My Roadmap

OK, with me signing up for the Repetition summer class and the Friendly Dragon Quilt throwing up a design question or two plus Paula's birthday rolling around, it is time for a plan:

(1) Finish the Friendly Dragon Quilt
(2) Make Paula's Princess Bed kit, much like her sister's
(3) start work on Repetition
(4) if possible: make a Chinese Coin quilt of some sort for Hannah's Christening in late August.

YIKES!

Cooked shirts

I came across this in InStyle and it's getting quite a lot of buzz in the fashion scene: Kean Etro's Cooked Shirts ... read about it here:
YumSugar.com and Fashionweekdaily.com



Foto from Teamsugar.com

Stitching away ...

I'm busy quilting the creature and at times it's hard graft, having to push the needle through about six layers of fabric and one layer of fleece. Why, you ask. Because I am obsessed with fraying and have therefore foldered all the edges under before fusing ...

So far, I'm quite pleased with the results though I am finding that all that previous tacking was a waste of time because whenever I smooth down the sandwich to avoid wrinkles, the tacking is in my way and causes said wrinkles. Sigh. Maybe safety pins are the way to go, who knows?

Just accepted into "Repetition" class

I am very excited to have been accepted into Tonya's repetition class. I've just introduced myself and if you like, you can follow my progress
here. This link will also go into my nav column.

Tacking together the different layers

I am being really good about this ...



very diligent ...



... hoping it will pay off.

You know I see all these progress shots with perfectly ironed tops and what-not and I feel really bad in my perfectionist lazyness that I don't do these things. Not doing them usually causes my headaches later ... so watch this space.

Daybeds are great for sandwiching

See my little assistant?

Instead of packing

... and much to the relief of my husband, who was fearing a week's holiday of me complaining "I wish I brought my quilt, I qish I brought my quilt", I spent the morning at my sewing machine finishing the assembly of Harrison's quilt:





The back is looking good as well. We did arrive terribly late because we also got lost after our GPS didn't know where we wanted to go. But it was the beginning to a great holiday.

Repinned, fused and partially sewn ...

With the dragon safely pinned to the wall in the previous step, I swapped needles to prep him for fusing ...



and turned my design wall into an ironing slope so that I could easily slide the little guy onto my ironing board.



Ironing with my ancient non-steam Rowenta went really well ...



leaving me time to start sewing the fused bits to the top. Hopefully, this labour of love will be used often. I wanted it to be sturdy but assumed that fusing the parts first would help me in assembling the dragon. What a learning experience but I don't think I'd change a thing - other than dial down the fretting.

All reassembled and pinned to the wall

It was like a very tricky puzzle ...



and maybe my approach of pinning it to the wall first was a bit complicated because this asked for re-pinning in the next step. But the critter is well and fully there.

Order!

I have been going on and on and on about it ... finally, I have a relatively orderly work area for my quilting, scrapbooking and painting.



Bliss!!!

Just enrolled

in the Summer of 2008 class focussing on repetition - something I do very well, repeating myself. Ask my husband, he'll agree.

My posts for this class have a label and link on the right.

Bento Box Pattern

Since I'm working on a rather complicated (for me!) quilt for my godson, I thought I'd have to do another quilt for my goddaughter. This is one of my current favourites: the Bento Box pattern, also seen here.

The photos tell me one thing very clearly ...: I need to iron more!

Mending a certain duck - again

Currently there is no time to quilt at Casa Dot because I am mending a certain and much loved duck. ...



She is in a relatively sorry state. The terrycloth used for her cover-all survived about three decades in my grand-parents violently pink and burgundy bathroom ... until it became a duck garment and was loved to pieces in about 15 months.



The back is relatively ok still and I am quite proud of the obvious assemblage.



I found some relatively terry-clothy-feely fabric that I am hoping will hold up better. With a pencil and a very patient feathered patient I traced all the pieced I needed, cut them using a monsterously large pair of scissors ... and began sewing them together by machine ...

... only to rip it all apart again and start over ... and rip it apart again and put it away in frustration.

Looks like I'm done, doesn't it?

I was tempted to just leave it at that ...

Prairie Points rock on ...

Getting the corners (almost) right ...



Dang ... precision is not my forte, despite my love for perfection.



Getting there ...



OK, I can live with that. My excuse for lack of perfection: at least the recipient can see that I *made* it and didn't just buy it ;-)



All points lined up. I love my multi-purpose easel.

Next on my wishlist: a new ironing board. Does anyone have any recommendations? I currenty use a *very* old one from IKEA that I bought as a student. It has been on its last leg for some time ... and with my birthday coming up, I think I can get someone to splurge. It will be a quilting-only investment because I have outsourced all my "normal" ironing.

Just ordered

Shopping at Amazon, what a nice way to waste one's time ;-)

I am however hoping for inspiration for a second quilt for my goddaughter, to be delivered on the last weekend of August.

Fabric sorting and storage

Ha! This is something that has been on my mind for a while now, especially when I see posts and posts with photos of shelves full of nicely arranged piles of gorgeous fabrics ... I'll just go and by myself some Billies with frosted doors!

Prairie Points rock!

As forcasted, I have been busy this weekend, checking the layout (portrait now, not landscape) and lining up my ducks, ahem prairie points:



Kristin is right: Prairie Points rock!



All I needed to do is fiddle with the corners a bit ...



but they are all lined up and will likely be assembled tonight.

Out of the slump

Whenever I finish one quilt, I fall into a quilting slump and struggle to get out of it. This time was no different but thankfully I had my knitting to tide me over.

Finishing a quilt is always a challenge for me, either because I am stitching away to meet a deadline or because I have a hard time deciding when to stop, like with my Turning Twenty which we are getting a lot of mileage from:



Today I'll spend some time on my new old project: the Friendly Dragon Quilt. I have said in the past that quilting saved my sanity when my girls were babies. The same is still true. I like seeing a result at the end of a session and creating something that others like using increases my sense of self-worth and accomplishment.