Sunday, April 8, 2012

These are a few of my favorite things [from the past week]

 Homemade baked chicken taquitos!

 A favorite mom-and-pop Italian place, where the chef talks to us every time.

 A favorite beer. [And a peek of our favorite, Chick-fil-a, in the background]

 Lots of good sewing time this week.

 Trying to figure out if I can fit Stephen's Easter basket into this dino pinata.

Modern art Easter eggs! Welcome to the big leagues of egg dyeing haha.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Sartorial Saturday: The Inaugural Edition

Merriam-Webster defines sartorial as relating to a tailor or tailored clothes; broadly relating to clothes.

Now, I am not being so generous with my apparel sewing as to say that my handmade items are 'tailored', but "Sartorial Saturday" does have a nice ring to it, and the blog needed a little organization to handle this new type of sewing. Plus, don't you feel smarter just thinking about the word sartorial? Henceforth, Saturdays will be all about my apparel sewing, leaving anyone not interested to completely blow past me in their Reader over the weekend.

*Let's just take a moment to appreciate the fact that I used both sartorial and henceforth in one paragraph. And people say higher education is a sham. Pfft.*

Back to clothing!

To start this thing off right, I noted that Joann's was having a Simplicity pattern sale this weekend, and stocked up on 5 patterns that I've been interested in. At $2 each, I felt pretty secure in buying them, even if they're a flop.

Without further ado [do you see a theme here today? We're being fancy]...

 Coral jersey knit and a plan to make View D. Without the gaudy rhinestones. In fact, I think it's really hard to see the potential in this pattern, and wouldn't have bought it if I hadn't seen a version somewhere on the Internet with some nice fabric and no embellishments.

 Two rayon jersey blends. Sidebar: I LOVE polka dot clothing. The pattern is actually not made for stretch fabrics, although it totally looks like a jersey dress. But I'm going to make a muslin to see how the fit is, and then make a sleeveless version. Making it with a knit will eliminate the need for a zipper yay! And um, if I have enough pink left over, I might make pajamas...seriously...the fabric feels so nice...is it ok to have a dress and pajamas made out of the same fabric? Hmm.

Linen-rayon blend and a Carolina chambray. The rayon makes the linen feel a little silkier and drape nicely, and as I had hoped, it also helps it from wrinkling. Hallelujah. I'm leaning towards making the Lisette dress in the chambray, but who knows. I'm wild. Sort of. As much as you can be when you're a beginner at sewing clothes.

See you next Saturday with my first completed piece! :)

Friday, April 6, 2012

IOUs

I owe my friend Allie a quilt. I'm sure most quilters have an IOU list. People they promised quilts to for some event or another, and then didn't finish it on time.

Allie's birthday was in January. It's apparently already April. Whoops. We live a few hours apart, and after I realized I wasn't going to be able to travel to see her for her birthday, making the quilt was pushed to the back burner in exchange for swaps and other current projects. Shame on me.

Nothing like a good kick in the pants to get me going though! She'll be in town on Sunday in the evening, and I'll be driving to meet up with her and my other old roommate. Not only do I love the idea of giving it to her in person, but then I also don't have to mail it! The thought of mailing a quilt actually makes my wallet scream in horror.

 I cut all these triangles. I had a charm pack of Ruby [Allie is SUCH a Ruby kind of gal] that I supplemented with some coordinating prints from ye olde stash.

I have a yard of that bottom Ruby print that I got super cheap with the intent to use it on the back. And then fill in with all the other supplemental prints that I added. I haven't a single idea for the back yet though, and how to make all those different prints work together in bigger cuts without looking jumbly...

 So I'm up to here. You'll notice...it's a wee bit small...I messed up BIG time on the math, and only calculated half the triangles I'd actually need to create a good size lap quilt. Time to get creative people, and think up a solution! :)

I'm thinking maybe my next quilt I should try something a little more leisurely instead of binge quilting? And perhaps I'll get all the math right too. Maybe? Nah.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Triangle Log Cabin Instructions

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I decided on triangle log cabins in warm colors of reds, yellows, oranges, and purples for my brand-spankin'-new bee participation.

I figured the blog was the best/easiest platform for the instructions to my fellow bee ladies, many of who are in Canada [I love when they talk about Robin being Canadian in How I Met Your Mother. Watch this clip. Also, I have no ill will towards Canada, lol]. So because of that, I need to ship out my fabrics soon!

I am sure that there are oodles of ways to put these together, but this is my method, and if everyone follows it then the triangles should be consistent. Yay! And hey, if anyone else wants to make them, now you'll know how!

 The center triangle will be made from a charm square. There will be one in every package.

 To make the triangle line up the ruler at 2.5 inches at the top of the triangle, and down through the bottom corner. Cut.

 Repeat with the other side.

 This is what it should look like when you are done. I chose this method because it is the simplest way that I could think of to create an isosceles triangle.

 [The triangle changed because the Ruby triangle is being used in another project]. Take the first fabric you want in your log cabin and lay it next to the triangle. You will note my ruler placement. The strip of orange fabric must be staggered with the triangle enough so that when the ruler is laid across that left edge there will be orange fabric to trim. You will have to do this every time you add fabric to the triangle.

 Sew, making sure to backstitch when you get to the triangle, even if you start sewing at the end of the strip. Press your seams open.

 Trim the strip on both sides so that the edges are flush with the original triangle.

 It will conveniently also trim the dog ears at the same time.

 This is what you end up with. A bigger triangle! This is the time to trim down the added strip if you want it to be narrower. Once you add additional fabrics you lose the opportunity, so if I had thought this was too wide I would have simply laid my ruler over top, using the seam line of the two fabrics as a guide to stay even, and trimmed to the desired width.

 Keep adding pieces to the sides, just like a regular log cabin block. This is after I had added one piece to all sides. You use the exact same method each time.

 As you can see in this picture, at the top of the red strip you will notice that it is angled, and then flattens out. I can still use the red strip, but I had to trim this down because the shape of the strip did not allow me to follow the line of the left side of the triangle when I went to trim.

Add as much fabric as you'd like [bee members, I give final measurements below]. It is important to sew accurately so you don't end up with a wavy/wonky triangle. And voila, now you have a beautiful triangle log cabin!

Ladies in the bee:
-Finished triangle size should be 15.5" across the bottom and 15.5" from the tip to the bottom.
-As you can see in my example, I don't want the widths of the pieces to be equal the entire time. I ask that you do not use any piece wider than 2.5" finished.
-Feel free to break each strip up into multiple fabrics. To do that you would just sew lengths together to form strips and then follow the instructions above.
-As far as color goes, in my example I did light to dark, but you can do whatever you want. You can use all the same color in each successive go-round, or you can be super scrappy. Whatevs!
-I'd like at least 3 additional rows around each triangle, just like my example.

Most of all, have fun! :) Holler if you have questions! That goes for anyone, not just bee members.

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

I finally have some progress again!

Apartment/Townhouse/House-Hunting is consuming pretty much every waking moment of mine. I have had the misfortune of moving every year since I started college [so that's 5 places so far]. Last year was certainly the most horrific, as we discovered the house we were renting had roof leaks and horrible mold in the walls that was making us sick. We ended up having to move out suddenly, store all our belongings in my parent's garage, and sleep on the floor at people's houses for a month while we looked for a new place to live.

So, needless to say, this year isn't quite so bad, but I dread May 1st when I have to move a king-size mattress down 3 flights of stairs :(

I haven't been sewing too much because of all this real life happening, but I have a few things.

Kelly's charm quilt. She wants it to be queen sized, and this is only about 60x80", so I have a bit to go. Except I don't have any more floor space. I'm thinking borders maybe?

I made this triangle log cabin last night to test out the idea I have for the new bee I'm in. I took the first month [because I'm impatient brave and bold and fearless!] and so I need to get cutting fabric to send out. I'll be posting instructions up here tomorrow, so everyone could make log cabin triangles if they so choose!

My super fancy mock-up. The background will be Essex linen in Natural, and the white will be some color once I receive all the triangles and decide what looks best. I'm still not sold on if I like it, but I think that's because it's made with warm colors while I almost always gravitate towards cool colors. I'm excited that the bee will help me embrace some of the reds and oranges in my stash!

I'm also brainstorming and designing a mini for Jessica at Make Me Crafty. We're doing a little swap [so she can get her swappy toes wet]. She's going to be making me a pouch, because I really want one, but just can never bring myself around to doing it.

Now I'm going to settle into my couch with some iced tea and check out all the other WIPs over at Freshly Pieced! :)

Monday, April 2, 2012

Reunited, and it feels so good

Alternately titled: My love-hate relationship with technology.

This is what happened yesterday:

I had finished cutting all my 5" squares for my friend Kelly's quilt. Since I'm feeling some quilting nostalgia after all my apparel making, I opened myself an Arizona Green Tea and set about arranging all these squares in a pleasing manner.

When I ran out of available floor space I sat back and took a picture to send to Kelly.


Me: [included with picture] Hey, just making sure you like this, or else I can scrap it, so just let me know.

[thinking to myself, how great it is that I can send her a picture so she can be involved in the process, aka, loving technology]

Kelly: Ahhh, I love the pattern!

Fast forward 7 hours. At that point, I had received about 700 of that exact same text. I couldn't turn my phone off because I was waiting for phone calls from realtors about homes we're interested in. The most I could do was turn my phone to vibrate [I don't have a silent setting].

Aka, HATING technology.

Needless to say, I was not pleased with this quilt after all this went down. Technology...you can't live without it...except yesterday I really, really could have.

*Linked up with SewHappyGeek and Quilt Story!

Sunday, April 1, 2012

These are a few of my favorite things [from the past week]

 We love all things space in this household. These are delicious. And fun :)

 Cocoa! She's 15 and a little hard of hearing, but still good for a snuggle anytime.

 Spent 10 hours scanning documents from the 1960s-present for my maternal side family reunion.

 Favorite dive bar/pizza place. This is only one of the reasons why.

 Hibachi and sushi dinner date with my sister when we were both going to be eating alone for dinner.

One of my closest friends is getting married and needed some "lemon" fabric for her table settings, so I scoured my stash and my favorite online fabric haunts to give her about 30 options :) Sometimes fabric obsessions are helpful!