Roman Stripes

One classic pattern for using up left over stripes is the Roman Stripes pattern.
Sewing on a foundation (in my case left over batting I pieced together from the cuttings of various quilts) the blocks go together fast and easy.
Next step is to decide on the layout.
One option would be some kind of zig-zag (not a big fan)

 Or turning all the stripe sections to the center to make diamonds (also not super excited about that)

 In the end I decided the classic layout of all stripes sections pointing in the same direction and having the different solid triangles layed out in diagonal rows.

I joined the blocked with narrow dark blue stripes, then quilted the top diagonally with wavy lines.
This was a fast, easy quilt with the added bonus of using scrap batting and scrap fabric (in this batics I had left from my City Sampler I made in 2017)

Laurelie

Hi there. I'm still here.
Sorry for being so quite lately, but on one hand there has been some not so funny life stuff going on, on the other hand I was away for four weeks in the US on a business trip.
I haven't done much knitting lately, just wasn't in the mood. But then I bought two skeins of Tosh Merino Light in the US and found the perfect pattern for it.

 The pattern is called Laurelie and I knitted it in the colors Wash House and Antler. After a nice bath and a bit of blocking the shawl is nice and soft and cuddly, and it's a shame it's summer because I want to wrap myself in it and never let go.

I totally love the pattern mix and really enjoyed knitting the shawl. Once you get tired of the garder stitch, you move to the mosaic section and then you transition to the lace section. Very much fun.

(Don't) Stop Me Now

.... I'm having a good time.
Or an obsession.
Here are:
Baker's Twine Potholder Nummero 2

 Baker's Twine Potholder Nummero 3

 Aaaaand Baker's Twine Potholder Nummero 4

Nope, not a problem. No way. Not at all.

Baker's Twine

Two weeks ago a friend of mine mentioned a new potholder pattern, which is quite popular right not. I checked it out, liked it, bought the pattern and got knitting.

The pattern itself is not difficult and the potholders knit up very quickly. I used less stitches than the pattern suggested, because they started out huge, and I like this size better (they are 20 x 20cm)
Knitting them is a bit hard on the fingers, as the knitting is rather tight, but the result is well worth the effort.

The potholders are nice a thick and the hangers are the 'dot on the letter i' to make them perfect.

I may have started with the next pair already ....

Wonky Flower Baby Quilt

Sorry for being off for so long. Other stuff got in the way (nothing serious, just playing too much computer games)
Anyway, I finished the Wonky Flower Baby Quilt. And I love it!

The quilt is 100 x 110cm (40" x 44") and has wonky flowers in four different sizes (12", 10", 8", and 6")

For the backside I went through my stash and picked 12 semi solids for all colors of the rainbow. Each stripe is a little less than 4" tall.

I went for simply shadow quilting the flowers on the front (which ment to turn the quilt 24 times for each single flower!)

One of the most difficult decisions was what color to use for the binding, but in the end there was only one possible choice.

The baby in question is not here yet, so it will still need a label.

Very, very happy with the finished quilt. I hope the baby parents will love it too.

Wonky Flowers – A Tutorial

A couple of days ago, I came across a new trick that solved a problem I had with sewing Wonky Flowers. The problem was that I never managed to align the background very good, which leads to a lot of waste in fabric (as I used way more background fabric than needed). The trick also helps with keeping the stripes I've sewn before aligned, not necessary very important in ‘wonky’ flowers, but nice nonetheless.

For a 6 ½ inch block (6 inch final) I need:

-        1   7 x 7 inches background (green)

-          8   1 ½ x 3 inches background (green)

-          3   1 ½ x 6 ½ inches foreground (purple)

-          2   1 ½ x 3 inches foreground (purple)

-          1   1 ½ x 1 ½ inches flower center (yellow)

I assemble the foreground fabric to four stripes with background on either end, and one with the flower center in the middle: 

 Next I take one of the stripes without the flower center (that one is the last stripe to sew) and lay it right side to the right side of the background and pin it. The positioning is a little tilted and off-center (I found the best way to center it is to put it where you want it and then mark a line ½ inch to the center of fabric, away from one of the edges)

Sew along the edge and then fold over and press. 

Now comes the trick. Fold the open side over by ¼ inch (sew allowance) and press. Then dap a little bit of fabric glue on the folded over bit and fold to the other side (I just push it down with my fingers, don’t iron it) 

Turn the whole fabric over and – carefully! – cut through the background fabric, between it and the stripe. Fold the now open bit over and sew along the crease when you ironed the sew allowance over. 

Now you have a stripe perfectly aligned with the background.

You can cut back the extra background fabric away from the second seam (but don’t need to – I just think it looks nicer)

Repeat this with the other stripes. As the background is not moved while you sew on the stripes, it stays nice and square.

Once all stripes are sewn on, all that remains is to square the block to size.

Feel free to play around with the length and/or thickness of the stripes. The measurements I gave are something that works for me and my project. Your mileage may vary. They are called Wonky Flowers for a reason, and a bit of variation is always nice.

Triangle Quilt-A-Long

Last year Bernina (the sewing machine company) hosted a Quilt-A-Long for a Triangle Quilt. As a Quilt with triangles was on my quilting bucket list and as I had a nice layer cake that should be enough for the required triangles, I decided to go along.
Once every couple of weeks a pattern for a new set of triangles was posted on the Bernina blog and I sewed happily along with hundreds of other women (and men, I presume), making different triangles in different techniques. It was fun, really. A noticed fairly soon, that my thinking that I could swap out yardage with a layer cake was a bit on the optimistic side, but I still managed to finish all triangles with the fabric I had (there was some creative fudging required, but in the end it was just enough)
I finished the rows a couple of months ago, but then the whole thing sat in its box.

After x-mas I pulled those rows out and finally finished the top. Not all points are perfectly aligned, but nothing to obviously is standing out, so I'm content.

The top is huge (216 x 202 cm - 85 x 80 inches), and finding a place in my appartment to take pictures of wasn't so easy (and, I just can't get the complete top to show - I promise the right hand side is nothing too exciting, really).
I'm looking forward to quilting it, though handling this much fabric will be a chore. I hope to get to it before summer, as I already have a receptient in mind.

Back from Far Far Away

I've been rather quite the last month, and that nothing to do with the stressful time before Christmas, but rather with the fact that I escaped from that stressful time by taking a vacation a long way from home. It might not been my farthest vacation destination (that honour goes to New Zealand), but getting there took quite some time, as you actually can't fly there, but have to take a ship.
I still flew a long time, first to Buenos Aires, then further South to El Calafata in Patagonia, and then a little further South again to Ushuaia (the Southern most city in the world), to get on a ship (the Midnatsol) to cross the Drake Passage and finally reach my destination: Antarctica.
We saw icebergs

And Penguins

And whales

And has an alround fantastic time.

Boxy Bags and Books

I made two box bags (well, one is more of a pencilcase really, but the basic pattern is the same)
First bag is for holding my meds when I'm traveling. I used mostly white scraps and added a red cross in the last step. There is also a red cross on the other side of the bag. The starting fabric size is two times 20 x 20cm

The same pattern, but starting with 23 x 13cm gets this bag. Perfect size for pencils and other writing paraphenelia.

Next year's journal is covered in fabric. I saw a project like this on pinterest some time ago and put it on my 'have to make is one day' list. Finally, that day has come.

I made that travel journal for an upcoming trip. I used maps from an atlas I bought second hand to cover two pieces of cardboard.

The binding is a so-called accordion binding with six signatures (foldes stacks of paper). The advantage of this binding is that I still have room to add stuff to the book. The hinges and the closure is made with fake leather, which I did sew to the covers by hand.

Seriously, this is my favorite book binding project so far.

Paint, Paper and Paste

I've been playing with making paste paper.
First I used acrylic paint to paint a background.

Once the backgroundwas dry, I added a second layer of paint mixed with paste (I used plain wallpaper glue - next time maybe I'm trying something else)

Using a spatula made from cardboard or some other instrument I scrapped some of that paste away again, revealing the underlaying background.

 And then I let it dry again.

For my first attempts I'm very happy with the outcome.

It is a bit of a messy process, but it is also a lot of fun to do.

I also experimented with carving my own stamps.

I'm very much in love with that stamp (a made three papers based only one that one stamp so far). To add something extra, I used silver embossing powder on that last stamp layer.

Other then just playing with color (which is a goal in itself, because fun you know) I also have some other goal in mind. Which leads back to bookbinding.

The paper I used in this booklet is in fact money (5 Euro notes). They are lightly glued together on one side, so you can easily tear a note off anytime you want to pay for something.
I made two as presents.

Binding Books

I love books and I love to craft, so it was inevitable that at one point I'd try my hands on book binding.
First technique I've tried my hands on was the Japanese binding.

Fun technique and I certainly will try it again, but the disadvantage is the book doesn't lay flat once opened. I'm using it as a sketchbook, so no big problem, but something to keep in mind.

Next technique is the more classic coptic binding, were you sew your pages through the fold and then glue the back to secure it. For the cover I used the last of my Rome fabric.

Last book (for now) is a leather bound journal I've made as a little surprise for my role playing group. I had fun figuring out in which way to print the pages inside so they can be read in the proper order once they are bound.

 For the spine I used a cross stitch binding. I very, very much love it.

I do have a few more ideas, so those won't be the last books I'm binding ...

Go Flames!

A couple of years back I went on vacation in the Canadian Rockies. Before I went there, I flew to Calgary and spent a night there. The next morning, while I was walking around, I was quite astonished when I saw a fire truck pass by with a big banner on the front which said 'Go Flames!'
I later learned that the Calgary Flames are a professional ice hockey team based in Calgary that, at that time, was competing in the Stanley Cup.
Anyway, my last quilt finish is also called Flames, but has nothing to do with ice hockey or any sport at all.

The quilt is from Rebecca Bryan's book 'Modern Rainbow'. I pretty much followed the pattern exactly and love how it came out. Mostly I like how fresh it looks, with the clear colors and the grey sashing that binds everything together.

I did use a small roll of 2 1/2" stripes in rainbow colors I bought at the Quiltmanufactur in Frankfurt together with some fabric from my stash.
For the back I used another roll in solid colors together with a greyish fabric reclaimed from a duvet cover.

The quilt top was finished back in May, but the quilting took some time (mostly because I refused to quilt in the summer when it was so hot). First I did sew along the grey strips in the sashing using my walking foot then free motion quilted a feather into each diamond.

I love how the quilt turned out. It doesn't have a home yet (and no label ... need to make a label), but I'm sure I'll find a place for it in the end.

Ripples

I've been working on this afghan for quite a while. It was abandoned for more than a year, when I picked it up again last month.

Basically, it's brown, blue and off white yarn left over from all kind of projects in more or less similar weight. I crocheted a simple ripples pattern, picking the colors pretty much random, except that I tended to go light-dark-light-dark, just to show of the ripple pattern nicely.

I didn't run out of yarn so much as deciding that I'm done (though I did manage to plow through quite a bit of my stash yarn and the selection got a bit thin in the end)

The size is 155 x 170 cm, which I think is a pretty decent size.
I still need to give it a wash (which, considering how many different yarns are in there, will be by hand in the tub - oh joy)