Unable to Settle

I had a reminder to back-up my laptop the other day, and it also prompted me to organise my photos into folders, sorted by month. I needed this more than I knew, I had been writing myself and this year off as unproductive but it turns out I was wrong. Up to a point. And that point was late June. Yep, I fell off the productivity/sewing mojo/whatever you want to call it bandwagon at Midsummer.

Stash pull for bed runner.

Since then I've covered every available surface, the corner of the sofa, our rarely used for the actual purpose dining table, sewing table, sideboard, etc... with must start projects. I've started each of them. None of them are finished. Few of them have been picked back up beyond the first week of starting. Honestly, I've never felt like this. I don't know what I'm doing. I do know I can't force myself to finish them all, I'll end up like a toddler or teenager rebelling against the overbearing strictures of my own self. Which is too much internal strife to bother with.

Some are more important to me than others. For instance, my dad does need a hat. His hair really is falling out, he's distracting the other bridge players and it was 5°C/41°F when he got up to walk the dog last weekend. So even though I barely ever knit, I'm the world's slowest (two Christmases passed before Paul got the scarf I promised), I've never knitted in the round before (but the newly bald shouldn't have to deal with seams), and I have real trouble paying attention to which stitch I'm on, this project is a definite priority.

I've had a 5 month hiatus from the Farmer's Wife quilt. I miss it, this block is not the most fun colours of the ten I've prepped. And that was my mistake. I meant to only prep 5 at a time from now on. But the colours distracted me and I selected for ten before I knew it, and then felt compelled to cut them all out. It went swimmingly till I reached the templates. They took me two months, and stared at me accusingly from the dining table all the while (yes, we eat on our laps).

I also knocked into it scattering the nicely laid out pieces...

I still love my colourful Death Star idea. When I started I got intrigued by trying to make my stitches less noticeable, so I tried some stuff. I got some good results, but finding a new stitch and then getting a rhythm with it is not easy. So I put this down again. Now I'm in two minds. Do I continue trying to make my stitches invisible, noble sure, I guess, but super time-consuming? Or do I go back to my FWQ regular whipstitch which I can bust out like nobody's business? I'll enjoy the process of the latter more, but will I feel annoyed with myself at the result, or once I'm more than a foot from the quilt will I even see the stitches if they're in a grey or matching thread? Ugh, these are the questions that have left this project sitting on a tray on couch, neglected for more than a month.

The others are all little projects, a giant cushion cover from leftover hourglass blocks, an elongated quilted cushion in Echino as a draught excluder, and a stash pulled bundle to make a simple bed runner just like the ones I made as wedding gifts.

One final thing, I've recently taken up and have found surprisingly meditative is free motion quilting. The #dailyfmq tag appeared on instagram, set in motion by the Crafty Planner. I've only spent like 3 ten-minute chunks at it, but I've enjoyed each of them, learned something each time, and discovered it's possible to slip into a nice peaceful state while you're at it, until you get too peaceful, make a mistake and then it all goes to hell! But everyone at the hastag is so lovely and helpful, I've definitely been encouraged to keep going. Which is amazing, because I swore right off FMQ the last time I tried (February) until I had a better machine (still the same machine).

Rio Grande Valley Turtle, pattern by Melissa of My Fabric Relish

So, I do have three big quilts in the works, one approaching top completion, one approaching block completion, and one with half the top fabrics washed (not my normal game but these fabrics apparently require it - more to come!). You've already seen Texas, so no more till I have something actually finished. The other two I'll blabber about in the next few weeks as I get a chance to take photos and get them in order in my head, more than anything else.

It's going to be interesting to see what I do manage to settle to in the rest of 2014. This year has been a test for me in very many ways, and I'm eager to see how I fare coming out of it. I think I might be growing up.

Knitted Dinosaurs - an almost complete work in progress

This week, I've been mostly knitting as the most pressing pre-Christmas deadline is the last post from Ireland to England for parcels! My sister is spending her first Christmas away from home this year, down in Brighton. So it's very, very, important that these parcels arrive on time. For some reason, I left her dinosaur to last to knit... True, the pink stegosaurus was more pressing (having to travel to Australia via Washington D.C.), but the blue allosaurus won't be handed over until a couple of days before Christmas at the absolute earliest!!! Clearly, I have prioritising issues.

Just so you have an idea, here are the finished dinosaurs!

The fearsome Allosaurus - on the hunt for biscuits, near you!

A stegosaurus for a little girl.

And the state of the one to be posted Friday....

One dissected dinosaur!

I just finished knitting all his legs and horns and tail clubs today. Tomorrow it will be a frenzy of stitching and stuffing to get this guy ready!! Wish me luck.

My other works in progress this week have been the quilting on my bed runners. Two quilted, one to go, and then the binding to make and put on... Here's one I quilted earlier :)

There's another (secret) quilt waiting in the wings to be quilted and bound as well. So I've plenty to keep me busy along with all the regular Christmas shopping and prep.

This is my first time linking up to Freshly Pieced's WIP Wednesday, can't wait to see what other people are making!

There is a plan. A Flannel Savanna Bop Plan!

I have been meaning to write a post all week. Everyday it's seemed more important to be sewing or knitting than writing. But now, on Friday night, my mind is a-buzz with all sorts of half ideas and half plans that I know I need to get some of it out or I'll just go into meltdown (or go back to procrastinating).

Inspired by Katy's 'getting the ssshh done' post, I am going to recount what my mind has planned to do between now and Christmas/New Year. This way I might see that I'm being utterly mental with this list, and totally over-reaching, or more hopefully it will distill the entire thing into a clear and manageable project in headspace.

First off, I have this pile of quilts to baste, quilt, and bind.

Thomas Knauer's Savanna Bop and Amy Butler's Cameo (quilt backs at bottom of pile).

The top two are the front and back for a baby's quilt, made of Savanna Bop flannel. So soft, and easy to work with! The next are three footwarmers/bed-runners all made from Amy Butler's Cameo collection with the blue at the base being their backing. There is one more quilt (turning out around 60" square) which is a total secret (as it is a present for a blog reader). I can't WAIT to share this quilt - I love it, favourite one so far - but I can show you this:

Hopefully it will remind him of Fruit Salad sweets, among other things!

So, that's five quilt tops that need basting, quilting, and binding. So far, EVER, I've made 2 quilts, and a partial top which I gave up on (temporarily). eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

I have all of the materials in stock, and just need to pick up a few new thread colours which are easily gotten in our local town. Then, I decided that it would be so much fun to make most of my Christmas presents this year (thoughtful and frugal). However, I may be overstepping my sewing abilities...

Other projects to finish and/or start are:

A Cameo cushion...

A coffee pot cosy...

A scrappy Echino phone cover...

A third pajama monster...

A, hopefully, manly scarf...

My first SisBoom Beauregard bear...

And, mostly finally, a third knitted dinosaur (not as pictured!)!

I may add another cushion to that list. If I'm not pulling my hair out when I'm a little further on. But who wouldn't rather make a cushion instead of heading into the cold, wet, and Christmas shopper-filled streets!!  I can't wait till there are some finishes, and I can show them off properly here! Though some things will have to wait until after they're gifted.

In the meantime, I'll keep sewing and knitting. And when I feel the urge to share I'll show you some of the other crafty things that have kept me occupied over the last year!

This bloggy stuff is fun! And my head feels a bit de-buzzed now too :)

happy days.

Tea Cosy I Have No Use For... gives me a sad.

I thought maybe it was time to introduce a little of my knitting. It's always for a specific someone and invariably takes three times longer to do than I expect! This piece of knitting, however, I decided to do on a whim with leftover wool when I was off sick from work.

On Ravelry I found a pattern for a Checkerboard Scarf by Kimara from Wee Folk Art. I love the texture the finished product gets, and am using it to make a scarf for my sister's boyfriend this Christmas.

This picture doesn't do the texture full justice, but it's the best I've got...

I didn't need another scarf, plus by the end of February in DC the temperature is already holding steady in the height of Irish summer range! But I had leftover batting and backing from my first quilt, so I thought - why not make something that requires quilting... All of these things came together into a strong desire to make a tea cosy for a teapot.

The Irish are a nation of tea drinkers, shown clearly in many episodes of Father Ted, so I've grown up surrounded by tea cosies (old ones; sodden and brown from many years of spills and being placed too close to the hob to keep the tea warm). I've also listened to plenty of complaints when trying to find new cosies that keep the heat in the tea. So I knew quilting techniques would definitely come in handy.

Here is the quilted sandwich, just waiting for me to wrap around the backing to create the binding. I attempted mitred corners with some help from the internet - it did not quite work out. I think because of the height of my quilt sandwich, this was a very thick batting. However, it has stopped me from trying using the backing as binding again on a quilt!




And, the final product!!

I'm very proud.

Once, I'd proudly finished the tea cosy. I realised that we don't have a teapot in our flat. But then the boxes we'd shipped over arrived and I felt sure I packed my trusty red 2 cup teapot - but NO! I didn't... I do tend to just make myself enormous mugs of tea and just drink them, but teapots are lovely to have when there's someone visiting. So lovely to sit and sip and re-pour and chat away.

I couldn't leave my on-a-whim-with-leftovers cosy to be forgotten in a corner, so I brought it back to Ireland and gave it to my parents. Renowned for their minimum of 3 pots of tea on a weekday. I thought it would be used, loved, petted each day! But, no, they declared it too good to use and no amount of declaiming this on my part would change that fact. And so it sits, in a corner, in Ireland, only rarely petted by me when I'm home. A sad end, one I hope to change someday! I think the best part about making something is seeing it used regularly. That's where true love of an object and the reward for the effort I made exists, I think...

I still loved making it! I think I'll go give it a pet now.

A :)