Works in Progress - How things Progress!

Right now I have a few projects finished up and a few  more that are well, you might say, IN PROGRESS....

The Done One is the pillow from a t-shirt project that I have had in my sewing room for at least 6 weeks and I kept studying it and thinking on it -- I was unusually determined to make it Perfectly Right so I did alot of thinking on it and making those little decisions about a project that can make a huge difference.  One decision was to go and buy the inside 'rope' that you get to make a cording around the edge of a cushion.  It was a bit more difficult to work with because of its stiffness, (as compared to my created cord of crochet cotton yarn) but I am really glad I made that choice because it gives a better definition to the edge of the cushion.  Another decision I made was to use two layers of fusible interfacing on the t-shirt so that it would hold it straight and firm -- and that was a good decision too, because this t-shirt has been worn and was slightly stretched at the lower front and had a teeny tiny hole in the fabric!

Now, working my way back, to the projects that are closest to being done...

They all are actually in the just beginning stages but some are much more 'ongoing' than others.

I am still enarmoured of the 'Many Trips Around the World" quilts and so have been working on blocks to create another quilt top to donate to my guild's charitable quilts program.   Even tho I took the time to sort through the two shoe boxes of 3.5 inch squares for just the pinks and greens, there is probably still alot of pink and green squares, so I am thinking that I will do a narrow dark green border on this and then randomly add pink and green squares to create an outside border.  This will make it a nice size quilt for a twin bed....

 

And of course I almost always have something growing with yarn and the crochet hook -- a granny square/ round motif afghan.

 

I saw, on Pinterest -- actually my cousin Judi sent me the link - an afghan made of very colourful circles surrounded by white - It has been preying on my mind now for weeks!  In fact in a previous post on this blog I complained how difficult it is to find bright clear yarn colours here in BC....  So I grabbed the opportunity to go with another cousin, Cindy down to Bellingham, WA last week and was able to pick up some brighter colours than are found around home...

 

I was thinking that I would use a cream as the background/connecting colour but now I see two blocks put together, the cream "muddies" up the brights, so I am going to change that to white, before it progresses any further...

 

Still to add to this pile of part dones are pink and red, and pink and burgundy, lavender and purple and light and dark blue.

 

 

And there are things that are barely off the "drawing board"!  Both of these projects are drawn by me on scraps of paper and are from a couple of other Blogs on the internet.  The first is a Woven Square Quilt Block - and handily it uses 3.5 inch squares and 3.5 x 6.5 inch rectangles and is on Sew Happy Geek from way back in January 2012  (click on the underlined bit and it will take you directly to a tutorial of this block)   I am just doing the Woven Squares, not the whole sampler style project, tho.

 

 

 

And the other Work in Progress is still on Paper, nothing cut and no fabrics chosen but it is one of those that will wiggle its way into my head and I will have to do at least a few blocks just to see how it works!  It too comes from a blog post more than 6 months old which is at What Comes Next and it too is a tutorial which makes it so easy to get done that much sooner since I won't have to figure out measurements, etc.  AND What Comes Next is practically my Neighbour, just west of me in New Westminster, BC!  So check out this idea and perhaps try it out for yourself!

 

 

There is just no end to what is happening around this house!

 

I would include a photo or two of the Forsythia and the Daffodils beginning to bloom here in the Fraser Valley, but my Niece in Winnipeg, Manitoba is fed up with my bragging about the beautiful weather here while the snow blows and everyones toes are getting frosty still...  Soon Winnipeg, soon the green grass and mosquito hordes will be upon you! hahaha...

 

The Afternoon Nap

I have an interesting mix of humanity and creatures in my household...  I have a very peaceful household...  Everyone seems to enjoy the company of everyone else...

Figuring out how Bloglovin Works...

Follow">http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/5665503/?claim=9ffeg9z3y6u">Follow my blog with Bloglovin

As many of you know Google reader is ending at the beginning of July and even tho I have not really got into using Google Reader I thought if many of you have you might find it convenient to be able to follow my blog in the NEW BLOGLOVIN which seems to be very similar to google reader.  Anyway, just over there on the sidebar is the button to use to follow my blog, if you are so inclined...

If you have not yet registered with bloglovin, simply go to http://www.bloglovin.com and follow the prompts to register.  It is just a bit more complicated if you are a blog and want a button so others will follow you, but I found it, and so can you...  no, really it is easy...  Go take a look.

If You went to a Retail Store...

What would you pay?

For a Leather IPad case?

 

Some time ago, I bought a leather skirt at a thrift shop and took the panels apart. The skirt cost me a shocking $7! And yes it is real leather, not a man made material that imitates leather...  Now a bit of that lovely skirt, is partially remade into an ipad case.

And.

So simple to make!  I did buy a pack of Leather needles to use in the sewing machine so that was $6 but of course there was 5 needles and I can use them again and again.  I simply measured the size of the ipad and added an inch all around.  I cut the two squares of leather and then using heavy duty Heat n Bond, fused flannel squares cut to the same size as the leather for the inside 'lining'.  I then sewed around three sides, made a leather overflap and added a decorative bit of fabric on the edge, then a button to close the flap and VOILA`!!  I have a Ipad case...

Took me about 30 minutes including sewing on the button...

 

There is still alot of leather to be used from that skirt -- I'm gonna have to think up things that want to be made in leather.

FINALLY - the SB Quilt Tutorial!

just click on where it says Tutorial - Sidy Blocks Quilt...  Pictures and words to help you create Three different sizes of this quilt pattern.  Enjoy!  or if you don't see the tab just clik on this link...

http://susanbeingsnippy.blogspot.ca/p/blog-page.html

Work in Progress - And Done

I'm working on ANOTHER "many trips around the world", this one using up the pinks and greens in my TWO shoeboxes full of 3.5 inch squares... 

It can be a bit tricky to keep the colours in order and in their diagonal line, so I made up one block and tacked it on the cork board that I keep just behind my sewing space -- along with the instructions, patterns or other works in progress details so that they don't drift too far from where they need to be handy!

So far, I have got a bit of a stack of the pinks and greens and I still have alot of squares to use up -- and you do know how "one thing leads to another" -- well, I am sorting the blues and browns into piles in preparation for the next 'many trips'!  This has become quite the addictive block!

 

The unpressed stack! It grows so very quickly and once you get going the thought process is almost automatic -- tho I do have to admit, I did have to do a bit of frogstitching when I just got too far in the ZEN moment...

 

 

I think another 4 blocks will make a nice size couch throw, but there are probably enough pink and green 3.5 inch squares cut to make another 11 blocks for a good sized twin...  I guess it depends on when I get tired of looking at pink and green, eh?

 

And finally a finish on a quilt that I can't think of a name for, but my friend Helen keeps calling it an SB quilt!  Flattering and I may just leave it at that -- she has already done a few of them and I keep promising a tutorial with size variations -- later this week I hope.  Just other more pressing things in life than playing on the computer...

 

 

And of course, Walter must get his two bits into the story, so there he is inspecting my piecing and quilting.

 

Oh, by the way, you might notice that the quilt is hanging over a dresser.  Recently I had a mishap with my ironing board -- it collapsed!  Which was not unexpected actually.   A couple years back I was walking along my street and there was an old ironing board sitting by a big blue garbage bin -- being the scrounge queen that I am, I made my DH go get it and bring it home, the ironing board, not the garbage bin, that is.  There was nothing wrong with it and it worked very well this past couple of years, but I suspect there was just too many times of Walter jumping up on it and so the latch that holds up the thing gave away....  So now after that big long story, I decided to bring an unused dresser into the sewing room, which, with adding stapled padding to the top has now become my new ironing board but also allows 6 drawers of storage space underneath it! Nice!

 

Hope y'all are having an very creative week! And are you visiting the "Beat the Winter Blues" Blog Hop? Lotsa giveaways, and some very nice blogs to check out! And of course don't forget the weekly Wednesday Works in Progress link up at the Needle and Thread Network -- all Canadian Blogs

 

 

March is Crochet Month - Sunday Afternoon...

What else to do on a quiet Sunday afternoon but to crochet granny squares together, into what will soon by a child size coverlet.

 

And to do it while watching The newest episode of the Mentalist, and to run to the kitchen during commercials to make a pot of Chili for the Men when they get home from work.  (We don't get normal weekends in this house -- work is done when it is scheduled...)

Do you have a project on the go for Crochet Month?