Just back from a working weekend at the Oregon farm, where autumn looks like it's nearing its end. Most of the leaves are down, so that meant lots of raking and flower bed cleaning. The chickens are laying eggs - they're delicious! However, two of them decided to turn into mean girls and started pecking the feathers off the other hens. Badly. So enter Hector! He's a very nice rooster - and within half a day had the hens shaped up.
The scarf from the handspun alpaca/merino wool I bought in Vermont is almost done. It's so soft and warm - perfect for keeping my husband warm when we're next up at the farm! The pattern is from The Purl Bee here - very easy. There's just something about cool days, cold nights, a warm fire, and knitting .... they're meant to go together.
Happy Creating! Deborah
Okay ... every time I think I can't be surprised by what fiber artists are doing, I find something that blows me away! A few days ago I found the most amazing amigurumi animals I've ever seen! Now amigurumi is something I play with every once in awhile - and I usually go half crazy with all those tiny stitches.
Then there's this family in Vietnam who makes the smallest crocheted amigurumi I've ever seen!
They have an Etsy shop under the name Suami (the youngest member's nickname) where they sell their work - definitely take a look at it and the additional photos on their blog!
And if you want to try some arigurumi that's a bit bigger (and hopefully easier) the pattern for this sweet sleeping mother and baby fox is available free on the Michael's website.
Happy Creating! Deborah
Oh boy ... I've been AWOL from Blogland this week sewing a dress for my granddaughter, little c. It's a simple type of dress, but I kept running into big problems with the pattern - and then kept making silly mistakes of my own! Like sewing an arm on inside out, which for some reason is something I do every so often!
The pattern is Burda 9503. If you haven't used Burda before, I'd think long and hard about it if you're not very experienced in sewing and if the pattern isn't marked "easy." Burda is a European pattern company and from my experience, the translations on the instructions tend to be difficult to understand. And they're pretty sparse! Burda patterns didn't used to include seam allowances on the pieces - they do now, however it can be confusing to figure out just how much of a seam allowance they're talking about!
If you do decide to use this pattern, here are some of the problems I ran into and how I fixed them:
Okay - the first one isn't a problem with the pattern! It's the way I was taught to mark things on patterns, like dots and where buttonholes go. I always thought everyone did it this way, but I keep seeing odd other ways, so I thought I'd show you what I do. Using thread in a color that shows up well against the fabric, go through the dot all the way through the fabric and pull leaving a fairly long tail. Go down through the dot the other way and pull through leaving a large loop. Cut the thread off leaving a long tail and cut the loop apart. Take the pattern off.
Then slowly open up the fabric being careful not to pull any of the threads full. Clip threads down the middle so that you have thread markings on each piece of fabric.
Now on to the problems! The first one is that when I went to pin the neck binding on, it was not even close to being long enough. So I had to cut another piece of binding that was longer. Luckily I had enough on the bias to do this! That problem was easily solved.
The biggie was in the button placket. For some reason, the instructions themselves were hard to follow and nothing seemed to go together the way it looked in the diagrams. So after struggling with that, I finally ended up making it work, went to make the buttonholes, and - nope. The placket was so thick, my machine wouldn't make buttonholes in it. The plackets did turn out much thinner than I thought they should, which makes me think the problem may have been in how big the seam allowance on them was. Seeing nothing to the contrary (and I've scoured those instructions again!), I made them 5/8 inch. I ended up having to take the plackets off (this was after top stitching them and having them totally finished .... not fun!), cut new plackets since I wrecked the first ones getting them off, and re-sewing them using a 1/4 inch seam allowance. This worked much better, so I'm thinking the instructions might have meant to say that ....
Anyways, it's finished!
And I have to show you a close up of the buttons - I love them! They're from Joann's.
Happy Creating! Deborah
The International Quilt Association's 2013 Houston show winner's have been announced and there are some stunners! See a complete list with photos here. I'll show you a few of my favorites!
Melissa Sobotka's Chihuly's Gondala is amazing! If you haven't seen a Dale Chihuly glass art exhibit, he has done several pieces where he fills wooden boats with his handblown glass floats - it's beautiful. Melissa saw his exhibit at the Dallas Arboretum last year and was so inspired she created this art quilt. I'm awed by the way she worked with color, texture, depth, ... all done with batiks and inks. Chihuly's Gondala took the Best of Show award. See more of her work (including costume design!) here.
I always love Jane Sassaman's work - it's fun, fresh, and colorful! Her quilt Illinois Album won the Master Award for Innovative Artistry. I really like the black border with the quilted leaves and the way it frames and emphasizes the center. To see more of her work, check out her website here.
Karen Sievert's A Truly Feathered Star incorporates beautiful quilting - I'm always impressed with the intricacy of great traditional quilting. See her website here for more quilts and a schedule of workshops, too.
And if you're in the Houston area, the quilt festival continues through Sunday in case you want to check out all the beautiful quilts yourself!
Happy Creating! Deborah
