A Long-Overdue Christmas Wrap-up

 It's been a tough month.

On the crafting front, I started Sue Spargo's Christmas tree pillow project. I cannot actually afford any of her kits, though, so I worked out of my stash. In the process I changed some motifs and stitches to suit my tastes, such as adding a manger scene because Christmas isn't secular for me, and eliminating most bullion knots because those are the devil's stitch. What I have so far:

I also stitched this freebie from Momentoell. I like the chunky effect she gets by using 6 or even 12 strands of floss. The lovely, soft colors are a nice change of pace, too, from the usual embroidered Christmas tree.

Not much jewelry making happened, but I did remake a bracelet (which apparently I never photographed) with several Christmas-themed charms into a necklace. No point in wearing a bracelet if my wrists are covered up in several layers of long johns and wool sweaters (it's so cold where I work).

 

My middle son gave me a skein of acrylic yarn for Christmas. I love the color, but it is too scratchy to wear so I crocheted a garland. This worked up so fast and fun I made a second with a different yarn.

He also gave me more buttons, so I made a button garland for the tree.

And I finally finished my youngest's quilt: 

On the book front, I read three Christmasy books:

The White Priory Murders by Carter Dickson: An enjoyable locked-room mystery, where, amusingly, Dickson had two characters immediately propose the most obvious explanations to accuse each other. John Dickson Carr was name-checked in the locked-room mystery Wake Up Dead Man, too, which was a fun little easter egg.

Snowed In by Catherine Walsh: a cute holiday-themed contemporary romance, related to her previous novel, Holiday Romance. I enjoyed it, but it lacked an effective structure to hang the story on.

Golden Age Christmas Mysteries ed. by Otto Penzler: some of these would better be classified as spy thrillers or adventures, but all were enjoyable. The collection runs the gamut from light-hearted, comedic stories to darker, melancholic ones, so there's something to suit most tastes.

I think that about wraps it up. Aside from the food, cancelled trip, car troubles, pretty snow fall, improv king cake ...

The Needle Case that Jack Built

I got a hankering to do some English paper piecing, specifically The Maker's Stash's star ornaments. EPP lends itself to small, portable kits, so I placed the cut-out papers, fabric, scissors, glue stick, and thread in my favorite pouch. I needed a place to store the needles, though, and a square of felt seemed too boring. Why not make a needle case just for EPP? 

So I flipped through all my sewing books until I found a cute pattern in All Sewn Up by Chloe Owens. But I didn't really need multiple felt pages for just a few needles; maybe I could just sew a felt patch on one side and sew a kind of loop on the other to hold scissors. 

And then I started looking through patterns I've torn out of magazines, and found a needle book by Cindy Blackberg which has a cord cleverly sewn down the center to hold a spool of thread.  So why not add that?

The Owens needle book had a fabric collage on the cover; Blackberg's had wool flowers. Why not make a little hexagon flower, since this is a needle book for English paper piecing?

The result:

I'm contemplating adding an elastic loop to the right edge to hold the glue stick. I still haven't started the stars.

Holiday Stitching Photo Dump

 Well, December did not turn out like I had expected. My oldest went in early on for surgery and ended up getting very sick after, not coming home until New Year's Eve. A lot of stitching got done in his hospital room, but very little social media and posting.

But before then, I participated in Wild Olive's ornament SAL in November, which gave me an excuse to finally make some of the designs from one of her patterns, which I bought ages ago.

Beatrice's 2022 Adventrees pattern was the perfect thing to keep my hands occupied during the long hospital stay. I had lots of fun choosing stitches and colors for each tree.

At night I got a little cross stitching done, enough to finish Praiseworthy Stitches' Snowflake Dreams and Elizabeth's Needlework Designs' Red Bird.

In early December I traced and cut out all the felt and fabric pieces to make a bunch of "bowl fillers" from Debbie Busby's Jingle all the Way pattern book; none of the stitching got done until January, though.

The mat is a design by Annie Lippincott, from an old issue of American Patchwork & Quilting.

Not a bad amount stitched for a crazy season!

Sue Spargo's Bloomed SAL

 

 

I started this back in May, when I was 80 days into the 100DayProject and desperate to stitch something new. For a few weeks, Sue Spargo demonstrated different embroidered flowers and stems, all done on a piece of wool felt. I used a smaller piece, so I only did one of each flower (and omitted a couple). This was a joy to stitch, so fun and pretty.

Some close-ups and in-progress pictures:

To finish it I backed it with a piece of cotton and did some "big stitch" quilting with pearl cotton that matched the felt; as you can tell, I didn't worry about even lines or precision. I was inspired to stitch the false binding closed with french knots, rather than slip stitch -- faster, more fun, and another way to add texture.

 

Love it! And now I get to put it away until next spring.

The 100 Day Project

 I joined the #100DayProject, a challenge to get artists out of a rut and into a daily habit of creating, on February 22. And what a mistake it was! 

1) It turns out, I already have the habit of creating (or at least stitching or beading) every day, and if I don't on a particular day it's because I'm dead tired, both physically and emotionally.

2) I'm not creatively blocked; in fact, I have a notebook of ideas and little time to explore them.

3) Although the Project doesn't require it, I picked one thing to work on -- my Hawai'ian quilt (huh, apparently I never showed off the completed center), specifically the crazy-quilted borders. But working on the same thing for one hundred days straight was tedious; so tedious that around day 80, I switched to a fun Sue Spargo stitch-along. 

4) The obligation to post on Instagram every day was exhausting. I'm clearly not cut out to be an influencer.

That said, I really did enjoy seeing other people's art, and I made a lot of progress on my own project, finishing two sides and most of a third:

 

 

A few of my favorite seams:

 (I'll save the Sue Spargo project for the next post.)

Next year, I'll just be a spectator.

Calico Cats

 My latest lap quilt:

It's very wrinkled, because while I waited days -- DAYS -- for the rain to stop so I could take a good picture, one of my cats claimed it. Fittingly.

The cat head pattern was from ... actually, I don't remember, and the pdf I have has no metadata. The calico fabrics, except for the border, are from the Little House on the Prairie fabric collection. The leftover squares (it was a "layer cake," meaning a set of 10-inch squares) I used for the back:

The quilting was very basic, which about all I can handle on a quilt this size -- in the ditch quilting between the blocks, diagonally through the nine-patches, an outline around each cat, and a very wide zigzag along the borders. I tried to do a swirl design instead of the zigzag, but although it seemed so simple to do in my head it was a disaster in execution. Sigh.

My husband and kids have worn out the other lap quilts I made, so this one is just for me!*

*And the cat.

A Christmas Quilt

 It's been a tough month, and I haven't made nearly as much as I wanted to. But I finished by scrappy Christmas quilt!

The intent was to use up the scraps and fat quarters of Christmas-themed fabrics I had accumulated. Unfortunately, I did have to buy a little yardage for the backing -- not enough larger bits to piece together -- but I was able to use even the smallest scraps for the binding.

Instead of quilting it, I listened to my mom and tied it with pearl cotton size 5.

I love it. So does my cat.

The Third Quilt

 I promised son no. 3 I'd make his quilt last year ... and we all know what happened. But maybe I can make it this year! Especially now that my machine has been serviced and cleaned and is humming along nicely.

The goal is 20 12-inch blocks to make a twin-sized quilt, with blocks about Legos, trains, superheroes, Minecraft, and whatever else he likes. I almost immediately faced a complication, though -- Barbara Cherniwchan's "Next Stop North Pole" quilt pattern, with train cars I knew J would love but which varied quite a bit in size. After much math, I figured out that one engine + one train car + one caboose would be the same width as four 12-inch blocks with sashing, so now I have the bottom row all set:

On a roll, I next made four Lego blocks. Shockingly, it was hard to find Lego-themed patterns anywhere (perhaps the Lego company is overly aggressive protecting its trademarks?), such that I ended up drafting them myself. 

I think that's a good start, and I think I will focus on finishing up little projects here and there before starting my fall stitching. 

A Belated Valentine

 Two consecutive quarantines knocked my schedule (and my health) for a loop, but I did manage a little stitching. Lolli and Grace's Floral Heart:

I'm loving her signature mix of bright colors, embroidery, and tiny felt details, and I plan on stitching more.

Fun with cutter quilts!

 I added buttons, bits of lace, and embroidery to the cut-outs, sewed them to backings, and stuffed them. I think I will give away the hearts to family members, but the lips are my favorite and I'm keeping them.

New Year, New Projects

I'm generally not one who marks the New Year, but for some reason I'm feeling all energized and organized and excited about my crafty projects for the year.

My long-neglected Tree of Stitches:

Keeping it in the cart by my chair should inspire me to pick it up more often than I have; and once I do, it really doesn't take long to do a section of specialty stitches.

Pintangle's annual TAST:

I wasn't kidding when I said I loved making inchies. I'm stitching roughly an inch square for each week. Once done, I'll back them with interface and cut them out, and make some sort of collage.

Monet's flowers:

The pattern calls for four flowers at the ends of a lariat but lariats aren't my thing. Do I make (very large, possibly heavy) earrings, or a shorter necklace (haven't figured out the clasp)?

A cellini rick rack star:

I don't have the called-for experience with rick rack beadweaving patterns, but I think I'll do ok.

Beadboy3's quilt:

This will be a sampler of his interests -- trains, Legos, Spider-man, cats, crayons, and Minecraft.

Flowers of the Month design from Just Cross Stitch:

I know I said I'd cut down on cross stitch for the year, but I adore the colors. I don't have enough fabric to make each design separately, so I will stitch it as one large grid, 4 by 3.

This should keep me busy for a while ...