at things from an unusual angle.

I thought I'd be able to capture the shimmer of the heat-haze of the day off the street and buildings. But maybe it's only visible through polarized sunglasses?

This overlap of both grids and the angles of the posts of the storage system inside The Broad is such a great design.

In the downtown main library, the cupola dome is really gorgeous and pattern-filled.

There's a great exhibit about the building of the library nearby and they included these detailed color and pattern guides to some of those patterns. I bet there's a book out there (or maybe in that very library) that contains all of them. How about any of these as the center of a medallion quilt?

The old library card catalog drawers are still there, but glued shut, still look very cool though.

A riot of patterns looking down into the new wing of the library.

And then one of many interesting mosaic doorsteps. This design would make a great quilt.

Final Fabric

 

I very much enjoyed my slightly postponed birthday lunch with friends Jaye and Tim last week. I still can't believe that I'm sixty now, but that's a whole 'nother blog post. After lunch we had a look around at the nearby Granary quilt store. I was very restrained and didn't buy the FIGO space dyes fat quarter pack that I was drooling over. Instead I opted for just one single FQ of this really interesting purple (that they had in lots of other colors) and 1/2 yard of the teal tracks fabric. 

I also got another bottle of unscented Best Press as mine is finally running out. I think I go through a bottle a year. Tim told me about using a vodka and water mixture to press out wrinkles in fabric and I am very intrigued to try this. Sometimes even Best Press won't work on some wrinkles. He also mentioned to only use very cheap vodka like the stuff for sale in plastic bottles, don't waste the good stuff, got it.

I also picked up a little mini windsock pattern. It has the metal rings included, it looked like a fun thing to make. They had some of them made up as examples in the shop and I thought they were pretty cute.

Will this be the final fabric purchase of the year? Most likely yes. Unless you count the pre-order I made of the beautiful Kona color of the year, Nocturne.

The Last New and Circles

 

My order from Sewtopia for additional Ruby+Bee fabric to finish my challenge quilt arrived. And of course while I was there (on the website, not in the actual store in Utah), I had to order some sale fabrics, a pin and some checked webbing. That's it, no more fabric buying for the year. I'm officially full up of fabric now. 

I love Happy Sew Lucky patterns and was so happy to see this pin which I will wear during the next few months as I write my political postcards.

Two Ruby+Bee solids, Rain Cloud and Turmeric, two Carolyn Friedlander prints to add to my collection. Someday I'll make a quilt with just those fabrics, maybe one of her patterns. A button print in the oddest colors, the background is almost a match to the Turmeric solid. And a very cute tossed calendar print to use on the back of my calendar quilt.

A trip to a LQS with friend Jaye, The Granary led to two more fabrics getting tossed into the final new fabric purchases pile. One a really interesting layered print by Valori Wells, and a fabric that I'd resisted buying earlier, the completely made-up just-for-fun Crytptids of the National Parks. This will be the backing for my National Parks panel when DH and I go traveling when he retires.

An interesting table runner pattern from Atkinson Designs. I'm pleased to see it offered at the same price online and for the .pdf version too. Not sure which month this will be for in my monthly table runner rotation, depends on which fabrics I choose.

From Sue Spargo online, after resisting the Toned Down Circle Sampler pattern several times I broke down and got it. It is sold with a kit, which I didn't buy as I have a lot of embroidery threads and I don't need to exactly replicate the pattern's colors. That led to me making a database (of course) of which embroidery threads I do have on hand. That was quite a fun diversion to look through all of it! And yes, I have plenty to do this pattern. 

This wool/acrylic Ellana thread was the only type I didn't have so I bought the kit pack. I already have the Sue Spargo book, Creative Stitching, that explains the stitches that are combined in each circle.

2Folios 2gether

 

I need to confess that I was hiding the fact that I actually made not one, but two Hold-Tite Folios. One for me that I already blogged about, and one for friend Jaye's birthday gift. Now that she has it in her hot little hands, I can go ahead and blab about it too.

I'm glad I took the time to change my thread colors for this visible stitching.

The felt that I used is a wool blend, but the type of felt isn't terribly important you just need something to help block the Sew-Tiles from glomming onto each other from either side of the folio. Magnets gotta magnet, you know...

I took the extra time to hand sew the binding down and it looks much nicer on both sides. This is me, always learning that particular lesson over and over again. sigh.

I also added a little doubled-over ribbon pull tab on the outside to Jaye's folio like I did on mine. I found it really helpful for opening the folio up easily.

Mine on the right is completely filled, both sides with Sew-Tiles, so it's expanded up to full size.

Heavy Metal Sewing

After receiving some great new Sew-tites from friend Jaye for Christmas, I decided it was finally time to make myself a Hold-Tite folio, using the pattern designed by Lilyella. It's a fairly simple pattern, and it was very fun choosing the fabrics to use for the various pieces. As you can see, I put a stripe of black/white polka dots across the front just because.

Time to insert the two sheet metal pieces which the pattern is designed around. They fit perfectly and leave plenty of room to sew around them without hitting them with the sewing machine needle (pshew!)

Here's how the inside of the folio looks so far, showing the vertical stitches that makes the folding part. I can't decide whether to use the purple felt or an orange one that I also have. But that's the very last step, I have to get the outer edge binding stitched on first.
 

Day 2 of Labor Day Sew In

Sunday I started making an insulated iron tote, from a pattern no less. I'd had all the ingredients for it sitting on my worktable for quite a while taking up too much room. And I got it all done pretty quickly except for the fastening bits where I was stopped in my tracks looking for four largish buttons. First I tried non-matching but I didn't really like this look.

Then I got obsessed with finding four that matched and had to re-sort a large part of my button drawer. "Somebody" had dumped one of the larger containers and the bottom of the drawer was a sea of loose buttons.  An hour later I found these black ones that have lovely etched designs on them. But then I couldn't find my buttonhole foot, and gave up sewing for the day. So much getting tons done on the second day of the Labor Day Sew-In.

Another potential fabric painted for ATC's, this time with Tsunienko inks.

I really like having a colorful clothesline.

Wandering Wednesday - Patterns of India

 Last year my husband got to travel to India for his work, and he took a lot of pictures, especially of patterns that he noticed.  I thought you might enjoy seeing some of these, mostly mosaics, but some stonework as well as wood.  Many of them are from the inside of various domes which make them even more extraordinary.  See any quilt design inspirations?

Class Samples

Here are the samples I made recently when I taught a short class about mark/pattern making on fabric to my quilt group, CQFA. Marks made by Lego Duplos, non-skid cushy rug mesh, bubble wrap, make-up sponge, and my favorie the square carpet castor.
Also a styrofoam meat tray is carved and then used as a stamp for the lower left image.

Knobbly rope is wrapped around a scrap of foamcoare and then printed for the cross-hatching image on the upper left.

It was fun demonstrating what I like to do with such an appreciative audience. And teaching just this little bit shows me how much work it is to put on these kinds of classes (and I didn't even do a handout or anything). But hey, it made me get my painting stuff out of storage which is a good thing, right?!

Sewing in the Works

Not quilting, but sewing nonetheless! I can't show you the quilt I made this week for the final Journal Quilt exhibit at the Houston International Quilt Show, rules and such. But I promise to post it when we're allowed to. I'm really happy with how it turned out, and am pleased with myself for getting and keeping my act together just enough to complete it.

Anyways! I made a cover for the futon that my son is keeping in his room as a flopping couch. It used to be his mattress, but now he has a real one from Sleep Number (quite pricey, but he sleeps much better now). He chose the fabrics from the great cheap fabric.com website, arranging them on the comparison page they have. I have just enough left over pieces to make some pillows to go with. He really is into blue these days, and these fabrics go very nicely in his blue-walled room. And then we are working on converting a queen sized couch/bed frame we no longer use, down to a twin size that will fit the mattress and his room. He's rather excited about chopping up furniture!! Something about using a chainsaw possibly...


And finally, I've got a coat in process for the challenge/contest on my QuiltMav friend Diane Harmon-Hoog's business Quilter's Threads. It is the Baltimore Coat from Purrfection, I'm making it in a brown lightweight ultra-suede type fabric, it is shiny and smooth on the wrong side, so it will be unlined. I don't really need a super warm long coat here in California. The contrast is the same fabric, but in green, my plan is to machine embroider before assembling the coat.. The race is on to see if I can finish it by Sunday!

She Still Shops by the Seashore

While picking up the spanking new single hole throat plate (sounds slightly risque' no?) at the local Janome dealer, I scored some threads on major sale, three machine cottons on cool wooden spools (future doll bodies I bet!), and one starry blue Halo. No, not Halo3 related. (Sorry, feeling bugged about buying violent video games lately!).

And a Diane Ericson pants pattern. I really was captured by the details on the bottom of the pant legs, and also that they are cropped. I feel like I can get away with wearing cropped pants since I'm so tall with long legs. Plus my ankles and calves are my best feature at this point! Note the name of the pattern "The Capitola Pant", and yes indeedy I purchased them in Capitola. (A town just south down the Pacific coast from Santa Cruz).
And if I happen to *actually* make these up in *real life* (as opposed to just in my ever hopeful and optimistic imagination), I promise to show you a picture!

Patterns on my Mind

Ooh, do I ever have patterns on my mind. Being out in nature, camping does that to me every time. I see patterns everywhere, and they get all my worn-out creative synapses snapping again And looky here it is the middle of August, and I haven't done anything for the Self Portrait Challenge which is all about patterns.

I took this photo of the rock dome at the Olmstead Point view turnout on the Tioga Road. The pattern on the rock just amazed me. I think I will make a screen or stamp out of it for printing purposes. Tioga Road or Highway 120 is closed during the winter months, it is at such a high altitude and gets so much snow they don't bother plowing it at all. So once you are finally up there driving around, you realize how crazy it was to even make the road in the first place! I'm glad it is there though, since I don't think I could make the backpacking trip that it would require to get from Yosemite Valley (4000ft elevation) up the Toulumne Meadow area (8400ft elevation!).

Then I combined it with a photo of me sitting on the shore of Lake Tenaya taken by my son, Zach. This is my absolute favorite lake in the whole world. The water is cold (of course, it is snow melt!), but so clear, and no yicky decomposing stuff on the bottom of the lake. I think not much lives in it compared to lower elevation lakes. The sandy beach is all granite sand which is different feeling than most beaches one goes to. Also there is a steady wind, coming up from Yosemite Valley, so there are continuous, small, very quick waves. Think of the ocean as a grown-ups' heartbeat compared to a babies' heartbeat.

I was really bummed that I forgot my swim suit, otherwise I would have gone in, cold or no cold.

I'm proud of myself that I figured out Photoshop Elements enough to do this! A little fiddling and concentration was all it took.