Princess Quilt for a Princess

Over the Christmas break I kept myself busy with piecing, and quilting, so that I could finish a princess quilt for this sweet princess.



I'd started this quilt well over a year ago (princess is now 9 months!) and would only work on this project sporadically.  As Christmas approached I decided to kick it up a notch and try and get this one finished and over to its intended recipient.  There were lots of blurry eyed late nights invested... but soo worth it.



For the quilt design, I wanted something that would allow me to feature the princess pictures out of this Alexander Henry 'Once Upon A Time' fabric.  I came across the 'Oh My Stars!' Quiltalong, which looked straight forward enough my for beginner quilt skills and would allow me to fussy cut those princess images for the center of different sized stars.  It is a great tutorial, and if you check out the Oh My Stars Flicker Group you will see some creative and diverse applications of this approach.



I composed the layout as I went along.  It took me a few shuffles of stars before I landed on a composition that was pleasing to me -- having a large central star surrounded by medium and smaller stars.



After I had pieced the quilt, I knew that there would be a strong probability that I would not be able to get it out to a professional long arm quilter for completing over the busy Christmas period.  So, I decided that I would quilt it myself!  I spray basted the quilt together and started by shadow outlining the stars in a Pearl DMC top thread - using this great tutorial for guidance.  And then further echoed that outline with Aurifil thread, until I reached the edges of the quilt.  It was a lot of work but well worth the effort.  I am enormously pleased with how this turned out.





I have my next quilt in the very early planning stages... more to come in a future post.

Wishing you a wonderful weekend.  What fun plans do you have?
Sam xxx

A little of this and that

The crafty gifts continued to come in last weekend - check out this adorable sheepy yarn bowl that my step kids gave me for my birthday. It is adorable, and so are they :) We'd spent last weekend together in San Antonio, Texas, at a family wedding. It was a really fun weekend and good to have that time together.

With some of my big work projects going live this last week I've been able to pick up the knitting needles again. First I pulled this hexagon blanket out of the WIP pile. According to my ravelry notes, I started this one back in 2009. Yikes! Its amazing to me that it has been 'in progress' for that amount of time (where 'in progress' primarily means sat on a shelf and awaiting some attention!) I'd also finished the first pink pop sock, and now onto the next... about to turn the heel and then on the home stretch. Really pleased with these. Look how lusciously soft this yarn looks all knit up. Yesterday I was also playing around with some liberty fabric squares. I am thinking of making these into a cushion cover. Loving the pinks and purples. And last but not least, I received this thank you card in the mail for the Bertie's Blanket sock yarn blanket. Thank you again for all your help with these hospice blankets. The recipient was Porter Hospice in Littleton, Colorado.

Hope you are enjoying a lovely long weekend. Mine started with a day trip down to Colorado Springs, visiting Garden of the Gods and taking a ride up Pike's Peak on the Cog Railroad. For the rest of the weekend I am taking it easy and I'm thinking that also means craft time :)

Wishing you a great weekend,
Sam xxx

This week in review : March 15

Lovely new Vespa self-striping sock yarn and a beautiful project bag from a friend.
Seaming Bertie's (hospice) Blanket - the very pretty sock yarn blanket, for which you kindly donated squares. Isn't that pile of threads so pretty.
A relaxing jigsaw puzzle that I stumbled upon at Barnes and Noble, showing an illustration from Sarah Watts (a fabric designer that I like).
Some pretty new fabric.

The weather here is glorious. Naomi is a bundle of energy and wanting to test out her new big girl bike at the local park. I hope you also have fun plans for this Sunday. And Happy Mother's Day to all Mums in the UK.

Love
Sam
xxx

WIP Weekend

I had all good intentions of writing a WIP Wednesday post, that almost became a Things-a-progressin Thursday, and then... well, you get the idea, it's the weekend now, so WIP Weekend it is.  The main work in progress has been the secret socks. I started knitting these the other week and got to a point where I decided that I wasn't loving how they were looking. They were fine, but they weren't great. Do you ever feel that way?

There were a few things that were bugging me:

1. They seemed too big and baggy (and I'm sure Joe doesn't want Nora Batty socks)
2. The hearts seemed a little squooshed
3. I was knitting a couple of rows from each end of the ball to give it a striped effect...  but the stripes weren't showing up

After much umming and aahing, trying to decide if these bugs were deal breakers, I ripped the sock out and started again, with the following fixes:

1. Cast on fewer stiches and changed from straight stocking stitch to K9, P1 - this touch of ribbing seems to pull the sock in nicely and give it a little bit of leg huggability
2. Added an extra row to the hearts so they are a little less stumpy
3. Ditched the stripes

Now I'm happy!  I don't love ripping out, but when I find myself knitting and knitting and questioning myself about the end result, I figure sometimes its best to just go back to the drawing board... or little notepad, in this case.



The socks are now coming along nicely, although I am currently in that mental phase of  'I just want to be done' after doing rounds and rounds and rounds of the K9, P1 stitch pattern.  I may add in the afterthought heel right now just to break up the monotony.  But all in all, pleased with how these are coming along.

Other than the knitting, there's also been some purchasing.  First up, this lovely Spun Right Round sock yarn.  I don't have any plans yet... it just called to me like a siren song:



And some fabulous Kaffe Fasset fabric: 



My uncle has asked if I would make him a quilt with bright, happy, seaside colours.  Here is our colour inspiration for the quilt.
 


I think these fabrics will above work well with some that are already in my stash - I wanted some golden sand, and sea blue colours in there.   I might need some other brights too, to make it pop.  I'm still playing around with ideas at this point... I love this part of the process.



I also pulled out the WIP Berties (hospice) Blanket.  It's been a thoughtful week for me:  A sweet high school friend passed away from breast cancer last Friday.  It has haunted me all week, and that gave me the nudge to pull this out, so it can be seamed and handed to a local hospice where it can bring someone some comfort.  Thank you to all who contributed squares - this is going to be a beauty.  I just have one last square to complete and then onto the seaming.



Go hug your loved ones xxx

Wishing you a good weekend,
Sam xxx

Quilt Retreat

I recently attended a quilt retreat with the lovely ladies from the Denver Modern Quilt Guild.  It was a fabulous weekend that gave me the opportunity to work on the Stained quilt.


This quilt started as a quilt swap with the ladies from the quilt guild. We used the Stained quilt as the inspiration for the blocks, and the fabric I provided came from the Sarah Jane at Play range. I've since added fabrics from the same designer's Wee Wander line.



I'd received a good number of squares from the swap but still needed a good bunch more to make it large enough for Naomi's new big girl bed. Over the retreat I was able to remedy that and the quilt top is almost complete now... just needs a border to bring it to the desired size.
I am really excited to have this one near completion and looking forward to sharing a finished project soon.


I hope you have had a lovely weekend,
Sam x

Quilty gifts

One of the really cool birthday gifts that I received this year was a mini quilt from Terrie:



Isn't it pretty! This is going to take pride of place in my craft room.

I was really touched that Terrie had made this for me.  Her work is impeccable and fabric selection couldn't be more perfect. I am one very lucky girl.

Terrie shared this with me at last month's quilt guild meeting and there was much oohing and aahing from the quilt guild members, and the decision was made that we should have a swap of similar mini quilts using the initial of the first name of our swap partner. My swap partner is Wendy, and she shared that her favourite colour is green.  Here is W for Wendy. Front:



The W fabric is from a line called sewing box, of which I had a layer cake. The design on this one is tape measures. I quilted along the tape measure lines to give them a little definition. The W template is from a Moda blog hop, called Spell it with Fabric, where each blogger is assigned a letter of the alphabet. The end result is pretty cool, and the templates are available for download in pdf format. Imagine the possibilities with this one - a child's name on a quilt, or a fun crafty statement on a mini quilt... Since I already have my initial letter, my swap partner will be making a letter for Naomi. I think Naomi is going to be so happy to have one of her very own as she is big into letters right now, especially those letters that form her name. I'll post a piccy next month, after the swap.

Since I'm rambling about quilty gifts, here's one that I made for another friend's birthday.  A reversible fabric bucket:







Isn't that cat fabric adorable!  It is catnap from Lizzie House.  The pattern is on the Birch Fabrics site: fabric buckets.  I made the large size, with a couple of modifications: instead of interfacing I used batting, and I added a pocket for storage of nik naks - scissors, dpns, you name it...

I need to make some of these for myself - so cute and extremely handy. I know that someone's toy cupboard might also benefit from better organization too :)

Hope you are having a lovely weekend,
Sam xxx

Where does the time go?

I am having a hard time believing that it is April next week...  Do you feel the same way? 
Time just seems like it is flying by this year. 

I thought I'd take the opportunity to do my monthly recap now since its the weekend (Yay!) and I don't have any FOs to share just yet.  So... the crafty input/output resolution... it seems that I am not making strides in the right direction.  Am I surprised?  Umm, truthfully no, not really.  The upside is that I have some lovely goodies to share with you on the blog :) Ha ha yes, what an excuse!

So here's the walk of shame:

1.  Yarn:
On the output front I have a sock:



It needs a friend.  But one is better than none :) 
I've been travelling for the last 2 weeks for my work, and all this time on planes has given me the opportunity to get some knitting done.  I've made a start on the second sock, so hopefully I'll have a completed pair to share soon.



I've had a hankering for some handspun sock yarn for a while now, and I'm really enjoying working with this Crown Mountain handspun yarn and seeing the color changes in the yarn.  It may come as no surprise that I acquired some more:





And then the monthly installment from Skein came in.  Its a lovely color, and I was sorely tempted to retain the subscription, but ultimately saw sense and cancelled my subscription.  Baby steps in the right direction.



Ooh, I did finish another square for the Bertie's (hospice) Blankets.  Thinking I may lay the blanket squares  out this weekend.  It's pretty close to completion, thanks to all the kind folks that donated squares.



2.  Fabric:
I made a couple of squares for another one of the gals at quilt guild.  Love the colors in this - bring on Spring!



There was the infinity scarf from my last post.  But I also picked up some more fabric for the Local Quilt, which I'm eager to try my hand at.



I almost forgot, I also made a 'huggie' for my cross stitch frame.  It helps keep the edges of the cross stitch linen protected. And it's plain old cute since it goes with the 'Once Upon a Time' theme of the cross stitch.  :)



I have the perfect project bag for this cross stitch project.  This bag has tremendous sentimental value:  After my Grandma passed away last year my Mum was packing her things away and found this hand quilted bag that Grandma had made.  Mum knew that I would love it.  My Grandma was a wonderful lady who I miss dearly.  It makes me so happy that I have something that she made.   







3.  Cross Stitch:
I finished the first in the 'Frosty Forest' Series:  Raccoon Cabin.  So cute!



I've started the 2nd square in this series, but I'm also itching to get started on the Once Upon a Time sampler - I am 3 months' behind.  Yikes!

Wishing you all a lovely weekend.
Sam xxx

Happy March

February flew by, didn't it.  The 2nd month of New Year resolutions... how did you do?

For me, the health related resolutions took a back seat this month.  Must do better:  My goal weight/size date is 2 months today.  The target is still doable... if I work hard at it.  I need to get my butt in gear!  ;o))

I have been making reasonably good progress on the crafty resolutions, but ultimately they are still out of kilter:  intake is exceeding output :)

Yarn:

• I completed another 3 squares for the Berties (hospice) Blanket (in addition to the square from last month that is also included in the photo below.)  I've found a local hospice who are eager to get their hands on these knit blankets, so trying to get this completed ASAP.

• And there was Naomi's pink sweater dress (which I am totally counting even though my Mum did a bunch of the work... but using yarn from my stash... so that counts, right?  :o)))
• I also started a cute baby sweater using stash yarn

• However, I've also picked up a couple of skeins of sock yarn including Skein sock in La Mer (yup, still need to cancel that subscription)

• Handspun sock hop yarn (so pretty!)

• Hello Yarn sock

moving swiftly on...

Fabric:

• On the output front, there's the monster bags that I just blogged about.  And although I purchased about 5 yards for some of the monsters, I also used about 10 yards from stash.  So all-in-all pretty good going there.
• There is the 2nd converging corners square that I made for a quilt guild swap

• And 3 stained glass squares that I made for a WIP quilt for Naomi

• I've also signed up to do the Local Quilt from Carolyn Friedlander with our local quilt guild.  I picked the following from my stash, and only needed to pick up an extra yard (ish) for the blue dots that will form the sky.  Good intentions here too :)

Cross Stitch:

• I am far behind on the cross stitch front
• Jan, Feb and March installments for Once Upon a Time are in.  I have the materials needed (and they are so pretty) but haven't yet started

• Jan-March are also in for the frosty forest, and my January block is still in progress. 

• To end on a positive note :)  I did get my 12 days of Christmas back from the framers this weekend, and oh my, I am in love!  I've liked everything about this project - the design, the materials, the theme... and now the framing! 

Well, thats it for me today.
Hope you are having a lovely Sunday,
Sam xxx