....Enough that we could break out the cross country skis we got for Christmas LAST year and finally have the chance to use them. We never had enough snow last year to use them! It was fun to get out and use them finally. This was Sunday last week.
By the next day, it was 50 degrees here, and all the snow melted! So weird. We had rain and thunderstorms for two days.
Today's Thursday, and the local schools are closed due to snow. We are supposed to get up to 10 inches of snow between today and tomorrow. What weather! Even the university is closed! I can't believe it. But Sweet Pea's school is open. She is one really unhappy camper!
EDIT: I totally posted the wrong video! LOL. Well, this video was just kind of fun (above). I had pasted it in to remember to show it to you sometime and then forgot to check it before I hit the Post button. Sorry!
Here.....below is the video I meant to post! LOL.
This video is from Missouri Star Quilt Company. It's a tutorial for how to make a scarf out of minky. A pretty quick and easy scarf. I made one for myself and one for Sweet Pea. But it hasn't been cold enough to wear them since I finished them. I'll take photos and show you later. But I thought you might like the tutorial.
I ordered a book from Missouri Star Quilt Company the other day. I got a notice of my order by email. I thought their order notice was pretty funny. Have you ever actually read their notice, if you've ordered from them? Here it is:
As you read this, the items you ordered anxiously wait on on our shelves
like a puppy in a pet shop window for its new owner. As we pick and pack your
order, we recognize that our whole life has been but a prelude to this moment.
In the very near future, our most decorated shipper will complete your order and
a hush will fall over the shop, and our eyes will moisten and be dabbed by
golden handkerchiefs as we courier this order on to you. When that happens
you'll receive a Shipping Notification email with your tracking number, and you
can check the status of your order anytime by logging into your account (just click here).
Pretty funny. I like people with a sense of humor.
I was shopping with Sweet Pea at a toy store the other day. I saw this on the shelf, and my first thought was, "Inspiration for English Paper Piecing!" I used these with my kids when I was a classroom teacher. I had sort of forgotten about them. I was thempted to buy it, just to play around with hexie designs. I still might. LOL!
My mom had these napkins out when I was visiting her at Christmas. I thought they were great. Don't you love them? Who wants to go have a drink with me?
Well, I'm going to do a lot of work today, even though the university is closed. I could use some catch-up time. And some of my meetings I'm working on scheduling via phone instead. But I may take a short break and sew a triple-zip pouch. That would be a nice treat!
The other day, Lynn did a blog post saying she was going to do the Triple Zip Along.
I thought it sounded like fun....and it's another completely doable project for me right now. If you want to see the completed project, you can look here (and the tutorial for making it is there, too). If you look at the related posts at the bottom of this post, you'll see the sample pouch as well. The zip along is being hosted by Debbie over at A Quilter's Table.
Our first task was to pick our fabrics. I pulled the three fabrics on the left as my starting point. I picked these up on a whim when I was in Grand Rapids a few weeks ago. I adore them. I went through my stash to see what I had that went with it. I found the fabrics on the right in my stash. They are Bella from Lotta Jansdotter. I got this fabric from Marmalade a while back (see/click button on my sidebar to visit this awesome fabric shop). I love them and haven't had the courage to cut into them yet. I pulled some zippers that would coordinate....the one on the bottom is a dark gray (charcoal). I feel like my zipper supply is depleted from all my earbud pouch sewing for Christmas. Gah! I have like 15 zippers left, but not the right colors. I wanted orange to go along with the grays. I guess it's time for another Zipit order! Poor me. :-)
We were also supposed to start cutting out. Haven't gotten that far yet. I have a hard time sewing during the week, unless it's by hand. So, I may not get my pouch made up until this weekend.
I'm not even sure which of the fabrics above I'll use yet. I really need to try not to overthink this, though. It's just a little zipper pouch, for Pete's sake!
I was thinking this (in other fabric) would make a good iPod case that could hold the earphones and charging cord for a certain little girl I know. :-)
Oh, and if you are following the Peace Quilt blog hop, I had my friend Doris' website wrong. She moved blog services, and I forgot to change it. The correct blog site is: www.madebyabrunnette.com You should go check it out and see her version of the Peace quilt. (She's giving away a copy of the pattern, too!) She added borders and applique, and she made the background the focus fabric and the peace sign solids. It's really cool.
After all that great snow we got last week, it was 55 degrees and thunderstorms here today! Pretty weird weather! It's supposed to be back down to 18 degrees by Thursday.
I can't remember how I heard about it, but just before Christmas, Jimmy Beans Wool announced they were going to have a mystery knit along....you wouldn't know what you were knitting unti you started, and you wouldn't know what the project was going to look like until the end. That intrigued me, except the last time I tried a knit along, I failed miserably. I just couldn't do the pattern. It stressed me out. So, I was worried about committing to another one.
But then they showed the wool they were using, and I loved it. It's called Lorna's Laces. And then they said the color was named after Downton Abbey. And then they said the clues would be released each week with a new episode of Downton Abbey. It was all too much fun, and I couldn't resist. So, I signed up.
The wool would arrive in December, while I was down in Florida, so that one could knit a swatch and be ready to start in January. So, I had my wool sent to Florida.
So, I told my mom about what I was doing. She got interested, too. And then she signed up, ordered the wool, and decided to do it with me. That made it even more fun for me.
The wool arrived on time. You can see the colors below. Nice, huh? Mom and I both knit our swatches and had to go down a size in needles, which is unusual. We both knit to guage most of the time.
We are 4 weeks into it now, and I'm actually staying on top of it and showing success!
We cast on and started this nice rosebud pattern.
Here it is after another "clue." Are you getting the feel for what we're making yet? (Sorry this is blurry. I took it with my phone, and it's kind of hard to take a good photo of your own arm, I've found out! LOL.) With my circular needles still in it, it looks like I've had some sort of weird hand surgery, doesn't it?!
And last night, I finished the final cuff edge on this hand. I think these are neat gautlets. I'm having a ton of fun with this knit along. It's a quick, manageable, and neat project for me right now. (Sorry for my computer plug in the background. LOL.) But what do you think? I think they are pretty neat and fun. And it fits!!! :-)
Here is the other side. You can't see it, but along the left side of this gauntlet, there are eyelets. I'm thinking we'll be threading something through there in the end, but I'll have to wait and see.
I assume Clue #5 will be casting on for the left gauntlet. Great. I'm looking forward to it.
I've learned new things already on this: I used a crocheted provisional cast on, which was neat. I've never done this clam shell finish before. And I've only done one other glove before, so making the thumb gusset was kind of neat and fun.
Mom's is coming along swimmingly, too, and she's enjoying it more than she thought she would as well (considering she lives in Florida and may have limited opportunities to wear these).
If you want to join in, it's not too late. I bet you could knit this up in a week or so and be caught up. I have found the instructions to be really clear, and the discussion forum on Ravelry has been informative, too. I think the gals at Jimmy Beans said when it's all over, they'll put out a PDF of all the clues put together in a pattern. So, maybe you just want to wait until then and pick up the PDF. Right now, all the clues are available on the Jimmy Beans Blog for free. You don't need to sign up or anything to participate.
It's kind of fun to read the story behind this from Jimmy Beans. It's the first KAL they've done, and they couldn't believe the response to it. They thought 100 people might join in, and they had over 3,000 join in. They couldn't keep up with the yarn orders. It's fun to read about. You can read about it here if you are interested. Good for them. It's fun to see people succeed.
Sometimes, I'd rather knit than do hand sewing. Don't know why. Just do. :-)
She was making some wonderful Zakka Sewing Kits from the book Zakka Style, a book I've been wanting and finally got. But I haven't had time to make anything from it. Amy's sewing kits were so beautiful and well priced (I told her she doesn't charge enough!), I decided to just buy one from her. I needed some immediate gratification.
She asked what kind of fabric I wanted, and I told her to just pick for me, because I love her style. Honestly, I love about everything she does. She had just gotten some of this fabric an linen in, so she used that for mine. It's beautiful, isn't it?
Inside is this little pincushion, and there are some pockets on the flap. I decided I'm going to use this for all my needles and pins for my Sue Spargo BOM project I'm about to start. Sue has lots of specific needles she recommends. So, I'm keeping all the needle packages for that project in this sewing kit. I'll keep the the packages in the flap, and when I have a needle going, I'll keep it in the pincushion. I am loving it.
And Amy is so sweet, she also threw in this matching keychain. I love that, too! This weekend, Papa Pea replaced all the doorknobs to the exterior doors in the house, so I have new house keys. I think it's time for a new keychain to go with them. Love it.
I'm really impressed with the quality of Amy's work. She has a nice Etsy shop if you are interested in her stuff.
Many thanks, Amy, for making me a wonderful sewing kit! I love it!
We had freezing rain all night last night, so school was called off today. It's supposed to be up to 50 degrees here later this week, then back down to 18 degrees. Weird January weather. Glad we got in a little cross country skiing finally this weekend. Hope we get some more snow sometime this winter so we can ski some more.
Hi Everyone! It's my turn today on Rene's (of Rene' Creates) blog hop for her new Peace quilt pattern. The photo above is the cover photo for Rene's quilt. Rene' does such a great job of taking her quilts on field trips for the purpose of photo shoots. Amazing photos.
I first met Rene' (in the foreground in the photo above) at my Gruber's retreat. I think Rene' is so neat. She has the coolest style--great design sense, great color sense, great personality. I love the quilt top she's working on in the photo above, and I'm totally going to plagiarize it (with her permission). She is so kind and generous, she even sent me some fabric I need to plagiarize her. I just really, really like Rene'. I am so happy to have her as a friend. And, she's about the cutest thing ever.
As I said in my previous post about this blog hop, the Peace pattern has a baby size, throw size, and a full-size pattern. Sweet Pea is totally into peace signs, so I thought I'd make this for her. When I showed her the pattern to ask her what she wanted, she looked at the pattern, smiled, and said, "Really?! For me?!" It was awfully cute. The two smaller versions use solid squares in the peace sign. The largest version uses pinwheels for the peace sign. I was hoping she'd pick one of the small ones, given my limited time to get this done. But no, she really adored the pinwheel version (pictured above in Rene's cover photo). Of course she did! You saw that one coming, didn't you?! She loved the pinwheels (just like her mom does!). I asked her what else she wanted for her quilt. She said she loved the white background. She also told me she'd love purple in her quilt. Hmmmm.....
The pinwheels in this quilt can all be made with charm squares (5" squares). (Actually, all the sizes are pre-cut friendly!) So, I went through my charm packs (yay! using something I already have!!!) to see which ones I had enough of. There were a few choices. I presented them to Sweet Pea, and she chose these, which I've had in my stash FOR. EVAH. I was really surprised she chose 1930's fabrics, but I guess the dogs hooked her. I was trying to figure out how I would incorporate purple, because I didn't think it would go with these charms. But, then I found this lavender in the 1930's section at The Attic Window, and it looked really nice with the fabrics. I was surprised at that. I paired it with Kona Snow.....Perfect!
One thing that bugs me about precuts is that they are not always cut accurately. And it's hard to know where to line up your stitches on the pinked edges. Rene' uses a fun method for making your half-square triangles, where you sew around the edge of the square and then cut in an X. I cut my purple 5" squares and used those edges to line everything up and ignored the pinked edges of the precut. You can see here how off some of those pinked edges are! Where the pinked edges were off, I just lined up to the nicely cut edge.
I owe a huge debt of thanks to my good friend Caroll for helping me finish this quilt. I have a confession...I goofed on what the deadline was and didn't start until 2 weeks before I needed to have it finished. EEEK! I had a Saturday Sew Day with Caroll up in Grand Rapids, and she sewed all the squares for me. I cut them and sewed them into pinwheels. I managed to get all the pinwheels done in a day and a half as a result of Caroll's help. Caroll, I love ya. Thank you soooo much!
I love patterns like this, where the resulting blocks are a little too big, so you can trim to perfection. It is such a huge help for a great finished product. A tip for you if you make this...use a nice ruler with a 45-degree line on it to help you trim. You can get those points lined up in the corners nicely.
Sweet Pea loved the resulting pinwheels. I gave her the pattern and asked her to lay it out for me. (Notice her shirt has a peace sign on it!) She loved doing this and got everything organized just so. Now, if an 8-year-old can do this, so can you! :-) That goes to show you how well Rene' put together the instructions!
And here, my friends, is the finished quilt top. Sweet Pea is totally thrilled about this. I really like it, too. Who'd-a-thunk the 1930's fabrics would look so good in a peace sign?! (There were some black and white and red charms in the pack, too, but I pulled them out and didn't include them in this project. That was Buffie's suggestion, and it was a good suggestion. Thank you, Buffie! Love my Saturday Scrappers at The Attic Window!)
Keeping it real, and true confession time....I was sewing pretty fast to get this done on time, and not all my points are perfect on the edges (they look really good in the centers). But, you know, I did not worry about it much, because this is going to be a well-used cuddle quilt for in front of the TV. It will get washed, stuff spilled on it, etc. Sweet Pea won't care or notice how neat my points are. So, I just didn't worry about it. :-)
I took Sweet Pea shopping to pick out a backing. Because it will be something to cuddle with in front of the TV, I suggested minky-like fabric. She picked out some pink minky fabric. I just have to piece the back and drop it off with the quilter. I am NOT going to attempt quilting with minky. I'll show it to you again when it's quilted.
Rene's pattern is very well written and clear. Everything fits together perfect. Very gratifying! The quilt goes together fast....Obviously! You guys know how long it usually takes me to complete a quilt top...Like a year or two! haha! And I got this one together in two weeks--and it's the full-sized one. So, there you go!
The Peace sign is so popular these days, especially with young girls.
RENE' HAS GRACIOUSLY AGREED TO GIVE A COPY OF HER PATTERN TO ONE OF MY READERS! YIPPEE! IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE ENTERED INTO THE GIVEAWAY, PLEASE JUST LEAVE A COMMENT ON THIS POST BY FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 1, AND MAKE SURE THERE IS A WAY FOR ME TO GET HOLD OF YOU.
I will draw a name Friday night and pick the winner! There are lots of other chances to win a pattern, too. Check out all the other posts on this blog hop to see everyone else's versions and to get in on their giveaways. It is so fun to see all the different versions and interpretations. I-spy versions, solids, rainbows, Christmas, Kaffe.... Too fun!
Full Disclosure: This pattern was given to me, free of charge, by Rene' to try out. And, as I've mentioned, she is my friend. However, everything I've said above is my honest opinion. The pattern is just great. If I'd have had any problems, I would have told Rene', who would have fixed them. You'll notice how many people on the list above have tested this pattern. :-) Rene' is very thorough!
