Little practical things and more quilting

Some of my studio time this weekend was used for a couple of needed practical things. I made a padded bag for my new car navigation assistant. I made the standard writstlet that I have been making and added a center divider, so that cord would not scratch the screen. I also put a layer of quilt batting in the bag to provide cushion.




I also realized that I needed one more cloth grocery bag, so made one out of the leftover bedroom curtain material (that I have been getting a lot of mileage out of!). I used the basic Morse bag dimensions. This one does not a have a flat bottom like most of my other bags, but I think that's OK.



With those two projects done I then turned my attention to finishing the quilt for Andrew & Sarah. As you can see from this picture, the pins are out. I finished the machine quilting yesterday then added the binding and did the hand sewing last evening.





I added the label for the back this morning. Just the basic message, who it is made for, with love, my name and the date. Now I can't wait to give this to them. I think it will happen sometime in February, we may be making a visit then.

Free Motion extravaganza

I spent time yesterday doing the free motion machine quilting on Andrew and Sarah's large lap quilt. I pulled my machine into the center of the room, put a table behind it and set up my ironing board to my left. Like so:

It was great fun and not nearly as cumbersome as I had thought it would be. I did a sort of large scale stipple. The black on black is almost invisible, here are some of the more white squares that show the quilting more obviously.


I ended the afternoon with a very numb right thumb. I guess I was a little too excited and clutched the fabric too much. Feeling is back in my thumb today, so no harm done.

In the spirit of Every Day Creative and inline with my goal this New Year I plan to post more often. I want to record what I am doing in my every day way to infuse creativity into my life this year.

If you are a lurking reader a comment of encouragement would be appreciated. What are you doing to keep your creative spirit alive in your life?

Creative Every Day

I have joined the Creative Every Day 2009 challenge. A very low key group. I want to use this commitment to spur me to get to the sewing room/studio more often and with less expectation and judgment. The theme for January is Play. We hosted an open house recently and in preparation for the "play" I found it necessary do some sewing projects.

In the waning hours before the event, a couple of things suddenly became an eye sore (to me) when contemplating entertaining. Items of very minuscule import that most probably only enter my consciousness. I do feel better having made them and will enjoy them.

1. Made a new set of oven mitts. (This fabric is from old bedroom curtains, at least 20 years old, a classic and durable Waverly print)












2. Recovered a very tattered chair seat:












3. Make a table mat to cover an unattractive table top.













So here's to a year filled with projects large and small that meet the challenge of infusing my life with creativity.

Great quote on sewing

I was just reading Marcy Tilton's newsletter and really like this quote:

"This I know: the act of getting my hands, heart and soul into making & inventing something brings great pleasure. Where there was once a neatly folded flat piece of cloth, suddenly there is a dimensional garment. In spite of setbacks (buttonholes gone bad, unintended puckers, 2 left sleeves.......), I return to the studio with passion and hope. Some days the act of stitching something together, smoothing out wrinkles, shaping an edge, tweaking a pattern, screening in a bit of color, all add together to make a feeling of joy that is almost beyond words. "

I often try to describe to someone what I get out of sewing, this sums it up so well. I am not at the designer level as Marcy is, but do very much identify with the intent and effect of the creative process that she describes.

Here's to "joy beyond words" in sewing adventures.

Christmas makings

Now that Christmas is over and the gifts have been given I can share some of the hand made gifts I gave this year.

For my son and daughter in law I wanted to make a tree ornament that said something special about 2008. So what better than to remember the campaign and election of Barak Obama? I snagged a photo of the Obama symbol from the campaign web site and proceeded to copy the shape for a round ornament. It was fun to do and turned out pretty nice. Andrew and Sarah really enjoyed receiving it and agreed that it will be a good remembrance of 2008.

For my each of my two sons I wanted to make a boxy shaped bag with a zipper. I followed the tutorial here, well I tried to anyway. The first time I got the width and length of the body transposed and ended up with a rectangle instead of a box.
It was amazing to me that I got almost all the way done before I realized that this object was not short and wide but long and narrow. Oh well. Andrew liked it and does feel he has a use for it. It actually is a good size for tools.











For my musician son I wanted to make a boxy bag that would hold CD's. This time I carefully thought out what the dimensions needed to be and actually measured a CD case. (how clever) I used a piece of fabric that Nathan had given me quite awhile ago, something that spoke to him while visiting JoAnn's with a girlfriend. I did not get a sewing room photo, so here you can see Nathan with it on our sunny Christmas afternoon.












Last but not least, the big ta da. I decided about 2 weeks before Christmas to make a quilt for Andrew and Sarah. My husband is making them a very nice blanket chest/coffee table and it occurred to me that a lap size quilt for the inside would be very useful. I selected a pattern with very large pieces and enlarged the lap size so that it is basically almost twin size. I went with a black and white colorway so that it will not show the dog hair of their black dog too badly. Needless to say I did not finish this before Christmas. It is pieced and pinned together, and that's how it was wrapped and given to them. They really liked it, here they are holding it up for a work in process photo. Since I knew they would not be going home with the quilt, I did whip up a set of 6 cloth coasters out of the black and white fabrics. No photo of those, sorry.









One more item to share. While Andrew and Sarah were visiting Sarah mentioned that she wanted to make a dog bed for their dog out of an old egg shell mattress pad, folded to a 36 x 46ish size. So, we went to Joann and found a really nice piece of purplish fur on sale. Sarah also wanted to line the bed with mylar insulated batting so that it would feel nice and warm to the dog. Sarah and I worked on this yesterday. We had to add a strip of black duck so that the piece was wide enough, since the edge of the fur had a very loosely woven selvedge. Here you can see Sirius quite contented with the results.

Getting ready

Just a quick post to show one more wristlet, on its way now to a certain little girl who likes pink.

Also, some gifts for David under the tree, wrapped in fabric gift bags.


That's all I can share now. A surprise is in the making...

Early Solstice gifts

I made up this bag to share at the gift exchange of my circle sisters. I "stole" the design inspiration from the Pink Lemonade Boutique web site. She has made some really nice bags with colorful fabric combos. What inspired me were the circles connected by lines and the use of rick rack. I made a basic fabric bag to wrap the gift in.
After making the bag I decided to make a wristlet to match it and then to make a wristlet for each of the other women in the circle.

Actually the bottom one, the spider fabric, is for me. Aren't they sweet? I loved making these and imagining who would get each one. Here's how it came down. Barbara got the circle rick rack bag with it's matching wristlet. (note the witch accessory fabric used for the lining and the and wristelt) Margaret and Merrill each got a dragonfly one. Molly got the greenish one with peace doves. Cathy got the one made out of the Japanese fabric that I made a blouse out of. Judi got the one made out of the Chinese girl fabric. Emily will be getting the blue fern one via the mail. Very fun work, and I am proud to say that every zipper was a thrifted or hand me down one. Some of these old zippers have waited a long time to be put to use.


Here's to making something to give away, I hope you find time to share your creativity with those you love.