On Shannon’s request.
Darn iphone, I’m hopeless at self portraiture with a regular camera, iphones make it nearly impossible. The makeup looked way better in my mind and a little better before I tried to use one of last year’s contact lenses. That was a mistake, my eye still hurts.
Thanks to Gillian too, for the inspiration.
Cute new stencil that appeared under the Go Train bridge this week:
I love public art!
We parked right beside this adorable little stencil art the other day, on Bloor.
This took way less time and agony than usual. I don’t know if it’s because (most of) the fabrics I used were decent quality and all the same weight or if it was because I figured it out all on my own. I won’t go so far as to say I designed it, haha, that would be too strong a word, but I certainly didn’t use a pattern or directions to finish it.
The backing is a Japanese fabric I am addicted to, from Designer Fabric Outlet on Queen West here in Toronto. I also used it in yellow on Maggie’s doll quilt and have plans for a yard of green in the near future. I used the black ikea fabric to bind. I even did a proper hand embroidered label this time round.
I have to say, I am pretty pleased with it. And while it hasn’t got a destination yet, I am sure I’ll figure out a home for it sooner or later.
Just when you (and I) thought I had given up on quilting completely, I went ahead and finished one quilt, made another and started a third. Go figure.
The first one was for Saira and Michael’s baby, Kiran. Yes, I’d made her a sweater too and given the quilt over at the baby shower, but I hadn’t actually finished it completely, so I took it back home and it sat for a while. Spurred by my last visit there, I got up off my duff and bound the shit out of it. It’s done and it’s awful cute.
The front:
The back:
Now don’t be asking me what the different fabrics are: I don’t know. I’m not fussy/obsessive about that sort of thing, ok? The pictures don’t really do it justice anyway, it’s way bright, the binding is mustard yellow bandanna print fabric. I used variegated thread on the top to quilt it and red on the back. I don’t have a walking foot so it’s a little lumpy.
The quilt I made and finished and shipped off to Meeps, I forgot to take pictures of. Maybe if I asked Ashley nicely she’d post one.
And finally, I don’t know who this is for, I was inspired by various flickr groups and realized that a zig-zag quilt would be super easy, so I crunched some numbers (and flopped all my fabric stash around a lot) and came up with this:
The orange, black and white with orange/pink/black are all from Ikea, while the tiny floral pink fabric is from India, I got it from a vendor at a trunk show at the workroom. I’m planning on using light pink to make a border (or sashing, right?) and then more of the same orange to bind. Light pink again for the back, or maybe dark pink. We’ll see!
Ari was sent a giant package from Japan including this micro lego set. It’s a little beyond Ari’s abilities (or rather, her patience and willingness to build something so detailed) so after her and Shannon completed the first 4 levels, I took it over and snapped a picture at the end of each level. It was most satisfying and I’d collect all the sets of this amazing toy if I could (I also completed all of the smaller sets of animals she got).
Then Shannon took over and created this flash file, which was probably just as much work, if not more.
Yay for collaborations!
I know, it’s been a long time since I blogged about the greatest store on earth, Value Village. To be honest, not much has changed there and I rarely go any more. I trickled over today to look for plaques, like, award plaques for a project I’m working on and to do some donating. The lady accepting donations was very nice, I told her about coming home around 10 pm last Friday night and watching a family (adults and children about Ari’s age) rooting through bags left as donations. She told me that they know who they are and that they do it regularly.
This is stealing. And the donations that are left strewn about are usually ruined by the weather making them unsellable too.
I did find some treasures today and if they’d been priced a little lower, they’d be with me right now. The first is this beautiful green sculpture which is reminiscent of my high school project called Reclining Poo (which, incidentally, I broke, glued back together and still have!).
Hand made, can you tell? Only $2.99. In hindsight, it almost seems worth it.
This next guy is made of painted pebbles and he has a yarn cravat:
He’s exactly as cute as you think he is. Also $2.99.
And this pig. I used to collect pig things when I was a kid, this is something I would have begged for.
I resisted this time.
I did get some good scores, 2 plaques and a small trophy AND a copy of Gobblet, a game we’ve had the Jr version of for a while. And really, I only paid $5 for all that stuff, so maybe saying everything is over priced there is an exaggeration.
And this is for Ali, who will know why-feel free to post on facebook or wherever:
How is your skush anyway?
Jana came upon an ad on Craigslist for free…stuff, I think it was a free bonanza really, and she kindly thought of me for the 4 giant boxes of fabric scraps. Lots of it was scary (polyester!) and unusable (biodegrading as you watch!) but some of it was super cute and vintage. There was a tiny bag within of tiny scraps of adorable flannel and I knew right away what I wanted to make.
Small, cute, perfect. I’m kind of following the instructions above, but as always, I am also doing my own thing. My squares, for example, are 2″x2″. As you can see, until I was interrupted by a certain someone’s bed time, I managed to cut 81 of them. I have more to cut, I think I’d like it to be 100 squares total, then a border, then binding.
And a close up because it’s worth it:
The kids fishing from a canoe is so cute, I wish I knew where it was from. I’d wrap my entire life in that stuff.
The original fabric I was going to use for the background of this quilt did not work out so well (it was a black light weight denim) so I had to do some quick improv. I wound up getting fabric at Ikea because…well, because it’s cheap there. I couldn’t make up my mind, like, when does that ever happen? So I went with black, orange and yellow.
Yeah.
Now I can’t decide how to organize them. Here’s where you come in.
1.
2.
3.
#1 was my original plan and then I turned a couple of the blocks and came up with #2. Then I wondered if it was a little busy, so I made a checkerboard, #3. I just don’t know.
The further possibilities (although time is a huge factor, I’ll be sewing on Tuesday) are to get rid of a colour (probably the orange) and just do a black and yellow checkerboard or stripes or…Agg. It’s endless. And I wish I’d also bought red fabric.
Help? Mommy? Anyone?
Sewing, sewing, sewing. Ironing, cutting, bandaging blisters and more sewing. Yes, I have a blister on my pinkie finger. From scissors. I’m intense, it seems, with shears. Today I spent about 3 hours at the workroom organizing my previously sewn together bits which were then pressed open with spray starch and a dry iron. Sorted together into stacks of three-random with no repeats-and sew together in chains.
Here’s a big chunk of chain, once I got the ball rolling:
It looks like a lot because it really is a lot. I used 50 strips of fabric sewn together in 2′s, then traced and cut out 10 double pieces then sewed 3 double pieces together. Somehow, when I do the math, it doesn’t come out even, but it DID somehow, come out with no extras. I like that. My quilt will have 9 solid rings.
And boy, do I like the workroom. It’s so pretty and refreshing and there’s Maisy saying hello and hoping for a tasty morsel. I did bring tasty morsels, but nothing for a dog.
Walked home via Dufferin Mall and ironed all my new seams flat. Washing the background fabric so it’s nice and fresh for Thursday.