artsy-crafty babe

Anybody still out there?

And just like that, almost 5 years have passed. 5 YEARS!!! (well, almost 5 years, but still!)

I'm still around, though this little corner of the web has been collecting cobwebs and dust bunnies. I spend most of my time over on Instagram, it's just easier. I do pop back over here to remind myself of something I've worked on or a family event, but that's about it. Between Typepad's recent upgrade and my remapping my domain to my new website I thought this blog was a goner. After a little dusting off I've gotten it back to where it was, mostly. There may be some broken links and missing photos here and there, but most of it is ok. One day I'll get my act together and corral my digital life in one spot, but that day isn't today.

I really do love going back over my old posts. There are so many precious memories here! I should probably update my About page, but I love it! It brings me back to that sweet time of life when the kids were little and things really were insane. The kids are mostly grown now and we're not quite as busy, but we're older and get tired more easily, so it all balances out. One thing that has remained the same is that being creative still keeps me sane (and don't peek behind my closed doors 😂)

I can't promise that I'll be back here before another 5 years pass, but this space is still alive for now.

**photo above is my most recent make

 

Loops and Ladies

If you've followed my creative endeavors over the years you know that I've dabbled in many things. I've always loved starting a new project! The majority of them involve fabric of some sort.

A few years ago I decided to concentrate on one thing to see where it led - solid colored fabric + hand sewing in mini quilt form. At first I was focused on the loop. I explored following the curvy line, changing colors to make a fluid composition. That was fun, so I kept going.

The loops morphed into larger loopyish circular shapes. I relaxed my rules and allowed lines to end. My designs got a little larger.

And then they got smaller. I call these Micro Minis. These little ones are so much fun! With these, the enjoyment came from playing with color. I also experimented with different stitches while quilting. The small size made them perfect for experimentation.

Have I mentioned I did all of these completely by hand? No machine sewing whatsoever. Slow sewing all the way!

About a year into my journey I got the idea to turn my "loops" into recognizable forms while keeping the fluid line aspect. It was after hearing a speaker at church talk about The Theology of the Body  that I got the idea to make my "ladies". Like most women, I've always struggled body image. At the time that I heard the talk I had already been working on loving and accepting my own body, so it seemed like a good fit creatively and personally.

There were some experiments with flowers along the way, but those didn't stick. I have yet to quilt any of those. In fact, I have yet to quilt and finish most of the things I've pieced over the past 2.5 years.

I have so loved making my ladies! In the year or so that I've been making them, they have evolved from small, simple forms to a bit larger, more complex forms with wings. I'm not sure where the wings came from, but they work.

With each one I discover something new or try out a different technique. Recently, I've relaxed my hand sewing rule and started machine sewing the outline of their bodies once I get to the quilting phase. Previously, I hand sewed the outline of their body with clear thread. Before that, there was no outline and they were entirely quilted.  I like the definition the machine stitch gives them. I'm not opposed to machine piecing them if I could find an efficient way to do so, but for now my hand sewing method works. I don't think I'll ever change the hand quilting aspect, that's my love.

This is an ever evolving process, nothing is set in stone. Looking back, I've come a long way...and I'm excited to see what the future holds!

(All the photos above are from my phone.I'd like to start using my camera again. Baby steps!!)

LA love

LA as in Louisiana, of course.

Keeping with the same theme as last time (gosh, however long ago THAT was), another one is finished. Louisiana love. Y'all, I'm stuck on these mini quilts! Right now, they're just the right speed for me.

This one isn't as I originally envisioned, but that is my fault. I was too impatient to do it how I wanted, so I compromised. The good news in this is that the original idea may come to fruition eventually. I'm pretty sure it will, actually.

It started without a plan, just an idea I had to get out. Once it took off, I knew exactly its' purpose. It was to be a gift for a dear friend moving home from out of state. Perfect. (it hasn't been gifted yet, so cross your fingers that she likes it)

I thought of her often as I was making it, thinking good thoughts and offering good wishes.

I think the stitched parish lines are my favorite.

If I were to keep it, I'd probably do something like this.

Love.

P.S.

It feels good to be here again!

Last month (okay, 2 months ago now!) I wrote about slow sewing and why all this crazy hand sewing fits in my life for Sew Mama Sew. Check it out if you’re interested ;-)

inspired by Lulie

I’m sure you’ve all see the work of Lulie Wallace. I love her style! The color, pattern, whimsy – I love everything about it. Last year for my birthday I treated myself to one of her prints. It took me about a year to find a home for it, but now it resides on my bedroom wall surrounded by lots of other fun prints I’ve collected over time. (that empty frame is will be filled eventually...I'm not too speedy at decorating!)

When I look at my wall, it’s that print that always catches my eye.

While in my mini quilt phase (which is still going strong), the idea popped into my head to make a Lulie Wallace inspired mini quilt.  I looked at several pieces of her work and chose elements that I could interpret into a quilt.  It was meant to be my summer long project, but I got so caught up in it that I finished it in a few weeks.  Well, almost finished – I think it sat longer waiting for binding than it took to do all the appliqué and quilting.

This was one of those projects that just flowed.  Love that.

The background was machine pieced then the flower arrangement was needle turn appliquéd.  Next was the fun part – the quilting!  Hand quilting is becoming my favorite type of hand work.

I’m not done exploring this medium. There are so many ideas I’m eager to get out of my brain that I wish I could finish them in an instant, but then that’s not really the point, is it? I don’t think I’d like them nearly as much if I were to machine quilt them (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Weird. I've always been a process girl, and this process makes me very content.

Right now, sewing by hand feels right, so that’s where I’ll be ;-)

 

pinwheel mini

Last fall I stumbled across a beautiful old handmade quilt at an antiques store.  I wanted to bring it home, but it wasn’t in my budget.  I did think to snap a quick photo. That quilt never left my mind.

Since then I’ve done some quick searches to try to figure out the pattern, but I never really found anything. Honestly, I didn’t look all that hard.  Do you know what it is?  I assume it is some sort of pinwheel variation.  I found something similar, but it wasn’t quite the same.

One day it dawned on me to reproduce it.  So I did, in mini version.  Have I mentioned I’m obsessed with mini quilts at the moment?

I didn’t hand piece my blocks like the original, but I did hand sew the rest.  The hand quilting is my favorite part. This is why I’m in love with mini quilts. Hand quilting a mini - yes. A full size quilt, uh, I’m not quite on board with that just yet, but I’ve jumped into crazier waters ;-)

 

sewing for sanity

Life is so very busy right now! I know one day I'll look back and wonder how I ever did it, but right now I'm living for the slow times to catch my breath. These kids [and life] of mine sure keep me on my toes.

During my down time (which isn't nearly enough) I've fallen back into hand sewing. Y'all how I love to sew by hand. When I'm feeling stressed and overwhelmed nothing calms me down like the movement of my needle through layers of fabric. I crave it.

If you follow me on Instagram you've seen this project pop up a few times...remember when I started this? About a month ago while looking for project to take along on a road trip soccer game, I rediscovered it. I threw the project, some fabric scraps, and my sewing pouch into a bag and hit the road. My original idea of turning the dresden plates into personalized mini quilts for the two youngest girls never did materialize, but I still had the urge to do SOMETHING with them. With no plan other than wanting to sew by hand, and a few hours in the car, I jumped in and started sewing.

The Dresden Plates had already been appliqued and quilted, but the rest was a blank canvas. I decided to fill in all the white space with patchwork. Because it was already a "quilt sandwich", the patchwork got appliqued and quilted at the same time. It was so fun!

Once I finished filling it all in, I went back and added more stitching. I finished the first one all too quickly, so I went on to another. I still have more quilting and stitching to do on this one and they both need to be bound, but I'm very happy with how this project is turning out.

(pssst - that stack to the left is my work on a new bag pattern - can.not.wait. to share!!! yeah, i'm a little bit crazy ;-))

dishy

So, when I have 3 days at home thanks to "Frozen Freak-Out 2014", I am able to make things and blog about it.  Three days at home with 4 kids and a husband with the flu.  I am SO READY to go to work tomorrow.  I'm kinda sad that it's only one day, then we'll all be home again for the weekend :(  (sorry, cabin fever!!!)

For a while now our dishwasher has been broken. I'm not sure why we haven't replaced it or gotten it fixed, but we haven't. It's hand washing all the time around here. After washing many, many, many dishes over the last few days I decided to make a little something to make the process more pleasant.

What I usually do is layer 2 dishtowels under my dish rack to catch all the water.  It's ugly and not too effective.  The dishtowels get drenched and I have to use 2 because none of mine are wide enough to cover all the area I need.

My solution - a mini dish quilt!  It fits perfectly under my dish rack.  It's wide enough to catch the dripping water from glasses on both sides ;-)  The batting and quilting make it absorbant.  And best of all, it's pretty!!

One side is an ikat home decor fabric I bought months ago when I was searching for new drapery fabric (that I never bought).  The other side is simple patchwork of a gray quilting cotton, navy twill and ticking.  I could have used 2 solid pieces of fabric, but I love piecing :)

I made it like a pillow with a layer of batting on one side, fliped to the right side, then quilted with straight lines.  It works great! If I'm feeling fancy, I'll use the ikat side, if I'm feeling not so fancy, then stripes it is. The only issue is that now I need another one to use while this one dries out :-) Not a problem!!

 

 

dresden plates

School started back up about a month ago and now things are in full swing. I’m not gonna lie, it’s kicking my boo-tay! Dance, soccer, volleyball, baseball, football, religion, aggghhh!!! I don’t know how we’re doing all this. Right now I’m thankful that I’ve managed to help them with homework, pull meals together most nights, and have their uniforms clean. It’s a very delicate balance...at any moment it could all come crumbling down!!

When I noticed things (in my mind) were getting frazzled, I knew that I needed to find a “me” project to work on. Something portable that I could work on where ever, or just have near me (in my bag) for comfort.

I rediscovered a Dresden plate project I started months ago. Back when my Grandmother gave me the quilt, she also gave me a few Dresden plates that she had made. I wasn’t really sure what to do with them, but I started by appliqueing them onto a piece of fabric. That’s where I left it. My thought now is to turn each one into a mini quilt - one for Ava and one for Ceci.

I’m not sure exactly what I’ll do, but I do know that they will each include things that are personal to each girl - embroidery, more applique, perhaps some stenciling. I feel out of my comfort zone doing such a thing, but it feels good. I’m excited to see where these go.

liberty pillow challenge

I am thrilled to be participating in Sew Mama Sew’s  Liberty Pillow Challenge.  The challenge was to make any kind of pillow I wanted using fabrics from the Liberty Stile Collection.  I received 8 fat quarters with the guideline of using at least 4 prints.  That’s easy enough, right?

The timing was perfect because I had just finished a slipcover for a little club chair that was in need of a pillow.

First off, I must tell you how absolutely YUMMY this fabric is.  I’m hooked.  I want more.  More more more!!!

My biggest challenge was deciding how I was going to show off these lovely prints. I was initially drawn to the darker colored prints because those coordinate best with my home decor, so deciding which ones to use wasn’t too tough.  

After a little thinking, I decided on a diamond-y cross shaped design.  I’m sure there’s a proper quilt name for this, but I don’t know.  This design is in my kitchen rug (which is not a quilt), so I did a little math and figured it out myself.  I’m pretty darned pleased with myself that I was able to do it!

To keep the quilt theme, I added some batting then quilted along the horizontal seams.  The back of the pillow is a simple envelope closure made from two of the prints on the front.  I rounded the corners then bound the edge of the pillow with the lightest of the prints.

I had a lot of fun planning and making this project.  Thank you Sew Mama Sew and Liberty Art Fabrics!

this quilt

I've written about this quilt before.  It was started by my grandmother many years ago for my mother, but it was never finished.  The quilt top was pieced using bits of clothing worn by my mother, her sister, and my grandmother.  It sat boxed up for 40+ years, then was given to me.  And what have I done with it?  Absolutely nothing, other than talked about it here a few times. I let it sit.  Six and a half years later I've decided to finish it.  Quilts are supposed to be used and loved, right?

At the time it was given to me, I had little quilt experience.  In fact, I don't think that I had ever completed a quilt, or if I did it was only a small one.  Taking on such a project was completely overwhelming.

It's a big-ish size. And hand-stitched.  All the quilting done thus far was done by hand by my grandma.  I know for certain that hand stitching was completely out of my realm.  Beyond that, it wasn't put together like the quilts I had seen.  I wasn't really sure what to do with it.

It didn't have a bound edge. Instead, the ends were folded over and the batting didn't quite go all the way to the edge of the fold.  It was sort of a mess.

But now?  I'm pretty confident in my quilting and hand sewing skills.  I have a whole bunch more experience under my belt.  I pulled it out Saturday afternoon and decided that it had been long enough.

The first thing I did was rip out the stitches on the foldover, then cut off the edges and squared it the best I could.  I'm sure I decreased the size quite a bit, but it had to be done.

On Sunday I quilted it - not by hand :)  When I first got the quilt I thought I would finish it how it was started, but I wanted it done.  I snapped on my walking foot and went to town.  I worried about tucks in the fabric because it was kind of loosey goosey, but the walking foot worked wonders.  I followed the same pattern my grandma had started.  After a few hours I was done, then I started in on the binding. 

I chose something from my stash, a green dot that fit right in with the other fabrics in the quilt.  I had one almost identical to the tiny green dot, but not nearly enough. 

As I was hand stitching the binding it occurred to me that I get my love of bright colors and polka dots honestly.  I could have picked out these fabrics today.

As soon as I was finished with the binding I couldn't wait to get it into the wash.  After close to 50 years in storage, it was beyond icky.  I crossed my fingers and threw it in.  I felt that the seams were strong enough, but I was iffy on the batting and the bright RED backing.  Would that old fabric bleed?  Would the batting clump?

I'm happy to report that it survived and came out of the dryer clean smelling and fluffy!  It puffed up quite a bit, much more than the quilts I usually work on.

And now we have another quilt in our collection.  I think it just might be my favorite.