some of my "to do" list

camille's red, aqua, and green colorway is so fresh and pleasant. i'm going to change the use of fabrics a bit by removing some of the larger graphic prints and i've selected a blue as the border. i think. i'm not sure about all that applique. i might have less of the flower squares and more something else. the bottom pink floral fabric is my backing.

this one looked straightforward until i realized there was twill tape sashing. sounds challenging. wonderful pattern, why not stick with the fabrics they already chose? couldn't get the exact orange floral for the border, so i'm substituting the circular print. green dot print is my binding; grey floral the backing. i'm falling for grey lately. it was one of those colors on my "absolutely not" list for ages. now it and orange are worming their way into my heart and projects.

my 12-year old daughter has her eye on this quilt. i'd like to make one for each of them and the central park collection suits her. it even has a few animal prints as a nod to the cp zoo, i'm sure. perfect for my animal loving miss. the colorway is a stretch for me because of the purple. it's still on my "i'd rather not" list. however, i can stand it in small bits and this isn't for me. this pattern also has a lot of applique but i can't resist the pennant bunting. i haven't made any for my home yet as much as i'd like to. maybe this will hold me over. because, of course, i will have this quilt whipped up in no time flat. check back next week, right?

there are a few more projects i have in the que, but they're stored away on the shelf and i'm too tired to pull them out for a snap. another post, another day.

time's up

she's done and that means i'm done. no more splish splash, no more stash.

i was up all night helping her with a vicious breathing episode. i'm literally moving on two hours sleep. the up side is working on this blog helped keep me awake so i could monitor her breathing. but now both of us should really get some sleep. it'll be breathing treatments every 3 or 4 hours for the next week. poor baby. maybe i'll find some "sniff snaff stash" time. probably not. and i was just getting out on that limb.

see? step one halfway completed.

out on a limb, part 1

i'm ready to begin my second quilt. the plan was to do my first pattern, "liliana" by crazy old ladies, again but in new fabrics, but this set of fabrics and my plans for it are just calling out to me. i'm helpless to resist. the even crazier part is i'm making up my own pattern! on my second quilt! yikes. i've been wanting to do a strip-style quilt with a jelly roll. looks like it's time. i've had this jelly roll, the backing and binding material for weeks now.

a few nights ago while the little girls were bathing (of course) i sketched out and then did all the math for an idea i had for these fabrics. on monday i went to the store to get a few more bits of fabric i decided i'd need. then i tried to make myself finish that dang "at last" quilt but i just couldn't. so yesterday i stopped messing around and broke the roll open. it's time to begin.

during "splish, splash, and stash" time i laid them out, making selections for the quilt parts, began cutting them in half. here goes nothing.

i'm calling it "out on a limb" because (a) it's an owl themed fabric with trees in it; (b) i'm taking the risk of making up my own design on my second-ever quilt; (c) there's going to be a strip across the the width, counter to the vertical strips, which could be thought to resemble a limb. seems appropriate.

at last

since my first quilt class last november, i've acquired the makings of at least 12 more quilts. i've been itching to dive into them, but have resisted on the grounds that the first quilt was not fully complete. that just makes sense, does it not? don't start something new until you've finished what you're working on. but i'm having a real problem. the reason it's not 100% complete is that i don't like the last bit of decoration that is supposed to go on the top. it's bound and fully usable now, but i can't get the embellishments to look right. i've purchased and tried no less than five colors of ricrac (5 yards each) and none appeal to me. it seems slightly undone the way it is, but when i lay out the ricrac and flower appliques, it gets very "ewhhhh" looking to me. it goes from "nice and almost done" to "too sugar sweet and grandma" for me. i'm throwing my hands up and moving on for now. hopefully i will get some inspiration along the way and come up with something i can be happy with.

quilt is "liliana" by crazy old ladies

once the flowers and ricrac are in place, i want to stipple quilt the pink border area.

someday.

this piece is called "at last" because (a) i finally bit the bullet and took a quilting class, which i've wanted to do for years; (b) it's for my baby - you know, "and the last shall be first"; (c) when i get my inspiration and finish it, i'm sure i'll be hollering "at last!"

my journey to sewing

loree and i in our homemade dresses (and haircuts), c.1975

my experience with sewing stretches back to my very beginnings. my mother was a competent seamstress that sewed all our dresses, which made up the majority of our wardrobe, for most of my childhood and continued creating dresses for us as teenagers, when we wore them mostly to church on sunday and to dances. she sewed the wedding dresses for all five of us girls and one for a sister-in-law as well. we grew up with pins in the green shag carpet of our houston, tx home on ainsworth. pattern pieces were regularly held up to our little selves for measuring. designs for clothing were doodled on all sorts of paper bits. (mom could draw as well.)

3rd grade school photo in a shirt my mom made

hours were spent looking over pattern books and racing through the isles of bolt after bolt of fabric at hancock's. it was as much a part of our childhood as breathing and eating and living in a house of eight kids. she was notorious for sewing on the finishing touches or pinning parts "to be finished later" on us as we ran out the door for a function. i'll never forget the morning of my wedding, walking in the door and seeing my dress with the buttons still not on - the buttons that were the only decoration on the front of the gown.

mom-made halloween costumes 1978

halloween was wide open to our imaginations and our costumes were far superior to the then-popular one piece vinyl body suit and plastic mask jobs everyone else wore. i never went to a school dance (sniff, sniff) but my sisters all had exactly the dress they wanted for their dates, made to order in every detail. we believed she could sew anything. but somehow, sadly, the skill was never passed on. maybe mom thought we were absorbing it by osmosis. i do remember her instructing me about lining up the pattern on the grain of the fabric. that's it.

i excitedly took home ec in middle school. i produced one pillow with an embroidered checkerboard pattern of pink pigs and lips that read "hogs and kisses" in the middle square. i don't remember anything else about middle school home ec other than being terrified my finger would get sewn through and our teacher telling us through her tears that the challenger space shuttle had exploded with school teacher sally ride on board. (that'll date me pretty accurately.) i did not pick up the ability to sew.

easter dress mom made my freshman year

high school was much the same. i took general home ec freshman year. when we reached the the sewing portion of the term, our darling elderly old maid teacher assigned us a rounded make-up cape for the project. if girls ever did use make-up capes to protect their clothing while applying make-up, no one i knew in three generations had. and it was one big circle. my mom completed the project for me. that was the end of home ec sewing instruction. and honestly, sewing just really wasn't cool at that point.

for christmas my junior year, mom surprised me with a basic model singer machine that she'd had on layaway for months, paying off bit by bit so she could give me a machine. i believe i cut out two squares to make a pillow for my bedroom, but it was never made. somehow the machine followed me out to college and into my marriage. when i took a puppeteering class as part of my early childhood education degree, i was surprised to find i could whip up a basic handpuppet shape rather easily. but sewing still wasn't cool and i had no interest.

a scrapbook page with hand and machine stitching on it (click to enlarge)

when my second child was born, i took a scrapbook class from heidi swapp that was all about making your own custom-sized page-protectors and stitching on your pages. i was smitten. i realized i really liked the feel of needle and thread in my hands even though cross-stitch was "not my style" for other craftables and wall decor. i used the machine to make some fun effects on my scrapbook pages from time to time, but my machine was located in the laundry room downstairs and my scrapbook room was upstairs.

after i was exposed to the world of blogging and on-line sharing about the time my sixth child was born, i slowly became aware of the handcrafted movement and dyi chic. i found myself wanting to make things with my own two hands, pretty fabric, a needle and some thread. kelly mccaleb had a tutorial on her blog for a vintage block baby quilt that looked doable. (which has since disappeared - oh, kelly, please bring it back!)

volume 1

the clincher, my true fall through the rabbit hole into the wonderland of sewing occurred when i came across the premier issue of stuffed, a softy magazine, whilst browsing scrapbook magazines at the bookstore. a fascination with softies quickly led to browsing in the craft book section which led to buying idea books on aprons, embroidery, then clothes, then whatever else i could get my hands on. my addiction to books is longstanding, crafting books being just an extension of that love and a marrying of the two.

i began looking for the designer fabrics i saw in the books. low and behold my favorite local scrapbook store opened up a small fabric section which soon took over a quarter of the store. i was completely hooked. but i still hadn't sewn more than the body of one small softie. all the females in my family were getting together for our annual "girls weekend", where three generations of ladies hang out at my s-i-l's cabin for a weekend of bonding on all sorts of levels. crafting is always involved. i had purchased a fabric headband at a boutique store that i was sure we could make for pennies on the dollar. it became our project for girls weekend 2010. i bought lots of those delicious fabrics, had my machine serviced, and set out for sewing fun with my seesters.

as i sat down to sew my first headband that weekend, i had a mild panic attack. i wanted so, so, so badly to be able to sew and i was terrified i wouldn't be able to actually do it. i got my headband all ready to sew, threaded the machine, put the headband in place, pushed the presser foot down and . . . nothing. nothing! i knew it. "mom! my machine won't go. what have i done wrong?" my wise and patient mother replied, "did you turn it on?" oh. i grinned sheepishly, turned the machine on, and started sewing. it worked! it wasn't perfect, but it was just fine and it worked! i made three more headbands that weekend for me and my girls. my seesters declared the project a hit, working well into the wee hours of the morning to knock out some really stunning numbers.

with a few simple projects under my belt, my confidence grew just a little. a couple weeks later with the mr. out of town on a hiking trip with the four oldest children, i decided to visit the fabric store again. i took along the two youngest charges in my care. in order to occupy the four year old, i let her pick out some fat quarters, thinking of a simple four square baby blanket i'd been gifted with my third child. it should be simple enough and fun to make for her. little did i know where it would lead.

fabrics: soliel by annette tatum for freespirit
my daughter has dubbed it her "star cookie blanket", an allusion to a fancy nancy book

the original blanket was backed with a coordinating flannel solid but the designer colors my sweetie had selected could not be matched by the standard stock of colors. i visited three fabric stores with two small girls trying to find a suitable flannel. none could be found. so i decided to just quilt it. sure, why not? then i could use one of the fabrics she'd picked as the backing and learn a little about quilting while i was at it. that turned into an eight panel baby quilt that i decided to handquilt, thanks to inspiration from jane brocket's the gentle art of domesticity.

 

an absolute must read

and quite a nice way to pass the time at soccer practice

 

 i started reading up on quilting and found a tutorial for hand quilting on the internet. that reminded me how i had longed to learn to quilt for just ages (another saga to be written at another time.) my store was offering classes. i was especially interested in the beginner class, which met monday mornings for four weeks and your first quilt would be done. finally, i decided to just do it. why not? homeschooling and six kids under twelve aside, i could make it happen. so i just did. the mr. was silent if not supportive; he knows my tendency to get obsessed and disappear. when my obsession was cooking that wasn't so bad because people still got to eat. years of slaving away over healthy, delicious dishes to be greeted by little people with "yuck!" put a damper on that one.

pressing and trying not to drool on myself as i eat a sucker in class
 

it was certainly an education taking that class; yet another saga i may or may not record. i learned a lot from what i did wrong just as much as what went right. and it got me addicted. completely addicted. before the class was over i had everything picked out for at least two more quilts, including the same pattern again with new fabrics. my fellow classmates and i reasoned we were familiar with it now, doing it once more would help cement the skills we were learning without throwing anything new into the mix. i found out my favorite part of quilting is probably handsewing the binding. love it. that takes me up to just about where this blog is going to start. i'm so excited to see where it's going to go from here. you're welcome along for as much or little as you'd care to see.

happy sewing, y'all.

let it begin

my sewing obsession, and yes, i can admit it is officially an obsession, has gotten too big for my personal blog so i'm giving it it's own home here. i know it's an obsession because two nights ago i stayed up til 3am looking at fabric sites and quilting blogs; for the last 4 months i've spent every penny of my personal pocket money on fabric; i fall asleep thinking about sewing and wake-up thinking about it, too. in a few short months my stash and supplies have grown large enough to fill an entire 7' x 3', 5 shelf  bookcase completely full. definitely an obsession.

late last night, when i should have been sleeping, i made the decision to start a separate blog for my sewing journey as a place where i can keep all my sewing related links. a large portion of those precious 40 winks were given over to musings on a suitable name. i tried on a few, but none seemed right. however, when i set up the blog tonight and put in my stand-by name until the perfect one could be found, i decided i liked it a lot more than i originally thought. so "splish splash stash" it is. i've even made a page to explain the why.

now on with the show.