WIP-lash!

Oh. My. I cannot believe it is Wednesday again already! Do you ever feel like you are just playing catch up all the time? My week started off like that, but things really fell apart on Monday with my boys having the day off school. A little trip to the playground turned into all night in the ER as my middle child suffered a concussion falling off a play structure. He is totally OK now, but it was a little worrying at the time. Especially when taking one child to the hospital involves having to find someone to watch your other children -- I'm not a real single parent (my partner is working out of town), but the longer I do this, the more respect I have for the real single parents out there. I was lucky that my friend took my other two kids -- and they got to have their first sleepover with their friends!

Anyhoo, back to the sewing! Needless to say, there has been no activity since middle boy bonked his head, but just before that happened, I did this:

That's right:

Basted! And the best part was discovering that my sewing/office space is big enough to bast a king size quilt just by sliding a chair and a coffee table out of the way - sweet! Hopefully it will get quilted in the next week.

Other than that, just more of this:

T-Hex is growing, but that is probably only about 1/3 of the hexies I will need to finish it.

And, oh boy, too many online-credit-card-doesn't-feel-like-you're-spending-real-money purchases. The best one came last week:

That is just a little teeny bit of Field Study. Anna Maria, you mad genious, you had me at the blue cheetah print!

And then there was this:

Mendocino is probably my favourite fabric line ever, so I jumped all over these Spoonflower fabrics as soon as I discovered them. These are on Kona cotton, and of course they are lovely, however I do have to say that the colours are not as saturated as the original fabrics. I will still be happy to stitch them up however!

There might also have been some yarn purchases and maybe a book, too. Is there an Online Shoppers Anonymous support group? Maybe that is Hoarders?!

That's all my little brain can manage right now, hopefully I will be back later with a finished quilt to show you. Linking up with WIP Wednesday, despite being late to the party.

Thanks for visiting - I hope you have a lovely end-of-the-week!

yzo

 

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Obsession & Avoidance

This king top sits cast aside, disgusted with its maker's lack of follow-it-throughness.

The backing fabrics have been located, but still the maker avoids the arduous job of clearing aside furniture, mopping the floor (!), and basting. So there it sits, folded and neglected.

What could be distracting the maker from this pressing job (the husband returns in just a few weeks, after all, and a new bed quilt has been promised)?

Ermm, could it be this...?

I am like a cruel mother, playing favourites, and this baby T-Hex has definitely captured my affections -- watching it grow, literally cell by cell, has become an obsessive pleasure. Have you become sick of hexie pictures yet? I hope not, because this WIP is long term: I figured out that I need three chevron repeats across and four repeats down for a 48" x 64" size. To keep it manageable I think I will have to sew chevron section separately and then join them all up at the end. I have discovered that my stash has a definite lack of yellows, oranges and purples - even though I am always attracted to those colours when buying fabric. Interesting.

I am linking up to WIP Wednesday and am looking forward to seeing what you are all up to.

Thanks for visiting and have a great week!

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T-Hex

I started sewing the hexies together, it was so awesome to see some progress after just cutting and basting for.ever. I am aiming for lap/couch throw size, so I'm about 1/18th done! (1/28th?) Yay! Hopefully it won't be a ten year project, but you just never know. Either way, I figured this one deserves a name - so Tyrannasaurus Hex it is. Big and scary, and if you're not fast, it might just eat you alive. I have a couple hundred hexies basted, so hopefully, alternating between making hexies and stitching them together, it will grow steadily over the winter.

I abandoned the king top this week in favour of a camping trip with the kids -- do not ask how that went, suffice it to say we spent the weekend in the spa pools at Harrison Hot Springs, so it did not go as planned, but it wasn't too shabby either. And we had an evening walk along the lake.

And thank goodness for WIP Wednesday as I thought to myself, "Whatever will people think? I said I was going to have that quilt basted this week, I better get cracking!" Peer pressure (internalized, imaginary peer pressure at that) is a powerful thing - it is not yet basted, but the top is done, and I managed to find the fabric for the backing.

Getting a full picture of a king sized quilt is challenging, so I had to enlist my photography interns to help out and drape it over our balcony.

I have no idea where or how I'm going to baste this monster! I may have to move all of our furniture out of the house.

I'm linking up with WIP Wednesday, and I have also been catching up with the Let's get Acquainted blog hop posts. Here are the recent and upcoming posts:

Sep 4 Lorelei from Mermaid Sews

Leoni from Strandkorbtraum

Sep 6
Tessa from The Sewing Chick
Bethany from Make Me A Quilt

Sep 11
Anne from SpringLeaf Studios
Kristy from Cotton Addiction

Sep 13
Julie from That's Sew Julie
Chelsea from Pins and Bobbins

Sep 18
Lina from Smultronbo's Pieceful
Chase from 1/4" mark

Sep 20
Jen from Closet Quilter
Anna from Pink Padme

Thanks for visiting and have a lovely week!

 

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Where are those WIP elves, anyway?

The big nasty WIP this week, is, unfortunately, not sewing related. After moving house and then immediately leaving for a long vacation, we returned home to find that, bah! Elves had not finished unpacking the house while we were away. So that is my ongoing current WIP. Since my kids only started full time school today (half waaah/half yippee!), not a lot has been accomplished. One thing that is making me feel a little happier though, is having all my fabric beautifully folded like so:

And, yes, that's our teacup collection - it is necessary to share storage space. And this shelving unit is in our living room (our whole downstairs is now open concept). I haven't decided if its weird to have fabric and tableware together. Is it weird? I do like that because of the doors, the cups and the fabric will be a lot less dusty! I guess I'll have to see what the bf thinks when he gets back to town.

Now, since this is my first day with no children around in, er, months, I am going to finish unpacking. Naaah, just kidding. Im going to hit that King sized top - hopefully I can get it finished today and maybe basted this week. I will need to find a coordinating quilting cotton for the binding - I can't imagine that voile would hold up for very long.

I'm linking up with WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced, guest hosted by Emily from Mommy's Naptime. I love visiting all the other projects that people are working on - so inspiring! Have a lovely day, and thanks for visiting.

 

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Nothing to see here, folks.

Seriously. Not much happened in the month of August (aside from an awesome vacation, that is). The king sized top that I started last week is moving along, it is about 2/3 pieced, and I just need to dig the rest of the voile out of a storage bin (somewhere, who knows where) to make sure that I have enough for the backing.

I took this picture because my son commented that it looked like I was sewing a surfboard, now I can't get that image out of my head!

But here is the only actual sewing that has happened lately:

Quilting will be simple straight lines next to the seams I think. I really love the gorgeous hand quilting that Leila did - it is stunning and really adds to her quilt, but I don't really need another big hand stitching project - the megahexie quilt project is enough already.

I realize that's not super exciting, but wait! I also have some fabric loveliness to share! Just before we left I was lucky enough to win a giveaway from Sarah-Lou of this Fairy Tale Friends charm pack:

I'm not sure what will become of this, but at the very least it would make a great addition to the hexie quilt.

I also won a giveaway from QuiltDad with a sampler pack of these Aurifil threads. I actually just bought some white Aurifil thread which I'm using on the voile quilt - it does seem a lot less linty than my regular thread, so I'm happy to be able to check out the other weights available in this pack.

Of course, I am not one to take a vacation without bringing back a little something... Was it just blind luck that found us on our first afternoon in London, walking through Oxford Circus and right past this?

No. That has to be fate! This Liberty store was voted "The Best Store in London" and when you go in, you can see why. The building itself is stunning, filled with so many beautiful pieces of workmanship (workpersonship? Although undoubtedly most of the woodworkers, builders and craftsmen of that era were men) it almost needs nothing inside it. And yet it is filled with five floors of gorgeousness. I made a beeline for the fabric remnant table, although I did pick up some new yardage too. I have to say, I think I was remarkably restrained!

Back in Toronto, we made a special trip to The Workroom as it is one of the few places in Canada where you can check out these lovely Japanese pattern books in person. Now just need to learn a little Japanese!

The Workroom also had a great wall of Fat Quarters, which yielded this (I was thinking only of the good of the hexie quilt, 'natch):

Okay, now that I have revealed an (embarrassing) amount of fabric purchases, I am going to pledge to use each and every one of these pieces of fabric in the next year! I'm not making any promises about the Japanese, however.

I am linking up with Fresh Sewing Day and the Small Blog Meet at Lily's Quilts. Also, after my lucky giveaway streak, I am thinking I will need to have a little giveaway of my own soon :)





This summer apparently I am also one of these:

Thanks so much for visiting!

 

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