Gathered Fabric Bowls

I finished my first project of 2014! Of course, I had to start a new project instead of finishing one of the projects I have waiting around for me, but oh well. :p Why did I choose this particular new project you say? Well, let's make a short story a little longer.

I signed up for a Craftster account last June, but I hadn't really done much with it until the end of the year. I don't have friends who craft, so I had been trying to find ways to connect with other crafters to share projects and ideas. I managed to make my way back to Craftster and dove right in to sharing my projects and participating in the forums. Like I mentioned in my 2014 Craft Challenge post, I'm participating in 50 Projects in 2014 on Craftster. I'm also participating in 14 Quilts in 2014. This one might be a stretch for me, but most of my planned quilty projects are small-scale or mini-quilts, not full-sized quilts. I've included them in my 50 Projects list to remind myself to make progress on quilty projects too!

One thing I am most excited about on Craftster is that the site has organized craft swaps. I participated in my first ever craft swap in November (not on Craftster), one for handmade Christmas ornaments, and it was a lot of fun! In December, I signed up for my first craft swap on Craftster, and that's how I came to make my first project of 2014.

The person I was crafting for had some cute fabric bowls on her wish list, and I jumped at the chance to make them for her. I followed this tutorial on A Spoonful of Sugar to make my bowls. I made three sizes with 6", 8", and 10" circles. They ended up a little smaller and shallower than I thought they would be, but I really like them. I used the same black and white print on the outside of each bowl, and the inside colors are varied. They nest easily and would be great for holding craft supplies. I definitely need to make some for myself!

 Have you made your first project of 2014 yet? What was it? I'd love to see it. :)

I've Been Bad

So, I've been a very bad blogger, and I'm sorry. I haven't posted in two months and it makes me sad. It all started because I wasn't feeling well and wasn't really getting anything done that would be worthy of writing about. As you probably know, when you don't feel well, it's hard to get the motivation to do things.

I'm working on a lot of projects and will have a lot to write about, but things might get a little crazy in March . . . because I'm pregnant! We're expecting a little girl this time, and I am so excited!

I've been feeling better (although I still get really tired on most days), and I have been getting a lot more crafting done.

I have only really progressed on one of the projects I last updated you on, my Woodland Sampler:

Woodland Sampler

Since my last update, I stitched up my September and October frames. I am currently working on the November frame and hope to finish it this week.

Wild Olive's Summer Stitching Club

My top is finished (expect for trimming it), but I still don't know exactly how I want to finish it. I have so many projects going right now, that I'm not going to worry about it until next year.

Wild Olive's Autumn Stitching Club

It's still going on right now (I think this is the last month), but I haven't started working on it. I know that once I get started, I'll probably fly through stitching up the designs. At least, that's what happened with the Summer Stitching Club. I may end up waiting to start this until I finish up all the handmade Christmas gifts I have planned.

ABC Quilt

This project has been on hold for too long. Maybe I can get in gear and finish it in time to give it to my son for Christmas. The timing would be good because we recently switched him to a toddler bed, and he doesn't have a nice blanket for it yet. It might be too much work to finish in a month, but I'm going try.

NEW PROJECTS IN THE WORKS

Eloise Baby Sweater

My first handmade item for the new baby is the Eloise Baby Sweater from MooglyBlog. It's adorable, and I am almost finished. I need to finish 1 1/2 sleeves and the neckline. Then, I get to weave in a million ends. That part won't be fun, but I'll be excited to have it all done and waiting for my little girl. Here is my last progress picture:

Countdown to Christmas Advent Calendar

BetterOffThread is running a Quilt-Along for this advent calendar designed by Elizabeth from Oh, Fransson! for SewMamaSew. The Quilt-Along started at the beginning of September, but I didn't hear about it until today! They are working on their binding this week, and I am just getting started.

Their final link up, which enters you to win some nice prizes, is on Monday, November 25th. I'm hoping I can get mine done in time to join in the link party.

So far, I have chosen my fabrics. I had a ton of fabric set aside for Christmas projects that will match/complement the family Christmas stockings I made two years ago, so that will make things a lot easier - no running to the fabric store before I can get started! I may have to trek to JoAnn's to get some white fabric for the sashing, but I'm hoping I can scrounge up enough from my stash to make it work.

Here are the fabrics I'll be working with:

Heartmade Holidays Ornament Swap

I'm participating in a handmade ornament swap hosted by Ashley from Heartmade Life. I have two ornaments to make and send to my swap partner by this coming Monday, November 18th. I think I finally know what I am going to make. Now, I just need to get them done!

My Sister's Birthday Present!

My sister's birthday is this Friday, and I have had a handmade gift idea for her for a LONG time. I have had everything I need to make it for a LONG time. I need to get it DONE! I'll be visiting her for her birthday, and I want to have it in hand, ready for her to open, when I get there. She might be reading this, so I'll post about her gift next week. :)

Work In Progress Updates

It's been awhile since I posted updates about the projects I'm working on. I have three long term projects going, all at once, but I forget to post blog updates because the changes happen so slowly (although, I have been posting progress pics on Instagram). Since it has been a while, there has been A LOT of change!

Summer Stitching Club

The Wild Olive Summer Stitching Club is coming to an end, but many participants are still working on the project - me included! I had a few weeks where I didn't work on this project because I was also trying to get caught up on another stitch-along, the Woodland Sampler. Once I got started on it again, I plowed right through the rest of the embroidery designs. I finished making hexies and piecing the top yesterday.

Now I just need to decide how I want to finish it. I changed the orientation of my hexies because I was thinking I might make it into a pillow cover instead of a mini quilt or wall hanging. But, now that I've gotten the top done, I might end up just finishing it as the original idea after all. I also need to decide if I am going to hand quilt or machine quilt it together.

 

Woodland Sampler

It took a lot of time, but I managed to get caught up on my Woodland Sampler. Each month's pattern comes out on the first of the month. I didn't sign up or start stitching until June, so I had a lot to do. It took me until August 7th, but all that stitching paid off. I think it looks great! I can't wait for the September pattern email!

My scroll frame isn't quite big enough to show you the whole thing, so the top of the January and February frames can't be seen, but this is what it looks like so far.

ABC Quilt

Sadly, this project has been on hold for a while. I originally wanted to have it completed in time for my son's 2nd birthday (May 23rd), but that didn't happen. I don't know why I thought I could pull it off in just slightly over a month, especially with my crazy over-planning tendencies.

I was on quite a roll with the project (even though it was late), but I got stuck on some of the embroider designs I was trying to draw up. I really wasn't expecting to have such a tough time drawing an octopus! Then, I started working on the two stitch-alongs I wrote about above, and I got wrapped up in them. There is something really special and fun about working on the same project at the same time as a ton of other people, but I would like to finish this quilt for my little guy in the near future!

 

New Projects Coming Up:

Autumn Stitching Club

I had so much fun with Wild Olive's Summer Stitching Club, that I signed up for the Autumn on too! The new Autumn Stitching Club stitch-along starts on Monday (Sept 2nd), and it only costs $5 for the whole thing right now. You should join in!

Pin Cushion Ring

I'll share this project when it's done. Hopefully it'll be up in the next few days because I really need one now.

More Embroidery Please! - Summer Stitching Club

I've been cross stitching for a long time, but I never really did much embroidery until about two or three years ago. For my first project with embroidery, I stuck to simple back-stitched names on Christmas stockings I made for my family and some close family friends. I'll probably share that project someday, but here's a peek at how they turned out.

Christmas Stockings

I really enjoy all the love that goes into something that is hand-stitched, so I've been trying to incorporate more embroidery into my projects. Right now, I'm working on an ABC Quilt for my son that has a lot of hand embroidery, and I love the way it's all coming together. I've been on the lookout for another embroidery project, maybe something for myself, and I found the perfect thing!

I've been following Mollie's Wild Olive blog for a while now, and was really excited when she wrote about her summer stitching club. Each week of June, July, and August she will send a tiny embroidery pattern to stitch up that will be made into little hexies. The tiny patterns will be great for a busy mom like me to finish quickly, and I'll finally get to make some hexies. I've been dying to try them! At the end of the summer, they'll all be put together into a cute little project. I'm really looking forward to my weekly emails!

If you want to join in too, it's just $5 if you sign up by June 2nd ($8 starting June 3rd). I think it's an awesome deal! You can click the picture below to go to her site.

ABC Quilt Progress - Still Stitching & A Realization

When I first started stitching, it was going by pretty quickly. I really thought that I might be able to finish Little Man's ABC Quilt before his birthday party on Saturday. Then, I hit a few snags. First, I had a few ABC blocks that seemed to just take forever to get stitched up. Second, Little Man decided that he needed hugs and cuddles all day long, every day. I tried, but I found that it's impossible to do any stitching while cuddling with him. Third, my shop had a nice influx of orders, and most were customized patterns and kits which take a while to put together. I love cuddling with my son, and having a busy shop is a good thing, so I didn't mind the lack of stitching.

I realized this morning that I haven't been able to do any stitching in two days. Today is Little Man's birthday, and my husband and I spent all day completely focused on him. So, no stitching again. I knew before today that there was no way I'd be able to finish this quilt by Little Man's birthday party, and that's probably why I avoided blogging for a week, but I'm finally okay with it. I'd rather take the extra time now to do a good job and make it awesome. Hopefully not having a deadline for finishing the quilt doesn't lead me to procrastinate.

I've finished 8 of the 30 embroidered blocks so far, and I'm going to try to get a few more done each day. Here are a few of the ones I've finished:

A, B, C, and D blocks for ABC Quilt

I'll be sharing more ABC Quilt progress photos as I go. You can check them out here:

Flickr

Instagram

ABC Quilt Progress - Prepping My Fabric

In my last post, I told you to yell at me if I didn't discuss actually stitching something in my next ABC Quilt progress update. I'm not going to write about stitching in this post, but don't yell at me just yet.

As excited as I am to start stitching, I needed to make sure my fabric was prepared before I could whip out the needles and embroidery floss. I know that whether or not you wash your fabric before sewing or quilting with it is a contentious subject - some always pre-wash their fabric while others never do - but ultimately it comes down to personal preference.

I'm not a quilting maven, so I was hoping I could get away with not pre-washing my fabric. Accurate cutting and sewing will be easier with crisp fabric. Common worries are fabric shrinkage and color-bleeding. I don't think I'll mind if the fabric shrinks a little after the quilt is all put together; it'll give it a lived-in look. I've read that most quilting cotton fabrics won't bleed, but to be on the safe side, I decided to check my fabrics to see if they are colorfast. I'd hate to spend hours cutting, embroidering, sewing, and quilting just to have the finished quilt get ruined when I wash it.

To check my fabrics for colorfastness, I cut a small piece from each fabric, soaked the fabric pieces in very hot water, rubbed the fabric pieces to get rid of the fabric processing chemicals, and then laid the pieces out to dry on a paper towel. When I checked to see if any color transferred from the fabric to the paper towel, I was happy to see there was none. So, I'm planning to get started on my quilt without pre-washing my fabric. Since I am still a bit of a worry-wart, I bought some Shout Color Catchers to use in the quilt's first wash - just in case.

Checking fabric for colorfastness

Next up, I'll be cutting my ABC block squares, transferring my embroidery designs to the blocks, and will start stitching! I only have 11 days left.

ABC Quilt Progress - Choosing My Fabrics

So, the last time I wrote about my ABC Quilt progress, I set a few goals for myself. By the weekend, I wanted to:

1. Have my alphabet designs all sketched out
2. Have my quilt layout finalized
3. Have my fabric purchased

Well, my weekend deadline came and went, and I succeeded in one of the three. It's sad, but that's not bad for me, Ms. Procrastinator. But, as usual, I have excuses for not completing them! One good excuse was an influx of orders in the shop for custom patterns and stitched items. The other excuses are discussed below.  :)

#1: All Alphabet Designs Sketched Out - In Progress
I was on track for finishing all my alphabet designs by the end of the week, but as I was sketching out Letter L, I realized that I hadn't left enough blank space around the edges of my block. After measuring and re-measuring, I confirmed that if I kept the current margins, my quilting stitches would go over my embroidery, which isn't what I want.

I spent a lot of Friday tweaking my block layout, trying to make all the text look even and leave space for the quilting stitches. After getting it all worked out, I decided that I needed to reprint all of my blocks and check to make sure the sketches I've already done will fit inside the new blocks. I plan to do this today. Originally, I wanted to have everything drawn out before I started stitching, but I realized that it's not really necessary. I can sketch the new designs as I go. Whew! It's nice to give myself a break sometimes.

#2: Quilt Layout Finalized - In Progress
I started out by sketching in a notebook and eventually graduated to the computer. I made a couple of mock ups for quilt layouts. Although I thought I knew what I wanted before started to put my layout together, I couldn't decide what I want to do with the border portion of the quilt. I was really stressing about having a "finalized" layout so I could calculate how much of each fabric I would need, but I decided to give myself another break here. I have a tendency to plan, plan, plan each little detail and that feeds into my procrastination - "I can't possibly start making X because I haven't planned out every possible detail in the project yet!"

I realized that this is crazy and the biggest reason why it takes me so long to finish (or ever start) my projects. To solve the problem of not knowing what to do about my borders, I decided to buy a little extra of each fabric so I can figure it out later. The extra fabric won't go to waste; I'll use it to make Little Man a matching pillow case. Damn! The decision to make the planning freak in me relax a bit felt so good!

Initial Layout Scribbles

Possible Layout

#3: Fabric Purchased - DONE!  :)
Before our house was our house, the old owners painted what would eventually be Little Man's room green and blue (two walls of each). When we found out we were having a boy, we decided to keep the colors. We like dark wood, so all of his furniture is espresso stained. When picking all our "baby stuff," we went with the colors that were already going to be in his room: green, blue, and brown. I still really like these colors, so I knew I wanted the same color scheme for LM's quilt. Colors, done.

I do not understand how to pick fabrics for a quilt - color value, scale of print, saturation of color, etc. - The thought of picking "the right fabrics" was starting to stress me out. I spent some time looking at pictures of quilts with similar colors to see if I could get some ideas, but I didn't really find anything. I went back through the quilts I've pinned to my quilting board on Pinterest, and I realized that I am really drawn to modern quilts. I love solid colors with bold stitching. After this realization, picking my fabric was easy. I decided that I would get solids. It took me a while at the store, but I eventually found the right colors. LM even helped pick them! He insisted on the blue I chose, and that led me to the one print I bought for the binding. I'm hoping the solid fabrics will let the embroidery be the star while still being interesting.

ABC Quilt Fabrics

I have a lot of work to do on this quilt to get it done in time; there are only 17 days left between now and his birthday party! Having the fabrics purchased really makes the whole project feel more "real" and takes away some of the excuses I could have for delaying more. My next progress post should include some actual stitching. If not, please yell at me!

So Excited!

While I focus my work for the shop on cross stitch and embroidery, I have a long list of crafts I enjoy. I tend to go through crafting phases. One month, I might focus completely on cross stitch. The next month, I might obsess over crochet or sewing projects. And, later, I might be in a crafting void or get interested in something new.

Recently, I've had the urge to quilt. A real, machine quilted quilt. I have only made one quilt before, maybe 12 years ago, as a gift for my boyfriend. It was a very simple quilt made up of squares, plain sashing, and a solid back piece. I had never machine quilted before (and still haven't), so I just tied the quilt. I was so excited just to have completed a quilt - I loved it - and I felt a little sad to give it away. Since that boyfriend is now my husband, I still have the quilt and get to use it!

I've been scouring the Internet (mostly through Pinterest), looking for cute/modern quilting patterns to try out and thinking about color combinations. I usually do lots and lots of "research" before starting a new project, but I know that one thing that has held me back from starting a quilt has been not having a machine I can use for the machine quilting. I don't want to send out my quilt to be quilted for me, but it can be challenging to machine quilt on a home sewing machine. My Brother machine is great, and has more room to roll up a quilt than many other home machines, but I'd like to make a quilt for our Cal King bed and I'm not sure it's big enough for that.

Then, this beauty showed up at my door: Brother PQ1500S High Speed Quilting and Sewing Machine. I am so excited to get to quilting! I feel like I can make masterpieces with this machine. Expect to see some quilted items from me soon.

I think I may love you Brother PQ1500S.

Happy Easter!

It's really easy to get caught up in creating items for the shop and not make things for myself. Even though my products focus on cross stitch and embroidery, I enjoy many other crafts as well. Like most crafters, I seem to always have a ton of projects on the back burner, but I finally got my head out of the shop and did a little sewing just for fun.

This is Mr. Baby's first Easter. Since he is so little, I found it hard to figure out what to put in his Easter basket. One of my favorite things to get in my basket when I was a kid was marshmallow Peeps. I happened upon a cute tutorial for Marshmallow Bunny Plushies, and I just had to make them! I, of course, decided to make them at the last minute, so I trekked out to the fabric store yesterday and stayed up super late sewing. I'm so glad I did! These little cuties turned out great, and Mr. Baby loves them.

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