some ginger quilting

 we interrupt my regularly scheduled sewing to bring you "what the girls are doing." after a considerable hiatus, the two oldest daughters are back at the machine. in fact, this time they are at my machine.

yesterday morning, my oldest daughter came to me and said, "mom, i have an assignment for english where i have to learn a new skill, spend 5 hours working on it, and write about the experience. i was thinking maybe you could teach me to make a quilt?" i jumped on that faster than a bar of chocolate! the good news was i already had fabrics and a pattern picked out for her to work with. over a year ago i set aside a project box for teaching d1 how to make her first quilt. we've just never gotten around to it between her scheduling and my general sewing busyness elsewhere. but yesterday we did it. thank you, english class!

we're using a riley blake layer cake, moda bella basics charm pack, and the moda bake shop recipe "easy bricks quilt" by amy smart of diary of a quilter. i got a bit nervous as we got started because i've never taught anyone to quilt before! although i'm fairly confident with my own skills now, teaching someone else what to do was a little nerve wracking just in case i forgot something. i needn't have worried, of course. we just got started and kept on going.

 since we are working with precuts, there wasn't much pressing to do, but the layer cake had been sitting over a year, so the ribbons creased the top squares a bit. we talked about "pressing" while quickly flattening a few squares.

 then the rotary cutting lesson. yikes! (lovely backside photo taken by the only available photographer in the house, d2.) i have never used a riley blake layer cake before, so i don't know if it was because it's been slopped around my sewing area since December 2012 or if it just wasn't precision cut well, but the squares weren't fully square. we just ignored that and cut away. it's a first-timer quilt, anyway.

she did a great job cutting her squares in half. i had to remind her about the safety button a few times, but she seems to have the hang of it. after a few cuts, i left her to herself.

 then d2 wanted to get moving on her quilt for the church fund raising auction. we pieced a 4 sq top out of the heather bailey "nicey jane" fabrics she selected a few weeks ago (that i let her have after i ordered replacements, of course). that didn't take long at all since the top only requires 3 seams. her seams were pretty good, but a bit shy in a few spots. i might go back and reinforce the seams with a second run since this is a baby quilt being auctioned off.

 i had her pin (something i rarely do) to teach her the skill as well as to improve her accuracy.

that was it for day 1 of two daughters quilting. i finished off the quilting for "paris daydreams" when they left for their math tutoring.

this morning, we got back at it with d1 chain piecing and d2 pressing the fat quarters for her baby quilt 2.0 (boy version).

 d1 is going to be a precision quilter, i can tell. she was meticulous about lining up her pieces before sewing and careful how she sewed. i expected it to be a bit more difficult for her, but her seams look great! this pattern is so easy that it's coming together in no time.

i'm itching to work on something myself, but seeing them excited about and engaged in the sewing is pretty much as good as doing it myself. i've been hoping they would get interested for a while now. i'm so glad the opportunities presented themselves to push both of them into the quilting realm. stay tuned for their finishes, which should be coming up pretty soon.

how to fix a block that comes up short

 while squaring up my wonky stacked coin blocks, i came up a bit short in one section of this block. since it was two adjoining sections that were short, i didn't want to unpick the entire two pieces, add in two longer pieces, and resew all those seams, so i did a little patching instead.

i apologize in advance for not adjusting my exposure or white balance for better photos but as i really wanted to get the darn thing fixed and just photographed as i went sort of as an afterthought, i did not focus on my photo quality. but fortunately for viewers, i was stitching with white thread on my navy blue fabric, so the seams will show up really well.

 i found a solid blue scrap that was big enough to cover the gap

 unpicked the top and bottom seams of the two adjoining pieces, but not the seam adjoining them, just far enough back to allow me to work with them without pulling out the entire section

 trimmed that bit so they were both even

 sewed the patch scrap to the side of the section thereby extending it's length

 then sewed the lengthened piece to the top and bottom layers around it, backstitching over where the original seams ended

and trimmed to square up with the side of the block

the block is now patched up and evenly squared

since this is a quilt that has lots of strips with seams in the solid blue section, i'm counting on this not showing up in the overall design once everything is put together.

how's that for some old-fashioned quilter's "make-do" sensibility?

washed clean, starting anew

 february ended with the first rain of the year, washing us clean and making everything fresh and new here. as rain is a rare event in our desert home, i am always enchanted by droplets sparkling in the overcast light, hanging from everything like chandelier crystals or simply sitting on every surface, pretty little beads of water and light. you can't touch them or keep them, only enjoy their ethereal beauty for the moment before they roll off or dry up. during a break in the showers, i caught a few images in pixels. i'd love to say this inspired some great new quilt idea, but in reality it only invigorated and refreshed me for working on the projects i already have going. that is a good thing, too.

indoors, i jumped around between cleaning the house, getting the baby out of whatever she was in, answering the door at the knock of neighbor children, and playing in my sewing room. it was a cozy saturday.

 in the quiet of the morning, i snuggled up with my "gypsy wife" pattern book and started filling in some of the missing math work. oh, this pattern does drive me crazy! and i know i'm not alone. i've got a whole new slew of questions for the qal group. after a while i decided to leave all that to later and just start thinking about my blocks for the new month instead. my new sugar block club instructions arrived, too. love this month's "explore" block!

but while mulling over the gyspy pile and considering fabric choices for march's "explore" block, i chose to work on my oldest son's long-neglected, barely begun "christmas" quilt instead. if i'm ever going to get the 40 blocks for this done before next christmas, and it had better be well before then, i had better get moving on it. joining in with the bom and qal this year has made me realize i should pace myself on other big projects like this wonky stacked coins quilt that i'm just not excited to sit down and complete in a week or so. not every project engrosses me and sucks me in like penny patch did. if it doesn't have a deadline, like a baby shower or gifting need, i will push it off in lieu of urgent or enticing projects. so i think i need to set some sort of weekly quota for this quilt to get it moving.

 we saw the new lego movie on friday and everyone's legoes were immediately brought down to the family room for a huge building fest. i heard more choruses than i can count of "everything is awesome!" and even the baby now walks up to her siblings and comments on their creations, "that's off-thum!" on saturday, when they weren't sneaking out into the rain, they were master building with legoes. it is pretty awesome, i think.

my oldest children were involved in a full-day church event, involving over 13,000 local youth. it was outdoors. imagine the surprise of everyone when, after months of planning, preparation, and no rain, it actually rained on them right during the culminating event of the evening! but they were troopers and stuck it out. they came home soaked to the bone, covered in mud and bits of grass, but very happy. and that was pretty awesome, too.

free-for-all february

i was on my way to fix my neglected toenails, when i stopped by the sewing table. that was the end of that for a while. hee, hee. sidetracked! my entire life is often sidetracked by sewing. sometimes this is funny and sometimes it's simply not. balance and prioritizing are a constant struggle in my world.

i tried to help with a portion of that by fabric fasting. january was good, february turned into a nose-dive, fabric purchasing free-for-all. the month is over as of today, so i'll be climbing on the wagon and starting over again. i should probably extend by a month (or 6) just to make up for february. who knew you could do an entire year's worth of fabric shopping in one month? i keep vacillating between contritely wanting to be honest in this space while being completely ashamed of myself, and feeling brazenly rebellious for busting my self-imposed limits. i did get some really great new fabric, after all. i'm like all jekyll-and-hyde{eann} about fabric fasting this month.

liberty lifestyle's practically extinct "bloomsbury gardens" collection found at jones and vandermeer

most of the last bits of my orders have arrived. i found some more meadowdot (allowed - always) and some liberty (not allowed just now) on-line (thank you, jones and vandermeer! - great shop),

small photo to minimize impact of large quantity already strategically piled to appear less

as well as one last fabric.com order (for current wips and not) that i just don't want to talk about. i am not sure exactly why i feel compelled to report every single bit i've purchased this month. i don't normally show my purchases, preferring to focus on my makes in this space. why couldn't i just say "i broke the fast" without completely humiliating myself by airing all my dirty laundry? all this talk, however, is the mourning of the damned, not the sorrow of the true penitent - meaning i am reveling in my purchasing sin.

one of the main reasons the idea of a fast appealed to me was that it would allow me to use the lovely fabrics that i had before they got completely lost in the stash vacuum. that is important to me. well, now i have even more that need to be used. so i am recommitting with my reasonings in mind.

hello, march!
let's fast.
wish me luck.
maybe the luck o' the irish will work for me.

on the bookshelf - rug edition

 

 this edition of "on the bookshelf" is actually more like "the UPS driver just arrived with a package and so we are looking at the new books on the new rug." so here's what's "on the book rug" today:

for me, some new quilt arrivals:

playful little paper-pieced projects by tacha bruecher
color essentials: crisp and vibrant quilts by amanda murphy
quilting with a modern slant by rachel may

when i get to dive into them, i'll let you know. i already have plans for st. patrick's day aprons from the paper piecing book. so cute!

for the kids, i recently added to our fairytale collection in preparation for doing a big, huge homeschool unit with the younger kids where we study various fairytales. i did this years ago with the oldest children and it was so fun. i like to go over each major (and some minor) fairytale and folklore story by reading as many versions of the same tale as possible. there are all kinds of related activities we do along the way.

 i found that rachel isadora has several new versions of classics set in Africa and illustrated in her wonderful, colorful collage style. this will help add more multicultural flair to our bookshelf.

 i also tracked down a few more books illustrated by sarah gibb. her delicate, lacey, silhouette-and-color style of illustrating is at the top of my list of favorite artists.

back of book jacket and book - they'd make great fabrics!

we've had her rapunzel a few years and loved it to pieces - literally. i just had to buy a replacement. i think it's my all-time favorite fairytale book.

 snow white and rose red is a rather obscure fairytale that i remember from my huge, lavishly illustrated fairytale anthology i had as a little girl. finding any modern publications was pretty difficult, but i did find a few. i hope the children love the story of the two sisters, a nasty gnome, and a kindly bear as much as i did.

what are you reading?

gypsy wips and shifting piles

 you've got to love a morning where you overhear your oldest daughter giving her little sister a counting by 5's and 10's lesson while they eat breakfast and then the 7 yr old tells you she's doing "baby daycare" for the smallest one, which means she's getting her something to eat and making her a special place to take a nap. with them all busily engaged or taking care of each other, i snuck in some sewing during piano lesson time.

my gypsy wife blocks for the month are done. or as done as i'm going to get them. four of the pinwheels are supposed to have borders around them, but i am still waffling over selecting solids or not for the borders. i'm saving that decision for later in the game.

 i've used this opportunity of only doing a few blocks at a time to really focus on precision and improving my skills. please don't look too closely at my points just yet! they are far better yet not fully perfected. when making the pinwheels, i overcut the pieces, which is easy enough since the pattern calls for 1/8" increments quite often. rounding up to the full 1/2" or 1" makes life easier all around. then i trim up after the blocks are formed before joining them. doing this continually would be extremely tedious. but doing one or two blocks at a time has been much more bearable. i would never take the time to do this otherwise.

i did not make my pinwheels completely scrappy, choosing to do one background fabric and four scrappy pieces for the pinwheel. none of the blocks are identical as i worked in at least one scrap from previous blocks to make each one unique. the first two incorporated red and blue, the second set (above) was yellow, blue, and green. as i put the second block (left) of the set together, i didn't think the yellow and blue print in the upper left corner stood out enough, so i replaced it with a different fabric that had a darker yellow and blues in it. this wasn't a waste because i simply used that block and the other one created from making the new hst in the next block i made, the yellow and pink one, where it still didn't stand out enough. oh, well. moving on.

better! but i wish i had shifted the fabric just a bit so more of the blue showed up rather than the yellow, which still seems to blend. thank goodness this is just one block of dozens in a very busy quilt. i can stop overthinking it now. why is it that the points i was off by a mm on are the bright blue colors rather than those that blend in at the tips so you can't even tell how perfect (or not) they turned out?

anywho, my blocks are done just in time for next month to roll in this weekend. and the new sugar block, too. oh, boy!

 the piano teacher did not bring her toddler today, so my wip pile is still spread out on the living room floor. down to two! amazing.

 actually, that just means there are more in the "needs binding" pile on the couch in the dining sewing room, which is wip pile #2. however, they have moved along in the racket, so that's progress. i do adore binding. there never seems enough time for it, though.

while the piano was a-playing and i was a-sewing and others were . . . a-doing whatever, this little lady decided to experiment with measuring, mixing, and pouring in the kitchen. sugar, oats, nuts, and anything in reach kept her occupied for some time. love how they are so busy learning at this stage. the messes, not so much. watching her continually reconfigure 12 lego duplo blocks for 30 minutes this morning was more enjoyable. but i do love her constant enthusiasm.

triangle along with paula

 that purchase from fabricworm that i mentioned finally showed up. after making two spring fabric mosaics (here and here) for the color intensive class, i wanted the fabrics. and once the fast was broken for the month, i just went ahead and purchased with glee. a tad bit of guilt, too. in all honesty, unlike my other purchases for the month, these were bought simply for the "i want" factor. i got some of the fabrics from the mosaics and some i had wanted to use for the mosaics. some i also got from fabric.com instead because they were less expensive (not arrived). i had no real idea what to do with them, but i'd created the pull when making the mosaics and thought they'd make something great. lucky for me, the idea showed up before the fabrics did. thank you, paula!

 

do i need another project? heck, no! but that isn't stopping me because i already have fabrics picked for this (so no purchasing required - really), i have the ruler, it doesn't start for another month (time to get wips done), and i've wanted to do a triangle quilt for ages. quilting along with a group under that sassy paula is the icing on the cake! isn't it great how quilt-alongs get you going on something you have intended to do? it just motivates and inspires me so much to work on stuff when doing it this way. i especially enjoy the flickr groups and link parties where you get to see so many variations on the same project. paula even has sponsors offering prizes along the way. so if you've ever wanted to triangle, and i know you do, come along.

for the last year, scrapbook papers like these (above) have been inspiring me to contemplate a triangle quilt. although i've considered doing a solid triangle quilt, i think my spring pull is a good match for this look.

now, my pull is actually a mix of the two mosaics: one that was more yellow/green/grey/pink and one that was new greens/spring blues/touches of warm colors. i am using the two florals of the same print in two colorways to tie everything together. it's now a very cool spring morning with some warm touches to it.

however, now that everything is here, i'm not sure how well it's blending. i've been breaking it down into separate groups to see if i like it better that way.

going with the blue background floral here. the main problem with this is it lacks any more coral. but pops are nice, so it could work.

then again, i really like just these together! so pretty and cheery, yet calm, too. there should be plenty left over for another project with these fabrics.

this it a mix to go with the grey background floral that incorporates the yellow-y greens and gold with bits of red, too.
 

or i could add a bit more grey (from stash!) and the soft magenta print to pick up the touches of purple in the main floral.

 

goodness, too many options! i think i'll just go with everything together. but not until the end of march, when the quilt along officially starts. until then, i have plenty of wips to complete!