Sunday Sundry 2-5-12

I finally got down to the sewing room yesterday afternoon.  It had been a long week of not-sewing, aka work, and I so needed some play time.  My intention was to start by straightening things up, as it was a royal mess in that space, but really, where is the fun in that?  

So I played with some of the scraps that were lying about...and there were a lot of them...and pretty soon I had a couple things put together.  Now, these (above) aren't necessarily colors I'd choose to work with for a bigger project, but they used up some oddball scraps, and they will become practice pads for free-motion quilting.

Then I made a different little block.  I took it upstairs to show Norm.

P:  I made you a Valentine.

N:  That's nice.

P:  Can you see the heart?

N:  (studying it)  Uh...not really.

P:  What?!  (outlining the shape)  See...here?

N:  Uh...if you say so.  I'm sorry, all I see is a "V."

P:  (frustrated)  Ugh.  Fine.  Then it's a "V" FOR VALENTINE!

We're so romantic, aren't we?  Anyway, I think it looks like a heart.  So I made another one.

And I'm loving that raspberry color of that heart/V on the left.  The whole time I was working on it, I was thinking of this:



She wore a raspberry beret
The kind you find in a second-hand store...

One day, I will find a raspberry beret in a second-hand store.  Mark my words.
Speaking of which, we are off on a thrift store adventure, so this will be short and not all that sundry today.  Enjoy the big game, if the Superbowl is your thing, or however else you choose to spend the day.

And remember, Groove is in the Heart!  I can't tell you how much I heart this song (which starts properly about 30 seconds in).  Just wish I could have found a clearer video, but you have to see the funky dancing (and Bootsy Collins, baby!) and whacked out colors and patterns, which I love.  Hard to believe it's over 20 years old already!

NewFO Challenge ~ January Recap

It's the end of January, for another few minutes anyway, and time to link up with Barbara at Cat Patches with how I've fared so far in the 2012 NewFO Challenge.

I'd say things are off to a good start.  In fact, not only did I start a few things, I finished them too!

One of the ideas/plans that I had listed for the NewFO Challenge was to do something scrappy—Scrap Happiness, I called it—and that is what I focused on this month.  It worked out well, because I had also joined the Sew Scraps Along at Pleasant Home for the month of January.

So here is what I did:

1.  Made a Scrappy String Ring wall hanging.  I'm going to continue making these Dresden plate type blocks in the coming months for a quilt.  In fact, I joined the String Thing Along, and the scrappy string ring quilt is going to be my project for that.

2.  Double Hourglass table mat.  Made with some bright, fruit and veggie print scraps.

3.  Scrappy Courthouse Steps block...

...which became a sewing machine cover...

...and what was left of the original block got "rebuilt" into a mini quilt!

I think that's it.  Looking forward to the start of a new month of NewFOs!

Sunday Sundry 1-29-12

"We Can Rebuild It...We Have the Technology"
I could not throw it away, that little courthouse steps block I'd cut a hole in to make the sewing machine cover last week.  So I started thinking and then turning circles in my sewing room, pondering the stash at hand.

Then I saw it:  A bit of Heather Baily Pop Garden fabric, bought on a whim during an online shopping spree last year. The daisies were huge...and perfect!

A bit of fusible interfacing and inconspicuous zigzagging closed the incision I'd made to extract the circle the week before.  (Hint:  The "scar" is at about the 3 o'clock position, but I hope you can't find it.)

I love how it turned out!  Some things are worth salvaging.  Like vintage Pyrex fridgies at the thrift store.

If you'd have told me 30 years ago that I'd have a soft spot for chartreuse, I'd have laughed myself silly.  Same thing about liking Tom Petty's music, or cilantro.  Weird things happen, is what I'm saying.

What shall I call this little mini?  The Six Million Minute block?  Because that's about how long the process took.  (For those of you too young to remember, that's a nod to The Six Million Dollar Man TV series of the 1970s, as is the quote above.)  Or something about flowers on the courthouse steps?  

Bunny trail:  I've got a wedding picture of hubs and me, with my little bridal bouquet, on the courthouse steps.  They were not big daisies I was holding then, but they were about as real as that fabric.  Hey, it was the '80s, lots of things were fake.  And here is where I could say something mushy like, "except our love for each other," which would be true and all, but I don't want you gagging on your breakfast this early in the day.

So here, in collage form, is the life cycle of the courthouse steps block.  Quite the metamorphosis, huh?

The Commitments
That is the sum total of the sewing that has happened around these parts lately, but I have committed to two other things this week, namely:


The String Thing Along, the mighty good idea of Brenda of Scraps and Strings.  The plan is to play with our strings and make a project by June 30.  A new blog has been set up so we all can post our progress along the way.  Care to play along?  Visit one of the aforementioned links and let Brenda know!

The second is a Scrappy Block Challenge, sponsored by Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.  Create a block using the three sizes of cut scraps described in the book Cut the Scraps!  Sarah gives all the details HERE.  I am going to give it a try and then donate whatever catastrophe block I come up with to her, for use however she sees fit.  I will admit to being a little anxious about this challenge, as I don't think of design as one of my strong points, but you never know, I may get a brain rave like I did with the courthouse steps block.  

Weird things happen, is what I'm saying.

Wrap It Up

I have an earworm of that Fabulous Thunderbirds song quoted in the title.  What I did to my sewing machine was cover it up, not wrap it up, exactly, but somehow that song floated into my head.  It could be that I was listening to Stevie Ray Vaughan Live at Carnegie Hall while I worked on this, and, tangentially, his brother Jimmie Vaughan was the lead guitarist in The Fabulous Thunderbirds.  My mind likes to travel down bunny trails like that.

Anyway, the Silver Singer went to visit the repair shop on Tuesday and was back less than 24 hours later, in fine form.  He said those mechanisms often seized up on a machine when the fancy stitches weren't used often.  Must have been a pretty simple fix to unstick it, and I'm grateful for that.

Silver, Model 600 Touch & Sew, on the left -
and Tammy, my Golden T&S 603E, on the right.

So I wrapped—er, covered it up today with this quilted cover, using up some scraps and stash in the process.  I did a little straight line and loopy quilting on it.  

The side panels are backed with fusible fleece and not quilted.  It was helpful to review this tutorial on Flickr for making a custom fitted cover, but I kept it pretty simple and didn't need to make any holes for a handle, etc.

(Back)

While I had the Juki threaded and ready for free-motion quilting the sewing machine cover, I went ahead and practiced the leaves for this month's Free Motion Quilting Challenge.  

This pattern is rather forgiving, in that being less than precise, shall we say, just sort of adds to the organic charm.  

At least that's what I'm telling myself.  ;)

The sewing machine cover is my third finish for January, and I am linking once again to Such a Sew and Sew's A Stitch in Time 2012 Finishes.  Elizabeth is having an open linky every month, and each finish counts as an entry for a giveaway.  For January, it's a jelly roll of Good Fortune by Kate Spain, sponsored by the Fat Quarter Shop!  Have a look by clicking the button below, and join the fun.  I think it's a great way to keep track of your completed projects for the year and stay motivated as well.




And swing by Confessions of a Fabric Addict to see some other finishes worth whooping about this week, and add your own!

Sunday Sundry 1-22-12

Hi-ho, Silver!
First, the good news.  (There really isn't any bad news, maybe just that the weekend is always shorter than my to-do list).

The "new" vintage machine sews like a champ!  Straight stitch, anyway.  I cleaned and oiled it and took the cover and bottom plates off and lubed the gears.  It really is in great shape overall, and doesn't appear to have been used that much.  In fact, outwardly, it's in better shape than my Singer 603E, its sister.  One is silver (or gray, maybe) and the other gold!

The only glitch—okay, so maybe a bit of not-so-good news—is that one of the levers to change to a zigzag or any of the other built-in stitches seems to be seized up.  I oiled the mechanism really well from the inside, hoping it might free it up, but so far it's still stuck.  It doesn't look like anything is broken or out of place with the mechanism itself.  So it may make a trip over to the fix-it man after all.  Still, it sounds great, looks great, and sews a nice, evenly balanced straight stitch right out of the gate.  I am thrilled, and I hope dear daughter will be as well!

Knock-knock...Who's there?...Orange...
Orange you glad I found some more Pyrex at Goodwill?  Two identical casseroles, one in a lovely turquoise and the other, well, you know.  I paired them with a matching vintage fabric found a while back at the thrift store.

And lest you think I buy up all the Pyrex in the county when I find it, I'll have you know there was an entire refrigerator set that I left there for some other lucky thrill seeker.  It was a brown speckled pattern with navy blue flowers, and if I weren't feeling so lazy, I'd look the pattern up and use the correct name to describe it, but you obviously don't know me.  Wasn't it enough that I left it there?  I thought so.  ;)

I could stare at pretty Pyrex glinting in the sun all day, but you all don't have that kind of time, so let's move on, shall we?

How about a vintage recipe box glinting in the sun?

It looks happy or hungry...I can't decide.

Cut it Up and Cry
Tears of joy, that is.  (Also, that's the title to a really good song by Sonia Dada that you might take a minute or six to listen to later.)  But cut it up is what I did to that courthouse steps block.  Don't worry, there will be a happy ending.

(I am not as maniacal as I appear.)

The idea was that I wanted to try one of my quilting idol's pieced circle technique.  If you follow Dan Rouse of Piece and Press, you'll know what I mean.  Seriously, I love everything he has ever made.
 
So I looked at that courthouse block the other day and thought, now what?  I don't really need another table mat or potholder or wall hanging at the moment.  Hey, why don't I cut it up and try piecing a circle?  
And was I at all nervous about doing this?  Well, sure.  But as Shay would say, it's only fabric.

But it totally worked!  Measure a bazillion times and cut once, was my mantra.  Then I pinned the bejeepers out of it all the way around the circle and sewed slowly and carefully.  Oh, and I had stay-stitched about 1/8" from the edge of my cut-from-courthouse circle because of all the seams I had sliced through.  I was worried about those coming apart as I fiddled with fitting the circles together.

And so now what?  Well, Silver, the sewing machine up there, needs a cover.  I pulled a couple other scraps, and I'm sure I'll cobble something together.  I'm sort of making it up as I go along.

A Reminder
The Veggie Market Quilt is in its final hours of auction on Ebay, but there is still time to bid.  You can own this one of a kind quilt and support Japan Quake Relief with your winning bid.  The details can be found in the auction description and also at Mom Wald's Place.

Thanks for visiting!  T-minus four hours until Downton Abbey!  Have a great evening!