2013

For 2013 too.

Happy New Year!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HST magic :) (lots of pics!!)

There are many tutorials on the web for making hst fast and easy. Here's one that'll give you 8 hst in a few minutes. I did not come up with this one and don't know who did, I just want to share...
First you start with 2 squares, one colour for one half triangle. Mine are Christmassy red and white.

Put them on top of each-other and draw 2 diagonal lines and sew on each side 1/4" from the line. So far nothing new.

Then cut: 2x diagonal, 1 horizontal and 1 vertical like this:

Press them open and cut them to the exact size (mine are 3 1/2 ") The precision trimmer by Martha Mc Closky is an absolute wonderfull ruler for that!

And tadááá...8 perfect hst's

Ah, the possibilities!

Unfortunately we need math. Don't worry, it's simple:   

 

              (A+1/2")x2=B

Meaning: A is the unfinished hst and B your starting square.

My hst is 3 1/2". Add 1/2" makes 4". x2 makes 8. So my starting square B was 8".

For safety I added another 1/4". If you are just as accurate as Harriet Hargrave you need not do that.





 Now what to do with these? Make a Christmas pillowcover that's easy to put on and off your cushion!
Sew your block of choice together and put a piece of thick fusible fleece on the back and quilt it if you want.

Then the back. Same hight as the pieced block but for the width, cut a piece that's approx. 1 1/2 the size of the pieced block.

Cut that piece in half

Make a seam on the cut edges

Put both pieces on top op your block, right sides together, overlap in the middle

Sew the overlap to secure it and then sew all the way around.
Sew a lockstitch all around to prevent any fraying.

 Turn, put a cushion in the pillowcover and enjoy!

Time for Christmas

My opinion about stitcheries was that it's rather lame and oldfashioned. Probably due to the "jolly"season, I did make one though :) And found it fun to do as well. Who would have known..haven't done any embroidery for over 30 years or so. I just started with no knowledge whatsoever to hinder me.

(found the pattern at red-brolly.com)

But now that it's done, i don't really know what to do with it. Shall i frame it?? Make a pillowcover??
Problem with the latter is that I ran out of large pieces of solid red fabric and ofcourse solid red is the only option I want. I found a piece of somewhat darker red and I guess that'll have to do. No fabricshops in the neighbourhood that sell solids and no patience for ordering online..Besides, i would never get it in time for Christmas anyway.

(Mmm, looks brighter in the picture than in real life...)
Weighing the options, I took a break to surf the net mindlessly and i read this post. Just what I needed! Let me share:

I rest my case.

Odd jobs

According to my dictionary, i have been doing "odd jobs", meaning that i am my own handy(wo)man.
Never heard of the expression, but truth is that i have been very busy doing all sorts of things that had to do with my toilet, bathroom and kitchen. After 26 years things needed a upgrade. Real renovation was far to expensive, so I put my painting clothes on and went to work!
New wallpaper above the tiles (no, we don't have tiles from floor to ceiling), a chandelier in the toilet (!) and new shelves there too.Painted the spaces between the tiles (is "pointing"a correct word? Grouts?) so now they're white again, scrubbed the same things on the floor. Those are grey again instead of black

Repeat in the bathroom

What needs to be done is finding a suitable towelrack and new bathroom cabinets. Hang the mirror and put all the stuff back. Gone are dirty tilegrouts, black fungusspots between bath and wall and old/worn out accessories. Today I finished another job: putting a blackboard sticker on a kitchenwall. Tricky, since the decall was 53x2.00 mtr. It turned out fine and I immediately wrote all sorts of stuff on it. Never knew that actual writing on the wall was so much fun to do *lol*

Inbetween i helped DS moving from one studentdorm to another ánd managed to play with fabric.

I had fun making some wonky dissapearing 4patch blocks. The result reminds me of kitchentowels:)  I think I'll make some more; it absolutely needs more red.. It'll have to wait though. First we are celebrating "Sinterklaas", the Dutch equivalent of SantaClaus (actually the other way around...), i'm going on a househunt with Quilting DD, Christmas is near (decorating!!) and much more.
Only 3 more weeks 'till my Christmasbreak..pfffff....!

Glowing...

Last saturday, C, Baking DD and I went to the "Glow" exhibition in Eindhoven, hometown of the Philips factory. Glow is an annual event in which there are moving light projections on buildings (that alter the building completely) and other arty farty light objects.

 We really liked these giant lampshades, that changed colour. C made the pics, including the artistic one below. Yeey for an I-phone, when you forget to take your camera:)

The startingpoint was in an old, abandoned factory, for the occasion turned into a café/bar. The old building had something to do with textiles: giant spools were displayed and all the tables had a sewingmachine in it's original cabinet at their side. One machine caught our eye...

A Lada! Special to me, since my car is a 20 year old Lada aka "the Russian Mercedes". (it says "made in the USSR"on the fuel tank lid). Never knew they made sewingmachines as well. Turns out the sewingmachines were Czech and not Russian..

Finally i did some "glowing"myself; couldn't resist.
Nothing quilty to report. I'm still handquilting the same project. I did play around with fabric the other day, but it's too soon to show. Next time perhaps!

Featherweight tote/dustcover part 2

When i get an email from someone who loves something i have sewn, but needs additional info, i'm happy to oblige since there's at least one fan. *lol*
So with more pics and more "how did i do it" the Featherweight tote/dustcover again!

 First things first: was it my design? NO. Was it my idea? NO again. the only thing i did was combine 2 tutorials into one. So credit where credit is due.
The paperpieced block is to be found here and the bag pattern here.

The bag is intended to protect the Featherweight IN it's case.

...and what would a heavy pic post be without at least ONE flipped over....

The original bagpattern is for a white FW which is a bit smaller than the black ones. The PP block also is bigger than the given patternparts, which is good since i wanted to make a bigger bag!

My bag front is 11.5"x11.5", WITHOUT seamallowance. Just add your fav seamallowance; mine was 1/4".

The PP pattern swapped two pattern parts, but if you look at the overall pattern, you should be okay.

The piping adds extra sturdiness but I found it a real pain to sew it as tightly as possible. i made the piping myself sewing a cord in a ready bought piece of bias strip, using a zipperfoot.

 Afterwards i cut a 1/4" seamallowance. I didn't know any other way to get it as I wanted.

 The bag pattern says you have to iron interfacing on the liningparts. I used a fusible fleece (Vlieseline H640) and ironed it to the OUTER parts. The fleece gave a sturdier bag with more padding to protect the FW. By ironing it on the outerparts, the paperpieced block was more secured as well. Mind to sew the PP block UPSIDE DOWN!

 

The reason that i made the bag higher is not just caused by the measurements of the paperpieced block. I wanted to fold it over the machine. My machine foot clip is in the case lid. It probably fell off once onto the machine, since my letter "s"is chipped. To prevent that from  happening again I needed protection on top of the machine.

 The details were embroidered on . The original pattern says "the perfect portable" but i declined on that much lettering and put '221k4" instead. Transferring the text can be done by taping it to your window as use sunlight to see through your fabric. I took a Sewline pencil.

When you use the bag as dustcover, you'll find you'll have extra space on top (remember as a bag it is folded over) No problem. With the fleece and piping it will stand and if you have to put your machine in a tiny space it still works :)

Hope this all makes sense for those who want to make this too. I mean: I know what I'm talking about but hopefully you do too :)

 

Happy sewing!

New quiltshop :)

Today C and I went to check out the quiltshop that a former employee of the fav quiltshop, started. (do you still follow) Since fav quiltshop closed it's brick and mortar building, she was out of a job and decided to follow her dream!
It was a bit of an adventure to get there; it was outside town, near the river ánd a road was closed. The house is just behind the river's dike! Gorgeous!

Ah! a quilt showed the way:)

Outside....

 C's new allstar sneakers reflected in the lovely teacabinet...

 Willeke, the owner, has a great eye for detail and everything was displayed very nicely. Even the towelrack in the kitchen was worth a pic..

..and check the view from the workshop area!

I bought a pair of scissors to match the Featherweight

For those who live in the area:
"Fat Quarters" in Culemborg. www.fatquarters.nl  and her blog http://colourfulaffairs.blogspot.nl/

Tomorrow, C, Quilting DD and I will go out again to a quiltshow in another lovely little town..Busy weekend!